The Ainur and the Children
 

Ive been wondering if the Children of Iluvatar will ally themselves with the Valar when The Unmarring of Arda begins. And if not, Will they rebel?

[ April 06, 2002: Message edited by: Warlord_of_Blood ]

I had already made a topic about this, but your title is better. Here's the start post of mine:


Ok, lets say you are one of the Children of Iluvatar, living in Arda after the End and the world is now fixed and lovely. You've met Eru and hung out with him and the Ainur. No wars left to fight, just sit around and sing, tell stories, make pretty things, whatever. Lots of time on your hands.
Do you think that eventually some of your fellow Children, Elves and Men, might start comparing themselves to the Ainur and say, "They aren't any better than me without all that power Eru gave them, I could do what they do if I had that power."

I think I might feel that way, and all of a sudden you have a rebellion. An interesting subject to theorize on.

P.S. You are mixing up Varda and Valar, you really should edit that.

mho, do you mean everyone will share a common and level playing ground? what's this, globalization tolkien-style? [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

well then, ten cents say it'll be a quasi-stable peace. the more poltically savvy and metaphysically endowed enclaves of ainur, quendi and edain will enjoy the benefits of a lopsided power system and thus work together to perpetuate it. small disenfranchished ainur and children will march to the streets, burning well-crafted effigies of the elite and exalting the name of feanor the true-sighted. their cries will be drowned by protestations of good faith, near-rebellion cured by clandestine and ephemeral doses of power. that is, until the next big convention.

seriously, i always thought the unmarring as one-shot resolution to ALL evil, and half expectant that the smallest dribble of evil will be reft from every ainu, quendi, edain and whathaveyou and shot into a geological correct containment, like the earth's mantle.

Bah, you know, after thinking about it more, this thread can be nothing more than a massive speculation fest. I'll only say one thing, I refuse to accept that evil can ever be erradicated, it always returns in some form or another.

hehe, I totally agree Mhoram, my favorite Tolkien quote is the one in my singature. No matter how complete the victory, the seed of Melkor can not ever be destroyed.

ok, ok, gang up on me...

mho, no need to thumb down this thread on my account, and i must say, massive speculation is not a bad thing. [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img]

peace!

/me sets "lurk mode" off

[img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

Actually, if we are talking about the end which none save Ilúvatar himself knows anything about, I think evil can be eradicated. Ilúvatar is the one, allmighty, super-fantastic, chief being above all else. The End is when all elves have either died or left for the Undying lands, the Dominion of Men has ended (in one way or another) and so on. I do not know excactly how many ages it is until that happens, but...

Anyway, the Sil says that this End will be so magnificent and grand that only Ilúvatar can comprehend it (or something like that), and I think the Children - and the Ainur - are supposed to grow ("gain levels" [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img] ) before this End is revealed to them. And this End is probably also not really an end, it is a brand new beginning.

Hope this made sense... Do comment and batter it as you feel...

[img]smilies/smile.gif[/img] [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img] [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

hmm...I don't think evil can be utterly destroyed. You see, when you have nothing to fight with, you can make wonderful things, great and precious, and become mighty. And as far as I can see might corrupts. A few examples:
- Melkor, mightiest of the Ainur, became evil
- Feanor, mightiest of the Noldor, rebelled against the Valar
- The Numenorians, mightiest among all men, rebelled against the Valar.

So i guess that there if there's nothing else left to fight, something or someone will show up after a period of time, deeming himself great and strong and wishing for the dominion of others. I agree with Mho and Thingol.

do keep in mind, however, that Tolkien was a christian, and various comparisons can be made through some objects and characters-like, One Ring=sin, Melkor=Devil. i was surprised in reading the simarillion at how similar the story of melkor's fall was to the fall of lucifer/satan, and how they both got a name change down on earth. it could be that tolkien, in this second Arda, is making comparisons of the restored second Arda to the restored second Earth that is said to come about in the book of Revelation in the Bible-and as God and Iluvator have similar absolute powers, i would guess that evil does in the end get eradicated-pulled from all memory and knowledge. but there will always be speculation

Demloth of Dol Amroth - Yes, I agree with you that they are very similar, but in a letter to Milton Waldman J.R.R. Tolkien says that he has been inspired by other religions and myths. However, he also says that he didn't want a Christian Middle-Earth but a religion of their own.

This letter is written in full in the Silmarillion, edition: 1999. Page x to xixx.

well well, methinks stress here falls on this:

lathspell, I fancy it was just slipped from your fingers, yet it makes the point. Evil (in a way, though appearing sometimes as force in ME) factually nothing, abscence, lack of good. Unmarring of Arda must, on general level, mean filling up, rather than destructing. And after the end, creatures will be brin full of light and wisdom, reflecting, as mirrors, wisdom and light of their Creator. Any rebellion comes out of pride, concentrating on one's self, but when one realises one has nothing of himself but is just a mirror for a being without beginning and with no end, there is nothing in particular to ground one's ambition on, therefore no possibility of rebellion of one kind or another

I agree: not point in a lot of speculation. Much news we read is mere speculation, after all.

Anyway, I do not believe that there can ever be a society where someone is not considered "evil", for, if there is free will, then there will always be one person or a group of people that want more than they have, even if their life is pretty good (for it can never be "perfect"). Then, those will only take their feelings for so long...then, they will try to rise up and claim what they believe is theirs.

Up

Well, if evil is part of Arda Marred, then it stands to reason that in Arda Unmarred, there will not be evil. But if evil is NOT part of Arda Marred, but instead an outside force, then there will be problems. Actually, there are two potential problems with Arda Unmarred:

A) Evil is a force inherent to Arda and/or its inhabitants and will always be there. If Arda really was the product of the Music of the Ainu, then it was Marred at the moment of its creation and has always had evil in it. Can there ever be an Arda Unmarred if it was evil at the moment of its birth?

B) Something does not have to be born evil to become evil. Even Melkor was not evil to begin with, but greedy, stubborn and vain. To prevent any new evil from occurring, not only would evil have to be removed, but also the inherent potential of anyone to become evil. Is this possible, if evil was a part of Arda to begin with? Or, because the Children come from Eru, is their fundamental nature to not be evil, but the work of Melkor causes them to become so?

B2) Non-evil can also cause strife. Several of Shakespeare's plays featured potentially harmful situations caused entirely through misunderstanding. For all potential conflict to be removed, you would also have to remove things like stupidity. If these things are removed in Arda Unmarred, does that mean that as a part of Arda Marred, they came from Melkor?

A second Marring?
 

Which, as I see it, would involve Eru removing His Children's free will. Which He would surely never do since, well, what would then be the point of their existence? So, while Arda may have been Unmarred, wasn't there still the potential for one of His Children to choose to rebel against Him and go about Marring it all up again, just like Melkor did all those years ago?

symestreem, I doubt that Arda was evil in its birth, since it was only in the middle of the First Theme of the Ainulindalë when Melkor wove his own designs into the song.

So evil was not inherent to Arda.

I think that the Unmarring of Arda will require the ultimate destruction of Melkor and his works, not necessarily stripping the Children of Iluvatar of their free will.