Qual é a origem dos poderes da Bene Gesserit?

As origens da Bene Gesserit são abordadas no prequel de Anderson / Brian Herbert " Duna: A Batalha de Corrin ".

A ordem foi iniciada por Raquella Berto-Anirul, que foi a primeira Reverenda Madre.

• Seus poderes originalmente foram causados quando ela foi infectada durante a Epidemia de Rossak, e foi tratada com água que foi infundida com plantas nativas de Rossak. Isso combinado com o vírus alterou-a para que ela tivesse controle do nível celular e pudesse controlar reações químicas em seu corpo.

  Sounding apologetic, Jimmak said, "We put you in the healing water. My friends and me. Let you soak for a whole day. It washed away your fever."

  "Healing water?" Raquella realized that she did feel strangely energized.

  "Special place." He smiled. "Only the Misborn know it."

  ...

  From the blood samples, he {{Dr Suk}} concluded that something peculiar had happened inside Raquella's body, a biochemical transformation he had never seen before. The battle between the retrovirus and the strange chemicals in the cenote had done something to her biochemistry, changing her in fundamental ways.

• Esses poderes se manifestaram quando a Feiticeira Suprema Ticia envenenou-a com "Droga Rossak":

  She was already lost, drifting into dark unconsciousness. Suddenly light flared in her mind, showing Raquella a new way to fight back, a weapon she had not known she possessed. Her body had been altered in the crucible of the Scourge, after assimilating the incomprehensible mixture of environmental chemicals. Raquella had unexpected skills and new resources now, deep within her very cells.

  Utter calmness pervaded her, and in her mind's eye Raquella saw the connections that led from the core of her brain—neural pathways spreading outward to veins, tendons, muscle—governing every function, whether voluntary or automatic. All so clear, like a human blueprint. ...

  Durante este evento, ela também surgiu com o início da infame ladainha "Fear":

  "I will not give up," she murmured. "I will fight back. Only fear can kill me now."

  Going deep within herself, Raquella waged an internal war.

  She shored up her body's defenses and constructed a biochemical wall against the poison's attack. Then she confronted the enemy head-on. Analyzing the molecular structure of the Rossak drug, she shifted the elements around...

  ... Because she was doing this for the first time, she explored her abilities, and realized that she had complete control over every cell and extraneous molecule in her body. ...

• Ela também foi (independentemente) a primeira pessoa que percebeu as propriedades medicinais da especiaria melange, junto com seu marido M. Suk (o fundador da escola médica Suk visto em Dune).

• Ela começou a ordem das Feiticeiras de Rossak, que tinham poderes mentais incomuns E começaram o conceito de programa de criação:

Ticia gave him a withering look for interrupting her. "...Now, in the face of this sweeping epidemic, I point out that we Sorceresses have another area of expertise. Because of our harsh world and our precise records of breeding over many generations, we understand bloodlines, the most important raw material of the human race. If this Omnius Scourge grows worse, we could lose prime branches of our species—not just the sheer casualties, but paths to our future.

"Now, as whole families, whole cities, are devastated on world after world, we cannot react too soon or too vigorously. Our race is in extreme peril. Even as we struggle to find a cure for this foul biological weapon, we must also take drastic action to preserve the best DNA before it it lost forever—protect and store key markers of some of the strongest lines, or the disease may erase them entirely. We must establish a program to protect the genetic information of all people, on all planets." She lifted her chin. "We Sorceresses have the capacity to manage such a program."

Da fonte real (em oposição aos livros feios escritos depois da morte de Herbert)

Da primeira passagem:

"I've studied with Thufir Hawat."

"The Great Revolt took away a crutch," she said. "It forced human minds to develop. Schools were started to train human talents."

"Bene Gesserit schools?"

She nodded. "We have two chief survivors of those ancient schools: the Bene Gesserit and the Spacing Guild. The Guild, so we think, emphasizes almost pure mathematics. Bene Gesserit performs another function."

"Politics," he said.

"Kull wahad!" the old woman said. She sent a hard glance at Jessica.

"I've not told him. Your Reverence," Jessica said.

The Reverend Mother returned her attention to Paul. "You did that on remarkably few clues," she said. "Politics indeed. The original Bene Gesserit school was directed by those who saw the need of a thread of continuity in human affairs. They saw there could be no such continuity without separating human stock from animal stock - for breeding purposes."

E mais tarde na primeira passagem:

"Have you ever seen truthtrance?"

He shook his head. "No."

"The drug's dangerous," she said, "but it gives insight. When a Truthsayer's gifted by the drug, she can look many places in her memory - in her body's memory. We look down so many avenues of the past . . . but only feminine avenues." Her voice took on a note of sadness. "Yet, there's a place where no Truthsayer can see. We are repelled by it, terrorized. It is said a man will come one day and find in the gift of the drug his inward eye. He will look where we cannot - into both feminine and masculine pasts."

E muito, muito mais tarde:

Jessica shook her head, seeing the signs of disturbance in Harah's face. What have I borne? Jessica asked herself. A daughter who knew at birth everything that I knew . . . and more: everything revealed to her out of the corridors of the past by the Reverend Mothers within me,

"It's not just the things she says," Harah said. "It's the exercises, too: the way she sits and stares at a rock, moving only one muscle beside her nose, or a muscle on the back of a finger, or - "

"Those are the Bene Gesserit training," Jessica said. "You know that, Harah. Would you deny my daughter her inheritance?"

Em resposta universal do personagem hyperaware Norma Cenva: "Crise e Sobrevivência"

Cioba Venport: "You have changed yourself into something more than human, Norma. I trust you are aware the Sisters of Rassak, including the last few Sorceresses, are also attempting to enhance themselves through drug induced traumas, near death encounters. Do you think there are any similarities with the navigator transformation?”

Norma Cenva: "All key advancements occur though crisis and survival. Without stress and extreme challenge, one cannot meet her potential."

A Bene Gesserit desbloqueia os poderes mentais de forçar os limites da sobrevivência colocando os alunos em situações de crise. Uma dessas crises é a Agonia das Especiarias, que é a fonte da capacidade de "outra memória" da Reverenda Madre. O teste da caixa é outra situação de crise.

Para as Feiticeiras de Rassak, a crise delas estava sendo um feto em desenvolvimento entre os ferozes patógenos do mundo da selva.

Outras habilidades da Bene Gesserit, como a voz, não requerem a agonia da reverenda mãe. Isso é comprovado por Paul usando a voz do tóptero e Gaius Helen Mohiam sugerindo que ele aprendesse.

Os poderes mentais das Bene Gesserit são derivados da sobrevivência, necessitando de evolução.