Forgive me if this has been brought up already, - I'd like to blame my poor execution of the forum search functions if so-, but I'd like to get everyone's thoughts on Bran Stark's true purpose in the long run of the story.

I'm very suss on it all, currently.

I'm personally of the opinion that The Lord of Light is in fact the one and only true God, (prophesies coming true, his 'enemy' clearly being real, and his followers seem to be the only people who can invoke any actual magic), and therefore, the God that he opposses, (for whom we do not have a name) must be real also.

I think the 'Children' of the forest may be leading Bran down the path to work for the God who opposes The Lord of Light.

A few things got me thinking, but the penny dropped for me when Melisandre saw 'the wolf-faced boy' in the flames when she was seeing the enemy's champion. I may not have the wording correctly, because I haven't read it in a while.

The children of the forest, -including the guy with tree roots growing out of him whos name escapes me-, keep using all these key words with Bran, talking about how darkness can help him, etc. etc.

The other clue is coldhands. And while he hasn't done anything stricktly 'evil' (and I am of the opinion that it's Benjen Stark, too), we can't ignore the fact that he holds all the traits of a White Walker/Wight hybrid. Thats not a good, 'Lord of Light-y' thing at all.

I might be completely off the ball here, but what you all thing?

- PC

I don't think that life is as simple as Melisandre, or her religion, sees things.

You make many good points, but I do see one flaw I see in your assessment:
The Others are obvious servants (or originators) of the power that Melisandre and the Lord of Light oppose. The Children of the Forest ALSO have a long history of opposing the Others, making it unlikely that they serve the same power.

That being said, I don't think their power comes from the same source, or if it does (which seems unlikely given the difference in apparent flavor) then they share very dissimilar goals.

While Mel seems perfectly comfortable with the idea that there's her God, and then there's the Great Other, and that's all the power there is, I am disinclined to think so dualisticly. While I recognize that the series is called "A Song of Ice and Fire," what I'm really seeing in the Children and their power is the addition of "Earth" to the wheel of power.

And actually, now that I think of it, the Lord of Light doesn't need to be a real God at all. Consider that just because rituals devoted to a God have power does not mean that the God must have power. What if the rituals of R'hlorr (or however you spell it) are just another kind of Sorcery? They could just draw power from "Fire," an unintelligent amoral power source, just like the "Ice" wielded by the Others. The more I think of this, the more I like it as an idea.

I don't think there are any actual gods. Rather there are seemingly supernatural forces that mortal men take to be gods.

The greenseers are the reality underlying the Old Gods the Northmen and Wildilings worship. Over the millennia, the greenseers have become the Old Gods to mortals; the children just happen to know more about the real story. The Three-Eyed Crow is the (a?) current exemplar of the supernatural-by-mortal-man's-standards Old Gods. Bran is becoming his replacement. It seems clear he's aligned with good but not everyone has precisely the same notions of what's good or bad. The fact that Bran can see the past through the trees and even reach out to people (past and present) plainly indicates there's some level of "magical" power there. It's possible that the children and the Three-Eyed Crow are doing/have done some things Bran's moral code would find objectionable but that doesn't mean they represent or are aligned with darkness.

Likewise, when Dany's dragons return, the pyromancers (who know nothing of that event) notice their own spells suddenly work better. So dragons seed the world with "magic," too. And Dany's got something going on that lets her survive fire, but she doesnt worship R'Hlorr.

ASoIaF is a "low magic" universe, but there are some forces beyond normal, mortal, "natural" ones. My theory is that for each "god" there's probably one or more real entities equivalent to the Three-Eyed Crow that are the source of powers attributed to that "god". As the series progresses, I hope these questions will be answered (I'd love to learn more about the mythology of the Drowned God to see if it fits this theory).

Hello i found this topic interesting so here are my thoughts about it

(since english is not my native language, i apologize in advance for any spelling/grammar errors)

My understanding is that the God of the Light is the power that can defeat and stop the others.

Azor Ahai is the "chosen" the one that will save the realm by the others (is an archetype that works for several religions and myths)

The story of Azor Ahai contains the element of sacrifice, he had to kill his wife so to create Lightbringer, without that making him a bad

character, i think is something he was destined to do.

So we have the only god the God of Light (whose power is able to bring people back to life) and a savior (chosen from the god) that through sacrifice can save the people.

On the other hand i think that the old gods are actually the greenseers and children of forest. The greenseers could connect with weirwood trees and could hear and maybe answer to northmen's prayers, something that would make them appear like gods.

Anyway i think Bran through his new role is going to play an important role in the next books, maybe he can warn some characters or communicate with them. But most important i think that Martin gives Bran great power and makes that character a key character in the whole realm. It is like a "repayment" for all his trouble, he wont be able to be a knight as he wanted but he can be someone more significant