Theoryland Chronicles

Members :Eclipse : The Dark One's Following

*this is old and unrevised/unedited; I'm simply trying to say that Ishamael has had much more freedom in the last 3000 years than 40 years every so often as the Ogier theorize*

3000 years ago, the seals were placed and the Forsaken put to sleep. All through the books (particularly in tEotW), we learn that the seals are weakening and that the DO can NOW start brushing/touching the world again. BTW, this also may relate to Ishamael being partially trapped (40 years free in every 1000...PHAW!), or him never being trapped to begin with, like he says (and I tend to agree).

What, over the last 3000 years, have the Friends of the Dark been dedicating themselves too? The general population of the lands believes (and rightly so after 3000 years) that the Forsaken are just stories. Probably the Aes Sedai believe in them (or maybe most don’t; what real proof do they have after 3000 years and most of the histories being destroyed?), and maybe some dedicated historians, but after 3000 years, nothing exists to stand as proof for the Forsaken, and only minimal exists for the DO:s very existence (the obvious breaking of the world, but...). Even the seals for his prison are lost throughout the world, nobody knowing what they are (except a very few well studied AS, and them only being ready because of Gitara:s Foretelling).

What has me asking this question is just how many DF there are running around. It:s amazing how many of the Aes Sedai are Black Ajah, and yet it was never discovered until now. I mean consider just how many of them there really are. I don’t remember the numbers, but there were less than a thousand sisters to start with (800ish sound about right, or less?). Now look at how many of them are Black. That is a surprising percentage considering the sisters have denied that ajah:s existence for about 3000 years now. And their numbers just keep growing. But not only the sisters, even the common DF. They are coming out of the woodwork like cockroaches, and their vows to the Dark are much older than three years! This is amazing, considering up until around twenty years ago, the DO was safely tucked away, the Forsaken too (if you believe Ishamael was mostly caught; but he may have been roaming about a little before Rand:s birth too, I can:t remember when his “cycle” was supposed to start back up), and there was no sign or proof that dedicating one:s self to the Dark was worth spit in a bucket.

Take Galina for example. She:s a Sitter, if I remember (or is she head of the Red?). Sitters wear the shawl for a good 70 years before becoming a Sitter, however Galina says she was a Black from long long ago (from the start? I forget). So we got this nearly 100 year old Red/Black. Why? How? To whom did she give her oaths and for what reason so long ago? There was nothing at that time to induce loyalty. No leaders. No cause. No sign from the DO himself. No promise of immortality or dominion. And if there was, who? And how? To me, it seems that without any support what so ever, the Dark has maintained an illogically sizable “force.”

Even the Trolloc Wars make minimal sense. There were Dreadlords, but they would have had to been women, because the breaking only ended with the extermination of all male channelers (and I HAVE read this). Even still, those DL, what could they have possibly been fighting for, or been motivated by, except personal advancement. They certainly weren:t getting orders from the DO or any of the Forsaken (talking about all those decades BEFORE it:s outbreak; there were thousands of DL). It happens that Ishamael was supposed to be free then, right? Sure. Sure. OK. But, that thing lasted 300 years, and Ishamael is supposed to have about forty years, right? So he exists for about 1/7 to 1/8 of the war, and goes away again (depending on when he was freed). It would have taken decades for him to convert so many to the Dark, so obviously they were following...what?... for the last thousand years?

So the Trollocs are finally defeated, there:s no Ishamael or DO to maintain contact with the population, and yet, there are those that, through out the millennia, dedicate their souls to a source/force with which they can have absolutely no connection.

For argument sake, let:s say Ishamael popped up once more 1000 years ago with Hawkwing. So what? He goes away after about 40 years, and .... what bloody sign, proof, assurance, cause, etc existed in the last 960 years for so many Dark Friends to exist now, and so many of them to be of the Aes Sedai? A lot of them we are reading about have been Black for a very very long time. Longer than Ishamael has been freed of late (if you buy the partial imprisonment carp). I can see nothing worth dedicating their lives to. Not the Aes Sedai, and certainly not the common individual going about his daily routine. I tell you, I just can:t see that farmer out in his field, standing up to stretch his back and saying, “Ya know, I think I:ll dedicate myself to a cause that has no source, no rewards, and no proof of existence.” And the Aiel. What in the world would prompt ANY conversion there? Aviendha says no WO, clan, sept, society, or first-sister would stay another:s hand at killing a shadowrunner. Absolutely no tolerance in the waste. There seems to be a disgustingly large number of these Aiel DF running around, when for the last 3000 years they have had positively nothing to feed a DO following. Quite the contrary, they have done more than any other society (even the Seanchan) to stomp it out, if it ever existed.

This comes from what I believe is the meaning of life. To get a return on an investment. Nothing is done (and I do mean nothing), without expecting a return, in some fashion or another. The DO is locked away. The Forsaken too. WHO/WHAT is going to be spreading out power, or even the promise of it? The common man might be granted power at the whim/behest of an Aes Sedai or rulers of the land, so why not just dedicate themselves to either one of those, or simply to themselves. Go up the scale to the Aes Sedai or the rulers, and what in the world are they looking to to give them MORE power? A ruler might look to the Tower, but then, where might the Tower look? The DO may as well not even exist. He can:t touch the world and hasn:t for 3000 years. The Forsaken are sleeping, so they aren:t dictating to the AS and spreading the word of the DO either. What possible lure could the Dark have for an Aes Sedai? Personally, I don’t get it. It doesn:t follow logic to me.

My stance is that there are way too many Dark Friends, and in way too many key positions (the fact that there are so many in key positions is ridiculous in itself; I know, I know. proselytes tempted with promises of immortality of late; still say there are too many) for it to follow logically. I think the partial release of Ishamael is a bunch of drek, but it may be Jordan:s way of keeping the faith alive. He can see my argument too. Without some form of link to the DO, the belief and it:s following would have died out. Ishamael was let loose to maintain the following. But only forty years per 1000? I don’t buy it. 960 is a long long time, and it would be all of ten generations (300 years) for any kind of following to die out without reassurances. Ishamael says he was never imprisoned (he:s not from the very start, so...), and only an Ogier reading books hypothesizes that he is free for 40 years per 1000. Until Jordan makes this one crystal clear, I say Ishamael has been free from the start, and the only thing maintaining the DO:s following has been him.

If you consider that being a Friend of the Dark became more of a society than a belief, then the members would not be Dark Friends at all. They would be of a society dedicated to the society, not the Dark One. The Dark One and his goals (even the very belief of him possibly) would not be in their hearts. For example, the guilds in Ebou Dar. You could say something like the Guild of the Nets (fishermen) used to be followers of Poseidon, but after so many years of having nothing to do with the god, the group of followers stuck around, gradually changing into the guild. They are of his “group” but they don’t believe or follow him. He is not in their hearts and there is no connection. In the case of the Dark Friends, the only connection these followers could have (if you agree it could have become more of a society than true followers), is a name. Take the woman Fain uses in Caemlyn (LoC. 572). She didn:t take her oaths seriously. She was joining a club in her mind. Jordan writes that because of those oaths, Fain could find her, but she was no believer. Also, take Mili for example (Shiain; the assassin). She only joined the Dark because she couldn:t channel. She did it to get power. From who? Certainly not the DO himself. Carridin mentions that she quickly became a high ranker with “circles” under her control. She:s been a DF for quite a while (years before Moiraine headed for the Two Rivers), but just what exactly has she sworn herself to? So long ago, it couldn:t have been much more than a guild. There was nothing for her to swear to or believe in (as far as the DO), and that:s exactly the way the rest of the world would have been after 960 years of NO CONTACT.

You (well, I anyway) can:t compare the way they follow after the Dark to the religions of our time. In the WoT, the people do not believe their Lords take any hand in what they do. It is all up to the Pattern, and it plays no favorites. The reason the DO gained a following in the AoL was because he could touch the world again. Before that time, nobody even knew he existed. Before that time, all the “evil” in the world was of a personal nature, instigated by nothing but self. But with the DO touching the world, then there was the promise of immortality. The DO promised wealth, power, eternal life, and probably more. However, with no contact/control over 3000 years (unless you believe in the 40/1000 theory - PHAW!, and that:s not even true contact; would be something akin to a very powerful male channeler demanding obeisance), the following would die to nothing more than a name, because there was no more promise. Not even the DO:s Chosen will willingly die for him; they think it themselves. So service to the DO in the average person:s lifetime would mean little, considering they would expect no reward in death. Which makes me question the following of the Light (Creator, whatever). Of course, every body knows the “beginning.” The Creator created the Wheel and the Pattern, and imprisoned the DO at the beginning of time... at least, they know it know. Guess they couldn:t have known that story in the AoL, or they would have been aware of the DO:s existence. Anyhoo, this could easily double in size if I continue in this vein. Suffice it to say, the Light doesn:t inspire a following any more than the Dark (neither one is active before the seals weaken), except I don:t see any sane person looking at the Blight and thinking, “Hmmm. Immortality in a world like that.... sure, sign me up.” What I see is a world looking at the nations, and then the blight, and thinking, “If THIS is what the Light brings, and THAT is what the Dark brings... think I:ll walk in the Light.” And then the followers of the Dark exponentially decrease in numbers because there is no reward, only the Blight as an example, with it:s Fades, Trollocs, Dragkhar, jumara and whatever else.