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RDM BATTLESTAR GALACTICA MYTHOS (THEORY):
In the dawn of the 22nd century a new religion became very popular worldwide, although primarily in North America. This religion was a neopagan religion based upon the ancient Greco-Roman mythology. However this religion had several unique features. One was an "aesthetic cultural regression." Believing the early 21st century to be the peak of human intellectual and cultural curiousity, the members of the religion mimicked various Western cultures aspects of the early 21st century - such as clothing style.
After decades of being marginalized this religious group decided to leave Earth after the discovery of jump drive. It took them many years to build the ships to do it, but they did. They left Earth on twelve gargantuan space ships they called "space galleons." These so-called galleons where each named after a sign of the zodiac.
The people aboard the galleons where almost entirely from the United States, Canada and Great Britain. The vast majority where American.
It took them more than a century before they found a world suitable for permanent human habitation. But eventually they did. They named their new home "Kobol", after the Persian word for "heaven." During the Great Exodus, each of the galleons developed their own cultural mores. They became twelve different cliques who each shared common ideals and beliefs, etc. about life. They became twelve distinct "tribes."
After many centuries on Kobol, global sophistication levels grew in terms of social structure, technology, art, music, astronomy and religion, eventually attaining the level of a unified civilization of humankind ruled by a quorum of twelve leaders, each representing one tribe that existed there. Upon the advent of automated life supporting systems (food production, waste management, etc., people began to forget how technology functioned and was created, since it became irrelevant to their lives.
Some scientists still continued to develop technology, one man discovered the means for giving humans immortality through creation of synthetically built cybernetic humanoid bodies that could better sustain and support the mind of an individual than a human body could. With artificial neural pathways constructed from "silica relays", these bodies were the perfect fusion of the organic and mechanical. Vat-grown with artificial and biological components integrated on a subcellular and molecular level, they were true cybernetic organisms. Once that body fails their consciousness could be transferred to a new one, or could exist on another plane, possibly just as what could loosely be thought of as "software", with corporeal forms only required if interaction with corporeal life is needed.
This technology was presented to the twelve tribal leaders, and they used it to allow them to shed their original bodies and transfer their consciousness into this new vessel to harbor their minds, becoming a cybernetic life organism (Cylon). It must be noted that the Lords didn't call themselves "Cylons", for that is a term that would be created by humans thousands of years later. Seeing the threat of having immortal beings with infinite power (effectively) but who could not control it (the human psyche still containing many primitive traits such as anger, aggression, jealousy, etc.), these transcended beings decided to hide the true method of ascension to the public but laid out for them a plan of personal and spiritual development which would shed these primitive feelings (the Sacred Scrolls) which, if individuals/groups followed in life, upon death only then they would transcend their state of being to join the Lords in immortality.
So this quorum of twelve beings (plus the thirteenth the scientist who remained hidden for a time to society) hid their true nature to protect the civilization from destabilizing and in doing so did not publicly acknowledge existence of it, but chose to claim they naturally rose to a higher state of being through practice of religion and self-purification. They said to the people that to join them (calling themselves Lords) as "ascended" beings, they would need to be good and pure in spirit, and if they practiced the ideals the Lords set out, would also gain spiritual enlightenment and thus attain immortality (which they would grant by transcending those who follow the path of righteousness) and thus allow the people to follow the footsteps of the Lords themselves, ultimately continuing to lead their people into a new era of peace and prosperity for Kobol.
The scientist who developed the technology was also granted immortality, yet was not elevated to the authoritive level of "Lord" but given the title "Count", and here sowed the first seeds of dissent for him, for he believed he deserved equal power of authority, possibly even ultimate power (reigning supreme) since he was the one who created the ability to transcend mortality. It must be noted that the other twelve powerful beings do not consider themselves beings of supreme power ("gods") but "Lords", rising to their level of power rather than having always having the power of immortality.
Peace and harmony ensued for a time, (the Opera House being the center of their civilization on Kobol and the location where the Lords resided (in the eyes of the humans), or at least communicated with the humans. Yet the Count, getting more and more rebellious believed he should have ultimate power and decided to act.
He began a movement secretly making himself known to a few humans, eventually creating a cult of followers and eventually a secret tribe who devoutly served and followed him. His next act was to create another set of twelve Cylons as his own servants that rule by his command, and made plans to use them to overthrow the Lords so he can reign supreme over humanity, using his new tribe to gain support with the rest of humanity, and for those who renounced him, death.
Overall, this left the universe with twenty-five "ascended" beings: twelve Lords, one Count, and twelve [second generation] Cylons.
When the twelve Cylon models emerged into consciousness, sentience and sapience, seven of the Cylons believed, agreed and followed the ideals of their creator, and five of them believed, agreed and followed the ideals of the Lords of Kobol. The five models who believed humanity should choose their own beliefs decided to contact the Lords (who were a more technologically advanced form of Cylon yet still the same form of life) and which gave the five permission to secretly extract the thireenth tribes' population to another location to protect them from the Count's possible plans for the annihilation of humankind and to tell them the truth of the origins of the Lords of Kobol.
These five Cylons still acknowledged their origins by venerating their creator, even though he was flawed, which they illustrated by forbidding the Count's name to be mentioned. They became known as "the five Priests who worship The One Whose Name Cannot Be Spoken." The five Priests still worshiped/revered him, yet chose to help humanity by aiding the Lords of Kobol and taking the small pocket of humans to a safe place, Earth, where they would be protected from evil Cylon oppression.
And so it is:
- The twelve "Lords of Kobol" are the original leaders, and first Cylons to emerge. They believe in humanity in that human life is worth saving, serving, and protecting.
- The "Count" is the scientist (and eventual fallen Cylon) who allowed the leaders to transcend into Lordship. He believes all human life should either worship him as supreme authority (due to his role in creating and attaining immortality) and that if they don't, they should not exist.
- The "Significant Seven" are the second generation Cylons (referred to as "Lower Demons" in the scripture) who worship their creator/god, the Count. They believe in the Count's beliefs of the obsoleteness of human life, and strive to follow his ideals as their own.
- The "Final Five" are also second-generation Cylons (referred to as "Priests" in the scripture) who also still worship their creator, the Count. These Cylons however do not follow the ideals of their creator/god but chose to serve humanity, and the original Cylons who emerged to protect the people of Kobol.
Once the Count and seven other Cylons discovered that the Lords and five Priests' foiled their plans to overthrow the Lords, a "war of the gods" ensued. This was the calamity that scripture describes, the result being the Count was overcome by the combined forces of the twelve Lords and five Priests. The Lords and Priests either tried to totally destroy the evil Cylons, or just (possibly due to humanitarian reasons) stripped the Count of all technological knowledge except basic life support. Either way, the Count managed to survive, saving his seven followers' source code with his own somewhere, hidden from the other Cylons. The memories of the seven did not survive, only the Count's did as he fled into hiding, self-boxing/deactivating himself, and deciding to reactivate at a time where he (through his seven followers) could both: (a) Once again try and contest rule over humanity, and if not, destroy humanity once and for all, and (b) find Earth, their promised land of descendants of once devout human followers and settle there.
After the war, the people of Kobol chose to leave their home planet and the tragedy that befell it behind, the Lords transported in a great Galleon the tribes to each settle and colonize a different world. Remembering what happened on Kobol, they scorned advanced technology (being the cause of so much pain and suffering on their originating home world) to the extent of rebuking it and starting civilization again, as simple farmers, even loosing contact with the other eleven tribes that settled on different planets.
The Sacred Scrolls (the scripture) basically describes not only a religious doctrine that the Lords of Kobol created and the Colonials adhered to, but also describes an extra, additional aspect of the Kobolian legacy transcribed after their habitation on Kobol. The people of Kobol, now called Colonials, never fully understand the whole truth of the war of their Lords, or even know the true nature of them, but write their knowledge and understandings down in scripture, as "The Exodus." The book of Pythia gives a general account of both the calamity that befell Kobol, and what occurred afterwards to the tribes of Kobol. Pythia describes the fallout from when the higher demon (the Count) and the lower demons (his seven loyal children) tried to overthrow the Lords of Kobol. The fallout being the Exodus and rebirth of humankind. Pythia, being an Oracle of the Lords of Kobol, might have been in communication with the Lords (and their five supporting Priests) and could have been directed to transcribe events for reasons even she didn't know or understand, such is the will of the gods to not have to explain their actions to mere mortals. These reasons apart from obviously recording history, could also have been a warning to mankind about greed for power, but mainly a prophecy of things to come (if evil [Cylons] returned).
Both good and evil Cylons were watching the Colonial civilization rebuild over the millennia, the good Cylons watching and protecting the tribes (all thirteen), and the evil Cylons waiting for the right time to infiltrate and gain control over the tribes of Kobol again. The Lords, in collusion with the five Priests, set out clues as to the location of Earth but devised them so only humans could find the way to Earth. Markers were left of various sorts, as well as myths and artifacts that would be needed to unlock the secrets, should the need and want ever arise to find Earth.
Some people can attain communication with higher powers through various different methods:
- The herb chamalla is not only a psychoactive plant that brings on irrational hallucinations to people taking it, but it can also be used as a convenient way that Cylons (both good and evil) can communicate with intended targets without arousing suspicions of others, or the receptor if they do not entirely believe in the scriptures.
- A more unsubtle form of communication can be achieved with the use of direct projection of visions, voices and music into the targets head through "head-apparitions" (e.g. Head-Baltar to Caprica Six, Head-Leoben to Starbuck, Head-Snakes to Roslin, and Head-Six to Baltar) that is only perceivable to a specific individual.
- Another unsubtle form of communication is the use of dreams to convey a message.
Each colony of Kobol, upon settlement on each of the twelve planets, took an anti, almost phobic view of technological usage. All pre-Exodus technology (electronic to space technology) was rejected and technologically, Colonial civilization rebirthed. It took a further 3,500 years before Colonial technology started to approach Kobolian levels of sophistication once again. Despite the technology regression, certain cultural holdovers from the Kobolian era remained on each colony. Most notably the "aesthetic cultural stagnation" that mimicked life in the early 21st century continued on the colonies throughout the millenia, regardless the technological situation. In addition, with near-universal literacy and no competing languages, the English language remained the same (apart from a certain profanity word).
Upon the rediscovery of computers, eventually concepts of artificial life emerged. The Graystone family of Caprica appeared on the scene many years before the First Cylon War to promote the use of CYbernetic Life OrgaNisms (Cylons) for the "benefit of humanity." Members of this business family started receiving visions from the Count. From those visions they gained the know-how to design and build mechanical Cylons. There was fierce opposition from many people, notably a Caprican civil liberties attorney named Joseph Adama. The results from this was the creation of a new form of Cylon, the first cybernetic organisms publicly known to the general Colonial civilization, and for a time all was well.
The evil Cylons and the Count helped to accelerate the Colonial-created Cylon technology over the next few years (just as Caprica Six helped Baltar later on in Colonial events), and also slipped into the Cylon mainframes programming code that led them to rebel against their human creators.
The reason why the evil Cylons didn't use "skin-jobs" was the Count did not have enough time upon reactivation (when he sensed Colonial technology level reaching a suitable level of sophistication). So he assumed he could just electronically infiltrate the Colonies, underestimating the extent the Lords and Priests would go to protect humankind.
When the First Cylon War started, the Lords of Kobol put the five Cylon Priests on the Colonies to help counter the mechanical Cylon offensive.
After the cease-fire, many Priest-Cylons (except Saul Tigh) perished. The result of the war was the Cylons fled once again, though now under public awareness, to regroup until they can once again attack the Colonies. This gave time for the Count, recreating his seven devout Cylons, to concentrate on developing the necessary technology (including synthetic organism, projection and resurrection technology) to conquer humankind again, waiting again until public opinion of artificial intelligence would yet again allow them to infiltrate and conquer humanity and human phobia of technology reduces to allow them to easily disable Colonial defence systems.
Once these parameters were achieved, the [evil] Cylons would strike again, choosing to attack once all Galactica-type Class ships were no longer in service (since they are impervious to Cylon electronic infiltration). Realizing and pre-empting this, the Lords (and Priests) laid plans to infiltrate the Colonies themselves in order to help them survive an attack by [evil] Cylons. Tigh still surviving did not need to be re-placed in the Colonies, but other Priests then had to reinsert themselves back into Colonial society. The Priests would insert themselves in supporting roles in Colonial society.
The Cycle of time in the Sacred Scrolls refers indirectly to the never-ending struggle between the Lords of Kobol (allied with the five Priests) and the Cylons (the seven "evil" Cylons and the Count). This struggle being the control over humanity by these transcended beings, and its effects on the human race. It refers to the everlasting attempts for the Count to both seek revenge for his fall from power and to finish his ultimate scheme of either ruling humanity or destroying it as revenge on both the Lords of Kobol and humanity for not acknowledging his role and function in creating the transcended form of being that is the cybernetic life organism that grants a person immortality.
The Cylons really do have a plan, but it is not the destruction of mankind, but its salvation from the cycle of time. Each party (Significant Seven, Final Five, Lords of Kobol and the Count) has a plan, to further their goal, but since the Lords (and Final Five) are more powerful, they always win but the evil Cylons are never going to be fully destroyed since they are immortal (and also hard to completely destroy physically).