Sir_Asura
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Failure to Comply
Posts: 129
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The tympanum at Foy is perhaps not the only thing to look at to get an idea about how people from the Middle Ages thought angels behaved. There are other tympanums that depict Judgment day scenarios, it was kind of a phenomenon that occurred around 1100. (Before that there was literally very little, almost no, architectural sculpture) I do think that in a way it is okay to bring today to these games--in fact that's a given since we have to reinvent these things to make games about them. My problem is that while I enjoy playing them, I don't think they should be elevated to the level of "extremely thought-provoking" especially when the discussions people have are completely removed from the generators of the game in the first place. Based on what you can see though is that the angels are part of God's army, more or less. Christianity as it developed to this point honestly had a lot of militant aspects. The vows a monk took for instance, obedience, chastity, and poverty are kind of similar to the vows of a soldier. The imagined heavenly order is honestly just an aggrandized feudal system. Today it is hard to rationalize a heavenly father who intends for hell, but in the middle ages this was, in my opinion at least, probably comforting. It ensures that there is no possibility of overall good faltering to evil. Evil is always a weak imitation of God. In the Tympanum you can see how this is reflected, with the hell mouth devouring sinners and hell being the only area with a good amount of activity. The rest of the tympanum is ordered through implied architecture and a general understanding of the structure of heaven. The angels are basically just extensions of God's jurisdiction. Since this tympanum is depicting Judgment day, they are helping the righteous into heaven and fighting off devils that may interrupt this process. I think when we recognize God as forgiving, loving, etc, we are forgetting that that's really what Jesus is--not necessarily what God is. God is much larger. Today we tend to conflate Christ with God, and in the process completely remove any of the vengeance that God possessed in the process. For a good part of Christianity, the old testament I think held just as much importance as the new testament, which honestly I think is what most Christians today pay attention to... if they look at scripture at all. Judgment day kind of makes a complete circle with the old testament. It brings back the vengeance, and in the old testament, if you didn't listen to the prophets, then yeah, you were pretty screwed and you went to hell (basically everyone). Then we get Jesus and all of sudden all you need is faith to go to Heaven. God is incapable of forgiving one sin, which is the sin of lost faith. If you stop believing you are damning yourself and that sin will be "locked" to your soul (St Peter has two keys, one that opens the gate of heaven and "unlocks sins" from you, the other basically condemns you). To address Shodan's point: Yeah, it's pretty ludicrous that I am bitching a mean steak about this stuff. I find the games to be fun, and unlike Tallgeese, I can still get a kick out of the story line. I mean, it's just annoying for me when people suddenly start to pull things out of these games that aren't there, or aren't right, and completely ignorant of where they came from (or about as informed as a wikipedia article). That kind of pseudo-intellectual crap gets old. It's still a video game; video games are good, and that makes it popcorn for my brain. If I want to think, I'll go make art or read a book or something. Otherwise, I am all for further developing carpal tunnel!
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