Speaker 1: Hey, welcome to Stuff to blow your mind. My name
Speaker 1: is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick. And hey folks,
Speaker 1: Robert and I were out of the office for a bit.
Speaker 1: I guess whatever you would call the office right now.
Speaker 1: We were out of the home office for a bit. Uh.
Speaker 1: So we are running a vault episode today. We're going
Speaker 1: into the vault for a classic episode on the demo Organ. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is a fun one. It's one that we referenced
Speaker 1: recently on the show, so we thought what better time
Speaker 1: than now to unleash the demogorgan once again. This originally
Speaker 1: aired on October one, twenty nineteen. I have very fond memories.
Speaker 1: I think you'll enjoy it at length. The universal Hubbub,
Speaker 1: wild of stunning sounds and voices, all confused, born through
Speaker 1: the hollow dark, assaults his ear with loudest vehemence. Thither
Speaker 1: he applies, undaunted and eat their whatever power or spirit
Speaker 1: of the nethermost abyss might in that noise reside of
Speaker 1: whom to ask which way the nearest coast of darkness
Speaker 1: lies bordering on light? When straight behold the throne of
Speaker 1: chaos and his dark pavilion spread wide on the wasteful deep,
Speaker 1: with him enthroned sat sable, vested night, eldest of things,
Speaker 1: the consort of his reign. And by them stood orcas
Speaker 1: and eighties and the dreaded name of dim Rumor. Next
Speaker 1: and chants and tumult and confusion, all embroiled and discord
Speaker 1: with a thousand various mouths. Welcome to Stuff to Blow
Speaker 1: Your Mind, a production of I Heart Radios, How Stuff Work.
Speaker 1: Hey you, Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My
Speaker 1: name is Robert Lamb, and I'm Joe McCormick, and I'm
Speaker 1: so excited. It's my favorite time of the year. It's October,
Speaker 1: which is my favorite month of the year anyway, but
Speaker 1: it's also my favorite time of the year at work
Speaker 1: because it's Monster Month. Here on Stuff to Blow your Mind,
Speaker 1: that's right when we devote the entire month of October
Speaker 1: and sometimes a little change two topics that are either
Speaker 1: obsessed with monsters or or darkness or horror or terror.
Speaker 1: Is there anything even remotely HALLOWEENI We just fully embrace it.
Speaker 1: It's the most wonderful time of the year. And so
Speaker 1: and you know, as we were coming up with episodes
Speaker 1: to record this year, where we you know, our minds
Speaker 1: turned to things we've covered in the past. So on
Speaker 1: one hand, there's an old episode of the show about
Speaker 1: the mind flares of Dungeons and Dragons. Uh, and it's
Speaker 1: led various folks to request another episode dealing with something
Speaker 1: from the world of Dungeons and Dragons. And likewise, last
Speaker 1: year we did an episode on the Great Basilisk where
Speaker 1: we talk about this concept of not only the monstrous Bassilist,
Speaker 1: but this kind of uh, you know, tech world futuristic
Speaker 1: vision of an all powerful, malevolent AI. And so we
Speaker 1: decided we we'd up the anti this year and discuss
Speaker 1: an entity that kind of combines both of these themes.
Speaker 1: And so we're going to talk about the Demogorgan. Now,
Speaker 1: I would not be surprised for the largest portion of
Speaker 1: you out there are familiar with the idea of a demogorgan,
Speaker 1: primarily from the recent Netflix show Stranger Things. I guess
Speaker 1: it's mainly the first season of that, right, Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean the creature it keeps popping up as well, but
Speaker 1: it's mainly that that first excellent season of Stranger Things,
Speaker 1: and uh, and I think that's a good place to start.
Speaker 1: Like the most recent pop culture incarnation of the demogorgan.
Speaker 1: It's probably one of the best new cinematic monsters that
Speaker 1: we've encountered in recent years. Uh, you know, this category
Speaker 1: confusion entity that's at once humanoid and be steal but
Speaker 1: at times he's bipedal and other times it's crawling around
Speaker 1: on all fours. It's like a v this fly trapped minotaur. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the other cool aspect of it's It's it's head
Speaker 1: at times looks like a featureless mask of flesh, but
Speaker 1: then it opens up in these these flower petals, these
Speaker 1: kind of uh you know, a razor toothed flower petals
Speaker 1: around this gaping maw. But I also like that it's
Speaker 1: a dimension hopper, right, which kind of means it's always
Speaker 1: it could pop up anywhere. Yeah, it travels through dimensions,
Speaker 1: though I'm uncertain if that's part of its natural abilities,
Speaker 1: because we see it feeding on an egg in its
Speaker 1: own dimension at one point. Uh. And perhaps it takes
Speaker 1: to hunting in our world due to the weakening of
Speaker 1: the connection between the two, uh, you know, due to
Speaker 1: mad science, of course. Um. But if this is the case,
Speaker 1: it's still quite proficient it traveling between the world's through
Speaker 1: those rips and tears to acquire food. Right, So it
Speaker 1: could actually be a rather mundane predator in its own world.
Speaker 1: It's just that Matthew Modine and his psychic projects unleashed
Speaker 1: this predator into it made it an invasive species in
Speaker 1: our world. Right. Yeah, yeah, like it, like it. It
Speaker 1: does pretty well in its own world, but here it
Speaker 1: can really go at it, you know, like a Superman
Speaker 1: with the Yellow Sun. Yeah. But of course in stranger Things,
Speaker 1: we also learned that the kids in the in the story,
Speaker 1: they name this creature the democ Organ because they are
Speaker 1: actively playing dungeons and Dragons and they and they are
Speaker 1: playing a campaign that involves the democ Organ. Uh. This,
Speaker 1: this Prince of Demons, is mighty demon, lord of just
Speaker 1: immense power. Now, Robert, I know that you have a
Speaker 1: reputation as a quite cruel dungeon master yourself. So do
Speaker 1: you subject to your adventuring travelers to a democ Organ
Speaker 1: every now and then? No? Not not no, not yet.
Speaker 1: And it's not the kind of thing you would you
Speaker 1: would inflict on your adventures in a hap hazard fashion.
Speaker 1: It is one of the most powerful entities in the game,
Speaker 1: so it's it's the kind of thing you cap off
Speaker 1: an entire campaign with that you would only throw at
Speaker 1: you know, a higher level, like really high level characters. Um.
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess you could throw it in haphazardly.
Speaker 1: You have just kind of a very casual game where
Speaker 1: people have like just immensely powerful characters. In each week
Speaker 1: you just battle some things that are tremendously powerful to
Speaker 1: just see how it all shakes out. But um, for instance,
Speaker 1: in the campaign Out of the Abyss, which is a
Speaker 1: campaign that I've been playing in my group that I've
Speaker 1: been dungeon mastering for about four years now, we are
Speaker 1: almost at the point where the Demogorgon may be encountered.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, so we've been building up to it. Do
Speaker 1: you have demogorgon que music ready to go when it happens? Basically,
Speaker 1: I mean, it's a it's a big deal. It's uh,
Speaker 1: you know, we have an enormous figuring that we've been
Speaker 1: putting together. It's a it's huge. Okay, Well, in the
Speaker 1: Dungeons and Dragons world, what is this demogorgon creature? It's
Speaker 1: obviously nothing like what's in Stranger things like that. It's
Speaker 1: not a venus, fly trap minotaur, right, So in Dungeons
Speaker 1: and Dragons. The Demogorgon dates back to nineteen seventy six.
Speaker 1: That's when this entity originated in a supplement titled Eldric
Speaker 1: Wizards by Gary Gyga himself and Brian Bloom. And if
Speaker 1: you look around online you can find this in PDF
Speaker 1: form and it has some you know, some adorably kind
Speaker 1: of crude illustrations of what the various creatures would look like.
Speaker 1: Those those those the illustrations, and Dungeons and Dragons have
Speaker 1: come a long way. Like the most like the earliest
Speaker 1: version of the democ organ that is illustrated in this
Speaker 1: book is which just crude sketch of this, uh, this
Speaker 1: kind of two headed tentacle armed, chicken footed thing with
Speaker 1: baboon heads, right yeah, with baboon heads. But the like,
Speaker 1: it's cute. I mean, it's like it's kind of like
Speaker 1: the monsters in the Ranking and Bass Middle Earth. Yea.
Speaker 1: And of course, you know, part most the big thing
Speaker 1: abou Dungeons and Dragons is it does take place in
Speaker 1: the mind, and especially early on they did, they didn't
Speaker 1: have elaborate illustrations. You're supposed to, you know, come up
Speaker 1: with it yourself. Today we have elaborate illustrations the most
Speaker 1: recent fifth edition illustrations of the democ Organ are just
Speaker 1: absolutely beautiful where it seems like there's like a burning
Speaker 1: on inside of the creature. But I want to read
Speaker 1: just a quick description from that original nine supplement to
Speaker 1: to properly describe what the creature looks like, because the
Speaker 1: basic description has not changed. Okay, melt my mind with terror. Okay,
Speaker 1: quoth guy GaX and bloom here. Uh. It is contended
Speaker 1: by some that this demon lord is supreme, and in
Speaker 1: any event, he is awesome in his power. This gigantic
Speaker 1: demon is eighteen tall and reptilian. His skin is plated
Speaker 1: with snake like scales, His body and legs are those
Speaker 1: of a giant lizard, His twin necks resemble snakes, and
Speaker 1: his thick tail is forked. Dimagorgan has two heads which
Speaker 1: bear the visages of evil baboons or perhaps mandrils. Rather
Speaker 1: than having arms, he has great tentacles. His appearance testifies
Speaker 1: to his command of cold blooded things such as serpents, reptiles,
Speaker 1: and octopi. And Robert, you brought in a glorious figure
Speaker 1: in the I now hold in my hand. It's uh,
Speaker 1: it's very nice. Yeah, this is a small one, the
Speaker 1: big one I couldn't even bring in because it's just
Speaker 1: it's it's too enormous. It would alarm people. Uh and
Speaker 1: they would they would wonder what was about to befall them.
Speaker 1: So so yeah, basically, this description, though, holds up. It's
Speaker 1: been tweaked a little bit. I think at one point
Speaker 1: the heads were more hyena like because as I mentioned earlier,
Speaker 1: we've had various editions of Dungeons and Dragons were on
Speaker 1: addition five at this point, uh and uh and in
Speaker 1: each edition has brought about various changes to the rules,
Speaker 1: the mechanic, to the lore, and we'll get into some
Speaker 1: of that in a minute as it relates to democgorgan
Speaker 1: Um and then the art, who has mostly gotten just
Speaker 1: tremendously better over the years. And again the most recent
Speaker 1: fifth edition art is absolutely splendid to behold. But of course,
Speaker 1: another thing to keep in mind is that the democ
Speaker 1: organ is a demon, a demon lord. And given the
Speaker 1: moral panics surrounding supposed Satanists and the the quote unquote
Speaker 1: dangers of D and D back in the nineteen eighties,
Speaker 1: the various demons and devils the game lore lost their titles.
Speaker 1: At one point Um so when I originally started playing
Speaker 1: back in the nineties, Uh, these various devils and demons
Speaker 1: were known as uh the tenari uh instead of actually
Speaker 1: referring to them as demons. So it's a rebrand. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was a rebrand because everyone was freaking out about
Speaker 1: imagine Satanist, which I think we've discussed on the show before.
Speaker 1: The Satanism as presented in the Satanic Panic of the
Speaker 1: eighties did not exist, no one, No one has actually
Speaker 1: no ritual um, you know, sacrificial uh worship of Satan
Speaker 1: has has occurred in human history. Uh, certainly not on
Speaker 1: the organized scale that uh that you see described in
Speaker 1: some of these moral panics. But but anyway, Yeah, the
Speaker 1: demonic edge was taken off the game for a while,
Speaker 1: and if you wish to invoke such entities you had
Speaker 1: to you had to bust out an older monster manual. Thankfully,
Speaker 1: the Demons of the Abyss and the Devils of the
Speaker 1: Nine Hells have made the return, and de mcgregan himself
Speaker 1: is is not only back, but he's a he's a
Speaker 1: cover batty, you know, he's he's there on the cover
Speaker 1: of Out of the Abyss and is the the creature
Speaker 1: that you battle at the very end, and you know
Speaker 1: he's he's not only fearsome physically, he's also a highly
Speaker 1: intelligent entity. He has an intelligent score of twenty, which is,
Speaker 1: you know, like top of the d twenty. Okay, how
Speaker 1: high does it go? Is twenty the most intelligent? Yeah,
Speaker 1: twenty is is tremendously impressive. It's like a John von
Speaker 1: Neumann kind of thing. Like it's I think, like a
Speaker 1: ten is is more in keeping with like, you know,
Speaker 1: sort of average human intelligence. This thing is beyond that.
Speaker 1: Like eighteen is is like really high for a starting
Speaker 1: character in Indungens of Dragons, starting mortal character. But the
Speaker 1: Demcgorgon does not use the intelligence for the good of humankind.
Speaker 1: The de m ocgorgan is gonna what is gonna design
Speaker 1: the most neferious financial instruments that have ever been uh imagined?
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I mean he's he's completely chaotically evil. Um.
Speaker 1: He's also known as the Sibilant Beast and the Master
Speaker 1: of the Spiraling Depths and h by in those two heads,
Speaker 1: each one has a name. In dungeons and dragon's lore,
Speaker 1: one is Annual and the other is Hathoradia. Uh I
Speaker 1: guess I don't know that anyone ever actually speaks to
Speaker 1: one head or the other. You just kind of speak
Speaker 1: to the de m Ocgorgan. Maybe that's the way to
Speaker 1: beat it. You get them fighting each other. Maybe, I
Speaker 1: don't know. I mean it basically, he's this wonderful embodiment
Speaker 1: of like chaos and disorder, and uh I you know,
Speaker 1: I think he wonderfully, you know, embodies the sense of
Speaker 1: maddening division. Kind of a perfect demon for modern times especially.
Speaker 1: And I also like to think of the two heads
Speaker 1: is representing like the different hemispheres of the brain. Okay,
Speaker 1: so maybe only one of them can do a complex language,
Speaker 1: maybe so, yuh. But but also I like the idea
Speaker 1: that the demon lords like are these mighty things, but
Speaker 1: perhaps they exist because they're they're like the accumulated runoff
Speaker 1: of all like human inequity, you know. And of course
Speaker 1: there are other demon lords as well, and they all
Speaker 1: plot against each other and war eternally. They represent different
Speaker 1: depths of moral sin. So Demogorgan's most prominent rivals are Orcus,
Speaker 1: the demon Lord of undeath, as well as the demon
Speaker 1: Lord of perversion graz It, and the Master of Lies
Speaker 1: fraz are Blue. But He's also opposed by Bahamat you know,
Speaker 1: Gou and then of course Jubilex and Zuktimi, who we've
Speaker 1: mentioned in passing on the show before. Wait, so one
Speaker 1: of his rivals is Orcas. You know. We began this
Speaker 1: episode with a reading from John Milton's Paradise Lost, in
Speaker 1: which the name Orcus is invoked. They don't really explain,
Speaker 1: Milton doesn't go into who Orcus is there, but uh so,
Speaker 1: I didn't expect Orcas to come back. Also in the
Speaker 1: D and D law here, Yeah, I mean Orcus was
Speaker 1: a Roman god of the under world who punished oathbreakers.
Speaker 1: And oh and by the way, he also has his
Speaker 1: own designated trans Newtonian object in zero four A two Orcus.
Speaker 1: Not all demon lords can make that claim that they
Speaker 1: actually have some sort of cosmic body named after them.
Speaker 1: But this gets to the point that the D and
Speaker 1: D is this wonderful mix of influences, fusing various twentieth
Speaker 1: century fantasy and sci fi works with mythology and flow
Speaker 1: in folklore to create its worlds. So that's so Orcus
Speaker 1: obviously comes from Roman mythology. There are other creatures we mentioned.
Speaker 1: Bahammed Bahamed is the entity that the knights templars who
Speaker 1: are accused of worshiping in the fourteenth century and we're
Speaker 1: subsequently eradicated for uh. So you know that's where that
Speaker 1: name comes from. But then there's d m ocg Oregan
Speaker 1: to consider, and uh and obviously the name predates dungeons
Speaker 1: and dragons because it pops up in Paradise Lost. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so you would I think, obviously expect given the word demogorgon,
Speaker 1: that this is something from Greek mythology, right, just sounds
Speaker 1: like something straight out of Greeks were of course, like
Speaker 1: like Medusa. So you might think, oh, well, this is
Speaker 1: some this is some Greek monster that gets turned into
Speaker 1: a god at some point. But despite what you would
Speaker 1: think from the name, you will not find the Demogorgon
Speaker 1: in ancient Greek mythology. You flipped through the works of Homer,
Speaker 1: labors of Hercules, myths of Antalympus, cults of Athena or Apollo,
Speaker 1: you're gonna find no demogorgan anywhere. So where does this
Speaker 1: beast come from? Well, we've we've considered pop culture, and
Speaker 1: we've considered uh, you know, a current twenty first century
Speaker 1: Netflix show. We've considered a twentieth century role playing game.
Speaker 1: So what we're gonna do is we're gonna dive deeper.
Speaker 1: We're gonna go into the literary world and continue to
Speaker 1: follow follow the shadow of Demogorgan through the spiraling depths.
Speaker 1: But first we're gonna take a break. Alright, We're back, alright.
Speaker 1: So we've been talking about the monster, the demon lord,
Speaker 1: the dem Organ as it is represented in Dungeons and Dragons,
Speaker 1: and Robert has some experience with that. But we now
Speaker 1: have said that we need to go deeper because we're
Speaker 1: trying to figure out where this monster came from. If
Speaker 1: it doesn't come from what you would guess based on
Speaker 1: its name Greek mythology, right, And our next step is
Speaker 1: to look at its very the way its name is
Speaker 1: invoked in various works of literature. So one of the
Speaker 1: books I was looking at on this count was a
Speaker 1: book called Dangerous Games. What the Moral Panic over role
Speaker 1: Playing Games says about play, religion, and imagined worlds, by
Speaker 1: Joseph P. Laycock, And uh, this is this is an
Speaker 1: interesting looking book that I really want to read more from.
Speaker 1: But the author mentions that DeMorgan pops up in a
Speaker 1: number of early modern and Romantic works. Uh. Interestingly enough,
Speaker 1: Leacock also highlights an author and RPG named that I've
Speaker 1: brought up on the show before. You may are Barker. Um,
Speaker 1: you know the this is this guy who is known
Speaker 1: for creating these books and this role world of Tucamel,
Speaker 1: which is this fantasy. It's the sci fi fantasy world
Speaker 1: that depends less far less on Western models of of
Speaker 1: history and religion and uh in myth and more on
Speaker 1: East Asian models. So uh there, if you're into fantasy,
Speaker 1: I recommend picking up those books. They are a little
Speaker 1: old fashioned in some respects, like they're very much in
Speaker 1: the mold of like kind of a swashbuckling uh, you know,
Speaker 1: male centered adventure. But the world that he created is
Speaker 1: really something to behold. But anyway, he he points out, quote,
Speaker 1: the prominence of original fantasy religions in D and D
Speaker 1: as opposed to adaptations of Christian saints and demons, can
Speaker 1: be attributed largely to the influence of M. A. R. Barker. Uh,
Speaker 1: because Barker was was very active in that whole scene
Speaker 1: at the time. These various individuals like Geykax and others
Speaker 1: who were creating these role playing worlds. But as should
Speaker 1: be clear from us talking about John Milton, the demogorgon
Speaker 1: is not something that is a purely created, uh you know,
Speaker 1: fantasy religion creature. It actually does have more of a history.
Speaker 1: It goes back into Christian mythology in some way. So again,
Speaker 1: whence the democ organ? Can we trace it back through literature? Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: let's look at some of the key examples of literary
Speaker 1: democ organ that pop up. Well, let's start with Milton's
Speaker 1: Paradise Lost. We read that fantastic quote from it in
Speaker 1: our cold open Uh. Paradise Losses, of course, the masterpiece
Speaker 1: of John Milton, who lives sixteen o eight through six
Speaker 1: seventy four, and which he sets no higher goal than
Speaker 1: to quote justify the ways of God demand which I
Speaker 1: always love that, like they just just really going for
Speaker 1: it with this work, you know, um. And to achieve
Speaker 1: this lofty goal, he retells the creation and the angelic
Speaker 1: fall and the fall of man, and in doing so
Speaker 1: creates a Satan that is uh, in some people's eyes,
Speaker 1: problematically uh sympathetic and tragic. Yeah. Now, I think you
Speaker 1: can easily say that Milton was not like sympathetic towards Satan.
Speaker 1: He was a devout, devoted Protestant Christian. But I've seen
Speaker 1: I've seen that criticism leveled at him, particularly in when
Speaker 1: I was growing up reading some particularly various like Christian
Speaker 1: fundamentalists of views of demonology and the treatment of demons
Speaker 1: and angels, and literature that would chart to another like,
Speaker 1: oh Milton made uh he he made Satan way too likable. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean I think if you've got no tolerance at all, uh,
Speaker 1: then then yeah, might might go too far for you.
Speaker 1: But I think one thing he sets out to achieve
Speaker 1: and does in Paradise Lost is he shows sin as
Speaker 1: as going astray, you know, as folly, as like following uh,
Speaker 1: following a misguided path, and not always just kind of
Speaker 1: this like uh, indefinable miasma of horrible nous. People often
Speaker 1: like to think of the devil is like something you
Speaker 1: can't even look at. But Milton's devil. I mean the
Speaker 1: kind of scary thing about the devil in classic conceptions
Speaker 1: of it is that he's seductive and that he makes
Speaker 1: good arguments. Yeah again, I mean de mcgregan and dn
Speaker 1: D has that intelligence of twenty wisdom of seventeen. You'd
Speaker 1: expect as much at least from Satan. Yeah, now in
Speaker 1: Paradise lost, of course, Satan Ultimately he loses a war
Speaker 1: in heaven. He falls down with his demons. They get
Speaker 1: cast into Hell. They have a big debate about what
Speaker 1: to do about this. Some demons counsel that they should,
Speaker 1: you know, take up arms, and I think Malock says,
Speaker 1: let's go fight again. Some say, you know, we're down here,
Speaker 1: we can do just let's make the best of it.
Speaker 1: You know, Hell's not so bad. And but but Satan
Speaker 1: gets to this idea He's going to get revenge by
Speaker 1: by corrupting God's favorite creation, the human, and spoiler, he
Speaker 1: pulls it off. But yeah, this epic poem, you can
Speaker 1: see you can almost think of it as kind of
Speaker 1: a reboot or kind of like an amazing piece of
Speaker 1: of biblical and fiction where he fleshes out this idea
Speaker 1: of a war in heaven and he adds in all
Speaker 1: sorts of dramatic and gnarly details. One I always liked
Speaker 1: is that he forges a sword for the Archangeel Michael uh,
Speaker 1: that is powerful enough to cut through anything, including the
Speaker 1: flesh of other angels. God forges the sword, you mean, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: who did I say forged it. Oh, I thought it
Speaker 1: sounded like you're saying Satan did. Okay, well I'm probably
Speaker 1: thinking Saranto because we just did that right, right, But
Speaker 1: to be clear, and God made the sword. Yeah, that's cood. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean, I feel like there's so much stuff in
Speaker 1: Paradise Lost. And we were talking before we came into
Speaker 1: the studio here about Dante as well, where there are
Speaker 1: these great works of literature within the Christian literary tradition
Speaker 1: that get incorporated into people's theology, like they forget that
Speaker 1: stuff that's just in Paradise Lost isn't actually in the Bible, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: And and we can thank Dante for the pretty much
Speaker 1: the whole concept of of purgatory becoming so prominent in
Speaker 1: when in West traditions. But but yeah, so so in
Speaker 1: creating Paradise Lost, Milton, he drags in a number of
Speaker 1: names and develops a more demon names that do pop
Speaker 1: up in the Bible, like the Elzeba, Belial, Mammon, Moloc.
Speaker 1: But then he also drags in Orcus and Demogorgon, and
Speaker 1: then there are seemingly new creations like most mus saber Uh,
Speaker 1: the architect of Pandemonium, the capital of Hell. So de
Speaker 1: mcgorgan is mentioned in book two and you heard it
Speaker 1: at the start of this episode described and this is
Speaker 1: a section of Paradise Lass that describes Satan's voyage out
Speaker 1: of Hell with sin and death. So the dem Ogregan
Speaker 1: is basically a background player's texture. Yeah, just add a
Speaker 1: little texture to this scene as Satan crosses the wilds
Speaker 1: of chaos and night that span the void between Heaven
Speaker 1: and Hell. And there are other literary invocations of the
Speaker 1: Demogorgon that I would say are basically the same. They
Speaker 1: use the demogorgan not as a major figure of significance,
Speaker 1: but something is sort of texture to a dablished that
Speaker 1: a place is sort of ultimately abandoned by God and
Speaker 1: and wretched, you know, like it's just really horrible. And
Speaker 1: another great example of this is the way the demog
Speaker 1: organ is invoked in Edmund Spencer's The Fairy Queen. Uh So,
Speaker 1: if you've never read it, The Fairy Queen is also
Speaker 1: it's like Paradise Lost, an English epic poem. It's from
Speaker 1: the sixteenth century, so it's earlier than Paradise Lost, and
Speaker 1: it's this really long poem about virtues and the adventures
Speaker 1: of chivalrous nights. It's one of those that's uh, you know,
Speaker 1: to modern readers. I think it has a whole lot
Speaker 1: of interest in it, and there is some great poetry
Speaker 1: in it, but also it can be very long and
Speaker 1: ponderous and kind of stuffy in some ways, because I mean,
Speaker 1: you can only read so much about piety and shipt um.
Speaker 1: But it's long been interpreted as containing a lot of
Speaker 1: allegorical representations of present figures and politics from the Elizabethan era.
Speaker 1: When it was written, I think I was reading about
Speaker 1: how spencer Um he secured himself a really nice pension
Speaker 1: from the Elizabethan court by presenting the poem to Queen Elizabeth.
Speaker 1: But again, the Demogorgan here does not appear as a
Speaker 1: main character, but sort of as a bit of character
Speaker 1: for the landscape. So just to read one stands in
Speaker 1: which it is invoked. Therefore desirous the end of all
Speaker 1: their days to know and them to enlarge with long
Speaker 1: extent by wondrous skill and many hidden ways to the
Speaker 1: three Fatal Sisters house. She went far underground from Tract
Speaker 1: of Living, went down in the bottom of the deep abyss,
Speaker 1: where Demogorgan in dull darkness pent far from the view
Speaker 1: of God's in Heaven's bliss, This hideous chaos keeps their
Speaker 1: dreadful dwelling. Is So this character is going She's going
Speaker 1: down into a into a dark, godforsaken place. And how
Speaker 1: do you signal places dark and God forsaken? How do
Speaker 1: you show places evil and far from God? Well, you
Speaker 1: mentioned it's where the demogorgan hangs out. So if the
Speaker 1: red Cross Night stands for piety and holiness, the Demogorgan
Speaker 1: stands for unholiness and satanic chaos. Now, another work that's
Speaker 1: uh that's often invoked that mentions the Demogorgon is another
Speaker 1: sixteenth century work. It's an Italian epic poem by uh
Speaker 1: Lodovico Ariosto, a titled Orlando Furioso, which is a poem
Speaker 1: that concerns the night Orlando, who is known in French
Speaker 1: traditions as Roland Uh. Now, at least in some versions
Speaker 1: and translations, it does mention Demogorgon quote the ruler of fates.
Speaker 1: But as far as I could tell, again, he's just background.
Speaker 1: He's just texture that's added to this to a particular scene.
Speaker 1: All right, So this gets us back to the fifteen
Speaker 1: sixteenth century UM. And so we see by then that
Speaker 1: the demogorgan is being invoked in UH literature written by
Speaker 1: Christians as some kind of infernal demons, some bad thing.
Speaker 1: Maybe it has something to do with fate, maybe it
Speaker 1: has something to do with chaos. And there's an earlier
Speaker 1: source that came across that's a hundred years or so
Speaker 1: before this UH, the fourteenth century Latin encyclopedia of pagan
Speaker 1: gods in their relationships, known as Boccaccio's Gina Loggia deorum
Speaker 1: Gentilium or the Genealogy of the Gods of the Gentiles.
Speaker 1: This was written by the Italian poet Giovanni Boccaccio, and
Speaker 1: Boccaccio apparently was commissioned to sort of like put together this,
Speaker 1: this compendium of all the bad old gods, you know,
Speaker 1: the pagan stuff back then, and show the relationships to
Speaker 1: each other, to make a family tree. I found an
Speaker 1: addition and analysis by Ernest Hatch. Wilkins actually could not
Speaker 1: find an English translation of this. I think there might
Speaker 1: be one out there somewhere, but maybe it's not available online. UM.
Speaker 1: But anyway, Wilkins, in this nineteen edition from the University
Speaker 1: of Chicago Press, was discussing what is covered in this book,
Speaker 1: and apparently in attempting to create a family tree of
Speaker 1: all pagan gods, Boccaccio regards the dem o Organ as
Speaker 1: the original pagan deity, like the great great grandfather of
Speaker 1: Jupiter or Zeus, from which all other pagan deities are descended.
Speaker 1: So the family tree just starts right at the top Demogorgon. Alright,
Speaker 1: So if you're if you're looking at various pagan gods
Speaker 1: from a from this Christian standpoint where pagan gods are
Speaker 1: a bad thing and perhaps are actually demons, then later
Speaker 1: that's where we getting the idea that the Demogorgan is
Speaker 1: something primal and perhaps uh vile in nature, the very
Speaker 1: first god. How strange. Now, it turns out this isn't
Speaker 1: the first reference to a demo Organ and Christian literature,
Speaker 1: and we will find an earlier mention of it later on.
Speaker 1: But before we move on to that, I wanted to
Speaker 1: talk about what I think is one of the most
Speaker 1: interesting literary depictions of the demo Organ, definitely the most
Speaker 1: interesting I've come across, and it's in Percy bish Shelley's
Speaker 1: Prometheus Unbound. And this is of course Mary's husband yes, yes.
Speaker 1: The husband of the author of Frankenstein, Percy B. Shelley,
Speaker 1: was an English Romantic poet. This is a lyric drama,
Speaker 1: so it's a drama sort of written in verse. The
Speaker 1: play is a response to the Greek myth of Prometheus,
Speaker 1: and Shelly first published it in eighteen twenty and he
Speaker 1: explicitly presented it as this as a response to the
Speaker 1: play Prometheus Bound by the ancient Greek playwright Escalus. So
Speaker 1: the myth of Prometheus, you might know it well, but
Speaker 1: just to refresh, it goes something like this. Prometheus was
Speaker 1: one of a race of deities in ancient Greek religion
Speaker 1: known as the Titans, and the Titans came before the
Speaker 1: gods of Olympus. The Titans were offspring from the union
Speaker 1: of Uranus the heavens and Gaya the earth, and they
Speaker 1: ruled the earth until Chronus, the king of the Titans,
Speaker 1: was dethroned and his allies were defeated by his son
Speaker 1: Zeus and the Olympian gods. This is the War of
Speaker 1: the Titans, or the Titanum macky um. So Prometheus was
Speaker 1: one of the Titans, the son of the Titan Yapidus,
Speaker 1: but he took the side of Zeus in the war
Speaker 1: between the Olympians and the Titans, so he's still around
Speaker 1: among the Olympian gods. And Zeus, of course is a creep,
Speaker 1: as is Zeus is you just set your watch to it.
Speaker 1: He's going to be a creep in a jerk. Zeus
Speaker 1: doesn't want mortal humans down on earth like us, to
Speaker 1: have power and knowledge like the gods. So he takes
Speaker 1: this crucial step in this myth of hiding fire from
Speaker 1: the humans. He takes fire from the earth, he hides
Speaker 1: it amount Olympus. He says humans can't have it, and
Speaker 1: Prometheus the Titan instead is sympathetic to humans, and so
Speaker 1: what he does is he steals fire from where Zeus
Speaker 1: had hidden it on Olympus, and he takes it down
Speaker 1: to share with the mortals below. And this is a
Speaker 1: trope that we see in various mythologies. So for instance,
Speaker 1: there's a there's a nearly id intical role in Chinese
Speaker 1: myth of the fire driller, who essentially does the same thing.
Speaker 1: And when we see this again in so many stories,
Speaker 1: there's some sort of knowledge of you know, some sort
Speaker 1: of generally it's basically technological in nature and it is
Speaker 1: taken from the gods one way or the other, borrowed
Speaker 1: from the gods and bestowed be either bestowed to humans
Speaker 1: by some benevolent entity like Prometheus, or it is just
Speaker 1: straight up stolen from the gods by mortals. Well, I
Speaker 1: think I like the Chinese version even better because in
Speaker 1: that the god who brings the fire doesn't it explicitly
Speaker 1: brings the technological means to make fire, not just the
Speaker 1: fire itself, so the fire drill. Of course, you know,
Speaker 1: if you ever used a bow drill, it's not so easy,
Speaker 1: but you can make fire that way. I think Prometheus
Speaker 1: is usually depicted as bringing like a burning branch or
Speaker 1: something yeah like that. And granted that makes for a
Speaker 1: much better sculpture of painting, right this naked Titan with
Speaker 1: the with with this highly symbolic of a flaming torture branch.
Speaker 1: But through the years Prometheus's gift to the humans, I
Speaker 1: think it's more often interpreted along the lines of the
Speaker 1: fire driller, where he's it's not just fire, Prometheus symbolizes
Speaker 1: the power from the heavens, who betrays the leader god
Speaker 1: and brings down general technology and knowledge and power and
Speaker 1: succor to the humans, which which it's interesting that in
Speaker 1: Prometheus and the figure of Prometheus and the figure of
Speaker 1: Satan have a lot in common, right, Oh kind of yeah,
Speaker 1: because I mean, yes, Satan. One of the things that's
Speaker 1: interesting about the story of Satan and the Garden of
Speaker 1: Eden is that Satan does not lie to the humans.
Speaker 1: You know, he's presented as doing bad, but he he
Speaker 1: encourages them to h to violate God's law in the
Speaker 1: garden and eat from the tree that has forbidden to them.
Speaker 1: But he says, you can eat from this tree and
Speaker 1: you will not die as you've been told you will.
Speaker 1: And it it turns out it's true. They eat and
Speaker 1: it doesn't kill them, except you could make the argument
Speaker 1: that maybe, well maybe it makes them mortal in the
Speaker 1: long run. But I mean, basically, he's a disruptor, to
Speaker 1: put it in like Silicon Valley terms, right, Like he's
Speaker 1: trying to disrupt creation. Um. But so in the Greek myth,
Speaker 1: of course, Prometheus being nice to the humans and betraying Zeus,
Speaker 1: both the mortals and Prometheus are punished for this. The
Speaker 1: punishment for humans is a sequence of events that leads
Speaker 1: to the opening of Pandora's box, out of which flow
Speaker 1: all the hardships and frailty of human life. You get plague,
Speaker 1: you get toiled to survive all that stuff, and a
Speaker 1: little bit of hope left over. I guess. Yeah. In
Speaker 1: the bottom, uh, Prometheus is punished in a more explicit way.
Speaker 1: He is bound to a rock in the Caucasus Mountains,
Speaker 1: and not only has he chained up, but Zeus sends
Speaker 1: a nasty eagle to peck out his liver each day,
Speaker 1: and unfortunately, Prometheus is immortal, so his liver, as an
Speaker 1: immortal liver, just keeps regenerating, and the eagle can fly
Speaker 1: back and peck it out and eat it again the
Speaker 1: next day. It sounds like a bad deal. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: a bad deal, But I don't know as far as,
Speaker 1: like you know, offending Zeus goes. I guess it could
Speaker 1: have been worse. I guess. So. Now, in response to
Speaker 1: this myth, Shelly Percy bis Shelley in his play takes
Speaker 1: up the banner of Prometheus and he makes him a
Speaker 1: heroic figure in the play. And I would say this
Speaker 1: is not surprising because you could definitely say that Percy
Speaker 1: Shelley was of a revolutionary temperament theologically, politically and in literature.
Speaker 1: He was very against the old ways and the old
Speaker 1: powers and the authorities, and for sort of disruption and
Speaker 1: revolution and doing things in a new way. Now, the
Speaker 1: plot of Shelley's play is kind of abstract and sort
Speaker 1: of loaded with characters and images of ponderous meaningfulness. So,
Speaker 1: uh so I'm gonna try to do a short summary,
Speaker 1: leaving aside all the stuff that takes us in other
Speaker 1: directions and focusing on how the Dimmock organ comes in.
Speaker 1: So Prometheus is we find him in this state where
Speaker 1: he's bound up by Zeus. It's Jupiter in this play,
Speaker 1: but this same figure, the king of the gods, bound
Speaker 1: up and tortured by Jupiter for bringing knowledge to the mortals,
Speaker 1: and in Shelley's version it is explicitly not just fire
Speaker 1: but general knowledge and aid. And there are two other
Speaker 1: deities who are sympathetic to Prometheus and they want to
Speaker 1: help him. These are the sisters Asia and Panthea, and
Speaker 1: they attempt to free Prometheus from his bondage. Asia is
Speaker 1: a c nymph who is actually the beloved of Prometheus,
Speaker 1: and Panthea is her sister. Led by a dream, the
Speaker 1: two of them venture into the underworld, and they meet
Speaker 1: a character called the Demogorgan, who is portrayed as a
Speaker 1: kind of supremely powerful but also strangely passive and kind
Speaker 1: of inert force of fate and nothingness, who is also
Speaker 1: the son of Jupiter. Now, when they first come across
Speaker 1: uh the demo Organ, the character of Panthea describes him
Speaker 1: this way. She says, I see a mighty darkness filling
Speaker 1: the seat of power, and rays of gloom, dark round
Speaker 1: as light from the meridian sun, ungazed upon and shapeless,
Speaker 1: neither limb nor form nor outline. Yet we feel it
Speaker 1: is a living spirit. This is very different from the
Speaker 1: D and D demigorgan, right, Yeah, This is more like
Speaker 1: a primordial soup of the deity. Yeah. So they say
Speaker 1: that they since there is a living presence down in
Speaker 1: the abyss with them, and there's a mighty darkness, there's
Speaker 1: something in the gloom, but they can't see that it
Speaker 1: has any kind of shape or body. And then Panthea
Speaker 1: and Asia have a consultation with the Demogorgon. They asked
Speaker 1: him questions and the Demogorgan reveals to them that Jupiter
Speaker 1: created the world with all the good and the bad,
Speaker 1: that it entails, and also that even Jupiter himself is
Speaker 1: not all powerful, because, in the words of the Demogorgon quote,
Speaker 1: all spirits are enslaved, which serve things evil. And he
Speaker 1: says to Asia, thou knowest if Jupiter be such or No.
Speaker 1: Of course Asia knows that even though Jupiter is the
Speaker 1: chief god, Jupiter still does things that are evil. He
Speaker 1: serves evil, so there must be some kind of power
Speaker 1: over him, because all things that serve evil have some
Speaker 1: power over them. So what is even Jupiter subject to? Well?
Speaker 1: The demo organ answer is that too. Quote if the
Speaker 1: abyssum could vomit forth its secrets. But a voice is
Speaker 1: wanting the deep truth is imageless. For what would it
Speaker 1: avail to bid the gaze on the revolving world? What
Speaker 1: to bid? Speak fate, time, occasion, chance, and change? To
Speaker 1: these all things are subject but eternal love. Love. That's
Speaker 1: the fifth element. I guess it is. So even Jupiter,
Speaker 1: the ultimate god of everything, is subject to the power
Speaker 1: of love. Uh. Sounds kind of cheesy, but then but
Speaker 1: then Asia is like, Okay, well, I love Prometheus, so
Speaker 1: when will he be freed? Like when shall the destined
Speaker 1: hour arrive for Prometheus to be to be freed, and
Speaker 1: the dem o organ just says, behold exclamation point. So
Speaker 1: then immediately the Demogorgan travels to heaven where Jupiter is
Speaker 1: the Jupiter, the chief God, is in the middle of
Speaker 1: a big speech about how awesome he is, and the
Speaker 1: Demogorgan appears and then he just he just messes up Jupiter.
Speaker 1: He casts him down, He destroys the tyrant creator God,
Speaker 1: and then Prometheus can be freed by Hercules and reunited
Speaker 1: with Asia. That's quite a climax. Well, but it's not
Speaker 1: the climax. Somehow, This is not the end of the play.
Speaker 1: This is like act three of a five act play.
Speaker 1: After this, it seems I've never read the thing in full,
Speaker 1: I admit I've read some passages. It seems like after
Speaker 1: this there is a lot of like sort of um
Speaker 1: windy pontificating about love and virtues and what is good
Speaker 1: and right. But anyway, I think the Demogorgon's role in
Speaker 1: this story is very interesting. He's well, so I kept
Speaker 1: saying he but the Demogorgan. Actually, one thing that's been
Speaker 1: pointed out by scholars is that the Demogorgan has never
Speaker 1: given a gender. Uh In in Percy's play. Uh In
Speaker 1: and other sources. It is I think, assumed to be
Speaker 1: a he, but there's no there's no gender in Prometheus Unbound.
Speaker 1: So the Demogorgon, whoever they are, whatever they are, is
Speaker 1: depicted as in some kind of infernal phantom of the underworld,
Speaker 1: but also a liberating force for positive good overthrowing the
Speaker 1: tyrannical order of creation at the appointed hour. Uh. Though interestingly,
Speaker 1: I would say the demogorgan doesn't really seem to act
Speaker 1: out of their own volition. It's almost as if, um,
Speaker 1: they are somehow triggered into this act by the visit
Speaker 1: from Asia and Panthea, Like it's the love for Prometheus
Speaker 1: from Asia that was faded to proceed the appointed hour
Speaker 1: of Jupiter's destruction and the liberation of the world. Another
Speaker 1: thing that's interesting here about Shelley's work, So we talked
Speaker 1: about how the demogorgan does not actually come from Greek mythology,
Speaker 1: even though he's being retro insurgent into like classical mythology here.
Speaker 1: Greek and Roman kind of blended mythology here. Um, what
Speaker 1: would the word demo gorgon mean if it actually were
Speaker 1: a Greek word. Well, you've got the apparent roots demos
Speaker 1: and Gorgon like the people's gorgon like democracy, and then
Speaker 1: then Gorgon again, the monster, the of which Medusa is
Speaker 1: a member of the species. But actually the gorgon name
Speaker 1: for Medusa that has a root in Greek too. It's
Speaker 1: from the word gorgos, which means something like terrible or grim,
Speaker 1: you know, terror inducing. So the demon organ could literally
Speaker 1: be translated as the people's terror, like the terror of
Speaker 1: the masses of people, which is a very interesting intersection
Speaker 1: with the idea of like a long faded revolution to
Speaker 1: dethrone tyrant kings and unworthy gods. And of course we know,
Speaker 1: uh Percy Shelley was a supporter of the French Revolution.
Speaker 1: He believed in atheism, He believed in republicanism, not to
Speaker 1: be confused with like the Republican Party of today, like
Speaker 1: in the context of the time, that was representative government
Speaker 1: as opposed to monarchy. Um. And so I think it
Speaker 1: could be tempting to think of like the French Revolution
Speaker 1: as Shelley's demogorgon, the people's terror, like this inevitable swell
Speaker 1: of justice that washes tyrants from their thrones, but at
Speaker 1: the same time contains a terrifying and mighty darkness that
Speaker 1: can't really be seen or understood. I like that, the
Speaker 1: people's terror, I mean, yeah, I don't know. I don't
Speaker 1: know if if Shelley himself would have seen that, uh
Speaker 1: seen that comparison, because I think he may have had
Speaker 1: a more a less nuanced view of the guillotine saying.
Speaker 1: And of course this introduces the idea of the democ
Speaker 1: organ as as being like potential, like political candidate. Yeah,
Speaker 1: perhaps in in our upcoming elections. Yeah, if if you're
Speaker 1: if you're inclined to use a right in candidate demogor
Speaker 1: the just rage of the people that is without form
Speaker 1: or shape. Now, one more example of demogorgan popping up
Speaker 1: in uh in In in a work of literature, uh
Speaker 1: Is is a story essentially a short story from Voltaire
Speaker 1: Voltaire Live, seventeen seventy eight. And I've never read this
Speaker 1: one before. I'd read I'd read some works of Voltaire
Speaker 1: in the past. Um, but at anyway, this one is
Speaker 1: titled Plato's Dream, in which the Demogorgon is presented as
Speaker 1: a genie who witnesses the initial creation um of the
Speaker 1: world by this primordial force called the demi urge, and
Speaker 1: along with its fellow genies. Uh. The dem ogregan is
Speaker 1: granted a portion of the creation too, then uh, you know,
Speaker 1: to then finish into a functioning world. The demogorgan is
Speaker 1: given the task of creating Earth and uh, and is
Speaker 1: then critiqued and criticized by his fellow genies for making
Speaker 1: such a mixed up planet. And so there's a part
Speaker 1: here I want to quote where the Demogorgon responds to
Speaker 1: his critics and says, quote, it is an easy matter
Speaker 1: to find fault, good for olks, said the genie. But
Speaker 1: do you imagine it is so easy to form an
Speaker 1: animal who, having the gift of reason and free will,
Speaker 1: shall not sometimes abuse his liberty? Do you think that,
Speaker 1: in rearing between nine and ten thousand different plants, it
Speaker 1: is so easy to prevent some few from having noxious qualities?
Speaker 1: Do you suppose that with a certain quantity of water, sand,
Speaker 1: and mud, you could make a globe that you'd have
Speaker 1: neither seas nor deserts. As for you, my sneering friend,
Speaker 1: I think you have just finished the planet Jupiter. Let
Speaker 1: us see now what figure you make with your great
Speaker 1: belts and your long nights, with four moons to enlighten them.
Speaker 1: Let us examine your worlds and see whether the inhabitants
Speaker 1: you have made or exempt from follies or diseases. I
Speaker 1: guess we'll just have to wait for the Europa Probe
Speaker 1: to form us on to resolve this one. Right, So,
Speaker 1: there's not much to really I feel like uncover in
Speaker 1: this one, but there are there's at least one detail
Speaker 1: in this that will become critical. Uh. In our next
Speaker 1: section of the podcast, after we come back from a break,
Speaker 1: we will get into the true abyssal origins of the
Speaker 1: demo organ. All right, we're back. So we've charted the
Speaker 1: path of the demogorgan through much literature throughout especially the
Speaker 1: Christian world, and its role in some interesting sort of
Speaker 1: revolutionary sentiments as expressed through literature like Prometheus Unbound or
Speaker 1: in Voltaire story. But we're trying to find the origin
Speaker 1: of this. Where does the Demogorgon actually come from? If
Speaker 1: it doesn't come from classic Greek mythology. Well, the origin
Speaker 1: is discussed in a nineteen sixty four book titled The
Speaker 1: Discarded Image and Introduction to Medieval and Renaissance Literature, written
Speaker 1: by none other than C. S. Lewis. In fact, it
Speaker 1: was C. S. Lewis's last book before he died, and
Speaker 1: it deals with medieval cosmology. He turns our attention to
Speaker 1: the fourth book of the Debate by Stadius, the first.
Speaker 1: Stadius lived uh see forty five through and this is
Speaker 1: an epic poem written in Latin about the Theban cycle.
Speaker 1: And here the author alludes to a deity that shall
Speaker 1: not be named a quote sovereign of the threefold world.
Speaker 1: And then early Christian author Lactantius, who lived to fifty
Speaker 1: through wrote a commentary on this work and stated that
Speaker 1: Stadius was referring in in fact, to the Greek uh
Speaker 1: demi Organ there this or creator quote the god whose
Speaker 1: name it is unlawful to know. So we're talking so
Speaker 1: demi Organ, from which we get Demogorgon and uh. And
Speaker 1: then Lewis writes the following to sum this up quote,
Speaker 1: this is plain sailing the demi urge or workmen being
Speaker 1: the creator in the Timaeus. But there are two variants
Speaker 1: in the manuscripts. One is Morgana, the other Demogorgan. From
Speaker 1: the later of these corruptions, later ages evolved a completely
Speaker 1: new deity, Demogorgan, who was to enjoy a distinguished literary
Speaker 1: career in Boccaccio's geneology of the gods in Spencer, in
Speaker 1: Milton and in Shelley. This is perhaps the only time
Speaker 1: a scribal blunder underwent an apotheosis. Oh that's amazing, uh,
Speaker 1: and just so in a mythological context, of course, Apotheosis
Speaker 1: here reversed to the process of a human being being
Speaker 1: deified or something being made into a higher being, like
Speaker 1: a god or a star or heavenly object being taken
Speaker 1: up into heaven. Ancient kings were sometimes made into gods,
Speaker 1: and legendary heroes like Hercules, sometimes lived lives that were
Speaker 1: so worthy or so notable they were assumed into the
Speaker 1: pantheon and became god. So I think that's what he's
Speaker 1: saying here, is that somebody made a blunder in copying
Speaker 1: a manuscript or in translating, in understanding what a word
Speaker 1: meant in an older book, and through that scribal error
Speaker 1: we got a brand new deity such that, you know,
Speaker 1: a thousand years later, Boccaccio would say, this deity is
Speaker 1: the original Macdaddy deity, like the Number, like the Pagan
Speaker 1: God before all the other ones, and it just comes
Speaker 1: from a mistranslation or misreading of a word, right, And
Speaker 1: the word that was misread or a mistranslated is the
Speaker 1: dimmi urge, which which curiously enough, is cited in that
Speaker 1: Voltaire short story. Right, So it seems like Voltaire was
Speaker 1: kind of on the right track with the association here.
Speaker 1: Uh And and this is great because the demi urge
Speaker 1: is one of my favorite characters from any mythology in
Speaker 1: the world. But its role is complicated and varies across
Speaker 1: different traditions, including like Platonic schools of philosophy and religion
Speaker 1: in the you know, in the centuries following Plato's actual teachings,
Speaker 1: and in various Gnostic religions. I'll try to give a
Speaker 1: general summary that applies to multiple lines of tradition that
Speaker 1: have sort of similar attributes, but just be aware that
Speaker 1: there are a lot of different things that are all
Speaker 1: sort of versions of the demi urge. The word demi urge,
Speaker 1: as uh As Lewis mentioned, comes from the Greek. In
Speaker 1: its original form, is just a common noun that means
Speaker 1: something like craftsmen. You know, it's somebody who makes things, sculptor, maker, producer.
Speaker 1: But within these religious points of view or in in
Speaker 1: these philosophies and cosmologies, the demi Urge is a figure
Speaker 1: that creates the material world, is the creator, but apart
Speaker 1: from many other religions, this does not mean that he
Speaker 1: is the ultimate creator God or that he is good.
Speaker 1: He is, I would say, variously portrayed as is everything,
Speaker 1: ranging from kind of neutral and bumbling to actively malevolent.
Speaker 1: And to give an example from one strain of Gnosticism
Speaker 1: in the Gnostic text known as the Apoco Craffon of John,
Speaker 1: the dimmi Urge figure is this foolish, arrogant, wicked deity
Speaker 1: called yelled to both who creates the material bodies of humans.
Speaker 1: I think he also maybe creates the material world or
Speaker 1: some aspects of it um and humans. The humans that
Speaker 1: he created end up with souls when they are inadvertently
Speaker 1: contaminated by a spark or a light from the higher
Speaker 1: nobler plane of being known as the play a roma,
Speaker 1: which means something like fullness. And so you've got the
Speaker 1: ple roma, the fullness the real world, the real greater place,
Speaker 1: which is is immaterial in nature, and then you've got
Speaker 1: the the crappy material world that yelled to both made
Speaker 1: and now we're stuck in that thing. And yelda bo
Speaker 1: Oath resents the fact that humans have this spark from
Speaker 1: the ple roma and tries to fight against it. So
Speaker 1: to do so, he tries to keep humans confused and
Speaker 1: in the dark, so we're always fumbling around in this
Speaker 1: kind of baffling material hell which is our everyday world.
Speaker 1: And the Gnostics within this tradition believe that you can
Speaker 1: only escape the horrors of the material world by becoming
Speaker 1: privy to secret knowledge. That knowledge is the gns is
Speaker 1: the secret knowledge that explains the real world. And this
Speaker 1: is this is how you transcend the secret mythology, the
Speaker 1: secret rituals that give you access to the true, fuller
Speaker 1: reality behind this material illusion that controls our lives. And
Speaker 1: you can actually see a connection to Platonic philosophy. Even
Speaker 1: if this sounds like a very kind of strange, complicated
Speaker 1: theological take on on the creation of the world, it
Speaker 1: sounds a lot like Plato's cave, right, Yeah, yeah, it does.
Speaker 1: I mean, and also the basic spirit of this is
Speaker 1: also reflected in other faiths. I mean, the idea of
Speaker 1: there being a secret reality of their of there being
Speaker 1: some sort of cycle that we need to break free from.
Speaker 1: I mean, you see that in say Hindu and Buddhist traditions,
Speaker 1: and this idea of the spark of something more divine
Speaker 1: being like trapped in the mud of our bodies. How
Speaker 1: do you see that also reflected in even more recent
Speaker 1: creations like scientology. Oh totally, I think, yeah, absolutely. I
Speaker 1: would say gnostic theology reflects something that is a very
Speaker 1: common belief among humans, and you can see how often
Speaker 1: it appears, not just in other religions, but in all
Speaker 1: kinds of pop culture. I mean, echoes of the gnostic
Speaker 1: worldview bounce around constantly even through contemporary culture, whether we
Speaker 1: are conscious of it or not, and whether the creators
Speaker 1: of these pieces of culture or conscious of it or not.
Speaker 1: If I mean, if you've seen the matrix, you already
Speaker 1: have a sort of baseline understanding of gnostic cosmology. You
Speaker 1: just replace the evil computers and the agents with like
Speaker 1: cosmic realms and wicked ar cons like the demi Urge.
Speaker 1: The demi Urge sort of created a material matrix for
Speaker 1: us to live in, when in reality we are beings
Speaker 1: from this better, immaterial world and we have to find
Speaker 1: ways to escape and get back to it. So you're
Speaker 1: saying we are star dust, we are golden, we are
Speaker 1: billion year old card, and we have to find our
Speaker 1: way back to the garden. Yes, but you can only
Speaker 1: get back to the garden if you teach your children well,
Speaker 1: because it is the secret knowledge that is required to
Speaker 1: get you there. And most people are never going to
Speaker 1: be let in on the secret. They're just sort of
Speaker 1: going about their you know, their everyday life, toiling after
Speaker 1: material things without understanding that the material world is bad
Speaker 1: and fake. But I love this idea that the demi
Speaker 1: Urge being this creator of the material world who's at
Speaker 1: the at the very least bumbling and at worst some
Speaker 1: kind of devilish thing that that hates us and wants
Speaker 1: to trick us into living bad, wrong lives. I could
Speaker 1: see this mistranslation leading to the creation of the demi
Speaker 1: Organ figure being an excellent modern reworking of the Gnostic
Speaker 1: theology and being a part of that demi Urge's plan,
Speaker 1: Like the demmy Urge hides the true nosis about its
Speaker 1: wicked role in creating the material world and these filthy
Speaker 1: bodies of ours by causing a scribal error that hides
Speaker 1: its six distance, and instead it gets everybody focused on
Speaker 1: this fake, illusory demon or primordial god, the democ Organ
Speaker 1: and then you're scared of the democ organ or you're
Speaker 1: in all of its primeval darkness and shapeless presence, so
Speaker 1: you forget that you need to be seeking the noses
Speaker 1: to escape this wretched unreality. Uh and uh yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean if you're ultimately if you're trying to envision
Speaker 1: the ultimate evil power in a in a in a
Speaker 1: fantasy world. Uh yeah, this this sounds like the This
Speaker 1: is the Prince of Demons right here. You know. I
Speaker 1: weirdly kept thinking about the demi irriage when we were
Speaker 1: recently talking about that book I read by Philip Ball
Speaker 1: about quantum mechanics that it is called Beyond Weird. It's
Speaker 1: great book. It's a new book from this year last
Speaker 1: year about quantum mechanics. And one of the things that
Speaker 1: I think is really great about the book is it
Speaker 1: doesn't let you off the hook. It doesn't just let
Speaker 1: you say wow, quantum mechanics sure does seem weird and
Speaker 1: then kind of shake your head and move on. Like it.
Speaker 1: It tries to force you to look at it. It
Speaker 1: does the thing from like Clockwork Orange where it helds
Speaker 1: your eyelids open and says, no, look at this and
Speaker 1: pay attention. And you know, one of the things that
Speaker 1: you walk away from that with is that, Okay, you know,
Speaker 1: I'm not saying that physical reality isn't real, but it
Speaker 1: it makes you think that whatever way we're interacting with
Speaker 1: the world on a day to day basis, you know,
Speaker 1: the kind of reality we perceive with like objects you
Speaker 1: can touch and and see and know their place and
Speaker 1: all that, that is not the ultimate like arbiter of
Speaker 1: what reality is. Like, your perception of reality is not
Speaker 1: necessarily the most accurate way of understanding reality, even though it,
Speaker 1: you know, it seems to work good enough to get
Speaker 1: you through life, so how could it be wrong? But
Speaker 1: yet we you know, we do experiments in physics all
Speaker 1: the time. Now that that just show you over and
Speaker 1: over again that the way you have of making sense
Speaker 1: of the world is some kind of derivative, second order
Speaker 1: kind of grasp of physics. So you have no intuitive
Speaker 1: way of understanding quantum reality. You know, what happens before
Speaker 1: decoherence and everything, So that ultimately there is this there
Speaker 1: is this deeper truth in the universe that that we
Speaker 1: are not inherently privy to. We're only privy to it
Speaker 1: via UH technology, via science, UH these are essentially gnostic
Speaker 1: tools of elevation. That that's how you get the noses
Speaker 1: as you do a double slit experiment. Well, I've enjoyed this, uh,
Speaker 1: this journey that we've taken, you know, because it feels,
Speaker 1: i mean, part of it seems like the natural destination
Speaker 1: for an exploration of the democ organ, that it would
Speaker 1: tie back to this primordial being that's wrapped in gnostic mystery.
Speaker 1: But on the other hand, I love that it also
Speaker 1: hinges incredibly upon just a scribal blunder. You know that
Speaker 1: it's a it's it's this thing that was actually you know,
Speaker 1: it's never really real in the way that we uh
Speaker 1: we might you know, attribute it as having been. It
Speaker 1: was never actually uh an entity that was worshiped or
Speaker 1: even factored into any actual myth cycle. No, it is
Speaker 1: wholly without shape and out of the darkness. It is
Speaker 1: the figure that Asia and Panthea go to visit, and
Speaker 1: you know, it just waits there until it's hour comes
Speaker 1: round at last. Yeah. Yeah, And I also love how
Speaker 1: we got to let's see if we got to to
Speaker 1: turn to Joni Mitchell, Crosby Stills and Nash uh c
Speaker 1: s Lewis Um Milton and of course Gary Gygax to
Speaker 1: understand it all a wonderful motley crew for those wooden
Speaker 1: ships on the water. All right, well, we're gonna close
Speaker 1: it out right there, But obviously I imagined a number
Speaker 1: of you have thoughts about the demogorgan, either the Netflix
Speaker 1: version or the Dungeons and Dragons incarnation, or perhaps some
Speaker 1: of the literary uh incarnations that we've discussed here as well,
Speaker 1: and of course we would love to hear from you.
Speaker 1: But stay tuned because again, this entire month of October
Speaker 1: is going to be Halloween themed as it has been
Speaker 1: in the past. Uh, We're gonna have all new monstrosities
Speaker 1: to consider. Uh tying in as much science as we
Speaker 1: possibly can. Have we ever done an episode on the
Speaker 1: science of Medusa snakes for hair? Is there's something there? Something? Oh?
Speaker 1: I don't know. I mean, I've I've covered at least
Speaker 1: blogged about Medusa back in the day, and I think
Speaker 1: I did maybe a monster science video about Medusa. But
Speaker 1: that would be an interesting one to to to explore again,
Speaker 1: because the Medusa is a is a fascinating monster. And
Speaker 1: then some of the things we've done with the Medusa
Speaker 1: are kind of monstrous. Uh yeah, I could. I would
Speaker 1: be up for a Medusa exploration. Bring it all right.
Speaker 1: In the meantime, if you want to support the show,
Speaker 1: the best thing you can do is make sure you
Speaker 1: have subscribed and then rate and review us wherever you
Speaker 1: have the power to do so. And don't forget about invention.
Speaker 1: Monsters are great, but the real monster is always human
Speaker 1: endeavor and human invention, and that's what we explore. The
Speaker 1: invention is a journey through human techno. His really, it's
Speaker 1: a it's a celebration or at least a contemplation in
Speaker 1: some in many cases, of the fire of Prometheus. Yeah.
Speaker 1: The things we made, how they made us, where they
Speaker 1: came from. Yeah, So make sure you have checked that
Speaker 1: show out as well, and make sure you subscribe, rate
Speaker 1: and review helps us out huge, thanks as always to
Speaker 1: our excellent audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson. If you have
Speaker 1: any feedback on this episode and we'd like to share
Speaker 1: it with us, If you'd like to get in touch
Speaker 1: just to say hi or suggest a topic for the future,
Speaker 1: you can email us at contact at stuff to Blow
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