Madoka Magica; Mein Leben.

Preface

The difficulty of writing this piece was exceptional: This right here before you is the fourth attempt.

First I tried explaining it straight, but it was too theoretical.
Secondly I tried poetically declaring it, but it was too theatrical.
Then I tried a cyclical approach, but it lost itself in it.
This structure now became possible only after I had gone through it all.

This work right now is deeply personal, and I feel like it is the only one that manages at all to transmit and capture the subject matter without losing itself along the way.

As such, please follow me to the bottom of this issue; this is the culmination of a decade of my own research and thought.

Some may say that it is madness to invest such effort into analyzing a magical girl anime. To them I will say that what truly is madness is that the world overlooks it; that people can see something like that and remain cold. That they can just walk past. I couldn't — I stayed for a while and looked, and listened with an open heart.

I simply couldn't let it go; this journey to figure this out was so meaningful to me that it’s impossible to overstate. This therefore is not just an analysis, but it’s also my very own personal journey, from darkness into the light.

This article does three things at once:

1. It tries to finally put into words what Madoka Magica: Rebellion truly means, what AiYo is, what was achieved there.
2. It attempts to detail how that understanding could have been reached at all; it is an account and an intellectual journey.
3. Finally, it is my personal testimony to the truth.

To do all of that in a single piece is almost too much, almost impossible. The problem most profoundly lies in the interconnectedness of it all. It is hard to talk about something if we have not yet established a common language to speak such things. At the same time it is incredibly dry to just go into metaphysics and write a philosophical account.
Additionally, not only would it be dry, I would necessarily have to base my findings on metaphysical claims which perhaps are too strong — stronger than I would even need them to be.

As such I will establish a few things in this introduction, without explaining too much, and leave the rest for later parts and in parts for perhaps another article.

Methodology

You will notice that oftentimes I equate the sign and the signified thing. This is not an accident or an overstatement based on ignorance, but it is a deliberate assertion. I am tired of pretending like associations and references are merely stylistic or that resemblance is merely coincidental. Fundamentally, I came to the conclusion that stories manifest archetypal truth; and that archetypal truth is primarily structural. Across mythologies, systems and stories, the same fundamental „things“ recur and the amount of things that are worth saying is much more limited than we often give it credit for.

I do not mean to say that things are the same in all aspects, but fundamentally that they are archetypally the same underlying „thing“. What I want to do instead is to point out that in the way that the story is meaningful, and in its meaning related to reality it is primordially the same thing.

It is the same symbol, the same metaphor.

Fundamentally we are right now in the postmodern era. Symbols have been deconstructed, reconstructed, reduced to their base essentials. But however something genuine and true can never be extinguished from them. That is something that I believe, and that I can see.

By using that type of language I remove myself from the purely academic playground. And that is okay, this right here is not meant to prove something to those who do not want to listen. I want to give and show something to those who want to find something, to see more:
More patterns, more meaning, more beauty.

Fundamentally, even the most ridiculous ideas which give you nothing are impossible to debunk and arguments are like seeds to be sown: Some may blossom into something great. Others fall on the road and the birds eat them. In that I am merely a sower; I have nothing to say to those who insist that there is nothing there, that there is nothing to see.

I merely stand here and I point out what I see; it falls on you to look and see for yourself. With your own eyes — if you have eyes to see, that is.

On the death of the author

I meant to finish this piece before the release of Walpurgisnacht Rising, but I ran out of time before I could publish it. The nature of this work is such that it really couldn’t sensibly be rushed, so we ended up with what we have here. However truly, the release recontextualizes much of what I wrote — and especially the authority I have been writing with. In truth the circumstances as they are now give me the freedom to truly claim what I wanted to claim all along without having to grapple with the accusation of „the text“ itself and the authors having some kind of supreme transcendent vision that I can not fully approach, or which supersedes my interpretations or the symbolism and philosophy that exists within the work itself.

I firmly stand on the ground that a work of art fundamentally is to be interpreted neither from the perspective of the author nor from the perspective of the beholder — but from the absolute perspective of God, and from the collective cultural unconscious that this work exists in context of. Therefore fundamentally a metaphor means what it means, not what someone thinks or what the author means. In that sense, and from that perspective you can not truly „own“ a story, even if you write it. Instead the story is a responsibility; it is a living thing that you are merely a carrier of if you are an author.

Endless sequels and endless continuation are impossible as every story that is worth telling has a beginning and an end. That is unavoidable and no man can do anything to escape this fate.

In that, the sequel, whatever it is — and I have not seen it yet — is to be seen as a proposition. Gen Urobuchi clearly says that he had no more ideas. That makes perfect sense: Because Rebellion is already a perfect ending, saying anything more makes the whole less. Being required to say something more is in itself a curse. So in time I shall consider their proposal, and evaluate.

But I must stress this: Nothing that could possibly be there has in itself the capacity to shake the conclusions that the metaphysics and metaphors imply. These things are greater than merely the author, and as such he has no inherent right over them. Especially not when his hand is forced by a giant corporation seeking profit over art.

However in that step, crossing this threshold, we leave behind yet another shackle that was binding and chaining this, my, work before:

It was the apparent perfection and sublime sophistication of Madoka Magica. This perhaps was the greatest conflict of them all: How can a work like this be of such properties and have such a nature? Am I not insane for even considering it? Even more daring: Am I not becoming heretical by merely allowing myself to entertain such notions? From all such things I am now genuinely free. Because the thing that was physical in this world has been lost, it is now merely a moment, something that existed in the past where context was lacking. With this context the magic vanishes from this world. What remains instead is however still the shell and the pointer towards the beyond.

I declare to you here and now: Even if there are mistakes, and even if the work fails and falls — this here is an image, an image of an idea: The transcendent true „Rebellion movie“ and its true sequel, which eternally exist beyond the veil.

My song, my story, is fundamentally first and foremost about that „Madoka Magica“, the one that can never be lost and the one that human authors can never touch: The one in heaven whose author is God.

„Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart turns away from the Lord.“

— Jeremiah 17:5

This world is not worth saving

We begin with the conclusion that Paul gives in the New Testament as to the nature of man.

As it is written:
„There is no one righteous, not even one;
there is no one who understands;
there is no one who seeks God.
All have turned away,
they have together become worthless;
there is no one who does good,
not even one.“

— Romans 3:10-12

The original series of Madoka Magica does many things, but one among them is most central, most important: It establishes a baseline. At the very end Homura draws a sobering conclusion:

Homura: „This world is NOT worth saving.“

— Homura

This is not a statement of a disappointed defeatist — far from it; the opposite in fact. This is a conclusion which is drawn soberly and unbearably. It is both the conclusion which the audience is supposed to draw and one that no one — least of all Homura — wants to draw: A necessary conclusion.

It is utterly impossible to grasp the conflict and setting of Rebellion without it, as it is the very premise behind the conflict of both its setting and ending. Which is why I find it so important to make this point absolutely clear. That shall be the purpose of this chapter. And I will go even further and say that this right here is the central point of the main series of Madoka Magica.
And yet right here there is a challenge: Many regard the ending of the series to be a happy one, instead of the absolute tragedy that it is.

I find that astonishing, but I may come only to the conclusion that the reason for such a perspective can only arise from living in a world where the fundamental questions that lead to it, which are equally applicable to the real world as well, are perpetually avoided. At the end of the series, what arises is something innate to our modern world: The lie of the last man — a false idol of death, cheap grace, the enemy of life itself. And yet at the same time we are so accustomed to this counterfeit salvation or even just the „normalcy“ of the mundane that it is glanced over without a second thought.

You would probably still be living in caves

The world seems ordinary, but under the surface it is governed by different laws than the ones that people understand.

It is firmly established by Kyubey:

Madoka: „What if you never came to our planet at all?“
Kyubey: „You would probably still be living in caves.“

— Episode 11

Think about what he is saying right there, the absolutely terrifying implications. If humanity had never progressed at all without their wishes, then it seems to imply that the true motor of human society and of progress is magical girls. Everything you do, everything you think you are, is made possible to exist only by the wishes of magical girls which come at the cost of their souls.

the shadow is obviously a metaphor

If it truly means that human society is progressing only because of this intervention, then humanity is incapable of truly advancing on its own. As a result, any action you or anyone takes to advance humanity is meaningless in the large sense of it. Essentially from an existential point of view, there is a shadow looming over all of reality.
This is not merely a facet, but at the very core of our conception of ourselves and our relation to society.

The reason why Kyubey is doing something like this is explained in this dialogue:

Kyubey: „At the moment when your Soul Gems flare out and turn into Grief Seeds, a tremendous amount of energy is produced. As Incubators, it is our job to collect that energy.“
Madoka: „... Are we just disposable energy sources to you, then? Are you saying we should just die for you?“
Kyubey: „Do you have any idea how many civilizations coexist across the universe, and how much energy they consume in a single second? Eventually, even you humans will be able to leave this planet and join us. When that day comes, you wouldn't want to venture out into an empty, desolated universe, right? In the long run, this arrangement benefits mankind as well.“

— Episode 9

Since the beginning of time...

The earth in Madoka Magica has been in the energy-generating business since humans used to live in caves. The statement that „humans would be living in caves“ without the Incubators is absolutely terrifying. It is however made much worse by the montage that follows it, where Kyubey shows to Madoka not only one incident but all of history. This strongly implies that ALL of human progress and ALL of history were centrally based on Witches and Magical girls. Without their intervention human society would not have advanced at all.

Prometheus, the bringer of fire, was Kyubey — or rather a magical girl

Fire has been given to humans because of Magical girls.

It is reasonable thus to assume that all or most inventions have been basically made because of magical girls. This implies that human understanding and potential are vastly miscalculated, and overestimated.

In the world of Madoka Magica humans are incapable of progress. And all of our supposed capabilities and all the things we as „human beings“ are proud of are lies. We have never achieved anything. Every single thing is a lie.

Jeanne d’Arc was a magical girl

History has been going from one bloodbath to the next, from one disaster to the next. And here is what is fact in the world of Madoka Magica:

most or ALL advancements of history have been caused by magical girls. To the uninitiated it may have seemed different, but primarily it was done through magic.

Additionally, in an equal amount to the blessings, curses spread through the world. Causing untold destruction and strife. Who knows how much of known history is reliable at this point?

This is an element of the setting which is rarely understood in its significance, as truly often stories feature a secret order to the world that eludes the general public. But rarely is its fundamental reality so tragic or so transvaluating of existence because of the existential disaster that this implies.

do they look happy to you?

The earth is a cattle farm. All of that has been done in order to provide the Incubators with energy. And they never ever cared about any of them. About humans or humanity, nor about magical girls.

You are just cattle.

This is also not my interpretation or dramatization of it. The four runes written in the image attached are: „Vieh“ This is German and literally translates to „cattle“.

Think about what this means: This is how humanity is viewed by the incubators.

Magical Girls are human sacrifices

Remember, in the real world people actually did this.

Now imagine living in this world of Madoka Magica: You are living your life, thinking you are contributing, but you are just living in an illusion. More to the point, this illusion is run on human sacrifices.

After all — all the comfort of modern life has been bought with the sacrifices of Magical Girls.

A public ritual is gruesome and abhorrent to our modern tastes. But never forget: People actually used to sacrifice their children. And let me be clear: What is happening here is, except for the public spectacle, exactly the same, the same moral abomination.

It is comparable to a Mayan society which offered their children up to the rain gods to ask for a plentiful harvest.

Editorial annotationIMAGE EVIDENCESeverity38/100LowThe supplied illustration is clearly Mesoamerican but does not visibly establish a specifically Mayan setting and appears closer to a Mexica/Aztec sacrifice image. Identify and source the culture shown, replace it with a Mayan example, or generalize the sentence to „a Mesoamerican society.“

But there is no offering; there is no harvest. It is happening unknowingly. What is valuable to you? Your family? Your daughter may just end up as a human sacrifice. Is it stability? All human affairs and wars and peace are dictated by the whims of witches and magical girls; all means of controlling disasters are just lies made to make you feel comfortable and sleep quietly without noticing anything wrong.

And the people aren't aware; they are blinded to the truth. Their children are sacrificed to an alien god — or rather to a demon, who never cared about them, and they do not notice — what good could any comfort or illusion be in light of this? What reason could there be to allow such a world to persist?

I would argue that the meaninglessness in the absence of god is the same one as the one in Madoka Magica, as — and here is the thing — if you look beyond all the fantastic concepts, you will soon notice that all of them are just metaphors for real things: For the real horror of absolute reality.

Not quite as cute as a white harmless looking cat, don't you think?

Madoka Magica contains within it countless allusions to Faust. And if Madoka is often associated with Gretchen, and Homura with Doctor Faustus himself, then Kyubey is undoubtedly the Mephisto of this story, sharing many characteristics with him. Mephisto is the demon who offers Faust his bargain. This is explicit as Faust is quoted many times in the runes and the character names. Among the many parallels is that Homura's power is to stop time, just as it was Faust’s wish to stop time if he ever experienced a moment that he would hope that it would last forever. This is of course a twist on that bargain.
If you are familiar with the story of Faust then you will know that Mephisto appears not as a dangerous-looking demon, but as a nice and helpful servant who seems like he is giving Faust a fair offer. This is absolutely similar to the way that Kyubey appears to the magical girls. Offering them a wish and magical powers in return for becoming witches and burning up their soul for energy — only that he conveniently leaves out that last part.

However, going back even further, even Mephisto in Faust is actually already created as a stand-in for Satan, the Devil. And the whole situation with Mephisto tempting Faust is actually a reinterpretation of the temptation of Hiob in the Old Testament. What is especially striking are the parallels drawn during the „Prolog im Himmel“ in Faust where Mephisto goes before God and asks to tempt Faust. The situation that this references and reimagines is:

„‚Does Job fear God for nothing?‘ Satan replied.
‚Have you not put a hedge around him and his household and everything he has? You have blessed the work of his hands, so that his flocks and herds are spread throughout the land. But now stretch out your hand and strike everything he has, and he will surely curse you to your face.‘
The Lord said to Satan, ‚Very well, then, everything he has is in your power, but on the man himself do not lay a finger.‘

Then Satan went out from the presence of the Lord.“

— Job 1:9-12

Therefore Kyubey in this story is the Devil.
But why is he so powerful then, and behind everything? Just as God allowed him to do as he pleases to Hiob, but setting him limits that is a general Christian Truth.
In fact the Bible often calls the Devil the God of this world:

„The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel that displays the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.“

— 2. Corinthians 4:4

and

„For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.“

— Ephesians 6:12

In that we can see that this is precisely the way to understand the character of Kyubey correctly: He is the devil, the God of this world. In the Bible we see that God is absolutely sovereign and the devil is powerless against him; but from humanity’s perspective it often does not appear so. When tempted it is the devil himself who appears as tempter; but God often works through his sovereignty. Indeed in the setting of Madoka Magica we never see God interfere directly, but strictly speaking this does not mean that he is not present. But nevertheless Kyubey as he presents himself is a physical God of this world.

This world is a desert

One motif that much Christian writing often emphasizes is that „This world is a desert“ and that we are merely wandering through it, and do not belong here. That most primordially has to do with the notion that this world is fallen; but especially in that its fallenness manifests in that there is something wrong with the world.

This world is a desert

A very important point is that Madoka Magica does not create a purely arbitrary fictional world. Its most fundamental subject is existential conflict; it does not establish a fictional metaphysics in order to create something alien or extreme, it establishes it in order to actually become capable of genuinely depicting the real world. Genuinely the world of Madoka Magica, with all of its horrors, is not more wrong than the world we live in. It is isomorphic to it: An accurate representation with different means but equal existential weight.

Homura sitting in the desert. This scene is from the opening of Rebellion, which is called „colorful“. Once Madoka is gone, who made the world to Homura colorful, the world becomes a desert once again. This is a reference to many things at once. 1. It describes that Homura has no attachment to the world beyond Madoka 2. It describes that the world really IS a desert once you strip away the „meaning“ which is always something transcendent.

Additionally, the world being a desert is again something that is used frequently by Nietzsche, as he described the loneliest desert as the place in which the burdened spirit goes to fight the hardest battles. And it is also a reference to the Biblical notion that this world is a desert.

In Nietzsche’s sense, the loneliest desert is the place where all values go to die, as the spirit fights against all the „thou shalt“ of this world.

In the Bible the desert is referring to the 40-year-long journey through the desert where the Israelites wandered through the desert.
Incidentally the desert is also where Jesus was tempted by the devil 3 times — but he resisted all of them.
The desert is an image for this world: To wander through this desert is the life of a Christian, looking at that which is beyond this world.

„They only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth.“

— Hebrews 11:13

The futility of Madoka's Sacrifice

Now we have established the setting and premise of Madoka Magica.
Going from here, let us look at the ending of the original series, as this is probably the pivotal event in the entire story. The thing that many overlook, but that is so crucial to understand, it is the conclusion that Homura herself gives to what has just happened:

Homura: „Just because Witches are no longer born into this world doesn't mean the curses harbored by mankind have ceased to exist. The distortions of the world have merely changed form, and now prey on people from the shadows.“

— Madoka Magica Episode 12

Notice how Homura puts it:
Homura says that curses are harbored by mankind and did not change.

What many people implicitly assume to be the case in the universe of Madoka Magica is that Kyubey is the origin of all curses. And yes, he does tempt people into it — but in general the true origin of curses is man.

The system of witches and magical girls is therefore merely a form. And yet the core is something else. This seems to implicitly be in line with something very close to the biblical notion of sin:

„Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:“

— Romans 5:12

From that Homura draws a staggering conclusion. This line has many different translations so I will go over the exact meaning:

Homura: „ほむらM‚悲しみと憎しみばかりを繰り返す、救いようのない世界だけれど—だとしてもここは、かつてあの子が守ろうとした場所なんだ‘“

— Madoka Magica Episode 12

The first part literally says that this world is filled with hatred and sadness, and that there is no possible way to save it. In short a twofold conclusion is reached:

1. This world is irredeemable
2. The cause of this is endemic, it is inherent in the structure of this world as it is now.

A common theme that people ascribe to the ending of the original series and seem stubbornly convinced about, is that Madoka saved the world. It is astonishing that this notion is so commonly and so deeply held among many viewers. It is a symptom of easily being swayed by the form and appearance of something, instead of looking at the deeper subject matter at hand.
Indeed Madoka managed to change the form which curses take. And perhaps Magical girls aren't suffering to the same degree anymore. But this stands in stark contrast to the judgment that the show itself gives about it through Homura (fully translating the above Japanese):

Homura: „This irredeemable world may be nothing but a cycle of sadness and hatred — but even so, this was a place she once tried to protect.“

— Madoka Magica Episode 12

Homura recognizes that the tragedy of the world and the state it is in — despite what Madoka has done — is so great that it is hopeless.

This mirrors the conclusion that God reached about the world when he sent the great flood:

„And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And it repented the LORD that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.“

— Genesis 6:5

Indeed in both cases there is something found: Noah finds grace in the eyes of God. Similarly Homura says: this is a place she tried to protect.

With this Homura says that the way she judges the effort of Madoka by is the intention. She does not say: this is the world she now protects or protected. She says that she merely tried.

Homura says:
The reason why it is precious is because Madoka tried to protect the world.
Admittedly, she does not say that Madoka failed, because she did not quite.

But it is surely not the salvation that many viewers — and as we will later see many of the magical girls themselves — ascribe to it.
Homura, however instead, values the world now because Madoka fought for it.

Homura: „I remember that. And I will never forget it. That is why — I'll keep fighting.“

— Madoka Magica Episode 12

The reason why Homura keeps fighting is because she remembers Madoka — it is in her honor. It is not for herself.
Therein, the ending of the original series is a complete and utter tragedy.

It is devastating because Homura is just one girl against a doomed existence. All she can do is fight to honor Madoka.

Indeed when she goes to fight into the desert the text reads:

„Don't forget. Always, somewhere, someone is fighting for you. As long as you remember her, you are not alone.“

— Madoka Magica

(picture)

If you read it from Homura’s perspective it is a mockery: How is Madoka really fighting for Homura? Homura is the saddest and loneliest magical girl on the planet. And all because she failed to protect Madoka and lost her best friend. In that — how exactly is Madoka fighting for her? Even if Madoka is a law that may also cull Homura one day. That does not really amount to fighting for her. It may seem like this is the case for other magical girls who never had a personal relationship with Madoka — but absolutely not for Homura. And if you look at Homura’s own quote from Rebellion you will see that „as long as you remember her, you are not alone.“ is an even greater mockery. As long as Homura remembers Madoka she is damned to be alone and to live all her life in her honor. Homura explains just how unbearably lonely she was, how she doubted her own memory. If anything this is a cruel and hollow cosmic joke.

And yet, ironically enough it is exactly right if you look at it from Madoka’s perspective: Homura still — even now — fights for Madoka. And Madoka herself said that she won’t be lonely, since she will see all timelines; in other words: as long as she remembers Homura she won’t be alone.

The irony is that many people of the audience find this ending to be wonderful:
Madoka died for others — therefore it is wonderful!

Yes, Madoka did sacrifice herself. But Madoka is not Christ — she could not save the world. And she did not rise from the dead. She is now a concept that erases Witches.

What Madoka gained for her wish, i.e. the exact mechanics of what that entails, is another common confusion. This is one particular moment where people are desperately clinging to the appearance:

Madoka: „I want to erase all Witches before they are even born. I will erase every single Witch in every universe, past and future with my own hands.“

— Madoka Magica Episode 12

What that should mean in practice is that Madoka ANNIHILATES the Magical girls before they become witches. Somehow the notion stuck that Madoka takes them away to heaven. But that is what people always like to think.

„Everyone who dies goes to heaven.“

— many people when someone died.

The biggest objection to this is that somehow Sayaka and Bebe appear in Rebellion, people who Madokami took away once. Given the upcoming movie anything can be retconned in at this point, but the way it was always implied to work and looking at additional material like Magia Record and Interviews, the most likely way this is reconciled is that Magical Girls that are taken away are kept merely as a record, or as information. Under extremely special circumstances they can become manifest as in Rebellion. But this is far from a normal occurrence.

Evidence that seems to support this is for example the concept movie which lists all the things which amount to „happiness“ but that „heaven“ contains nothing of it. Inherently Madokami is a pseudo-Buddhist concept: Non-existence.

Non-Existence for all purposes is just death, no different from the death of any other person.
Therefore I will treat them as interchangeable. What it almost certainly is not is a kind of heavenly existence in bliss as many imagine it.
Therefore plainly: Madoka is a concept now that erases witches.

And not even the evil that they cause goes away with them as we have learned.

Essentially, Madoka just replaced one evil with another by removing the effect without the cause — which caused the niche of „spreading curses“ that was occupied by the witches before to immediately be filled by wraiths, as the curses harbored by mankind still exist and now „merely take a new form“.

Shown for 3 frames in Homura's transformation sequence in Rebellion

In Rebellion we see how Madoka is now worshiped as a Goddess by the magical girls. She is called „the hope of magical girls.“ But there is no hope here; there is only death.

This is why in Rebellion we see the writing: „SIE VERHERRLICHEN DEN TODV“ — They are worshipping death. (pic attached)

Editorial annotationIMAGE EVIDENCESeverity32/100LowAt full resolution the line appears to end in TOD followed by punctuation, not „TODV.“ Recheck the rune transcription against the sequence or rune key and correct the extra character; the frame otherwise clearly supports „they glorify death.“

This is a double meaning:

1. This of course summarizes the perspective Homura has on Madoka's sacrifice.
2. But at the same time, it also refers to the fact that Madoka does not bring salvation but just death.

There are many runes in the background

Maybe someone will say now: It's not clear enough, maybe it's just the former? There is actually another one which is even more clear on the Wallpaper Witch Runes, all in Japanese:

Closed window right:
SYOU METU KYU USAI —
Annihilation (消滅 Shōmetsu) Salvation (救済 Kyūsai)

Surrounding winged feet:
SORE GA MA HOU SYOUJO —
This is a magical girl (それが魔法少女 Sore ga mahō shōjo)

Open window left:
ENKAN NO KOTO WARI —
Law of Cycles (円環の理 Enkan no kotowari)

Surrounding outstretched arm:
KI SE KI —
Miracle (奇跡 Kiseki)

It's basically making clear: There is an implied association between annihilation and salvation. But Annihilation is not Salvation; it is just death.

The imagery in this scene is perfect. With Homura kneeling at Madoka’s feet and crawling at her. But the familiars are throwing tomatoes at her, saying: Gott ist tot! Gott ist tot! And the burning ship with people drowning and falling into the water with everything sinking. This together perfectly describes what has happened and how to understand it:

A burning ship is a fitting symbolism, as there is no escape except to drown by your own hand.

The burning ship is the world and its state. It is a tragedy without helpers, and everyone is mercilessly drowning in the water. They jump overboard when all that awaits them is a cold grave; there is no salvation. A burning drowning ship is a visual representation of a counterfeit salvation: In Christianity, Noah’s Ark is that by which he survived the drowned world perishing in waters.
A burning ship sinks:
It is tragedy, the first world perished in water; the next one will perish in fire.
Drowning and Burning, no escape, no salvation.

„They are glorifying death“ is a reference to Nietzsche’s Antichrist where he describes Christianity as a religion that glorifies death, a religion of death, all Christians as nihilists.

Nietzsche viewed Christianity fundamentally as anti-life, because it is so focused on the afterlife. That it denies this world for the purpose of the next. But — and there he is right — that only works if there indeed IS a next world. But what if there is none? What if this world is all there is? Denying this life for the next is then like going on a burning ship: The ship is the faith. And yet it fails.
Thus leading to death instead of salvation.

According to Nietzsche the primordial noble thing is the noble man, and Christianity extinguishes that nobility through their focus on the hereafter. According to Nietzsche they do not actually care that there is no such thing; their true motive is resentment and weakness: Clinging to a futile hope because they have nothing else. Therefore arriving at slave morality and finally the last man.

This critique however was mainly addressing the Christianity of his day, which was the Lutheranism of late 19th-century Germany. Which combined many horrible aspects together. First and foremost it was basically a state religion that swore on the emperor before Christ. Secondly it offered salvation for all through easy believism. Which incidentally is exactly the thing that the magical girls in Madoka Magica are practicing: They are embracing an easy salvation without recognizing that it’s actually annihilation. And that there is no hope there. Instead they cling to a false image.

This is mainly what Nietzsche was criticising. And in this corrupted form Christianity is truly the slave morality that he despised so much. As it offered salvation to all indiscriminately, therein it is a religion of death. Of course this has nothing to do with the teachings of the Bible which teach that God will redeem ALL things, and not just offer a cheap escape from this world. Instead he calls his followers to sell everything and follow him. Which is a kind of existentialism, which — ironically enough — is very close to the things that Nietzsche admired.

Indeed Nietzsche fundamentally was an existential philosopher who sought to overcome the decay of his age by any means. In his hatred of Christianity I find it hard to miss his certainty in diagnosing it to be one single thing, which it is far from. In that I can only conclude that the thing that offended him so was that which appeared to him before his very eyes; which he merely took at face value as the real thing.

You shall not make yourself an image, Homura

As such we now get this scene:
Homura is standing at Madoka’s feet and is trying to grasp them. This is again a biblical motif, John the Baptist says that he is unworthy to even wash Jesus’ feet; and yet Jesus washes the feet of his disciples. However Homura can’t grasp Madoka’s feet; instead there are scratch marks on the image. Showing that she clawed and failed.

However the other familiars are mocking „good for nothing“ — who is Ai — and who are throwing tomatoes at the image of Madoka declaring „Gott ist tot“ (God is dead).

This, in this context now takes on multiple meanings:

First. They are glorifying death, but God is dead. Meaning that Homura recognizes that the salvation in death that they are aspiring to is a dead God that she does not believe in. This is the true sense in which Nietzsche’s statement „God is dead“ is absolutely true, even within the very concept of Christianity. For example the God of Cheap Grace IS dead. It is a dead God that never existed, and who has nothing to do with the God of the Bible, and worshiping him leads to eternal damnation. The second death.

Second. The immediate context is that in that situation the world they are living in without wraiths where they do not fight is a mockery that dishonors Madoka’s sacrifice. Therefore the tomatoes and God is dead. Here „God“ is the God that Homura was living for until now: The God who is Madoka, to honor her. Homura is realizing, after having just talked to Sayaka about it — though she does not yet admit it — that to live with Madoka and the others like this, is more important than to honor her sacrifice or anything like that.

Third. The Madoka that Homura — or Ai — is crawling towards is now merely a dead concept. Therefore God is dead; or rather Madoka is dead — but Madokami is dead as well; just in a different sense.

This basically is a multifaceted perspective:

The law of cycles salvation as „God“ is dead because it is merely to glorify death. The legacy of Madoka as a „God“ — which is what Homura said at the end of episode 12: „this is a place she once tried to protect“, as a God is dead because Homura herself is now living a mockery of that concept. And finally Madoka herself as a „God“ that is as Homura’s purpose is dead because she became a dead concept.

Nietzsche said in Twilight of the Idols that he philosophizes with a hammer; he rings all the idols and hears them sing — by shattering. And so nothing again remains. And as all those „Idols“ or „Gods“ die, the illusion will soon begin to crumble.

Homura remembers what the world she lives in is like, and what the existence of this illusion means. While contemplating all those realizations of this chapter, as they are coming back to her one by one Homura now rides down the boat into the depth of the abyss. Mirroring the journey on the river Styx while being ferried into the underworld.

As such we have seen the full state of this world.
It is so important to keep this in mind when we look at the things that happen next.

The country of sweets

Skipping ahead — as for the „in between“ the time has not yet come — we arrive at the climax of the entire series: The moment that changed my life forever when I saw it.

Madokami comes down from heaven to pick up Homura.

Homura is lying there and when Madokami comes on her is written „Das ewig Weibliche“ — which means „the eternal feminine“. This is a reference to Faust 2; the final scene is the burial of Faust, where Mephisto thinks that he will now claim his soul.

A somber conclusion that is repeated again and again, in fiction and our culture. A cathartic ending. But not this time. This time alone, among all the stories, something different came to be. This something in this form is that amazing thing that makes Madoka Magica special. That in contrast to the previous chapter makes it amazing.

The ending of the original series of Madoka Magica is „Magia“, and in the full version of that song there is a line that says:

„Back when I loved books about strange lands,
illuminated by their captive suns,
I believed
all the stories that told me
that wishes came true.
(Amidst light and darkness)“

— Madoka Magica, Magia

The final line here is „Amidst light and darkness“, the original Japanese says: „hikari to kage no naka“, which literally means „in between light and darkness“. Ironically, there is a certain cover of that song on YouTube. It replaces that line with „Was I a fool to believe those lies?“

Oh my sweet child, those were not lies — Miracles and Magic DO exist.

However that quote, that line is one of sublime beauty because it is actually reminiscent of one of the most beautiful verses of the New Testament:

„And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.“

— John 1:5

This chapter is the light to the previous chapter’s darkness. And the Word of God however remains forever true: The darkness comprehended it not.

Homura's tenderness

In order to genuinely appreciate the price that Homura paid for her rebellion. Perhaps now more than anything we need to look at who Homura is as a person.

This is so crucial because a lot of the series more subtle visuals are charcterizations of Homura. And I guess it’s not something that many piece together.

Homura more than anything is an incredibly gentle and sensitive being. That is somehow unusually sounding because people usually associate her with being a calculating and precise warrior.

I want to make this case to you, to see her how she really is.

The reason why this is so often overlooked is that it seems like a self contradiction. How can someone be strong yet gentle, emotional yet controlled? Our culture has taught us that they are opposites, therefore we tend to read characters as either one or the other. And if it’s both than it must be insanity.

What Homura wants more than anything, her hearts desire is shown during the first half of the rebellion movie.

Please let that sink in.

This is what Homura wishes for, more than anything in the entire world. To be moemura — just an akward girl without redeeming qualities, because that is what she sees herself as even now — amidst her friends who care for her and who accept her just like she is. For Mami to no longer be alone but to live with someone close. For Sayaka and Kyouko to just go to school as ordinary friends. For Madoka to be with her family and friends and to be happy every day.

And even then, Homura is not some special hero everyone admires — it is her dream, her fantasy, anything could be possible.

Even Sayaka admits: The person who wished for such a world can not be evil.

It is a gentle world, a kind world. A world in which magical girls can be what they are meant to be. Where they can be together.

And for Homura herself? Her biggest part in this is to be around and there, to be connected to others.

It is not nothing. But it is not much, and it is not misplaced. It is not arrogant. It is just a little gentle thing. To have an ordinary happiness, too like everyone else. To also be able to stand with them and protect someone else.

It seems healthy. And if anything self deprecating. Homura really doesn’t dare to wish for anything special.

When Madoka hugs her in the flower scene, her answer is: „You have blessed me more than I could ever hope for“

And with that she runs off ready to die.

You have to appreciate how little that is. How bleak her world is and has always been. And how little was enough to save her.

In connect the second part says: „This single place I could trust in saved me.“

Homura is a person who had nothing. She is living alone. With a heart condition and stayed in the hospital for a really long time.

A 14 year old kid being sick with a life threatening illness in the hospital is already sad. And then she is also completely abandoned and really has no one close to her. And has no friends or relatives to look after her.

And then she goes to school and people mock her behind her back, she fails at school, has no social skills, and is frail and sickly, and has to go to the nurses office a lot.

You have to keep this in mind when you see Homura getting estranged from her friends in the anime. These people mean everything to her. Even Mami and Sayaka who misunderstand her. But Madoka more than anyone.

Homura just accepts being misunderstood and unable to express herself. It’s a silent capitulation.

And he called his disciples to him and said to them, “Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the offering box. For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.”

— Mark 12:43-44 ESV

Homura is that poor widow.

The fact that Homura is often seen as being obsessed with Madoka to an unhealthy degree, like she is selfishly keeping her for herself, completely misses the point of who Homura even is as a person and what matters to her.

What Homura values so highly are extremely ordinary little things which everyone gets daily as a common courtesy. The premise that she would want Madoka for herself is wrong, simply by the fact that her entire character depicts her as someone who feels greatfull when someone just greets her and calls her name. Madoka is just a person who does such things.

From Homura’s perspective Madoka is an amazing strong person who betters the life of everyone surrounding her. To her she is like the sun. And yes, she does want to be in it’s light for a bit. But is that really so wrong and evil? It is a completely different thing from wanting to monopolize her, or have all of her for herself. Having Madoka call her name and go to school with her is Homura’s little coin. It is not more than that. To say that her getting to have that is already selfish or obsessive is an unbelievably cruel and mean thing as far as I am concerned.

There is a video on YouTube called „Homura was never a good person“. Good? God alone is good. But Homura is a kind and gentle person, someone who cares a about everyone and about what is good for them.

Twilight of an Idol

It’s amazing to see the bad wrap that some give Homura for her actions. My instinct why that is has always been utter disbelief. I find it impossible to even relate to how someone can come up with something like this.

The biggest accusation that we get against Homura is that she undermined Madoka „agency“ in that Madoka self determined to become an unfeeling abstract concept. And even if this is both: unnecessary, as Madoka being taken away from the law of cycles is „just a tiny part of it“ — meaning that the system that she created still continues to exist without her. Stated on multiple occasions that Madoka ordinarily would not want this.

It is still seen as inherently valuable to affirm her sacrifice — to the point of imaging her to cling to it despite all reason.

So valuable in fact that Homura overruling this agency is seen as an act of blasphemy.

The question here is really, and most fundamentally: WHY?

Why is that so important? Why is it for you so important to see Madoka — a poor 14 year old girl who was driven into an extreme situation out of a combination of self deprecation and necessity — condemned to death in the name of „her choice“.

I will be frank with you: I can not help but see in this phenomenon a profound sickness of our society. It is in my mind indefensible, and this argument in itself a moral failure.

Children should be protected even from their own bad choices. I am sorry everyone. I don’t think it is wrong to save a 14 year old girl from the consequences of her own actions if they can be avoided. To value self determination to this degree, to value it even over life itself, is by its definition idolatry.

Indeed this is one of the most pernicious and most evil idols of our age: the freedom of man to self determinate. It is in essence just one thing: Vanity.

Ironic: for it was out of Vanity that Christ was condemned. Perhaps this is most profoundly where I started seeing a pattern.

Twilight of an idol 2

As I already pointed out: the world that Homura wishes for in her heart of hearts is depicted in the dreamworld of the Rebellion Movie. It is her hearts desire.

The issue any dream or wish has is that by desiring something to become real or true, whatever is not that thing must become false. This is simply a trivial consequence of the law of the excluded middle as something and its opposite can never be true at the same time.

Therefore in order for Madoka to be a person, a friend and a human being she can not be something which is not that. That is she can not continue being an impersonal abstract concept.

The thing which makes Homura controversial — apart from trivially disproven misreadings of her character — is that by making this dream come true, she had to overcome the wish that Madoka made.

There are many layers to this critique, and they are often so intervowen that we have to nail them down and refute them one by one.

Essentially, the arguments go in this order: Madoka does not want to be saved from this fate. Madoka’s Sacrifice is necessary and she made that choice herself. Madoka is the hope of magical girls.

I have had many discussions on this topic over the years. And no matter how often I have refuted 1 and 2, and they are easily refuted with direct support from the original material, the argument is never won. Because at the end of the day the thing that binds people to condemn Homura is the third and most profound reason. And it is also incredibly illusive.

I will start with the simpler ones and we will go one by one.

Madoka’s true feelings.

The flower scene Mata ashita

Past Necessasity.

Even if it may have been necessary it is not necessarily right now Homura: I took only a tiny piece Note: Madoka’s mom says making a mistake can be a solution -> Madokami NOT Homura. Even if Madoka made that choice back then, why does that mean she should have to pay the cost of it herself?

Madoka is a symbol.

If you have followed my argument thus far, then I have made to you the case that Madoka Kaname is a 14 year old girl who wants to do something that matters and thereby got entangled into something which causes her to suffer. That she would genuinely be better off if she was free from it, doesn’t really want it and that Homura saved her from it in a way that does not undo the good that she brought forth.

Based on that evidence, the case rationally seems pretty settled. It seems like a free lunch honestly. And now, some will still feel like something is wrong. Like this just can’t be right, all these reasons, they can not be right — because Madoka is the hope of magical girls. And Homura is the devil who pulled her from heaven.

And that is because Madoka’s sacrifice is not merely a matter of fact or a mechanical transaction. But it is a symbol.

And this is exactly deliberate and perhaps one of the greatest genius things of Madoka Magica: What is the value of a symbol?

When a person becomes a symbol that person stops being real and becomes and abstract concept. In that to look past that and see the person behind the symbol in itself becomes an act of blasphemy.

In truth, this is the real rebellion of Homura. To look past the symbol and to see the real Madoka who is a girl that needs to be saved.

But it actually goes even further because what Madoka symbolizes is actually something which in the context of that narrative itself is under scrutiny.

The true tragedy of Faust

As we have briefly mentioned in the previous chapter, Homura has always been an allusion to Faust. In Madoka Magica, her power is to stop time — as was Faust’s Bargain with the devil: if he experienced a moment of pure happiness, where he would wish that time would stop forever, Mephisto would claim his soul. In order to understand what that means we need to briefly go over Faust and the beginning and end of his bargain.

The deal was:

Faust: „Werd ich zum Augenblicke sagen:
Verweile doch! Du bist so schön!
Dann magst du mich in Fesseln schlagen,
Dann will ich gern zugrunde gehn!“

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust I (V 1699–1702)

It says: „Should I say to a moment: Stay! For you are so beautiful! Then you may put me in chains, then I will gladly go under!“
This is the term of the contract in Faust. That Faust may see a moment of pure happiness, something that is truly worthwhile and then for that alone the devil may claim his soul.
The context here is that Faust is a tortured intellectual who has studied everything, philosophy, science, law, theology, and finally magic — yet nothing seemed worthwhile to him, so having become restless, incapable of crossing over into a „true world“, this is now his terminal solution.

The very ending of Faust 2 is that Faust says a very similarly worded sentence, and dies after:

Faust: „Nur der verdient sich Freiheit wie das Leben,
Der täglich sie erobern muss.
Und so verbringt, umrungen von Gefahr,
Hier Kindheit, Mann und Greis sein tüchtig Jahr.
Solch ein Gewimmel möcht’ ich sehn,
Auf freiem Grund mit freiem Volke stehn.
Zum Augenblicke dürft’ ich sagen: Verweile doch, du bist so schön!
Es kann die Spur von meinen Erdetagen
Nicht in Äonen untergehn.
— Im Vorgefühl von solchem hohen Glück
Genieß’ ich jetzt den höchsten Augenblick.“

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust II (V 11575 — 11586)

It says: „Only thus is freedom earned and life, by him who conquers it daily. And so is spent among danger: childhood, adult and old age; such struggle is what I want to see, of a free people on free ground! Then to the moment may I say: Stay! For you are so beautiful! The trail of my days on earth may not perish even in aeons! Therefore in anticipation of such highest happiness I am now experiencing the highest Happiness!“

Mephisto thought he won. Because these last words contain within them the expression from the very beginning: That he was shown a moment of pure happiness. But there is a twist here, Faust says that his happiness is found in anticipation. Not in being given something by Mephisto, but in the struggle and in striving for the highest things has Faust found his happiness — and yet even in that he only says: „THEN to that moment may I say“, meaning that he is looking towards the highest things from afar; it is not in his life that he has found the thing that he was looking for, but in the struggle itself — though it may still forever remain unattainable. Therefore what follows after this is the burial of Faust:

„Gerettet ist das edle Glied der Geisterwelt vom Bösen:
‚Wer immer strebend sich bemüht, Den können wir erlösen.‘“

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust II (V 11934 — 11937)

It says: „Saved is the noble member of the spirit world from evil: Whoever strives for the highest things, him we can save!“

Therefore, in striving for the highest things which are beyond this world Faust is saved and goes to heaven. The whole thing ends with:

„Alles Vergängliche ist nur ein Gleichnis;
Das Unzulängliche, hier wird’s Ereignis;
Das Unbeschreibliche, hier ist’s getan;
Das Ewig-Weibliche zieht uns hinan.“

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust II (V 12104 — 12111)

It says: „The temporary things are merely a parable; the unfit becomes event here; the indescribable happens here; the Eternal Feminine draws us in.“

And with that Faust is saved and goes to heaven. God therefore wins his wager with Mephistopheles from the prologue in heaven from the very beginning.

In Faust, the story itself does something which is not Christian. Faust is saved by „the eternal Feminine“ which is explicitly not Christian salvation through Christ alone. It is a humanistic, neo-platonic concept that grants salvation to all who strive towards a vague concept of the good.
Ironically, this is precisely the thing which Madokami represents:
A cheap grace for all magical girls, a redemption that takes them all away — Salvation / Annihilation, by appearance it is indistinguishable. In truth we do not know where she would have taken Homura — and I will give it the benefit of the doubt and say that Homura wouldn't have just perished like all the other magical girls, since she is special. But what exactly would have become of her is something which we do not really know — and it is certainly not heaven; nor is it the resurrection of the dead.

Christ says:

„Jesus answered, ‚I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.‘“

— John 14:6

No one comes to the Father except through me; there is no salvation and no other heaven except in Jesus Christ. This is and has always been the orthodox teaching of the church, and Goethe deliberately averts that in Faust, choosing Humanism over orthodox Christianity.

On the surface we have a very similar scene with Homura lying there, but under the surface the lives of Homura and Faust are very different. In fact the lessons that Faust learned at the end of his life — that struggle for the highest things is that wherein true happiness may be found — have been the guiding light that Homura was running towards from the very moment she met Madoka.

And now, Homura is lying there when the eternal feminine appears, the law of cycles to take her away. By itself this is the same humanistic conclusion that Faust presented. Homura has found meaning in fighting for Madoka, so having experienced that now, she could be happy — she even met Madoka again after all this time (as Kyubey says), so she can now die happily. A Humanist and Faustian conclusion. Remember that this is not heaven, and not eternity, not salvation; it is death — annihilation. At best it would be the same kind of eternal death that Madoka herself is condemned to: to exist as an abstract concept perpetually.

When I was watching this the first time I thought the show itself did not understand this and was going to just play it straight; that Madoka would take away Homura to „heaven“. To a peaceful resolution, and death would be declared paradise. This is what is to be expected. There are many films and many shows that end this way. And the audience appreciates, loves it: oh there he goes!

But what was truly won? The best example of that is the movie Gladiator — the gladiator dies, taking his revenge and remaining victorious. But what really is his victory?

He is dead. And there was no salvation for him. No heaven. He is just dead. And if we look at it from a Christian perspective then not only is he dead but he also went to eternal damnation in hell.

And yet Christians cheer for endings like this. I find it unbearable.

But this is the way of this world, it was one of the many reasons why I hated Christianity for the longest time with a passion. Because it is all so hypocritical, so ignorant and foolishly grasping at a hope that falls apart at the easiest contemplation.

It is „cheap grace“ — or Madokami; Death.

It is to be expected so I solemnly accepted this conclusion. I genuinely believed that this is what was going to happen. After all: Humanism is the law of this world. It is so deeply ingrained that no other solution, nor possibility can really be imagined. This is how it always ends, I thought in my heart, this is okay — it has been a great flight, we have gone close to the sun. But now Madoka Magica as a work will fail to reach the absolute. It will perish like all the others, and perhaps another some day, will come after it; to attempt it again.

So I thought in my heart of hearts at that moment.

However it did not come to pass.
Instead Homura rejects the eternal feminine, and pulls Madoka from heaven therein breaking the very fabric of reality.

When I saw it, I stood up in awe and started cheering.

It was beyond amazing that someone actually did it for once.
Someone rejected this humanism, this trap and the nihilism that is so apparent but gets ignored by all and everyone. Back then I could not understand what exactly it was that I was seeing. But in that very moment I knew that this is what I always wanted to see, why I started watching anime in the first place.

Amazingly, what is portrayed next is a resurrection of the dead, not some abstract apotheosis or implied afterlife.

This is a stark rejection of the religion of death that seeks the salvation in escaping the world, but instead embraces and redeems it, here and now.

A genuine miracle happened. Not according to the laws of this world, not what was „proper“, but what is scandalous. Back then I knew immediately that this, that I was seeing, was the truth. For this was what I always wanted to see depicted. I wanted someone to do this, because I knew that it is what is necessary but at the same time impossible because it is a transgression against the laws that bind this world.

The great irony is that this is precisely as controversial in its own universe as it is in the real world. The depiction IS the real thing: a genuine Rebellion.

Homura rejects the eternal feminine — but what did she choose instead?
That I could not understand, but I wanted to know. I wanted to understand. I spent years chasing after it; and this very article is the answer I have finally reached after all of it.

The cryptic answer that the show itself gives is: AiYo, it's love. No one could possibly understand this feeling. Ironically then Homura says that she suffered endlessly in the maze that she was trapped in. But now even that suffering has become precious to her, because it was for Madoka.

Back then it was something foreign to me, because it does not resemble „love“ as I know it or as fiction usually depicts it. It is something else, completely and utterly.

Note also how different it is to the struggle of Faust: for Faust the „salvation“ of cheap humanistic grace is found in striving for higher things and imagining them from afar. For Homura all struggle is valuable only because it is for Madoka, therefore it is precious. For Faust the motivation for the highest things comes from within him: It is HIS desire, HIS nihilism, HIS meaninglessness. For Homura it is the struggle for the other that allows her to cross over, to pull Madoka from heaven. Therefore Faust's path leads to the eternal feminine — salvation; annihilation. Madoka however rejects this false God.

Do you consider stability and order more important than desire?

And thus, it is a new creation.

Homura sits at a table and has a cup of tea. On the pole is written: „Die ewige Wiederkehr des Gleichen“, which is „the eternal return“. The eternal return stands for the hardest thing man can bear:

To imagine that he eternally recurs, the same thing forever and ever. And an Übermensch is he who will affirm life even if he is cursed to eternally repeat his own mistakes; who creates new values despite that and will go on to the future.
Implicitly this refers to a sentence Homura said just before:

Homura: „I remembered all the time that I repeated time, all the time that I suffered, it was all for Madoka; therefore even pain is dear to me now.“

— Rebellion

There is also the finishing quote from episode 10, Homura’s monologue ends with:

Homura: „If it’s for her, I do not mind being stuck in this eternal maze.“

— Madoka Magica Episode 10

Incidentally Episode 10 ends with the opening of the original anime „Connect“, which is essentially Homura singing about her eternal loop and never giving up because of the promise she made with Madoka. It says: „The beautiful blue sky will always wait for me, therefore I am not afraid. By now, no matter what happens, I won't get disheartened.“

I recommend you read Connect as a whole now. It starkly contrasts itself with the purpose of Faust’s life. Remember that Madoka Magica as a whole begins with Connect as the opening in medias res; this already is beyond the conclusion to Faust’s life: To struggle for the highest things. However, Homura has struggled for them for the longest time, and lost herself, fallen and gotten back up. But this final time something else, something greater has happened.

In essence the naive view of humanism that Faust reaches as its conclusion, is the very thing that Homura started with before even her journey truly began. This was loop 1 Homura. We are now however in the post AiYo new world.

In order to understand the extent of Homura's Rebellion and its true nature we skip ahead to the „hallway scene“.

In the new world that Homura has rewritten, Madoka transfers into school. It is a new scenario; in this world Madoka's mom was transferred to the U.S. for three years and they just moved back. Madoka is now the transfer student.

This also is another bookend, as the movie now ends again the same way as the entire series began, except now it is reversed: Homura is now showing Madoka around. And now we return to the same hallway where we had the following dialogue in the first episode of the original series:

Homura: „Kaname Madoka, do you value your own life? Do you consider your family and friends precious?“
Madoka: „I... I do. I love my family and friends. They mean the world to me.“
Homura: „Is that true?“
Madoka: „Of course! Why wouldn't it be?“
Homura: „I see... If that's true, then you must never think about becoming someone else. If you do, you'll lose them all. You just need to remain Kaname Madoka, as you always have been.“

— Madoka Magica Episode 1

In that dialogue Homura tried to warn Madoka, tried to tell her that she shouldn't make a contract with Kyubey to sell her soul. But of course it was cryptic and Madoka did not understand her.

Now, they are again walking through it as they have this dialogue:

Homura: „How does it feel to be back again?“
Madoka: „I guess... everything feels familiar. And, at the same time, it's different. It feels strange.“
Homura: „I'm not surprised. It's been three years.“
Madoka: „No... It feels like nothing's changed at all... In fact, if anything's changed around here... it's me...
Yeah... It is me...
I should have a different form...
a different purpose here...
So, why...?“

— Rebellion

After this, Madoka's eyes start lighting up, and she starts returning to become Madokami again. In that moment Homura grabs her.

Madoka: „...! Homura!? Hey! Let go!“
Homura: „It's OK. You're exactly what you should be... what you've always been.“

— Rebellion

Madoka thereafter turns back to the ordinary girl, however the background behind them still shows the universe and all the stars and nebulae.

Homura: „Madoka Kaname, do you treasure the world you live in?
Or, would you break its laws to follow your heart?“
Madoka: „Well, I... I, er... I don't... I, I mean, yes.
I do treasure this world.
But, I don't think a person should go and break the rules, just because they feel like it...“
Homura: „Ah, I see...
Well, then, I suppose one day... you'll also be my enemy.
It's fine. I don't care.
Because even then, I'll keep wishing for a world where you can be happy.“

— Rebellion

And after this, Homura returns the Red Ribbon she got from Madoka back to her and ties it into her hair. She looks at her smiling with crying eyes:

Homura: „I knew it.
They always did look better on you.“

— Rebellion

We don't exactly get a lot of explicit statements on Homura's new world. However this scene is very clear in what it shows and says if we look at it in the context of Madoka Magica as a whole and the metatextual elements that it references. This is why we must start with it to understand what really happened in full.

The nature of Homura's new world is apparently one of more direct interference than the previous world. When the previous world and the previous changes were the results of changes on the metaphysical level, the changes here are less subtle direct interventions: Homura has inserted Madoka into the timeline instead of rewriting the entire past to make her have been there.

Yet Madoka's judgment about this world, if it seemed strange to her, which Homura asked, worried if she did a bad job with the world, is that only she herself has changed. Madoka accepts the world that Homura made as genuine, but she herself is now out of place, her own insertion is the most radical one. She was ripped out of the law of cycles and became a living human once again.

However Homura holds her and tells her: „You're exactly what you should be.“

Many people say that Homura did injustice to Madoka by pulling her out of there — it was Madoka's will to become the law of cycles, therefore it is not right to undermine her agency in this way.

However against that we have Madoka's own words in the first hallway scene from episode 1: „I do. I love my family and friends. They mean the world to me.“; of course Madoka said that without knowing about the possibilities of going somewhere else and about the reality of the world. However the same sentiment is repeated again in the „flower scene“ in Rebellion, and much less ambiguously (we will return to that in Chapter 4). There Madoka says that she would never want to go away from her friends and family and she could not bear it. And this is what Homura acted on — on a direct request and statement made by Madoka, that her sacrifice to become Madokami was made out of desperation, NOT plan or design.

But now comes the most important part: Homura asks her, „Do you consider stability and order more important than desire?“ Another translation says: „Do you treasure the world you live in? Or, would you break its laws to follow your heart?“ Madoka says that she values it and that you should not break the rules just because you feel like it. However, this interaction represents a tragic misunderstanding.

Homura is asking Madoka if it is okay that she broke the rules of the world which bind it, and the idol which she herself became in order to save her. But Madoka understands it, as if Homura is talking about casually breaking rules and laws in order to gain something simple or some benefit in this world. Madoka does not understand the extent of what Homura is saying — just as she misunderstood her in Episode 1.

Homura phrases it this way, because she feels like she broke the law of this world. She did what people say she ought not to, but what she knew was necessary and right and good. As we will later see in this chapter, Homura didn't really wrong or hurt anyone in any way with what she did here. However in the eyes of the world what she did is evil.

This is why Homura says: „I do not care what I become! I pulled her from heaven, therefore I must be a demon.“ Homura does not say that she is doing something evil or that she is trying to hurt someone here. Instead what she says is that in the eyes of the world, an action like this is too radical, too divisive. Therefore it is evil.

When Gideon destroyed the statues of Baal in the Book of Judges, the people wanted to kill him. But he didn't do evil. What he did was good. Yet in the eyes of the world it was evil what he did. It is the same as when Jesus healed on a Sabbath, and the Jews wanted to kill him for it — because he has broken the laws of man; but not the laws of God.

This is a similar case. Homura did not break the law of God. It is written:

„For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: ‚Love your neighbor as yourself.‘“

— Galatians 5:14

This is what she has kept. She says that what she is driven by is „love“.

However, now you may say: What she is driven by is not love, it is desire.
Desire? For that we can try her according to the biblical standard of what love is:

„Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.“

— 1 Corinthians 13:4-8

Homura to Madoka is kind and patient beyond all else, she never stopped loving her even when Madoka stupidly fell for Kyubey again and again. It fits all of these criteria. But beyond all else, it is not self-seeking.
And that is proven — along with many other things — in how she reacts to Madoka rejecting her.

Madoka does not understand that she is rejecting Homura, who has given everything for her: Her own life, her soul and even her justice. But Homura takes it as such: „I see, then, I suppose one day... you'll also be my enemy. It's fine. I don't care. Because even then, I'll keep wishing for a world where you can be happy.“ This is selfless love. It is the opposite of keeping Madoka for herself, or locking her away. Homura saved her at the cost of her everything. And now, despite Madoka meaning everything to her and she herself wanting nothing more than to be close to her — she lets her go. Because Madoka's happiness is the most important thing to her.

With crying eyes she ties her ribbon on her: „I knew it; it always looked better on you!“ This mirrors the words that Madoka's mother gave her when she sent her to school. Just like how her mother sent her daughter to school without trying to keep her for herself (as sometimes happens with a devouring mother archetype), Homura lets Madoka go to her family. Leaving Homura herself all alone.

This is the same spirit as in that Paul writes:

„For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my people, those of my own race, the people of Israel.“

— Romans 9:3-4

Paul says that for others he is ready to be even cut off from Christ. And now imagine that. Christ is his treasure, his everything. Without him, he is nothing. But even that he is ready to give away for love.

Essentially, this is the ultimate display of love: To sacrifice „to be loved“ for love.

Under a strange sky

Returning now once again to the scene where Homura sits at the table: Before Homura now stands Sayaka, and she attacks Homura for breaking the law.

Sayaka: „Do you know what you have done?“

— Sayaka, Rebellion

What law has Homura broken?
And Homura even says: the law of cycles still exists; I merely broke off a small part of it!
So what law did she break?

„You broke apart the hope of magical girls“, says Sayaka — by pulling Madoka from heaven, Homura destroyed an idol, she broke the illusion. Essentially she destroyed the lie that Sayaka was living by. That is why she hates her. To destroy the lie and to tell the truth is always a revolutionary act.

Sayaka is furious at Homura; Homura however accepts this; she says that she is now the „evil“ in this world. She herself will bear the curses and their effects and will act as agitator and upset the laws of the world. The curses that were haunting humanity because of all of their sins are still there. Homura is not creating something evil, she is managing it.

A central concept that is so key to understanding Homura's Rebellion is to look very precisely at the way the word „law“ is used, and its inner meaning. Just as we had a misunderstanding between Homura and Madoka when Homura asked Madoka if it is okay to break the law to follow your heart. The way Homura meant „law“ is as the values and consensus of society. The way however Madoka understands „law“ is as the genuine law of what is good and right. Meaning, Homura is referring to the „law“ as a postrelativistic concept. However Madoka is conceptualizing it prerelativistically.

The thing about Sayaka however is that she does not understand the „law“ as a prerelativistic pure abstract; as a form of the good as Madoka, but as the law as it is written by the letter: As values as such.

Nietzsche about this in his three metamorphoses of the spirit:

„All these heaviest things the load-bearing spirit taketh upon itself: and like the camel, which, when laden, hasteneth into the wilderness, so hasteneth the spirit into its wilderness.
But in the loneliest wilderness happeneth the second metamorphosis: here the spirit becometh a lion; freedom will it capture, and lordship in its own wilderness.
Its last Lord it here seeketh: hostile will it be to him, and to its last God; for victory will it struggle with the great dragon.
What is the great dragon which the spirit is no longer inclined to call Lord and God? ‚Thou shalt,‘ is the great dragon called. But the spirit of the lion saith, ‚I will.‘
‚Thou shalt,‘ lieth in its path, sparkling with gold—a scale-covered beast; and on every scale glittereth golden, ‚Thou shalt!‘“

— ZARATHUSTRA’S DISCOURSES. I. THE THREE METAMORPHOSES.

This is a very fitting description of how Homura views the law that she broke, and the laws that she is acting as agitator against. The laws that Homura is breaking are the old values, the „Thou shalt!“, the man-made laws of this world.

If we look in detail at what is going on in Homura's world we see the following scenes:

First, we see Mami react to Homura breaking a cup. Mami is standing there and reaching for something in the air, while a familiar runs past her. When she suddenly turns around to see the cup broken. Notice that this brings us back to Madoka Magica Episode 3, where Mami died and her broken cup was all that was left of her. In Mami's hand is found a black feather and she is surprised.

This does two things: First the cup represents Mami’s identity, it is broken just as when she died. Except this time she does not die, and a black feather appears in her hand instead. Now — were it a white feather, it would symbolize protection. But it is black instead.

What happened here is that Homura upset the order of this world and intervenes. Mami however, this time around is alive.

Second, we see Kyouko sitting in a tree eating apples and sharing them. Kyouko notices Homura's familiars asking her for an apple. She throws it to them. However Homura denies her: She shakes her head and the apple instead falls into the water.
Kyouko is visibly upset.

What happened here is that Homura denied Kyouko's values: Kyouko is a Master Moralist, according to the Nietzschean conception of morality. Kyouko's value is: „You shall not waste food.“ This however is not a true universal. It is a man-made law that Kyouko imposes onto the world.

Homura denies it, and shatters the idol. But is that really evil?

There is a passage in the New Testament when Jesus heals a crippled man on the Sabbath:

„Another time Jesus went into the synagogue, and a man with a shriveled hand was there. Some of them were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus, so they watched him closely to see if he would heal him on the Sabbath. Jesus said to the man with the shriveled hand, ‚Stand up in front of everyone.‘
Then Jesus asked them, ‚Which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?‘ But they remained silent.
He looked around at them in anger and, deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts, said to the man, ‚Stretch out your hand.‘ He stretched it out, and his hand was completely restored. 6 Then the Pharisees went out and began to plot with the Herodians how they might kill Jesus.“

— Mark 3:1-6

Healing on the Sabbath is a good thing. It was never forbidden. However the Pharisees turned the law, which was good, into legalism. In short, they turned the God-given divine law which is good, into a man-made law, which does not exist for the people but as a mechanism of control. It becomes an end in itself.

Ironically, Christ when he is healing on the Sabbath, while breaking the man-made laws of this world, while keeping the absolute divine law of God, is acting in accordance with Nietzsche’s description of the Übermensch: He IS the law, therefore he can simply impose the law. Nietzsche would argue that Christ’s absolute laws are not from God but from man, namely himself — but he would entirely agree with the critique of Christ against the Pharisees and would call them hypocrites all the same.

In Kimi no Gin no niwa there is a verse that says:

„The girl who lost her way today too
came home the earliest
She should run while finding
a place brighter than righteousness, right?“

— Kimi no Gin no Niwa

A place that is brighter than righteousness is not necessarily an evil place. It depends on what you really mean by „righteousness“. Righteousness often implicitly means self-righteousness, to be right and good in your own eyes.
This is reminiscent of that which Madoka’s mom said way back in the original series: In order for her to be right, someone else must be wrong. And so Homura gladly is wrong, so that Madoka can be right. And Sayaka is now cursing her for it. Sayaka is a firm servant of the „law“.

But if you look around the state the world is actually in you see that Homura didn’t really hurt anyone. And yet, even the audience is accusing Homura of being evil, they are agreeing with Sayaka. And indeed, the appearance is all that matters for most.

Indeed, if we just soberly list all the things that Homura did it becomes evident that the accusations against her are baseless:

1. Homura took control over a world that was going to ruin and is managing the curses that plague mankind
2. Homura extracted Madoka, Sayaka and Bebe from the abstract concept known as the „law of cycles“ and put them back into the world where they can have a normal life.
3. Homura upset the values of the world by breaking a cup, wasting food, and making the world strange and appear ominous to Sayaka’s eyes.
4. Homura accepted Sayaka’s enmity and let her go, despite Sayaka being clearly antagonistic towards her.
5. Homura even accepted that Madoka would be separate from her if that is what it took to protect her.

That's not how someone who is power-hungry or someone who is trying to keep Madoka for herself would act. The one thing that all of those things have in common that creates the accusation is that all of them demand responsibility. No one was responsible, and therefore there was chaos. Now Homura took it all upon herself. That is her cross to bear.

In Homura's eyes the feathers were white all along.

As she talks a tomato hits Homura’s head thrown by her familiar, the same as those that her familiars were throwing at the idol of Madoka, when Homura is grasping at her feet.

The black feathers are white in Homura's eyes. The black color is merely appearance, just as Christ was despised in the eyes of the people, so is Homura despised in the eyes of the world. However in Homura's eyes they are white. White feathers symbolize resurrection and protection.

Editorial annotationPROVESeverity48/100LowCite the visual or cultural basis for assigning black feathers to apparent evil and white feathers to resurrection and protection. Color symbolism is context-dependent, so the reflected color alone does not fix those meanings.

Homura now stands guard over this world, and acts as its protector. In order to do that she has to upset the laws of this world, because the laws and values of the old world lead to ruin. Therefore Homura is evil.

Black feather or white feather — it is in the eye of the beholder.

Beyond that remains only the absolute, beyond good and evil: And in that, the law is fulfilled in one commandment: Love; and the things that happen out of love are always beyond good and evil.

Editorial annotationQUALIFYSeverity97/100CriticalIn Christian terms love is the fulfillment of God's law, not a realm beyond good and evil. „The things that happen out of love are always beyond good and evil“ also conflicts with the moral test you just applied; reformulate this around love's conformity to truth.

And that is precisely why Homura does not mind this judgment, as it can no longer touch her.

Homura rewrites Sayaka’s memories so she can have a normal life without obsessing over her. Sayaka however says that even then she will always remember that Homura is a demon. To that Homura replies that she should try to act politely and not cause a fuss, because otherwise it may even upset Madoka.

And with those words Homura lets Sayaka go. You have to be very clear here, this is how Homura acted towards her enemy who hates her:
She brought her back to life, and gave her a new chance to be happy with her friends and family.

Bebe does not mind the black feathers or ominous sky — what may they look like in her eyes?

Editorial annotationPROVESeverity96/100CriticalIdentify Nagisa/Bebe's status before, within, and after Rebellion. Her embodied return is central evidence for what the Law of Cycles does to magical girls and must be reconciled with the earlier annihilation thesis.

Meanwhile Bebe is running through the rain of black feathers, and is dancing in the liquid from Homura's overflowing cup — which symbolizes Homura's power and control over the world.

Bebe is happy beyond comprehension, a child is often more sensible than adults. Bebe does not mind the appearance, she is looking beyond appearances and at that which she has been given here: A new chance at life, a world that Homura will protect.

Instead of complaining, Bebe goes off to school with her friends.

While Sayaka does not love Homura, she still likes what she gave her. She happily goes to school, even crying tears of joy seeing Hitomi and Kyosuke again after having been dead for so long, and with that she looks past the encounter she just had.

A place to belong, in the desert that is this world.

Skipping forward to the end, we now see the world going in slow motion.

Among the final images is one of a brick house, with the floor being covered in sand and footsteps in it. And dead trees growing menacingly in the middle. This floor is the same desert that Homura was lying in when Madoka was coming to get her.
It represents the world as it is: A desert that is not worth saving.

However Homura built brick walls around it, and painted them with pretty pictures so that whoever is inside may have some comfort. This again represents the nature of this world.

Homura is not God. She can not fix everything. But what she could do, she did. She saved Madoka from a fate worse than death. And acknowledging that the world IS a desert, she did the best she could.

The night has ended, now it is morning.

After that we see multiple scenes that show how the characters are doing. Mami is with Bebe, Sayaka is with Kyouko, Madoka is with her family. Everyone seems happy.

Editorial annotationOBJECTIONSeverity80/100HighThe post-credits half-moon and Homura's solitude now make the happiness visibly provisional, but the argument still needs to face the stronger instability evidence: Madoka begins to recover her cosmic identity, Homura anticipates enmity, the Law of Cycles remains divided, and Kyubey is visibly broken. Explain how the rescue reading accommodates those details.

It concludes with the sign, saying: The country of sweets; Good morning.

Good Morning refers to Mada Dame yo. But also to Thus Spoke Zarathustra and the great sunrise.

Editorial annotationPROVESeverity32/100LowThe supplied frame now visibly establishes the „Good Morning“ sign, but the claimed three-way reference still needs the relevant Mada Dame yo lyric or translation and the specific Zarathustra passage. Similar dawn language alone does not establish deliberate intertextual reference.

Finally, at the absolute end, after the credits we see Homura again: Sitting on her chair alone. Before half a moon, and on half a hill — for her other half, the one who sat next to her; Madoka's closeness, that was what she paid for in order to save her. And yet the theme that plays in the background is still, and again, Mada dame yo: Already, but not yet.

A wish without an answer

Now, finally. After having gone all the way: We have seen the beginning and the end.

But a single question now remains — It is the conclusion that a certain article reaches:

„The Nietzschean project, understood broadly as an attempt to ‚redeem‘ sickness of all types by construing it as a necessary genealogical stage in the development of something greater (rather than by healing it), is probably not at all relevant to the real world. We do not want or need redemption from our illnesses in the form of some kind of insight they exclusively can provide us, no insight into the epistemological structure of the human psyche will heal a physical ailment or ameliorate an oppressive social dynamic, and philosophical insights, spiritual depth, personal autonomy, and moral development are probably not purchased with a proportional amount of suffering, psychic or otherwise. The highly granular degree of epistemic autonomy Nietzsche describes as the prize of the post-nihilism ‚ubermensch‘ is probably not a possible or conceptually coherent phenomenon, and describing your past as something you willed into being whole cloth is probably neither an effective coping mechanism nor some secret key to ‚greatness‘.
But in a world where beliefs are made magically real and an alien is trying to turn you into a rock, it is, at least, a pleasant dream.“

— Imagak, Suspended in Dreams on the Mitakihara Loop Line — A Nietzschean Reading of Madoka Magica: Rebellion Story

Is this a conclusion you are willing to accept? Is that it?

To tell you plainly: I was not.

I, alone, struggled against reality to go beyond that place where he ended, concluding it an „impossible dream“.
The things that were written before are in truth trivial, and still I hope you can see them now — as they are amazingly beautiful.
But is that beauty enough?
Here and now, comes the most important part: I will tell you the conclusion I reached at the end of this world. If the last chapter was Homura's journey, then this is mine.

The only way how I may convey what must be said is by taking you along with myself, personally.

We begin at the end of the conclusion of the last chapter: Standing under a strange sky, having seen the triumph I longed to see I had met that which I wanted to find.

But in order to understand we need to go back again to where I came from, in order to see where we are going.

Der Tod Gottes

Before I found Madoka Magica, I was a Nihilist, a Nietzschean. I fully agreed with the conclusions that Nietzsche made; that is why reading Imagak's article was so natural to me. I already knew what he said.

However I will sum up where I came from and what the central themes of Nietzscheanism are and how they ought to be interpreted.

First and foremost, I firmly disagree with the premise that the Nietzschean project is „an attempt to ‚redeem‘ sickness“. That view is in itself what Nietzsche himself would call „bloodless“; it is pragmatic, but it lacks the heaviness and the profound inescapable tragedy of the Nietzschean realizations.

I propose a counter-thesis: The Nietzschean project is a desperate and helpless attempt to pave the way to cross over. To overcome the tragedy that has befallen our civilization and our spirit.

When curing a sickness, then the question that must be asked is: For what purpose? That very purpose has already been swallowed whole by the giant sea of nihilism that we have been drowning in, following having „overcome“ — or lost — that which kept us afloat for so long. We can not be cured of the meaninglessness of the cure.

The word „cure“ exists in the context of direction, somewhere where the premise has not yet been accepted, where merely trivial observations are permitted and the grand apocalyptic whole remains ignored.

The „death of God“ as Nietzsche calls it, the „twilight of the idols“: it is freedom at an unbearable cost. The truth at the price of our sanity, of our direction.

The Übermensch whom Nietzsche longs for is not merely a „cure for nihilism“, it is an abstract faint hope that somehow, somewhere something that he does may prove useful, may somehow pave the way for someone else in the far future, someone more noble than Nietzsche himself, someone different who thinks in a way different from him. That someone will walk on the road that he paved and will overcome this endless night and usher in a new dawn.

This is why Nietzsche shatters idols: So the Übermensch will not be trapped by their empty promises. This is why Nietzsche is relentless in attacking everything: So only the strongest things may survive so they can serve as tools for him to cross over.

The Übermensch shall be the purpose of this earth. Thus is his final hope; that it will be hell instead of heaven is his crushing fear. But even that he is willing to risk, because even then he understood how desperate, how urgent the situation is.

When Nietzsche says: „Gott ist tot“ — „God is dead“ he says it without gloating, for he already saw the 20th century with all of its horrors in his wake.

Die ewige Wiederkehr des Gleichen

Nietzsche said that the Übermensch would embrace the concept of the Eternal Return. I don't think that this means that he must strictly metaphysically agree with the ontological and physical assumptions. What it means is that the Übermensch must be capable of bearing it. And I must stress: To truly bear it, does not mean indifference, it means to truly understand its horror, to look into the abyss unceasingly without flinching and then embrace it.

The eternal return is this: The number of states that the universe may be in is finite; therefore any state that is will come again; and since it came again from this state we are in, it will recur forever.

This means that even me, who is thinking these thoughts while writing; and even this you who are reading even now, will recur. We will live and die, and then after an unfathomably long time the state of the universe will return back to what caused us to be as we are now. And then: We will not know that it happened, we will think again the same things we thought now; we will have thought them an infinite number of times already. And anything we do will inescapably lead back to this.

All the suffering of history that happened, all the horrible death and destruction. All the people who died and despaired, they will return only to suffer and die again. Children dying of cancer will be born again only to suffer again and again, thinking the same thoughts again and again.

The meaning of the eternal return is not to think that this is factually true, or that it is probable or not.

Its purpose is different: It is to see that, the meaningless forever; and in the face of that to declare something „worthwhile“. To dare to say „yes“.

And yet the difficulty of this task can not be overstated:

„What is your greatest experience? It is the hour of the great contempt.
The hour in which even your happiness becomes repulsive to you, and
even your reason and virtue.
The hour when you say: ‚What good is my happiness! It is poverty and
dirt and wretched contentment. But my happiness should justify existence itself!‘“

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Zarathustra’s Prologue, Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Nietzsche is utterly correct here; what is the highest thing? What good IS my happiness?

I can be happy for a while, but is my happiness that I feel for a fleeting single moment worth the entire suffering of the world?

Only someone who looks away could possibly claim that. Only someone indifferent, someone without compassion.

About the end of Nietzsche’s life is narrated the anecdote of the Turin Horse. We do not truly know if it happened or not.

But what is said is that Nietzsche was seen weeping in the street, while clinging to the neck of a horse. Some say that he saw the horse being meaninglessly beaten to death, and he could not bear seeing it.

After this breakdown Nietzsche became completely insane and could no longer continue his work. Many see this as a refutation of Nietzsche, as they see him as this stern and edgy nihilist.

But he was not; he was someone who saw the horse — that is humanity — being beaten to death by itself and by the whims of the mob all his life, and he longed for a different future. Or at least for something that could outweigh it all, that could be worth it.

The Only Thing I Have Left to Guide Me

The metaphor of the Eternal Return is hard to overlook in Madoka Magica: Homura loops to save Madoka again and again.

One thing that is absolutely critical to understand is that — and this is the true purpose of the entire chapter of „this world is not worth saving“ — the eternal return is in effect in more than a single way:

The loop is a „return“, but the true eternal return that Homura comes to understand is that this world in its entirety is hopelessly lost.

The state of the world is determined by factors outside of Homura's control.

And so, as a Nietzschean I immediately understood her on that level. This world truly is not worth saving, it is a place where tragedy and sadness return unendingly. The natural and ordinary conclusion to such a world, one where the truth is depicted, is that it ends in disaster. That the world because of all the curses can not be saved. That all perish.

At best it ends in death: Salvation; Annihilation.

And in that expectation I saw the end of the dream in Rebellion.

Homura would fail, like Nietzsche she would not be able to cross over. She may pave the way for someone else; a tragic conclusion as is befitting of this world.

But it did not come to pass, not this one time.

This once, Homura grabbed Madoka and pulled her from heaven.

This represents overcoming the eternal return. Breaking the very fabric of reality.

When Homura regurgitates her soul gem and bites it — shattering the structure of her own soul and recreating herself — she bit off the snake’s head.

No longer will she be passive, now she will impose her will onto the world.

In that moment I saw what I wanted, what Nietzsche wanted, for the first time expressed in fiction. Something that before this moment had never been done before.

A monumental triumph.

And from this moment, from when I saw it, this is what I wanted. I wanted to grasp this: I wanted to cross over into the impossible.

I too now wanted to pull God from heaven.

But how? And what was this thing? Nietzsche only ever talked about „something“; he was drawing shapes from a distance, he was spinning tales, pointing at a shadow.

But this, this was a genuine image.

This is also why it made it impossible to let go, why I couldn't possibly accept a boring and mundane conclusion like that this was impossible without Miracles and Magic.

No matter what I would reach it.

The heart you touched shined, turning so colorful

I find it unavoidable to now talk about my reading of Homura, which is directly tied to my interpretation of „Colorful“, which is so absolutely central to Rebellion and understanding everything.

I find that this is both the central motive for Homura and myself.
The heart you touched shined turning so colorful.
To Homura this happened multiple times, or rather it happened again and again.
First it happened under the arc of triumph, where Homura was drowning in nihilism.
Then it happened again when Madoka offered Homura her last grief seed — I will never forget the promise we made.
And then yet again in the flower scene, and in abstract when Homura turned into a witch.
The central motive is that Madoka reached out her hand.

This is why the opening lines of Colorful read: you touched my heart and it shined, turning so colorful.

In truth this is not even the opening line, but in the full version this is the beginning of the refrain.
In the movie version it is repeated two times:

„The heart you touched shined, turning so colorful.
Therefore I will take flight riding on Hope.“

— Colorful

And then again:

„The heart you touched shined, turning so colorful.
Therefore I will take flight riding on Hope.
I will protect your wishes that are gathered beneath this endless sky.
And go to a tomorrow no one yet knows.“

— Colorful

This implies the conclusion; there are four steps in sequence being described:

1. the heart was touched and shined, turning so colorful.
2. Therefore I take flight riding on Hope.
3. In order to protect you.
4. And go to a tomorrow no one yet knows.

We can see that inherently the flow here is outward from the core: the heart was touched, therefore it shined and turned so colorful.

What is apparent is that the heart shined, and its consequences are depicted in chapter 3: the tomorrow no one yet knows, the new world.

Interestingly we know that the soul gem of Homura is said to have turned into a color worse than a curse — Homura calls it AiYo.

So therefore „turning colorful“ means that Homura’s heart began to love.
Love in essence is never passive; it moves.

Love always hopes, always protects, always trusts, always perseveres; and it never fails.

Love hopes, therefore Homura rides on hope.
And love never fails, therefore she can boldly go into a tomorrow she does not yet know.
These qualities are self-evident; charity is like that.

The first verses of Colorful are complementary to this:

„I saw a dream when I threw away that perspective which was so monochrome in my eyes.
And this bond which was created in this empty world granted me a strong will.“

— Colorful

It describes the world as a desert, where nothing matters: essentially it is nihilism and the state we have learned about in chapter 2.
In a world where nothing matters, Homura came across something that did.

To my astonishment, this is precisely what Homura experienced towards Madoka; that I myself can relate to, but not to a person (at least not back then) but to of all things a work of fiction:
Madoka Magica, as a work.

I, too, was a nihilist wandering about in an empty world, and this scenery was so monochrome in my eyes.
Nothing mattered, nothing had any meaning.
I longed for a distant morning.
And then I saw, not really a dream but a work of fiction, which is not that far away from a dream.

And now, this work, this depiction, this image and answer: it touched my heart, and it shined, turning so colorful.

I would figure out what this meant, and I realized this inherent meta-referential parallel quite early.
I now had hope; I had found this thing: this is something that mattered.
Even if the world would call me foolish for putting so much weight on an animated movie.
I did not care:
I would go forward now, into a tomorrow no one knows.

Even as I am writing this, this identification in all its aspects:
The irredeemable world around me, seeing it depicted in a satisfying way.
The future, a true image of overcoming, of sunrise after the night before me.
And Homura who in all of that stands central, before this mystery, reaching out her hand as it crumbles to sand; that was myself now.

The following chapter is now my story, of how I, too, toiled in an endless maze, how I searched for the one way out, and how in the end I too was saved.

These tender threads of Fate

Incidentally, when I came up with the title of this chapter, I looked some more at the passage of Colorful that it is from.

One thing in the translation of that part made little sense to me for some time, this is from the full version:

„The moment when I felt compelled to take a peek
You were wrapped by threads of light
Surely our thin, delicate, and tangled strands of fate
Can still change
Even if I'm wrong, the path I believe in
Will light up a new sight“

— Colorful

The part I stumble over is: „Even if I’m wrong, the path I believe in“.
No, that is false; error is error, truth is truth.
To pursue something based on belief indifferent to if it is correct or not is not excusable.
You can not persist in your path with this mindset: you are called to do what is right.

Also, what path does Homura doubt to the degree she thinks it could be wrong, but is hoping for the best?
That is out of character.

This is when I looked closer.

The original Japanese says:

„間違えでも信じた道は新しい景色を
照らすだろう“

— Colorful

Japanese is a language where a lot of words are inferred from context, and the subject is omitted. The literal meaning is closer to:

„Even if it is wrong, the path believed in will illuminate a new landscape.“

— Colorful, literal translation

It can either mean: even if the path I believed in was wrong.
OR it can mean: if the path YOU believed in was wrong.

In that it can actually refer not to Homura, but to Madoka.
Madoka believed that with her sacrifice she would save the world.
But she was wrong, she just created a cheap grace and this world is still not worth saving.
However it DID create a new scenery.

It is therefore completely correct; yet awfully mistranslated.
The translation itself implicitly assumes a reading of Rebellion that is commonly held but far from established.

And this right here is the color that I found everywhere searching for it now.
The issue with Madoka Magica and this example is that its nature is like a fractal.
After a certain level of sophistication you can zoom into any thing and you will get endless streams of references and meaning from it, then you can zoom into any of those relationships and then into the relationships between the relationships.
What is revealed there is truly infinite in its scope.

However every single one of such facets is merely a thread.
The threads then weave together, up and down the levels of abstraction, up and down the reference chain. Pointing them all out is a fool’s errand, because „all“ will never be exhausted. The very fact however that the nature of this work is such that this is the case, is in itself however astonishing and its implications disturbing.

Indeed, many will contest that you can truly go to such lengths; they will call it „free association“ and deny any inherent coherence. Others will cite the „death of the author“ to justify it but thereby rob it of its meaning.

Therein is the even more important point to this chapter: Here I show you how I arrived at the methodology which makes this entire project possible, as I mentioned in the preface. It avoids both errors, as I will demonstrate and justify. This is therefore perhaps the most philosophical chapter of this entire article.

These tender threads of fate: now I will do my best of pointing out how to entangle them. We will start with the most immediate and go further and further into it.

Deconstruction, Reconstruction

A typical statement that one will immediately find online is that Madoka Magica is a deconstruction of the magical girl genre.
Another statement that is just one step more sophisticated than the last is that it is a reconstruction of the same.

Both have some merit to them, and in fact build one upon the other in their train of thought.
However the fundamental error in both statements is not the words deconstruction or reconstruction, but the word „magical girl genre“.
Madoka Magica does extensively use the deconstructive method, but the subject that it is applied to is philosophy, morality, meaning, meaninglessness, nihilism, and finally the very concept of deconstruction itself.

However it is not wrong to say that Madoka Magica has something extraordinary to say about the magical girl genre, but it is shortsighted to merely leave it at calling it a deconstruction. I would even go so far as to say that Madoka Magica most primordially is an affirmation of the central motives of Magical Girl anime:

Love and friendship are worth fighting for, and truth and courage WILL save the world.

The biggest proof that this is the case is frankly the profound failure of basically all the „Dark Magical Girl anime“ that came out after Madoka Magica to replicate its success. Had Madoka Magica been merely a deconstruction, then it would have been easy.

Indeed, Madoka Magica is in its depiction of its characters far less bleak than many of the anime that came after it. Don't get me wrong, the setting itself is a cosmic horror story. However genuinely even the most flawed characters in Madoka Magica like Sayaka and Mami are very much relatably human, and far from being irredeemable.

As an example I will compare it to two anime that came out after it to „jump on the bandwagon of Dark Magical girl anime“, namely: Magical Girl Raising Project, and Magical Girl Site.

The latter even more than the former features characters who are utterly monstrous and irredeemable. There is an argument to be made — however flawed it is — for Kantian morality. There is no argument to be made to defend rapists or a brother who uses his sister as a punching bag. That's just comically evil. And while those things do happen in real life, there is little philosophical conflict to be had here, as every sane person will agree that they are utterly indefensible.

It was not that kind of irredeemable darkness that made Madoka Magica special; it was the light that shines in the context of such darkness. It was indomitable will that remains in the face of the apocalypse; Madoka Magica at a higher level of analysis can be argued to be this:

A story about how a weak girl with a heart condition became the ultimate magical girl of love and courage, who saved her friend from non-existence itself.
Who overcame nihilism on an open field, in the face of the bleakest, most hopeless possible world; literally and explicitly with the power of love.

I like to quote a line from Magia for that:

„I believed
all the stories that told me
that wishes came true.
(Amidst light and darkness)“

— Magia

Ironically, there is a popular cover to this song, it translates the last line in parentheses liberally as:
(Was I a fool to believe those lies?)

The original line is:
Hikari to Kage no Naka.

It literally means: in the intersection/in the middle of Light and Darkness.

What it genuinely means is this:
I believed that they would come true — with all of the glory, and all the horror.
Miracles AND Magic are real.
Not one or the other, but both. It's not just light, and not just darkness; but it is light in the darkness.

This is what Madoka Magica does when understood properly: it depicts the darkness in order for the light to shine most brightly.
And oh boy does it shine!

This is also where many of the magical girl anime that followed after Madoka erred horribly.
Proving that they understood nothing.
Apart from the examples I mentioned before, most of them just had a bunch of magical girls killing each other, others just depicted unbearable darkness without salvation as an end in itself.
The amazing thing about that is, in particular how much they missed the point.

After Madoka Magica I spent some time watching many of them to see if someone continued the legacy, made something more, added a new perspective; but I found nothing. One notable exception to this is Yuuki Yuuna is a Hero. Here, we genuinely have an understanding of „Darkness used as contrast material“, however its framework is explicitly Shintoistic in its nature. It does not have the same depth.

And that is genuinely the thing that made Madoka irreproducible. One thing that it had was genuine philosophical sophistication.

And in that — ironically enough — we genuinely see the deconstructive method properly applied. However not primarily to the magical girl genre, but to the moral frameworks of the characters.

Three are particularly clear in terms of what they represent:

1. Sayaka represents Kantian principle ethics.
2. Kyouko represents Hedonism and value morality.
3. Kyubey represents Utilitarianism.

It's important to understand that while it is indeed possible to also include Homura as representing Nietzscheanism, more profoundly Homura and Madoka's conflict represents something which is not of the realm of moral philosophy. It is more primordial, it is existential philosophy and by its nature semi-religious. It is what remains after those three have already failed.

Mami on the other hand is pre-moral, she is just a woman in a hostile world trying to survive. It is stated multiple times that she is a weak person putting up a front and judges things based on how she feels about them.

The best example of Mami's moral attitude is how she responds to finding out the truth of this world. If Mami finds out the truth, she kills everyone and herself in the end. It is interesting that she is very smart about how she goes about it, meaning that she traps Homura first, and then immediately kills Kyouko because those two pose the greatest danger to her. This means that she is very clearly deliberate and not insane. However what it shows is that her moral comprehension of the world does not allow her to continue existing while it is as it is. She can not cope with reality at all.

Sayaka in the meantime will drag herself to death with her own morality. Which in fact is self-righteous and principles without grace will just always lead to ruin. Just as she refuses to accept charity from Homura and Kyouko, considering herself to be better than them. In that she perishes.

Kyouko's undoing is in wanting to save Sayaka, proving that her Hedonism does not lead to any kind of salvation but is merely a cope in order to numb herself and continue existing in this world despite its meaninglessness. In the moment when she understands that she herself longs for transcendent values, saying:

„I became a magical girl because I liked stories like that.“

— Episode 9

This is when she dies. The reason she dies is that in her attempt to be idealistic and believe again, she is unsophisticated. Her philosophy collapses. In this ego death, she reverts to a more primitive naive morality. Its unsophistication leads to her destruction.

And finally there is Kyubey. He is a cosmic utilitarian. And by his monstrous logic Utilitarianism is refuted, Madoka already has an answer for this: If your logic leads to this, then you are our enemy! It is the correct answer, because if a logic — any logic — leads to this, then it is wrong no matter how right it may seem. It is by its nature disproven by contradiction.

What all of these depictions have in common is that they use the method of deconstruction in order to undo the concepts. To point out their flaws. This is not merely a problem in a genre, but a problem in real moral frameworks. This is what is being deconstructed.

And yet even that, this nihilism that is left in all of their wake is only a darkness that is there to make Homura shine more brightly. This is perhaps what I want to stress the most. Their failure, their hopelessness is not something to be left as a final conclusion; it is but prologue:

Madoka wishes to become a Magical Girl, and Homura meets her again in a familiar dream. This is genuinely what makes Madoka Magica so special. It is not those philosophies and their faults — though it has that, too. But it is the question of what remains after them.

What has value in such a world?

the Butcher

Taking a step back, we must understand that these conflicts did not first appear in Madoka Magica, Gen Urobuchi has written on this topic for the longest time. The main conflict of his work is in large part the foundation of morality. And Kyubey's Utilitarianism is perhaps one of his favorites.

It is easy to dismiss much of his work if we simply view it as a refutation of utilitarianism. However Utilitarianism often fails because a system that is built on it as a premise fails disastrously. He however usually frames it as a more difficult question:

What if it actually worked? What if it was actually Utilitarian in a measurable and true degree, and those running the system weren't even corrupt or secretly doing something else — but genuinely followed the philosophy to its conclusion? Therein a critique based merely on flaws becomes insufficient, as flaws can be corrected.

The trolley problem presents a dilemma: is it preferable to pull the lever to divert the runaway trolley onto the side track with just one person? — Wikipedia

One interesting conversation I had with a friend who is a Christian, when I was not yet, went thus: I asked, „What would Jesus do when confronted with the trolley problem?“ My friend thought for a moment and answered: Jesus would not choose, he would not have to!
Of course that is, on the surface, a very naive statement — and I couldn't understand it at the time. Instead it made me think even less of Christianity as something which may cause people to respond in such a foolish way, denying possibilities in an apparent reality, when confronted with a dilemma. How can you solve it by not answering?

Is it right to sacrifice the few for the many? Or rather: is it right to sacrifice anyone for my own perceived moral values, how can such a thing be permissible? In the end my friend was exactly right: Utilitarianism must be rejected as a premise.

The problem with Utilitarianism is not that it gives the wrong answer to such a question — for forced inaction is arguably an even worse answer — but that it gives an answer at all. This situation is the absolute moral dilemma where the free action of consciousness MUST be allowed to remain. The answer can neither be that your hand is forced, nor that you can absolve yourself of responsibility. You have to act, you have to decide. What both Utilitarianism and Principle ethics have in common is that both lead to cowardice, they refuse moral responsibility by deferring to a higher principle. When in fact it is the responsible individual who fate placed in that exact situation who is and must remain responsible. Responsibility always requires freedom to act, and all freedom is always responsibility; those things are inherently the same.

There is a wonderful article about the Nihilism of Fate/Zero which makes the point quite clearly in my opinion.

Gen Urobuchi is most profoundly a nihilist, like myself formerly, and he gets there by tearing down everything. All philosophy which seeks to give instructions in this world and by the laws of this world is always materialistic. And as such it is torn down because there are truly precious things in this world, which are worth more than anything material could ever count; and yet whose value is subjective, and therein they must be dismissed when making an objective decision.
But in dismissing them the world itself loses its value since in the final analysis it is those very things that carry the weight of the world.

The issue fundamentally is that something is necessary to justify the suffering of the world; and if we sacrifice that which outweighs the world itself to save it — have we not lost everything?

That inherently is the tragedy of Kiritsugu and the curse of the holy grail on him in Fate/Zero (Full spoilers ahead).

The protagonist of Fate/Zero is Emiya Kiritsugu. He is a Utilitarian who despises Utilitarianism, but sees it as without alternative.

The plot of Fate/Zero is that there is a Holy Grail, which can allegedly grant any wish, with different characters having different purposes for attaining the grail.
Among them is Emiya Kiritsugu, who wants to save the world.
However for that he is willing to go to any length.

Before finding the holy grail war, Kiritsugu was trying to save the world in the only way he could: pulling the lever on the trolley problem. Sacrificing the few for the many.

And yet when he finally stood before the holy grail — having sacrificed everything he had in order to attain it — the grail declared to him: I am merely power, without a plan to attain that which you wish; I can not grant it.

The grail wanted to impose utilitarianism onto the world, because that was the method by which Kiritsugu went all his life. Yet to him the grail represented something else: A solution that he himself could not imagine. That had been his only hope: To truly and genuinely save the world, someway somehow.

Realizing the horror of what that would mean, Kiritsugu destroyed the holy grail. And it exploded in a sea of flames and the city perished.

Amongst the things that Emiya Kiritsugu sacrificed to save the world most primarily, beyond his justice and humanity, there was „Love“.

Therefore from that, arose a wish: What if he had only gone with love — is it not said that love will save the world? Though it would have been foolish. Maybe, someway, somehow, it could have worked. He sought something which is impossible by his own means, and that ended only in a (the) lake of fire.

And in many ways, this alternative Kiritsugu — who rejected Utilitarianism and the world for love, is Homura. And Kyubey and the world of Witches, is in many ways the World that the holy grail offered Kiritsugu: A world where the few are sacrificed for the many.

And in rejecting it, a new stage was set: Madoka Magica, it is said that Gen Urobuchi was scouted for it precisely based on his previous work on Fate/Zero. And in many ways it is a spiritual continuation.

After Fate/Zero this is a Quote that Gen Urobuchi gave in an Interview:

„Therefore, in order to write a perfect ending for a story you have to twist the laws of cause and effect, reverse black and white, and even possess a power to move in the opposite direction from the rule of the universe. Only a heavenly and chaste soul that can sing carols of praise towards humanity can save the story. To write a story with a perfect ending is a double challenge to the author's body and soul.
Gen Urobuchi had lost that power. It still hasn't recovered. The ‚tragedy syndrome‘ is still continuing within me. Is this a terminal disease? Should I give up on the pure ‚warrior of love‘ that I've longed for?“

— Gen Urobuchi in Fate/zero vol. 1 postface

Is not this its fulfillment? The Ultimate Magical girl of love and courage: Someone who fought for 100 loops to save her friend, who sacrificed herself, her justice, her happiness for love. Who bore the curses of the world as her own responsibility. And in the end even accepted rejection; and never stopped loving.

Is that not what he wanted to write? The ultimate conclusion?

My purple Qualia

Gen Urobuchi even did not exist in a vacuum. His further works all have the same longing, the darkness being an expression of it. Yet beyond the philosophical conflicts, in the underlying purely existential foundation there is the tradition of SekaiKei.

The philosophical conflicts themselves, and even utilitarianism, as seen in the previous chapter, here form merely this: „The world“. Ordinarily it can no longer be saved. Profoundly, deconstructing the philosophical solutions — which many of the other works we will look at go for, as we will see — has removed them as sensible alternatives. Therefore forcing Madoka Magica to go for a higher, more genuine solution.

In contrast to „the world“ exist Madoka and Homura.

SekaiKei is interesting in that the word itself means „World Type“, but everyone seems to disagree what exactly it is — and yet most can identify a SekaiKei when they see it. Basically, a SekaiKei is a story where the conflicts in personal relationships between people and the conflict in the world in general become synchronized.

Essentially the world and its issues are an expression of the individual’s struggle, and the individual’s struggle is the stage on which the battle to save or destroy the world is fought. Many have articulated an opinion on it which is mostly based on its historic context, which is seen in the dissolution of Japanese society in the late 1990s, the trend towards atomization and isolation as well as a general nihilism that has spread. And while that clearly is part of it, it is undeniable that — whatever way they did it — the SekaiKei genre reflects ancient ideas and is psychologically and archetypically apt.

It goes back to the ancient idea of microcosmos and macrocosmos:

Often in a SekaiKei there is also a distinction between the mundane world in which the main character starts out in, and the hidden magical world of horror which is the true nature of reality.

Where it gets most interesting is that the thing that SekaiKei focus on, where they differ in their tradition from my western examples — which are in their nature obsessed with the self-enlightenment of the individual — is that they focus primarily on the relationship between the protagonist and others.

In particular a SekaiKei typically involves a protagonist who starts out ordinary and ventures into this other world, and someone else who already inhabits it. This relationship is the beginning and the end of the world.

Therefore the microcosmos that is corresponding to the macrocosmos of the universe, is not man; but it is that relationship. And most interestingly contrary to what many popular descriptions of SekaiKei say it is; the plot usually works this way:

The two people are drawn towards each other unavoidably. But there is an insurmountable barrier between them. Because they, no matter how close they get, can not truly understand each other, the world can not be saved. However even their best efforts are not enough, and one or both of them end up sacrificing themselves; and then the world is destroyed either way. However if somehow they can „cross over“ (and no one understands what that would even mean), then the world is saved.

Profoundly, even the genre itself is misunderstood.

I name this goal as this: Communion; if communion is achieved, the world is saved. If it is not achieved, the world is destroyed. This in that actually makes sense: if someone fails to become connected to society, to matter, to connect, then his world is destroyed. But also the world itself is destroyed because if the connection is not possible, who will keep it running?

When reading about SekaiKei one will inevitably stumble upon a certain description on TV-Tropes

In particular I find this description to be unrepresentative:

4. „In the climax of the story, the characters are forced to choose between settling things on either the micro-level of the relationship itself, or the macro-level of how it affects the world at large. Typically, both are exclusive.
5. A Bittersweet Ending generally follows. If the world is chosen, the conclusion often involves a Heroic Sacrifice on the part of one or both of the Star-Crossed Lovers, or them being separated and unable to ever meet each other again. If the romance is chosen, we may have the couple being the only survivors of an apocalypse. Taking a Third Option is, however, also a common subversion.“

— TV TROPES

While there are SekaiKei like this, more primarily the conflict is not between the relationship and the world, but it is the relationship itself which is the central point of tension: If the relationship works, if they genuinely and truly understand each other, then the world is saved — because then they by themselves prove that this existence is worthwhile. If they do not, then the world is destroyed because ontologically a world without meaning has no business existing; it is therefore right that it is destroyed.

„A man who has a why can bear any how.“

— Nietzsche

This „why“ is in question, the „why“ is what this sekaikei is about: Can we create a why in an empty world?

Contrary to popular belief, the SekaiKei genre did not start in the 1990s. The first SekaiKei (at least in the Japanese tradition) was arguably Devilman. Fundamentally the conflict is that Akira can not reach Ryou — who is the devil himself — and thus he kills him. In his last moment before God destroys the world the devil understands that he lost something irreplaceable; but he can not understand how and why.

He cries a tear; and the world is destroyed.

The symbolism before that moment is a baton being given to him again and again which he can not receive. In his final moment he understands that something unbelievably precious was destroyed: The relationship, and the world.

The world from his perspective has no value without the relationship, and yet since the relationship now could have been saved — instead of having been impossible from the beginning — the world even has infinite value. Both are lost, a tragedy. The true beginning of the SekaiKei genre:

Can this fate be avoided? If even the devil himself can cry when he loses a loved one — then perhaps even this wretched humanity around us can be redeemed? Perhaps even this world can be saved.

Voice of a distant star is another sekaiKei: It is more raw and more primitive (in a good way) since it depicts a raw conflict: Our two protagonists are separated more and more by distance, messages taking more and more time to reach each other. Until finally it takes 8 years to receive a message. In the end, a miracle happens: across time and space and even relativity they wish both for the other to connect; and so by a miracle they both share a single thought overcoming the world:

„I am here“

— voices of a distant star

That is all. But does this save the world?

Another SekaiKei is Neon Genesis Evangelion, perhaps the most famous example of them all. I want to point out a single thing at this moment: Seele’s plan, the Human Instrumentality Project to destroy all A.T. Fields and turn everyone into a soup of LCL, is PROFOUNDLY an artificial solution to exactly the sekaiKei problem:

It overcomes distance and misunderstanding; if everyone merges into one, then my experience is your experience and we will then truly understand each other. However, that too is rejected; it is not life, the world can not be destroyed — this is not acceptable, not good, not right. Embodied existence must remain maintained.

This is why in the final moment of the End of Evangelion we see Shinji with Asuka on the beach. He is choking her because that is a representation of the human relationships within this world. He does not overcome; he merely continues living to find a new solution somewhere somehow in the future, accepting a mundane existence as that is preferable to a non-existence within LCL.

Her purple Qualia.

One yet even more important example is Qualia the purple: Without going into details about how that is achieved, Gaku goes to the absolute extreme and overcomes the entire world in order to save her friend Yukari. (It is uncannily similar to Madoka Magica in this.) However at the end, this supreme power leads her to save her at the price of non-existence itself.

And yet then in the final moment, Yukari manages to recognize Gaku even from non-existence. Realizing that this solution, too, is unacceptable, she affirms this:

„My feelings are mine and mine alone“

— Gaku, Qualia the purple

And with that however, she affirms mundane existence and just lets fate take its course... An ending that I myself could not possibly accept nor understand. How can she after going through all of this just relinquish power and go back to mundane existence, achieving nothing?

Essentially she admits that she was incapable of saving the relationship and submits to fate.

What all of them have in common is that they do not manage to genuinely break through: All of them end back in the mundane world with the world being not saved, surrendering and succumbing to fate or mundane existence.

Therefore Homura's Rebellion must be seen in light of all these previous failures. Madoka's sacrifice is one more such failure mirroring the past.

But Homura alone, recognizing the same thing:

„This feeling is mine and mine alone, it is for Madoka alone:
More passionate than hope
Deeper than despair
Love“

— Homura, Rebellion.

Ironic, isn't it?

The ultimate solution was something so absurd all along. To simply unconditionally do the absurd and the impossible with the power of love. Just like in the fairytales we read as children, and which we made fun of when we became adolescents.

Even then, the true communion is not reached. But still — Homura managed to save both Madoka and the World.

The main theme of Rebellion is amazingly: Mada dame yo — Not yet. And the ending theme is also a variation on it. Not yet; or rather already — but not Yet.

the Holy Grail

At this point someone could be inclined to think: Well, there are all of those narrative threads and conflicts.

But why does any of that matter?
Is it not just a nice story for us to enjoy?

A thinker whom I find particularly interesting for this purpose is C.G. Jung. What he did is systematize the landscape of the collective unconscious. Frankly my reading of him is very much inspired by Jordan Peterson’s Maps of Meaning lecture series which I watched many years ago.

Campbell's hero’s journey.

What is particularly substantial to observe is that humans across cultures tend to imagine mythologies and construct systems to map the unknown and the world in a remarkably similar way. In fact much work has been done to point out structural similarities between them.

Additionally, one interpreted subject which is of particular interest right here is that of the Monomyth. It is famously described in Joseph Campbell's The Hero with a Thousand Faces. It is a meta-story which means that it is the structure that many famous Hero Stories follow.

„A hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are there encountered and a decisive victory is won: the hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man.“

— Campbell summarizes the monomyth, The Hero with a Thousand Faces

In itself this is an extremely interesting subject to learn about. I find that Jordan Peterson does a very good job at explaining it across his many lectures and video series.

My point here is however building on this foundation:

The SekaiKei in themselves are NOT the same monomyth. It is something decisively different.

Therefore using a little bit of the same methodology I want to show you a bit around the texture of the sekaiKei and their symbols. The sekaiKei genre as well has motives that recur again and again, and which then lead into Madoka Magica.

In this a massive amount of the meaning of the symbols of Madoka Magica is contained. It is also its tangle to reality: Symbols like this tie to reality, they describe structures within the collective unconscious.

They are not arbitrary. Nor are they merely contained within a single work.

One example that I like is this:

Another one is the holy grail:

TODO Gallery: Fate/Zero No Game No life Zero Madoka Magica

The crown:

TODO Gallery: GuiltyCrown Code Geass Gurren Lagann Madoka Magica

And many more such cases.

Essentially, these symbols are expressions of what is pulling at the heartstrings of men. What we have here is a new monomyth:

The hero looks beyond the veil, and he espies a world on the brink of crumbling. The known world disappears and only an unknown strange world remains. There is no guide or mentor, he is now thrust into this world.

Can he save it? Can he save himself? What is valuable?

This is essentially the mirror image of post-modernity. Japan has entered the declining post-security world earlier than the rest of the West. In their collective unconscious this was already looming: A world where terrors lurk beyond the threshold.

But also a world that can not be redeemed by ordinary means. A radical new solution becomes necessary.

What I found is that the SekaiKei long ago had formulated the existential problem that Madoka Magica is handling.

These symbols and narrative threads: The recurring theme of people abandoned in a cold and unsafe world. This is the fire we as a civilization face. After World War Two the great narratives of our time failed.

As Nietzsche said:

„‚What world survives? The apparent world perhaps? No. In abolishing the true world we have also abolished the world of appearance.‘
— Mankind’s Zenith; Bright Daylight; Implicit Zarathustra.“

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols.

Though, ironically, and he knew that this would be: Darkest night, inescapable nihilism. We have awoken from a dream: What world survives? None. Oh how we long to return to this dream. We have exited Plato’s cave, but outside it is midnight; the sun is not shining anymore.

Or so we think. Even our own midnight is yet another story, another dream. A nightmare. We have not yet awakened. It is still not morning. Mada dame yo, the night is still half eaten.

Where is the child who dreams?

Madoka Magica indeed does finally create something meaningful, something genuinely resembling an answer. Somewhere behind the symbols, something behind the weave we see:

Love and truth will save the world.

But how?

The invisible door

The invisible door to the beyond, and the secret key to open it: It is AiYo.

Ironically the answer to seeing this image, this solution and this answer is tragic: It is that it IS impossible. If this is the form it takes, if it is so absurd, then we must concede.

People no longer believe in miracles.

Therefore it must remain a pleasant dream. We have found the Übermensch, but this; this can not be. This image is merely fiction.
A miracle beyond miracles is required in order to open this gate so it must remain sealed.

I attest that this is the genuine reason for the current „isekai“ trend.

SekaiKei has concluded with Madoka Magica: Love is needed to progress here, a miracle is needed.

The door remains locked.

Therefore another way was taken: So we all, collectively, retreated into isekai; perhaps to search for a way, for a key?
Perhaps to dull ourselves into escapism?
Either way, the light faded from anime at that point and began to dim.

It had done the deed, the fire was done; it had found what it could and what it sought. Concluding it impossible.

Philosophy and art had failed. A next story will not be found. Madoka Magica is merely a glimpse at the true world: But terminally it remains unattainable. I again was drowning in my own darkness.

„And no man in heaven, nor in earth, neither under the earth, was able to open the book, neither to look thereon. And I wept much, because no man was found worthy to open and to read the book, neither to look thereon.“

— Revelation 5:3-4

The only remaining thing is the truth.

We skip ahead, I have desperately searched every corner: Like Faust I studied everything to no avail. God spared me from his uglier mistakes.

After having exhausted every framework and every path, finding nothing to solve this conundrum, I stumbled into a church.

I had excluded the possibility of a Christian interpretation long ago, because I believed that this would necessitate the conclusion that Madoka is Christ.

I thought I understood who Christ is according to Christianity: A nice person, someone who is helpful, who loves everyone the same; who has no favorites. He does not discriminate, secures a happy ending for everyone no matter what. Who undoes everyone’s mistakes.

In short I genuinely believed that „the Christ“ of Christianity was like Madoka in Madoka Magica. And at the same time I understood deeply and profoundly that such a messiah will always necessarily lead to cheap grace. It is an idol of Death. In Rebellion we see such a crushing critique of this apparently Christian faith and everything I knew about it. And I knew so many people who called themselves „Christian“ but obviously merely participated in a cultural facade; a farce. If anything I thought that a nihilist who at least struggles with the hard questions of Theodicy and meaning instead of simply haphazardly handwaving them, is more true to the words of Christ than they in their indifference.

That is perhaps therefore what the idolization of Madoka and Christianity represented to me both: Indifference, and profanity masked in self-righteousness. An abomination.

And this in itself was what made it impossible to consider this possibility. It is cheap grace, it is merely a religion of death as Nietzsche said. Something that rots our civilization from its core, that robbed us of our strength. That was perhaps the root cause of our demise and the poison in our hearts.

Homura who achieved AiYo — who saved her friend through love, that is what is genuinely that which is good. Even if it may yet be impossible, it is still „the good“. And the good outweighs the world, even if we will perish with it. There is nothing else, for except for that this world is a desert. If that is the case, I thought in my heart, then we need a new religion for a new age. A solution that couldn't have been imagined before.

However I discovered a different truth. One that I could not imagine possible.

„Then one of the elders said to me, ‚Do not weep! See, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has triumphed. He is able to open the scroll and its seven seals.‘“

— Revelation 5:5

The cost of discipleship

By „coincidence“, I came to service into a small reformed church.

I liked how earnestly everyone was taking it, and what made a big impression on me was that the people there actually were engaged in trying to understand what the Bible is teaching and Christian theology.

This is something that I always respected: To genuinely engage with what you believe; even though back then I couldn't imagine how this could possibly work with what I understood about Christianity.

But what was astonishing to me was that the doctrines of reformed Christianity are extremely different to the cheap grace that I knew: Under reformed doctrine, man is not „basically good“, but instead he is dead in his own sins and transgressions. There is no one righteous, not even one, no one who asks after God. Like sheep all have gone astray, there is no one who does good, not even one. No one „deserves“ anything good, but only wrath — for their indifference and their sins.

The God of this world is the Devil himself. But one day there will be a reckoning, a day of wrath when all Godless men will perish along with the world; and will go to their just eternal punishment in hellfire.

When I heard that I was astonished, I said: „I know this to be true; for everything you said is apparent from this world.“ — It is also exactly the state that the world is in, in Madoka Magica — „but surely, this has nothing at all to do with Christianity? Isn't Jesus supposed to be this all-loving guy who saves everyone equally? Surely if that is true then it can never possibly be this way!“

This is when I learned about the doctrine of limited atonement: Jesus does not save everyone, he did not die for everyone. Only for the elect.

This doctrine single-handedly solves the issue of theodicy.

I was intrigued, and I stayed a while and started coming back again and again.

So this is now the truth about Christianity that I came to accept:

„Cheap grace“ — the universal, indiscriminate salvation of everyone — this audacity, this demand for God to save everyone because they „deserve salvation“ — is a poison that slipped into the church over the ages: It is not and was never the true Gospel.

Our world replaced the faith that built our civilization with a counterfeit, with a lie that allows people to sleep comfortably at night.

In German there is a word; it's called: „Der liebe Gott“; it basically means „The good God“. But it's not that God is merely good. It is a God who is by definition well-meaning to everyone, who is in a sense even beyond religion, who is on our side even if we do not worship him. The „good God“. This God is in a perfect way represented by the character of Madoka — which is the God that most people who call themselves „Christian“ believe in.

Madoka was just a girl like us, and she sacrificed herself to save everyone! That is what people believe Christ to be.

I can not put it better than Dietrich Bonhoeffer put it in his „The cost of discipleship“, which this chapter is named after:

Costly Grace

„Cheap grace means grace as a doctrine, a principle, a system. It means the forgiveness of sins as a general truth and the love of God as the Christian idea of God. Whoever assents to it has already received the forgiveness of his sins. (...)
Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without the living and incarnate Jesus Christ.
Costly grace is the treasure hidden in the field, for whose sake a man gladly goes and sells everything he possesses. It is the pearl of great price, for which the merchant gives up all his goods. It is the royal rule of Christ, for whose sake a man tears out the eye that causes him to stumble. It is the call of Jesus Christ, at which the disciple leaves his nets and follows him. (...)
Costly grace is the incarnation of God.“

— Costly Grace, The cost of discipleship, Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, August 1939

It is so important to understand this:

Cheap grace is „the good god“, „the eternal feminine“, „the god of death“, „salvation; annihilation“ — Madokami

Editorial annotationQUALIFYSeverity98/100CriticalThis chain currently treats several distinct ideas as synonyms: sentimental theism, Goethe's Eternal Feminine, Bonhoeffer's cheap grace, universal salvation, death, and Madokami. State the narrower structural resemblance you claim and preserve their doctrinal and literary differences.

If this, however, is NOT the true Christ — then what is he?

Looking at the description of Bonhoeffer's description of costly grace — there is another character in Madoka Magica who is resembled here.

„Costly grace is the treasure hidden in the field, for whose sake a man gladly goes and sells everything he possesses.“
„It is costly because it costs a person his life.“
„Costly grace is the gospel which must be sought again and again, the gift for which we must ask, the door upon which we must knock.“

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The cost of discipleship

In many ways Homura does this action.

And yet we have an issue here: Homura does them for Madoka; but Madoka is not Christ.

Nevertheless, there must be something here: When looking further — even though I did not yet believe, I started seeing that „something“ was here. Something that I have to look at further.

The resurrection of the dead

When looking further into Christianity there was one massive glaring issue that was impossible for me to overcome initially. And that was the question of going from a theoretical or even mystical „appreciation“ to an actuality.

„Faith“ does not at all mean to „irrationally assume something without evidence“, as many believe it means. Faith in truth means „trust“; it is the understanding that something is reliable.

To have faith in Christ means to know him personally as your LORD and savior in a way that you know him to be reliable.

This necessitates two things:

1. That you know him to be capable of doing that which you expect.
2. That you know him to be willing to do that which you expect.

If you know both of these to be true, then you can trust in him. This trust is fundamentally what „faith“ means.

One passage comes to mind regarding this:

„And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain.“

— 1. Corinthians 15:14

Without the resurrection of the dead all faith is meaningless. And about Abraham the father of faith it is written that he believed in the LORD who was even capable of raising the dead.

Again, without the resurrection of the dead all faith is meaningless. This is an absolute truth and fact.

But what does it mean to „believe“ in the resurrection? In truth I find that it is God who makes you believe by giving you that evidence which you personally need.

The good news is that the Grace of God is boundless; he will go to great lengths to accommodate those who seek him.

For me the thing that was so central was how the atonement works. How can a man die for sinners, how can someone else pay for my sins?

I understood that there was no other way. But only if there is no other solution, it does not mean that it is indeed so. That would just be wishful thinking. But by the grace of God one day the veil was lifted before my eyes and I saw: Christ is not merely a man, and the wrath of God is not like the wrath of men.

Jesus Christ is literally God, like ACTUALLY God. Not some prophet or God man, or better man of noble heritage — he is the eternal God who created heaven and earth.

All understanding we have of the God of the Old Testament; we often think: The God of the Old Testament is the father. That couldn't be further from the truth. THAT is Christ. This God, he came down from heaven and died for sinners. That day I saw the light and I recognized it. And thus I became a Christian.

Because I now knew God, I knew that there IS a resurrection of the dead.

This, again is so different from what is commonly understood as Christianity in our world: The resurrection of the dead is not merely a spiritual or heavenly realm. It is a PHYSICAL resurrection. Because God has the power to raise the dead. And God is also willing to do that, and promised it to us by giving his Son Jesus Christ and confirming him by raising him on the third day.

Here is another thing that the resurrection of the dead means, going back to Madoka Magica:

The resurrection of the dead means essentially that love is not in vain.

Love never fails.

The story of Christ is that he loved his own, he gave away everything for them, was abandoned and crucified between two evildoers. By this the world condemns itself, if Christ just dies and stays dead; then this world is not worth saving and it will be destroyed.

But God instead raises him from the dead. That is the miracle.

To deny the resurrection of the dead means to believe that love fails. To believe in the resurrection of the dead means that love and truth will save the world.

Those two things are exactly the same.

This is also why what is depicted at the end of Rebellion is archetypically an image for the resurrection — and actually the dead ARE genuinely alive again — because love prevailed against the world itself and tore down its fabric. That is the resurrection; its form is always thus.

To deny it is to say that it is merely a pleasant dream.

Madoka as Shadow

My search now has led me to the truth: Jesus Christ, the way and truth and life.

But now one thing remains to be faced. What now to make of this?

If I go on to a Christian world view, will I lose my Madoka Magica?

Will it now remain standing as a donkey that has pointed me to the truth? Or will I now, knowing the correct framework go back and see new things ever more brilliantly? Will I now kick back the ladder on which I was climbing for so long? Or will I now integrate that which I knew all along?

Amazingly, by grace, the second possibility turned out to be the truth. By surrendering it under Christ I lost nothing. And I gained now the only genuine way to read Madoka Magica in a satisfying way: Through Christ.

All truth is Christian truth. There is fundamentally one issue we have with Madoka Magica now: What is Madoka?

Madokami is NOT Christ because she is cheap grace. But Madoka at the same time represents „grace“ to Homura.

Madoka is indeed a Christ figure in Madoka Magica, and she has intense Christotypical Symbolism attached to her.

However when we look closer we will see that Madoka mostly represents Christ in a relational way in the context of Homura.

Ironically this duality: Something representing Christ in its extended context but becoming an error and Idol when taken outside of this relationship, that is a conflict that is profoundly known from scripture itself.

A good example of that is „the brazen serpent“, and indeed many of the images of Christ that exist in the Old Testament.

God gave the brazen serpent to Moses. And when he lifted the snake up those who looked on it were cured. This is an image for Christ and it was good.

Indeed all the sacrifices of the Old Testament were shadows of Christ.

But both the sacrifices and the serpent were later abused and idolized to mean something which goes beyond their original purpose.

Indeed many of the figures of the Old Testament are incomplete shadows of Christ. They were heroes of the faith and ordained by God.

For example David was God’s chosen King and anointed to be King over Israel. But he was only a shadow of the true King from his house, who would rule in eternity; who is Christ.

Indeed even in the New Testament we see for example in Acts 17, that Paul says to the Athenians that their own poets were rightly able to deduce attributes of God; and yet they erred in ascribing them to Zeus when in truth there is only one God who is the LORD. Amongst other things in that same chapter the Greeks had constructed an altar to the unknown God in Athens. There was a disaster at that time, and they decided to let sheep run freely to see which God’s altar they may lie down next to, so they would know what deity they had offended.

However they lay down far away from all of them. As a result the Greeks built there an altar „to the unknown God“ and sacrificed the sheep to him, for they thought they offended this God whom they didn't know.

Paul praises them for this, for they had rightly sought to honor God even though they did not know him. And even though they erred and were dead in their sins and transgressions like all men, through the grace of God, he allowed them to arrive at this correct conclusion.

In short through grace, God allowed the eternal truth to become partially manifest. And yet without the genuine Gospel there was no salvation. Thus Paul tells them:

„The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent.“

— Acts 17:30

God used this image to make them believe.

In that it is a truth that is revealed in scripture that the shadow of Christ manifests itself. But it precedes the Gospel.

Therefore my conclusion as to Madoka is this:

Madoka the person, in relation to Homura represents a shadow of Christ, a proto gospel.

It can not in itself save, and yet she has the „shape“ of salvation. But Madokami is an idol. Indeed even in Madoka herself there is a second idol.

It is complex, the truth, the image, the replacement of the original with the image. All these things are impossibly entangled in Madoka.

And yet despite everything — in a mysterious way, that the movie itself only depicts in abstract imagery — it is enough.

Homura as Saint

One last time: „You touched my heart, and it shined, turning so colorful“.

I offer a thesis: The one who touched her heart from behind the image was Christ — in Misterioso; in a mysterious manner.

„kanata he
kimi no te wo tori
kokoro dake ga
shitteru basho he

taking your hand,
I reach for the distance,
heading for the place
that only our hearts know.“

— Misterioso, Rebellion

I dreamt that I met again a familiar smile.

After going into the loneliest desert Homura goes the way of the world; her energy is exhausted and eventually she starts turning into a witch. Kyubey captures Homura’s soul into a barrier in order to observe the law of cycles.

The dream world is apparently a peaceful world where the magical girls are battling nightmares instead of wraiths.

These nightmares are however displayed as puppets that are controlled by hands. It is written on the background: Made in Kabinet; Homulili

Kyubey says about Homura that she is like a chick unable to hatch from its egg. She is a witch; yet she is not yet. And at the same time Homura also exists as a protagonist within her own dream world. Because Homura is not yet a witch and this is within her own soul, somehow the creation is more benevolent than witches usually are. The soul gem has not yet flared out, and her ego and soul still remain.

The laws of the world are governed by the familiars of Homura who affect the world. If you read through the additional material you will see many of them listed with explicit functions that make the world in Rebellion work. One example being the Zeppelins „Lise“ who change the memories of people inside.

Among the familiars one thing that stands out more than anything is the children of the city, they are listed as:

This is amazing because this is Homura listing the conditions of her heart plainly.

If we see this list, then we can be reminded of this passage:

„They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy.“

— Romans 1:29-31

Especially fitting is that it lists as the second to last: „no love“. And the last child of the city is „Ai“ who is love — but no one has seen that devil yet.

One thing we immediately stumble upon if we read these things side by side is that Homura was surely seen as virtuous even before Rebellion. Madoka called her „my best friend.“ So why does Homura see herself this way?

The dreamworld is the world of Homura’s heart’s desire; what she wishes for more than anything in her heart of hearts. It is the manifestation of what she sincerely wished in her heart — not what she spoke, when she wished to be the one who protects Madoka. To stand by her side. For this purpose all the other characters were lured inside the barrier, in order to live out this dream.

The first part of Rebellion is Homura remembering the truth of the world and realizing the nature of this dreamworld. It is striking what kind of evaluation Homura reaches once she understands that this is an idealized world that SOMEONE dreamt of: She considers it a mockery of Madoka’s sacrifice.

It is absolutely heartbreaking to understand that Homura gives this answer to seeing her own heart’s desire portrayed before her: What she wants more than anything is a mockery. And she decries it. This world is a product of the things she wished for in her heart that even back then she could not speak loudly. Homura does not dare to claim this: It is the essence of self-denial. Madoka sacrificed herself and went to a place worse than death; while Homura gets to live out her dreams? The horrible, irredeemable world that Madoka once tried to protect is out there. But she, instead of fighting wraiths, as would be her duty, is instead here — in this dream — having a pleasant everyday life. To her this is a mockery.

It is only after Sayaka — of all people — tells her that this fantasy is not that bad, that she reconsiders it.

Does it really have to be destroyed? Why exactly is this a mockery? Because it does not honor the sacrifice Madoka made? But what use is honor to an abstract concept?

In truth the dream world is not merely a world of Homura’s desire, but it is a world of recursive introspection: The world adjusts itself to the realizations that Ai makes; and yet Homura also controls the world, leading to new confrontations, new realizations. Homura looks into her own soul again and again, and thereby strips away everything layer by layer, going in deeper and deeper into her own soul. Until she finally reaches the bottom of her own abyss.

And this is when Madoka jumps on her all of a sudden.

The familiars light a firework in celebration: Homura is tipped over by Madoka who jumps on her.

What follows after this is the flower scene:

Homura tells Madoka about the world, veiling it in metaphor. And yet it is the truth: Madoka went away to a faraway place, and Homura could no longer reach her.

Madoka however answers:

„I would never want that.“

— Madoka

This is the key realization that makes Homura understand everything.

Madoka did not want to become an idol. Madoka does not need Homura to honor her as a God, or as a memory or as some kind of ideal that she has always been chasing behind. Madoka is merely a girl who needs to be saved. In that Homura shatters even her own idol.

The flowers wilt and die. The violet flowers were Homura’s admiration, her idolatry, her pretty image of Madoka. But the image has to die for the truth to be set free.

The ponpon seeds flying away represent a new beginning. Homura says: You have blessed me more than you could ever know. A why, once again. An idol shattered. And yet a genuine blessing nonetheless.

Homura now calls Kyouko; the familiars in the background are dancing to a familiar tune: I will never forget the promise we made…

What promise? To save me from myself, from my own foolish mistakes.

Now, finally, Homura can save Madoka. Not as an ideal, not as a purpose. But as a human being. As her friend.

Death and Rebirth

When she was riding the boat, the image of Sayaka saying that the world is not so bad that it should end appeared; and Homura agrees with that:
The beautiful dreamworld is not evil. Since there is no idol left to mock, and meaninglessness surrounds it, there is nothing to find fault with. That is because the metric by which „fault“ could even be defined has vanished along with the idol. This right here is the void of existential nihilism that falls onto Homura.

Without direction, she separates herself from the world and locks herself away. She knows now that she is the witch. That she is the one who trapped everyone here. And yet the world where they live happily, it is beautiful to her, and she does not have to end it either.

Kyubey then appears and breaks this stalemate: He tells Homura that it was he who trapped her, and that he did it in order to observe the law of cycles — in order to control it, and in order to reach Madoka once again.

This changes the evaluation of the situation. Homura now gains one last thing which she can still do for Madoka: to die for her.
While Homura recognized that Madoka does not need honor, she still needs protection. And if that is what „good for nothing“ is good for, then that is just a fitting end for her. Homura summons a curse in order to drown herself and the dreamworld.
In that she now manifests her witch form.
It is interesting to note the symbolism we have here:

Homura’s witch Homulili is the nutcracker witch. Her nature is self-sufficiency.
She is a nutcracker because fighting again and again and enduring hardship after hardship is cracking nut after nut.
Her character sheet says:

„Her gallant form has now become useless, after having cracked many nuts.“

— Homulili’s character sheet

Indeed Homura's sin is self-sufficiency; she has always relied only on herself. However, this is now the absolute limit where she can not go further alone by herself. She is just one girl, and all she can do is give her life, and then that is it.

Homura experiences the world now as a witch: All her memories have come back to haunt her. All her failure. But here another transformation takes place; her introspection reaches its zenith.

At the same time seeing the funeral procession unfold are the magical girls and most importantly Madoka and her servants Sayaka and Bebe who kept Madoka’s memories for her in order to deceive Kyubey so he wouldn’t notice.

The following scene is a confrontation of these two:

1. It is Homura’s internal self-reflection.
2. The outward confrontation between her witch form and the Magical Girls trying to reach her.

The exact nature of Homura’s witch form is that she stubbornly goes to her execution, but at the same time giant arms appear from her back that are desperately clawing back to life. The soldiers march. Homura's Nutcracker witch fits her character perfectly: With self-discipline, she even manages to suppress her desire to live because she believes it to be necessary. But that, too, is a manifestation of her self-sufficiency. Her teeth have fallen out, because she has burned out. She has given everything, and this is the last thing left to give.

Madoka on the other hand is running towards Homura in order to reach her.

The song that plays in the background is Misterioso.

„Taking your hand,
I reach for the distance,
heading for the place
that only our hearts know.
(...)
The sky is blue and high;
the young wind shines.
A song of wonder
is yet unseen like a small bell.
At the end of the far-too-long night,
there’s a chorus that awakens the dawn.
No matter how fickle it may be,
it foretells the beginning.“

— Misterioso (English translation https://canta-per-me.net/lyrics/misterioso/)

And so in a mysterious way now, something absolutely and utterly impossible happens: Ai (Love) is born. Is it because the true gospel somehow slips between the cracks? I can not say, the authors couldn't possibly know the solution either.

They do not know where it comes from and what it is; but just like the Greeks before them they knew one thing: THIS is what it looks like, and in a mysterious way it MUST become manifest. It MUST or the world is lost. It MUST or there is no hope.

Love in its essence is not merely a feeling, though it is. But it is an absolute. Homura metaphorically sees Madoka’s hand reach towards her in all of her despair, and all of her darkness. Just as it happened in the flower scene: A small kindness, a small warmth. Homura loves Madoka just for that alone. She already knew, and she already loved. But here this love reaches a critical mass.

Madoka did not reach Homura with magic or with some extreme deed of compassion. Nor by saving her or giving her something of immeasurable value; but with kindness alone.

„Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.“

— 1 John 4:7-8

The origin of this love is insurmountable; it is not given because Madoka gave something first. It should not logically be possible for love to be born from this. Madoka just reached out her hand to Homura; on paper nothing special happened. Madoka may be seen as a savior by many, but to Homura she is just her friend who made a terrible mistake. It is Homura who loved; her heart was touched and it shined, turning so colorful.

„The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.“

— John 3:8

And this is what happens here: in a mysterious way. The wind blows and awakens Homura now completely, the seeds that once were sown now bloom. Standing next to Madoka for a moment Homura and Madoka break the illusion. Madoka asks her if she is afraid. Homura says: No. I will not hesitate anymore. The flower has grown, love has finally awoken; now is the time to act.

AiYo

Now, Homura is lying in the loneliest desert.
And Madokami, this idol of death; this false God that came into being by the sacrifice of Madoka.
This law, this world; none of them matter anymore in the face of love.
Homura grabs Madoka and pulls her from heaven.
Homura’s soul gem turns into a new color:
Homura’s heart and soul were touched; they now shine, turning into a brilliant color.
Therefore now she takes flight riding on Hope.

Homura grows wings:
The soul gem is shattered; Homura merges her soul with the spool which is the karma that ties Madoka and her together.
She accepts the responsibility for all of it.
A new world is created, with a new principle: love.

Finally, this results in the creation of the new world as we had seen in chapter 2.

The most important thing is that Homura, loving Madoka genuinely — not as an ideal, not as some kind of idol but as a person — does that which love — true love — always does: it lets her go. Not into her own death, by her foolishness, because Love always protects. But into her own life, where she can be with her family.

Homura — whose wish was to stand next to Madoka and to fight as someone who can protect her — now truly has become someone who protects her. But not by standing next to her. Instead she stays far away, suffering all alone for her.

Remember: somewhere someone is always fighting for you. If you remember her, you are not alone.

But Madoka does not remember. And yet her life is happiness. Paid for by Homura.

If we look closely at the lyrics of Colorful we see what it truly means:

The heart that was touched is Homura's heart. Her soul gem literally turned into a new color, one that was not seen before. Love is something which is not of this world, therefore no one in this world could possibly understand it.

Homura takes flight riding on hope with her new wings, and now she goes on protecting everyone’s wishes and moves forward to a tomorrow no one knows.

My cup overflows

In the new world, I want you to pay attention to a few more things:

The symbolism accompanying Homura is twofold, Nietzschean but it is also Christian. And not just Christian but messianic.

When you see Homura looking „evil“ and being despised and rejected by the world, amazingly this reminds me of what the prophet Isaiah prophesied about the coming messiah:

„He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem. Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.“

— Isaiah 53:3-5

Many people in our culture conceive of Jesus as some glorious hero who goes before the people and everyone cheers for him.
But this is a twisted perspective. The people crucified him; they hated him for telling the truth. He was the one who upset their man-made laws.

This is the image that Homura bears now: The image of Jesus Christ. What does that make her? A God? A false messiah? No. Merely Christian.

That is what everything is building towards. Anyone who loves is born of God, because love is not from this world but from God. Every single Christian is a son or daughter of God, and every single one is a saint. That is all that Homura is: nothing more — and nothing less.

„But we all, with uncovered face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image, from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.“

— 2 Corinthians 3:18

As such, bearing the image of Christ in the eyes of Sayaka and the world she is evil. Someone who needs to be persecuted. But being persecuted for the sake of truth and love? That is nothing new. Another observation:

Her cup overflows.

Editorial annotationIMAGE EVIDENCESeverity50/100ModerateShow the table, overflowing cup, Bebe in the liquid, tomato, soul-gem crown, and black/white feathers in sequence. Annotate the observable parallels before arguing for Psalm 23, anointing, kingship, or messianic symbolism.

„You prepare a table before me
in the presence of my enemies.
You anoint my head with oil;
my cup overflows.“

— Psalm 23:5

Homura is there sitting at a table, before Sayaka.

While she is talking the liquid from her cup overflows and engulfs the world.
In that moment Bebe cheerfully runs through the overflowing purple water:
She is celebrating, she is a child; she sees this world as it truly is: A fresh chance, a world where she can live her life once more.
She is dancing in a rain of black feathers: But who cares if they are black? This could be seen as Nietzschean relativism, but it could also be seen as the World rejecting that which is Christian and good as evil.

„Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these.“

— Mark 10:14

A tomato flies and hits Homura’s head; does it anoint her with oil? Maybe so. But that same fruit was thrown at the image of Madokami before, and there is definite crown symbolism with Homura’s soul gem.

Homura now is King in this world; bearing the image of Christ, after an almost literal resurrection of the dead rejected by mankind; having paid the price of discipleship, and finally, having sacrificed to be loved for love.

That truly and genuinely is the image of a saint.

The Eternal Glory of God

“I know that you can do all things; no purpose of yours can be thwarted. You asked, ‘Who is this that obscures my plans without knowledge?’ Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know. You said, ‘Listen now, and I will speak; I will question you, and you shall answer me.’ My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you. Therefore I despise myself and repent in dust and ashes.”

– Job 42:2-6

After having witnessed how everything finally, at the end of this world fits together. After having seen the heavenly spheres move in unison, like Dante at the end of the Divine Commedy, I repent in dust and ashes. For I admit that all I have written is yes insufficient to declare the glory of the LORD.

And additionally, foolishly, I am still even now writing about a magical girl anime.

Ironically even this very conclusion here, rhymes with the ending of Rebellion: If its final form is something so irrational — what shall we make of that.

Conclusion

Finally a conclusion remains:

Madoka Magica does not lie and does not cheat itself but manifests that which logically follows, and additionally strives for the high and transcendent without looking away, while also mounting an enormous amount of structural sophistication. This by necessity manifests „truth“ — and by that I mean structural truth.

However all truth is Christian truth. Christ IS the truth. Therefore wherever „truth“ is manifested, Christ is shadowed. This may be a fundamental law of this reality.

Homura in Madoka Magica basically represents a true Christian being saved by grace alone.

The ultimate answer to „how this is possible“ is: „For man it is impossible, yet with God all things are possible“.

When at the end after the credits play: Mada dame yo, it means: Not Yet. Not Yet... to already but not yet.

Wer hat geträumt? It was me: For just as Homura saw the shadow of Christ in Madoka, I did in Madoka Magica. And it led me to the truth. And I could even keep everything, in even greater detail and depth and glory. It is all so beyond amazing.

After having seen all that, having witnessed and understood. To me, this conclusion is undeniable.
I bear witness that I have seen, and there is no doubt.
Everything, everywhere proclaims the glory of Christ. Now that I see it, it is so radiant and beautiful.

I hope that you have seen beauty here. Perhaps you are struggling to go the next step, to believe. If you are at least feeling a pull, a longing that says: „maybe there is something!“ even if you back away from it, I am grateful beyond words if that is what you got from all of this.

And therein is now my foundation laid; in this my blog I will show you other works. I will show you the weave, how it relates to each other. And how all of them — weakly, cowardly, longingly, naively, desperately, but nevertheless so beautifully — are climbing upwards towards the ultimate truth.

Sources

Madoka Magica Episode 11: (https://wiki.puella-magi.net/Madoka_Magica_Episode_11:_The_Only_Thing_I_Have_Left_to_Guide_Me) Madoka Magica Episode 12: (https://wiki.puella-magi.net/The_Beginning_Story:_Episode_12)

Faust (https://herrlarbig.de/2008/10/01/faust-1-verweile-doch-du-bist-so-schoen-v-1700)

Rebellion Transcript: (https://pastebin.com/sckF0rsz)

Rebellion Runes: (https://wiki.puella-magi.net/Witch_Runes/Rebellion)

Madoka Magica connect : (https://wiki.puella-magi.net/Connect)

If you want to read more about the details of the familiars and the funeral procession you should read up the very detailed work here:
https://archiveofourown.org/works/51109111
From a literary analysis perspective this work is brilliant. My part is not literary analysis to understand what it may represent but to break down the existential dimension of what we have here.