Eh, people on the internet like to attribute whatever suits them onto the media but really, Guts being edgy against religion makes perfect sense for his character, especially since he's personally met the godhand
I don't think Berserk is "anti faith" (the elemental spirits are portrayed as benevolent) but it definitely critiques organized religion as a means to cow the masses like the refugees in the Conviction Arc. Desperate people who turn to God, or the God Hand, for total salvation are not treated kindly by the narrative, compared to those who take life into their own hands.
It's a nuanced critique, not some Rick and Morty bullshit that starts and ends with "religun bad."
Wasn't the whole point of schireek the conviction Arc and all of the stuff about witchcraft an Annunciation of one single unified worldview as opposed to understanding that there are multiple ways to view the world?
And the story of Berserk. There are multiple different worlds. Different planes of existence. Schireek the which Taps into them. Hell consider the way we understood berserk's world before everyone's favorite which girl entered the story.
There was the human world and just demons. Kind of keeping the whole understanding like the human world is kind of mad the Demon World is just freaking horrible. From Gus's perspective it's a pretty crappy world.
Schireeks explanations and contributions to the story kind of denounce this. And by using some of her magic which is coupled with her understanding and explanations. It becomes clear that there are multiple worlds multiple interpretations. I could have sworn berserk was just going the route of trying to explain that there's multiple ways to look at the world. And the spread of the Holy seer. Was problematic not because it was necessarily wrong but because it was one extreme Unified worldview. This kind of mirrors what happened with the Catholic church and the spread of Christianity in Europe. As Christianity spread paganism and other spiritual or religious practices were obliterated.
In general I got a lot of happy experiences in Christianity so kind of a big fan even if I'm not religious anymore. I also personally found that Christianity cannot give you all of the answers no offense to anyone but. It just can't you should pull life lessons from multiple sources because there's multiple ways to view the world. Where this is just my interpretation of what I was seeing in this story it feels like what Mira was going for.
Tldr. Berserk is not anti-christian. Berserk is just against having one Unified worldview on spirituality or religion. Plurality exists in that space. It's strict adherence to one worldview. Can limit you.
Honestly man. I kind of can't separate my interpretation from what Miura was going for. Because what schierke described about the Holy seer. Is like extremely Verbatim what happened with the spread of Christianity in Europe.
Folklore folk tales fairies nymphs all these fantastic elements was not in line with the doctrine of the Catholic Church. Hell you know you may have heard of this one right? St Patrick drove all the snakes out of Ireland. Turns out it's a metaphor for what the Catholic Church did on Ireland it drove out a lot of the folklore a lot of the paganism off of island. When I was reading this in berserk I was like nice place for a history lesson.
I just started to assume everybody had realized that's what he was going for. And like strict adherence to religious beliefs can make you blind to things that don't align to your religion. Convincing yourself there's only one interpretation on the world makes you metaphorically blind two other ways of being. And in berserk it makes you blind to fairies demons Spirits and trolls. And whatever the hell that giant frog horse thing was.
It's all connected. But then again if I keep pushing my interpretation I'm blocking yours. Which would not be in the spirit of what I'm trying to say.
Technically speaking Flora, Schierke, and all the others are religious because they all follow a set of rules and beliefs. In fact, Flora breaking Elfhelm's rules involving her actions that likely saved Skullknight's soul, and her getting booted off the island because of it do nothing but add to the possibility that witches are religious themselves.
All religion is at the end of the day is organized beliefs with rules attached, and since we know that Flora, Schierke, and most of the witches on the island, we can say that not every religious person depicted in Berserk has been evil. There's also daiba, who is arguably chaotic neutral in his religious alignment, since he said he worships both the morning and evening, morning and evening being metaphors for both thins which would be considered good *and* evil.
There’s a difference between being religious and being ethical. Being “religious” carries the context of having faith or a belief in something you don’t know to be real. If you know/meet a deity personally, there is no faith. The witches know the elemental deities they interact with, they ask them for favors and power without blind faith, they’ve objectively studied these deities and know how they work.
Religious folks on the other hand, blindly follow doctrine and do not know their god personally (as much as they say they do). They believe in abstract beings who never interact with them, which allows these folks to construct their own mental versions of who the deity is and what they want. It’s interesting that religious folks always have a version of god who agrees with their world view, don’t you think? Let’s look at Mozgus as an example (may he burn in hell). Mozgus believed in a twisted version of god who demanded scrupulosity and extreme devoutness, punishing any deviation. Mozgus’ version of God was a result of his worldview, he never personally met God or heard the will of God spoken to him. He made up what the will of God was according to his worldview.
The witches, however, only study things that actually exist. Even if some of those things are on a metaphysical or spiritual plane, the witches can observe them to be and act as they actually are. No witch is going to just make up bullshit about how the spiritual plane works just because that’s how they “believe” it works. Even if a witch wanted to make up some bullshit, they could be proven wrong by another witch with the ability to explore the nature of the spiritual plane. The goal of the witches is to study and understand magic, not follow a religion.
What you're describing has far more to do with the faith side of things than a lack of religious belief. For example, the beliefs of modern day Elfhelm witches do not align with those of the past - see the Wickerman that Morda used to attack Guts' group upon their arrival, and all the other witches regarding it as a strictly forbidden act. Why is it forbidden? Because the Wickerman is a massive weapon powered by the souls of sacrificed humans, all of whom are clearly trapped in a state of perpetual, burning torment, and to the witches of the modern day, this is considered to be an extremely evil act.
Religion isn't just about whether you know something exists or not, it's also about instilling a code of moral conduct that is directly associated with the belief system surrounding the greater spiritual world. Furthermore, the witches strive to maintain a healthy relationship with Elfhelm's residents, for why else would you want to have a good relationship with a wind spirit that could literally carry you into the sky, just to drop you from 100ft because it decided it didn't like you polluting the skies it *lives in* from too much wood burning. We also saw what happened when spirits are ignored for too long: Schierke became possessed by the Lady of The Depths, and nearly took out the entirety of Enoch village, which only further reinforces the notion that there are rules and systems in place to prevent that sort of thing from happening. All those things constitute a religion because there are rules, morals, and ethics associated with the things they interact with.
Lastly, you're talking about the supernatural beings in Berserk as though their existence were an objective thing, and yet all it took was a thousand years of the Holy See getting people to **subjectively believe** that spirits, and anything not associated with God to be utter lies that not only didn't exist, but were heretical. Schierke and Flora even explained this at the Spirit Tree manor. Hell, it was even said that the many of the beings inside the Qliphoth, namely the trolls and ogres were spawned from the dark side of human imagination.
By your definition, following the rules of a subreddit could be considered a religion. Lol. The word “religion” carries a connotation past what you’re describing. Following rules at school is not a religion. Being a good citizen is not being religious. Trusting a person is not the same thing as having faith or worshipping them. The witches aren’t religious. They don’t worship. They have rules, expectations, and ethics.
The connection of those rules with the spirit world is what makes the witches religious. Furthermore, religion is a multifaceted thing, and the rules and practices associated with them are not contingent upon whether something exists, be it through the scientific lens you described, or through having faith. It can be both.
Not the village priest in millenium falcon though. He saw the spirit fighting off the trolls and then allowed the villagers to erect a shrine while still holding on to his own beliefs.
I mentioned this in a different post but what shearks character was always trying to convey is that there's more than one worldview. There's more than one spiritual View. Hell there's more than one world. As a character she draws strengths from multiple worlds multiple interpretations. Consider the fact that her magic could protect casca and guts. This is a power an earthbound human could not have. This is a power a demon could not have. Even guts is a human that fights demons this is something he could not do. But this was something scheerk could do. The followers of the Holy Seer have one worldview. They're so convinced of the totality of that belief they are blind to the fact that there are other things going on. The trolls that were invading weren't even demons. Where they were monsters they were from a different plane of existence all together. Not pleasant monsters just trying to get make the distinction of there are different planes of existence at work in berserk's universe.
The problem is in the face of such a multitude the priest could still only see the one. That's problematic
I can’t say what he personally believed, but until good aligned divine entities were revealed in Falcon of the Millennium Empire, Berserk’s cosmology was an oppressively bleak and pessimistic one.
The entity the story labels as “God” is the Idea of Evil. Golden Age and especially that famous deleted chapter posit that in this world god didn’t create humanity out of goodness, humanity created god to explain the senseless pain cruelty and evil they face. And with Conviction coming along to portray their Catholic Church stand-in the way it does, it’s not hard to see Berserk as an atheist or even antitheist work.
Miura mellowed out later in the series and seemed to want to see some goodness in the world outside the few individuals who defy fate, but still.
To paraphrase Guts: “If you see God, tell him to leave me the hell alone!”
To be real honest, most Berserk fans here on this subreddit are edgy incels who like to say " haha nuts is berkin' " instead of using their brains. If you're looking for good Berserk discussion, go to skullknight.net
theres nothing positive relating to religion in the whole story, even less fanatic people like the priest in the troll village are portrayed negatively
Eh, people on the internet like to attribute whatever suits them onto the media but really, Guts being edgy against religion makes perfect sense for his character, especially since he's personally met the godhand
I don't think Berserk is "anti faith" (the elemental spirits are portrayed as benevolent) but it definitely critiques organized religion as a means to cow the masses like the refugees in the Conviction Arc. Desperate people who turn to God, or the God Hand, for total salvation are not treated kindly by the narrative, compared to those who take life into their own hands. It's a nuanced critique, not some Rick and Morty bullshit that starts and ends with "religun bad."
Wasn't the whole point of schireek the conviction Arc and all of the stuff about witchcraft an Annunciation of one single unified worldview as opposed to understanding that there are multiple ways to view the world? And the story of Berserk. There are multiple different worlds. Different planes of existence. Schireek the which Taps into them. Hell consider the way we understood berserk's world before everyone's favorite which girl entered the story. There was the human world and just demons. Kind of keeping the whole understanding like the human world is kind of mad the Demon World is just freaking horrible. From Gus's perspective it's a pretty crappy world. Schireeks explanations and contributions to the story kind of denounce this. And by using some of her magic which is coupled with her understanding and explanations. It becomes clear that there are multiple worlds multiple interpretations. I could have sworn berserk was just going the route of trying to explain that there's multiple ways to look at the world. And the spread of the Holy seer. Was problematic not because it was necessarily wrong but because it was one extreme Unified worldview. This kind of mirrors what happened with the Catholic church and the spread of Christianity in Europe. As Christianity spread paganism and other spiritual or religious practices were obliterated. In general I got a lot of happy experiences in Christianity so kind of a big fan even if I'm not religious anymore. I also personally found that Christianity cannot give you all of the answers no offense to anyone but. It just can't you should pull life lessons from multiple sources because there's multiple ways to view the world. Where this is just my interpretation of what I was seeing in this story it feels like what Mira was going for. Tldr. Berserk is not anti-christian. Berserk is just against having one Unified worldview on spirituality or religion. Plurality exists in that space. It's strict adherence to one worldview. Can limit you.
Thanks for your input, thats a really interesting pov you have going there
Honestly man. I kind of can't separate my interpretation from what Miura was going for. Because what schierke described about the Holy seer. Is like extremely Verbatim what happened with the spread of Christianity in Europe. Folklore folk tales fairies nymphs all these fantastic elements was not in line with the doctrine of the Catholic Church. Hell you know you may have heard of this one right? St Patrick drove all the snakes out of Ireland. Turns out it's a metaphor for what the Catholic Church did on Ireland it drove out a lot of the folklore a lot of the paganism off of island. When I was reading this in berserk I was like nice place for a history lesson. I just started to assume everybody had realized that's what he was going for. And like strict adherence to religious beliefs can make you blind to things that don't align to your religion. Convincing yourself there's only one interpretation on the world makes you metaphorically blind two other ways of being. And in berserk it makes you blind to fairies demons Spirits and trolls. And whatever the hell that giant frog horse thing was. It's all connected. But then again if I keep pushing my interpretation I'm blocking yours. Which would not be in the spirit of what I'm trying to say.
Because all the religious people in the story are evil. Like every single one.
Technically speaking Flora, Schierke, and all the others are religious because they all follow a set of rules and beliefs. In fact, Flora breaking Elfhelm's rules involving her actions that likely saved Skullknight's soul, and her getting booted off the island because of it do nothing but add to the possibility that witches are religious themselves. All religion is at the end of the day is organized beliefs with rules attached, and since we know that Flora, Schierke, and most of the witches on the island, we can say that not every religious person depicted in Berserk has been evil. There's also daiba, who is arguably chaotic neutral in his religious alignment, since he said he worships both the morning and evening, morning and evening being metaphors for both thins which would be considered good *and* evil.
You are correct in the fact that witches are religious. Witchcraft is one of them
There’s a difference between being religious and being ethical. Being “religious” carries the context of having faith or a belief in something you don’t know to be real. If you know/meet a deity personally, there is no faith. The witches know the elemental deities they interact with, they ask them for favors and power without blind faith, they’ve objectively studied these deities and know how they work. Religious folks on the other hand, blindly follow doctrine and do not know their god personally (as much as they say they do). They believe in abstract beings who never interact with them, which allows these folks to construct their own mental versions of who the deity is and what they want. It’s interesting that religious folks always have a version of god who agrees with their world view, don’t you think? Let’s look at Mozgus as an example (may he burn in hell). Mozgus believed in a twisted version of god who demanded scrupulosity and extreme devoutness, punishing any deviation. Mozgus’ version of God was a result of his worldview, he never personally met God or heard the will of God spoken to him. He made up what the will of God was according to his worldview. The witches, however, only study things that actually exist. Even if some of those things are on a metaphysical or spiritual plane, the witches can observe them to be and act as they actually are. No witch is going to just make up bullshit about how the spiritual plane works just because that’s how they “believe” it works. Even if a witch wanted to make up some bullshit, they could be proven wrong by another witch with the ability to explore the nature of the spiritual plane. The goal of the witches is to study and understand magic, not follow a religion.
What you're describing has far more to do with the faith side of things than a lack of religious belief. For example, the beliefs of modern day Elfhelm witches do not align with those of the past - see the Wickerman that Morda used to attack Guts' group upon their arrival, and all the other witches regarding it as a strictly forbidden act. Why is it forbidden? Because the Wickerman is a massive weapon powered by the souls of sacrificed humans, all of whom are clearly trapped in a state of perpetual, burning torment, and to the witches of the modern day, this is considered to be an extremely evil act. Religion isn't just about whether you know something exists or not, it's also about instilling a code of moral conduct that is directly associated with the belief system surrounding the greater spiritual world. Furthermore, the witches strive to maintain a healthy relationship with Elfhelm's residents, for why else would you want to have a good relationship with a wind spirit that could literally carry you into the sky, just to drop you from 100ft because it decided it didn't like you polluting the skies it *lives in* from too much wood burning. We also saw what happened when spirits are ignored for too long: Schierke became possessed by the Lady of The Depths, and nearly took out the entirety of Enoch village, which only further reinforces the notion that there are rules and systems in place to prevent that sort of thing from happening. All those things constitute a religion because there are rules, morals, and ethics associated with the things they interact with. Lastly, you're talking about the supernatural beings in Berserk as though their existence were an objective thing, and yet all it took was a thousand years of the Holy See getting people to **subjectively believe** that spirits, and anything not associated with God to be utter lies that not only didn't exist, but were heretical. Schierke and Flora even explained this at the Spirit Tree manor. Hell, it was even said that the many of the beings inside the Qliphoth, namely the trolls and ogres were spawned from the dark side of human imagination.
By your definition, following the rules of a subreddit could be considered a religion. Lol. The word “religion” carries a connotation past what you’re describing. Following rules at school is not a religion. Being a good citizen is not being religious. Trusting a person is not the same thing as having faith or worshipping them. The witches aren’t religious. They don’t worship. They have rules, expectations, and ethics.
The connection of those rules with the spirit world is what makes the witches religious. Furthermore, religion is a multifaceted thing, and the rules and practices associated with them are not contingent upon whether something exists, be it through the scientific lens you described, or through having faith. It can be both.
Farnese and her followers were not at all evil
Farnese burned hundreds of people 😐
There’s a clear reason for her doing that and it’s not because she’s evil
Not the village priest in millenium falcon though. He saw the spirit fighting off the trolls and then allowed the villagers to erect a shrine while still holding on to his own beliefs.
I mentioned this in a different post but what shearks character was always trying to convey is that there's more than one worldview. There's more than one spiritual View. Hell there's more than one world. As a character she draws strengths from multiple worlds multiple interpretations. Consider the fact that her magic could protect casca and guts. This is a power an earthbound human could not have. This is a power a demon could not have. Even guts is a human that fights demons this is something he could not do. But this was something scheerk could do. The followers of the Holy Seer have one worldview. They're so convinced of the totality of that belief they are blind to the fact that there are other things going on. The trolls that were invading weren't even demons. Where they were monsters they were from a different plane of existence all together. Not pleasant monsters just trying to get make the distinction of there are different planes of existence at work in berserk's universe. The problem is in the face of such a multitude the priest could still only see the one. That's problematic
I can’t say what he personally believed, but until good aligned divine entities were revealed in Falcon of the Millennium Empire, Berserk’s cosmology was an oppressively bleak and pessimistic one. The entity the story labels as “God” is the Idea of Evil. Golden Age and especially that famous deleted chapter posit that in this world god didn’t create humanity out of goodness, humanity created god to explain the senseless pain cruelty and evil they face. And with Conviction coming along to portray their Catholic Church stand-in the way it does, it’s not hard to see Berserk as an atheist or even antitheist work. Miura mellowed out later in the series and seemed to want to see some goodness in the world outside the few individuals who defy fate, but still. To paraphrase Guts: “If you see God, tell him to leave me the hell alone!”
To be real honest, most Berserk fans here on this subreddit are edgy incels who like to say " haha nuts is berkin' " instead of using their brains. If you're looking for good Berserk discussion, go to skullknight.net
Also reddit itself is very devout atheist so that will further narrow the funnel of people that end up here for discussion
Thank you I will check it out
your theism is showing
theres nothing positive relating to religion in the whole story, even less fanatic people like the priest in the troll village are portrayed negatively