Myth: An analysis of Neon Genesis Evangelion
Neon Genesis Evangelion (EVA) is a miracle in Japanese anime history. This anime series first came out in 1995, soon after Japanese economic bubble burst in 1991. The anime shows its refusal to traditional patriarchal values by repeating the bible in a metaphorical way that opposites the traditional binary values.
The world setting of EVA is based on Jewish bible and Christian bible. After the Second Impact (corresponds with Second Apocalypse in Jewish bible) in Antarctica, over 80% of lands on the earth becomes barren and toxic, and human society is endangered by the lunatic aliens, 13 Angels (corresponds with thirteen apostles of Jesus). Human common technology has little effectiveness in combating these monsters, but scientists who encountered the first Angel during the Second Impact find a special weapon to fight against the Angels, whose name is Evangelion and whose appearance is like a huge cyborg. These scientists then establish NERV, an organization designed for repelling the Angels and preventing the Third Impact (the Third Impact would happen if these Angels touch the core material, “Adam”, beneath the buildings of NERV). Besides, EVA is a monomythic anime in which the protagonists are three 14-year old children, pilot No.1 Ayanami Rei, pilot No.3 Ikari Shinji, and pilot No.2 Asuka Langley Soryu. These children are chosen by the highest human organization, SEELE. Corresponding with how God chooses his prophets, these children have no right to refuse this opportunity. Ikari Shinji tries to escape several times, but his fate leads him back to his position again. Ayanami Rei, as a group of replicates, does not have her free wish, and thus even death could not free her from driving Evangelion. Asuka, instead, embraces the idea of driving Evangelion as her own pride. These children grow up by combating with the Angels, while these Angles evolve as well. The first eight Angels could only cast physical attacks, but the tenth Angel has the ability to control the human mind, and thus the tenth Angel is able to kill Ayanami Rei and bring Asuka lots of pressures that finally drive her crazy. In the last two episodes, the thirteen Angel evolves itself into a boy figure, disguising itself as the pilot No.5 Nagisa Kaoru. Kaoru meets Shinji, brings him help and love, while at the end Shinji finds out Kaoru is the monstrous Angel, and Shinji is forced to kill his best friend. In the end, NERV is destroyed and the Third Impact occurs. As a result, every human-being loses their physical bodies, the “heart-barrier,” and dissolves into a sea of consciousness.
EVA tends to use lots of montages to illustrate its biblical background. Materially speaking, EVA is a 2D animation. It does compose of different image layers, but the editing technique used in EVA is clearly montage, a common filmmaking technique in which a series of short shots scenes is rapidly listed together. EVA uses lots of flashbacks during its narration, which usually are a sentence or a symbol that metaphors or introduces the implied religious meaning of the story. For example, in the opening (OP), besides the face and the silhouette of the main characters, EVA adds the symbol of Kabbalah Tree, for at least three times, which implicitly introduces the religious background and the whole story plot.
Traditionally, Kabbalah Tree, or Tree of Life, is a classical symbol in Judaism and Christianity, which serves as a map of creation. God creates living creatures from ex nihilo (literally means out of nothing), and these creatures evolve into a higher and more complicated form by learning knowledge. Kabbalists tend to consider the first three spaces of life as a life form without time and space, which might refer to a completely chaotic condition where creatures enjoy eternal life and boundless space. The growing of Kabbalah Tree is completely following the evolution of patriarchal society, in which human evolves from a chaotic, non-binary conscious world into a hierarchical world with clear gender-difference and power-difference. It’s worth noting that EVA uses the reversal version of Kabbalah tree in the entire series, implying that this story would reverse the traditional binary ideas. In fact, the reversal version of Kabbalah deliberately tells audiences the story plot: some scientists in NERV pursue eternal life-form and boundless space through reversal evolution.
The flash-back of NERV sign, which sometimes comes with the symbol of this inverse Kabbalah, is also an interesting religious hint that shows the refusal of traditional patriarchal ideas. The word NERV is a German word for “nerve.” Nerve transmits our sensations to the brain and it does not have the right to select sensations, nor does it have the ability to create new thinking. Similarly, NERV is not the supreme organization in fighting against Angels. In fact, SEELE (soul in German) controls NERV (nerve). NERV protects “Adam” beneath its organization, while scientists in NERV have no idea about what “Adam” is and why they have to prevent the occurrence of the Third Impact. According to SEELE, everything should follow the guidance of the Dead Sea Scrolls; in reality, Dead Sea Scrolls are a series of ancient Jewish biblical manuscripts. But intriguingly, the small sentence around the NERV’s symbol states that “God is in its heaven, all right with the world.” This sentence implicitly describes the fact that although SEELE, as a “God-like” or “father-like” control figure, has absolute power to dominate NERV, SEELE does not notice that NERV has chosen a different route from what Dead Sea Scrolls ushers, and SEELE does not participate in any practical things that happen in the world. Combining the religious meaning of all these signs and words, we could easily observe that the original plot of SEELE is a traditional way of evolution. SEELE follows the method of Kabbalah in the ancient Jewish bible to protect the original route of patriarchal evolution, while some scientists in NERV wants an inverse outcome and secretly follows a reversal version of Kabbalah that would finally enable humans to return back to the embryonal status (a primate, matriarchal status). This embryonal status is like the status of the child's birth in Jung’s theory: “a state of non-recognition, non-differentiation...a golden egg which is both the man and the universe and yet neither, the irrational third” (Jung, 290). Because inside the primitive egg, creatures could be both a man and a universe, and yet even anything or nothing, NERV believes that this kind of embryonal status could eliminate all hierarchy and disputes and creatures would enjoy eternal life and boundless space.
From the point that NERV secretly chooses the reversal evolution, the relationship between NERV and SEELE is no longer the relationship between the brain and the nerve. By reversing the initial Kabbalah and setting the “ex nihilo” as the ultimate goal of human-beings, the tree of evolution becomes more gnostic than ever before. Ellwood in Myth mentioned an example of modern Gnosticism with psychological and therapeutic thought: “abandon the search for God and the creation of other matters of a similar sort...learn who is within you and says ‘My God, my body, my soul’...” (Ellwood, 9). This is exactly how NERV creates Evangelion. NERV does not follow the traditional, god-assigned route, but rather NERV creates their own gods with similar sorts. Evangelion is created from the cells of “Adam” discovered in the Second Impact. Religiously speaking, Adam is the son of God, so using Adam’s cell is an efficient way to create a god, and the fact that creating Evangelions from Adam corresponds with the biblical stories where Eva (the female) is created from one rib of Adam (the male). In order to control the Evangelion, scientists create a spine-like cockpit that carries a pilot and inserts this artificial spine into Evangelion’s body. From the episode 12, we strangely find out that Evangelion could be out of control, and the armor outside Evangelion, which makes it look like a cyborg, is actually a restraint that limits the capability of this newly-born god and forces Evangelion to follow human’s wish. Evangelion is not a cyborg or any kind of robot. Evangelion is, just as how the title describes, a neon genesis of supreme life, the human-created and human-controlled female god. It’s also interesting that although NERV choose a matriarchal, reversal path, NERV is initially afraid of this matriarchal power and want to restrain this power by creating a patriarchal hierarchy (the idea that humans should control Evangelion), and it’s not until the later part of this story does the Evangelion perfectly fuses with pilot’s own will.
Nevertheless, NERV’s reversal, matriarchal method of evolution and SEELE’s traditional, patriarchal method of evolution are still two binaries. The spectacular point of EVA series is that this anime overcomes the boundary of binaries, which is fully demonstrated by the debut of No.13 Angel, Kaoru Shinji.
Kaoru Shinji crosses the border of gender and the border of human-beings. Since EVA is an anime that composes of various biblical elements, we would expect that scientists who challenge SEELE (the soul), disobey the guidance of Dead Sea Scrolls (the bible), and champion the newly-created female god (the Evangelion) would be the evil side under a traditional perspective. That’s why NERV is continuously fighting against Angels in the entire story. Angels, though often depicted as monstrous aliens in EVA, might be biblically and traditionally on the righteous side. The show-up of No.13 Angel further demonstrates that Angels might be on the righteous side as well. No.13 Angel is a boy with a beautiful appearance and a warm soul, who also disguises himself as the Pilot No.5 in NERV. As a human, Nagisa Kaoru is the psychological savior and the best friend of Shinji. Here, Kaoru is deliberately designed as a homosexual character who is deeply admired by Shinji. When Ikari Shinji is nearly depressed, Kaoru is the only person who could effectively encourage Shinji and gives him new hope and new love. Kaoru himself is also a character that crosses the boundary of human-beings. Kaoru is an Angel with human appearance. The double personas of Nagisa Kaoru give him a Hamlet style of dilemma. Kaoru is both a human boy that has human emotions and also an Angel that seeks for “Adam,” the righteous route of evolution. Just like humans such as Shinji, Kaoru is struggling in his fate as well: Kaoru could either choose to survive by touching Adam, or he could choose love, which means death for Kaoru, and protect humans. Although he is an Angel assigned by SEELE and he has the instinct of triggering the Third Impact, Kaoru finally begs Shinji to kill himself. Shinji thus drives Evangelion to kill Kaoru by his own hands, and the background music becomes Beethoven’s Ode to Joy. For Kaoru, this is the joy of freedom. Under the patriarchal SEELE, Kaoru has no choice but to follow the Dead Sea Scrolls (bible), but now he could choose to die in his best friend’s hands.
The debut of Nagisa Kaoru is also the successful turning point for this story, where NERV’s plan of reversal, matriarchal evolution is completely revealed and thoroughly presented to the audience. Kaoru reveals the deepest secret of NERV that the core material beneath NERV is not an “Adam” but a “Lilith,” which means that NERV is not patriarchal as what other Angels think, but rather, NERV is an organization based on a female demon, Lilith, who religiously is the first wife of Adam and the first demon in the world. Although NERV pretends itself as a patriarchal organization led by the righteous “Adam,” NERV is led by a female demon Lilith. From this point, EVA becomes an explicitly anti-patriarchal anime, for it puts the matriarchal NERV as a protagonist and makes Evangelion as a form of special weapon to fight against traditional patriarchal power SEELE. Although the protagonist Shinji is a male, and the principle of NERV is Shinji’s father, Ikari Gendo, they are all deeply controlled or affected by certain matriarchal beliefs. Gendo changes his last name into Ikari after his marriage with Ikari Yui, which is not usual and even awkward in Japan society. The project of Evangelion is based on Ikari Yui’s research, and Ikari Yui thereafter becomes the first Evangelion due to an experimental accident. Ikari Gendo tries his best to fight against SEELE’s plan, because he wants to save his wife from the Evangelion. It’s also worth to notice that Ikari Gendo creates many replicates of Yui and names them as Ayanami Rei (who is the Pilot No.1), and many scenes in EVA implicitly describes Ayanami Rei as a goddess (or at least as the representation of goddess). Thus, NERV is a matriarchal organization. Although the goddess, Ikari Yui, is dissolved into the blood of Evangelion, the representation and the worship of the goddess, Ayanami Rei, still existed. By this point, with the understanding that SEELE follows the traditional biblical method, the whole series of EVA, thereafter, becomes a matriarchal action of fighting against traditional patriarchal society.
The ending scene of EVA is gorgeous in crossing patriarchal-matriarchal binaries. NERV completes its reversal evolution plan and dissolves everyone in the world into a sea of consciousness. Although Shinji himself is suppressed by patriarchal rules and always longs for a world without disputes and hierarchy (a matriarchal world), he chooses to refuse this chaotic, embryonal status as well. He starts to realize that there should be a balance between patriarchal reality and matriarchal nihilism. Shinji notices that though he could escape into his children's archetype and back to the status of everything but nothing, he still feels strange about the world without any differentiation. In Shinji’s stream of consciousness, Shinji imagines the alternative possibility of his life with support from both patriarchal force and matriarchal force and finally accepts his values. This ending scene not only explains the ideas that a complete human being should cross the binaries of basic patriarchy and matriarchy, but also illustrates Jung’s child archetype idea again: “a possible synthesis of conscious and unconscious elements of knowledge and action...would shift the personality from ego to self” (Jung, 181). That is, EVA series ends when Shinji grows up as a human with both matriarchal, unconscious and patriarchal consciousness. “Congratulations to all children,” the ending scene writes, and it is also a congratulation that the world has both patriarchal force and matriarchal force and that these two forces could harmoniously coexist with each other.
Work Cited
Ellwood, Robert. “Myth, Gnosis, and Modernity.”
Jung, Karl. The Archetype and the Collective Unconscious. Princeton University Press.
