“Forgive them Father, for they know not what they do.”
Luke 23:34
The above passage is a line found both in Luke’s Chapter of the Bible and in the Ubisoft video game, Farcry 5. The line itself is spoken by Joseph Seed, the head of the religious organization known as the Project at Eden’s Gate. While many in the game--and the gaming community far and wide--typically call the religious organization a cult, a closer inspection of the character, himself, yields some interesting insights. Mainly, that Joseph Seed might be more than just a preacher, supposed prophet, or cult leader--he may actually be the second coming of Christ.
The Father
Before we dive into just why I believe that Joseph Seed is actually the Messiah, it’s important to first give an overall brief history of the character. Much of this history is offered through small anecdotes given by the Father, himself, as well as through the Path that players can voluntarily walk. Throughout the Path, there are plaques that describe the formation of the Project. Much of Joseph’s history, however, is described in the pre-order bonus called The Book of Joseph. Within this manuscript, Joseph, himself, discusses his history. The Book of Joseph is supposedly given to all new members of the Project, so that everyone understands the beginning and end of the Word that Joseph preaches about.
Joseph was born to a poor family in Rome, Georgia. He’s three years younger than Jacob, the older brother, and 11 years older than the baby of the family--John. The Book of Joseph goes into detail about when Joseph first heard the Voice that would prompt him to form the Project later in life. Basically, one day while he was being abused by his father, a Voice spoke within his head and showed him images of the future. Joseph describes the Voice as something more than just an audible experience but one that was physical and tactile as well.
After this visit by the Voice, Joseph’s life more or less was altered. Eventually, he was separated from his brothers after the abuse from his father was discovered. He spent the next several years wandering from foster home to foster home. Often, he’d make the mistake of mentioning the Voice and his adoptive parents or foster parents would quickly place him in someone else’s hands.
Once Joseph was old enough to live on his own, he took on quite a few jobs. His primary interest was in locating his brothers, however. When those searches proved fruitless, he stopped for a time and tried to settle down in a single location. It was during that period where he was assaulted and mugged by three thugs. It was in this moment that he felt abandoned by the Voice--who he believed was God--and at that moment, the Voice returned and showed him the Collapse that was to occur on Earth.
As players who have completed the game know, and for those who haven’t oops spoilers, the Collapse winds up being a nuclear strike that devastates the country of America--and quite possibly the entire world. Armed with this knowledge, Joseph returns to his search for his brothers. Long story short, Joseph finds them, begins the Project, moves to Hope County, Montana, and the events of the game start a few years after they’ve gained control of much of the area.
While the residents of Hope County who have refused to join the Project see Joseph as nothing more than a megalomaniac cult leader, those within the Project tend to place him on part with the great Prophets within the Bible and other religious texts. It was only at the very end of the game, when I defeated Joseph Seed and he gave that line listed at the very beginning of this article, that I realized that Farcry 5 was about more than just taking down a cult leader. They were asking an interesting question.
What if the second coming of Christ was real and this was how everyone had decided to treat him?
With that rather broad introduction to his character given, this article will switch to an analysis of Joseph Seed with the understanding that he is, indeed, the Messiah.
Imagery
Let’s begin with a wide-view lens on the game as a whole. Farcry 5’s cover depicts the Seed family sitting at a table for a meal. Clearly, they’re invoking imagery from Da Vinci’s The Last Supper. Much like that classic work of art, Joseph is seated in the middle where Jesus typically sits. He’s surrounded by his disciples. Like Jesus, Joseph is also surrounded by his disciples. He has his brothers and adopted sister surrounding him as well as various members of his flock. Right from the start, Ubisoft introduces Joseph as the Messiah.
As for the character’s appearance, Joseph Seed is based off of the Canadian actor Greg Bryk. The game utilizes his appearance and his voice. Although the depiction of Christ in many American churches and cathedrals is historically incorrect, Joseph matches that Americanized version of Christ. He’s white, has dark hair, blue eyes, and a beard. He’s a slender man with enough muscle to be healthy and display that he’s worked a lot of his life in a form of physical labor. Although Joseph keeps his hair tied up into a bun, if he were to let loose that little knot, you can be sure that he’d have Jesus-fied hair flowing around his face.
The Tomb
Joseph’s path mirrors that of Jesus’s in many ways. They were both born to poor families. Jesus was born in the stables, basically, because his parents couldn’t afford to stay somewhere nicer. Jesus worked with his hands as a carpenter. Joseph also worked in an orchard, factory, and quite a few other jobs that required tough physical labor. Jesus was born of a triarchy. He’s the Son bit of the entire Father and the Holy Spirit. While Joseph’s triarchy is a little less impressive, he’s still one third of a set of three sons. Joseph was placed in jail much like Jesus was for the simple crime of practicing and preaching his faith in a manner or location that the general populace didn’t appreciate.
However, perhaps one of the biggest parallels that I noticed was the story of the Tomb. After Jesus died from the crucifixion, his body was placed in a tomb. He had told his believers that he would be dead for three days, and then he would return to life and leave the tomb. From there, he would walk among his disciples before eventually returning to Heaven to sit beside his Father. Joseph also has his period within the tomb. It comes at the end of the game.
As players know, the game ends with you being rescued by Joseph and handcuffed to a bed within Dutch’s bunker. You’re locked in that bunker for seven years while you wait for the bulk of the radiation to secede overhead. Joseph is also in that bunker for seven years with you. He is entombed as well and will emerge again to rejoin his followers. This is literally something that happens for those who play Farcry: New Dawn know.
While it takes Joseph a bit more than three days to emerge from his tomb, he emerges all the same. You can bet, too, that some of his followers thought he was dead. To suddenly see their leader alive and well? Second coming of Christ. Right there. It’s all over it.
There’s also what comes after. Jesus leaves and returns to Heaven. In Farcry: New Dawn, Joseph does something similar. He eventually leaves his followers and travels North. This portion of the former Hope County is being guarded by a radioactively-altered Bliss that makes it almost impossible to pass through unless you have a special serum. Essentially, there is a veil that separates Joseph from his followers. While he might not be in Heaven per se, he’s apart from them.
The Healer
Jesus is typically known as a healer. He spends a good deal of his time during his teachings going from town to town and healing the sick. While Jesus uses seeming magic to heal the sick and lame, he could have just been quite a clever fellow who understood the mechanics of the human body and the medicinal properties of certain herbs. The fact is we don’t know. Regardless, Joseph also is a healer.
For a portion of his life, he spent his time working at a mental institution. While we don’t know the exact profession that he had there, he was--at the very least--working to help people heal. Like Jesus, he spends his time among those who society has more or less abandoned. Later on, like Jesus, he also brings into flock those who consider themselves to be outsiders.
Besides just working at a mental hospital, however, Joseph also works to cure his followers from their alcohol and drug addictions. His brother John, in fact, was addicted to cocaine and who knows what other drugs. He helped them heal from their addictions. Granted, some might argue that he also made them addicted to the Bliss, but based on evidence from the game, the Bliss, itself, is not addictive. As the Book of Joseph explains, the Bliss was originally used to simply help those who despaired over knowing that their family would be taken by the Collapse because they wouldn’t join the Project. It was also used as a way to ease the withdrawal stage of breaking addiction. This is similar to how doctors use non-addictive medications to help alleviate the symptoms of withdrawal for addicts in rehabilitation centers.
More than that, however, Joseph heals the hearts and souls of his flock. As mentioned before, many of them are outsiders. They’re pariahs of their own society. Or they have a different perspective on their fellow humans. One that doesn’t agree with the status quo method of thinking. Joseph offers them a family, a safe place, to be themselves. It’s likely the first time that many of these people have felt a connection to other people.
The Crucifixion
Perhaps the most well-known story of Jesus Christ is the Crucifixion. He’s whipped, tormented, and eventually nailed to a cross and hung there for days until he dies. While Joseph Seed is not nailed to a cross, he does undergo his own form of Crucifixion. The stages of the Crucifixion are represented both literally and metaphorically throughout his life.
In the case of whipping, Joseph Seed was frequently abused by his father. Old Mad Seed, as he was known, frequently whipped his sons with his leather belt. This was to the point where, eventually, Child Protective Services was called to remove the boys from the man’s care.
Throughout Joseph’s life, he is tormented. Whenever he speaks of the Voice to someone, they immediately think he’s crazy. He was sent away from families that he actually enjoyed because they thought he was insane. He’s been assaulted by thugs, undergone periods of starvation both in jail and when he was homeless, and he’s nearly frozen to death, too.
It’s the metaphorical form of Crucifixion, however, that really ties him to being the Messiah. Three nails are used to pin Jesus to his cross. Joseph has three nails, too, however they come in the form of his brothers and adopted sister. John, Jacob, and Faith are all members of his family that you have to kill in order to reach Joseph. Each one is a significant loss to the man. Their loss likely causes the same amount of pain and agony that physically being nailed to a cross does.
There’s also the phrase, “nailed them to their cross,” to consider. This phrase typically means that you have them pegged down. You can’t peg Joseph down for the final showdown until you’ve nailed him to his cross. Those nails are the death of John, Jacob, and Faith.
The Second Coming
One last aspect that we need to consider about Joseph being the Messiah is the plethora of suggestive evidence that the Bible has on the second coming of Christ. A lot of it can easily be applied to actions that Joseph takes both in Farcry 5 and Farcry: New Dawn.
Hebrews 9:28
“So Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.”
In this passage, it describes the second coming of Christ in that he will appear to his followers and save them from the threat of the end of the world. Joseph does this twice. The first is before the Collapse. He gathers his followers and offers them locations of safety. At least until the Deputy comes along and screws it all up, anyway. The second is after the seven years of waiting in the tomb--ahem, bunker--are over. He finds his followers who managed to survive the Collapse and saves them yet again. It’s Joseph who finds Eden’s Gift which saves the New Edeners from starvation during a particularly nasty winter.
2 Peter 3:10
“But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.”
This passage in the book of Peter literally describes the Collapse that we see in the game. It calls this time the day of the Lord. Who was right about the Collapse? Who heralded the coming of the Collapse? Joseph Seed.
Matthew 24: 37-39
"For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.”
Much like Noah’s Flood, the Collapse is supposed to be a strike against the Earth that destroys most of mankind. In the game, unless you tend to travel by car frequently and listen to the radio, you likely miss the rising tension in the rest of the world. There are news reports that depict various uprisings and problems that are occurring throughout the world. However, despite these, no one expects the sudden nuclear strike that happens at the end of the game. Much like this passage suggests, the general populace of Earth was unaware of the Collapse and so we were swept away by it. The Collapse signals the coming of the Son of Man--Joseph Seed.
Summary
This blog post has gone on long enough. I could easily pull out various other passages in the Bible that mirror Joseph’s characterization, story arch, and decisions. However, I highly encourage you to do a little search yourself and see just how intricately the character of Joseph Seed was woven by the team at Ubisoft. While the Farcry games have always offered a lot of fun for its players, Farcry 5 offers something else. It asks big questions that makes you take a step back and utilize a different perspective in order to answer those questions. In today’s world, we could all practice trying different perspectives to examine our fellow man through.
Joseph Seed is the second coming of Christ. ‘Nuff said.
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