Today’s post is from a former staff member, Kaze, who you’ll remember playing a vital role on Beneath the Tangles for a number of years. We’re blessed to have him still drop by from time to time, while also contributing to his own blog, Nanaca Sakura.
I once explained how Madoka was the gateway anime for me into the world of Christian aniblogging. And certainly, that was the first anime that got me to write something about the intersection of religion and anime. But when I think about some older anime that stuck with me, I realize that the first anime that really flipped the switch for me was an anime by the name of H2O -Footprints in the Sand-. As a visual novel adaptation, it was hardly an impressive anime, but it was memorable. Most notably was how it was clearly inspired by the poem Footprints in the Sand. I was quite intrigued to see an anime based off a Christian poem (at the time, I didn’t know it was originally a VN), but I didn’t think much of it beyond amusement. Fast forward 8 years when I discovered not only was it a VN, but it was a VN written by my newest favorite author SCA-DI. And then the pieces all fell into place, for the commonality between them which attracted me so was the exploration of Christianity and the question of God.
SCA-DI is perhaps the most intelligent, talented, and philosophical writer in the entire industry. Some fans have claimed he would be a Pulitzer Prize winner if he didn’t spend all his efforts writing for a niche genre with lots of porn. It’s a really strange dichotomy to see a medium so steeped in immorality also portray some of the most thought-provoking philosophy on life and happiness, integrated into intriguing, engrossing stories that make for truly amazing literature. More so than anything, however, is how his stories resonate so strongly with his audience because of their brutally honest depictions of suffering in a broken world and the seemingly hopeless (but not completely hopeless) struggle to find happiness. And like most people who question why the world is the way it is, SCA-DI also poses questions about the nature of God who allows such tragedies to occur.
My favorite thing about SCA-DI’s incorporation of theology is that it is truly an honest, straightforward questioning of God. It is not for or against the existence of God, nor is there some innate bias in painting a certain picture of God. It is instead a pure curiosity where the author hypothesizes traits about a god and lets the characters and story explore what might happen in a world where such a god is reality. Without a doubt, he has a deep understanding of Christian theology firstly because he is one of the few authors who can actually quote the Bible in proper context (better than most Christians, at that) and second because when I asked him about it, he said this:
I think it is difficult to understand Western philosophy without understanding Christianity.
SCA-DI describes himself as heavily influenced by Wittgenstein’s philosophy and by extension, the problem of God. For him to be informed of Western philosophy, he must also be informed of Christianity. I do not interpret his works as philosophy which he believes in but rather philosophy which he himself is still in the process of exploring. Thus, to look at the theological aspects of his works is to join him, a Japanese native with a Japanese perspective on religion, on his journey into the question of God’s existence. With each work, he explores a story where a god might operate with humans in a different way, and with each story, the influence of god on the characters and how they perceive the suffering around them can be observed.
Case 1: God as a Miracle Worker
I have the least to say about this case, simply because I did not read the VN and my memories of the anime are hazy at best. However, the existence of a “god” in this story is the most direct of my examples. In H2O -Footprints in the Sand-, a deity performs a blatant miracle for the protagonist. In doing so, he is cured of his blindness and is able to live a happy, fulfilling life, or so he thinks. With sight comes the ability to observe the suffering and evils of those around him. Try as he might, he is unable to win against the powers of society with only the miracle of sight. Although he was blessed with the miracle he desired, he was unable to achieve the outcome he thought he could. In other words, even when God bestows the miracles we ask upon us, maybe it is not for the best. Maybe there is a reason we do not receive miracles, reasons that we could not imagine existed because of our blindness.
During your times of trials and suffering, when you see only one set of footprints, it was then that I carried you.
Sometime miracles do not go the way we think, and sometimes we take them for granted. When the suffering of the protagonist reaches its peak, he wonders why he was given such a miracle in the first place and questions whether he has been abandoned. Yet it is the Christian poem which provides an answer: when there was only one set of footprints, it was because God was carrying you. Sometimes the greatest miracle is not the one where we can literally see a new world, but the one that looks like we traveled the path alone.
Perhaps miracles as we imagine them cannot truly exist. In a world where God hands out miracles according to our whims, we will lose the ability to appreciate their very existence, for then miracles would be the expected way of life. It is only through suffering and struggling that we can appreciate the happiness that we find at the end of the tunnel.
Case 2: God as an Observer
If God works not with blatant miracles but instead as someone who is silently carrying you on his back, what would God look like as a quiet observer to our suffering? In what has become one of the most critically acclaimed visual novels, Subarashiki Hibi explores this question. I remember when people would talk about how the porn scenes in this VN were absolutely vital to understanding what was going on. Before I was into VNs, I scoffed at that claim, thinking such a thing couldn’t possibly be true. How wrong I was.
I suppose porn, by definition, exists to give sexual gratification. In that case, SubaHibi does not really have porn because the sex scenes are, by and large, sexual violence with many disturbing and disgusting details. While there are other plot reasons for their inclusion, they also exist to fully immerse the reader in what suffering may look like in its rawest form. It is one thing to say a character has been violated; it is another to show you the gritty details of it from the victim’s perspective. What follows then is the same question as before: does God really exist in a world with such suffering? Even if He does, surely He has abandoned us.
But a god certainly exists within the world of SubaHibi, as one who is observing the suffering of those around him. Quietly and calmly, he pushes the characters toward the right direction, even when they still choose the wrong one. The characters, seemingly alone in a world of pain and fear, struggle with all their might to find happiness, and the beauty of SubaHibi is that some of them definitively do not. Such is the reality of life. In this imperfect world, there are people who die without ever knowing the thing called happiness. Life does not always get better as many would claim.
Lies and falsehoods, shams, vulgarity and uncleanness…god is something who allows all. No matter what absurdity is tossed into our lives, god shall say to us: ‘Live happily!’
It is only through countless struggles, hopeless suffering, and encouraging words from an observer that some of the characters can arrive at the place known as happiness. Most importantly, that place is never a place where you are by yourself. Indeed, one of the messages here is that people cannot live on their own, and they most certainly cannot escape suffering by themselves. It is the relationships we form with others that allows us to overcome struggles, perhaps including the relationship we form with God. And should we ever miraculously reach a place to call happiness, how easy is it to forget about the one who gave a small and quiet push away from the path of death and carried you on his back when you thought you couldn’t go on?
If God does exist as an observer, maybe even He cannot stop Himself from intervening from time to time. And if so, would that not be a mark of how overwhelming love His love for us is? In other words, even if God is not a flashy miracle worker, He is not a simple observer either. He is not always actively participating in our lives, and maybe that inconsistency feels like betrayal. However, by watching the characters struggle onward, we see that even if God is not actively helping you, that doesn’t mean He isn’t watching over you, ready to step in should the need arise. Even if God only intervenes at the most critical of times, He can still lead us out of the spiral of suffering and to a place of happiness, even when we ourselves do not realize what happened. With a single line, he encourages us to continue struggling onward in this broken world: “Live happily!”
Case 3: God as Beauty
If you have been paying any amount of attention to me, you would know that SCA-DI’s latest VN has become one of my favorite stories of all time. It’s been almost 2 years since I read it, and I’m still raving about its perfection; this has never happened to me before. Sakura no Uta is a masterpiece unlike anything I’ve experienced before, and I have made the absurdly bold claim that every Christian missionary to Japan must read this. I welcome anyone to disagree with me, but you’ll have to read it in Japanese because there’s no translation. Sakura no Uta has resonated with eroge fans across Japan (admittedly, a niche population) and I believe it is because Sakura no Uta is clearly a philosophical masterpiece that taps into the subconscious of Japanese society, or even human society itself, as it explores the meaning of life and happiness.
There is not such a defined existence called “god” unlike the previous two stories, so arguably I am grasping for straws here. However, as a Christian, there were a handful of key conversations that stuck out to me and made me think about the overall story this way. What if God was not merely something that interacted with us from the greater cosmos, but something that actually resided in us? Indeed, Christianity talks about accepting Jesus into your heart and being filled with the Holy Spirit. Sakura no Uta explores this possibility, albeit in a very indirect and arguably unintentional manner.
A work of art is a corpse. But a corpse that never rots, like a beautiful specimen.
What is beauty and how do we define it? When we see beauty, we just know “that’s beautiful.” What if that sense of beauty was tied to the sense of God? What if the things we viewed as beautiful were because we were subconsciously seeing God’s beauty in it? And what if the beauty that humans created, through works of art, music, writing, etc. were all but a reflection of the beauty of God inside of us? Perhaps we can only recognize the beauty of God because we can contrast it to the darkness of a sinful world; what if the things we recognize as beautiful are our souls reacting to something beyond the mere physical? Sakura no Uta is a story of art and beauty, the people who create art, and the ones who are moved by that beauty. And so, a certain character that is able to create a beauty which seems to be of the heavens is called “the child who houses god.”
When such perfect beauty is born into the world, it must be a gift from god. That a god is housed in a person is the only explanation for how such beauty can be created by human hands. But through the story of these characters who seek the greatest heights of art, one wonders: what is art and what makes art beautiful? The inspiration for the creation of a piece of art and the feelings it inspires in others is intangible. One cannot simply define it as being that of the gods. Even in a world full of suffering and pain, we can appreciate the beauty of art and creation. No matter how much despair the characters feel at one point, it is the beauty of art in which they find their salvation. If but a single person deems something to be beautiful, if it can inspire an overflowing of positive emotions in someone else, does that make something a work of art? If by any chance such things deserve to be called beautiful, then the creators of such art must be recognized as talented enough to birth such beauty. At the end of this train of logic is this consideration: do we all house a god within ourselves?
A god who walks with man is weak, but where people believe, there shall he be. A god created by the people is weak, yet it is for that reason he can be with man.
(Even with a line like this, I can’t properly capture the beauty of the original prose)
If the beauty we create is from a god, then those who struggle to create must house weak gods compared to the geniuses who can pen a masterpiece with a single breath. But those who house weak gods struggle with all their might to create even a single piece of art that can be called beautiful; these are people who walk with their god. What stuck out to me the most is the idea that God is willing to become weak if it means He can walk by our sides because that is exactly what Jesus did when He came down as a human. A god who is not willing to become weak for us may be powerful, but he is not one I would want to be in a relationship with. The idea that God is willing to sacrifice to be with us is the hallmark of God’s love for us. Sakura no Uta manages to use the concept of art and beauty to point out the juxtaposition of what humans believe a powerful god to be and what God actually is like. Perhaps it is not that God does not exist but rather society’s interpretation of God that does not exist. Is true strength a god who can vanquish enemies in an instant or one who is willing to die for the sake of another?
But another side to the story is that the beauty humans create is not the direct work of God; it is the reflection of God as the ones who were made in the image of God. Our works of art can “create” God in the sense that our creations are a reflection of the God who resides in us. If God exists where there is beauty, then our creation of beauty is the expansion of God. In a world full of suffering, God leaves His mark not with spectacular miracles but through the beautiful art formed by human hands. With this perspective, God is all around because we are the images of God in the truest sense. Everything we see as beauty and good is God, and God is every good and beautiful aspect about us and the world we create. We want to imagine God’s goodness as a beauty beyond imagination but perhaps God’s beauty is something we are already surrounded by. When we are always exposed to His beauty, we begin to think of it as normal, as boring. Yet it is when we suffer and struggle most in life that we realize how beautiful the simplest of things can be and how God’s love can take the smallest of forms. What is beauty? Beauty is God.
Case 4/5: ???
If there is a case 4, it would be SCA-DI’s newly written LN Youjosama to Zerokyuu Shugoshasama, which I have bought but haven’t gotten around to reading yet. Given that it’s just a the first volume, I’m not convinced it actually has any heavy duty philosophy or theology yet. Case 5 though, would be Sakura no Toki, the sequel to the best VN ever written. I have the typical skepticism regarding sequels, especially with the way Sakura no Uta ended, but this is SCA-DI, so I have no choice but to remain as hyped as possible until it gets released and I can make an actual judgment on it. Still, I’m sure it will contain some amount of theology; whether it will be a mere continuation of the original or have some new ideas regarding the question of God is a different story. Even Wittgenstein changed his philosophies over time, and I look forward to see how SCA-DI’s ideas evolve as he continues to provide us with the greatest stories the VN medium has to offer.
SCA-DI explores many different aspects of how God could be in this world of suffering that we live in. He does not try to tell people “this is how God is,” but only that “this is how God might be.” It is an honest exploration of the nature of God and the theology surrounding pain and suffering. His works encourage the audience to continue this exploration on their own, and I think such encouragement is equally relevant to Christians. No human could have a complete understanding of God, and the continued exploration into God’s characteristics is something Christians should always be doing as we seek to know God more. It is doubly rewarding to experience SCA-DI’s opinions and try to reconcile his conclusions with our own comprehension of God’s nature in a broken world. While I recommend everyone try out some of his works for yourselves, I understand many readers are adverse to the pornographic content of the eroge medium, especially in the case of SubaHibi. I have tried to avoid spoilers as best as I could, and I want to point out that a spoiler-free analysis of these works would be far more interesting and expansive than this surface level introduction I provided. I hope everyone managed to read to the end of this long article, and for anyone who learned to appreciate the world of SCA-DI’s philosophy, I will leave you with a final quote:
Suffering is important. Frustration is important. All the crap in the world is important. By experiencing it all, you can have the greatest kind of life.
– Kusanagi Naoya, Sakura no Uta
SCA-DI? Is that his real name? Great article btw!
I don’t know
It’s his pen name.
Oh cool
What’s a pen name? > _ <
A pseudonym printed on the title page or by works in place of their real name
what does that face mean?
The more I hear about SCA-DI, the more I want to read something by him: Little Busters and Rewrite left me wanting more. Yet (as you know) porn is a big deal for me: things only became worse if it is vital to the plot. Yet, what you say about Subarashiki Hibi is quite interesting: I don´t consider that realistic depictions of sexual violence with no intent to arouse the reader are pornography (in fact, as a lawyer, I have to deal with some of them, and pray for the victim and the perpetrator as I read). Now, I suppose that, this being a graphic novel, this scenes will be illustrated and the characters will be teens, and I don´t know if I will endure that: to read them is one thing. I´ll have to think about it. For now, my next target is “When the Seagulls Cry”.
As always, thank you for your deep, interesting, unusual and thought-provoking review! And, as I´m approaching the end of the list of recommendations, maybe you have more recommendations of well-written, all-ages, multiple-route VNs?
Yeah the more I read SCA-DI’s stuff the more I like him as an author. SubaHibi is an understandably hard read for most, and I won’t try to downplay how graphic it can be: some of its scenes were the hardest things I’ve pushed myself to read. I ended up skipping through some of it and had to step away and take breaks at times because they were just not something I wanted to experience. I don’t blame anyone for not choosing to read SubaHibi because of them.
As for other reads, Umineko (When the Seagulls Cry) is definitely a great choice. Roughly 100 hours of characters debating whether or not supernatural things exist is very applicable to theological debates. The tricks the VN uses to make the reader doubt his/her own understanding of what’s happening in the story are really fun. I’ve been meaning to get around to reading the new translation, but the length is just so daunting. Hmm there just aren’t that many multi-route, all ages VNs around so the choices are limited. I can’t recall what else you’ve read but Ever17, Clannad/Steins;Gate if you didn’t see the anime, Higurashi depending on how you like Umineko cover pretty much all the highly rated ones.
I´m afraid I saw both animes. Umineko, Ever17 and Higurashi, then. Thank you very much!
Well, in the end that dark sabbat-humiliation-gore cannibal feast scene at the end of the second arc of Umineko ended up being too much for me to cope with, despite the characters being otherwise very compelling. Maybe Ever17 will suit my tastes better.
That’s too bad, but everyone does have their own limits and it’s always hard to know what is or isn’t fine for people when recommending things. Which actually makes for some interesting commentary since the entire point of that arc was how vastly different the same events can be viewed by people with a different perspective. What may have looked like a cannibal feast scene to one person may have looked like a fun celebration of thanksgiving to another. The beauty of Umineko is you never know which parts are true, which parts are exaggerated, and which parts are pure lies. And so such questions get reflected in reality and religion where a person’s spiritual experiences get viewed by different people in vastly different ways. Is the supernatural real, a mere embellishment of what actually happens, or an outright lie?
I hope you find Ever17 more enjoyable. It’s quite different with more of an atmosphere of slow suspense and subtle clues rather than throwing a bunch of chaos at you intentionally and you trying to untangle everything from the start.
I thank you for the recommendation, though: I had a lot of fun with Umineko´s way of playing with everything in the mistery genre. And I do like the sink-or-swim approach to what is happening, and the multiple layers of the narrative. Without choices, the reading felt somewhat longer, but the characters were so compelling as to make up for this: I would go on just out of wanting some new, interesting pieces of information about them. The Ushiromiya siblings, specially, were fascinating: Krauss, Rose, Rudolph and Eva were everything I want in a mistery novel: clever, flawed, relatable, with issues, with a legitimate position and very distinctive features. Their relationships with Hideyoshi, Natsuhi, María and Kyrie were all very interesting too. It felt like an Agatha Christie novel with Chestertonian bizarre elements, and only the best of them succesfully present so many compelling and suspicious people at once.
The rest were maybe not so unique and Kinzo struck me as a sick, abusive bastard, but I could put up with them: the servants (spoilers?) and their “furniture” dilemma felt very alien to me (except for the very professional but pompous and cheeky Gohda, though), but hey. And I kinda liked Jessica, George and Nanjo, even if they were more sterotypical. Battler, not so much: maybe he gets better in latter arcs, but he struck me as really dumb and whining (yes, his relatives were murdered, but still), and it was like he constantly got on the way of the story.
As I loved the invisible, ominous menace disguised in ritual/demonic imaginery, the actual presence of a flashy and talkative Beatrice and a crew of blonde demons was disappointing, and I hated her personality and traits: in my view the scene of the chapel, for example, would have been so much better and ominous without putting a face to the killer. I disliked the fact that the dialogue between Beatrice and Battler, my two least favorite characters, became such a big part of the second arc, and as she started becoming more irritating and provocative-hell dominatrix-whatever and he even more whining and dumb than usual, it was too much. , she became both a great source of irritation and a temptation. So
…when the feast happened, it crossed my line and I stopped. What you mention about the supernatural is probably the most interesting aspect of the storytelling: I love this sort of narrative.
I´ll tell you when I finish Ever17! Thank you for everything.
Yup, a lot of fans have made the comparison to Agatha Christie novels. So much so, that I can’t recall if it was fans or the author himself who said how they influenced Umineko. For Kinzo and the servants, I’ll just add that they are written that way intentionally. Risking spoilers, keep in mind the theme of misdirection and narrator bias and how that might influence how some characters are portrayed. I think most people are frustrated with Battler at the start for the reasons you listed. A lot of fans end up loving him by the end; I’m more neutral but admit he does get better. I think by the climax, I was really just in awe of how powerful Umineko is as a tale of our relationship with the supernatural.
The thing with Beatrice, Battler, and an actual “presence” in the story is that the whole thing wouldn’t work without them and their personalities, though I can get why one might find them off-putting. Battler needs someone to “fight” against and vice versa. Giving the mystical supernatural a form that actively challenges Battler, who is adamant about denying its existence, is what allows Umineko to weave its story about humanity’s struggle with the spiritual. There are additional spoiler reasons why the story focuses on them and why Beatrice is the way she is, but suffice to say, the story changes direction multiple times and by the end, the mystery part of Umineko is perhaps the least interesting aspect.
Ups, just rereading: despite the confusing formulation, I´m not saying that Rewrite or Little Busters were written by SCA-DI, but that they awoke my interest in intelligent VNs.
A bit late to the party, but quite a contemplative post I must say at the many different ways one can view God. And I like how all of them can be taken and linked together to form a fuller picture of His nature.
On another note though, I came back from my Japan trip two weeks ago. In my 3.5 days of wandering the streets of Akihabara I did not come across Subarashiki Hibi, granted I was not actually searching for such VNs. Mayhaps I came at the wrong time for it: most of the stores were promoting some 3D sim games, Nine, Rance, and most notably Key’s upcoming Summer Pockets. Still for a famous VN, it struck me odd that the stores (e.g. Sofmap) did not have a prominent area dedicated to it.
As for all-ages, multi-choice VNs, there is Angel Beats 1st beat, Chaos;Head, Muv Luv, and the upcoming Summer Pockets seems promising. And if you’re fine with non-Japanese visual novels, I personally enjoyed Lucid9, although the full story is still WIP.
It shouldn’t be surprising if you think about it though. How often do stores keep dedicated sections to games that are 10/20/30 years old? Most stores won’t even carry games that old, let alone advertise them. You have to go hunting for games the older they get, no matter how famous they are. Combine this idea with the fact that VNs and PC gaming is a very small niche in Japan, and you would never expect to see VNs older than a year being advertised in stores. Nine and Rance were released very recently; Summer Pockets is released next month. Even with Rance being possibly the most popular franchise in the medium (apparently still with a score of 90 on EGS), I still wouldn’t expect it to be prominently displayed in 1-2 years.
A fair point, though I did note that Sofmap allotted display portions for Clockup’s newer and older works (from 2011 – 2016) as well as for the Grisaia series, with Grisaia no Meikyuu’s OP (the VN debuted in 2012) being continuously played. Which is funny since the latter is not even the latest of the Grisaia series.
Also, your tidbit on Rance’s popularity caught my eye. Admittedly I have never read nor have any thoughts picking up the series, but its premise makes me question whether most readers place more emphasis on sensuality than a deep profound story.
I don’t know about story, but Rance likely has the best gameplay the medium has to offer, or at least, some of the games do since they can vary a lot. I haven’t bothered with the series since I’m not willing to put up with all the sex just for an otherwise fun game.