I love almost everything about this show and almost everything about the finale. One thing that's always irked me is that the plot about Sisko being the emissary of the prophets and their whole feud with the pah wraiths is never adequately explained. How is it that the pah wraiths are bound by spell books and incantations? Why did the prophets need Sisko to throw that magic book in the fire? Couldn't anyone have done that? What important work did they have Sisko doing after that? I can accept magic spell books and the like without question in a fantasy universe, but in a Star Trek series it feels like an explanation is missing. I've never had any problem with Sacrifice of Angels in and of itself, but the fact that the prophets are never adequately explained ruins it retroactively for me.
Can anyone make sense of the prophets-pah wraiths plotline?
- Thread starter KJY
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I basically regard it as canned mythic crap, designed to appeal to the Fantasy and Star Wars crowd. The Pah-wraiths are your basic demons, and evil people use magic to summon them.
Until someone does it the first time, no. The Prophets are not in the Fire Caves. They have no way of knowing what happens there until someone--the Sisko--can see it for them.
It's just speculation, but I think the prophets and pah-wraiths are the same race, and perhaps they even evolved on Bajor long, long ago - they are of Bajor, after all. Over countless eons, they evolved and perhaps took an unnatural step abandoning their physical bodies, but to do so required a special environment - an artificial one they made, which was inside the stable wormhole they created. Civil war broke out and the losing side (apparently for more interested in manipulation of "lesser beings," self aggrandizement, glory, etc. even at the expense of others, you know, evil bastards, was cast out and could only continue to exist in a limited manner outside the wormhole - essentially imprisoned there in the fire caves - a kind of hell for them, such limited existence. Even the orbs are probably weapons, or left over relics of that war. But afterwards, their existence was no longer temporal, but stretched out over time, from long past to future times, a simultaneously occurring existence rather than a linear one. We humans cannot really grasp existence like that. Yet, when elements of future occurrences are relayed to the past, that is the stuff of prophecy. The current race of Bajorans has since arisen and are ignorant of past civilizations on Bajor, since the ravages of time have utterly wiped out the clues to the former inhabitants' corporeal existence. Only the orbs remain, the pah-wraiths, and the sky temple, so naturally the modern race of Bajorans built a religion around all of that. How could you not? And the orbs reveal something of the prophets and some hints as their entire existence, past, present, and future. You just have to be able to correctly discern the meaning on those visions.
So when prophecy says something will happen or someone in particular will do it, that's because it's already been done from the perspective of the prophets.
But they're just aliens.
So when prophecy says something will happen or someone in particular will do it, that's because it's already been done from the perspective of the prophets.
But they're just aliens.
[CITAÇÃO = "JRTStarlight, post: 12043289, member: 74231"] É apenas especulação, mas acho que os profetas e os fantasmas são a mesma raça, e talvez eles tenham evoluído em Bajor há muito tempo, eles são de Bajor, depois de tudo. Ao longo de inúmeros eons, eles evoluíram e talvez tomaram um passo anormal ao abandonar seus corpos físicos, mas exigir um ambiente especial - um artificial que eles fizeram, que estava dentro do buraco de minúsculo que eles criaram. A guerra civil estourou e o lado perdedor (aparentemente para mais interessados na manipulação de "seres menores", o engrandecimento próprio, a glória, etc., mesmo à custa dos outros, você sabe, bastardos do mal, foi expulso e só poderia continuar a existir De maneira limitada, fora do minhoca - essencialmente preso lá nas cavernas de fogo - uma espécie de inferno para eles, uma existência tão limitada. Mesmo os orbes são provavelmente armas, ou deixaram as relíquias dessa guerra. Mas depois, sua existência já não era temporal, mas esticada ao longo do tempo, desde tempos longos até futuros, uma existência que ocorre simultaneamente e não linear. Nós, seres humanos, não conseguimos compreender a existência assim. No entanto, quando elementos de ocorrências futuras são retransmitidos ao passado, esse é o material da profecia. A atual raça dos bajoranos surgiu desde então e ignora as civilizações do passado em Bajor, já que os estragos do tempo destruíram completamente as pistas para a existência corpórea dos antigos habitantes. Somente os órbitas permanecem, os pah-wraiths, e o templo do céu, tão naturalmente a raça moderna de Bajorans construiu uma religião em torno de tudo isso. Como você não pode? E as órbitas revelam algo dos profetas e algumas dicas como toda a sua existência, passado, presente e futuro. Você só precisa ser capaz de discernir corretamente o significado nessas visões.
Então, quando a profecia diz que algo acontecerá ou alguém em particular o fará, é porque já foi feito da perspectiva dos profetas.
Mas eles são apenas alienígenas. [/ QUOTE]
Eu concordo com tudo isso, mas isso é exatamente o que não me deixa entender a questão do livro Pah-wraiths. A totalidade dos profetas pode ser entendida de forma racional e pensar neles como alienígenas, mas o livro parece uma coisa muito mítica
Então, quando a profecia diz que algo acontecerá ou alguém em particular o fará, é porque já foi feito da perspectiva dos profetas.
Mas eles são apenas alienígenas. [/ QUOTE]
Eu concordo com tudo isso, mas isso é exatamente o que não me deixa entender a questão do livro Pah-wraiths. A totalidade dos profetas pode ser entendida de forma racional e pensar neles como alienígenas, mas o livro parece uma coisa muito mítica
Yes, but they only know about those events in a second hand way, as if they read it from a book, not in every detail. They are after all, as you say, just aliens.
Still waiting for the Universal Translator.
of course. My english is not very good but I will do my best
I agree with all this but that is exactly what does not let me understand the question of the Pah-wraiths book. During the whole series the prophets can be understood rationally only as an alien species but the book seems a very mythical thing.
I agree with all this but that is exactly what does not let me understand the question of the Pah-wraiths book. During the whole series the prophets can be understood rationally only as an alien species but the book seems a very mythical thing.
I don't speak Spanish, either, but my translator did a poor job using Spanish - so I tried Portuguese, which seems to work far better - i.e. I'm pretty sure it's not Spanish but Portuguese.
I'd say the orbs also seem mythical, but advanced tech seems magical and mythical to more primitive species, and add time travel, or knowing the future in the past, and who knows what can happen. Obviously, either the prophets made the book, or the orbs directed the primitive Bajorans to make it following "sacred" rites - thing advanced things they didn't understand, but were happy to do since that's what their gods wanted. I don't know if this explains what's troubling you, but that's make take on it - tech at such a level it cannot be seen with normal vision - but can detect Bajoran DNA (the Pat-Wraiths don't have) and somehow can sense if a non-Kai is reading the book, and contains the tonal qualities necessary to release other functions and free the Pah-Wraiths. Or maybe the PAh-Wraiths made it, too. No one says the orbs (which may have been weapons in their civil war) only came from one side. Some of those may have been made and used by the Pah-Wraiths, or they may not have favored either side, but couldn't conceal information that favored one side - they were just neutral tools.
What's really happening, of course, is many writers are sloppy and think little of resorting to fantasy in a science fiction show, or use gobbledygook instead of jargon or anything based in actual science. You just have to accept things that look mystical or magical are just incredibly advanced tech and let it go at that.
I'd say the orbs also seem mythical, but advanced tech seems magical and mythical to more primitive species, and add time travel, or knowing the future in the past, and who knows what can happen. Obviously, either the prophets made the book, or the orbs directed the primitive Bajorans to make it following "sacred" rites - thing advanced things they didn't understand, but were happy to do since that's what their gods wanted. I don't know if this explains what's troubling you, but that's make take on it - tech at such a level it cannot be seen with normal vision - but can detect Bajoran DNA (the Pat-Wraiths don't have) and somehow can sense if a non-Kai is reading the book, and contains the tonal qualities necessary to release other functions and free the Pah-Wraiths. Or maybe the PAh-Wraiths made it, too. No one says the orbs (which may have been weapons in their civil war) only came from one side. Some of those may have been made and used by the Pah-Wraiths, or they may not have favored either side, but couldn't conceal information that favored one side - they were just neutral tools.
What's really happening, of course, is many writers are sloppy and think little of resorting to fantasy in a science fiction show, or use gobbledygook instead of jargon or anything based in actual science. You just have to accept things that look mystical or magical are just incredibly advanced tech and let it go at that.
It's just a series-long story arc about an alien religion, written by fallible humans. It's basic good vs. evil. Don't try to overthink it.
But do give them credit for at least taking on the subject of religion. Star Trek pretty much tried to avoid it everywhere else, as much as possible. This is one of the credits of DS9 that might make it stand out, possibly for some even above, other Trek series. But YMMV.
Maybe the same way the Enterprise can be blown up be three people reciting a combination of numbers of letters? In a galaxy where voice activated technology is mundane words have power.
Someone(s) on staff were Tolkien fans. Dukat = Gollum. Sisko = Frodo. Book = The Ring. Kai Winn = Boromir?
Nothing I think. Wasn't Sarah's final words to him about his job being done?
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Considering how the Prophets view time, it also means it's time to retire, they're going on vacation, Sisko's gotta study for finals, and he just arrived at DS9 ... all at the same time.
I thought that was even stated on screen at some point? Either way that's how I always saw it too.
"sufficiently advanced technology", but yep.
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