Does This Anime HATE Religion?

A Certain Magical Index is truly a Christian anime if you want proof just look at these nuns no but seriously I'm somewhat surprised hardcore fundamentalist Christians who believe the Earth is 3000 years old haven't tried to burn every copy of index in existence due to how it portrays some Christians as genocidal Wizards to be honest I'm exaggerating a bit I want to explore how index portrays religion and Believers as a whole is index a brutal attack on the concept of religion or does it present a more nuanced and Fair View emphasizing both the positive and negative connotations of its real world applications now I know religion is a highly sensitive subject so watch this video with an open mind or I might wrestle your jimmies religious representation in Japanese weave media is pretty common with Christianity often presented as having the power of both God and animate on your side as the followers of Christ wages Supernatural battle against the forces of evil this is the kind of thing I wanted to learn at school Aura does the opposite portraying Christianity or a fictional religion clearly inspired by it as a cult for some nefarious evil plan question is which category does index fall into I find it hard to generalize a series into one of these categories as the answer is a black or white the central setting of index is Academy City the home of all things science sealed off from the outside world and a protagonist being atheists despite Tomah the main character believing in heaven uh whatever while you may think Academy city is a Haven for r slash I am very smart users who were fedoras and have neck beards longer than mine ironically the students which reside in the city are only there in the first place to develop psychic powers due to a cult which the leader of Academy City Alistair Crowley established now whether you class flamer as a real religion or not is up to you still I find it ironic the city which is inherently opposed to religion was pretty much formed by one also see this video for a proper explanation about it Alastair himself could also be classed as an edge Lord atheist who hated Christianity and did the Hipster thing we all try to do at school one time when we try to emulate Jesus by forming our own Silly religions which were adopted by no one oh maybe that was just me and yeah Alistair was the one who was somewhat successful funny he also calls himself the b66 which is basically the devil from Revelations the final book of New Testament and not the indexed version which is the real version in Academy City religions aren't worshiped but rather studied and analyzed pragmatically by students who wish to venture into that field so in my opinion it's a quite a realistic approach to how a city of pure science which deals with facts and logic would approach the concept of Faith from all this information you'd think the author kamachi Kazama is projecting his beliefs into the story that there is a conspiracy theory that Tomah is controlled by Aleister aka the devil shattering the illusions of those who believe in God to convert them to his side in order to destroy religion for good especially when Alistair absolutely hates the concept of God or gods and wishes to destroy the magic side which of course includes the key religions of the world truly as the magical in trying to indoctrinate our youth into apostasy and adopt a religion of worshiping fictional women if you couldn't tell I'm being sarcastic I want to talk about the interesting relationship Toma has with religious themes but first let's move on to the Christians in index specifically the quote unquote evil ones who terminal loves to punch in the face there are three main churches in index the Anglican Church which are based in the UK the Vatican church based in Vatican City Rome and the Russian Orthodox Church which obviously is in Russia now none of these churches are depicted as perfect by any stretch mainly due to corrupt leadership the Anglican Church is led by Laura Stewart who pretends to be quite outgoing and Goofy which is nothing more than a facade of her true nature where she is undoubtedly cruel and manipulative even to other members of the church and her own country she purposefully lied to both style and kanzaki and convinced them to erase the memory of their dear friend index every single year forcing them to act as enemies towards her despite the immense pain Laura also stripped index of her identity treating her more like an object than an actual person and if you've read the index novels you all know that Laura is even worse inside while the Catholics are initially led by Pope mataris who seems uh morally gray I mean he did order the assassination of a 15 year old kid but trust me he's a saint compared to the real leader of the Roman Catholic church and God's right seat and that being the armor of the right Fiamma is somewhat of a megalomaniac who believes he's the second coming of Jesus destined to save the world by recreating Noah's flood or in the modern method of nuking the hell out of it and From the Ashes then ruling as the prophet of his idealized Society then you have the Russian Orthodox Church whose patriarch is a young kid called Kranz who is actually a decent person and a competent leader despite his age but he was briefly assured and imprisoned by some douche who wants to Ally with Fiamma to start World War Three so yeah not exactly examples of Good Samaritans I don't think Hamachi is trying to suggest churches or Christianity are inherently evil just that these organizations can use religion to control the masses for ulterior motives or individuals using them as a means to obtain power and authority and if you know anything about the history of Roman Catholic Church you know this was a reality for hundreds of years with the church prompting the monarchies of Europe to wage a holy crusade in the Middle East or the concept of indulgences which were a payment made to the church to decrease the amount of time waiting in purgatory to get to heaven sooner so komachi presenting the one supreme authority churches used to have even being able to influence numerous nation states is actually accurate historically and also presents a moral lesson that believes it represents good and the will of God can be used as a means to control others and create a tyranny therefore I see it more as a warning from kamachi to not let history repeat itself since the modern equivalents of these churches no longer have the power they used to have or what they do in index although we still have wars going on over which religious book is the truth so looks like this message is still relevant today while the churches in index were corrupted by morally questionable individuals they do not represent Christians in the series as a whole as is a common theme in both index and the real world that even if a country or state is led by some evil dictator that doesn't mean every single person in that country is also a dick as yes Believe It or Not There are Christians in India X that actually embrace their faith to try and help others and bring about good and the best example I can think of is none other than the big titty non or solar Aquinas named after Saint Thomas Aquinas who wasn't a big titty Mill or solar doesn't really have a bad bone in her body even when she was betrayed and hunted down by her fellow nuns she forgave them classic example of turning the other cheek and if we talk about spoilers from the light novel Ali study a hundred year old man turn Lolly I mentioned earlier believes he cannot enter a church due to him committing as many sins as humanly possible but or solar says God hasn't given up on you and this is so accurate to the Christian faith as Jesus would forgive and pardon Sinners of his time such as tax collectors and prostitutes if they followed his teachings and believed in God despite calling himself the b66 or solar tends to alist his wounds now orsola herself isn't perfect when England was attacked she was fed up with being a support character I was like I don't want to be useful for once and so she was mind controlled by something known as a Divine mixture where she ended up harming others whoever Justified or not but since she was under the influence of the Divine mixture I do not fully blame her nevertheless or Sola is also trying to atone for her sins in this moment while also pardoning Alistair in the name of the Lord even a member of the clergy like herself can sin as no one is perfect in the Christian Faith Like Jesus even though Jesus did get wrathful at one point but whatever Hume humans aren't perfect we all make mistakes and that's the case with our solar here which is perfectly captured in this moment even though her mistake was minor compared to alistair's many acts of being a Degen it is her obligation to atone as well Alistair previously condemned Christianity and still does in his moments believing there is no salvation in the world and yet found value in both the Bible and or sola's words do you think sins can ever be forgiven Alistair asked or Sola answered people spend their entire lives searching for the answer to that question and you must not think you'll be able to find the answer if you seek it forgiveness can only be given by God and his heart is truly unfathomable all you can do is live your daily life the best you can and be on your best behavior and wait for the time of judgment by the way if you want your sins forgive even for not subscribing to me you can fix that right now and I'll reward you with a special Tomah video at 20K Subs while Alistair was not converted I think he began to understand the importance of faith in this moment even if he believes he's too consumed by hatred and is vehemently opposed to religion the message being that even if you disagree with a concept or teachings of religion it is undeniable that its underlying messages are those to help those in need with nowhere else to turn but index doesn't necessarily suggest religion is a requirement to live a meaningful or moral life religion is just one Avenue that works for some people if we look at when Tomah defeated Fiamma and stopped his evil plan to save Humanity which Fiamma believed was actually the right thing while he did have good intentions he was trying to achieve his goal via horrendous methods but his utilitarian ideals and God complex misguided him the I was focused on the collective saving the world entirely as opposed to Toma who also had a complex evolving saving others what a difference is Tomer focused on individuals as Thomas saves others on a case-by-case basis solving the problem at hand when it arises Fiamma however is focused on something too large in scale to feasibly handle due to his God complex the collectivization of societies in history have often led to totalitarian regimes in the effort to try and create an idealized Society or Utopia once you start categorizing groups of people into good and bad it can then escalate interviewing the bad group as enemies who must be eliminated to bring about an Ideal World and that is why fiamma's ideology is immoral as opposed to Thomas and this can be linked back to religion in a sense of Heaven and Hell with the righteous being rewarded and this sin is being punished or the believer versus the Infidel where the infidels can be persecuted against for not subscribing to the popular ideology despite Fiamma attempting to wipe out most of humanity he has shown compassion by Tomah who saves fiamma's life by placing him into an escape pod in the Star of Bethlehem which was about to crash into the Arctic Ocean don't ask why there is only one working Escape pod it's because of the what Tomah acts so selflessly that he lets the guy who started World War III get away to safety with no certainty that he will be able to survive himself you may think that's absolutely stupid Toma is an absolute idiot for letting Fiamma live I mean turmer is a dumbass he didn't know time zones were a thing but I think Thomas actions have a symbolic meaning Fiamma was the head of the church who misrepresented his religion by acting like the thing he was aiming to destroy making him a really [ __ ] well-written villain in my opinion and yet ironically Toma an atheist is the one who acts more like the Messiah himself in this situation by pardoning Fiamma and saving his life love thy neighbor even if they started World War Three I told you all turmer is the second coming of Jesus but yeah the message is this also presents is that you don't need a religion to be a moral person as ultimately the one responsible for your actions is not a holy book but yourself and I think that is the key theme to add more religious connotations into the mix Fiamma doesn't get away without punishment as Alistair the b66 service his arm and nearly kills him implying Fiamma was judged by the devil for his actions poetic antoma is not the only atheist in a story who has religious connotations as accelerator also seeking Redemption and atonement for his sins of mass murdering clones leads him to take the form of an Angel suggesting that accelerator is no longer consumed by hatred and is not the monster he used to be again another example of you not needing to follow a religion or ideology just do what works for you to become a better person while index is undoubtedly critical of religion it's by no means labeling it as an outright bad thing I believe it's presented in a tasteful and nuanced way that shows you both the good and bad aspects and that's a common theme with index as a whole it presents complex moral dilemmas where the correct answer to problems isn't always obvious this makes it more realistic and engaging which is why I love this series so much I know the other religions play a role in index but the main focus is Christianity at least for the first light novel series and I felt there was more I could talk about with this as a post in Norse mythology or Buddhism for example anyway if you found this video interesting and would like to see more similar content both about and not about index click on these videos on screen right now thanks for watching and I'll see you all next time bye bye

Channel: Aeon of Horus

Views: 9,607

Keywords: A Certain Magical Index, Toaru majutsu no index, Toaru Kagaku no Railgun, A Certain Scientific Railgun, A Certain Scientific Accelerator, Toaru Kagaku no Accelerator, Theory, Discussion, Light Novel, Anime, Manga, Review, Reaction, Kamijou Touma, Accelerator, Esper, Level 5, Season Four, Railgun, Index, fight, ability, Shokuhou Misaki, Sogiita Gunha, Misaka Mikoto, Power, Dragon, Imagine Breaker, Season 4, Index NT, To Aru, Index IV, VS, World War 3, WW3, Arc, Christian Anime, Religion, Jesus

Id: Q9M9mL0RE8U

Length: 15min 40sec (940 seconds)

Published: Sun Mar 12 2023