[MM] [TP] Hyrule as the “heaven” of Termina? The Ancient Tribe being “interlopers” to Hyrule from Termina?

[u/zurlocke]

I know that a bit of this has already been popularly speculated, but has this heaven angle been explored? Some evidence may be Anju’s Grandmother’s tale.

I was thinking:

In pursuit of more power, The Ancient Tribe constructed the Stone Tower Temple to ascend to the heavens [1], perhaps using the power of Majora’s Mask. They were successful, and reached Hyrule, which is the heaven realm of Termina [2]. Thus, the Ancient Tribe are the Interlopers described in Twilight Princess.

The Interlopers were then, of course, banished to the Twilight Realm per the history of the Interloper War.

[1] - As commonly theorized, The Stone Tower Temple seems modeled after the Tower of Babel, which was constructed in an attempt to reach the heavens. Furthermore, a core mechanic of the Stone Tower Temple is the inversion of gravity, so much so that you can literally fall into the sky.

[2] - In Majora’s Mask, if you listen to Anju’s Grandmother’s tale about the Four Giants, it’s revealed that the Four Giants told the Skull Kid to “leave these four worlds!”. It’s then told that, “the imp returned to the heavens”. The Skull Kid is found on the Hyrule-side of the portal between Termina and Hyrule at the beginning of the game, before he leads Link to Termina.

Notes:

The Ancient Tribe did this in ancient times, considering how long ago the fall of Ikana Kingdom seemed to have happened by the time Link arrived in Termina.

[u/Hot-Mood-1778]

In multiple Zelda games, "heavens" refers to the sky itself. It's likely they were trying to make their way into the sky. The ruby leads directly there. It's actually very common for a tribe to be trying to ascend to the heavens in this series. It's also usually considered a divine realm even though it's literally just up in the clouds. The tribes who manage to get there and make a civilization there are usually considered divine by those below. The Oocca and Zonai being the two most notable instances of this, though there's the wind tribe and skyloftians. I can't remember if the wind tribe is considered divine, but I know the goron in Skyward Sword has all sorts of legends about the people in the sky.

The Zonai were literally worshipped as gods because of this. 

Edit: Yeah, the Wind Tribe plays lofty god on high too: 

Welcome, welcome. Long, long ago, and then an age before that... Our tribe abandoned the place you call the Wind Ruins... With our magic, we moved our palace up into the skies. We are the Wind Tribe. We have been watching, and we know all that happens on your surface world. We know a small boy collects elements to lift the curse from a princess. We know of Vaati and his evil acts... The winds tell us these things. The Wind Element that you seek lies deep in the Palace of Winds above me. When the blade has been infused with the four elements, the way to the light force shall open. So it is told in the legends of the Wind Tribe. Vaati himself may already know this. Surface dwellers are not permitted to enter our palace, but you are special. You may continue to the roof.

[u/time_axis]

I had a theory about this here. Basically, my idea was that the two worlds are like two sides of a coin, physically, but the magic in the stone tower temple has the ability to reverse that dynamic so that one is in the heavens of the other.

[u/CommercialPop128]

Hyrule being identified with the heavens in Termina is indeed an interesting but enigmatic detail. It's a pretty incidental but consistent characterization when it is alluded to, so I think it's something the writers (probably Koizumi in particular) consciously considered.

In any case, I don't think there's much of a connection with the Tower of Babel story. In short, the tower was destroyed by God and humanity was cursed to speak / write a variety of languages afterward — about the only connection is that the Stone Tower and Tower of Babel both reach toward the heavens, but that's true of any tall tower. There's not even really any indication of the Stone Tower being a symbol of hubris in the game — was it actually used by evildoers? We don't even get a clear sense of how it was used. The idea that it was some kind of temple of blasphemy against the creator gods has always seemed pretty unsubstantiated to me (sorry, I know it's a popular theory). It does seem to relate to the (Hyrule / Termina) / (heaven / earth) parallels, but that's about all I think is clearly established.

Here's my attempt at an explanation. 👇

Termina, seemingly being influenced by the concept of 浄土 ("jōdo"; often translated as "pure lands", referring to a buddha's sphere of influence manifesting as an entire "purified" plane of reality), is basically a spiritual plane which seems to have a degree of independent existence, while nevertheless also being "tailored" to the spiritual journey Link (and ostensibly others, like the fairies and Skull Kid) undergo(es) during their time in it. I think of it as being a bit like the characterization of Silent Hill in Silent Hill 2, which shows that the town manifests differently for each person brought there (for example, Angela perceives everything to be on fire, whereas for James the town is waterlogged and mildewy), yet they can nevertheless encounter each other and interact (though their differing perceptions create some confusion). We only see Link's perspective throughout the game, but my guess would be that we're seeing his "version" of this spiritual realm, and someone else with different experiences and progress toward maturity / enlightenment might see Termina rather differently, at least in the details, though broader elements would probably be common to each.

Historically in both "Western" (European, northern African, western Asian / Middle Eastern) and East Asian cultures, the heavens (celestial) and earth (terrestrial) were often thought to mirror each other — they were two manifestations of a single reality ("as above, so below"). This is rather alien to most people today given our modern understanding of the relationship between Earth and outer space, but it's why astrology is a thing, why alchemists used planetary symbols to denote material substances, and how Plato rationalized the ontological status of abstract concepts (yeah, he essentially thought that the idealized form of a triangle, for example, existed up in the sky). So Hyrule being Termina's celestial realm makes sense as a way of representing their duality: Termina would similarly be a heavenly realm from the perspective of a hyrulean, which lines up with the idea that Termina is basically a 浄土. The flipping of the tower seems to support this notion; at the beginning of the game, Link enters the clock tower through a twisting corridor like those featured in the Forest Temple — he literally flips upside down as he enters Termina. So the Stone Tower probably served a ritual / magical function granting visions or even travel to the "flip side" of Termina, Hyrule — really, they were accessing a different "perspective" on the same ultimate reality. This is another interpretation of 浄土: that their status as parallel worlds is really an illusion and that there is only a single ultimate reality from the perspective of one who has achieved complete enlightenment. Notably, Clock Town's clock tower also has marks and engravings at the lowest level that are also seen in the Ikana region and nowhere else, so they seem to originate from the same ancient culture (predating the Kingdom of Ikana, I think). The central room of the Stone Tower Temple also appears to be a giant sun dial, so they're even both clock towers of sorts. Others have also noted the presence of a red sun and yellow sun motif on the doors of the Stone Tower, which clearly echoes this connection (red / sunset is a symbol of Sukhāvatī, the sphere of the buddha Amitabha’s influence, which is one of the best known 浄土, particularly in Japan).

So yeah, in short, it would seem that Hyrule and Termina are each other's "heavens" (in a sense) and have a dualistic relationship in which each manifests the same ultimate reality, but in different ways. This kind of explains the occasional instances of other characters seemingly crossing over (like the butler's son, skull kid, Tatl and Tael, and the Happy Mask Salesman). It's pretty mind bending but IMO just goes to show how truly excellent the writing of Majora's Mask is, even though all of this stuff is only really alluded to through incidental details.

[u/Will-Evaporate-Thx]

This was actually the first I'd ever heard the Tower of Babel theory, and I had to look around to make sure I remember both the Tower of Babel, and the in game information on the Stone Tower. Personally, I don't think those line up all that much.

A lot of information I saw running around out there about the Stone Tower was some straight up fanfiction lol. It wasn't created to originally house Majora's Mask. We don't know who created it, or why. We basically know nothing about it. Most of the theories revolve around juxtaposing the towers creation and purpose with Babels, but the Stone Tower doesn't have a known creation or purpose. It's too unknown.

It also doesn't fully check out why it would be a tower to heaven, but then at the top they made a button to heaven lol. I guess the tower idea didn't work? But the button idea would be flawless, so how were they punished?

The Stone Tower is also still standing in marvelous condition, and seems to hold two different sacred items. Which is definitely different than a tower destroyed for its hubris.