Roland - General discussion

[Wuducynn]

Just a quote from Song of Susannah to throw out there - thought it might keep the discussion going.

Spoiler:

Roland and Eddie are in the cartmobile heading toward their first meeting with Sai King:

The gunslinger said, "I used to think the most terrible thing would be to reach the Dark Tower and find the top room empty. The God of all universes either dead or nonexistent in the first place. But now... suppose there is someone there, Eddie? Someone in charge who turns out to be..." He couldn't finish.
Eddie could. "Someone who turns out to be just another bumhub? Is that it? God not dead but feeble-minded and malicious?"
Roland nodded. This was not, in fact, precisely what he was afraid of, but he thought Eddie had at least come close.
"How can that be, Roland? Considering what we feel?"
Roland shrugged, as if to say anything could be.
"In any case, what choice do we have?"
"None," Roland said bleakly. "All things serve the beam."

Roland claims he doesn't hold to any god (as in having a relationship with a god), and this may be true. That doesn't mean he doesn't believe in one, as the passage above seems to indicate.
It seems that he's saying he might even think there was a god and he expected him to be dead.
But it could also suggest that he could have never existed in the first place.
Or that he does exist, but is evil.
He is an odd bird.

Thoughts?

From his prayer (which I took the time to type out for your pleasure and to prove my point) he obviously holds to many gods. Or he wouldn't pray to them right? Roland says one thing but the truth is another.

[obscurejude]

CK, what if Roland prayed to honor Jake? Perhaps his superstition was enough that he didn't want to take any chances, just in case someone was listening. I'm not sure your passage is any more definitive than any of the others,

[Wuducynn]

CK, what if Roland prayed to honor Jake? Perhaps his superstition was enough that he didn't want to take any chances, just in case someone was listening. I'm not sure your passage is any more definitive than any of the others,

Of course he prayed to honor Jake. Why would he call on the names of these various gods and goddesses, in such an important time and event if he didn't hold to them? Do you question the importance of that prayer in displaying Roland's beliefs?

[obscurejude]

Did you just punch the screen of your laptop? I was just saying that a lot of people hold to a form of religion in times of grief, just in case. Many people were religious around the time of 9/11, but not so much afterwards. "Holding" to anything means that actions result from those beliefs, not just lip service.

[Wuducynn]

Except we have other examples of Roland calling on his gods and praying throughout the series. What I'm saying is he says he doesn't hold to any god but often times throughout the series Roland says one thing but in reality its another. And I think that prayer was more than just getting religious in a time of need. That would be true if he didn't say prayers and call on his gods until that point, but thats not how it was.

[obscurejude]

CK, I don't think we disagree as much as you seem to think we do. The things you describe about Roland are endearing, but I don't think they prove that he holds a particular belief about Gan or god. I love the scene in Wolves where Callahan refuses to give Susannah an abortion and Roland says, "Your Jesus sounds like a bastard." A couple of pages later, Roland crosses himself after the pere does when they witness Black 13 for the first time. Similar situation with Jake's death in the sense that Roland has his moments, but again, I think its because he's afraid that God might be dead- or the top of the tower is empty. King has said before that what scares humanity the most is chaos, and that is what is suggested of Gan if he is in fact the one orchestrating the "present distress." I think this is the part of Roland that hates Gan, but what else is there beyond the tower? It goes back to the whole idea of the tower being the symbol of cosmological meaning, as I'm convinced it is in Browning's poem, and throughout the series. Regardless of the notion that maybe there is no meaning, what else is there to do but pick up the horn and blow? In describing his own poem, Browning once said, "if there is one theme, it is, 'he that endureth to the end shall be saved."

[Wuducynn]

CK, I don't think we disagree as much as you seem to think we do. The things you describe about Roland are endearing, but I don't think they prove that he holds a particular belief about Gan or god.

We do disagree. I feel they are proof that he does hold to certain gods. Its just more evidence that while he may say one thing, what he feels on the inside or knows, is different.

but again, I think its because he's afraid that God might be dead- or the top of the tower is empty. King has said before that what scares humanity the most is chaos, and that is what is suggested of Gan if he is in fact the one orchestrating the "present distress." I think this is the part of Roland that hates Gan, but what else is there beyond the tower? It goes back to the whole idea of the tower being the symbol of cosmological meaning, as I'm convinced it is in Browning's poem, and throughout the series. Regardless of the notion that maybe there is no meaning, what else is there to do but pick up the horn and blow? In describing his own poem, Browning once said, "if there is one theme, it is, 'he that endureth to the end shall be saved."

<----- This all very interesting, how do you get the idea that Roland is afraid the top of the Tower might be empty? Wasn't Walter the one who was worried about that?

[obscurejude]

I got it from SJ's passage CK. It was Walter's fear as well. Its one of many things they have in common.

I disagree that you think we disagree. Are you saying Roland is a catholic?

[obscurejude]

Eddie hits the nail on the head, in my opinion.

[Jean]

Roland, like his whole world, has no concept of religion. In the world where all continuity of culture is broken, and this state of breaking reproduces itself all the time, there are only some vestiges of past cults, a total confusion of beliefs, like flotsam and jetsam washed ashore after a shipwreck. Roland is a pragmatic who prays whatever he sees fit at the moment; I see him as potentially religious (his obsession looks like religious fanaticism to me much more than it does like drug addiction), but for now the only thing he believes in is the Tower, which doesn't constitute any consistent religious entity in the system of views he inherited.

[obscurejude]

How do you really feel about it Jean?

[Jean]

about what?

[obscurejude]

I was just responding to your intense tone. I like it.

[Jean]

ah, but you know that Roland is for me a typical Catholic saint in the process of formation... Joan of Arc, St.George, this list may be very long. The fact that he has no idea of Christianity only makes it more interesting. By the way, I don't consider his

Spoiler:

Prayer over dead Jake

a prayer in the real sense of the world. It's just a piece of lore, something that is rooted so deep that it remains even in atheist societies (as the example of my country showed), let alone countries of confused contexts. The same way, his saying "there'll be water if God wills it" doesn't really refers to any "God"; it's a piece of folk wisdom, something handed down from a culture where "God" was more than a handy word.

[obscurejude]

I agree Jean, but be prepared to hear otherwise from CK.

[Jean]

it also depends very much on whether the one who expresses his/her opinion is religious. I heard a lot of times people say "I believe in..." when they just mean they know some cult, are interested in it, and study it. I know a lot or shamanists, a dozen Zoroastrians, some followers of Mayan cults, and quite a few Sun worshippers (all mostly girls). So I would like to emphasize that I use the word "religious" in the stricter sense: namely, that someone really believes what he professes to believe, follows the dogma, fully shares the soteriology, adheres to the cosmological ideas proposed by their religion, to its moral principles and every-day-life regulations, and practices the liturgical rites, - all that to the maximum possible extent.

[obscurejude]

I use it in the same sense Jean, very much so. I was trying to convey that to CK, but you do it with such eloquence.

[Jean]

[obscurejude]

[Wuducynn]

Are you saying Roland is a catholic?

Of course not, where did I say that?

[Wuducynn]

I never said Roland was religious...he never said he didn't hold a religion. He said "I don't hold to any god". You can hold to a certain god or gods, and not necessarily be religious. I'm saying that its obvious from his prayers and his calling on his gods at various times through the series that he does hold to certain gods and is spiritual, whether he says so or not. Which is, by the way, JUST like Roland.

[obscurejude]

As I see it, if it was "inside him all along" then it would be evidenced by his actions in a consistent way, by habits that are appropriated toward the end (telos) to which those religious beliefs aspire. According to your logic, then Roland must be a Catholic because crossing himself indicates that it was "inside him all along" rather than just mimicking the pere like Jean and I suggest.

[Wuducynn]

Sorry, but just because he crosses himself at some point doesn't make him a Catholic. And spirituality doesn't have to be some kind of consistent thing either. All through the series he calls on his gods, and at various times he prays. So there is some holding to some gods in some way going on. Especially in his prayer for Jake it is in evidence.

[obscurejude]

Spiritual is one thing, but I think that religious is another, as Jean and I have espoused.

[Wuducynn]

And like I have just said several times.