I dont really understand the idea of the prophecy anymore.
Arya killed the Night King
so what was the point of the prophecy? I thought Jon or Dany were the Prince That Was Promised. Can anyone explain?
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6lolololololololololol– MöozCommented Apr 30, 2019 at 5:55
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2Your guess is as good as mine. Maybe in the showverse, Azor-Ahai is a mythical hero who will come along to slay the biggest threat the mankind has ever seen......Cersei Lannister and Bronn.– AegonCommented Apr 30, 2019 at 6:19
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6Vanished as quickly as the dothrakis– KepotxCommented Apr 30, 2019 at 6:37
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1But that's been a long time prophecy, known for 1000s of years, it might have changed during generations but not this drastically– StarseekerCommented Apr 30, 2019 at 12:56
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2There is one other possibility I think people are ignoring: the "prophecy" might have just been Nostradamus-level nonsense.– Keith MorrisonCommented Apr 30, 2019 at 14:50
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1 Answer
What's stopping Arya from being the Azor Ahai. She became Azor Ahai because she acted on the prophecy and made it true.
I can't talk about the Azor Ahai prophecy from the books as I haven't read them.
In the show, however, the prophecy, as told by Melisandre, goes like this
The Long Night is coming. Only the prince [prince or princess, according to Missandei’s translation] that was promised can bring the dawn … I believe you have a role to play, as does another. Summon Jon Snow.
She also claims that prophecies are dangerous things and she has been wrong in interpreting them.
She first claims Stannis to be the Azor Ahai but upon his death, when she returns to Castle Black & resurrects Jon Snow, she says to Davos that Jon is the Prince that was promised. But when Jon banishes her she goes to Daenerys & tells the prophecy to her.
In the show, at this point, Melisandre doesn't claims that Daenerys or Jon Snow is the "Prince That Was Promised". She only claims they have a role to play.
Back in season 3, Melisandre prophecises to Arya that she sees darkness in her & in that darkness eyes staring back at her. Brown, green & blue eyes she will shut forever and repeats it today because she can now correctly interprete the visions she saw in the flames.
Prophecises are that only, people who believe in them, act accordingly & in turn make it true.
It's the similar case in Harry Potter, Voldemort acted on a prophecy & made Harry Potter the chosen one. If he didn't act on it & try to kill Harry as child, that prophecy would be bullshit & he would still be alive & more powerful.
Like so many fundamentalists, she(Melisandre) saw a cataclysmic threat solely through the lens of her scripture, insisting it was being fulfilled chapter and verse, pointing to all the prophetic "evidence" with the myopic, connect-the-dots-sheeple fervor of a conspiracy theorist.
But prophecies and magic are a slippery business in Game of Thrones, both real and fallible, true and apocryphal. In that sense they are stories, and all stories are true in one sense or another—but what they tell us about our future depends not on what they say so much as what we decide that they mean.
Stannis was not Azor Ahai, after all, and the show remains agnostic on whether Arya's shanking of the Night King makes her the Princess Who Was Promised or just a kick-ass girl with a cool dagger at the right time. Sure, we can go back through the legend and find ways to connect Arya to passages about smoke and salt and blood—and sure, Valyrian steel was forged by dragonfire according to some accounts, so in that sense she was wielding a fiery blade. But if we can squint and make enough of the piece fit, does that mean a prophecy has been fulfilled or just that we've skillfully reimagined the outcome to line up with the story we expected to hear?
That's the thing about stories, the ones we tell both about ourselves and the world we live in; they're only useful insofar as they get us where we need to go, when they serve us and not the other way around.
answered Apr 30, 2019 at 7:03
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Good catch. Although I think the book might differ from what the show showed us, we only have to be based in previous seasons for the Azor Ahai prophecy and not in written material. Commented Apr 30, 2019 at 7:14
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1Yeah, good explanation, I guess I was thinking of a combination of the book/tv show prophecy, thus maybe in the TV show it could be respected. In the book I think there were a number of signs that described the birth(a red comet I think was one of them). And also the whole Lyana+Rhaegar how I understood it was part of the prophecy, thus it didnt really make sense. I hope they explain this better in the next episodes, since it was a bit of a letdown. I loved the episode but I guess the clues were pointing somewhere else for how some stuff was supposed to happen. Commented Apr 30, 2019 at 7:24
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3didn't the show mention that the one who was promised should be born admist salt and smoke? and that he would be born from the line of Prince Prince Aerys and Princess Rhaella?– KepotxCommented Apr 30, 2019 at 7:38
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1@Starseeker Bran had to be doing more than that. Maybe we get it next episode. People are theorizing that Bran is Lord of Light & he warged in the past to set up chess pieces for the final act to take place. Let's see Commented Apr 30, 2019 at 9:53
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1@KharoBangdo "Azor Ahai will be reborn amidst smoke and salt wielding the flaming sword Lightbringer" Dragonstone is a good combination of salt and smoke, being a volcanic island. Also, Stanis wield a magic sword, and even if not the descendent of Aerys and Rhaella, he have targaryen blood. While Jon and Dany seems to fit better to the description, Stannis still check some marks– KepotxCommented Apr 30, 2019 at 9:56