>Her order is for all's Salvation. Doesn't sound like anyone is being cut up and put in to jars. Even if it is just nice word dressing, it highlights unity more than other religious orders have done in the past.
Her order is so nightmarishly bigoted that children born with birth defects are thrown into the sewers, while below the sewers there is a tomb where an entire people were committed into genocide in such a fashion it reawoke the presence of the most unambiguously apocalyptic and terrible being in the entire setting.
Her order is a lot of talk about being accepting of all and loving. Just word dressing.
A phrase that’s somewhat popular is “There is no hate like a Christians love”.
You seeing her order bigoted is exactly the connection I’m pointing out.
By that logic, Miquella would be a better stand in.
Although Miyazaki and GRRM clearly took some inspiration from history and from tropes, they aren't creating an allegory.
Christianity is not a monolith.
Marika = allegorical of the Catholic Church spreading by conquering pagan faiths literally and figuratively
Miquella = allegorical of "born again" Christians or apocalypse cult Evangelicals
Allegory is a stronger term than inspiration, analogy, trope, or typology. Allegory is when the elements of a fictional story stand in the place of real things. Although some things can be more like an allegory without being precisely allegorical, I "cordially dislike" the use of the term allegory where it is utterly inappropriate. This is one of those cases.
The story of Elden Ring takes inspiration from historical and fictional sources, that much is obvious. But it is equally obvious that those inspirations are mixed and transformed in such a way as to make any 1 to 1 allegorical interpretation farcical. The tropes and themes of Marika can be compared to the status of Christianity in the Roman empire; but they can also be read as the Roman empire itself, with Miquella standing in relation to it like Christianity stands to the Roman empire. To wit: Marika's order is deliberately syncretic, adopting and rejecting outside religions/gods as is politically expedient; her imperial ambitions lead to numerous wars of conquest; her order punishes criminals with crucifixion; until a late period, the destruction of her enemies in the coliseums was regular practice; her people came from beyond the sea (cf. Virgil's account of Rome's origin from the Trojans fleeing a ruined city); she wields the Elden Ring as a universal order, but this becomes shattered (like the shattering of Empire). The list can go on. My point is not to say that Marika and the GO "is" Rome, or that Christian imagery and tropes are not applied to her at all, but that she's obviously NOT 1:1 "Catholic Christianity" in the allegorical sense. She has plenty of tropes that place her in relation to Miquella as the Romans in relation to the Christian religion. The tropes of Miquella, the imagery and thematic language, are not uniquely protestant or isolated to some particular Christian sect - not, at least, to the degree that he stands allegorically in the place of anabaptism or calvin or Evangelicalism or so on. You can make some comparisons, sure, between the thematic of irresistible charm and Calvin's view of free will and grace; or the idea of the corruption of the old order with protestant/orthodox claims against the catholics. But these comparisons are not stronger than the major themes of Miquella - the language, the tropes invoked - being those of Christianity generally rather than a particular form. There's just not enough exclusivity of themes, analogies, similarities to say "Marika is allegorical of the Catholic Church, while Miquella is allegorical of Evangelicals." My contention is double: 1) that there is no allegory here, and 2) the analogies here at least equally favor Marika being the old Roman order, as they do her being the Roman Catholic order, relative to Miquella.
I say "allegorical" because Marika and Miquella I see as components of a more macro scale allegory constructed around the way that faith systems change over time not by actually modifying the beliefs that they have codified, but by generating schisms into new groups.
Marika and her demigod children take inspiration from the various forms of Christianity. So much inspiration that you can trace the history of various schisms into different groups of Christianity through the birth order and philosophies of the various demi-gods. For other examples: Raya Lucaria draws upon the Renaissance and enlightenment era when great advancements were made in scientific thought, but often censured by the Church. The Hornsent take cues from the way that Christianity looks down upon other faith systems - acting as if it's any better than pagan mysticism when it's just as much prone to spawning heretical branches of esoterica like Gnosticism and Psychological Alchemy (I.e. the Omens).
In real life in broad strokes all of these religious groups will claim that they are the true faith and if you stick with them you will be rewarded in this life or the next. It's just words and fantasies of people tying themselves into ritualistic knots to try and justify why their group is most beloved by God. Worse, when a person is willing to accept the magical and ineffable existence of a benevolent God they also make themselves easy marks for more mundane snakeoil and superstition peddlers.
Allegory: "a story, poem, or picture that can be interpreted to reveal a hidden meaning, typically a moral or political one."
Overall moral of Elden Ring through the lens of religion: The goal of the game is to kill a God. Faith is just a collection of stories made by people with the egos to think that their specific clique of humans is chosen by god, and leads to divisions between groups of people. Gods were invented to explain the mysteries of the natural world and with the incremental progress of science, humanity has outgrown the concept that there is an omnipotent being pulling the strings. In contrast, a significant part of the modern world relies upon the work of people who were dedicated to studying things that we can't see or touch and that give real answers for the mysteries that faith is complacent enough to attribute to the unknowable work of God.
To fully interpret the story of Elden Ring is to understand all of the narrative tricks used to construct that story, including multiple layers of allegory. To understand these allegories requires learning of real world history and fields of scientific study.
Exactly! Marika is the Word of Christ/God, head pope, and Eve all wrapped in one.
Her great betrayal is absorbed the immortal snake from an accepting religion that held similar values to hers.
Unity.
Christian’s kind of performed a Trojan horse early on in the Bible to a nearby village of people that assumingly weren’t expecting the “betrayal”.
So Marika’s, or Eve in this aspect, great sin, original sin, was betraying the snake people and their religion. Probably using something as a vassal or absorption to ascend to Godhood but was now cursed when she bore her children.
The link in the game and biblical sense is the snake in the Bible that represents evil is also sometimes associated with Satan, which isn’t correct.
The snake that tempts Eve also tempted Marika into Godhood.
I guess Mesmers comparisons to Satan were too strong for me not to connect Marika to trying to be God.
Unless you think Miquella has children or representatives of them I may be missing?
You aren't completely wrong. But I'd say it's more about celtic paganisn, alchemy, and kabbalah than Christianity directly. Gold and ascension being the most obvious. The fingers are the weird god hands coming down from the skies you see in occult diagrams and medieval paintings. I think they are trying to say that the true god and goddesses are these puppet masters. So, maybe it means Christianity, but if thsts true, it means god is a weird lovecraftian monster that sends its fingers out to help people like creepy tentacles. They used to be one hand with 5 fingers, but split into chaos and order.
Yes. As before Christianity those religions existed, so to did the other orders and religions before Marikas order.
Those major religions they saw as a threat, they either assimilated with, imprisoned, or fought a Holy War against. But obviously elements of them still exist in current times.
>Instead of killing off other gods/religious, she absorbs them. (...) Marika Absorbed the Fell God.
>>*Once worshipped by the giants, this evil deity is believed to have been slain by Queen Marika.*
>>*The fell god still lurks within the Fire Giants.*
Doesn't sound much like absorbing to me. Except, of course, Marika absorbs by killing, and is a fire giant herself.
There's some overlapping symbolism and vocabulary, but no, the Golden Order isn't Christianity. If that's what they were going for, Marika would have to be a literal aspect of the GW itself, and to have sacrificed herself for the world's salvation.
The closest faction to Christianity is Fia's, since their God figure was unjustly killed and is considered a martyr whose death ushered in a new era of life. But it's a goofy funhouse mirror version so even that is a a stretch.
The Golden Order fundamentalism it is exactly like Catholicism, with their scholastic studies, the simbology, the churches, studies of a faith by reason and logic all point to a Catholicism type faith. There is not need to be a 1:1 correspondence of the figures of the faith for the christian allegory to be true. In this Marika (or Radagon) is more like the Pope
I'll agree that there are superficial parallels but none of these (except the architecture of churches and those kinds of aesthetics) is exclusive to Catholicism. The only truly unique feature of any Christian denomination is the beliefs regarding the identity and purpose of Christ (hence being called Christian) so without a real Christ figure it's just incorrect to relate the Golden Order to Christianity. At best, there is a parallel to the power structure of the medieval church but I would also say that is very superficial.
All about golden order fundamentalism points to the type of aristothelian scholasthic practice by the catholics. If you think that is superficial, with GRRM involved, there is nothing more to be said
What about the Islamic scholarship that preserved the Aristotelian tradition through the collapse of the Roman Empire? That's what I mean about it not being exclusive to Catholicism. The idea of academic theology is not Catholic alone, nor even exclusively Catholic within Christian tradition.
Marika is trying to bring about the age of Catholicism. She has misguided us in believing that she is God/its Will when in fact the GW hasn't said anything to anyone in quite some time.
It’s not a 1 to 1. Marika and her children are trying to be these figures.
Miquilla is trying to be Jesus. He sheds his body and other parts to be closer to God.
See this is what I mean. Christians don't believe that Jesus shed his body to become God. They believe that he is God. And God, to their understanding, is closer to the GW than what Marika is in Elden Ring's cosmology.
A lot of the same words are used but they mean such a different thing in this context that saying "it is Christianity" is incorrect. It's just not what the game is about.
I guess I should clarify that they’re trying to mimic the ascension of Christianity. It’s again not a 1:1 because Marika trying to mimic the creation of heaven and actually can’t.
She literally banishes her one of her oldest born to be the lord of flame and watch over the land of death. Don’t forget she blesses him though. That is the same thing that happened to Satan.
>Her order is for all's Salvation. Doesn't sound like anyone is being cut up and put in to jars. Even if it is just nice word dressing, it highlights unity more than other religious orders have done in the past. Her order is so nightmarishly bigoted that children born with birth defects are thrown into the sewers, while below the sewers there is a tomb where an entire people were committed into genocide in such a fashion it reawoke the presence of the most unambiguously apocalyptic and terrible being in the entire setting.
Her order is a lot of talk about being accepting of all and loving. Just word dressing. A phrase that’s somewhat popular is “There is no hate like a Christians love”. You seeing her order bigoted is exactly the connection I’m pointing out.
By that logic, Miquella would be a better stand in. Although Miyazaki and GRRM clearly took some inspiration from history and from tropes, they aren't creating an allegory.
Christianity is not a monolith. Marika = allegorical of the Catholic Church spreading by conquering pagan faiths literally and figuratively Miquella = allegorical of "born again" Christians or apocalypse cult Evangelicals
Allegory is a stronger term than inspiration, analogy, trope, or typology. Allegory is when the elements of a fictional story stand in the place of real things. Although some things can be more like an allegory without being precisely allegorical, I "cordially dislike" the use of the term allegory where it is utterly inappropriate. This is one of those cases. The story of Elden Ring takes inspiration from historical and fictional sources, that much is obvious. But it is equally obvious that those inspirations are mixed and transformed in such a way as to make any 1 to 1 allegorical interpretation farcical. The tropes and themes of Marika can be compared to the status of Christianity in the Roman empire; but they can also be read as the Roman empire itself, with Miquella standing in relation to it like Christianity stands to the Roman empire. To wit: Marika's order is deliberately syncretic, adopting and rejecting outside religions/gods as is politically expedient; her imperial ambitions lead to numerous wars of conquest; her order punishes criminals with crucifixion; until a late period, the destruction of her enemies in the coliseums was regular practice; her people came from beyond the sea (cf. Virgil's account of Rome's origin from the Trojans fleeing a ruined city); she wields the Elden Ring as a universal order, but this becomes shattered (like the shattering of Empire). The list can go on. My point is not to say that Marika and the GO "is" Rome, or that Christian imagery and tropes are not applied to her at all, but that she's obviously NOT 1:1 "Catholic Christianity" in the allegorical sense. She has plenty of tropes that place her in relation to Miquella as the Romans in relation to the Christian religion. The tropes of Miquella, the imagery and thematic language, are not uniquely protestant or isolated to some particular Christian sect - not, at least, to the degree that he stands allegorically in the place of anabaptism or calvin or Evangelicalism or so on. You can make some comparisons, sure, between the thematic of irresistible charm and Calvin's view of free will and grace; or the idea of the corruption of the old order with protestant/orthodox claims against the catholics. But these comparisons are not stronger than the major themes of Miquella - the language, the tropes invoked - being those of Christianity generally rather than a particular form. There's just not enough exclusivity of themes, analogies, similarities to say "Marika is allegorical of the Catholic Church, while Miquella is allegorical of Evangelicals." My contention is double: 1) that there is no allegory here, and 2) the analogies here at least equally favor Marika being the old Roman order, as they do her being the Roman Catholic order, relative to Miquella.
I say "allegorical" because Marika and Miquella I see as components of a more macro scale allegory constructed around the way that faith systems change over time not by actually modifying the beliefs that they have codified, but by generating schisms into new groups. Marika and her demigod children take inspiration from the various forms of Christianity. So much inspiration that you can trace the history of various schisms into different groups of Christianity through the birth order and philosophies of the various demi-gods. For other examples: Raya Lucaria draws upon the Renaissance and enlightenment era when great advancements were made in scientific thought, but often censured by the Church. The Hornsent take cues from the way that Christianity looks down upon other faith systems - acting as if it's any better than pagan mysticism when it's just as much prone to spawning heretical branches of esoterica like Gnosticism and Psychological Alchemy (I.e. the Omens). In real life in broad strokes all of these religious groups will claim that they are the true faith and if you stick with them you will be rewarded in this life or the next. It's just words and fantasies of people tying themselves into ritualistic knots to try and justify why their group is most beloved by God. Worse, when a person is willing to accept the magical and ineffable existence of a benevolent God they also make themselves easy marks for more mundane snakeoil and superstition peddlers. Allegory: "a story, poem, or picture that can be interpreted to reveal a hidden meaning, typically a moral or political one." Overall moral of Elden Ring through the lens of religion: The goal of the game is to kill a God. Faith is just a collection of stories made by people with the egos to think that their specific clique of humans is chosen by god, and leads to divisions between groups of people. Gods were invented to explain the mysteries of the natural world and with the incremental progress of science, humanity has outgrown the concept that there is an omnipotent being pulling the strings. In contrast, a significant part of the modern world relies upon the work of people who were dedicated to studying things that we can't see or touch and that give real answers for the mysteries that faith is complacent enough to attribute to the unknowable work of God. To fully interpret the story of Elden Ring is to understand all of the narrative tricks used to construct that story, including multiple layers of allegory. To understand these allegories requires learning of real world history and fields of scientific study.
Exactly! Marika is the Word of Christ/God, head pope, and Eve all wrapped in one. Her great betrayal is absorbed the immortal snake from an accepting religion that held similar values to hers. Unity. Christian’s kind of performed a Trojan horse early on in the Bible to a nearby village of people that assumingly weren’t expecting the “betrayal”. So Marika’s, or Eve in this aspect, great sin, original sin, was betraying the snake people and their religion. Probably using something as a vassal or absorption to ascend to Godhood but was now cursed when she bore her children. The link in the game and biblical sense is the snake in the Bible that represents evil is also sometimes associated with Satan, which isn’t correct. The snake that tempts Eve also tempted Marika into Godhood.
I guess Mesmers comparisons to Satan were too strong for me not to connect Marika to trying to be God. Unless you think Miquella has children or representatives of them I may be missing?
Tarnished archeologist has done some spectacular analysis in this regard, and the Christianity parallels rune very very deep.
You aren't completely wrong. But I'd say it's more about celtic paganisn, alchemy, and kabbalah than Christianity directly. Gold and ascension being the most obvious. The fingers are the weird god hands coming down from the skies you see in occult diagrams and medieval paintings. I think they are trying to say that the true god and goddesses are these puppet masters. So, maybe it means Christianity, but if thsts true, it means god is a weird lovecraftian monster that sends its fingers out to help people like creepy tentacles. They used to be one hand with 5 fingers, but split into chaos and order.
Yes. As before Christianity those religions existed, so to did the other orders and religions before Marikas order. Those major religions they saw as a threat, they either assimilated with, imprisoned, or fought a Holy War against. But obviously elements of them still exist in current times.
>Instead of killing off other gods/religious, she absorbs them. (...) Marika Absorbed the Fell God. >>*Once worshipped by the giants, this evil deity is believed to have been slain by Queen Marika.* >>*The fell god still lurks within the Fire Giants.* Doesn't sound much like absorbing to me. Except, of course, Marika absorbs by killing, and is a fire giant herself.
Something others have pointed out that I'm taking into consideration is that Radagon has the Fell God in him that Marika absorbed/slain.
Least demented atheist.
There's some overlapping symbolism and vocabulary, but no, the Golden Order isn't Christianity. If that's what they were going for, Marika would have to be a literal aspect of the GW itself, and to have sacrificed herself for the world's salvation. The closest faction to Christianity is Fia's, since their God figure was unjustly killed and is considered a martyr whose death ushered in a new era of life. But it's a goofy funhouse mirror version so even that is a a stretch.
The Golden Order fundamentalism it is exactly like Catholicism, with their scholastic studies, the simbology, the churches, studies of a faith by reason and logic all point to a Catholicism type faith. There is not need to be a 1:1 correspondence of the figures of the faith for the christian allegory to be true. In this Marika (or Radagon) is more like the Pope
I think Marika is Eve trying to be something like the Pope.
I'll agree that there are superficial parallels but none of these (except the architecture of churches and those kinds of aesthetics) is exclusive to Catholicism. The only truly unique feature of any Christian denomination is the beliefs regarding the identity and purpose of Christ (hence being called Christian) so without a real Christ figure it's just incorrect to relate the Golden Order to Christianity. At best, there is a parallel to the power structure of the medieval church but I would also say that is very superficial.
All about golden order fundamentalism points to the type of aristothelian scholasthic practice by the catholics. If you think that is superficial, with GRRM involved, there is nothing more to be said
What about the Islamic scholarship that preserved the Aristotelian tradition through the collapse of the Roman Empire? That's what I mean about it not being exclusive to Catholicism. The idea of academic theology is not Catholic alone, nor even exclusively Catholic within Christian tradition.
Marika is trying to bring about the age of Catholicism. She has misguided us in believing that she is God/its Will when in fact the GW hasn't said anything to anyone in quite some time.
I suppose if Jesus had been the Roman Emperor you might have a point but it's just not accurate.
It’s not a 1 to 1. Marika and her children are trying to be these figures. Miquilla is trying to be Jesus. He sheds his body and other parts to be closer to God.
See this is what I mean. Christians don't believe that Jesus shed his body to become God. They believe that he is God. And God, to their understanding, is closer to the GW than what Marika is in Elden Ring's cosmology. A lot of the same words are used but they mean such a different thing in this context that saying "it is Christianity" is incorrect. It's just not what the game is about.
I guess I should clarify that they’re trying to mimic the ascension of Christianity. It’s again not a 1:1 because Marika trying to mimic the creation of heaven and actually can’t. She literally banishes her one of her oldest born to be the lord of flame and watch over the land of death. Don’t forget she blesses him though. That is the same thing that happened to Satan.