The Gnostic Gospel of Evangelion
Table of contents
This essay contains spoilers. (All of them.) Major spoilers do not start until after the analysis of the title and title sequence, but if you want to avoid all spoilers, watch the series and "End of Evangelion" before reading.
eon Genesis Evangelion is perhaps the most dissected and deconstructed anime of all-time. It may be the most re-constructed, too, having been retold in no less than five subsequent movies over the course of 26 years. And the varied analyses reflect creator Hideaki Anno's own apparent indecision about it what it all may mean and how it all ought to conclude. This makes it a tough watch for a first-time viewer, especially if you're watching it hoping for the various conspiracies and dramatic plotlines, religious imagery, and psychological themes to congeal into a singular message. It's not that type of series. It's more like an abstract painting, where it's less about what's inside the piece than it is what you get out of it, a mood board of various ideas dressed up as cartoon drama. Even as much as Evangelion is a tentpole within the anime industry and a cultural phenomenon in Japan, watching it is an individual experience.
As such, the wealth of commentaries on the series vary greatly, as they should. Analyses of the show, whose title translates to "the Gospel of the New Beginning," can be categorized into many different denominations with various disagreements within. It functions, in other words, in the way that it presents itself: as a religious text. To this end, I feel like it may be helpful to strip away a lot of the speculation and subjectivity and try to explain the show for first time viewers or anyone confused as to its themes or messages by drilling down to the core components of the show. This is that project: the Gnostic Gospel of Evangelion.
On the surface, Neon Genesis Evangelion is an anime series about a team of teenage mecha pilots defending a post-apocalyptic Tokyo from otherworldly invaders bent on destroying the city. This description could describe any of the dozens of mecha franchises dating back to the 1970s. And the notion of defending a post-apocalyptic Japan stretches all the way back to World War II. But Evangelion subverts both of these standard anime tropes: it exists neither to present heroic cartoon figures nor to comment on the devastation of atomic war. It's protagonists are instead deeply flawed, and the show in some ways exists to showcase their shortcomings. And the defense of Tokyo-3 is merely a front in a much larger conflict in which the pilots turn out to be pawns. To get to the bottom of this conflict, we'll take a telescoping view of the show.
What's in a name?
Neon Genesis Evangelion is a story about a new beginning. But like the poet Dan Wilson once wrote, "Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end." The title, then, is a reference to the show's lore. Earth's first beginning, as far as we're concerned, occurred 4 billion years ago when a figure named Lilith crashes into the Earth, lodging herself deeply beneath what is now modern-day Japan. This impact sent a huge amount of debris into space which would eventually coalesce into Earth's only moon. Lilith was one of seven Seeds of Life, sent by aliens referred to as the First Ancestral Race to create of life on new planets. Her crash landing, however, was a mistake: another Seed of Life--Adam--had already landed on Earth, buried deep in the Antarctic ice.
The First Ancestral Race had divided their own essence into two halves: Adam received the Fruit of Life and Lilith the Fruit of Knowledge, reflecting the Judeo-Christian Biblical account of man's creation. In the book of Genesis, God forbade Adam and Eve from eating from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, that they may never know good and evil. And when they did, he banished them from the Garden of Eden--not as punishment, but that they might not also eat from the Tree of Life and live forever, becoming god-like themselves. And, in fact, God set up cherubim and a flaming sword to guard the way to the Tree of Life thereafter.
Likewise, the First Ancestral Race divided the two types of Seed and forbade them from populating the same planet. Each Seed was accompanied by a Spear of Longinus (named after the Roman soldier who pierced Jesus Christ's side on the cross) which would paralyze one in case of this very sort of conflict. Lilith's Spear did not survive the trip, so upon Lilith's crash landing, Adam was paralyzed by his Spear. Lilith's progeny--the life we know on earth, including humanity--would then inherit the earth while Adam's progeny--the Angels who were the rightful heirs to Earth--would not. And this looming conflict would be held in stasis for four million years by the Spear.
This event--the crash landing of Lilith--would come to be known as the First Impact, one in a series of Impacts that would shape the series' world as we come to know it.
The Second Impact would occur in the year 2000, when Adam is discovered in Antarctica and a team of researchers travel there to perform experiments on the find. They remove the Spear of Longinus, awakening Adam and creating an explosion that would shift the Earth's axis and melt the Arctic ice cap. Between the explosion, the resulting natural disasters, and prolonged social unrest, half of Earth's population was destroyed. The Spear could not be re-inserted into Adam, but in trying to do so, the scientists reduced Adam to a harmless, embryonic state. But not before the Chamber of Guf (named after the Otzar, or the treasury of souls produced from the Tree of Life) is unsealed, unleashing the Angels, along with a four million year old conflict.
A Third Impact is foretold in the Dead Sea Scrolls, an ancient book of alien origin that explains the Seeds of Life (unrelated except in name to the Jewish Qumran Caves Scrolls). This Impact is the potential culmination of the conflict between the Angels and humanity and the new beginning referenced by the show's title. It is around this potential Third Impact that the events of the series unfold.
Title Sequence
The Evangelion title sequence is unusual in that it starts not with an introduction to the characters, but rather a series of religious symbols that contextualize the narrative. A lot of debate has centered around these symbols, informed by assistant director Kazuya Tsurumaki's insistence that "There is no actual Christian meaning to the show, we just thought the visual symbols of Christianity looked cool." But this should not be taken to mean that the symbology is meaningless, only to indicate that the they were not using the show to communicate any specific ideas about religion, but rather religious symbols to contextualize the plot of the show.
The opening image is that of a seraph, one of the highest order of Biblical angels associated with the idea of purity. This is likely a reference to Isaiah chapter 6, where the prophet meets the seraphim in a vision of God's Throne Room. In the scripture, a seraph takes a piece of coal from the temple's alter and uses it to cleanse Isaiah's lips, purifying him so that he can receive God's message, which is a message of judgment and restoration of the rebellious Jewish people. This suggests that the coming conflict between the series' Angels and our chief protagonist, Shinji Ikari, is a process of purification necessary for him to play a role in the new beginning, and also creates a parallel between God's judgment and the Third Impact, his restoration and the thereafter.
The second symbol in the title sequence is the Kabbalistic Tree of Life (a symbolic tree distinct from the Tree of Life in the Garden of Eden). This upside down tree depicts the ten emanations through which the divine connect to the material world. The roots depict the divine will, which then extends through creation, then understanding, then kindness and love, then strength, judgment, and discipline, then harmony and compassion, then endurance, tenacity, and drive, then splendor, sincerity, and truth, then the foundation and ultimately the physical world. Through the physical world, these ten emanations then branch out, continuing to connect the divine with the material. This symbol suggests Shinji's road to self-actualization, which will be central to the series' plot.
The show's theme song, Cruel Angel's Thesis, reinforces this theme, suggesting that through this struggle he will become a legend. But it also suggests a double edged sword: though he will develop meaningful relationships through his self-actualization, his destiny will ultimately require him to relenquish them. A Cruel Angel's Thesis, indeed.
We're then introduced to the trio of pilots: Shinji in the foreground, and Asuka Langley Sohryu and Rei Ayanami in the shadows, followed by another, more intricate Tree of Life illustration, the Systema Sephiroticvm X Divino Rvm Nominvm. This more complex diagram shows the ways in which the different emanations of the divine relate to one another, suggesting each character represents an emanation or aspect of the divine. Shinji, for instance, represents the Yesod, or the foundation through which the emanations are transmitted to the Malkuth, or the physical world. In other words, he is the character who bears the most responsibility. Asuka represents Tiferet, or beauty, and battles her pride throughout the series. And Rei represents Binah, or understanding, and battles a certain fatalism. These three--Yesod, Tiferet, and Binah--are the central nodes in the symbol, symbolic of their roles as the central characters. Next we're introduced to Misato Katsuragi, the operations director at NERV, the company who created the EVAs (mecha suits), and is the chaperone to Shinji and Asuka. She represents Netzach, or endurance, and struggles with habitual behavior throughout the series.
At this point, the title sequence introduces Shinji's EVA, Unit-01, and the theme song suggests that the weight on his back will eventually turn into wings. We're introduced to the staff of NERV, including Shinji's father, Gendo Ikara (who represents Chesed, or love, and struggles with the loss of Shinji's mother), through a series of headshot portraits. The entire second half then plays out as a rapid-fire slideshow, introducing secondary characters, showing clips of battles against Angels, alluding to the show's lore, alluding to the characters' inner struggles, and finally ending on a lingering shot of the Dead Sea Scrolls, suggesting that all that will transpire relates to prophecies that were written long before any of the characters were born.
NERV and the creation of the EVAs
After the Second Impact, the United Nations created an Artificial Evolution Laboratory in Hakone, Japan, at the site of the First Impact. The company created to oversee this laboratory was a precursor to NERV called Gehirn and the two primary projects undertaken at the lab were Project-E, the creation of the Evangelions, and the development of the Magi supercomputers. Hakone was chosen so that Tokyo-3 could be built on top of the GeoFront, an underground cavern where Lilith remained suspended since the Impact. Gehrin's aim was to protect her, as the newly awakened Angels would sense the GeoFront and try to break into the cavern to merge with her. The city is therefore outfitted with defense systems to protect against attacks and buildings that retract into the ground, protecting the civilian population during battles.
Dr. Naoko Akagi, the mother of Dr. Ritsuko Akagi, oversaw the creation of the Magi supercomputers, named after the Three Wise Men from the Gospel of Matthew. She built the three computers to reflect the three aspects of her personality: scientist (Melchior-Magi 1), mother (Balthasar-Magi 2), and woman (Casper-Magi 3), so they're intended to produce different outputs when given the same inputs. After their completion in 2010, the Magi would become central to operations at the NERV Headquarters, coordinating battles against the Angels.
Project-E, or the Adam Revival Project, was overseen by Gendo Ikari and revolved around creating clones of Adam to defend Tokyo-3 from the Angels. After several failed attempts, Unit-00 was successfully created from genetic samples of Adam recovered from the Katsugari Expedition. Unit-01 was then created from genetic samples of Lilith. And Unit-02 was again created from genetic samples of Adam. These are not traditional Mechas because, while they are technologically augmented, they are primarily biological. Their synchronizations with pilots are therefore voluntary, and rely on the implantation of a soul that is open to syncing with a given pilot.
Unit-01's soul came from Yui Ikari, Shinji's mother and a Gehirn scientist, but due to a freak accident during the Contact Experiment, she was fully absorbed into the EVA. Rei was originally created during an attempt to recover Yui after she was absorbed into Unit-01: her DNA is from Yui but her soul is from Lilith, as is Unit-00's soul. Unit-02, the first production EVA, contains the partial soul of Kyoko Zeppelin Sohryu, the mother of Asuka and a scientist at the German division of Gehrin. This deprived her of her maternal aspects, however, and she eventually had a mental breakdown after her relationship with Asuka was severed.
The pilots are able to sync with the EVAs through an entry plug filled with LCL, the blood of Lilith which is the "primordial ooze" from which Lillan life first evolved. Through this connection, the pilots are able to control the EVAs as a pilot would control a traditional Mecha. But the EVAs' behavior is not always willed by the pilots: Unit-01 acts independently on several occasions when Shinji is in danger and Unit-00 at one point lashes out at Ritsuko in an attempt to take revenge against her mother, Naoko.
After the completion of the two major projects, Gehirn is restructured as NERV and moved below ground into the GeoFront: a cavern created by the impact of the Black Moon, the vessel in which Lilith traveled to Earth. A system of windows and mirrors feed sunlight into the cavern, creating a day/night cycle and the illusion of being above ground and a system of 22 armored plates protect it from entry by the Angels and create a base for the city's retractable skyscrapers. NERV's headquarters exist in a pyramid that extends deep below ground to Terminal Dogma, where Lilith is suspended.
The Angels
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The Human Instrumentality Project
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The Third Impact
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Jon W. Cole is a graphic designer / developer based in Atlanta. His interests are corn syrup & esoterica. He has yet to take down his Christmas tree or remove his Bernie Sanders For President license plate.