Raava

"spirit"

- Don't worry, we will be together for all of your lifetimes, and we will never give up.

Raava is the spirit of peace and light in the world. In 19,830 BSC, Raava began to combat her natural opposite, Vaatu, the spirit of darkness and chaos. Raava permanently bound her essence to Wan's and said that she would be with him "in all [his] lifetimes," starting the Avatar cycle.

History


Raava is one of the oldest known spirits, having existed over ten thousand lifetimes before the appearance of the first humans. She and Vaatu spent much of their existence combating each other, with neither able to fully vanquish the other. Even if Raava were to destroy Vaatu and usher in a new era of peace, what little darkness existed in Raava would magnify until a new Vaatu burst forth, beginning the cycle again. The reverse would happen to Vaatu if he were victorious over Raava.

Around the time when Wan began living with the spirits and mastering firebending, Raava and Vaatu were fighting in the Spirit Wilds, near Wan's camp. As the two spirits brawled, they caused much destruction to the forest around them, causing other spirits to flee. Raava managed to take hold of Vaatu, though when Wan came to the two and tried to persuade them to stop fighting, Vaatu tricked Wan into freeing him from Raava's grasp, which he did by means of firebending. After Vaatu escaped, Raava became very angry with Wan, introducing herself as the spirit of peace and light in the world. Then, she explained to him that Raava and Vaatu needed to keep on struggling with each other because they are the balance in the world.

When Wan was at the air lion turtle, Vaatu and his dark spirits attacked, and Raava showed up to aid the village in defending itself. When Wan asked the lion turtle for the power of air, Raava had to hold the power for him until he mastered it. Raava was hesitant to aid Wan, but relented when he argued that neither one of them could stop Vaatu alone. The two then went on a journey together for Wan to master the elements and work together to defeat Vaatu.

One day, while Wan was practicing mastering all four elements, he and Raava noticed the smell of smoke nearby. They both sought out the source of the smoke, realizing that it was a group of humans from Wan's lion turtle city, including his friend, Jaya, who immediately attacked Raava with firebending. Wan protected Raava, but learned of the human's hatred toward all spirits. Then, the aye-aye spirit approached with a group of other spirits to attack the humans for burning down the forest. Vaatu used this anger inside the spirits to turn them into dark spirits who then charged at the humans. Raava combined her energy with that of Wan's and together they were able to temporarily stop the fighting between the two groups, but out of fear of killing Wan, she left his body and carried him away. The humans and spirits reengaged in battle, which ultimately resulted in the annihilation of Wan's human friends and Raava's weakening to nothing more than a ghostly wisp.

During the Harmonic Convergence, Wan demanded Vaatu go through him first before attacking Raava. After Wan had displayed no hope of winning alone against Vaatu, Raava joined her power with Wan once again; however this still proved to not be enough power to defeat Vaatu. After Wan touched one of the massive energy beams, Raava was then permanently merged with Wan, allowing him to overpower and lock away Vaatu, thus restoring balance to the world. Years later, as Wan lay dying on a battlefield, Raava reassured him that their quest for peace would not end in vain and told him that they would remain together for all of Wan's lifetimes.

Trivia

 * Raava and Vaatu appear to be representations of the yin-yang concept in Chinese philosophy, which is used to describe the way in which opposite forces are interconnected and interdependent in the natural world. In this case, the concept accounts for the duality associated with the fact that Raava represents light and peace, while Vaatu represents darkness and chaos. Her attributes, however, are ironically closer in Taoist thought to the ideal of darkness (yin) than that of light (yang); Raava is female and relatively reasonable, if abrasive and initially discriminatory, instead of male and aggressive.
 * As Raava became smaller, some details on her body disappeared.