April 5, 2024

April 5, 2024 By
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Rick Ritchie: Fingolfins Final Fight / flickr

One of the key elements which connects J.R.R. Tolkien’s personal faith with his myths is his understanding of angels and their role in world history. He believed, like many other Christians, that angels had a more direct interaction with humanity in pre-Christian times than they did after the incarnation. For, after God became human, the role angels had changed to reflect the more direct relationship humanity would have with God. As his myth took place in pre-history, long before the incarnation, God had far less direct interaction with humanity. It was the time when God’s angels, the Valar and their servants, were given the most freedom to interact with and direct world history:

The cycles begin with a cosmogonical myth: the Music of the Ainur. God and the Valar (or powers: Englished as gods) are revealed. These latter are as we should say angelic powers, whose function is to exercise delegated authority in their spheres (of rule and government, not creation, making or re-making). They are ‘divine’, that is, were originally ‘outside’ and existed ‘before’ the making of the world. Their power and wisdom is derived from their Knowledge of the cosmogonical drama, which they perceived first as a drama (that is as in a fashion we perceive a story composed by some-one else), and later as a ‘reality’. On the side of mere narrative device, this is, of course, meant to provide beings of the same order of beauty, power, and majesty as the ‘gods’ of higher mythology, which can yet be accepted – well, shall we say baldly, by a mind that believes in the Blessed Trinity.[1]

Tolkien could have pointed to ancient Christian writers like St. Augustine, showing how they also said that Christians and Platonists (among others) were talking about the same thing when they mentioned either angels or the gods.[2] Augustine wasn’t interested in a debate over terms; Christians and Platonists agreed that there was the One (God) over and above all the others, indeed One from which the angels (or  other “gods”) came to be. Christians certainly could see that the role angels had in pre-Christian history, with the power and authority given to them, could easily be misconstrued, turning them into gods. This is especially true in the way many of the angels were said to have particular domains for their power and authority, similar to the way  pagans mapped out their own pantheons. We can see this kind of understanding of Origen in the writings of Origen, who, influenced also by the Jewish tradition, explained how various angelic powers ruled over a particular territory of  creation, sometimes being that of a particular element:

But someone might say that, if the sea and each of the rivers were animate, it would entail a long logos to seek how it is that they are animate; nonetheless, all have been assigned to a holy power. And here are angels put in charge of managing marine affairs and other angels to manage the affairs of this or that river, so there are also angels to manage the air, and when more divine angels manage the affairs of the air, then the air does not sicken or become noxious. [3]

Tolkien engaged this notion, and brought with it, other early Christian sentiments, such as the reason why the Mosaic Covenant forbade the use of images is because the incarnation had not yet taken place, and so there was no legitimate way for  God to be represented by a material form. He took these assumptions further and considered the kinds of implications they would have had in the far distant past, further before the incarnation, when there was even less direct interaction between God and creation; this led him to think that temples, would have had similar negative connotations in the far distant past. This is why they were often banned and those who constructed them did so for an evil purpose.[4]  This explains the situation he developed for Númenor :

The Númenóreans thus began a great new good, and as monotheists; but like the Jews (only more so) with only one physical centre of ‘worship’: the summit of the mountain Meneltarma ‘Pillar of Heaven’ – literally, for they did not conceive of the sky as a divine residence – in the centre of Númenor; but it had no building and no temple, as all such things had evil associations. But they ‘fell’ again – because of a Ban or prohibition, inevitably. They were forbidden to sail west beyond their own land because they were not allowed to be or try to be ‘immortal’; and in this myth the Blessed Realm is represented as still having an actual physical existence as a region of the real world, one which they could have reached by ship, being very great mariners. While obedient, people from the Blessed Realm often visited them, and so their knowledge and arts reached almost an Elvish height.[5]

If some angelic power became too attached to the world, and the power they had over the world, they risked falling away from God, becoming, that is, a fallen angel (that is, a evil daemon or god). This could be seen in the way Morgoth, and later Sauron, tried to “incarnate” themselves: they wanted to take control over the world by infusing themselves into it, contaminating it in the process, so that all those who were of the world would be influenced (if not controlled) by them. A temple in this era would have been the sign of such a desire for domination and control, a desire which ultimately would become the source for Morgoth and Sauron’s downfall, for they would distil their power into the world, so if that power were broken or destroyed, they would lose the power and control they possessed over others (as can be seen with the destruction of Sauron’s ring). Thus, in the world where angelic beings had more direct contact with humanity (and other races), Tolkien believed that those powers could and often would work for the good of the world, but he also saw the temptation many of them would face, for they would believe the world must be molded to their particular notion of what is good and so accumulate power in order to force the world to conform to their will instead of the greater will of  God (Eru). This can be seen as being quite similar to the way early Christians understood the pre-Christian world, where daemonic powers, fallen angels, who gave into such a temptation, still held sway over the domain they had been given before their fall.

After Christ, after the incarnation, the world changed; the place of the “gods” had changed. Those who remained faithful and pure still have an important role in the kingdom of God, but those which had fallen found God’s intervention in world history slowly working to remove their power and influence over the world, making them as if they were dead (exemplified by the way apologists would talk about how Plutarch revealed that “the Great Pan is dead.”)  Angels now found their primary service was to help point humanity away from themselves and to God; this meant they could and would still help reveal qualities about God, but their purpose was then to recede, similar to the way John the Baptist did after Christ’s baptism. Tolkien expressed this to his son, Christopher, after telling Christopher about an encounter with what be believed was an angelic presence while engaging eucharistic adoration:

And the ray was the Guardian Angel of the mote: not a thing interposed between God and the creature, but God’s very attention itself, personalized. And I do not mean ‘personified’, by a mere figure of speech according to the tendencies of human language, but a real (finite) person. Thinking of it since – for the whole thing was very immediate, and not recapturable in clumsy language, certainly not the great sense of joy that accompanied it and the realization that the shining poised mote was myself (or any other human person that I might think of with love) – it has occurred to me that (I speak diffidently and have no idea whether such a notion is legitimate: it is at any rate quite separate from the vision of the Light and the poised mote) this is a finite parallel to the Infinite. As the love of the Father and Son (who are infinite and equal) is a Person, so the love and attention of the Light to the Mote is a person (that is both with us and in Heaven): finite but divine: i.e. angelic.[6]

Thus, in another letter, Tolkien also told Christopher to keep his guardian angel in mind, reflecting, once again, the relationship between the angel and God, and how the angel hopefully will serve as a source of comfort and peace:

Remember your guardian angel. Not a plump lady with swan-wings! But – at least this is my notion and feeling – : as souls with free-will we are, as it were, so placed as to face (or to be able to face) God. But God is (so to speak) also behind us, supporting, nourishing us (as being creatures). The bright point of power where that life-line, that spiritual umbilical cord touches: there is our Angel, facing two ways to God behind us in the direction we cannot see, and to us. But of course do not grow weary of facing God, in your free right and strength (both provided ‘from behind’ as I say). If you cannot achieve inward peace, and it is given to few to do so (least of all to me) in tribulation, do not forget that the aspiration for it is not a vanity, but a concrete act. I am sorry to talk like this, and so haltingly. But I can do no more for you dearest. …[7]

Tolkien indicated, in these passages, that he believed that angels somehow participate in the divine life; this allowed them to serve as a face which we can turn to when we need to engage God. This is not because we cannot have direct access to God, as we can, but we still want and need something to apprehend which is more relatable than the transcendent divine nature itself. Because they are given this kind of participation in the divine life, this gives us another reason why it is fine to call them “gods.” They are “gods” similar to the way we can become “gods,” that is, not by nature, but by grace. Each angel then can serve to represent one of more uncreated energies (and thus qualities) of God, those energies which they have engaged or “assimilated” into their own being..

With this understanding of angels, we can better appreciate the way Tolkien presents angelic beings as gods, and even how they can be tempted and fall. Each of them participated in some elements of the divine life, giving them experience of various uncreated energies of God, energies which gave them power and authority similar to the way God’s energies themselves have power and authority over the whole of creation. They were free to engage that gift with love, and in doing so, share what they have been given with the rest of the world, coordinating their own actions to affirm God and God’s greater glory, or else, they could take what they have  been  given, and try to use it for personal gain at the expense of others (including the world), glorifying themselves in the process (and so fall from grace, as can be seen in the way Tolkien described the fall of Morgoth). And, in the pre-incarnate era of history, Tolkien thought that those beings which did not fall, those which took what was given to them and continued to embrace God with faithful love, would have had all kinds of powers and control associated with those elements or qualities of the divine life they had, powers which then let them be viewed as gods by those who were not so close to God. After the incarnation, such powers, such angelic beings, still exist and thrive, and still served humanity and the rest of creation, but humanity now can have its direct connection with God, which is why they no longer needed angelic beings to serve them as tutors; instead, they became friends and fellow lovers of God sharing with each other the blessings they have received as exemplified by the Song of Songs, where they can be said to be the friends of the Bridegroom.

[1] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition. Ed. Humphrey Carpenter and Christopher Tolkien (Broadway, NY: William Morrow, 2023), 205-6 [Letter 131 to Milton Waldman].

[2] See St. Augustine, City of God in NPNF1(2): 178 [IX.23].

[3] Origen, Homilies on the Psalms: Codex Monacensis Graecus 314. Trans. Joseph W. Trigg (Washington, DC: CUA Press, 2020), 268 [Homily 3 on Psalm 76].

[4] See J.R.R. Tolkien, “The Rivers and Beacon-Hills of Gondor,” in The Nature of Middle Earth. Ed. Carl F. Hostetter (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2021), 392-3.

[5] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition, 301 [Letter 156 to Robert Murray, SR].

[6] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition, 141 [Letter 89 to Christopher Tolkien].

[7] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition, 94-5 [Letter 54 to Christopher Tolkien].

 

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February 8, 2024

February 8, 2024 By
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summonedbyfells: Bust Of Tolkien / flickr

J.R.R. Tolkien’s background such as having a priest, Fr. Morgan, as his guardian after his mother died, as well as his education, with his love for languages and ancient traditions, helped form his personal liturgical preferences. They led him to be disappointed in the various Catholic liturgical developments which occurred after Vatican II, as those changes were not in accord with his own predispositions. However, unlike many who hold similar liturgical inclinations, Tolkien understood the church could and did have the authority to develop its liturgical traditions in ways which ran contrary to his own desires. He knew that he had to humbly accept the way the church was going. This is not to say he found it easy, as he did not, but he knew, as he wrote to another priest, Fr. Alex Jones, his loyalty was being tried: “As you may imagine, I find these days extremely trying: a severe test of loyalty; and attendance at Mass has become an exhausting exercise in patience and humility (in which I am deficient).”[1]

This is a one of the major differences which can be found between Tolkien and many others, who, like him, prefer the Tridentine form of the Western Liturgy. Which is why, if someone were to try to invoke him and his name to support their resistance to the changes which have happened after Vatican II, they would be doing him a grave disservice. He did not reject the authority of the church to develop and change its liturgical tradition. Instead, he said that no matter how difficult it might be for them, they could not  just abandon the Catholic faith:

For all of us ‘conservatives’ I think the trouble in our Church is at present more trying than all our personal and physical woes. But it has to be endured. Only loyalty and silence (in public) will provide the ballast for the rocking boat! As the disciples said to Our Lord: we have nowhere else to go….[2]

Tolkien consistently defended the church and its authority and he would be upset to learn that his liturgical preferences were being promoted to turn him into a weapon against the church itself. He believed that his mother’s death came, in part, because she had become Catholic: her family rejected her because of her conversion so that when she found herself all alone, after his father’s death, they did not give her the help she needed. He felt she was a kind of martyr to the faith, and that all the struggles she faced would have been for nothing if he abandoned the faith when he found the situation to be difficult. This is not to say he could not, or would not, complain in private. Similarly, it is clear from his letters, he was struggling with his faith due to the changes which went on after Vatican II. But what he made clear is that those challenges should not serve as excuses for himself to be disloyal to the church, to justify abandoning the church as the church was established by Christ.

Ultimately, Tolkien understood the temporal history of the institutional church was going to be one riddled with problems and to expect otherwise is foolish. On the other hand, he also believed that there would be those who helped advance Christ’s work in the world, and their contributions to the church, more than overcame all the deficiencies he found in the church itself. One good and holy priest, like Fr. Morgan was enough. Similarly, the gifts which Christ gave to the church, that is the sacraments, and especially the eucharist, kept him with the church. He said the only way he could abandon the church in full is if he didn’t believe in Christ and Christ’s teachings, which is not to say he would not be tempted to do so, as he made clear, it is a temptation most if not every Christian faces in their life. “The temptation to ‘unbelief (which really means rejection of Our Lord and His claims) is always there within us.”[3]  Or, as he explained in a different letter to his son, Michael, one way he was able to deal with the problems in the church was to understand the church’s primary function was to make such the eucharist was being given out, making it a kind of “monstrance” in history:

We all suffer these strains, since H[oly] M[other] C[hurch] began to employ such vulgar nurses. Still the Church is in the last resort only a tabernacle (or monstrance) for the Blessed Sacrament, and it has been through the ages, each age in a different way, an extremely imperfect one, not to say deplorably ugly and ill-kept. But it is the only one available and outside is the ‘howling-wilderness’. For myself I find that only concentration on the immutable, indelible, and unsulliable sanctity of the Real Presence keeps one in hope and charity. Of course, that at times will make one indignant at the casualness and irreverence of priests (and laity), but that is in Our Lords hands; all we can do is exhibit our own devotion and reverence and teach, if we can, our children to feel and do the same.[4]

Tolkien, moreover, felt the greatest scandals in the church were not blasphemy, such as “liturgical abuses,” but rather, the ways Christians abuse each other (and, of course, non-Christians):

With regard to the blasphemy, one can only recall (when applicable) the words Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do – or say. And somehow I fancy that Our Lord actually is more pained by offences we commit against one another than those we commit against himself, esp. his incarnate person.[5]

This, of course, is a far different position than what is found in those who completely resist Vatican II and its liturgical development. Many of them claim those developments are akin to liturgical abuse, indeed, even “blasphemy” (what, that is, they define as blasphemy, which often is not the case), which they then say justifies their rebellion as such blasphemy must be considered the most important issue at hand. He would find their pretense of piety to be false, as the way they go about it is abusive themselves, showing that what lies behind their revolt is malicious and far from Christian, let alone a representation of traditional Catholicism. For, like St. Thomas More, Tolkien held a strong belief in the teaching concerning the papacy, and the authority of the Pope, which is why it is clear he would have nothing to do with so-called traditionalists who either attack or outright reject the Pope:

I myself am convinced by the Petrine claims, nor looking around the world does there seem much doubt which (if Christianity is true) is the True Church, the temple of the Spirit dying but living, corrupt but holy, self-reforming and rearising. But for me that Church of which the Pope is the acknowledged head on earth has as chief claim that it is the one that has (and still does) ever defended the Blessed Sacrament, and given it most honour, and put it (as Christ plainly intended) in the prime place. ‘Feed my sheep’ was His last charge to St Peter; and since His words are always first to be understood literally, I suppose them to refer primarily to the Bread of Life. It was against this that the W. European revolt (or Reformation) was really launched – ‘the blasphemous fable of the Mass’ – and faith/works a mere red herring. I suppose the greatest reform of our time was that carried out by St Pius X: surpassing anything, however needed, that the Council will achieve. I wonder what state the Church would now be but for it.[6]

But, yet, even though he believed that the institutional church should have the Pope as its authoritative leader, he did not deny the need for Christians of various faith traditions to come together and reestablish the bonds of love they had lost.  He worked in and promoted ecumenical gatherings. He believed it was important for Catholics to be a part of them, and indeed, to engage them with all due love and humility, indeed even mutual forgiveness:

I find myself in sympathy with those developments that are strictly ‘ecumenical’, that is concerned with other groups or churches that call themselves (and often truly are) ‘Christian’. We have prayed endlessly for Christian re-union, but it is difficult to see, if one reflects, how that could possibly begin to come about except as it has, with all its inevitable minor absurdities. An increase in ‘charity’ is an enormous gain. As Christians those faithful to the Vicar of Christ must put aside the resentments that as mere humans they feel – e.g. at the ‘cockiness’ of our new friends (esp. C[hurch] of E[ngland]). [7]

No matter how much Tolkien found himself struggling with his faith, something which those who read his letters or other treatments of his life find were very real for him, those struggles did not lead him to justify abandoning the Catholic faith, or reject the authority of the church to determine its liturgical traditions. He felt there was something much more fundamental, much more important, that had to be dealt with, which was the lack of charity among Christians. He believed Christians should respond to the challenges they had with humility instead of aggression. He highlighted the eucharist as being what helped keep him in the faith, that is, he believed in the real presence, and even had some private experience in relation to his eucharistic devotion which helped reinforce it:

The only cure for sagging of fainting faith is Communion. Though always Itself, perfect and complete and inviolate, the Blessed Sacrament does not operate completely and once for all in any of us. Like the act of Faith it must be continuous and grow by exercise. Frequency is of the highest effect. Seven times a week is more nourishing than seven times at intervals. Also I can recommend this as an exercise (alas! only too easy to find opportunity for): make your communion in circumstances that affront your taste.[8]

What Tolkien said at the end of that passage, recommending Michael to receive communion, not where his liturgical sensibilities are met, but rather, to the contrary, where they are challenged, is exactly the kind of message which needs to be told to those so-called traditionalist Catholics who resist the church and its liturgical developments. It is what differentiates Tolkien from them, even if Tolkien shared some aesthetic preferences with them.

[1] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition. Ed. Humphrey Carpenter and Christopher Tolkien (Broadway, NY: William Morrow, 2023), 519 [Letter 289d to Father Alex Jones].

[2] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition, 531[Letter 294a to Michael Tolkien].

[3] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition, 474 [Letter 250 to Michael Tolkien].

[4] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition, 366 [Letter 194a to Michael Tolkien].

[5] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition, 138 [Letter 86 to Christopher Tolkien].

[6] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition, 476 [Letter 250 to Michael Tolkien].

[7] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition, 554 [Letter 306 to Michael Tolkien].

[8] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition, 475 [Letter 250 to Michael Tolkien].

 

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December 5, 2023

December 5, 2023 By
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Mags_Cat: The One Ring / flickr

War is hell. While it might sometimes be unavoidable, it should never be glorified. It is always an evil, and as such, even when it becomes necessary, it tends to corrupt those who are involved in it. Extra care should be had by those who are forced to defend themselves against an unjust aggressor that they do not become like those they oppose.

From their own experiences, veterans know firsthand the horrors of war; many of them end up trying to do all they can to make sure they do not have to experience another war in their lifetime. They understand the true price of war, and wish no one would have to pay it. This is not to say they all end up becoming pacifists, but they end up seeing the value of pacifism and doing all that is possible to stop war before it happens. This is why it should not surprise us that J.R.R. Tolkien, a veteran of the First World War, had an ambivalent reaction to the Second. He recognized the need to resist the Axis Powers, but he was often ashamed of the way the Allies waged the war, seeing that they often used the same evil they fought against, that is, they took on the logic of Nazi Germany and used it in their war efforts

There was a solemn article in the local paper seriously advocating systematic exterminating of the entire German nation as the only proper course after military victory: because, if you please, they are rattlesnakes, and don’t know the difference between good and evil! (What of the writer?) The Germans have just as much right to declare the Poles and Jews exterminable vermin, subhuman, as we have to select the Germans: in other words, no right, whatever they have done.[1]

Tolkien would be upset at the way many of his readers have tried to use his works for warmongering. While he believed war might sometimes was unavoidable, he was clear, war is a disgrace, a total waste. He did not believe it is something to be glorified but rather, something to have us hold our heads down in shame:

The utter stupid waste of war, not only material but moral and spiritual, is so staggering to those who have to endure it. And always was (despite the poets), and always will be (despite the propagandists) – not of course that it has not is and will be necessary to face it in an evil world. But so short is human memory and so evanescent are its generations that in only about 30 years there will be few or no people with that direct experience which alone goes really to the heart. The burnt hand teaches most about fire.[2]

Tolkien saw how those who waged war tended to follow the path of Saruman or Boromir:  that is, they end up embracing the same uncontrollable tools of power and domination as used by the enemy; even if they should win, they end up becoming a new force of evil in the world: “What a world. In times of my own world, it is as if Saruman had got control, stolen the Ring, and managed to down Mordor – and then become a new Lord of a scorched earth. But the unexpected always happens.”[3]

Tolkien was not a pacifist; he was a realist who wanted everyone to remember the proper goal of war was peace. It was not, of course, the peace which comes in the wake of massive destruction, but rather the peace founded upon and allowed for reconciliation between enemies. But the temptation for power gets in the way, and so war often ends with a peace founded upon violence and the sacrifice of countless innocents, as seen in the development and use of the Atomic Bomb:

The news today about ‘Atomic bombs’ is so horrifying one is stunned. The utter folly of these lunatic physicists to consent to do such work for war-purposes: calmly plotting the destruction of the world! Such explosives in men’s hands, while their moral and intellectual status is declining, is about as useful as giving out firearms to all inmates of a gaol and then saying that you hope ‘this will ensure peace’. But one good thing may arise out of it, I suppose, if the write-ups are not overheated: Japan ought to cave in. Well we’re in God’s hands. But He does not look kindly on Babel-builders.[4]

But even without the bomb, the desire for domination and control, instead of restorative justice, could be seen in the approach many took in regards Germany and the other Axis Powers. There was no charity, no desire to help the people who were under the Nazi regime. Instead, all of them were seen as the enemy; innocents were turned away, and if and when they died, there was a lot of gloating:

The appalling destruction and misery of this war mount hourly : destruction of what should be (indeed is) the common wealth of Europe, and the world, if mankind were not so besotted, wealth the loss of which will affect us all, victors or not. Yet people gloat to hear of the endless lines, 40 miles long, of miserable refugees, women and children pouring West, dying on the way. There seem no bowels of mercy or compassion, no imagination, left in this dark diabolic hour. By which I do not mean that it may not all, in the present situation, mainly (not solely) created by Germany, be necessary and inevitable. But why gloat! We were supposed to have reached a stage of civilization in which it might still be necessary to execute a criminal, but not to gloat, or to hang his wife and child by him while the orc-crowd hooted.[5]

He believed, therefore, one of the tasks of those who were soldiers was to make sure they did not lose their own humanity, as he told his son, Christopher:

Alas! that you of all folk should ever have landed yourself in the Urukhai. Like dooming a child, because of a juvenile interest in trains, to become a plate-layer for ever or a porter. But you would have it! And I expect you’d have found Orcdom anywhere. This is War. And it is the task of people like you to try and keep that in the human consciousness. At present they seem determined to perpetuate the squalor and servitude of War in Peace, so that Peace shall become like War shorn even of the last tattered rags of glory.[6]

Tolkien believed it was extremely important that those who found themselves in the middle of a time of war to struggle to preserve their humanity, to never let themselves go against their conscience when it warns them that the way they are choosing to act, the quick and easy way, the way of destruction, leads only to ruin. Those who would use Tolkien to promote unjust wars, or to follow the path of domination and control, and with it, seek total annihilation of one’s enemies instead of their conversion, only use and abuse him in the way he saw Hitler used and abused the Germanic tradition:

Anyway, I have in this War a burning private grudge – which would probably make me a better soldier at 49 than I was at 22: against that ruddy little ignoramus Adolf Hitler (for the odd thing about demonic inspiration and impetus is that it in no way enhances the purely intellectual stature: it chiefly affects the mere will). Ruining, perverting, misapplying, and making for ever accursed, that noble northern spirit, a supreme contribution to Europe, which I have ever loved, and tried to present in its true light.[7]

Tolkien would look with horror the way many have used his works to promote and justify evil, such as racism. He would see they were doing to his legacy what Hitler did with the Germanic tradition. He would resist those who would use his works to support propaganda that justifies making the enemy in war look inhuman and so worthy of utter destruction.

Tolkien warned us about the evil which is to be found in war. With Saruman and Boromir, he gave us examples of what happens when we give in to the way of power and domination. He showed us with Gollum how mercy and pity, however unearned, can serve the way for a greater good, even if those who are given it would use that mercy for evil. He shows us the hope we must have and how we must use it to maintain our integrity, while warning us of the destruction we will face if we do not. Those fans who would use him to undermine his principles, who would use him to promote militarism instead of humanism, truly have done his work, his legacy, a grave disservice. They do not understand the spirit of his works, not only the humanism, but also the Christian spirit of pity, which lies at the heart of his work. They offer no pity, no mercy, as they seek to slowly take over the world with their ideology. They can be said to have accepted the temptation of the greater Ring, not Sauron’s Ring, but Morgoth’s Ring, as they they try to control and dominate the world for their own sullied interests.

[1] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition. Ed. Humphrey Carpenter and Christopher Tolkien (Broadway, NY: William Morrow, 2023), 134 [Letter 81 to Christopher Tolkien].

[2] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition, 110 [Letter 64 to Christopher Tolkien].

[3] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition, 149 [Letter 91c to Christopher Tolkien].

[4] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition, 168 [Letter 102 to Christopher Tolkien].

[5] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition, 160-1 [Letter 96 to Christopher Tolkien].

[6] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition, 114 [Letter 66 to Christopher Tolkien].

[7] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Revised and Expanded Edition, 77 [Letter 45. to Michael Tolkien].

 

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July 27, 2023

July 27, 2023 By
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Oxyman: Brythnoth Statue At Maldon/ Wikimedia Commons

Many Tolkien enthusiasts, mostly as a result of their interest in Middle Earth, misunderstand Tolkien’s sentiments. They try to use his writings to promote ideological positions which run contrary to his own beliefs and desires. This phenomenon began when he was alive, but it has only become much worse over time. Now, many of his readers try to use his works to promote sexism, racism, and warmongering, among other views which would have disgusted Tolkien. The rise of an “alt-right” reading of Tolkien also explains the criticism given to productions of his work which stand more in line with Tolkien’s own sentiments than theirs. They want him kept in a small little corner, with only one version of his tales, their version, allowed, instead of accepting the complex mythological conception Tolkien had for Middle Earth. To be sure, as it is myth, there is an allowance for all kinds of interpretations, including those which run contrary to Tolkien’s own views, but this does not mean we can or should ignore the beliefs he held and how they molded his own stories. He wrote primarily to entertain himself, and his friends, but also to do so in a way which reflected his own lived-experiences, such as the horrors they encountered during World War I.  Understanding those experiences will help make sure that Tolkien’s own viewpoints, which make their way in his writings, are not misinterpreted. He should not be made into a representative symbol for beliefs and practices which he stood against. For example, his work should not be seen as promoting some sort of chivalric honor code nor some sort of romanticism of war, but instead, they show he was rather ambivalent to both.

For Tolkien, as with many other survivors of the First World War, war was understood truly to be hell. While he survived the war, in part, because he was injured and so taken off the battlefield, he saw many of his close friends brutally killed. This left a mark upon him for the rest of his life. It made him realize war should never be taken lightly, nor it should ever be romantically glorified. But he was not a complete pacifist. He understood war could become necessary when some great evil is at work in the world, as, for example, if some would-be dictator began invading other countries, turning them into playthings for his or her sadistic wrath. The only response to such evil is to try to stop it, preventing it from becoming worse; doing nothing, allowing that evil to grow and fester, can quickly become criticized as a kind of sin of omission. War might be necessary, but it must also be examined and criticized in reflection, making sure that those who engage it do not glorify themselves or the war, for if they did so, they could quickly become like the monsters they are trying to overcomes. Sadly, Tolkien thought, only those who have experienced the horrors of war will truly understand the evils involved in it. The valiant deeds of those fighting in such wars, not the horrors of war itself, will most likely be remembered by subsequent generations, because it is those stories which are told. Tolkien believed if such glorification of the heroes of a war is not tempered with stories concerning the brutality of war, and the evil which is done in war, future generations will eventually lose sight of the true evil of war, allowing them to be much more easily led to embrace it even when it is not necessary:

The utter stupid waste of war, not only material but moral and spiritual, is so staggering to those who have to endure it. And always was (despite the poets), and always will be (despite the propagandists) – not of course that it has not is and will be necessary to face an evil in the world. But so short is human memory and so evanescent are its generations that in only about 30 years there will be few or no people with that direct experience which alone goes really to the heart. The burnt hand teaches most about fire. [1]

Tolkien understood that war should not be treated as if it were a game, and yet that is exactly what many did in medieval Europe. They created rules for war as if war was a glorious contest, rules which created the conditions for contestants to have equal standing in battle. And, once it was taken in that regard, it was easily romanticized, with the combatants being given the status that is now often given to sporting legends. Various poets, in their descriptions of war, in the gallantry they made for it, helped also in presenting such a romanticized version of  war, and in doing so, they helped further develop the rules and expectations placed upon those going to battle, doing what they can to enhance the rules of chivalry so that medieval elites, those who could and did read the stories they wrote down, would be encouraged to share in with the great game being presented to all.

Tolkien also knew, and often studied, poets who understood the problems underlying the system of chivalry. They often saw the spirit of chivalry often created conditions which led to the defeat of those who followed its directions in their lives. Not everyone would follow the chivalric code, and fighting against those who did not leave those who did at a severe disadvantage. To be sure, this criticism was not meant to suggest that anything could and should be done in war to win; there were moral standards which were expected for just wars. But, what was important is that those moral concerns should not be confused with the artificial honor code of chivalry, a code which always made battle seem more like a sport than anything else. That is, it is one thing to have moral rules which must always be obeyed; that is not the problem; it is when battle follows other, arbitrary rules so that the battle becomes a sporting contest, a game, that leads to major problems. Tolkien learned this lesson, not only through his own experience of war, seeing the horror of it which made sure he could never see it in such a light, but also through his own studies and writings on medieval literature. He found many of the texts he studied had undercurrents in them which were critical of the gallantry of the knights and their notions of chivalry. Be it the story of Sir Gawain, or the poetic fragment related to the Battle of Maldon, Tolkien took a keen interest and found himself in agreement with their writers are they questioned or deconstructed the order of chivalry in their verse. For example, Tolkien pointed out how the chivalric code broke Gawain down in the story of Sir Gawain and the  Green Knight. Indeed, the way the chivalric code had him place himself under the trust of a “sovereign lady” ultimately had to be undermined:

And so we end. Beyond that our author does not take us. We have seen a gentle courtly knight learn by bitter experience the perils of Courtesy, and the unreality in the last resort of protestations of complete ‘service’ to a lady as a ‘sovereign’ whose will is law; and in that last resort we have seen him prefer a higher law. [2]

The Battle of Maldon went further than the author of Sir Gawain, for, as Tolkien explained, it focused on the way the chivalric code could and would hurt not just those nobles who embraced it, but upon the people who relied upon them. Byrhtnoth, the noble lord who fought and died at the battle of Maldon, died, in part, giving in to the rules of chivalry, following them even when his Viking opponents did not. He did not just obey the rules of the game for himself, he expected his subordinates do so as well, even if that mean they would suffer the same cruel fate as he had. His Viking opponents understood this, and  though they did not embrace the chivalric code for themselves, they asked Byrhtnoth to do so, asking him to let them cross over to land so that then no one would have an undue advantage over another. They asked, as it were, for him to give them a fair fight while never intending to fight fair themselves. Thus, it is suggested that they tricked Byrhtnoth, using the system he followed in order to gain an easy victory for themselves.  Many needlessly suffered and died as a result of the way Byrhtnoth  took and understood the battle:

It was heroic for him and his men to fight, to annihilation if necessary, in the attempt to destroy or hold off the invaders. It was wholly unfitting that he should treat a desperate battle with his sole real object as a sporting match, to the ruin of his purpose and duty.[3]

Though Byrhtnoth embraced the honor system, his code of conduct led to a brutal waste; it was a code of conduct, not based upon basic rules and obligations expected to make sure war was ethically waged, but rules which allowed it to be treated as a sporting event: he was playing a game, while the Vikings were not. And so, while Byrhtnoth fulfilled what was expected of him, the end result was that he let himself, and his people, down. “Magnificent perhaps, but certainly wrong. Too foolish to be heroic. And the folly Beorhtnoth at any rate could not wholly redeem by death.” [4]  Byrhtnoth was foolhardy, but he was not the only one who was; it was a common problem thanks to the way war had become romanticized and treated by the poets. The problem was systematic; as long as the chivalrous spirit was promoted without questioning, the end result was predicable: foolish lords, taking things too lightly, will not fight the battle as they should, allowing all the horror and destruction which comes out of war to be significantly increased. Loyalty, which to be sure is a virtue, was often misplaced in the medieval system, and so many good people lost their lives because their sovereign did not care about them as much as about the game they thought they were was playing. Even the story of Beowulf, Tolkien believed, demonstrated this problem, making it, therefore, a theme which tied three major literary interests of his: “It is no accident that in this poem [Sir Gawain], as in Maldon and in Beowulf, we have criticism of the lord, of the owner of the allegiance.”[5] We can perceive some of this play out in Tolkien’s own works, such as in The Lord of the Rings, wherein we find Theoden let himself to be foolishly led by Wormtongue, causing his people to suffer great harm as a result.  Denothor, the Steward of Gondor, likewise wanted to have his sovereignty followed, even if it meant he took down the lives of those he cared for, like Faramir. In The Hobbit, Thorin also engaged this kind of folly, though in the end, thanks to the not-so noble “thief” Bilbo, he was able to die making amends for his failure. Far from glorifying the medieval system of chivalry, far from being a romantic presentation of war which should be used as an example for our own situation, Tolkien’s works contain similar ambivalent positions on war as is found in many of his favorite Old English texts. This is what so many readers of Tolkien seem to miss. They see the war in his stories and they read it with romantic eyes. They do not see that Tolkien, while understanding and accepting the necessity of war, denied such a romantic notion of war for himself. He couldn’t follow it after living through the horrors of war. He is best to be seen like St. Augustine, who said, if and when war is necessary, it must be pursued in the interests of true peace:

Your will ought to hold fast to peace, from the necessity and preserve you in peace. Peace is not sought for the purpose of stirring up war, but war is waged for the purpose of securing peace. Be, then, a peacemaker even while you make war, that by your victory you may lead those whom you defeat to know the desirability of peace, for the Lord says: ‘Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called children of God.’ [6]

Augustine, of course, did not promote a sham peace, where evil is allowed to fester, grow more powerful, and needlessly hurt people due to negligence. Peace must not be made merely by appeasing evil, giving it all it wants. For that is not true peace, but rather, its opposite, as such evil will then continue to spread its corrosive malice in the world. What is important is that war must not be embraced as being something it is not, that is, as being a good in and of itself. War for the sake of war, war treated as a kind of game where its participants are like  players vying for glory, must also not be seen as acceptable. Those who are involved with war are touched by its evils; even if they survive, even if they work for and promote the greater good and win, they will be wounded by the war itself, and will need all kinds of rest and healing, perhaps for the rest of their lives (something Tolkien showed quite well with the fate of Frodo). War is an evil, and must always be understood as such. Tolkien understood this. Tolkien presented its evils in his works. Tolkien explored this theme in his academic studies. But, sadly, the presentation of Tolkien and his stories, by his fans, and by the media, has not often presented the ambivalence Tolkien had for war. This is why his writings sometimes have often been used to promote a new kind of romanticism of war, a new chivalry, one which stands in sharp contrast to Tolkien’s own views.

[1] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Letter 64 to Christophe Tolkien” in The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. ed. Humphrey Carpenter (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1981), 75-6.

[2] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Sir Gawain and the Green Knight” in The Monster & The Critics and Other Essays (London: HarperCollins, 1997), 99.

[3] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Ofermod” in The Battle of Maldon. Ed. Peter Grybauskas (New York: Harper Collins, 2023), 30.

[4] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Ofermod,” 30.

[5] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Ofermod,” 33.

[6] St. Augustine, “Letter 189 to Boniface” in Letters 165 – 203. Trans. Wilfrid Parsons, SND (New York: Fathers of the Church, 1955), 269.

 

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November 16, 2021

November 16, 2021 By

Araniart: The Elves Leave Middle-Earth / Wikimedia Commons

Tolkien, like his friend C.S. Lewis, contemplated the notion of “unfallen” beings living in a fallen universe. He thought that if they existed, even though they were not tainted by sin, they would still be affected by the fall. It was with this understanding that wrote concerning the Quendi, the Elves, in his writings:

The Quendi never “fell” in the sense that Men did.  Being “tainted” with the Shadow (as perhaps even the Valar in some degree were, with all things in “Arda Marred”) they could do wrong. But they never rejected Eru, or worshiped Melkor (or Sauron) either individually, or in groups, or as a whole people. Their lives, therefore, came under no general curse or diminishment, and their “life-span”, co-extensive with the remainder of the life of Arda, was unaltered – except only insofar as, with the very ageing of Arda itself, their primitive vigour of body steadily waned. [1]

Since the corruption of sin affected the world at large, all who are a part of the world would find themselves touched by it. Even unfallen beings could do wrong (and so fall into particular, but not universal, sin). More importantly, their connection with a world in which the fall took place would have an effect on their lives. The Quendi felt this in the way they were associated with their bodies; in youth, their bodies are strong and vigorous but as they aged, their spirit grew in strength and out of harmony with their body and all material being. Their bodies would grow weak and their spirit would grow strong. They would become more and more spirit like until, at last, they would seem to vanish from the world itself. They would have to exert themselves in order to engage their physical nature. They would always possess a material nature and a tie to the world at large, no matter how spiritualized they had become. Their fate was tied with the fate of the world. They would continue to live until the end of time, even if their presence would not be so readily perceived by others.  In this way, the sins of others tainted the world, and through their connection with the world, created a disharmony in their very being. It was not their own sin, but the sins of others which did this. They were established to be in and of the world. Their ultimate fate, however, was not known by them, because the fate of the world in the eschaton was not  known by them:

Another thing which distinguishes the living from the unliving is that the living employ Time in their realization. In other words it is part of their nature to ‘grow”, using such material as is needed or is available to them for their embodiment. So that a living pattern does not fully exist at any one moment of time (as do unliving patterns); but is complete only with the completion of its life. It cannot therefore rightly be seen instantly, and is only imperfectly envisages even with the help of memory. Only those who conceived its pattern and whose sight is not limited to the succession of time can, for instance, see the true shape of a tree. [2]

The completion of their life, unless it was unnaturally brought to an end (such as through violence) would be with the end of the world itself.  This is why their destiny could not and would not be known until the end of time. For they existed with the world, and their destiny was intricately tied to the destiny of the world, but the destiny of the world was full of unexpected surprises which only Eru (God) knew. Only those outside of time, only those who have already seen what happens in the end, would know their fate. This they and others often asked if they would perish when time came to an end, or if Eru, God, had some other destiny for them. This was a question which concerned them and though they had speculations and guesses, they could not provide any final, authoritative answer to the question.  Tolkien was interested in offering a way to explain the presence of the Elves in the past while acknowledging their general disappearance in the present.

In a slightly reformulated exploration from what was quoted above, Tolkien made it clear, sin was an issue; sin had corrupted the world and so those connected to the world, whether or not they were fallen beings, would feel the effects of such sin in their own lives

The Quendi never “fell” as a race – not in the sense in which they and Men find themselves believed that the Second Children had “fallen.” Being “tainted” with the Marring (which affected all the “flesh of Arda” from which their hröar was derived and were nourished), and having also come under the Shadow of Melkor before their Finding and rescue, they could individually do wrong. But they never (not even the wrong-doers) rejected Eru, not worshiped either Melkor or Sauron as a god – neither individually or as a whole people. [3]

What is interesting is the way Tolkien viewed the possibility of unfallen beings as being affected by sin. He believed individuals within an unfallen group could do wrong, they could sin, but whatever they did would not affect the group as a whole in the way original sins did with humanity. Thus, he thought that someone living in the world without sin could still feel the wounds of sin upon their lives, but if they did, it must not be asserted that they did so because they themselves were fallen creatures. This is an important observation and distinction which, if employed theologically, could offer insight into the various traditions surrounding Mary, the Theotokos.

Mary, through special grace, knew no sin in her life. This did not mean she would be free from the effects of sin in her life. Following Tolkien, we could say, because she lived in the world, a world touched by sin, she could and would suffer because sin continued to influence the world and what happened in it. Indeed, she shared with the rest of humanity the conditions put upon its historical existence as a result of the fall. This is why she could and would eventually die; her death was not due to any sin she committed, for she was without sin, but due to her ties with the rest of humanity; indeed, it would seem, from the way various theologians and saints have presented her death, in solidarity with the rest of humanity, she accepted death for herself even though she knew no sin. [4]

This is also why Jesus could also die without knowing sin. He took on human nature, which itself is good and pure, but he took it with the way history had formed and shaped it. He took on a role in human history, a history influenced by and shaped by the effects of sin upon the world. He came to be in solidarity with us all, to experience the effects of sin upon himself. He bore sin upon himself without knowing sin. “ He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed” (1 Ptr. 2:24 RSV). And thus, he who knew sin could “become sin” in the sense he took upon himself a human life and death and assumed for himself in his humanity the effects of sin upon himself. “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor. 5:21 RSV). It was in this fashion that he could and would experience the full effects of sin – all the way unto death and into the realm of the dead, engaging all that was touched by sin in and through his own being;  then, having done so, he could and would reconfigure the world.

Even if we do not believe Elves, even if we understand all that Tolkien wrote was fiction, he tried to provide ways it could, in theory, be true and relate to the world which we lived in, indeed, to the Christian faith. This allowed him to pursue categories of being which we rarely consider. What exactly would be the experience of an unfallen being in the world. Could they suffer, could they die, could they, also, somehow deny their own goodness and sin? Lewis, of course, explored this theme in the Space Trilogy, but Tolkien did not think we needed to leave the Earth to raise these questions and consider the possibility of such a life existing here with us on the Earth. In doing so, he suggested that such unfallen creatures could and still would be affected by the taint of the “Shadow,” the taint of sin. Once humanity had fallen into sin, once the world was marred by the effects of sin, even sinless people (Mary and Jesus) could and would feel the effects of sin upon them even if they knew no sin themselves. They could and would die, despite their sinlessness. If Jesus, the God-man, could not do so, then there would have been no way for him to overcome death by death itself. Then sin and death would have had the final say. Thus, Tolkien was correct in making the observation that those without sin could and would still feel the effects of sin in their lives so long as they lived in a world marred by sin. Though death can be said to be one of the effects of the fall upon creation, this does not mean all who die are sinners, which is why Mary, though she died, did not die because of any sin on her part but rather because of her unity with the rest of humanity (and the world at large).

[1] J.R.R. Tolkien, “The Awakening of the Quendi,” in The Nature of Middle Earth. Ed. Carl F. Hostetter (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2021), 36.

[2] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Elvish Reincarnation,” in The Nature of Middle Earth. Ed. Carl F. Hostetter (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2021), 254.

[3] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Concerning the Quendi,” in The Nature of Middle Earth. Ed. Carl F. Hostetter (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2021), 88.

[4] While she knew no sin since birth, she still had to be open to grace, so that she could receive grace upon grace, to grow in grace. This is why it is said that at the annunciation, after her acceptance of what the angel had told her, the Hoy Spirit embraced her and gave her more, indeed, greater grace than she had before, making her ready to fulfill her role as the Theotokos. Thus, we are shown, the grace needed to be pure is less than the grace which is offered to all of us, for we are called to grow in grace, to become greater through grace than we are by nature, and when we do, we will find the Spirit overshadowing us as it did Mary and helping us give a spiritual birth to Christ in our lives.

 

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September 29, 2021

September 29, 2021 By

ActuaLitté: Tolkien / flickr

The phenomenon of evil raises many questions, especially in relation to how God can be justified if God allows such evil to happen. There have been and remain many ways to answer those concerns. However logical, however invaluable each potential solution might be, there always are more questions which can be raised. No one answer seems to be satisfactory. This is why it is invaluable for us to raise several different potential answers, with each giving a new angle, a complementary position, which helps us look at and examine the question in a new light. Each of them will provide is some element of the truth, and so prove worthy of our consideration, even if each of them always proves to be inconclusive in and of itself.  Even though we recognize such answers are being complements to each other, when we examine them and try to bring them together, they seem to contradict each other in significant ways. This is because we are grasping for the absolute truth with limited intellects; what we have to deal with and accept is that our engagement with the truth will be filled with paradoxes, and in this regard, Kant was right in promoting the notion of antinomies. Nonetheless, even as we accept this, we will find some theodicies are more interesting, or more compelling, than others, and these tend to be the ones passed down from generation to generation. One such theodicy can be found in the felix culpa, the notion that our sin, our evil, is a “happy fault,” because in the end it has led to something greater than what would have been if there had been no such fault:

O certe necessárium Adæ peccátum,
quod Christi morte delétum est!

O felix culpa,
quæ talem ac tantum méruit habére Redemptórem!

O truly necessary sin of Adam,
destroyed completely by the Death of Christ!

O happy fault
that earned for us so great, so glorious a Redeemer!

Tolkien embraced the felix culpa in his mythology. Despite all the harm which evil does, there is a sense that the freedom which has allowed such evil in the world allows for and will produce something greater than what could be if no such freedom existed. This is because evil cannot and will not have the final say. Instead, goodness will have the final word. Whatever has been harmed by evil will be taken in by the good, given what it needs to be healed, and will be rendered stronger and better than it was before. Tolkien worked with the notion that the harm that evil has done to the world  (Arda) will be healed and in that healing, the world and all that is in it will be made greater than it was before:

There was, however, one element in the Design of Eru that remained a mystery: the Children of Eru, Elves and Men, the Incarnate. These were said to have been an addition made by Eru Himself after the Revelation to the primal spirits of the Great Design. They were not subject to the subcreative activities of the Valar, and one of the purposes of this addition was to provide the Valar with objects of love, as being in no way their own subject, but having a direct relationship to Eru Himself, like their own but different from it. There were, or were to be, thus “other” than the Valar, independent creations of His love, and so objects for their own reverence and true (entirely unselfregarding) love. Another purpose they had, which remained a mystery to the Valar, was to complete the Design by “healing” the hurts which it suffered, and so ultimately not to recover “Adar Unmarred” (that is the world as it would have been if Evil had never appeared), but the far greater thing “Arda Healed.” [1]

In Tolkien’s mythology, Eru, also known as Ilúvatar (God) created the Ainur (angelic beings), and together with them, produced a great work of music which established the guiding theme for creation, a theme which formed the basis for  the history of the world (Arda). Some of the Ainur, like Melkor (also known as Morgoth), tried to take control, to disrupt the original harmony the Ainur produced and make it their own, only to find Eru was able to use that discord to create something new, a greater, more glorious harmony, which also helped share world history.

Then Ilúvatar spoke, and he said: ‘Mighty are the Ainur, and mightiest among them is Melkor; but that he may know, and all the Ainur, that I am Ilúvatar, those things that ye have sung, I will show them forth, that ye may see what ye have done. And thou, Melkor, shalt see that no theme may be played that hath not its uttermost source in me, nor can any alter the music in my despite. For he that attempteth this shall prove but mine instrument in the devising of things more wonderful, which he himself hath not imagined.’[2]

Despite the freedom which Eru gave to the Ainur, Eru was always working with, in and through them to establish elements of the music which only Eru gave to it, elements which demonstrated Eru remained in control of history. These elements were hidden to everyone but Eru until they manifested themselves in history, so that even the Ainur found themselves consistently surprised as to what they saw happening on Arda. Thus, though Eru had given the Ainur some power over history, they were not given ultimate control; there were many things in the world which went beyond their knowledge and understanding, among which were the “Children of Eru,” that is, the Elves and Men and other similar incarnates. While they were not as great as the Ainur, they had been given their own will, their own ability to shape the contours of history (beyond what the Ainur had done), and their histories would be filled with events which surprised the Ainur. This was, in part, because they came out of the harmony, the “third theme” which Eru made to deal with and overcome the harm that Melkor’s discord had brought to the world:

And they saw with amazement the coming of the Children of Ilúvatar, and the habitation that was prepared for them; and they perceived that they themselves in the labour of their music had been busy with the preparation of this dwelling, and yet knew not that it had any purpose beyond its own beauty. For the Children of Ilúvatar were conceived by him alone; and they came with the third theme, and were not in the theme which Ilúvatar propounded at the beginning, and none of the Ainur had part in their making. Therefore when they beheld them, the more did they love them, being things other than themselves, strange and free, wherein they saw the mind of Ilúvatar reflected anew, and learned yet a little more of his wisdom, which otherwise had been hidden even from the Ainur. [3]

The Children of Eru had their own destiny; included in it was their own ability to do evil, to bring further discord into the world, but in doing so, they were also capable of bringing everything together and establish a final and fitting conclusion to the world and its history, so that in and through them, Arda, the world could and would be healed. Obviously, Tolkien had the incarnation in mind as he wrote this, seeing that in and through humanity, God would become human and work in the world to heal it from all the damage sin had caused it. Nonetheless, this could be and would only be hinted with the most subtle of hints throughout Tolkien’s mythology; in his reflections on his mythology, such as we find in The Nature of Middle Earth,  we find more of his own religious views and opinions, and how they are reflected upon in his myths, but in the myths themselves, he tried to keep such religious elements rare and obscure.

It would seem, in the way Tolkien saw humanity, and the rest of the Children of Eru, as taking part in the work of the Ainur by being a part of the harmony which is necessary to fix the discord Melkor brought to Eru’s design, Tolkien could also have been working with the classical theological opinion that humanity, in some fashion or another, had a destiny to replace those angelic beings which fell with Satan. That is, the “choir of angels” needed its full complement, and humanity could and would produce some who could serve that role. St. Anselm promoted this notion, though he thought (but was not sure) that humanity did more than merely replace the fallen angels:

If the angels, before any of them fell, existed in that full number about which we have spoken, then human beings were created solely for the purpose of replacing the angels who had neem brought to perdition, and it is plain that they will not be greater in number than these. If, on the other hand, the number of all the angels in existence did not add up to that perfect number, what needs to be supplied is both the number of those who had been brought to perdition and the number which had previously been lacking. Moreover, there will be  more elect people than sinful angels, and thus we shall say that human beings were not created solely for the restoration of a number which had been depleted, but also to make up a number what was not yet complete.[4]

Tolkien, through his stories, engaged many of the theological problems which Christians engaged throughout the centuries, showing his basic agreement with the principles Christian thinkers have established, but doing so in a creative fashion. God established creatures with free will, creatures which could and would produce discord, but in the end, that discord would be and could be lifted up and used to make something better. Evil, though not approved by God, and not created by God, could still be used by God to produce something greater. Grace would heal the world from the effects of sin, and through that grace, not only would evil be overcome in the eschaton, what is good will made better thanks to the incarnation. This does not, of course, answer why things could not have developed without such disharmony. Perhaps the answer is that evil, no matter what it tries, has to be proven ineffective;  that is, only if evil is defeated from within, instead by some external force making sure no one chooses evil, can it truly be overcome. If there were no freedom, no subjects which could will evil, evil would be a potential, and so long as it was a potential, it would not be properly overcome. It has to exhaust itself, and in that way, have its very potential extinguished from within. Thus, Tolkien suggested, only by allowing it to play it can it be undone and overcome, and in its overcoming, it will be shown that in all such evil, some good remains, a good which can and will be collected by God to establish a new, greater creation:

Then Ilúvatar spoke, and he said: ‘Mighty are the Ainur, and mightiest among them is Melkor; but that he may know, and all the Ainur, that I am Ilúvatar, those things that ye have sung, I will show them forth, that ye may see what ye have done. And thou, Melkor, shalt see that no theme may be played that hath not its uttermost source in me, nor can any alter the music in my despite. For he that attempteth this shall prove but mine instrument in the devising of things more wonderful, which he himself hath not imagined.’[5]

Evil must come to reveal its own inner weakness, its own inner contradiction, its own ineffectiveness, if it is to be overcome. Only by allowing creatures the freedom to do all they want to do, including all the evil they could want to do, will they see the full fruit of evil and in that demonstration, find its overcoming. The ultimate representation of this in Christian theology is the cross. For Jesus took up the cross as the loving servant of the world, allowing evil to do all it wanted to do to him. Jesus let evil use up all its energy and power on him, so that it could and would expire; in this way, evil was overcome from within. Jesus, in his death, and in the mysterious time before his resurrection, saw evil come to an end so that then he could take all the good which was left and take it into himself and establish a new, glorious creation, a new harmony out of the old, in and through his own resurrection. Thus, the glory of the resurrection is not just his own glory, but the glory of the new creation, the glory of the new harmony, which is begun in time but will find its fulfillment in eternity.

[1] J.R.R. Tolkien, “The Knowledge of the Valar,” in The Nature of Middle Earth. Ed. Carl F. Hostetter (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2021), 233.

[2] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Silmarillion. Ed. Christopher Tolkien (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1977), 17.

[3] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Silmarillion, 18.

[4] St. Anselm, “Why God Became Man” in Anselm of Canterbury. Major Works. Ed. Brian Davies and G.R. Evans (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), 291-2.

[5] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Silmarillion, 17.

 

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September 22, 2021

September 22, 2021 By

cocoparisienne: Clock, Fate, Lifetime / pixabay

We are contingent beings; this is why, though we have free will, our will has limits as to what it can and cannot do. There are boundaries to our freedom. Nonetheless, those boundaries, those limits, establish the context in which we act. We need that context if we want our actions to have meaning and value. For what we decide to do, given the options we have, not only will show to others, as well as to ourselves, the kind of character we have, it will help form and establish our character. For what we do becomes a part of who and what we are. This is what our free will is about and why we have been given it. It gives us the opportunity to create and establish for ourselves what we want to be. Of course, we also are given some (but not absolute) ability to influence things outside ourselves, that is, to shape the context for our future actions, for what we do not only changes us, but changes the world outside of ourselves as well. That there are things outside of our control does not mean we have no freedom; limited freedom is still freedom, because it means there remains some element of our actions which result from our own personal choice outside of the bounds of necessity.

Tolkien, speaking through the voice of  various sages in his writings, tried to deal the problem of free will, reflecting upon how and why it could be said to be preserved even if it were not absolute:

They would not have denied that (say) a man was (may have been) “fated” to meet an enemy of his at a certain time and place, but they would have denied that he was “fated” then to speak to him in terms of hatred, or to slay him. “Will” at a certain grade must enter into many of the complex motions leading to a meeting of persons; but the Eldar held that only those whose efforts of “will” were “free” which were directed to a fully aware purpose. On a journey a man may turn aside, choosing this or that way – e.g. to avoid a marsh, or a steep hill – but this decision is mostly intuitive or half-conscious (as that of an irrational animal) and has only an immediate object of easing his journey. His setting-out may have been a free decision, to achieve some object, but his actual course was largely under physical direction – and it might have led to/or missed a meeting of importance. [1]

Tolkien’s reflections followed along the lines of many medieval thinkers in the way they dealt with predestination (or fate) and human freedom. He did so creatively, as can be seen in the way he turned fate into a category which reflected all those conditions which lay outside our control, that is, into a category related to objectivity. However, he understood, even in situations where fate seemed to have the most influence on our actions, we still had freedom, because we still have the ability to react to whatever it is we experience, for in that reaction, we find we can and will exercise our will. For example, death is a matter of fate; we shall all die, and that fact lies outside of our control; nonetheless, how we deal with death, both in the way we prepare for it all our lives, but also when it is right upon us, indicates where our freedom lies. Thus, while fate often is seen as being opposed to freedom, Tolkien thought that there was a way in which the two could be said to work together. Even when fate seems to have the upper hand, and there are situations which we are “fated” to experience, or actions which we are “fated” to do, Tolkien thought such fate was not absolute and that there remained some room for us to act and react to that fate. Indeed, there could be some good intended for us which, through our actions, we lose or there could be some evil which we are predicted to suffer, but due to the way we exercise our freedom, we circumvent it.[2] Nonetheless, it is clear that Tolkien was concerned about the way we could miss out on some important event, some great good, by the way we act; that is, if we will to do some sort of evil, we could impede our full potential and therefore lose out on various goods which God intended for us.[3]

This follows the way many medieval Christians understood their relationship to the world at large. Though they knew they had freedom, they also knew that many, if not most, of the conditions of their lives were outside of their control. They also knew that many things could and would influence them, and that they must exercise their will to make sure they stayed in control instead of being dominated by such influences. They did not think all such influences were bad, indeed, many, as Hugh of St. Victor explained, were meant for our benefit, but even then, we would have to engage them properly:

God made three wonders of beneficial influence in creation: herbs, precious stones, and the stars. Some herbs have the power to cool down and warm up, causing a complete change in the condition of the body. And all the stars, the planets in particular, have specific effects through the air on bodies subsisting below them. And when the body is changed, its affinity with the soul inside causes the soul to change as well, receiving joy or sadness or other such affections from outside. But these affections do not rule the human soul to such an extent that our actions follow them rather than our discretion and free will. [4]

The problem that most church officials had with astrology was not the notion that the stars could and would influence people and events, but rather, the notion which developed from that premise, the idea that such influence was absolute, making everything outside of our control. Thus, if we look to ancient Christian writings, we will see many, including many of the most educated and holy among them, reflected upon the stars and their influences, that is, engaged some form of astrology, not because they believed the stars established fate, but rather, because they believed those influences could be overridden if we knew of them and actively worked against them.[5]  Those who would try to plot the future, as if it were all absolutely predetermined with nothing that we could do to change it, were those whom the church rejected, but otherwise, the premises behind astrology were often taken seriously, and studied side by side with the rest of the astronomical sciences. It is in doing so, moreover, science was able to advance, showing that many of the supposed influences were not there (or very weak), demonstrating how erroneous it was to try to cast horoscopes in order to predetermine what must come to pass.[6]

Thus, though we have free will, we are influenced by things outside of ourselves, some more directly than others. If we let them, those influences could undermine our will. However, no matter how much we follow after them, how much we let them undermine us and our freedom, we never lose it entirely; we never become pure objects without subjectivity. We remains subjects with a will of our own, and though it has been weakened, thanks to grace, we can exercise it, and make it grow stronger, so that we can regain what we lost. This is why, no matter how much we allow “fate” to influence us and direct us, we still can encounter that “fate” and make something of it for ourselves. Our freedom, our ability to make choices always remains with us. We can sense it in every moment of our existence. Even if and when we feel completely trapped by a situation outside of our control, we still try to do something to change it. We do not give up. We feel there is something which we can do. We could not and would not feel trapped if we did not first know and experience freedom for ourselves, indeed, if we did not yet experience at least some level of that freedom, no matter how miniscule, remained with us. For it is that awareness which allows us to know that our freedom has been impeded; if we did not possess it. This is why  Tolkien’s examination of “fate” and its relationship with free will is interesting and important because it shows us one of the ways in which our will will always remain free, for we will always have the freedom to determine for ourselves our reaction to that situation, even if  that reaction is internal and not capable of changing the situation in and of itself.

[1] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Fate and Free Will,” in The Nature of Middle Earth. Ed. Carl F. Hostetter (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2021), 229.

[2] Is that not what happened to the people of Nineveh?

[3] For example, if someone were called to religious life, but did not enter it, they would lose out much of the glory which God desired them to obtain through such a life.

[4] Hugh of St. Victor, “Notes on Genesis,” in Interpretation of Scripture: Practice. Trans. Jan van Zweiten. Ed. Frans van Leiere and Franklin T. Harkins (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols, 2015), 66

[5] Indeed, in the renaissance, this exactly was what Ficino was doing when he engaged astrology: he was trying to create various means by which human freedom could be increased, not diminished, showing that astrology did not have to be indicative of fate but rather of potentialities.

[6] Nonetheless, the interdependent relationship between all things means all things can and will have some sort of influence upon everything else; the question is not about the possibility of such influence, but how much influence is really there, and it would seem, for most things, it is relatively little.

 

 

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September 15, 2021

September 15, 2021 By

Julian Nyča: Bust of Tolkien At Oxford / Wikimedia Commons

Those who work for and promote the good, those who seek justice in the world, must not knowingly and willingly use evil to fight evil. This is because if they do so, they would slowly be corrupted by the evil they use and replace the evil they fought against with their own evil. This is one of several themes one can find throughout the works of J.R.R. Tolkien. Not only do the ends not justify the means, by embracing evil means, the person who employs that evil will no longer properly seek after and promote the proper good, but instead, they will seek after some lesser good (which, of course, is what evil has us do). The reason why no one should use the Ring against Sauron is that they would only replace Sauron and become the new Dark Lord in his place. The corruption might not be fast; indeed, much good could appear before the evil which lies in it is revealed, but the evil would emerge, and with it, evil would be shown to have been victorious because it would have corrupted and destroyed the good from within, which is a far greater victory for evil than merely having an external victory against the good.

Tolkien understood that those who truly worked for and promoted the good would seek to be consistent with and promote the ideals of the good in all that they did. Evil, if it is not given something to corrupt, something to use up as a kind of fuel, would eventually expend itself and come to an end, and those who worked for the good can then see the good which they have done blossom forth in the world, healing it of the wounds it experienced due to evil. Thus, though evil often appears to be victorious in the world, it is only a limited victory; what lies beyond the tragedy of evil, and all the destruction it brings, is the eucatastrophic ending which will be had by those who supported and worked for the good.

Thus, we see the way in which Manwë dealt with Morgoth, also known as Melkor, was such that he did not, and could not, engage Morgoth in the way Morgoth would have dealt with him. Evil could not overcome evil, for all it would do is replace one evil with another; this is why Manwë had to meet Morgoth’s evil with good, Morgoth’s hate with the dictates of love, and Morgoth’s lies with the truth, even if this appeared to give Morgoth an advantage:

Should Manwë and the Valar meet secrecy with subterfuge, treachery with falsehood, lies with more lies? If Melkor would usurp their rights, should they deny his? Can hate overcome hate? Nay, Manwë was wiser, or being ever open to Eru he did His will, which is more than wisdom. He was even open because he had nothing to conceal, no thought that it was harmful for any to know, if they could comprehend it. Indeed Melkor knew his will without questioning it; and he knew that Manwë was bound by the commands and injunctions of Eru, and would do this or abstain from that in accordance with them, always, even knowing that Melkor would break them as it suited his purpose. Thus the merciless will ever count on mercy, and the liars make use of truth; for if mercy and truth are withheld from the cruel and the lying, they have ceased to be honoured. [1]

Tolkien indicated that if we are to honor mercy and truth, we must truly embrace them, willing to render them to all and not just to those who we think deserve them. Once we stop giving either, or both, to someone, we have ourselves given way against them ourselves and have begun to follow the path of evil, becoming like the one which we oppose:

If Manwë had broken this promise for his own purposes, even though still intending “good”, he would have taken a step upon the paths of Melkor. That is a perilous step. In that hour and act he would have ceased to be the vice-gerent of the One, becoming but a king who takes advantage over a rival whom he has conquered by force. [2]

Intending good, but using an evil means to attain that good, is exactly what leads us along the path to greater and greater evil. For what we have done is see some evil as being good, allowing our own understanding of the good be corrupted. This is exactly what evil does; it corrupts the good, indeed, it is a disordered engagement with the good itself. The more we give in to that disorder, the more we embrace evil, the more we lose ourselves and the good which we once had. Thus, at times, the path of the good is difficult, for evil will encourage us to do things in ways that expediate our desires, but expediting things in such a way comes at too great a cost. Honor, mercy, forgiveness, indeed, the preservation of life, when possible, is necessary if we are not to give in to the sway of evil ourselves. This is why, for example, Gollum could not have been killed by the Elves, even if he “deserved it”:

‘Deserves it! I daresay he does. Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the very wise cannot see all ends. I have not much hope that Gollum can be cured before he dies, but there is a chance of it. And he is bound up with the fate of the Ring. My heart tells me that he has some part to play yet, for good or ill, before the end; and when that comes, the pity of Bilbo may rule the fate of many – yours not least. In any case we did not kill him: he is very old and very wretched. The Wood-elves have him in prison, but they treat him with such kindness as they can find in their wise hearts.” [3]

Capital punishment embraces an evil means, for it seeks to destroy the life of someone else, a life which, however corrupted, contains good in and of itself, a good which could be mended and healed. By acting in such a manner, capital punishment embraces the very evil it seeks to eliminate, causing those who embrace it to follow the path of corruption until they become like the ones they executed, or worse. Who deserves death? We are not the ones to judge that; we must work to preserve life, and if someone has been rendered no longer a threat, we cannot argue self-defense as a justification for executing them. If we say a killer should be executed because no one has the authority to take a life, we contradict ourselves, because we say we have the authority to take a life, and so we become just like the killer, with the only difference being in the reasons  we give for our death-dealing.

It could be said, and indeed, it is often said, if we allow those who have done great evil to live, we risk their escape, and if they do escape, we are to blame. But this, again, Tolkien considered. It is true, they might escape, they might go out into the world and cause more havoc, and we should do what we legitimately can do to make sure this does not happen; but if it happens, though evil will appear to be victorious for a time, such evil nonetheless will find its victory temporary, and it will eventually exhaust itself in one fashion or another. Tolkien showed this in various ways, among which, the way in which Melkor’s escape eventually led to his greater undoing:

The weakest and most imprudent of all the actions of Manwë, as it seems to many, was the release of Melkor from his captivity. From this came the greatest loss and harm; the death of the Trees, and the exile and anguish of the Noldor. Yet through this suffering there came also, as maybe in no other way could it have come, the victory of the Elder Days: the downfall of Angband and the last overthrow of Melkor. [4]

Similarly, the way in which Gollum escaped and survived allowed him to become the means by which Sauron’s Ring was destroyed. Though Gandalf did not know that this would happen, he sensed that the mercy shown to Gollum by Bilbo and the Elves would lead to some greater good, and that greater good would justify the mercy which was rendered to him. Tolkien also pointed out that those who do evil, but find themselves halted by the good, will also be given the opportunity to repent and change their ways. If this were to happen, they would then be able to work for and help overcome the damage they have done to the world, which would produce a far greater good than what would happen if what had been corrupted by evil found their life extinguished. [5] Thus, Manwë rightfully hoped that even Morgoth had a chance to be saved, because being held captive, he would be prevented from doing evil, allowing him the time to think upon and contemplate his misdeeds:

He was made captive as a punishment for his evil deeds, under the authority of the King. So we may say; but it were better said that he was deprived for a term, fixed by promise, of his power to act, so that he might halt and consider himself, and have thus the only chance that mercy could contrive of repentance and amendment. For the healing of Arda indeed, but for his own healing also. Melkor had the right to exist, and the right to act and use his powers. Manwë had the authority to rule and to order the world, so far as he could, for the well-being of the Eruhuini; but of Melkor would repent and return to the allegiance of Eru, he might be given his freedom again. He could not be enslaved, or denied his part. [6]

While, it is true that many who are imprisoned do not repent and change their ways, certainly there have been many criminals who have indeed become reformed, so that this notion that we should work to preserve criminals and do what we can to promote such reformation is justified. The key is to do what we can to help encourage such a change. Prison should not be is about revenge, for vengeance is in the hands of God, not us. So long as we ignore this, prison will less likely bring about reformation, and those imprisoned, when set free, will not have changed their ways; this is because no one showed them the care and compassion they needed to find themselves redirected  and embrace the good they had forsaken; instead, they would have found their ways validated by the system itself. To be sure, many might reject such reformation, no matter how much it is encouraged, and such people will likely be a threat to society all their lives. This is why prison can be and should also be used to keep them separate from society as whole, so that they will not be able to cause much more harm to society (and it would, in theory, also protect them from those in society who would otherwise seek them harm). In doing so, we should always treat those imprisoned with the dignity all humans deserve, for if we deny them that dignity, we become monsters ourselves, showing the evil has not been stopped but only transferred to new inhabitants.

Tolkien understood the way evil worked and corrupted people. He saw not only the way people could and would embrace evil means for some intended good, but how, in that embrace, they would create new, and possibly worse terrors themselves. He also understood the difficulties involved in following the path of the good, that it could and often would appear to be a weakness to do good. He saw that evil could and would often take advantage of that apparent weakness. But he saw that so long as evil did not find new hosts, it would eventually find its host exhausted, and the evil itself will create its own undoing.[7] The good, then preserved, can set about healing the world which had been damaged by such evil, but it could not and would not do so if those who were on the side of the good allowed the ways of evil to corrupt them, for then, instead of healing the world, they would have continued its destruction.

[1] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Ósanwe-Kenta,” in The Nature of Middle Earth. Ed. Carl F. Hostetter (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2021), 214-15.

[2] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Ósanwe-Kenta,” 216.

[3] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring in The Lord of the Rings: Collector’s Edition (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1974; repr: no date listed), 69.  Frodo would eventually learn this lesson, for not only does he  find himself saving Gollum’s life, he would also seek to preserve Saruman’s life despite all the evil Saruman had done to the Shire.

[4] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Ósanwe-Kenta,” 216.

[5] In this fashion, Tolkien even suggested “Arda” (or the world) healed from the damage done to it by evil would become something greater than it would have been if it had not been marred. See, for example, J.R.R. Tolkien, “The Knowledge of the Valar,” in The Nature of Middle Earth. Ed. Carl F. Hostetter (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2021), 233.

[6] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Ósanwe-Kenta,” 215.

[7] At the end of the Lord of the Rings, this is exemplified in the way Frodo granted Saruman mercy, showing he had learned what he did not understand before he had been the Ringbearer. Frodo did what was good, but despite the mercy Frodo showed Saruman, Saruman would not live long, for his corrupted servant, Wormtongue, would kill him, showing that Saruman had created the means for his very destruction.

 

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June 3, 2020

June 3, 2020 By

Pau Llopart Cervello (paxillop): The Lord of the Rings / pixabay

JR.R. Tolkien, in his letters, talks about the way one of his readers thought Frodo should have been treated as a traitor and sentenced to death:

Fair it would and did as far as Frodo considered alone was concerned. He ‘apostatized’ – and I have had one savage letter, crying out that he shd. have been executed as a traitor, not honoured.[1]

Tolkien understood that Frodo had failed. But he understood there was more to Frodo’s story than giving in to temptation. He had fought against it until he come to the limits of his strength, and it was only after he was broken down that he gave in. Through the story of Frodo, Tolkien showed how frail he understood humanity could be: people can be beaten down, broken down, manipulated, and pushed to their limit until, at last, they do the thing they thought they would never do. Good people can be made to do bad things, and, if we have not suffered as they have suffered, if we have not been tortured and pushed to the limit as they have been, we should avoid judging them, thinking we would do better in their shoes: “It seems sad and strange that, in this evil time when daily people of good will are tortured, ‘brainwashed’, and broken, anyone could be so fiercely simpleminded and selfrighteous.”[2] Indeed, when talking about the ultimate fate of anyone, he knew the kind of humility we should have: “But we who are all ‘in the same boat’ must not usurp the Judge”. [3] He applied this even to Gollum: “Into the ultimate judgment of Gollum I would not care to enquire.” [4]

Through his experiences with war, as well as seeing what he saw happening around the world during his life, Tolkien learned how evil could corrupt and destroys otherwise good people. Frodo was a good person, a hero, who was worthy of all the honor and respect he received, despite the fact that in the end, he gave into temptation. He pushed on to the end, using all his strength to resist evil, and that was  all he could be expected to do: “Frodo deserved all honour because he spent every drop of his power of will and body, and that was just sufficient to bring him to the destined point, and no further.” [5]

It was not just the fact that Frodo had wrestled with, and fought valiantly, against the Ring for so long which allowed him to be a hero and receive a hero’s reward. It was also his good, indeed, merciful nature, one which he shared with Bilbo, which also allowed him to receive the mercy which he himself needed after he gave into his desire to claim the Ring for himself. Tolkien believed, following the teachings of Christ, that this was exactly the spirit which we need to have if we want to be saved. We need to show mercy and forgiveness to others if we want to receive mercy and forgiveness for ourselves:

But we are assumed that we must be ourselves extravagantly generous, if we are to hope for the extravagant generosity which the slightest easing of, or escape from, the consequences of our own follies and errors represents. And that mercy does sometimes occur in this life. [6]

Frodo fulfilled his duty, even if he also was overcome by the Ring, because he had first been merciful to Gollum. Indeed, it was not just his mercy, but all the mercy and pity which Gollum received throughout the years which allowed Gollum to be where he needed to be to take the Ring to its final doom. If at any time beforehand, pity had not been shown to him, it is likely that the quest to destroy the Ring would have ended in failure. Thus, Tolkien, seeing the pattern which developed in his writings, acknowledges that it was such pity and mercy which brought salvation to the world (as well as to those who fell into temptation themselves):

When Frodo says it was a pity that Bilbo did not kill Gollum, Gandalf quickly replies, ‘Pity? It was Pity that stayed his hand.’ (Notice how Tolkien himself capitalizes and personifies Pity). As the wizard further reflects upon the mercy shown to the creature, he muses that ‘the pity of Bilbo may rule the fate of many – yours not least’ (FR I/2), and in the long trajectory of the plot, the Ring is destroyed only because Gollum bites it from Frodo’s finger. If not for Bilbo’s pity, in show, Frodo’s quest would have failed. Tolkien reflected after publication that ‘the “salvation” of the world and Frodo’s own “salvation” is achieved by his previous pity and forgiveness of injury.’ [7]

Tolkien caught on to a major Christian element in his works. If we want to receive mercy, we must ourselves be merciful. Certainly, we should struggle against sin, but if and when we fail in our struggles and give in, we do not have to fear all is lost. God’s grace transcends our sins and is able to save us. Nonetheless, if we are to be saved, we must recognize in humility not only our failings, but human weakness in general so that we can then share the mercy we receive with others understanding their failings come from the same weakness which we have. We must recognize that as we falter and give in to our temptations, others, likewise, falter and give in to their own temptations; the temptations might differ, the pressure put on people to give in might differ, but everyone has a point in which, without grace, they will give in to sin. When Peter denied Christ three times, he had come to the limit of his own power to resist evil, but because he had a great, merciful and loving heart (which Christ brought out when he met with Peter after the resurrection), he was able to receive forgiveness. When Ossius of Cordova signed an Arian decree, it was only after extensive torture of himself and his loved ones; he had been taken to the limit and was broken down; nonetheless, with the greatness of his faith, hope and love, once he was set free, he was free to denounce what he had done and receive forgiveness (which is why St. Athanasius always considered Ossius with the highest of regards). Endo’s Silence also delves into this theme, with Christ himself affirming the forgiveness of those who were broken down by the powers that be in Japan.

Thus, Tolkien presents to us the picture of salvation which follows the Lord’s prayer. If we want mercy, if we want forgiveness, we must be merciful to others. We cannot judge them and their final fate. We can judge their actions, to be sure, but we cannot judge what lies behind their actions, knowing whether or not they were broken down and faltered through the stress of their lives, or if the followed through with evil without putting up a fight. Even if it is the latter, people still possess an element of the good within them, so that like Gollum, there is always hope for their salvation. We should hope for the salvation of all and act out in that hope with mercy and grace so that we then, can attain the salvation which desire for ourselves despite our own failings. If we deny such mercy to others, then we risk our own condemnation, as the Venerable Bede explains in his commentary on James:

For there will be judgment without mercy on him who has not acted mercifully. He will be judged without mercy who, when he was able to do so, did not act mercifully before he could be judged. Since this may be properly felt about all who are without mercy, it is clear in every way that the greater the mercy each one has obtained from the Lord, the more unjust he is in denying mercy to a neighbor needing it and the more justly he has paid the penalty for this wickedness . [8]

Frodo learned this lesson well, as the Scouring of the Shire shows. He was willing to show the mercy he received to Saruman, and in doing so, overcome evil with good, as Paul said Christians should do:

Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God; for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.”  No, “if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals upon his head.”  Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. (Romans (RSV) 12:19-22 RSV).

Frodo’s mercy stung at Saruman, giving him the final victory:

Saruman turned to go, and Wormtongue shuffled after him. But even as Saruman passed close to Frodo a knife flashed in his hand, and he stabbed swiftly. The blade turned on the hidden mail-coat and snapped. A dozen hobbits, led by Sam, leaped forward with a cry and flung the villain to the ground. Sam drew his sword.

‘No, Sam!’ said Frodo. ‘Do not kill him even now. For he has not hurt me. And in any case I do not wish him to be slain in this evil mood. He was great once, of a noble kind that we should not dare to raise our hands against. He is fallen, and his cure is beyond us; but I would still spare him, in the hope that he may find it.’

Saruman rose to his feet, and stared at Frodo. There was a strange look in his eyes of mingled wonder and respect and hatred. ‘You have grown, Halfling,’ he said. ‘Yes, you have grown very much. You are wise, and cruel. You have robbed my revenge of sweetness, and now I must go hence in bitterness, in debt to your mercy. I hate it and you! Well, I go and I will trouble you no more. But do not expect me to wish you health and long life. You will have neither. But that is not my doing. I merely foretell.’[9]

It was Wormtongue, following the evil ways of his master, who would bring an end to Saruman, embracing a nihilistic hate, showing the end which evil brings upon all who embrace it. It knows no love, no mercy, no hope, no glory. It only knows gloom and the desire for destruction. To hold onto mercy, to embrace it, is to hold on to the whatever remnant of the good lies within us all, holding onto that which offers healing and rest. So long as we remain merciful to others, we can hope that such mercy will be met with greater mercy, one which will lead to our salvation: for when mercy meets mercy, it finds the heart willing to be saved.

[1] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Letter 181 to Michael Straight [drafts]” in The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. ed. Humphrey Carpenter (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1981), 234.

[2] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Letter 192 to Amy Ronald” in The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. ed. Humphrey Carpenter (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1981), 253.

[3] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Letter181 to Michael Straight,” 234.

[4] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Letter181 to Michael Straight,” 234.  This is in part because Tolkien also understood that despite how corrupted Gollum was, there was always some good which remained. Gandalf, therefore, said that there was some hope, albeit little, for Gollum:

‘Only too true, I fear,’ said Gandalf. ‘But there was something else in it, I think, which you don’t see yet. Even Gollum was not wholly ruined. He had proved tougher than even one of the Wise would have guessed -as a hobbit might. There was a little corner of his mind that was still his own, and light came through it, as through a chink in the dark: light out of the past. It was actually pleasant, I think, to hear a kindly voice again, bringing up memories of wind, and trees, and sun on the grass, and such forgotten things.

‘But that, of course, would only make the evil part of him angrier in the end – unless it could be conquered. Unless it could be cured.’ Gandalf sighed. ‘Alas! there is little hope of that for him. Yet not no hope. No, not though he possessed the Ring so long, almost as far back as he can remember. For it was long since he had worn it much: in the black darkness it was seldom needed. Certainly he had never “faded”. He is thin and tough still. But the thing was eating up his mind, of course, and the torment had become almost unbearable. — [4] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring in The Lord of the Rings: Collector’s Edition (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1966), 64.

[5] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Letter 192 to Amy Ronald” in The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. ed. Humphrey Carpenter (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1981), 253.

[6] J.R.R. Tolkien, “Letter 192 to Amy Ronald,” 253.

[7] John. M. Bowers, Tolkien’s Lost Chaucer (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019), 116.

[8] Venerable Bede, “Commentary on James” in Commentary on the Seven Catholic Epistles. Trans. Dom. David Hurst, OSB (Kalamazoo, MI: Cistercian Publications, 1985), 26-7.

[9] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King in The Lord of the Rings: Collector’s Edition (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1966), 299.

 

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February 7, 2020

February 7, 2020 By

Araniart: Elves Leave Middle Earth / Wikimedia Commons

J.R.R. Tolkien, believing England did not possess a great myth of its own, wanted to write one for it. As with all such myths, he wanted it to be seen as semi-historical, that is, he wanted it to be seen as a possible pre-history for the world. In his writings and reflections, he treated it as if it were history, trying to reconcile what we know of recorded history with his myth, while recognizing that its mythic elements allowed it to transcend history and present universal truths in a way which only myths can do.

Tolkien was a devout Catholic, and many have noted various Catholic elements find themselves expressed in his works. On the other hand, many elements of his myth seem to contradict is Catholic beliefs. If Tolkien wanted his myth to be taken as a possible pre-history of the world (even if he knew it was not), it would seem that he would not want his Catholic faith to contradict what is found in his myth. Was there a way he could reconcile the two?

Tolkien could respond by pointing out that a part of the confusion lies in the difference between myth and theology. What is acceptable in myth, what is acceptable in poetry, is different from what one would expect from a systematic theological examination. Nonetheless, this does not mean Tolkien wasn’t challenged in trying to keep his mythic universe compatible with his Catholic faith. He was, but in many ways, he was following along the tradition of the great writers of myth and legends from the Middle Ages, because, like him, they assimilated non-Christian traditions and ideas into Christian stories (such as can be found in Beowulf or the legends surrounding King Arthur). Tolkien was trying to produce a great English myth which took into account not only his Christian faith but the pre-Christian and non-Christian tradition which helped create England.

There are certainly many places in his work in which the conflict between various non-Christian and Christian views shows up, but perhaps none make itself more apparent than the way reincarnation worked for Tolkien’s Elves.  As Scull and Hammond’s Reader’s Guide explained, from the earliest stages of his writings, The Book of Lost Tales, Tolkien had established ways in which Elves which had been killed were able to be reborn in the world (with the caveat that Elves could and sometimes refused to do so):

From the writing of *The Book of Last Tales, for decades it was a firm tent of his mythology that the Elves who were killed might be reborn in their children, and this was still the case when Tolkien wrote *Laws and Customs among the Eldar in the late 1950s, in connection with the story of the Elf Miriel who ‘died’ and refused to reincarnate. [1]

Sometimes, Tolkien had the Valar make the new bodies for the Elves, but eventually he went forward with a more traditional approach in which the souls of the Elves, the fëa, made their own body for itself:

In Reincarnation of the Elves, as a second thought, Tolkien considered whether, rather than the Valar making the new body, the houseless fëa might be able to rebuild its body from memory. In the very late writings it is clear that this became his view of the matter.[2]

If Elves chose to forgo reincarnation, they could wander around “houseless” without a body, and thus become ghosts in the world.  But it is clear, for Tolkien, the fate of the Elves tied them to the world, and so they were meant to be immortal and stay with the world throughout all time. Due to Melkor and the corruption he put into the world of creation, Elves could be killed, but because of their connection to the Earth, they were expected to eventually reincarnate (and those who did not do so were rebelling against their proper nature as well as the Valar).

Tolkien was very clear that such reincarnation was for the Elves, and not for humanity, keeping therefore with his Catholic faith about the fate of humanity. When asked to justify it, his response is that he didn’t think Catholic theological particularly rejected reincarnation for all life, just human life, as Verlyn Flieger explained in a discussion concerning reincarnation found in The Notion Club Papers:

For a practicing Catholic like Tolkien, the idea of reincarnation would have been theologically problematic, although on a purely intellectual basis he seems to have had no trouble with the concept. In answer to an inquiring reader who asked him about the practicality of the Elven-concept of reincarnation in Half-Elven offspring, he wrote, “I do not see how even in the Primary World any theologian or philosopher, unless very much better informed about the relation of spirit and body than I believe anyone to be, could deny the possibility of re-incarnation as a mode of existence prescribed for certain kinds of rational incarnate creatures” (Letters 189). Whether he acknowledged the possibility theologically or simply chose to accept it imaginatively, nevertheless, in the limited freedom that comes with being an imaginative world-maker, reincarnation offered him a viable means of entry into his “Mars.”[3]

Now, it might be asked, why did Tolkien feel the need to have Elves reincarnate? What brought about this aspect of his mythos, especially when it seemed to challenge if not run contrary to his Catholic beliefs?

Perhaps the answer lies in the fact that Tolkien was trying to write a myth for England, and in doing so, incorporate and acknowledge various folklore traditions into his work to help make it authentic. In doing so, we can find he had many sources of inspiration, from the Finnish Kalevala to the Nordic Sagas. But, more important for us here, we should note that this included Celtic lore, despite the ambivalent stand he took on it. For, as Scull and Hammond relate, Celtic influence can be found throughout his work:

Despite his denial to Stanley Unwin, elsewhere Tolkien admitted a certain Celtic influence on his writing. In a letter to Milton Waldman written in ?late 1951 he said that one element he wanted his mythology to possess was ‘the fair elusive beauty that some call Celtic (though it is rarely found in genuine ancient Celtic things)’ (Letters, p. 144). On 25 April 1954 he wrote to Naomi Mitchison that ‘the living language of the Western Elves’, Sindarin, had ‘a linguistic character very like (though not identical with) British-Welsh: because that character is one that I find, in some linguistic moods, very attractive, and because it seems to fit the rather “Celtic” type of legends and stories told of its speakers’ (Letters, p.176). [4]

The Elves, therefore, have a Celtic aspect to them. And this then brings us to why Tolkien would have them reincarnate: because folklore studies indicated a similar notion concerning Celtic fairies: that they, too, were known to reincarnate. In his extensive study, The Fairy Faith in Celtic Countries, published in 1911, W.Y. Evans-Wentz explained that belief in the reincarnation was a part of the Celtic fairy tradition:

We proceed now directly to show that there was also a belief, probably widespread, among the ancient Irish that divine personages, national heroes who are members of the Tuatha De Danann or Sidhe race, and great men, can be reincarnated, that is to say, can descend to this plane of existence and be as mortals more than once. This aspect of the Celtic Doctrine of Re-birth has been clearly set forth by the publications of such eminent Celtic folk-lorists as Alfred Nutt and Miss Eleanor Hull. Miss Hull, in her study of Old Irish Tabus, or Gesa,  referring to the Cuchulainn Cycle of Irish literature and mythology, writes thus:–‘There is no doubt that all the chief personages of this cycle were regarded as the direct descendants, or it would be more correct to say, as avatars or reincarnations of the early gods. Not only are their pedigrees traced up to the Tuatha De Danann, but there are indications in the birth-stories of nearly all the principal personages that they are looked upon simply as divine beings reborn on the human plane of life. These indications are mysterious, and most of the tales which deal with them show signs of having been altered, perhaps intentionally, by the Christian transcribers. The doctrine of re-birth was naturally not one acceptable to them. . . . The goddess Etain becomes the mortal wife of a king of Ireland. . . . Conchobhar, moreover, is spoken of as a terrestrial god;  and Dechtire, his sister, and the other of Cúchulainn, is called a goddess.  In the case of Cúchulainn himself, it is distinctly noted that he is the avatar of Lugh lamhfada (long-hand), the sun-deity  of the earliest cycle. Lugh appears to Dechtire, the mother of Cúchulainn, and tells her that he himself is her little child, i.e. that the child is a reincarnation of himself; and Cúchulainn when inquired of as to his birth, points proudly to his descent from Lugh. When, too, it is proposed to find a wife for the hero, the reason assigned is, that they knew “that this re-birth would be of himself” (i. e. that only from himself could another such as he have origin).’  We have in this last a clue to the popular Irish belief regarding the re-birth of beings of a god-like nature. D’Arbois de Jubainville has shown,  also, that the grandfather of Cuchulainn, son of Sualtaim, was from the country of the Sidhe, and so was Ethné Ingubé, the sister of Sualtaim. And Dechtire, the mother of Cuchulainn, was the daughter of the Druid Cathba and the brother of King Conchobhar. Thus the ancestry of the great hero of the Red Branch Knights of Ulster is both royal and divine. And Conall Cernach, Cuchulainn’s comrade and avenger, apparently from a tale in the Cóir Anmann (Fitness of Names), composed probably during the twelfth century, was also a reincarnated Tuatha De Danann hero. [5]

Thus, by his inclination to include traditional mythic folklore into his own story, to help make for a myth for England, Tolkien’s Elves take on aspects found in the greater tradition. It helped authenticate his story by connecting it with the greater, and more wide-spread understanding of the Elvish tradition. It was, of course, to be carefully developed throughout is writings, so that he would create a lore all which transcended the sources which inspired him.  Nonetheless, its roots remain within the classical tradition, a tradition which he knew about – and reflected upon – in his other writings and lectures, such as found in his On Fairy-Stories. Likewise, we know many of his own stories and poems incorporate this tradition more than others, showing his attempt to take historical events (like the Death of St. Brendan) and tie them into his own mythic history, showing that he was truly trying to write a myth which could include pre-Christian notions and Christian history and theology and relate them together.

It is, therefore, Tolkien’s inclusive view of myth, where myths represent the truth in a non-literal, non-positivistic fashion, that allowed Tolkien to develop notions concerning Middle Earth which represented ancient (and pre-Christian) views. But he was aware of the challenge it posed. He did not want to see his myth as fundamentally contrary to his faith, but on the other hand, he did not want to limit his mythic exploration by following the most simplistic (and literalistic) representations of the Catholic faith. He believed that within orthodox teaching there was a wide diversity of possibilities which could be used in his works. While reincarnation was denied for humanity, it was not entirely denied for others. Indeed, medieval Christians wrestled with these questions, as they took and adapted folklore people believed in, including Elvish folklore, as they tried to find a place for the Elves in the Christian tradition. Tolkien, following his predecessors’ inclinations that the Elves were tied to the Earth and its history, had to explain what happened to them if they were killed. His response was creative, even if it could be said to exist on the edge of Christian thought.  His work, then, shows that Catholics are not bound to a very narrow worldview; of course, this is not to mean all possibilities are equally valid, but it does show the great diversity of thought possible once Catholics start thinking beyond what is dogmatically defined and into what is possible.

This is important because many Catholics, sadly, as with many critics of Catholic, have long thought Catholicism teaches a very narrow perspective and worldview, which all Catholics must follow. This is not the case. Catholicism allows for a great diversity of thought so long as that diversity can show itself compatible with revelation. And as Tolkien shows us, this leaves room for very creative notions. It is this creativity Catholics need to embrace as they engage not only literature and the arts, like Tolkien, but the sciences as well, for Catholics need to be able to develop their faith which fit the worldview they find themselves living in if they want to be able to have a voice in the development of that worldview for future generations.

[1] Christina Scull and Wayne G. Hammond, The J.R.R. Tolkien Companion and Guide: Reader’s Guide (London: HarperCollins, 2006), 827.

[2] Christina Scull and Wayne G. Hammond, The J.R.R. Tolkien Companion and Guide: Reader’s Guide, 827.

[3] Verlyn Flieger, A Question of Time: J.R.R. Tolkien’s Road to Faërie (Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 1997), 134-5.

[4] Christina Scull and Wayne G. Hammond, The J.R.R. Tolkien Companion and Guide: Reader’s Guide, 150.

[5] W.Y.Evans-Wentz, The Fairy Faith in Celtic Countries (Glastonbury, UK: Lost Library, 2016), 368-9. Similarly, Evans-Wentz documented in his work the way many of those who believed in fairies thought of them to be wandering spirits of the dead, which fits Tolkien’s approach concerning those Elves who chose to forgo reincarnation.
There are elements of Evans-Wentz’s work which can help illuminate aspects of Tolkien’s approach to the fairy. For example, Tolkien, and Evans-Wentz agreed in theory that the reduction of Celtic belief in fairies to simply being some sort of memory of an ancient pygmy race was erroneous. Evans-Wentz thought such a theory was reductionistic and ignored many aspects of fairy lore, including the size of many of the faeries (see ibid., xxii-xxiii; 233-235). Tolkien, likewise, understood that the inhabitants of the fairy realm was not necessarily diminutive in size:

As for diminutive size: I do not deny that the notion is a leading one in modern use. I have often thought it would be interesting to try to find out how this has come to be; but my knowledge is not sufficient for a certain answer. Of old there were indeed some inhabitants of Faërie that were small (though hardly diminutive), but smallness was not characteristic of that people as a whole. The diminutive being, elf or fairy, is (I guess) in England largely a sophisticated product of literary fancy.
(J.R.R. Tolkien, “On Fairy-Stories” in The Monster & The Critics and Other Essays. Ed. Christopher Tolkien (London: HarperCollins 1997), 110-1).

And, in what might represent an indication of Tolkien thinking through the source material with some knowledge of Evans-Wentz, he explained that for those faerie who are small, it was not an essential feature of who they were, making pygmy theories ridiculous:  “But smallness in Faërie, as in our world, is only an accident. Pygmies are not nearer to fairies than are Patagonians.”(J.R.R. Tolkien, “On Fairy-Stories,”115).

It would be interesting to see how much, if any, of Evans-Wentz’s work directly or indirectly influenced the development of Tolkien’s lore. To be sure, there will be parallels, because the two worked with much of the same material, but Evans-Wentz work was written for a Bachelor of Science degree at Oxford University in 1910, and so it would have been readily available for Tolkien to peruse.

 

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