Dalinar, the pious man or a discussion on attributes

[Guest]

Yesterday, I was bored so I started googling the different primary attributes for the Radiants. I was mostly interested in reading the definition of each terms. That may seem trivial, but as a non-english speaking person such as myself, there sometimes is a gap between what I believe a word really means and its proper definition. Albeit, the same could be said about French as there are many words I end up having an idea of the general meaning without knowing the exact definition.

 

I thought the google definition of "pious" was most interesting.

 

pi·ous

 

adjective

 

devoutly religious.

synonyms:religious, devout, God-fearing, churchgoing, spiritual, prayerful, holy, godly, saintly, dedicated, reverent, dutiful, righteous

 

making a hypocritical display of virtue.

"there'll be no pious words said over her"

synonyms:

sanctimonious, hypocritical, insincere, self-righteous, holier-than-thou, pietistic, churchy;

 

(of a hope) sincere but unlikely to be fulfilled.

synonyms:forlorn, vain, doomed, hopeless, desperate;

 

I have always interpreted pious as frugal, strict about laws, rigid in a mink-like way etc. Seems I was partially right. There appears to have a huge religious connection to the word pious, which I found surprising as Dalinar did not struck me as a particularly religious person. I found him strict about his Ways of Kings book and on how people should behave in times of war, but religious?

 

Sure he as visions of the Almighty, but we do not see him visit the Ardents all too often and he seemed not to care much about Vorinism or so I have always thought. In terms of religious matters, Shallan appears to be the most devout of all characters.

 

If we move on to the other definition, we start seeing words such "hypocritical", "self-righteous" and "holier-than-thou". Whereas I can easily tie the last two to Dalinar, I found hypocritical to be less fitting. That is unless we get to see another facet of Dalinar, which would be most interesting. I have always thought Dalinar was slightly too obsessed with his rules and that he needed to let go some of it.  As for being hypocrite, I guess I could tie it to his past as the Blackthorn. He was (and still is) a warlord tyran who killed and raged war across a country in order to unite Alethkar, but he does not tolerate any false conduct, even a minor one, on his sons and personal entourage. So he got away with it, but his son will mostly likely pay the highest price. That is slightly hypocrite.

 

Third definition mentions vain and doomed and I believe we may see that in Dalinar at some point. He is obsessed with the unity of Alethkar, all his actions have been geared towards that goal, but it may be clouding his judgement. I think the second oath to the Bondsmith will go in that direction: uniting them does not mean bringing them by force under his name and forcing them to behave as he wished. He needs to cut everyone some slack and he needs to realize some things are more important that Alethkar. I could also see the second oath having to do with his family: unite them, but start with your relative or something along the sorts. I guess I am not too good to come up with oaths...

 

So what do you guys think? Google definition is fun. We could do others.

[Chrono she/her]

With regards to Dalinar's backstory, I see him as a man struggling to find redemption for doing some truly horrible stuff. Doing those sorts of things, along with fighting so hard to try and reunify Alethkar, is probably what cracked him enough to become a Bondsmith. Does this mean he is a hypocrite? Yeah, but in that sense we're all hypocrites for trying to be better than what we are. 

 

I think you're also implying some things about Dalinar's sons that are false. Adolin, once he understood the meaning of the Codes and why they were so important, was happy to follow them. Renarin never complained at all. Dalinar's real problem there was that he just expected them to follow them without giving them the reason why. He did try to explain to them why it was important, but until Adolin had a personal experience, he didn't truly understand it. Once that was done, they were willing to follow the Codes.

 

I also think that Dalinar definitely has some "Holier than thou" problems, as exemplified by him basically taking control over the kingdom. He thinks that he is the best one to solve the problem, so he takes over. I'm really hoping that one of his oaths is "I will let men choose for themselves the path of goodness, instead of me forcing them to do what I want because I know better." However, as Wit says, maybe a tyrant is what Alethkar needs right now. The Alethi have this mindset of force being a ruling pattern: since Dalinar openly became a military leader bigger than Elhokar, people now respect him and listen to him (except for Sadeas and his cronies, but that's another story). 

 

Believe it or not, Dalinar is very similar to Nohadon from ancient times. Nohadon unified the Silver Kingdoms by force, making them work together in order to face the Desolations. It was only after the danger had passed that he was able to peacefully unite them. I'm actually convinced that Nohadon was a Bondsmith, and that Dalinar is kind of repeating his history. Either way, Dalinar has a lot to learn still, which is kind of the point. We've still got three books of character growth for him, so I'm expecting great things for him to still happen. If he is still living by the end of the first part of the series.

[Kurkistan he/him]

Also, if you keep reading the definitions, an older definition of "pious" comes to light:

 

archaic

dutiful or loyal, especially toward one's parents

 

If you disregard the second clause there I would say "dutiful or loyal" fits Dalinar so Stormfathering well that the dictionaries on Roshar might as well have his face there instead of even bothering with a definition.

Edited May 31, 2014 by Kurkistan

[Guest]

 

I think you're also implying some things about Dalinar's sons that are false. Adolin, once he understood the meaning of the Codes and why they were so important, was happy to follow them. Renarin never complained at all. Dalinar's real problem there was that he just expected them to follow them without giving them the reason why. He did try to explain to them why it was important, but until Adolin had a personal experience, he didn't truly understand it. Once that was done, they were willing to follow the Codes.

 

I meant that Dalinar most probably had the opportunity to live his youth. Albeit, he made mistakes, but he did not have a leash on him at all times, nor did he have a father always frowning looking down at his every gestures. Also, he ragged war all across the country and had most likely killed many prominent high ranking lighteyes just to get his way. Now these are only assumptions, but I assumed as much based on the reputation the Blackthorn has. My point was that Adolin will most likely get prosecuted for killing one hateful murderer highprince whereas Dalinar most probably got away killing many non murderer highprinces. In a way, this is slightly hypocrite as he sees the laws or the code as a finality in itself. Either you go with it or you sink.

 

I agree with you he does not bother to explain things to anyone: he just expects people to do as he says because he is Dalinar. He does not listen to others counsel much either. How many times as Adolin tried to warn him about Sadeas? He never listened. He did not try to see his son's very valid points. Albeit, he did seem to learn as he tried to verify Kaladin's about Amaram instead of just brushing it away.

 

 

I also think that Dalinar definitely has some "Holier than thou" problems, as exemplified by him basically taking control over the kingdom. He thinks that he is the best one to solve the problem, so he takes over. I'm really hoping that one of his oaths is "I will let men choose for themselves the path of goodness, instead of me forcing them to do what I want because I know better." However, as Wit says, maybe a tyrant is what Alethkar needs right now. The Alethi have this mindset of force being a ruling pattern: since Dalinar openly became a military leader bigger than Elhokar, people now respect him and listen to him (except for Sadeas and his cronies, but that's another story).

 

Can't disagree with you here. Dalinar needs to learn to listen to others. He needs to realize he is not the pantheon of virtue and he can actually be wrong about many many things. Besides, I do not think he always knows better...

[Chrono she/her]

 

I agree with you he does not bother to explain things to anyone: he just expects people to do as he says because he is Dalinar. He does not listen to others counsel much either. How many times as Adolin tried to warn him about Sadeas? He never listened. He did not try to see his son's very valid points. Albeit, he did seem to learn as he tried to verify Kaladin's about Amaram instead of just brushing it away.

 

Dalinar needs to learn to listen to others. He needs to realize he is not the pantheon of virtue and he can actually be wrong about many many things. Besides, I do not think he always knows better...

 

Dalinar often doesn't know better. However, we can see that he's learning from his mistakes in Book One. For one, he trusts Adolin more: when Dalinar plans to meet Eshonai to discuss peace, he listens to Adolin's complaints (albeit sufferingly) and lets Adolin go in his place. As you mentioned, he sort of believes Kaladin when he claims that Amaram killed his men, instead of pushing it away. However, I think his current big issue is taking over things when he should just let the people in charge do their job.

 

An argument can be made that Elhokar was an exemption case: he was legitimately a bad king and someone who knew what they were doing needed to step in to get the job done. However, that mentality is dangerous. If Dalinar is justified in taking control from Elhokar, who's to say that he can't take control from every Highprince and basically become a dictator of Alethkar? Dalinar needs to step back and delegate work. He can't just do everything by himself. 

 

However, considering how many people have outright told him that he's taking too much control and basically becoming a dictator, I think he will learn this lesson soon.

[Guest]

Dalinar often doesn't know better. However, we can see that he's learning from his mistakes in Book One. For one, he trusts Adolin more: when Dalinar plans to meet Eshonai to discuss peace, he listens to Adolin's complaints (albeit sufferingly) and lets Adolin go in his place. As you mentioned, he sort of believes Kaladin when he claims that Amaram killed his men, instead of pushing it away. However, I think his current big issue is taking over things when he should just let the people in charge do their job.

 

I found he seems to have an easier time to trusts outsiders than his own son. He is more lenient towards Kal and inclined to believe him. It took A LOT of persuasion for Dalinar to accept to have Adolin go in his steed. In fact, it required Kaladin to assess it was a good plan before he could say yes.

 

 

An argument can be made that Elhokar was an exemption case: he was legitimately a bad king and someone who knew what they were doing needed to step in to get the job done. However, that mentality is dangerous. If Dalinar is justified in taking control from Elhokar, who's to say that he can't take control from every Highprince and basically become a dictator of Alethkar? Dalinar needs to step back and delegate work. He can't just do everything by himself. 

 

Actually, I found Dalinar to go easy on Elhokar. He even admits how he refrained to interfere at times because he loves Elhokar so much. He should have been more rough with Elhokar and prompt him to learn how to be a good king. I found he goes much harder on his sons than on his nephew. For the rest, I agree. He needs to trust his relative to do their work properly. He improves in WoR as he starts to trust Adolin to take care of a few things such as the gems runs.

 

I think he will learn a lesson soon as well and I wonder how it will play out. I cannot wait to learn more about his past: I get the feeling the Blackthorn really was a despicable person.

[bookspren]

Great work digging up all those definitions, maxal! I've been thinking about this and I think Dalinar could be said to be pious in all three senses.

In the third sense, he is certainly desperate and at times feels hopeless, as if his quest to "unite them" is vain.

In the second sense, self-righteous does describe him quite well, though he certainly isn't insincere.

The first sense is where it gets a little interesting. While Dalinar is not as outwardly religious as Shallan, he does have a strong commitment to what he believes is right. He believes he is seeing visions from the almighty and acts on them in the face of overwhelming opposition. When Navani wants to move in with him, he says no because it goes against Vorinism. He follows his religion even after knowing the god he worshipped is dead. Finally, in the battle at the end of WOR he claims to be a prophet. So I think pious is a surprisingly good (though not obvious) adjective for our highprince.

Edited June 1, 2014 by bookspren

[kaellok he/him]

Piety, which is what pious people demonstrate (courageous people have bravery, pious people have piety), is from the Latin pietas, which roughly translates as a man who respects his responsibilities to the divine, to country, and to kin, especially parents.  It was considered a complex and highly desirable virtue. 

 

I have absolutely no idea where the hypocritical element came from, nor could I easily find its insertion to the definition in a quick Google search.  The synonyms provided for that particular entry do not relate to piety or piousness in any way or element that I am aware of, or that I have ever seen.  It's also not applicable to Dalinar; just because he acted one way in his youth and another now, and deplores those who act the way he used to does not make him a hypocrite.  It makes him a man who learned from his mistakes.

 

I also do not trust the addition of 'vain, doomed, hopeless' and etc.  That is not in keeping with the context of any time that I have ever seen it used.  While I am not an authority on the subject of word meanings, I tend to read a lot.  And I have been reading for a very long time.  I would think that one of the thousand of books or tens of thousands of articles I've read or hundreds of games I've played would have used it in that way.  I know that you are simply using what search pulled up, and I found the exact same as you--I just reject the idea of it being accurate.

 

What I always saw as the defining characteristic of piety, or those who are pious, is that of Faith.  A belief in oneself, and in others.  Dalinar certainly exemplifies these.

 

Edit: added clarity

Edited June 1, 2014 by kaellok

[Moogle]

Dalinar's belief in a god could be seen as him being pious. It really does come out of left field:

 

“God isn’t dead. If the Almighty died, then he was never God, that’s all.”

[Gabriele she/her]

Agreed (and upvoted) to what Kaellok said.

 

Google is not God, nor is Wikipedia or any other website that provides definitions for words. I've seen to many mistakes there myself.

Edited June 1, 2014 by Gabriele

[Guest]

Piety, which is what pious people demonstrate (courageous people have bravery, pious people have piety), is from the Latin pietas, which roughly translates as a man who respects his responsibilities to the divine, to country, and to kin, especially parents.  It was considered a complex and highly desirable virtue. 

 

I have absolutely no idea where the hypocritical element came from, nor could I easily find its insertion to the definition in a quick Google search.  The synonyms provided for that particular entry do not relate to piety or piousness in any way or element that I am aware of, or that I have ever seen.  It's also not applicable to Dalinar; just because he acted one way in his youth and another now, and deplores those who act the way he used to does not make him a hypocrite.  It makes him a man who learned from his mistakes.

 

I also do not trust the addition of 'vain, doomed, hopeless' and etc.  That is not in keeping with the context of any time that I have ever seen it used.  While I am not an authority on the subject of word meanings, I tend to read a lot.  And I have been reading for a very long time.  I would think that one of the thousand of books or tens of thousands of articles I've read or hundreds of games I've played would have used it in that way.  I know that you are simply using what search pulled up, and I found the exact same as you--I just reject the idea of it being accurate.

 

What I always saw as the defining characteristic of piety, or those who are pious, is that of Faith.  A belief in oneself, and in others.  Dalinar certainly exemplifies these.

 

Edit: added clarity

 

A word can have different meanings. I thought it was interesting to see the various definition of pious. As I said, my source was google. Type in "pious" in google and press enter: you will get my stuff.

 

 As far as my understanding of languages go, a statement, an action or an idea can be both pious and hypocrite. In French, we could say "voeux pieux" which would mean "having ideas that are rightly good you wish to uphold while knowing full well you won't or can't". This can be seen as a form of hypocrisy with oneself.

 

For example, Dalinar's desire to uphold his code in a rigorous manner that leaves no place for interpretation could be seen as overly pious and therefore hypocrite as he does not impose such as high morality on himself. He absolves his own past crimes, he does take the punishment for them, he just moves on. He is trying for redemption, I agree, it is honorable, I agree too, but it is also in strong contradiction with his code. Nalan, I believe, would agree with me as he managed to killed Ym based on 40 years old crime. How many crimes in Dalinar's past? Hundreds? We could also agree his relation with Navani is highly hypocrite as he is going against the very same convention he is trying to force on others. He does it because he loves Navani. He realizes this and yet he keeps at it. Even Adolin reflects on this, thinking his father obeys the laws that suit him. Now I am faulting Dalinar here  (the man deserves some happiness and sweetness), I am just pointing towards what I believe is a weakness in his piety.

 

As for vain and doomed, than maybe my French example works there as well. "Pieux" refers to religion matters. However, if it is used with word "voeux" (voeux means wishes), you are bringing a holy quality to your thoughts. I does not have to be directly related to the church, but to morality. Religion by itself is more or less a set of moral laws: "You will not kill", "You will not lie", etc. OK, now I do not want to offense anyone's belief by saying this, but for the sake of the example, I will reduced religion to a set of morals implying good conduct. Now, if your wishes are pious, then you are morally good in the same way religious teaching are. I dunno if this is clear, I hope it is. Bottom line is, if you are deceiving yourself by thinking (or wishing) you are up to maintain such high morality why clearly not being able to then you are not only hypocrite, but vain and doomed, doomed to failure.

 

Albeit, I am not a letters person and some of this is based on this French language (as it is easier for my to picture in my native language), but since the word has the same origin in both language, the parallel can be made or so I think.

Edited June 1, 2014 by maxal

[Gabriele she/her]

Lol, trust those Gauls to twist their Latin.

Edited June 1, 2014 by Gabriele

[kaellok he/him]

Interesting counter-points, maxal.  In my post I wasn't trying to find fault with the definitions you found (as I found the very same ones myself), but rather with the source; I have literally never seen the word or its variations used in some of the ways the dictionary says it can be used.  The connotation (or contextual situation) a word is used in can greatly change its meaning in the English language (I have a poor grasp on other languages, so I won't comment more), and the connotations can change from year to year and decade to decade.  Mostly, I was curious if the definitions that seemed...odd...to me were leftover relics from a hundred years ago, and not really relevant to today.  Apparently French has something similar that is still in use today, which would explain why the concept is still alive in the dictionary.

 

Regardless, whether it's my interpretation or yours, I think we can both agree that Dalinar is pious--even if it doesn't really come across that way at first.

[Guest]

Interesting counter-points, maxal.  In my post I wasn't trying to find fault with the definitions you found (as I found the very same ones myself), but rather with the source; I have literally never seen the word or its variations used in some of the ways the dictionary says it can be used.  The connotation (or contextual situation) a word is used in can greatly change its meaning in the English language (I have a poor grasp on other languages, so I won't comment more), and the connotations can change from year to year and decade to decade.  Mostly, I was curious if the definitions that seemed...odd...to me were leftover relics from a hundred years ago, and not really relevant to today.  Apparently French has something similar that is still in use today, which would explain why the concept is still alive in the dictionary.

 

Regardless, whether it's my interpretation or yours, I think we can both agree that Dalinar is pious--even if it doesn't really come across that way at first.

 

I confirm the expression is still around in French I could find instances were all these meanings are currently being used. Since the word appears to have the same linguistic origin in both languages, I assumed both meanings were in effect. Although you are right, it may be the English expression is slightly out of date while this is not the case for the French one. This is where someone like me (a non-English speaking person who was mostly self-taught) would make a mistake. It is funny how some words just turned out being the same in both languages, especially considering they have very different roots. I guess this just enlightened the importance of Latin at some point in history.

 

I wonder if Brandon went to check on the exact definition and implication of each of the primary attributes before writing his characters. I would assume so (as he is a writer), which is why I think some of it can be applied to Dalinar.

[kaellok he/him]

 

I wonder if Brandon went to check on the exact definition and implication of each of the primary attributes before writing his characters. I would assume so (as he is a writer), which is why I think some of it can be applied to Dalinar.

There are plenty of writers who don't do much, if any, research on their subject material.  On the other hand, Brandon is a very good writer, so I suspect you are correct haha.  This is especially true since the Attributes should reflect the character's story arc in rather substantial ways.  I'd honestly be more curious if he came up with the Attributes before the characters, or after, or if they developed at basically the same time.

[Guest]

There are plenty of writers who don't do much, if any, research on their subject material.  On the other hand, Brandon is a very good writer, so I suspect you are correct haha.  This is especially true since the Attributes should reflect the character's story arc in rather substantial ways.  I'd honestly be more curious if he came up with the Attributes before the characters, or after, or if they developed at basically the same time.

 

That surprises me, I mean writers purposely not doing any research... If you are to use primary attributes to define some of your characters, then you need to get them right. In the case of SA, I get the feeling it was more of an iterative process. The story evolved a lot since its first draft (based on the excerpt we had recently) so no I do not think he had all plan out. I believe some of the characters were fleshed out since the beginning (Dalinar, Kaladin and most probably Shallan), but others went from an idea to full characters as the story unfold (Adolin most likely).

 

Again, this is only me trying to figure out what goes on inside Brandon's head

 

Other attributes are fun to read about as well, but pious really was the most interesting.

 

 

[happyman he/him]

I have to partially agree with kaellok here.  As a native English speaker, the "real" definition of pious (without more context) is the first definition on that list.  When the word appears without context or emotion, that's what it means.

 

The second definition is a form of sarcasm or mockery which relies on the first definition to make its point.  The term pious is often used to mock people who are seen as being hypocritical or holier-than-though by pretending to follow definition one.  It's saying that they aren't really living up to the first definition.  It doesn't have that meaning without the appropriate context, though.  It depends on the relationship between the people involved.  (This is why dictionaries always lie.  Context is everything.  Online dictionaries are particularly bad about not giving context.)

 

The third definition is probably out of use nowadays.  Either that, or it's even more context-sensitive than the second definition.  Either way, I doubt it has anything to do with Dalinar.