I know that the mental and spiritual effects of using the Lazarus pits are… disagreed upon. There’s no true canon for it. But I would like to posit a theory based purely on canon, particularly the Red Hood and Red Robin comics. (I never did a deep dive on Damian, so while I do know he has also been affected by the pit my own lack of knowledge or time to actually read those comics keeps me from including anything from his story.)
The two big non-comic canon sources that have in universe explanations and data on Lazarus pit effects are the Arrowverse and the Gotham Knights video game. Both have unique takes on the subject and, in my opinion, over complicate it. Ra’s al Ghul has been using the pits for centuries. When he met Bruce, my understanding of his character is that the pit had yet to have any visible impact on his sanity or personality. Ra’s’ anger is always controlled, he shows superior mental acuity and honesty most of his madness could conceivably, and in fact more feasibility, be from his existing mental illnesses and his inability to accept his own death. Ra’s’ madness always seemed to be his own, stemming from his antisocial tendencies, narcissism, and need for absolute control. When his own death was approaching it became much more apparent and he became more desperate and unhinged, but I don’t really attribute that to the pit’s direct influence.
All this is not to say that the Lazarus Pit doesn’t affect its users minds, only that those effects are not always so obvious as people believe.
Moving away from verified canon, and into my own interpretations and theories, I propose that the mental effects of Lazarus exposure doesn’t add or amplify anything, emotions or otherwise, but that it hinders or blocks certain logical pathways and connections. Jason is, of course, our best case to study as he was exposed to Lazarus water on only one occasion and the immediate aftermath is well documented. One major issue in attempting to understand the Lazarus effects is that Jason’s case is obviously not a controlled experiment, and it is difficult to differentiate between Jason’s own trauma and instability and the effects of the pit. Which is where Tim comes in. While it’s not verified that he was actually exposed to any Lazarus water I still firmly believe that he was. I’ve talked about this in another post, but for those who aren’t aware, during the Red Robin comic run Tim was severely injured while Ra’s was trying to recruit him. He needed an emergency splenectomy and when he awoke from that he was in a Lazarus chamber, a non-sterile underground cave. Tim’s injury was severe and he aggravated it with a lot of activity before getting medical attention. Tim never died and he was never put directly in the pit, but I’m reasonably certain that part of his treatment involved Lazarus water, considering his ease of recovery, lack of death, and the presence of a Lazarus pit.
So between Tim and Jason we have two cases for comparison. This is of course in no way a valid data set to draw conclusions from in real life, but since we’re talking about fiction and making up logic and explanations for things that originally had none, I think it’s enough. There are others who have history with the pits, but since, as far as I’m aware, they don’t have comics of their own giving deep insight into their thoughts and plans and actions, it’s very difficult to analyze them properly (with the possible exception of Damian, who I would include if I had actually read the comics he was revived with a Lazarus pit in).
In the time directly following exposure to the Lazarus water both Tim and Jason did show signs of elevated adrenaline, which could lead people to assume that the pit is the cause, however as both of them we actually in immediate danger it’s difficult to say for certain. Tim was in an unfamiliar place, alone with an enemy, in the same room as a substance he knew to be dangerous. Jason was being chased by hoards of assassins, being led by someone he couldn’t quite recognize and then (if memory serves) pushed off a cliff into the ocean near a boat that he had to use to escape from an island, all while very confused because the last thing he remembered is dying and maybe vaguely clawing his way out of his own grave. So. Adrenaline seems like a natural response.
To me, the biggest immediate symptom looks like susceptibility to suggestions, with Jason’s quick trust in Talia and Tim’s acceptance of the White Ghost’s explanation of events and his subsequent alliance with the League of Assassins. While neither of them fully trusted the people I mentioned, they did go along with them easier than would be expected, as well as for longer than I think they normally would have. Their paranoia kept them from fully trusting anyone but there was a disconnect between that conscious paranoia and their reactions that makes me think the pit is responsible. There’s also the fact that in the Gotham Knights game this susceptibility to suggestion is an important part of the Pit’s side effects, though it’s less noticeable the less a person has used the pits. While the game definitely played up all the effects of the pit, it is an official DC game which leads me to lend some credence to its fundamental lore.
The other major mental side effect I believe the pit imposes on its users has to do with logical thinking about cause and effect. This is a bit more nuanced and difficult to explain but I’ll do my best.
We know that as the Red Hood Jason had strict rules about hurting kids. We also know that he brutally beat Tim when he was still a kid and had no problem with it. I don’t think it’s because he didn’t see Tim as a kid or because he was able to justify it by saying that Tim signed up for it. I think it simply didn’t occur to him. All he could see was how his actions would affect Batman. His understanding of cause and effect was so narrow that he couldn’t even imagine that his actions would affect anything other than what he intended them too. The attack was a message to Batman and Robin, it didn’t cross his mind that it could have any other consequences or that Robin was an actual person and not an extension of Batman or a symbol of Bruce’s perceived betrayal.
We see this same goal oriented logical disconnect again when Tim betrays the League of Assassins. He spent his time with the League doing everything he could to avoid killing or ordering anyone else to kill. He is adamant about not killing anyone and returning to his black and white morality as soon as he could. When he sabotaged the League computers and caused every single connected system to detonate his only thoughts were about the message he was sending Ra’s, that he would never be his ally and that he would always be loyal to Batman. He couldn’t even imagine that in doing this he probably caused countless deaths of people all over the globe, some of whom were probably innocent servants or prisoners. His awareness of the potential lethality of his actions began and ended with the survival of the Council of Spiders, who he thought probably escaped in time. I don’t think he ever realized that he’d probably killed people, and since his exposure to the pits was minimal I think it may have worn off before he ever encountered a situation where it was relevant again.
Actually this effect is observable in Ra’s as well and probably has been since his introduction. People seem to have forgotten that Ra’s is an ecoterrorist who’s goal is protecting the planet and keeping human civilization in check. The League’s original purpose was precision elimination of politicians and businessmen and scientists who could threaten the natural balance of the world. Sometimes they had to eliminate entire civilizations or cities to keep humanities progress in check. Obviously they didn’t succeed and their goal changed to mass genocide, which is how Bruce came to know of their existence in some continuities, but once Ra’s health started declining the focus of the organization turned to self preservation and maintaining power. All this is to say that Ra’s strayed very far from his original goal of preserving the natural balance of the world, and somewhere along the way he ended up so focused on keeping humanity in check that he forgot about actually preserving the world and all its other inhabitants and ecosystems, some of his actions and plans actively endangering what he wanted to protect in the first place.
So, to summarize, the Lazarus Pit doesn’t affect mood or impulsivity or identity, it blocks certain neural pathways and impedes logic and one’s ability to see the bigger picture beyond their goals. Those affected by Lazarus water retain their identity, sense of self, and emotional control, but lose logical comprehension of cause and effect and become more susceptible to suggestion.
