Laying Down the Shards: Two Recreance theories

[Aeshdan]

Ever since we first saw the Recreance, the question has been asked: Why? Why would the Radiants, after defending humanity for all those generations, choose to renounce their oaths, leaving their spren trapped in agony and humanity defenseless? Even with the revelation of Humanity's origin on Ashyn, and the fact that they'd destroyed that world and had to flee to Roshar, things didn't quite seem to add up.

So I have two theories about why the Radiants committed the Recreance, presented together because they're kind of interconnected.

Theory 1: The Radiants did not expect to leave their spren as deadeyes. 

There doesn't seem to be any mention of dead blades or deadeye spren before the Recreance. Moreover, when Syl offers to break the bond in WoK, she says it would cause her to revert back to a non-sapient state, not leave her a deadeyes. And even when Kal actually breaks the bond in WoR, we don't see any sign of Syl being made a deadeye, she just goes mindless like a windspren. So I theorize that when the Radiants renounced their oaths, they expected their spren to revert en masse to their pre-bonding state, mindless in the Physical but fine in the Cognitive. That's something I can imagine the Radiants being willing to do, for a good enough reason. But for some reason, this revocation was different from anything that had come before, and instead tore out their spren's minds, leaving them deadeyed.

Theory 2: The Radiants renounced their oaths because they no longer believed they were needed.

Whenever the Radiants had had doubts before, Honor was able to point to the unquestionable need for them to continue. The Radiant powers might be dangerous, but they were also the only thing that was keeping humanity alive through the repeated Desolations. But leading up to the Recreance, for the first time in millennia humanity seemed safe. The Heralds claimed they had won, sealing the Fused on Braize forever. The singers were lobotomized beyond any hope of recovery, and the Radiants had no idea that the listeners had escaped. Odium was locked away by Honor's sacrifice. The only threat left that could imperil the entire human race was the Radiants themselves. Under those circumstances, it's not surprising that the Radiants might have decided to revoke their Oaths, remove the last threat to humanity.

Thoughts?

Edited December 16, 2020 by ReaderAt2046
Punctuation error.

[Karger]

1 hour ago, ReaderAt2046 said:

There doesn't seem to be any mention of dead blades or deadeye spren before the Recreance

I think there is a WoB about this.  There were a few but they were rare.

1 hour ago, ReaderAt2046 said:

Odium was locked away by Honor's sacrifice. The only threat left that could imperil the entire human race was the Radiants themselves. Under those circumstances, it's not surprising that the Radiants might have decided to revoke their Oaths, remove the last threat to humanity.

This I find interesting.  It also jives well with them leaving a history behind and not destroying the tower first.  A warning and a guide just in case.

[Aeshdan]

 

2 hours ago, ReaderAt2046 said:

There doesn't seem to be any mention of dead blades or deadeye spren before the Recreance.

56 minutes ago, Karger said:

I think there is a WoB about this.  There were a few but they were rare.

Could you show me the citation? Because I went looking through the Arcanum and I couldn't find any WoB on this.

[Karger]

2 hours ago, ReaderAt2046 said:

Could you show me the citation? Because I went looking through the Arcanum and I couldn't find any WoB on this.

I can't find it either.    But consider.  Radiants of a third oath or higher must have broken oaths before at sometime during the several thousand year history.  They would have known about dead blades.  We know that they were not perfect.  One of them had to executed for fraternization with the enemy according to WoR.

 

[Bearer of all agonies]

Maybe Spren only become deadeyes if they were bonded of third oath or higher because of how strong the bond is then. Where as in WoR, when Kaladin breaks the bond, when he has only sworn the second ideal, Syl just become mindless as said earlier.

 

9 hours ago, Karger said:

[psc92]

The way I see it the Recreance happened for these reasons:

1. Humanity's origin: The revelation that the humans are the invaders instead of the singers would have been a devastating thing for many Radiants to find out about especially since they believed that their purpose was to defend what they believed was rightfully theirs.

2. Destruction of Ashyn / Honor's Insanity: We know that at this point Honor had been dealt the death blow by Odium and was slowly dying and going insane in the process. The Radiants being told that the surges were responsible for the destruction of their previous home, and would be the destruction of Roshar as well probably scared a lot of Radiants.

3. Lack of Desolations: At the time of the Recreance there has not been a desolation in millennia. It's entirely possible that the Radiants believed that the Desolations were over, that they were no longer fit for purpose, and that by sticking around they only risked the destruction of Roshar. 

4. The False Desolation and the lobotomization of the Singers: We know that the False Desolation happened around the time of the Recreance so this likely was the final nail in the coffin for many of the Radiants. Lobotomizing the Singers, whether it was intentional or an unintended side effect of imprisoning Ba-Ado-Mishram, can only be described as one of the most evil war crimes in the history of the fantasy genre. When this happened most of the Radiants probably reacted like this:

I'm pretty sure that they knew that abandoning their oaths would turn their spren into Deadeyes and they did it anyway because they considered it the lesser of two evils.

 

[Aeshdan]

11 hours ago, Karger said:

I can't find it either.    But consider.  Radiants of a third oath or higher must have broken oaths before at sometime during the several thousand year history.  They would have known about dead blades.  We know that they were not perfect.  One of them had to executed for fraternization with the enemy according to WoR.

 

Yes, Radiants definitely must have broken their oaths before the Desolation. But do we know that a Radiant of the third oath or higher breaking their oaths results in a deadeye? We know it's possible to break the bond without producing a deadeye, because we see it happening with Syl. I'm theorizing that there was something qualitatively different about the Recreance, some unknown and unanticipated x-factor that caused that specific act to leave the spren as deadeyes instead of simply causing them to devolve.

[psc92]

1 hour ago, ReaderAt2046 said:

Yes, Radiants definitely must have broken their oaths before the Desolation. But do we know that a Radiant of the third oath or higher breaking their oaths results in a deadeye? 

Yes

Quote

Questioner (paraphrased)

If after speaking the Third Ideal, Kaladin were to betray his oaths, would Syl turn into a Shardblade?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Yes.

Words of Radiance Washington, DC signing (March 20, 2014)

 

[RShara]

I think the reasons for the Recreance were multifold--disillusionment of their "higher calling," the realization that they lobotomized an entire species, plus the promise from their God that they and their powers would destroy the planet, among others. I also wouldn't be surprised if it were their spren's idea in the first place.

12 hours ago, Karger said:

I can't find it either.    But consider.  Radiants of a third oath or higher must have broken oaths before at sometime during the several thousand year history.  They would have known about dead blades.  We know that they were not perfect.  One of them had to executed for fraternization with the enemy according to WoR.

 

This is probably the one you wanted

Quote

Question

Can a Shardblade come back to life?

Brandon Sanderson

This is something that has never happened on Roshar yet. Now they didn't have many opportunities for it to happen in the past, because it was rare for a Radiant to break their oaths. It is not something that's happened and the spren think it's impossible.

Arcanum Unbounded Seattle signing (Dec. 1, 2016)

 

[GriffinMaze]

The answer is simple. Its because Honor was going insane. Every generation of KR knew that humans were the voidbringers originally and they destroyed Ashen (via the Dawnshards, I don't know why people always say it was because of surgebinding) But the one generation that put down their blades was when Honor was going crazy. As explicitly stated by the Stormfather

[Karger]

5 hours ago, Bearer of all agonies said:

Maybe Spren only become deadeyes if they were bonded of third oath or higher because of how strong the bond is then. Where as in WoR, when Kaladin breaks the bond, when he has only sworn the second ideal, Syl just become mindless as said earlier.

I can't image that in over three thousand years no radiant of third ideal or higher over break their oaths.

1 hour ago, RShara said:

This is probably the one you wanted

Yes thank you!

3 hours ago, ReaderAt2046 said:

Yes, Radiants definitely must have broken their oaths before the Desolation. But do we know that a Radiant of the third oath or higher breaking their oaths results in a deadeye? We know it's possible to break the bond without producing a deadeye, because we see it happening with Syl. I'm theorizing that there was something qualitatively different about the Recreance, some unknown and unanticipated x-factor that caused that specific act to leave the spren as deadeyes instead of simply causing them to devolve.

Rshara got the WoB.  I was correct.

Edited July 13, 2020 by Karger

[RShara]

3 hours ago, GriffinMaze said:

The answer is simple. Its because Honor was going insane. Every generation of KR knew that humans were the voidbringers originally and they destroyed Ashen (via the Dawnshards, I don't know why people always say it was because of surgebinding) But the one generation that put down their blades was when Honor was going crazy. As explicitly stated by the Stormfather

Because Honor said both.

Quote

But in the days leading to the Recreance, Honor was dying. When that generation of knights learned the truth, Honor did not support them. He raved, speaking of the Dawnshards, ancient weapons used to destroy the Tranquiline Halls. Honor … promised that Surgebinders would do the same to Roshar.

Edit: I forgot to actually link the thread with my theory that the spren were willing participants in the Recreance.

 

Edited July 13, 2020 by RShara

[GriffinMaze]

1 hour ago, RShara said:

Quote

But in the days leading to the Recreance, Honor was dying. When that generation of knights learned the truth, Honor did not support them. He raved, speaking of the Dawnshards, ancient weapons used to destroy the Tranquiline Halls. Honor … promised that Surgebinders would do the same to Roshar.

 

 

That doesn't say that Surgebinding destroyed Ashyn. It says the Dawnshards destroyed Ashyn. Then an insane Honor said Surgebinders would destroy Roshar. Something he clearly never said before he was insane and they made it thousands of years without destroying Roshar. I don't understand how people get that mixed up with "Surgebinding destroyed Ashyn". It clearly doesn't say that

Edited July 13, 2020 by GriffinMaze

[+Bzhydack]

12 minutes ago, GriffinMaze said:

 

That doesn't say that Surgebinding destroyed Ashyn. It says the Dawnshards destroyed Ashyn. Then an insane Honor said Surgebinders would destroy Roshar. Something he clearly never said before he was insane and they made it thousands of years without destroying Roshar. I don't understand how people get that mixed up with "Surgebinding destroyed Ashyn". It clearly doesn't say that

Its not about what happend on Ashyn in reality, its more about what Radiants belive. And when they knew about Ashyn and saw power of Dustbringers in action, they add 2+2 and bam, they think "Our Surgebinding is dangerous fo whole planet".

[RShara]

28 minutes ago, GriffinMaze said:

 

That doesn't say that Surgebinding destroyed Ashyn. It says the Dawnshards destroyed Ashyn. Then an insane Honor said Surgebinders would destroy Roshar. Something he clearly never said before he was insane and they made it thousands of years without destroying Roshar. I don't understand how people get that mixed up with "Surgebinding destroyed Ashyn". It clearly doesn't say that

Ah, I see, I misunderstood what you meant. Right, Dawnshards destroyed Ashyn, but Radiants were afraid surgebinding would destroy Roshar, I think is what I'm trying to say. So while surgebinding wasn't relevant for Ashyn, that's where the fear of surgebinding destroying planets comes from.

It might mean some of what we're seeing now, and what Nale said and Notum hinted at--because Honor was dying/is dead, there'll be fewer limits on Radiant powers, and the lack of those limits heightens the potential for destruction.