Raiden Shogun, Istaroth, and the Meaning of Eternity | Genshin Impact Lore/Theory

what is eternity it's a question that many philosophers and religious circles have pondered over the centuries and it's a question that the ride in shogun struggles with herself in her latest story quest in gentian impact many of you watching are probably thinking well it's simple eternity is time infinite and while i'm not necessarily here to argue against that i think it's oversimplifying things a bit eternity isn't just a limitless amount of time it can be so much more than that and it's not until we change our perspective on eternity and time that we can truly understand the theme and philosophical conflict that underpins the entire story of gentian impact should humans be allowed to decide their destinies to get a clear understanding of where the story is heading we need to explore the topic of eternity time and free will but i'm getting ahead of myself here so let's start off with the basics the quest line that changed my perspective on gentian impact forever in paratrix ambrosa in act two of the ryden shogun story quest the traveler and paimon help a with defending the sacred sakura from rift towns that have mysteriously appeared in the region as they clear out the monsters a and the traveler encounter manifestations of the people and memories from the cataclysm 500 years ago this prompts a into recounting some of the events that transpired and she reveals to us that 500 years ago her sister makoto suddenly left inuzuma to address a situation in kanriya after realizing what makoto had done a quickly set out to conriya to find her sister but by the time she arrived makoto was already unconscious and dying in her desperation a jumped into makoto's plane of consciousness preserving it and bringing it back to inazuma after her return a noticed the sudden appearance of the sacred sakura which she was able to use to repel the forces of the abyss because of this a speculated that the sacred sakura was somehow linked to makoto's plane of consciousness after reflecting on her past a comes to the realization that her pursuit of a static eternity was restraining her people's wishes for a better future shortly after this a loses control of her body and reveals that the puppet ride in shogun is rebelling against her due to changes in her perspective on eternity in response a takes the traveler and paimon to makoto's plane of consciousness to confront the puppet ryden shogun a and the puppet engage in a duel where the victor would be able to carry out their vision of eternity realizing that the fight might last for a long time a expels the traveler in paimon from the plane of consciousness the traveler and paimon then seek for help and she is able to reopen the portal and send them back to makoto's plane of consciousness upon the traveler's return a and the puppet participate in one final battle where a eventually defeats the puppet in response the puppet submits to a and allows her to fulfill her new vision of eternity it is at this very moment that makoto emerges from within the muso ishin and provides a with a seed after an emotional exchange a plants the seed which sprouts into a fully grown sacred sakura and though it sprouts in the present the sacred sakura takes root in the past and is able to save inuzuma from the cataclysm which confirms a suspicions about the tree bringing the story full circle the implications of a planting the sacred sakura are significant to the overall conflict of genshin impact as well as the history of innozuma it even connects to a lore entry that we have from enconomia in the parable of the tree from the biakuyakoku collection we are told the story of a gardener who laments the fact that he must chop down a tree that takes 500 years to grow a priest who is the incarnation of the god of time comforts the gardener telling him to plant the branches of the tree because his one thought shall echo through eternity the gardener listens and plants the branch which instantly sprouts into a fully grown tree similarly the seed that is planted by a instantly sprouts into the fully grown sacred sakura but what is causing the explosive growth of these trees in the dialogue at the end of a's story quest she speculates that makoto may have been assisted by a higher being ishtaroth the god of time however if istarath helped makoto that would mean that they had some foreknowledge of the future for their plan to work in other words makoto needed to at least have an idea of how the future would unfold otherwise all her planning would have been pointless interestingly the questline itself hints at the idea that somehow makoto and istarath were aware of future events in the cutscene where yay sends the traveler and paimon back into makoto's consciousness the memories of the traveler from the past and present are being replayed as he moves through dimensions however there is one memory that doesn't fit in with the others in ashikai's video on this questline which i will link down below she points out that a few of these shards of memory depict something we haven't seen yet a field of cecelia's looking into this more i realized that this field of cecilia's directly links back to the tavot chapter storyline preview in the trailer preview the traveler ends his journey in a field of cecilia's which means that we could be getting a glimpse into the future if this is the case it means that the traveler is somehow experiencing the past present and future at the same time in this cinematic additionally it also confirms that makoto's plane of consciousness transcends the laws of time which also explains how the sacred sakura was able to fully grow in an instant given this information it would logically follow that is the god of time herself transcends the boundaries of time the parable of the tree appears to confirm this saying for it is the god of moments who is able to take seeds from this moment into the past and the future upon first glance it seems like the parable is saying that isaroth is capable of time travel which would make sense because she is the god of time after all however additional entries on ishtaroth challenge this notion another entry from the biakuya koku collection elaborates on this and it reads as follows she was the moment she was every moment she was the measure of a thousand wins in the sun and the moon she was every second of joy every moment of rage every instant of longing every minute of obsession she was every flash of delirium we call her kairos or the ruler of the unchanging world wait a minute it says that is the ruler of the unchanging world how is that even possible doesn't the existence of time imply that a change will occur well let's talk about it as humans we are bound to and programmed to experience time in a linear fashion from our perspective the past progresses into the present which builds into the future take an apple as an example at the current moment the apple is resting on the table that is our present moment as humans we can't go back to a time when the apple was still on the tree nor can we jump forward to a time when the apple has completely rotted all we can experience is the apple in its current state in front of us on the table this is linear time and this is the way humans have been programmed to experience time but what if that's not the case for istharoth you see for istarath to have helped makoto it would mean that every future moment must have been known to her she would have needed to know that the cataclysm was coming that makoto would die and that a would eventually plant the sacred sakura in the future because if this wasn't the case then none of this would have happened additionally if isteroth is indeed the god of moments and she is in every moment that would mean that she is in the past present and future at the same time logically it would follow that is experiences time in a non-linear fashion and if time can be experienced in that way it changes our definition and understanding of eternity something that i believe makoto was able to grasp to a certain extent but how does our understanding of eternity change given this information a roman philosopher by the name of boethius once considered this dilemma of eternity in a series of books he wrote known as the consolation of philosophy in his writings boethius examines the relationship between time and eternity and ultimately concludes that eternity is the whole perfect and simultaneous possession of endless life the meaning of this can be made clearer by comparison with temporal things for whatever lives in time lives in the present proceeding from past to future and nothing is so constituted in time that it can embrace the whole span of its life at once essentially for a being to be truly eternal it must exist in an a temporal state or outside of time by existing outside of time an eternal being would not experience the past present and future instead what we perceive as the past present and future in a linear sense would be observed as if it were a present single moment similarly this lines up with descriptions of istarath as she is in every moment of time thus experiencing the past present and future all at once however an issue we run into here is that this means that a truly eternal being has knowledge of things to come and this is what boethius has to say about that since then every judgment comprehends the subjects presented to it according to its own nature and since god lives in the eternal present his knowledge transcends all movement of time and abides in the simplicity of its immediate present it encompasses the infinite sweep of past and future and regards all things in its simple comprehension as if they were now taking place thus if you will think about the foreknowledge by which god distinguishes all things you will rightly consider it to be not a foreknowledge of future events but knowledge of a never-changing present again this lines up with the idea that estheroth is the ruler of the unchanging world as an eternal being isarath experiences the past present and future simultaneously as a single moment or unchanging present therefore the idea of foreknowledge does not exist for israth rather than knowledge of one present moment composed of the past present and future unfortunately given how we as humans are bound to linear time this idea of eternity can be quite difficult to comprehend and when going through boethius's works i definitely had a hard time digesting the ideas contained within the consolation of philosophy so to help illustrate the idea contained within his writings i think it would be a good idea to use a more concrete example and in this case that would be one of my favorite films of all time arrival originally adapted from the book story of my life by ted chang arrival explores the ideas of eternity in more concrete terms the film opens up with the arrival of 12 alien spacecraft in various locations around the globe the u.s government summons a linguistics professor by the name of louise banks as well as a physicist by the name of ian donnelly to assist in making first contact with the alien beings upon entering the alien spacecraft louise and ian are greeted by two seven-limbed aliens which they call heptapods these alien beings attempt to communicate with louise and ian using a complex language composed of strange circular symbols initially louise struggles with deciphering the language but is still able to make a few breakthroughs when the heptapods speak of a weapon that they would like to talk to humanity about it sends the world's governments into a panic perceiving the aliens as a threat china issues an ultimatum to the aliens and several other governments follow suit with time running out louise meets with the aliens who tell her that the weapon that they want to provide to humanity is their language as it can alter how one experiences time they also explain that in the future humanity will save their race from extinction it is at this moment that louise finally understands how to read the heptapods language and she begins to experience time in a non-linear fashion upon returning to the camp luis realizes that she must stop the impending war now that she experiences the past present and future simultaneously she is able to take a look into her future in this future she is at a un dinner where she meets with the chinese general shang who thanks her for persuading him to stop the attack louise replies she's not sure what he's talking about and in response he provides her with his cell phone number and recites his wife's dying words to her the scene then jumps back to the present where louise finds a satellite phone and makes a call to general shang she recites his wife's dying words to him which causes the general to call off his attack on the aliens other countries follow suit and peace is restored after this the aliens depart leaving earth with the knowledge of their language and bringing the world powers together as you can see the movie arrival illustrates bowie these's ideas in a more concrete manner in the movie the heptapods communicate using circles shapes that have no beginning nor end in doing so they are able to express all their thoughts at once this contrasts with how we as humans communicate all our thoughts and ideas have a clear beginning and end and this also manifests itself in how we communicate on paper we write sentences that typically extend horizontally or vertically depending on our language interestingly we perceive time in a similar manner to how we communicate in a line the heptapods from arrival completely differ in this regard for them time is experienced as a collection of the past present and future all at once similar to how they communicate through their language in the movie louise is able to grasp this concept of non-linear time thus escaping the human condition of linear time in doing so she is able to experience the past present and future simultaneously as if it were an unchanging present this enables her to make the phone call that would ultimately save humanity and the heptapods going back to ganshin impact a tells us that makoto had a profound understanding of eternity it's possible that estheroth imparted this knowledge of eternity onto makoto acting in a similar manner to the heptapods from arrival both louise and makoto would circumvent the obstacles of linear time and transcend their understanding of eternity by meeting with the chinese general in the future luis would have the means to end the violence that was to come similarly the understanding that she would give av sacred sakura a seed in the future the makoto of the past would go to kanriya knowing that her death would kick off the events that ultimately save her people i believe that makoto further touches on this idea of eternity in her final cinematic eternity extends time into infinity dreams illuminate each moment within when both shine in unison the sacred sakura blooms from the darkness finally free from the clutches of the heavenly principles now the nightmare has dissipated and reality is made whole the vision we both yearn for is still further ahead according to what makoto says here it appears that eternity is the key to freeing the people from the heavenly principles but there's another important component to this dreams in the final quote it sounds like eternity provides a space for infinite time so that dreams or ambitions of the people can find a way to break free of the heavenly principles interestingly a similar sentiment is echoed by dane's leaf in the tavot chapter storyline preview in the perpetual mean time of a sheltered eternity most are content to live and not to dream but in the hidden corners where the gods gaze does not fall there are those who dream of dreaming some say a few are chosen and the rest are dregs but i say we humans have our humanity we will defy this world with a power from beyond if what makoto and dainsley are saying is true then our definition of eternity becomes problematic according to boethius eternity is the experience of the past present and future as a timeless unchanging present and this is where the contradiction lies because if a being exists eternally by this definition then free will cannot exist the implication here being that the dreams of humanity don't exist because everything is predestined and predetermined after all if the past present and future are all equally known then that means that all outcomes have been decided you effectively have no control no free will in the constellation of philosophy boethius raises these concerns as well but he addresses them saying similarly all the things god sees as present will undoubtedly come to pass but some will happen by the necessity of their natures others by the power of those who make them happen therefore we quite properly said that these things are necessary if viewed from the standpoint of divine knowledge but if they are considered in themselves they are free of the bonds of necessity in simpler terms there is no distinction of time for divine beings everything is happening at once therefore the idea for knowledge does not exist it is the unchanging eternal present that we mentioned before even so it would logically follow that everything just happens automatically however boethius argues that although the past present and future are known we as humans as rational agents must still make a choice in this sense free will still exists because a choice must still be made despite the fact that it was already known to eternity my issue with this argument though is that it still doesn't fully solve the problems with boethius's argument because at the end of the day there is still only one version of the past present future it leaves no room for possibility which implies that free will doesn't exist for centuries philosophers have debated whether or not free will exists and the answer for each person really depends on how you view the definition of free will in relation to time however there is a french philosopher by the name of henry bergson that provides an interesting response to this age-old question according to burksen the biggest flaw in how we approach the discussion on free will is our portrayal of time in a linear fashion our biggest mistake is that we try to represent time using space in other words we tend to illustrate time in a physical manner when in reality it has no concrete physical form at its core time is just progress something that can't be represented physically sure you can see its effects but time itself cannot physically manifest itself let's use genshin impact as an example let's pretend that ayato's banner has just been released and i'm thinking about pulling on the banner when we portray my decision in real time we tend to think of it as a decision tree so here i am i've reached point o where i must decide whether or not to pull on the banner or walk away this is generally how we conceptualize time in a physical sense additionally most people would argue that free will is preserved in this model because at point o i have several options to choose from bergson would reject this betrayal since time is progression something we can't represent physically instead he would argue that there are no lines there is just the moment that a decision must be made because we are a rational free agent in other words we create our own reality if we had to use the previous diagram only point 0 would exist because by berkson's logic the future is not created till you make a decision which preserves the idea of free will in this example you are not constrained by the choices you could have made because in the moment you can just do whatever you desire this is bergson's definition of free will if we accept this particular definition of free will then doesn't it stand contradictory to boethius's idea of eternity according to bergson reality is only created once a decision is made implying that the future is unknown which conflicts with the idea of the eternal unchanging present in the context of genshin this would mean that the decisions made by makoto were shots in the dark and she got lucky that everything panned out the way it did so how do we reconcile this as contradictory as it seems i would argue that eternity and free will aren't necessarily mutually exclusive let's go back to the movie arrival when i summarized the plot of the film i actually left out a crucial character which was louise's daughter you see throughout the film as louise is learning the language of the heptapods she gets quick glimpses of her future in this future she gives birth to a daughter who dies at a young age from cancer when she fully transcends linear time you would expect her to choose to not have her daughter but instead she chooses to have her daughter accepting the good and bad that come with that decision so at this point you're probably thinking that this doesn't necessarily resolve the contradiction between eternity and free will but i actually think in a way it does you see by breaking free of her sequential consciousness louise is able to exercise her free will in an eternal sense for louise at least her past present and future have merged and she is creating her reality at all these points in her life from that perspective she has a greater sense of purpose and is quite literally driving her life decisions this contrasts with a linear perspective on time where one can only exercise your free will at a single point the present moment in this regard you could say that humans passively live their lives whereas louise and the heptapods who have transcended time drive their reality i believe that makoto and istarath operate in a similar manner with how they perceive time having merged the past present and future they are able to exercise their free will by creating reality effectively merging the ideas from boethius and bergson of course there are definitely arguments that free will is not retained based on my theory but i think it best resolves the issues that we have between eternity and free will and so we go full circle and arrive back at what danes leaf said in the tavat story chapter line preview in the perpetual mean time of a sheltered eternity most are content to live and not to dream but in the hidden corners where the gods gaze does not fall there are those who dream of dreaming some say a few are chosen and the rest are drags but i say we humans have our humanity we will defy this world with a power from beyond given our discussion on the philosophy of eternity and free will i believe this quote best summarizes the philosophical conflict with ingention impact ultimately it's a struggle between the people of tevat and the heavens for mankind to truly prosper they must transcend time and forge their destinies part of transcending time includes preserving the past something that celestia is looking to erase at the same time the people must find their greater purpose in what is to come there will always be those who passively live their lives unaware of the bigger plan but there are those like makoto who understood the greater context and dedicated their lives to fulfill a dream in this context the plan enacted by istharath in makoto was incredible despite knowing the consequences of her decisions on her loved ones makoto sacrificed herself to save innozuma and to fulfill her role in the larger struggle against the heavenly principles with makoto's part of the plan completed it's now up to a to find her path to eternity and fulfill the dreams of the people of innozuma at the end of the day whether or not you agree with the philosophical ideas presented in this video one thing we can probably agree on is that makoto has done something incredible against an impact she transcended time and dared to defy the heavenly principles [Music]

Channel: BitShark

Views: 3,869

Keywords: Raiden Shogun, Raiden shogun istaroth and the meaning of eternity, Raiden shogun ei, Ei, Makoto, Istaroth, Genshin Impact, genshin impact lore, genshin impact theory, raiden ei, genshin theory, genshin lore, genshin impact ei, genshin impact raiden, raiden ei vs raiden shogun, raiden ei cutscene, raiden ei and raiden shogun, raiden shogun story quest 2, genshin impact raiden shogun story quest act 2, Sacred Sakura, Genshin, genshin impact story, theory genshin impact

Id: CVT-6rPVZe8

Length: 26min 6sec (1566 seconds)

Published: Thu Mar 24 2022