About Taim, 100th time

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Tazren Talamar said:
But people haven't been creating them en masse. Rand seems to be fairly unique; there haven't (iirc) been any mention of other male channelers hearing voices that literally tell them how to create new weaves. And women certainly don't seem to just make them up with no effort. Isn't it more likely that a Forsaken took an interest in Taim, offered him immunity and then passed on some knowledge? Or that a Forsaken usurped his identity. Considering that they Forsaken have made attempts at controlling most nations in the known world, why wouldn't they be going for the Black Tower as well? It would be strange if they didn't.

Seems more unlikely that he'd be a copy of Rand.

Actually, we know from Cadsuane that Rand is not necessarily unique in that regard.

From Crown of Swords
The woman looked at the battered tea things as if she had all the time in the world. "Now you know," she said at last, calm as ever, "that I know your future, and your present. The Light's mercy fades to nothing for a man who can channel. Some see that and believe the Light denies those men. I do not. Have you begun to hear voices, yet?"

"What do you mean?" he asked slowly. He could feel Lews Therin listening.

The tingle returned to his skin, and he very nearly channeled, but all that happened was that the teapot rose and floated to Cadsuane, turning slowly in the air for her to examine. "Some men who can channel begin to hear voices." She spoke almost absently, frowning at the flattened sphere of silver and gold. "It is part of the madness. Voices conversing with them, telling them what to do." The teapot drifted gently to the floor by her feet. "Have you heard any?"

What Cadsuane is describing is a rough overview of the interaction between Rand and the LTT voice in his head. Considering that she expected Rand to be hearing voices it seems like it a common afflication among male channelers. While she doesn't say what the voices tell the men to do, I don't see why just that piece of the madness should be unique for Rand.
 
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IIRC, Semirhage indicated that there were people even during the AoL that heard real voices, as in, their past lives. That other make channelers hear voices doesn't mean everyone's other voice is real. Hearing voices is pretty much madness 101, isn't it?
 
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I'd have to agree with Tazren on this one. Rand was unique in that when Nynaeve checked his mind, she found the telltale black hooks indicating the taint, but white counterparts that seemed to mesh/alter the black hooks. Your average male channeller didn't have the creator on his side counteracting the effect of the taint.

While Cadsuane did mention that crazy male channellers heard voices, that doesn't mean that they all hear a singular persona from their past life which attempts to gain control of the power and channel. The taint seems to affect everyone differently, which is natural considering that the Dark One himself is chaos incarnate.
 
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Speaking of voices:

Semirhage said:
"He's insane /../ Graendal could explain it better than I. Madness was her specialty. I will try, however. You know of people who hear voices in their heads? Sometimes, very rarely, the voices they hear are voices of past lives. Lanfear claimed he [Rand] knew things from our own Age, things only Lews Therin Telamon could know. Clearly, he is hearing Lews Therin's voice. It makes no difference that his voice is real, however, In fact, that makes his situation worse. Even Graendal usually failed to achieve reintegration with someone who heard a real voice. I understand the descent into terminal madness can be ... abrupt."

It is Semirhage speaking, so obviously, we can't be 100% sure that she's speaking the truth. But it adds up with what we've seen. Rand seems to be having pretty severe reactions to his madness, and it's continued after the taint was purged from saidin. If Taim actually heard a real voice, wouldn't he also be worse off? Especially considering the fact that he's been channeling for much longer than Rand.

Also, I would like to add, that while Rand certainly did channel on his own in the early books, he didn't channel reliably or skillfully until after Asmodean started teaching him. Taim has been channeling pretty well, from what we've seen. Otherwise he wouldn't have been able to teach the other Asha'man so well.
 
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Tazren, I'm going to take a few minutes during my lunch break at work to respond to you. Here's one of your questions,
I've always been wondering if that were possible. To seal a human in a stasis box, and have them released now, in the current age.

The answer is pretty much a definite yes. Remember when Moghedien was trapped in a vacuole for an interterminant time by Ishamael, reliving the same sad scene over and over again? I believe that in that chapter or another one, it is made reference that stassis boxes are very similar to vacuoles. The difference being that vacuoles are natural, and can open or close themselves off seemingly randomly. That's one reason why Moghedien had such fear at the time. She didn't know if her punishment would end up being an eternity with the vacuole closing itself off before Ishamael came back to retrieve her.

As for the Gholam being in a stassis box, that's been aluded to in the books but never actually stated outright. A Gholam is a living creature (although a shadowspawn). I'm not sure how quickly a Gholam would age, but a thousand year life span would be pretty much unbelievable. Since they don't seem capable of reproducing, I think the Gholam in the current age must have been in a stassis box in order to have survived from the previous age.

So if a stassis box can work for a shadowspawn, and a vacuole can work for a human... it stands to logic that a stassis box can hold regular humans as well.

Secondly, let me respond to your point about Mazrim Taim being just a normal current age, false dragon at the end of The Great Hunt. You say,

The general idea is that the Taim we see isn't actually Mazrim Taim. It's Ishamael posing as him. Meaning that somewhere, somehow, Ishamael got rid of him and replaced him. Which probably wouldn't have been difficult for him to do.

1) Taim would have had to have had a fairly good knowledge of the power prior to his capture in order to succeed as a false dragon. When he and Davram Bashere spoke for the first time, we hear Taim taunting him concerning what he had done to Bashere's family and followers during his time as a false dragon. Rand has to break the two up because Taim is instigating Bashere. I can't quote the book right now, but from that conversation, we learn two things. #1, "That" Taim knew intimate knowledge of "the original" Taim's activities, enough of which to thoroughly convince Bashere of his identity. #2 "The original" Taim had to have a pretty extensive knowledge of the power in order to pull off those activities, and the leadership of his army in the first place. Taim doesn't strike me as a natural leader, unlike Logain. He had to enforce his rule and gather followers by proving his magical abilities, and forcing others to his will. He did not just gather such an army through charisma alone.

So if the original Taim had an extensive knowledge of the power, where did he get it? In the first book, The Eye of the World, the main characters hear rumors of false dragons in the world creating chaos and turning men against each other. At this point in the story, no Chosen has been fully released. Ishamael is still partially trapped. Aginor and Balthamel only get released toward the very end of the book. Ishamael gets fully released sometime during the book. Although we don't know exactly when each Chosen is released, we can guess from Aginor and Balthamel's appearance that they were only recently released due to their decrepit appearances. Ishamael is a bit trickier, but in one of the Padon Fain POV chapters, he remembers chasing Moraine's group in the Eye of the World. At that point he remembers Ishamael appearing to the Myrdraal in charge of the chase (right before Shadar Logoth) as sort of a shadowy, version of himself. That shadowy description seemed to me at the time to be Robert Jordan's way of pointing out that Ishamael was only partially there. In other words, he's still partially trapped at that point. Remember that the only time Ishamael speaks to the boys is in their dreams, by somehow pulling them into tel'aranrhiod.

I'll send some more stuff to you at a later time, work calls.
 
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I would love to see more about when the Forsaken were released into the world.

I am thinking some of your theories might be a little off as to when they were released. Did Ishmael get out a little sooner than the others? Very possibly since he was never completely imprisoned. You say Aginor and Balthamel only got out at the end of the Eye, but what about the others?

I am thinking Ishy got out sooner because of the partial imprisonment. I understand that your thoughts on the "shadowy" Ishy (pardon the pun) at Shadar Logoth and him only being partially out, but I am thinking he was fully out and chose to appear the way he did. The time difference between Shadar Logoth and the Eye is not all that great. If he got out before the others, I would expect it to be more of a gap.

We also know that Lanfear got out about the same time as Aginor and Balthamel. In the beginning of the Great Hunt, trollocs or Myrdraal, I forget which, wrote "Daughter of the Night" she walks again on the dungeon walls in Fal Dara. Again, very short time period between the other events.

Personally, I believe all the forsaken, with the exception of Ishy got out of the prison at the same time, regardless of what Moiraine or other Aes Sedai think. All the timing is just too close together. Heck, truth be told, Ishy may have gotten out at the same time also. One mass prison break. That would explain the "shadowy" Ishy and the close appearances of the other forsaken.

I am sure someone can give more definitely timelines. This is just a late night theory from a very tired poster...
 
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1) Taim would have had to have had a fairly good knowledge of the power prior to his capture in order to succeed as a false dragon.

That's not true. Some False Dragons haven't been able to channel the OP at all. And Taim can channel strongly. Everything he needs to do to be an even more successful false dragon is blow things up. That's pretty basic, at least if you're strong with Fire and Earth. You don't have to know lots of fancy, complex weaves. You certainly don't need to know how to test people for the ability to channel, for instance.

His knowledge of the One Power wouldn't have to be considerable at all. He could be a wilder with a few tricks (which could include killing stuff) and be wildly successful as a False Dragon.

So if the original Taim had an extensive knowledge of the power, where did he get it? In the first book, The Eye of the World, the main characters hear rumors of false dragons in the world creating chaos and turning men against each other. At this point in the story, no Chosen has been fully released. Ishamael is still partially trapped.

Well, first: he could be Ishamael. Ishamael could've killed Taim at some point after he was captured, and started posing as him. Problem solved.

If Taim is working for Ishamael, he could've gotten that knowledge when Ishamael was partially released. Ishamael was free as much as 20 years prior to EotW, since he was involved in the events during New Spring. He killed the Head of the Black Ajah, and raised Alviarin in her stead, for instance.
 
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Tazren, I'm with you on this. I'm favoring your Taim is working for Ishamael theory most for one very basic reason. Taim had to have something to keep him from going mad for all the years he was channeling before he set himself up as a False Dragon. It's not something you can choose to fight off ... the madness is inevitable. The only way out of it is with the buffer that the DO offers the male Forsaken ... which also explains how Taim got so many recruits to the shadow. Offering freedom from madness with the massive power that comes from the One Power would be very alluring to anyone having to deal with the taint.
 
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Tazren, I think you are misunderstanding me. During The Eye of the World, Mazrim Taim simply could not have been Ishamael. The theory you follow says that sometime after The Great Hunt, Ishamael replaced Taim since he couldn't have been in two places at once (Ishamael fighting Rand above Falme and Mazrim Taim being thrown from his horse). My comment about Mazrim Taim's knowledge is twofold, but still prior to The Great Hunt.

Let me quote some of the chapter where Rand first meets Mazrim Taim in the Lord of Chaos.

Rand had clung to sanity for close to two years, so far. Yet in front of him he had a man who must have managed it for ten or fifteen. That alone was worth something.

So, part of the reason that Rand wants to meet with Taim is to find out how he stayed sane all that time. It's an abberration. Of course, you could knock a year off since at this point in the story you're claiming that this is just Ishamael posing as Taim, but your original Taim would have had to be able to stay sane for 9-14 years prior to the switch. I believe that Taim probably had one of those black lines connecting him to the dark one which shielded his mind from the madness. Of course, posters who think that Taim was just a regular false dragon from the current age probably think that he's insane at this point, just really good at hiding it.

Taim claimes his identity in the following quote:

The prisoner's mouth quirked in what might have been the beginning of a smile, and he rubbed his chin. "I shaved, Bashere." His voice held more than a hint of mockery. "It is hot this far south, or had you not noticed? Hotter than it should be, even here. Do you want proof of me? Shall I channel for you?" His dark eyes flickered to Rand, then back to Bashere, whose face was growing darker by the minute. "Perhaps not that, not now. I remember you. I had you beat at Irinjavar, until those visions appeared in the sky. But everyone knows that. What does everyone not know, that you and Mazrim Taim will?" Focused on Bashere, he seemed unaware of his guards, or their swords still hovering near his ribs. "I hear you hid what happened to Musar and Hacharai and their wives." The mockery was gone; he was just relating what had happened, now. "They shouldn't have tried to kill me under a parley flag. I trust you found them good places as servants? All they'll really want to do now is serve and obey; they won't be happy otherwise. I could have killed them. They all four drew daggers.

So Taim used some complex weaves... some sort of compulsion prior to the battle at Falme, and he has knowledge of a secret event that was hushed up by Bashere (once again an event occurring prior to the battle at Falme. It was certainly enough to convince Bashere of his identity. Ishamael would never have had knowledge of these occurrances unless he were somehow in communication with Taim while Ishamael was still partially trapped.

If your theory is correct in that Mazrim Taim was killed and switched, then Ishamael would have had to have found Taim (while still partially trapped), spent the time to teach him how to channel, advised him on his war efforts, and learned of Taim's incident with Bashere's followers. Afterwards, according to your theory, darkfriends without Ishamael's knowledge would have had to capture Taim and suck his soul out (possibly with a Draghkar) in order to retain Taim's body for Ishamael's rebirth. Later when "the replaced Taim" meets with Rand in Caemlyn's palace, he'd have to be a good enough actor to fool Bashere into believing that he is the real Taim.

That just seems unreallistic.
 
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I think someone who could pull off posing as the Dark One himself might also be a good actor. Anyway, I don't think he'd need to have Taim's mannerisms right or anything like that; simply knowing those details would satisfy Bashere. And I think any Forsaken would know how to extract information from a mere mortal.

As for Taim knowing Compulsion - people who learn to channel on their own have their tricks. Verin notes that in fact quite many had some form of persuasion (making their fathers buy them jewellery/dresses/stuff, etc) as their trick, although they're made to forget it when they join the Tower. I could easily imagine a person like Taim coming up with a crude form of Compulsion that hits like a hammer so that the results are as drastic and irreversible as what he describes.

...Now, I don't want Taim to be Moridin/Ishamael in disguise, and I refuse to believe it until I see it written in the books themselves, but so far the possibility is very real I'm afraid. :look:
 
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I still don't think so. If Ishamael is really now Taim, then who is Moridin? He can't be both. They both have very busy lives in very different places. Demandred hasn't died, and has no need for rebirth into a new body. He can't be Moridin. Moridin exhibits many of the traits that only Ishamael has. Plus it just doesn't make sense for the Dark One to raise a newcomer to the title of Nae'blis.

No, even if you want to believe a set of improbable circumstances that could result in Ishamael being brought back into Taim's body, the mannerisms and traits of Moridin match too closely with Ishamael's.
 
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Tehmpus said:
I still don't think so. If Ishamael is really now Taim, then who is Moridin? He can't be both. They both have very busy lives in very different places. Demandred hasn't died, and has no need for rebirth into a new body. He can't be Moridin. Moridin exhibits many of the traits that only Ishamael has. Plus it just doesn't make sense for the Dark One to raise a newcomer to the title of Nae'blis.

No, even if you want to believe a set of improbable circumstances that could result in Ishamael being brought back into Taim's body, the mannerisms and traits of Moridin match too closely with Ishamael's.

Of course he can be both. We don't really know exactly what Moridin does, aside from attending the odd Forsaken gathering. We do know that he's busy with something, important enough that he wasn't at the Cleansing, for instance. That could well be posing as Taim. Taim's the boss at the Black Tower - I'm sure he could find the time to slip away and meet other Forsaken.

And I agree with Ilenora - if Taim is a wilder, it would make sense that he'd have some form of crude compulsion. And that he could blow things up. But compare that to the hundreds and hundreds of weaves that exist, and the very specific tricks he knows, like detecting if someone can learn to channel. How did he figure it out? It's very specific.

Another piece of purely circumstantial evidence is this:

ToM said:
"And you see," Taim said, walking with one hand folded - making a fist - behind his back.

Not real evidence. But it's interesting, given Moridin's link with Rand and how Moridin felt the loss of the hand.
 
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Tehmpus said:
I still don't think so. If Ishamael is really now Taim, then who is Moridin? He can't be both. They both have very busy lives in very different places. Demandred hasn't died, and has no need for rebirth into a new body. He can't be Moridin. Moridin exhibits many of the traits that only Ishamael has. Plus it just doesn't make sense for the Dark One to raise a newcomer to the title of Nae'blis.

No, even if you want to believe a set of improbable circumstances that could result in Ishamael being brought back into Taim's body, the mannerisms and traits of Moridin match too closely with Ishamael's.
Oh... I think we might be talking about slightly different things here. You're thinking of Ishamael being resurrected as Taim, the way Aginor & Balthamel were resurrected as Osan'gar & Aran'gar, right? No, I don't think that's likely, indeed. What we're talking about (or at least I am and I assume Tazren etc are as well) is Ishamael being resurrected as Moridin (which seems to be a fact by now) and the resulting Moridin-Ishy posing as Taim, the same way as, say, Graendal was posing as a noblewoman in Arad Doman.

Myeah, and if that was what you meant all along, Tehmpus, and I just misunderstood that quoted part, I apologise for butting in. :look:
 
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As did I. When I say that Taim could be Moridin, I mean that Moridin uses the OP to disguise himself and appear as Taim.
 
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Ok Ilenora & Tazren, I understand your viewpoint now a bit better. I was trying to respond to the theory proposed by the thread originator who believes that Moridin is actually Demandred (according to the first post).

Well, if you think that Ishamael is just magically disguising himself as Taim (instead of being transmigrated into his body), then the theory definitely becomes more doable. Ishamael is definitely pretty good at disguise making. After all, look at what he did to Jain Farstrider.

I don't have the books with me right now, but if I were you, I'd look at the chapter where Rand meets Moridin and their streams of balefire cross (Rand's one power with Moridin's true power). If the Lews Therin part of Rand's mind can somehow detect Ishamael's soul in a similar way to how the other servants of the wheel (heroes of the horn) can recognize each other, then he should have a similar reaction to Moridin as he did when Rand met Taim for the first time. After all, your theory claims that Moridin/Taim/Ishamael are all the same person. If that's true, then Lews Therin should be freaking out at Moridin just as much as when he met Mazrim Taim in Caemlyn.
 
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Actually, Lews Therin is conspicuously absent the entire chapter. Rand even calls out to him during the fight with Sammael, with no response. So that doesn't really say anything.

But even so ... the doubt here is whether or not Taim is Moridin, isn't it? That Moridin is Ishamael is pretty much an open secret. There's plenty of evidence to prove, none to oppose it. Which makes a potential reaction of LTT's to Moridin sort of irrelevant, unless it blantatly states his identity. It has no bearing on Taim's true identity. If anything, LTT's reaction to Taim alone could suggest that he's a Forsaken in disguise. It was what pointed lots of people to the Taimandred theory before that got refuted.
 
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Tehmpus said:
Ok Ilenora & Tazren, I understand your viewpoint now a bit better. I was trying to respond to the theory proposed by the thread originator who believes that Moridin is actually Demandred (according to the first post).


Two posts below the first one:

Corwin Matheos said:
And yes, I concede that Moridin is probably not Demandred, but I really like this Moridin = Taim = Ishamael theory.

:laugh:

But the theory I see it now is:

1. Ishy got killed.
2. Real Taim got "rescued".
3. Ishy got Taim's body.
4. Ishy goes and presents himself to Rand, LTT goes berserk, Bashere is suspicious if he is Taim or not, he doesn't look exactly the same.
5. Ishy distorts his image when presenting himself to other Forsaken (and in Shadar Logoth), he doesn't want them to know that he is impersonating Taim. They mistrust each other and keep all secrets from each other, so this makes sense. Greandel started planing how to takes his place immediately, for example.

About Demandred - I have no idea anymore, except that I have some feeling he is also part of this plot in some way.
 
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But that's much more unlikely than the simpler theory of:

1. Ishy got killed.
2. Ishy is reincarnated into the body used by Moridin.
3. Taim escapes.
4. Taim is killed by Ishy, who then impersonates him.

Your theory requires much more precise timing.
 
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I believe DO is perfectionist and that he has perfect timing. :)

Besides, Ishy had to know Taim in order to impersonate him by making weaves, no one knows Moridin, he could just make whatever weave he likes, no one would know the difference.
 
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Ishy would have known Taim if he killed Taim ... he could just have interrogated him before killing him. And there's nobody who really knows Taim, so he wouldn't even have to dig up a whole lot of information.

I don't think that the DO has perfect timing. Considering the bodies he gave Aginor and Balthamel, it doesn't appear to be an easy thing to match people to new bodies. Just feels a lot simpler for Ishy to have killed Taim, in that case.
 
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