"Dagobert did lead in making sacrifice at a shrine that Winnithar had built where the house formerly stood in which the boy was born. That house Winnithar had burned, for her to have whose howe stood behind it. Strangely, at this halidom the Wanderer forbade bloodshed. Only first fruits of the earth might be offered. The story arose that apples cast in the fire before the stone became the Apples of Life." (Time Patrol, p. 382)
The Wanderer is a time traveler from the twentieth century. Another twentieth century time traveler, Janne Floris, is horrified to witness a slaughter of prisoners offered to the gods. And, in another time travel scenario, Malcolm Lockridge persuaded prehistoric dwellers in Cornwall:
"...that manslaughter was not pleasing to the gods."
-Poul Anderson, The Corridors Of Time (London, 1968), p. 213.
However, there is a force more powerful than gods:
"'...against time the gods themselves are powerless.'" (Time Patrol, p. 457)
Everyone dies in time. The Wanderer must tell his followers to face their deaths. Heidhin must die so that Veleda can preach peace instead of war. An unintended death resolves the problem at the end of The Shield Of Time and again at the end of "Death And The Knight." The Time Patrol has no alternative but to accept these deaths as necessary.
13 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I would argue, however, that God alone is immune to time. For God, past, present, and future are eternally present to Him in an eternal NOW.
Sean
Sean,
I argue that self is known only by contrast with other and that "other" is recognized as distinct from self only if it is recognized as having been perceived before and thus is assumed to have remained in existence as a separate entity between occasions when it was perceived. Thus, I argue, a self-conscious being is necessarily temporal.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I can see how that applies to US. But, I still think it's logical to say God TRANSCENDS time and is not bound by it.
Sean
Sean,
Logically, my argument, derived from Kant, seems to apply to any self-consciousness. I agree that "transcendence of time" might make some sense but then we would have to give some content to the term "transtemporal" as against "atemporal."
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Now we are wading into waters that a philosophical amateur like me will be unable to handle. I'm not at all sure how to talk about "transtemporal" and "atemporal." I'm reminded of St. Augustine's discussion of time in the last books of his CONFESSIONS (albeit, that was a long time ago).
Sean
Sean,
A straight line is negated if it is reduced to zero length and becomes a dimensionless point, a position without magnitude, whereas it is transcended if it is incorporated into a square or a cube. Thus, the transtemporal would have to incorporate but go beyond time, not merely negate it by reducing it to a durationless instant.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Hmmm, meaning God transcends time because He is transtemporal? I remember Dante saying something like that in the DIVINE COMEDY, perhaps in the PARADISO. What you, and maybe Dante as well, says about time seems to fit better into how God regards time.
Sean
Sean,
Yes, I do not think that any being can be conscious in a timeless instant, a mere now with no past or future. (That would be nonexistent like a mathematically flat plane with zero depth.) He must either be in time or transcend it - whatever the latter would mean. We transcend the fictional chronology of a novel. We can read or reread it from the beginning or from any arbitrary point in the narrative. But we are in our own temporal dimension. In a sense, we transcend time, while also remaining in it, in moments of contemplation. But anything beyond that is way beyond my ken...
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I have another suggestion: for God to BE God, He would need to exist infinitely from all eternity, with no beginning and no ending. Since God somehow transcends time, it COULD still be said that He sees all time, past, present, and future, from all eternity. Isn't that functionally close to saying He sees all time in a single NOW?
But, this too is way beyond my ken!
Sean
Sean,
I can understand a superior being knowing our timeline in a single now but I still think that he would need his own temporal dimension for his consciousness to work, as argued earlier.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I remain dubious. Because, if such a Being NEEDED his own temporal dimension in order for his consciousness to work, that seems to mean he was not perfect and unlimited, and hence not truly God.
Sean
Sean,
Whereas I argue that no being can meet the requirements of the God described in Christian theology.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Or for that matter, the requirements of Plato and Aristotle.
Sean
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