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News from Bree
spymaster@theonering.net
Dec 24 2013, 8:28am
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Christmas, Eru and Middle-earth. A look at The Debate of Finrod and Ahrabeth
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[caption id="attachment_85533" align="alignright" width="300"] Finrod Felagund and the people of Bëor; art by Ted Nasmith.[/caption] In this new TORn Library feature, Dr Timothy Furnish explores a lesser-known, but important, philosophical treatise from The History of Middle-earth and speculates whether J.R.R. Tolkien may have doing more than "merely" evoking Christian myth.
Is Christmas the Birthday of Eru’s Son? Incarnational Theology in Middle-earth by Timothy R. Furnish Much has been written in the last half-century on J.R.R. Tolkien as a Catholic writer and on Christian themes in his various tales of Middle-earth, especially The Lord of the Rings; to name but a few of the most prominent examples: Frodo as a suffering Christ-like figure; Gandalf as a dying but resurrected type of Christ; lembas as consecrated bread; Galadriel ‘s similarities to Mary; Aragorn as the pious and noble ruler who vanquishes evil and heals the land; and, in general, the constant reminder that “there are other forces at work in this world... besides the will of evil.” But Tolkien went beyond mere symbolism or figurative hinting at Christian theology and actually embedded the prophecy of the Incarnation within Middle-earth’s history, in “Athrabeth Finrod Ah Andreth” (“The Debate of Finrod and Andreth”) found in Morgoth’s Ring: The Later Silmarillion, Part One: The Legends of Aman (Houghton Mifflin Company, 1993), pp. 303-366. Finrod Felagund was a Noldorin Elf of the First Age (some 7,000 years before the War of the Ring!), brother of Galadriel and King of Nargothrond, as well as the first Elf to encounter Men. He was killed by a werewolf in Sauron’s dungeons while helping Beren on his quest to regain a Silmaril from Morgoth. Andreth was a mortal woman in love with Finrod’s brother, Aegnor, whom the King of Nargothrond would periodically visit and converse with at length on the differences between Elves and Men in terms of mortality and immortality. (“Do candles pity moths?” Andreth asks Finrod; to which he replies “Or moths candles, when the wind blows them out?”) But in the course of discussing the evil that Melkor, renamed Morgoth, the original Dark Lord (and Sauron’s mentor) had done to Arda (the solar system), their conversation takes on an eschatological and decidedly proto-Christian tone. Finrod relates it had occurred (or been revealed?) to him that “the errand of Men” was “to heal the Marring of Arda” and that he had had a vision of “Arda Remade” wherein the “Eldar... could abide in the present for ever, and there walk, maybe, with the Children of Men, their deliverers.” This optimistic prophecy then elicited a confession from Andreth—that there was an “Old Hope” among Men which said that “the One [Eru, or God] will himself enter into Arda, and heal Men and all the Marring from the beginning to the end.” The Elven King responds that “these things are beyond the compass of the wisdom of the Eldar, or of the Valar maybe”—the Valar being the archangelic beings who, in the First Age, still dwelt in Valinor, to the west of Middle-earth—while also avowing that “if Eru wished to do this, I do not doubt that He would find a way.” Finrod goes on to admit that “I cannot conceive how else this healing could be achieved” since “there is no power conceivably greater than Melkor save Eru only. Therefore Eru, if He will not relinquish His work to Melkor... must come in to conquer him.” He also marvels that “no such hope was ever spoken to the Quendi” [the Elves’ name for themselves]” and was in fact given only to mortal Men. Christopher Tolkien, who edited this work, affixes some 40 pages of explanatory notes and snippets from other writings of his father’s to the end of “Athrabeth Finrod Ah Andreth.” Much of it deals with the relationship of the body (hröa) to the soul (fëa) among Elves and Men. But a fair amount examines this Middle-earth protoevangelium: “since Finrod had already guessed the redemptive function was originally specially assigned to Men, he... proceeded to the expectation that... Eru would come incarnated in human form” (although this specific expectation is not actually spelled out in the Athrabeth). Christopher Tolkien adduces a slip of paper on which his father had written that this story “is (if inevitably) too like a parody of Christianity” but then opines that “this surely is not parody, nor even parallel, but the extension—if only represented as vision, hope, or prophecy—of the ‘theology’ of Arda into... Christian belief; and a manifest challenge to my father’s view in his letter of 1951 on the necessary limitations of the expression of ‘moral and religious truth (or error) in a ‘Secondary World.’” The 1951 letter to which the younger Tolkien refers is one to Milton Waldman of Collins Publishing, the relevant part of which is that Tolkien critiqued the Arthurian legend for being too explicitly Christian: “that seems to me fatal. Myth and fairy-story must, as all art, reflect and contain in solution elements of moral and religious truth (or error), but not explicit, not in the known form of the primary ‘real’ world” (Humphrey Carter, ed., The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, Houghton Mifflin, 1995, p. 144). How might we read this riddle of Incarnational prophecy in Middle-earth? Did J.R.R. Tolkien change his mind about the error of making Secondary World theology resemble overmuch that of the Primary World? Or did he perhaps feel that giving the Elves some glimmer of redemptive hope would lessen their dread of the future: “beyond the ‘End of Arda’ Elvish thought could not penetrate, and they were without specific instruction... They said therefore that Men had a shadow behind them, but the Elves had a shadow before them.” Then again, maybe the creator of Middle-earth simply let his Catholic faith get the better of him and overrule his literary governor. Perhaps it is wise not to delve too deeply into such matters. Rather, let us simply rejoice in the notion that the Dominion of Men ushered in by Aragorn as King Elessar does not merely refer to the political and demographic supplanting of the other races by humans, but to the realization of God’s salvific plan for all sentient creatures through one Man. Thus, it is worth considering that Christ’s “other sheep…not of this fold” (John 10:16) might refer to Elves (and Dwarves, and Hobbits), if they ever did exist; and that the Son of Eru whose birth we celebrate on December 25th died and rose for them as well as for all Men and Women. Happy Yule/Merry Christmas! Timothy R. Furnish is a PhD in History (Islamic, World and African) and also holds a M.A.R. in Christian theology and history. His book Glorious Warriors And That Which They Defend: War and Politics in Middle-earth’s History should be out from Oloris Publishing in spring 2014.
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Rembrethil
Tol Eressea
Dec 24 2013, 3:54pm
Post #2 of 10
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I was going to talk about this on Sunday! Oh well.... Good thoughts here, whether you agree or not with the religious sentiment. Was Tolkien becoming more romantic and using the great medium of religious hope to carry that weight and burden of hope? Or was he getting too religious? Personally, I don't find it distracting. If I read a Buhddist author, I expect Buhddist elements to crop up, or even dominate, given enough time. If I ask a Mormon for their opinion on something, I expect a Mormon answer. If I ask an Atheist what the meaning of life is, I expect an atheistic answer. You can't deny yourself in the long run, Tolkien's faith was very important to him, and something so close to his heart couldn't be hidden. We all have our own bias, and I just make judgement on what ideas occur, and refuse or accept them. We do it every day. When someone says' Look at that red balloon!' we compare the colour of the balloon to out personal standard of 'redness'. We then agree or disagree, and we can try to convince each other of their error, and as we have more experience of 'redness', we may modify our thoughts on the matter. Or not. What natural sceptics we all are!!
Call me Rem, and remember, not all who ramble are lost...Uh...where was I?
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Mikah
Lorien
Dec 24 2013, 5:00pm
Post #3 of 10
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I am still most interested to read the thoughts that you have prepared for Sunday Rem!
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CuriousG
Half-elven
Dec 24 2013, 5:06pm
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There are Christian authors who don't seem to weave Christianity into what they write, but Tolkien clearly did the weaving, whether he felt ambivalent about it or not. I think there are people who don't want to read about Christianity who would like to say it doesn't exist in Tolkien's world, but it does, it's just something that you have to pretend isn't there if you prefer it that way. At the same time, I would call his works original fiction and not disguised Christianity. As you say, you can see the influence of his beliefs, which is pretty normal for a writer, whatever their beliefs are. I think when readers get most annoyed is when an author is heavy-handed and awkward about inserting their belief system into their works. It's the subtlety that counts. It's funny that JRR found Arthurian legend to be too obviously Christian. I don't think of it that way. It's another story where you can see Christian influences, but I don't think "Oh, look, there's Jesus, and there's Mary" when I read an Arthurian tale. Maybe because I haven't read the same versions that he did.
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Rembrethil
Tol Eressea
Dec 24 2013, 5:40pm
Post #5 of 10
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That the overt and anachronistic Christian faith professed by Arthur and his knights, was the disappointing factor for JRRT. There is no reasonable way that the whole kingdom was as thoroughly 'christianized' as the later tales make it. The loss of the original pagan stories might have affected Tolkien more as a literary and linguistic appreciator. Like the loss of a great piece of art might be lamented by an art lover, and the later copies and imitations may be despised. On the topic of religion in literature, Well, Tolkien is always the exception to the rule. By all rights, he should NEVER have been published. The Council of Elrond chapter should NOT work. A million other things are 'wrong' with Tolkien's works, but we love them, and they DO work. We have to keep in mind that not a lot of other writers had such longevity as Tolkien. He had been working on his Legendarium for the better part of a century. His notes are composed of thousands and thousands of pages, and hundreds of characters. He wrote furiously, and in trying to create a mythos that contradicted his moral compass in a myriad of ways, he ways bound to fail in the long run. He tired of it, I think. Not of creating more details, he loved that, but in the subconscious denial of his faith. He loved ME, halflings, and the Elves, but he knee that it would never be truly in line with his faith. He tried to make it so, and polished the rougher aspects, but the inconsistency remained. Towards the end, I think a sense of urgency came over him. He needed to finish wrestling with the moral quandaries he had set for himself. Whether he got soft in the head, or just wanted more consistency, the fact remains that he wanted revision. In the end he had only partial success. The christian elements in its conceptions, aided him, but the contradiction was too deep to be removed.
Call me Rem, and remember, not all who ramble are lost...Uh...where was I?
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CuriousG
Half-elven
Dec 24 2013, 9:12pm
Post #6 of 10
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Interesting to say that urgency overcame him. I will make my own very meager comparison when as a teenager in school, I was supposed to write a short story (5 pages or so), and I randomly chose a supernatural topic: angels. I wanted to be creative, so I wanted the angels to be surprising and do bad things in addition to good things, but I would l think inside, "but angels are either good or bad, they can't be both." So I would wrestle with the rules I grew up with, and then I would have to explain and explain their behavior until it bored even me, and ultimately I picked a different topic that I wasn't as invested in and knew I could write in a hurry so I could get a decent grade in the course vs no grade at all. Urgency vs bias.
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Brethil
Half-elven
Dec 25 2013, 4:05am
Post #7 of 10
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I am looking forward to it too Rem!
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And being able to touch on your thoughts in detail. Especially how the real world faith integrates within the legendarium. In the meantime have a wonderful holiday all!
Have an idea relating to the world of JRR Tolkien that you would like to write about? If so, the Third TORn Amateur Symposium will be running in the Reading Room in March, 2014. We hope to see you there!
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Din II Ironfoot
The Shire
Dec 26 2013, 2:02pm
Post #8 of 10
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Tolkien intended Middle-earth to be our world's past, so as a Catholic writer he had in mind that his beliefs were the future for his world. Prophecy was real so why should the elves not take an interest in and be aware of such an important thing? I think he saw it fitting they would. But he wanted to keep his religion subtle within his writing. I think he would have written a piece like this for his own benefit, to add depth and meaning to his world, but probably never intended it to see its way into any book(??!!). I don't think Tolkien subconsciously denied his faith in his writing at all. All analogies break down, and this grand work was far more subtle than an analogy. So yes it had inconsistencies with his beliefs. But I think it was in all the ways he wanted it to be.
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Eruvandi
Tol Eressea
Dec 26 2013, 5:52pm
Post #9 of 10
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You took the words right out of my mouth!
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Rembrethil
Tol Eressea
Dec 27 2013, 3:29am
Post #10 of 10
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I don't think he did it categorically
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But when he set out to make a mythology that was NOT Catholic or Christian, he knew he was going to write about gods that could not exist in his faith. He had to make a system that contained the slightest hint of heresy, so that he was not repeating the story of Christianity, I am not suggesting that he lost sight of what was real, and what was not. He termed his work sub-creation, so he did have perspective, and did not intend to create a real world system of belief. He did abandon the conceit that ME was our world in a different time, just as he abandoned the idea that his mythos was to be England's replacement mythology. The idea was only entertained as a nice, but untrue fantasy. The problems with this view, and the endeavor for consistency,(we all know haw much he loved consistency) became much too much work and irreconcilable. He had expressed his thoughts on fairy stories. Most, he admitted to be untrue, but containing elements of truth, but also error purported as truth. These kernels were the heart of the meaning. Not all to be believed, but to be enjoyed. Indeed he enjoyed many of the pagan stories for their literary achievements, not the theology. The real epitome of fairy story is the truth contained within it. As the amount of truth, or erring truth, increases, it becomes more meaningful, and when the fairy story ideal is true, absolutely true, it fuses with reality, reaching the deepest meaning. The gospel story he considered the greatest fairy tale, but one that was true, and thus more meaningful. What I am feebly attempting to say is this. He had certain things he held to be true--absolutley, unquestionably true.(He believed that the ideas of Catholicism/Christianity were true from the beginning of time, thus the thiught of a development into Catholicmtheolgy is ruled out by me) These things niggled at the back of his mind, hindering full enjoyment of his stories. As the Legendarium became more developed, the amount of flux and fluidity in his stories decreased, and things took concrete, immovable forms. They contradicted his core beliefs in many cases, and his enjoyment gradually lessened as these counter-positions were taken. He tried to shift some of them in later revisions, making them as close to his beliefs as he dared, but it was unfinished, and we are left with a work in progress. All IMHO, of course.
Call me Rem, and remember, not all who ramble are lost...Uh...where was I?
(This post was edited by Rembrethil on Dec 27 2013, 3:34am)
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