Since the nominal topic of our discussion was whether Paul was a messiah or not, I think I’ll question our basic assumption. Does it matter whether we define Paul as a messiah? If the people who followed him believed him to be a messiah should that not be enough? The fremen believed that he was their savior, so to them he was their savior, whether he truly had come as a fulfillment to prophecies or whether he merely took advantage of the prophecies. And even if he did simply take advantage of prophecies that had been planted there, he still led the people to their freedom. Does it even matter if the prophecies were real or planted by the Bene Gesserit? If the fremen believed in the prophecies, Paul came and fulfilled the prophecies, and the fremen believed that Paul was their savior, then he was a savior to them. In this situation, I believe that the fremen’s faith in Paul proves he is their messiah. By no means would you ever get a freman to believe that Paul wasn’t a messiah.
I suppose the position I’ve outlined above leads back to the question of a messiah versus the messiah. This question, however, presupposes that in the world Herbert created, a single messiah is possible. My question would then be how would you identify a single messiah as the messiah? That again depends on how Herbert’s world works. Would The Messiah have to fulfill the prophecies of all religions, or do religions exist that claim to expect the one true Messiah? In the first case, would Paul work as The Messiah? He fulfilled prophecies from several different religions, but did he cover all of them? What about the second case? How do you know which religion to trust when they say that their Messiah is the one true savior? I ask these questions strictly from an outsider perspective like us reading Herbert’s novel, not to get into a religious debate about the competing religions we live with, but without getting into a debate, we can think about these questions abstractly in regard to today’s religions. I’ll let you others do that, however. I’m not about to start pulling out the worms now that I’ve opened that particular can.
Putting aside messiahs for a moment, I’d like to talk about Paul as a political instead of a religious leader. In “Politics as a Vocation,” Weber talks about hereditary, charismatic, and legal justifications for leadership. While Paul admittedly has some roles he occupies through charismatic justification, he also has a ninety-generation pedigree set up by the Bene Gesserit. Despite this hereditary justification already being in place, does he actually gain the positions of leadership that should be his through his family ties by his charismatic leadership, or does his justification in those roles rely mainly on his hereditary right to rule? Which justification takes precedence in Paul’s situation if both justifications are present? Wow, a lot of questions in that post, but I’m still more interested in hearing what other people have to say on the political front than trying to come up with my own answers since I’m sure you all know much more about politics than I do (you all don’t actively avoid politics).
