Jasmine/Choronzon

[Cordy_Chase]

I'm attempting to for once make a true effort into progressively getting some Buffy/Angelverse fanfiction written (all Cordy/Angel romance btw, not that most folks here couldn't have guessed that XD) and in researching demons to come up with a plot for one of my concepts, I came across a high powered demonic agent called Choronzon.

Lord of Hallucinations or Dispersion, Choronzon is the decay of reason, order, emotion, health, and sanity.

She appears as a seemingly harmless, confused being, goes by many names, is often referred to with male pronouns because she is an associate aspect of the Beast in The Book of Revelations and is able to manipulate people subtly while appearing to make an extravagantly crude attack.

Described as an anti-life, an empty shell, Choronzon is said to have some form of involvement in the presence of hate and/or bitterness in a soul and amplifies the false ego or false sense of self dissolving of the earthly mind to insanity and the soul to forlornness, an affliction that also extends to those whose lives are affected by the victim.
Just to listen to her is to plant the seeds.

As a passionate hater of ordered thought, speech and behavior as well as any other manifestations of order, her goal is to create chaos and anarchy by presenting her shell of an essence as a substantial universe appearing to be incredible and freeing and to feed upon the life force of the victims she breaks within.

Source: Choronzon

Alright, so does this sound familiar?
It did to me.
When I first read this article, my first thought was of how a lot of these descriptions of Choronzon at least loosely describe Jasmine and I had to wonder if her character was based on Choronzon.

In truth, I'd accept the craft of Choronzon as a sensible explanation for how screwed up the team was during the time she was possessing Cordy, from Wesley's horribly irrational decision to release Angelus for an integration to Angel's blindness to the possession and response to Jordy's rape of Connor.
Hell, even for Angel's Darla affair during his beige period and for Holtz.

I'm so using this in one of my fic ideas.

 

[thrasherpix]

Personally, I think Jasmine = Jesus (at least as understand by people who write things like The Borg of Heaven, which I think Joss would if he bothered to think about it).

It's been a long, long time since I've dealt with Choronzon as a concept (either good or bad), but that one just doesn't fit for me (just as I'm sure Jesus won't fit for Jasmine to many others). Still, it could be interesting in a fic, and yet you'll have to take into account that she was a Higher Being (or that the Higher Beings are easily played by a demon or Old One).

 

[Cordy_Chase]

No, Jesus is absurd to me but granted I'm not sure what description you're referencing.

 

[thrasherpix]

I'm referring to how they incorporated Revelations and and Christian imagery into it as someone like Joss could do. (Even some Christians say Revelations is a horror story, and it's a prophecy that must come about to allow the New Heaven and New Earth, just as Jasmine comes to give humanity after the Beast and other signs.) And in that new world, there is no free will because free will allows for evil, and no such evil exists...people exist to worship Jesus/Jasmine/God instead. And as The Borg of Heaven goes into goes into as it examines the Bible verses in a literal sense (as many fundies say the Bible SHOULD be interpreted), Heaven is prepared for war, just as Jasmine was. "The Body of Jasmine" also reminds me of "the Body of Christ" (in the sense of the Christian Church, the ones who await for the coming of Jesus/Jasmine) that some people see themselves as part of. (And it was watching the Jasmine arc in which I could see why evil does not exist in Heaven, because they're all filled with the spirit of Jesus/Jasmine, so to do harm to each other is as doing harm to one's self, all to serve the Brain, which is Jesus/Jasmine who fills them all, overriding any free will and sense of individuality or desire to do anything but worship.)

It wouldn't surprise me if Joss wanted it to be even more obvious but wasn't allowed, so Jesus went from a man (typically depicted as white though he definitely was not, assuming any such historical figure existed at all in which there is reason to doubt) to a black woman named Jesus, er, Jasmine.

Obviously, no one who identifies as Christian would see Jesus as anything of the sort...though when I did ask some Christians about the entire free will and evil thing in the New Heaven and New Earth, it became clear that was a topic they hadn't thought about before and didn't enjoy thinking about at all.