[Music]
[Applause]
it's been almost nine months since I did
the last episode of Silent Hill
mythology for the longest time when
people have asked me if I would ever do
another mythology video I said I would
and the subject would be the order of
Silent Hill however I have refrained
from doing that these past nine months
for one core reason unless I can bring
an original perspective to something
about the game there's no point you see
there is already a pre-existing analysis
of the order that I believe is
near-perfect
and it was done by a youtube user named
reinstall Paul I referenced his work in
the last video when I was discussing
silent hill's roots in alchemical
tradition if you want a thorough
analysis of the order and its various
real-life religious influences I highly
recommend you go watch reinstall Paul's
presentation which I will link in the
description box below with that said the
fact that you are watching this video
indicates that I finally have an
original perspective to offer the ideas
I will present in this video came to me
when I was rewatching reinstall Paul's
series a couple of weeks ago while I
listened I noticed that while he did a
good job applying his knowledge to the
character of God the orders highest
deity I felt that there were some cool
bits of information that went
unmentioned today I want to present an
addendum of sorts that will give a
greater appreciation as to what the god
of Silent Hill actually is I believe
that my theory will not only clear up
some pre-existing confusion about the
nature of God but it will also provide a
deeper appreciation for silent hill's
horror let us begin by listing what we
know for certain about the character of
God and then we will address those more
confusing elements God is the highest
deity of sound Hill's
secret doomsday cult the Afra mentioned
order unlike the gods of our reality the
God of Silent Hill did not preexist
humanity rather the orders God was
supposedly born
from the pleas of the suffering before
God humanity suffered relentlessly all
they knew was a never-ending cycle of
pain and suffering out of despair a
random man and woman offered a serpent
and a reed to the Sun and asked for joy
from this God was born it was solely a
desire for God that birthed God in other
words God was willed into existence this
newly birth God brought forward many
gifts to the world such as the invention
of time which apparently did not exist
prior to God's Advent God purposefully
invented time as a promise that the
cycle of pain would no longer be eternal
but would come to an end
alongside this God birthed lower God's
angels and even the paradise that would
come at the end of time but before the
pious could be delivered to paradise
God's strength ran out and she collapsed
as she breathed her last breath she
promised her followers that she would
come again and deliver them to paradise
the order intends to bring about this
paradise via the rebirth of God
throughout the many years that the order
existed as an institution they sought a
mortal female that could serve as a
vessel they sought a womb for Immaculate
Conception this person ended up being
Alessa Gillespie
the daughter of the orders leader Dalia
Gillespie it is from this point that the
story of the Silent Hill saga begins
starting chronologically from Silent
Hill origins onward there were other
pieces of information regarding the
order that will be addressed momentarily
but I must now return my focus to the
character of God specifically the
aspects of God that have caused Silent
Hill fans some confusion first of all I
would like to ask all of the Silent Hill
fans watching this video to pretend for
a moment that you know nothing about the
franchise that this video you're
watching now is the only thing about
Silent Hill that you have ever watched
now I ask you to consider everything
I've told you about the character of God
if the only information you know about
God is what I just
you does God seem like a villain we all
know that God is one of the primary
antagonists of the whole saga but to an
outsider does God seem all that
villainous God seems to want to deliver
the world from pain and suffering on the
surface there doesn't seem to be a lot
wrong with that yet if you play the game
you find that the character of God often
takes on a demonic malevolent appearance
to make matters worse the character of
God displays a wide range of positive
and negative forms throughout the series
allow me to run down the list of God's
contradictory descriptions up until this
point I have shown you two images of
what one might classify as God one is
the God in the paintings with orange
hair and a red dress the other is the
incubator from Silent Hill 1 to those
who argue that the incubator isn't God
but merely the vessel I point you to the
holy grail of Silent Hill mythology the
book of lost memories the book confirms
that the incubator is in fact a form of
God aside from these pleasant portrayals
of God we also have frightening
portrayals we have the Incubus which
emerges from the incubators back in
Silent Hill origins there is the version
of God known as alice's dream which
looks like Incubus but not entirely in
Silent Hill 3 there was the character
that again looks a bit like Incubus but
now has a head that looks like alice's
in total we have five representations of
the orders god that greatly differ in
their presentation we have depictions of
a divine goddess as well as an evil
devil so which is it
it seems that even the members of the
order can to offer a direct answer to
that question for instance there is a
conversation that Vincent and Heather
have about God that amplifies our
collective confusion
common for people to worship the same
God and still disagree God you sure you
don't mean devil Chevy like so what does
one make of these contradictory
depictions of God in order to address
this fully I need to give two separate
answers first the simple yet incomplete
answer and second the complex complete
answer the simple answer regarding why
God takes these multiple forms lies in
the avro mentioned book of lost memories
quote the form of God that is born to
the earth changes depending on those who
summon it as we know the monsters of
Silent Hill are the physical
manifestations of one's unconscious mind
this fact extends to the character of
God as well one might view God as a
heavenly angel and another might view it
as demonic that is the simple answer but
nonetheless it is an incomplete answer
there are still questions that arise
first of all if the members of the order
believe God is benevolent and will
deliver them to paradise why does the
book of lost memories say that the
demonic versions of God are projections
of Dahlia and Claudia when these do be
most likely to perceive their God like
could be heavenly one in the paintings
moreover why does the book of lost
memories say that the heavenly incubator
is alessa's projection of God while
alice's other projection of god alessa's
dream is much more demonic also we still
have to deal with the fact that to a lot
of people the promise of a paradise free
from pain is both relished and chastised
by various characters in the series
again what do we make of this did the
lead writers for the sound hill games
make canonical mistakes games posed
Silent Hill for not included or was all
of this mysteriously intentional I
intend to argue for the latter and
reinstall Paul's presentation he
addresses the character of Incubus and
its striking resemblance to Baphomet the
history of Baphomet in occult and
alchemical tradition is very complicated
so I will give you the basic information
on the one hand
ferment is viewed as demonic is the
official symbol of the Church of Satan
as well as the image of the devil in the
early turret most importantly the most
famous depiction of Baphomet from the
French occultist le fais la vie
describes Baphomet as quote a
pantheistic and magical figure of the
absolute now what does he mean by
absolute well let's look back to
reinstall Paul's presentation if you
look at lady's depiction of Baphomet you
see many contradictions one hands points
upward the other down it has a goat's
head but a human body it has fish scales
but bird's wings and so on it is because
Baphomet possesses all of these opposite
elements that Lavy describes it as the
absolute like Baphomet the God of Silent
Hill bears these opposite elements now
they're firmly good nor evil divine nor
demonic but all of the above it is the
very fact that both Baphomet and the
goddess Silent Hill are paradoxes that
makes them divine the notion of God
being a unity of opposites is not unique
to Silent Hill nor ladies illustration
it is a concept that has been plundered
for millennia going as far back as the
beginnings of judeo-christian tradition
and maybe even further than that one
person who has investigated this
contradictory god image is somebody who
has been referenced many a time in this
series Carl Jung in his book called ion
Jung outlined his belief that all human
beings strive to greater things he
called the pinnacle of the striving the
end of this process the self the self is
the god image the highest ideal human
beings have symbolized
this striving towards the self in many
ways but most importantly with religious
depictions of perfect men for example
Christians strive to emulate Jesus who
was supposedly a perfect man Buddhists
follow Buddha Muslims follow Muhammad
and so on according to Jung what made
these beings perfect to avatars of the
self was their ability to bring their
light
and darkside into perfect balance in
Jesus's case following his crucifixion
his soul descended to the depths of hell
the lowest low so that he could be
reincarnated and ascend to heaven like
Baphomet young viewed Jesus too as a
union of opposites he was a man but also
a God he is everlasting but also only
existed once in time given how well
Jung's theories seem to have applied to
the sound he'll meet those up until this
point I think it is reasonable to assume
that Jung's conception of God as a union
of opposites applies after all
references to the unity of opposites in
Silent Hill
don't stop merely with the character of
God one of the items you can obtain in
the first Silent Hill game is the disk
of Ouroboros the Ouroboros is the
ancient symbol of the dragon eating its
tail while it symbolizes the neverending
cycle of life and death it also
symbolizes especially in Jung's mind the
state of being before time began where
all of life and all of its opposites
were contained in one seed a concept
that the human mind cannot possibly
fathom
hence the Dragons still being alive even
though it is eating its own tail this
state of being also reflects the state
of being that existed before the God of
Silent Hill was born before God invented
time there's also the amulet of Solomon
as reinstall Paul explains the symbol
represents the unified polarity of
masculine and feminine energy amongst
other things this union of opposite
elements continued with the key of
hagath the centaur pillar the crest of
mercury and more to drive the point home
I would like to reference Carl Jung's
analysis of the Jewish God in the
affirmation texts I on Yonge discusses
the problem of the Yahweh istic God
image which had been constellated in
men's minds
ever since the book of Job during the
development of the Christian religion
the notion that God was solely good was
brought about a notion that quote did
not satisfy the conservative Jews again
I must summarize for the sake of
simplicity and time
unlike the Christian God which is widely
viewed as only good the Jewish Yahweh
seemed to be both good and evil
even rabbinical scholars have noted that
the destructive aspect of God it doesn't
seem to distinguish between the
righteous and the wicked at times like
the power of a tornado as for how this
relates to silent held there were
several references to Jewish religious
tradition the after mentioned amulet of
Solomon is one of them with the Star of
David however there are also references
to Metatron and Samael Metatron and
Samael were Archangels from Jewish
tradition Metatron was the heavenly
reincarnation of the biblical prophet
Enoch and some Al is often accorded with
Satan another pair of opposites while I
believe that the case is now clear that
the god of silent hill continues the
age-old tradition of depicting God as a
paradox I understand that some people
might not be satisfied the main
complaint I think might be offered is
that the game still does cast the
members of the order including their God
as evil and all those who oppose the
order as good this is true but we must
not forget the orders argument in favor
of their religion they believe that
existence is so full of pain and
suffering that it would be better if it
had never existed they believed that it
must be destroyed and that a new
paradise old world should be formed in
its place while some of you might take
the side of somebody like Heather who
thinks that such a paradise would be
boring and that conflict is inherent to
existence it's never that simple there
are people that believe life is nothing
but tragedy and moreover have good
reason to believe that when pain gives
way to agony people will go from
praising God and its creation to praying
for death as an escape from suffering if
you think you know for certain what is
good and what isn't or that God is good
or isn't you are sorely mistaken you
might have chosen the right answer but
your faith in that answer will be tested
thank you all very much for watching
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