Btvs and representations of faith.

[ninelives]

Hi,

I'm making a fanvid for youtube.

The song I'm using has some lyrics that deal with the deception that goes with having blind faith.

I feel like btvs has something to do with faith with all its symbolism.

It doesn't seem that way though when I try to think of any clips that represent it at all in the characters or storylines.

What do you think?

Whenever I type in Buffy and faith in the search engine it comes back with results on the character Faith, so it's difficult to look up.

All I can think of is Drusilla's character before she became a vampire.

 

[Blaze]

Just to be clear, are you talking about faith as in religion? or more hope/beliefs in someone (let's say Buffy)?

 

[ninelives]

Faith in general so both. I was definitely thinking about faith in Buffy as something to look at.

I get that faith is usually associated with religion but I was thinking more in terms of how buffy can be seen as a role model like the 'what would buffy do'. That sort of faith in someone's character like despite their mistakes they always rise above it so in the long run it's like they can do no wrong.

In Buffy the supernatural is a material reality so it is real and therefore wouldn't require any faith or trust. Like the show as representing experiences and our experiences are real.

Yet the idea of a 'chosen one' would seem to me as like a representation of having an all encompassing faith on a single person. Though in the show these attributes are seen to be grounded in reality.

Whereas Drusilla was seen as having a blind faith which wasn't grounded in reality because it didn't save her from Angelus. In that way her faith was destructive and not the empowerment that Buffy focuses on.

 

[Kean]

I think it's going to depend on how you perceive faith, personally. I think Angel's character and story draws heavily from Catholicism. His story is redemption, he tells Marcus the one thing he wants is forgiveness, higher powers have intervened in his life several times in order to guide him on a greater path. Even little things like his name, Angel, a lot of the episodes that he is a main focus of have titles with religious resonance, especially in his own show: Angel, Innocence, Passion, Becoming, Revelations, Amends, The Prodigal, Sanctuary, Judgement, Epiphany, Forgiving, Benediction, Awakening, Sacrifice, and Conviction. The team he sets up in L.A. works off the basis that they don't care you once were, they only care about who you are now, or who you are trying to be. It's a very caring, empathetic environment. A lot of his life is about the presence of miracles, even his soul (if you read the translation of the curse) is described as an invocation of God.

If you are looking for examples then I think the big moments in his life: Whistler meeting him, Buffy loving him back, his return from Hell, the snow from Amends, the Shanshu prophecy, being able to get into Kate's apartment to save her without and inviation, Connor. To me, they are all instances of faith and grace in action.

There's also something Giles says in The Wish, he is about to break Anyanka's amulet and she calls him a stupid fool for thinking the other world was better than the Wishverse. He just pauses, looks her in the eye and says "Because it has to be" and then he smashes the necklace. That is the definition of blind faith to me.

And of course, there's Buffy dying so that her sister (and everyone else) could live and later being resurrected. I think that is the most obvious Jesus reference in the entire verse.

 

[Blaze]

Like Kean said, The Wish is a good example of blind faith for a better world.

Another good example is when they fallow Buffy to the Vineyard. They did it because of their faith in Buffy and her capacities as a general. Xander's speech would be a good example of faith in Buffy.

Another example that come to mind is the gang having faith in themselves in the sense that they feel like they will always beat evil. For example when they sing I've got a theory in OMWF.

 

[ninelives]

Thanks Blaze for letting me know I didn't explain myself properly to begin with. 🙂

That gives me a greater understanding of what a miracle means. Before you talked about it I would have probably been associating it with supernatural luck. I always had trouble understanding it in Angel but I just brushed it aside. So his faith comes from his will to become the person he wants to be and to overcome his past by being given mercy? Such as Whistler showing him the way or him being allowed to enter Kate's apartment to save her? It being like a mergence of both a faith in himself with a higher power? Also he restores the faith to those who have lost their way much like how Whistler got him out of the gutter. Cool.

The Wishverse example was great. It was like a parallel world wasn't it? Which makes me unsure whether Giles blind faith paid off or not. It's like a realm of possibilities. What he did though definitely made real a better world just like what he had faith in. So I've got to take back what I said before about blind faith leading to a negative outcome in Buffy.

Thanks for the vineyard example, I've managed to fit all of that into my vid focusing on Xander. It was great for it's comparison between faith and feeling betrayed by the outcome.

The I've got a theory was interesting. With Buffy singing about having faith in themselves whilst at the same time having lost the ability to really care about all the problems happening. I think faith usually involves something higher like something to reach for whereas Buffy was in the highest place (heaven) and was "torn out of there".

Thankyou Kean and Blaze, that helps me.

 

[Taake]

I think Buffy's jump in the end Of season 5 is a sign of blind faith. She trusts that she is interpreting her vision of the first Slayer correctly,that she understands what she meant by "death is your gift"... And she was right.

But at the end of the day she had to take a leap of faith, hoping she was correct in her assumptions and that her sacrifice would close the portal and save Dawn. In other words she blindly trusted her instincts.

 

[ninelives]

Thanks Taake,

I had included that but not because it occurred to me as being of blind faith. Cool. A 'leap of faith' that's iconic lol. 'death as your gift' so it was like a faith into the unknown both in saving everyone and into the experience of death? Normally I'd of just seen that event as a sacrifice, this is a new way of looking at it for me.

It's similar to Giles in The Wish, with both his and Buffy's blind faith being correct. Maybe that's the difference between Giles faith in the wishverse (which was unknown possibilities) with Buffy's leap of faith (also unknown outcome) versus Drusilla's faith in a belief system.