From: "Roy C. Lackey" 
Subject: Re: (urth) Some problems if the Pancreator/Outsider is theHoly Trinity
Date: Tue, 11 Jun 2002 00:58:32 -0500

From: James Jordan


>At 03:08 PM 6/10/2002 -0500, you wrote:
>>James Jordan wrote:
>>
>> > .... remember that Urth is a universe-cycle before ours. These events
>> > predate the promise to Noah by about 50 billion years maybe. We don't
know
>> > that such a promise had been given to any Urnoah in Urth history. Nor,
>> > returning to the first point, do we have to assume that God managed
Briah
>> > precisely the same way He manages our cycle.
>> >
>>
>>I've come across this stated in the archives before; is the source an
>>extra-textual Wolfe interview or the like?
>
>         Yes.
>
>>The reason I ask is because it seems
>>odd that in a whole different cycle of creation you'd still get the Apollo
>>moon
>>landing whose picture is recognizable as such.  And as someone else
mentioned,
>>how would Severian's box with BOTNS make it through the singularity?
>
>         Well, the fact that is does somehow pass through the singularity,
>on board the Ship perhaps, or in the Yesod Library, is the intra-textual
>indicator that these events are in our past. That's always the problem with
>Wolfe: which of the tiny hints are important and which of the hints are not
>hints at all?

In addition to the objections raised by others, there are all those stories
in the Brown Book, clearly recognizable to students of Classical mythology
as founded on Earth's mythology. It also contains a direct quote from
Genesis, and another from Marlowe's FAUSTUS. No. No. No. Urth is in our
Earth's far future.

Facts aside, as well as theological difficulties, the notion of Severian,
turning water into wine, being baptized, dying and being resurrected, a
world savior, etc., in a previous iteration of creation, makes him the
prototype for Jesus. Kind of cheapens the whole Holy Spectacle, doesn't it?
Putting the cart before the horse.

Not to mention it plays hell with Nick Gevers' idea of placing 5HC in the
SUN universe. A separate creation with an Earth, complete with Ireland,
Scotland, Wales, and New York City, DAVID COPPERFIELD, and Catholic saints
(all mentioned in the text), stretches credulity past all endurance.

-Roy



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