From: "Don Doggett" 
Subject: (urth) King Jesus/Autarch Severian/Calde Silk - Part One
Date: Sun, 10 Nov 2002 14:58:11 -0800

Hello everyone.  This is my first post, though I've been lurking around for
months soaking in the great conversation and waiting for an interesting
topic of my own.  Whamo!  As chance would have it, I had just finished my
second reading of TBotNS when I came across a book I had never heard of
before:  King Jesus by Robert Graves.  I immediately bought it and read it.
To me it was a revelation, not just because it's an incredible and heretical
work
of art, but because there are so many themes in it that echo through NS, LS,
and SS.  In some ways (imho, of course) NS is a reworking of Graves' work
(why had I never heard of this book before?).  But enough intro.  I'll dive
right in.  I think a list is easiest.

1. This is the obvious one.  Severian's lameness and the wound on his face.
This applies to Silk as well (at least the limp) but this has been discussed
before so I'll move on.

2. This one is marginal but interesting.  Dorcas appears in KJ as the
playmate of the boy Jesus.  While they are playing "Noah's Ark" she becomes
frightened and runs away.  It's on p.166 and it reads like Dorcas and
Severian's relationship writ small.

3. Jesus in KJ is a product of the manipulation of bloodlines by devotees of
the triple goddess with the goal of creating the second Adam.  He is also
the grandson of King Herod.  Simon son of Boethus to Herod Antipater (Jesus'
father): "What if this latest millennium should close with the appearance of
a King who combines all the qualities of his predecessors:  true born like
Adam, sinless like Enoch, faithful like Abraham, wise like Solomon?" p.64
Malrubius to Severian in Citadel:  "In you all the divergent tendencies of
our race may have achieved synthesis."  Silk is also an engineered man
displaying most of these qualities.  Jesus' cousin John the Baptist is also
a product of these sorts of machinations, by adherents to the Goddess. (I
immediately thought of Scylla, the undines and the Mother)

4. Severian's multiplicity of personalities has it's echo as well:  "But
Apollo, who contains within himself the shades of numerous gods and demons
is now the sole master of Delphi." p.245 (I'm offering specific quotes, but
these themes run throughout the book.  It has to be read to be appreciated,
unless I'm just waay off base)

5. Jesus to Mary the Hairdresser (Magdalene) servant of the Goddess:
"Therefore my fate will be as the Father ordains, not as your mistress
ordains.  I am released from the jurisdiction of the Female;  I have come to
destroy her works."  This conflict is reflected in NS and LS and especially
in SS when the narrator worries over the intentions of the Mother.  This is
also the Jesus parallel that Mantis was searching for long long ago
regarding Severian's execution of Prefect Priscia in UotNS.

6.  Typhon.  In KJ Herod seeks to reestablish the worship of the sun god
Set-Typhon.
In addition one of Jesus' marks of true kingship is a typhonic or red beard.
This ties Typhon in NS and LS to both the red sun, which Severian the New
Sun vanquishes, and to Herod.  To further bolster this, Silk is described as
having a reddish gold beard.

7.Graves says somewhere in the book that the sun god gives birth to himself.

8. And last, at the end of King Jesus/Short Sun Jesus/Silkhorn departs in a
ship with Mary the mother/Maytera Marble, Mary the wife of Jesus/Nettle, and
Mary the Hairdresser/Seawrack who is the servant of the Goddess/Mother.
Note also the Arthurian parallel.

I hope that I am not rambling incoherently but I find my discovery very
exciting.  It's given rise to some tenuous theories that I will post in Part
two so as not to make this too long.  Thanks for bearing with me.
D.D.












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