The Barrow-Downs Discussion Forum - View Single Post - Why is enigma pretty much tied with maia and earth spirit...

obloquy · 08-18-2001, 01:18 PM

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Re: Why is enigma pretty much tied with maia and earth spiri

I've run across an additional pertinent letter. Letter 212, a drafted continuation to a fan letter that was never sent, contains this:

<blockquote>Quote:<hr> Elves and Men were called the 'children of God', because they were, so to speak, a private addition to the Design, by the Creator, and one in which the Valar had no part. (Their 'themes' were introduced into the Music by the One, when the discords of Melkor arose.) The Valar knew that they would appear, and the great ones knew when and how (though not precisely), but they knew little of their nature, and their foresight derived from their pre-knowledge of the Design, was imperfect or failed in the matter of the deeds of the Children. The uncorrupted Valar, therefore, yearned for the Children before they came and loved them afterwards, as creatures 'other' than themselves, independent of them and their artistry, 'children' as being weaker and more ignorant than the Valar, but of equal lineage (deriving being direct from the One); even though under their authority as rulers of Arda. The corrupted, as was Melkor/Morgoth and his followers (of whom Sauron was one of the chief) saw in them the ideal material for subjects and slaves, to whom they could become masters and 'gods', envying the Children, and secretly hating them, in proportion as they became rebels against the One (and Manwë his Lieutenant in Eä).

In this mythical ‘prehistory’ immortality, strictly longevity co-extensive with the life of Arda, was part of the given nature of the Elves; beyond the End nothing was revealed. Mortality, that is a short life-span having no relation to the life of Arda, is spoken of as the given nature of Men: the Elves called it the Gift of Ilúvatar (God). But it must be remembered that mythicallythese tales are Elf-centred,[*1] not anthropocentric, and Men only appear in them, at what must be a point long after their Coming. This is therefore an ‘Elvish’ view, and does not necessarily have anything to say for or against such beliefs as the Christian ‘death’ is not part of human nature, but a punishment for sin (rebellion), a result of the ‘Fall’. It should be regarded as an Elvish perception of what death – not being tied to the ‘circles of the world’ – should now become for Men, however it arose. A divine ‘punishment’ is also a divine ‘gift’, if accepted, since its object is ultimate blessing, and the supreme inventiveness of the Creator will make ‘punishments’ (that is changes of design) produce a good not otherwise to be attained: a ‘mortal’ Man has probably (an Elf would say) a higher if unrevealed destiny than a longeval one. To attempt by device or ‘magic’ to recover longevity is thus a supreme folly and wickedness of ‘mortals’. Longevity or counterfeit ‘immortality’ (true immortality is beyond Eä) is the chief bait of Sauron – it leads the small to a Gollum and the great to a Ringwraith.

In the Elvish legends there is record of a strange case of an Elf (Míriel mother of Fëanor) that tried to die, which had disastrous results, leading to the ‘Fall’ of the High-elves. The Elves were not subject to disease, but they could be ‘slain’: that is their bodies could be destroyed, or mutilated so as to be unfit to sustain life. But this did not lead naturally to ‘death’: they were rehabilitated and reborn and eventually recovered memory of all their past: they remained ‘identical’. But Míriel wished to abandon being, and refused rebirth.[*2]

I suppose a difference between this Myth and what may be perhaps called Christian mythology is this. In the latter the Fall of Man is subsequent to and a consequence (though not a necessary consequence) of the ‘Fall of the Angels’: a rebellion of created free-will at a higher level than Man; but it is not clearly held (and in many versions is not held at all) that this affected the ‘World’ in its nature: evil was brought in from outside, by Satan. In this Myth the rebellion of created free-will precedes creation of the World (Eä); and Eä has in it, subcreatively introduced, evil, rebellions, discordant elements of its own nature already when the Let it Be was spoken. The Fall or corruption, therefore, of all things in it and all inhabitants of it, was a possibility if not inevitable. Trees may ‘go bad’ as in the Old Forest; Elves may turn into Orcs, and if this required the special perversive malice of Morgoth, still Elves themselves could do evil deeds. Even the ‘good’ Valar as inhabiting the World could at least err; as the Great Valar did in their dealings with the Elves; or as the lesser of their kind (as the Istari or wizards) could in various ways become self-seeking. Aulë, for instance, one of the Great, in a sense ‘fell’; for he so desired to see the Children, that he became impatient and tried to anticipate the will of the Creator. Being the greatest of all craftsmen he tried to make children according to his imperfect knowledge of their kind. When he had made thirteen,[*3] God spoke to him in anger, but not without pity: for Aulë had done this thing not out of evil desire to have slaves and subjects of his own, but out of impatient love, desiring children to talk to and teach, sharing with them the praise of Ilúvatar and his great love of the materials of which the world is made.

The One rebuked Aulë, saying that he had tried to usurp the Creator’s power; but he could not give independent life to his makjngs. He had only one life, his own derived from the One, and could at most only distribute it. ‘Behold’ said the One: ‘these creatures of thine have only thy will and thy movement. Though you have devised a language for them, they can only report to thee thine own thought. This is a mockery of me.’

Then Aulë in grief and repentance humbled himself and asked for pardon. And he said: ‘I will destroy these images of my presumption, and wait upon thy will.’ And he took a great hammer, raising it to smite the eldest of his images; but it flinched and cowered from him. And as he withheld his stroke, astonished, he heard the laughter of Ilúvatar.

‘Do you wonder at this?’ he said. ‘Behold! thy creatures now live, free from thy will! For I have seen thy humility, and taken pity upon your impatience. Thy making I have taken up into my design.’

This is the Elvish legend of the making of the Dwarves; but the Elves report that Ilúvatar said thus also: ‘Nonetheless I will not suffer my design to be forestalled: thy children shall not awake before mine own.’ And he commanded Aulë to lay the fathers of the Dwarves severally in deep places, each with his mate, save Dúrin the eldest who had none. There they should sleep long, until Ilúvatar bade them awake. Nonetheless there has been for the most part little love between the Dwarves and the children of Ilúvatar. And of the fate that Ilúvatar has set upon the children of Aulë beyond the Circles of the world Elves and men know nothing, and if Dwarves know they do not speak of it.

Footnotes
*1 - In narrative, as soon as the matter becomes 'storial' and not mythical, being in fact human literature, the centre of interest must shift to Men (and their relations with Elves or other creatures). We cannot write stories about Elves, whom we do not know inwardly; and if we try we simply turn Elves into men.
*2 - [A note apparently added later:] It was also the Elvish (and uncorrupted Númenórean) view that a 'good' Man would or should die voluntarily by surrender with trust before being compelled (as did Aragorn). This may have been the nature of unfallen Man; though compulsion would not threaten him: he would desire and ask to be allowed to 'go on' to a higher state. [Footnote continues into discussion of Mary as unfallen.]
*3 - One, the eldest, alone, and six more with six mates.
<hr></blockquote>

I apologize for the length of the post, but I couldn't bear to cut it up more than I did (there were a few paragraphs before the point I chose to begin my citation).

I don't really have any points to push with this addition, I just thought it was a very interesting letter and should not be left out of this (rather off-topic) discussion.

-obloquy

</p>

08-18-2001, 01:18 PM	#38
obloquy Ghost Prince of Cardolan Join Date: Apr 2001 Location: WA Posts: 941	<font face="Verdana"><table><TR><TD><FONT SIZE="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Haunting Spirit Posts: 59</TD><TD></TD></TR></TABLE> Re: Why is enigma pretty much tied with maia and earth spiri I've run across an additional pertinent letter. Letter 212, a drafted continuation to a fan letter that was never sent, contains this: <blockquote>*Quote:<hr> Elves and Men were called the 'children of God', because they were, so to speak, a private addition to the Design, by the Creator, and one in which the Valar had no part. (Their 'themes' were introduced into the Music by the One, when the discords of Melkor arose.) The Valar knew that they would appear, and the great ones knew when and how (though not precisely), but they knew little of their nature, and their foresight derived from their pre-knowledge of the Design, was imperfect or failed in the matter of the deeds of the Children. The uncorrupted Valar, therefore, yearned for the Children before they came and loved them afterwards, as creatures 'other' than themselves, independent of them and their artistry, 'children' as being weaker and more ignorant than the Valar, but of equal lineage (deriving being direct from the One); even though under their authority as rulers of Arda. The corrupted, as was Melkor/Morgoth and his followers (of whom Sauron was one of the chief) saw in them the ideal material for subjects and slaves, to whom they could become masters and 'gods', envying the Children, and secretly hating them, in proportion as they became rebels against the One (and Manwë his Lieutenant in Eä). In this mythical ‘prehistory’ immortality, strictly longevity co-extensive with the life of Arda, was part of the given nature of the Elves; beyond the End nothing was revealed. Mortality, that is a short life-span having no relation to the life of Arda, is spoken of as the given nature of Men: the Elves called it the Gift of Ilúvatar* (God). But it must be remembered that mythicallythese tales are Elf-centred,[1] not anthropocentric, and Men only appear in them, at what must be a point long after their Coming. This is therefore an ‘Elvish’ view, and does not necessarily have anything to say for or against such beliefs as the Christian ‘death’ is not part of human nature, but a punishment for sin (rebellion), a result of the ‘Fall’. It should be regarded as an Elvish perception of what death* – not being tied to the ‘circles of the world’ – should now become for Men, however it arose. A divine ‘punishment’ is also a divine ‘gift’, if accepted, since its object is ultimate blessing, and the supreme inventiveness of the Creator will make ‘punishments’ (that is changes of design) produce a good not otherwise to be attained: a ‘mortal’ Man has probably (an Elf would say) a higher if unrevealed destiny than a longeval one. To attempt by device or ‘magic’ to recover longevity is thus a supreme folly and wickedness of ‘mortals’. Longevity or counterfeit ‘immortality’ (true immortality is beyond Eä) is the chief bait of Sauron – it leads the small to a Gollum and the great to a Ringwraith. In the Elvish legends there is record of a strange case of an Elf (Míriel mother of Fëanor) that tried to die, which had disastrous results, leading to the ‘Fall’ of the High-elves. The Elves were not subject to disease, but they could be ‘slain’: that is their bodies could be destroyed, or mutilated so as to be unfit to sustain life. But this did not lead naturally to ‘death’: they were rehabilitated and reborn and eventually recovered memory of all their past: they remained ‘identical’. But Míriel wished to abandon being, and refused rebirth.[2] I suppose a difference between this Myth and what may be perhaps called Christian mythology is this. In the latter the Fall of Man is subsequent to and a consequence (though not a necessary consequence) of the ‘Fall of the Angels’: a rebellion of created free-will at a higher level than Man; but it is not clearly held (and in many versions is not held at all) that this affected the ‘World’ in its nature: evil was brought in from outside, by Satan. In this Myth the rebellion of created free-will precedes creation of the World (Eä); and Eä has in it, subcreatively introduced, evil, rebellions, discordant elements of its own nature already when the Let it Be* was spoken. The Fall or corruption, therefore, of all things in it and all inhabitants of it, was a possibility if not inevitable. Trees may ‘go bad’ as in the Old Forest; Elves may turn into Orcs, and if this required the special perversive malice of Morgoth, still Elves themselves could do evil deeds. Even the ‘good’ Valar as inhabiting the World could at least err; as the Great Valar did in their dealings with the Elves; or as the lesser of their kind (as the Istari or wizards) could in various ways become self-seeking. Aulë, for instance, one of the Great, in a sense ‘fell’; for he so desired to see the Children, that he became impatient and tried to anticipate the will of the Creator. Being the greatest of all craftsmen he tried to make children according to his imperfect knowledge of their kind. When he had made thirteen,[3] God spoke to him in anger, but not without pity: for Aulë had done this thing not* out of evil desire to have slaves and subjects of his own, but out of impatient love, desiring children to talk to and teach, sharing with them the praise of Ilúvatar and his great love of the materials of which the world is made. The One rebuked Aulë, saying that he had tried to usurp the Creator’s power; but he could not give independent life to his makjngs. He had only one life, his own derived from the One, and could at most only distribute it. ‘Behold’ said the One: ‘these creatures of thine have only thy will and thy movement. Though you have devised a language for them, they can only report to thee thine own thought. This is a mockery of me.’ Then Aulë in grief and repentance humbled himself and asked for pardon. And he said: ‘I will destroy these images of my presumption, and wait upon thy will.’ And he took a great hammer, raising it to smite the eldest of his images; but it flinched and cowered from him. And as he withheld his stroke, astonished, he heard the laughter of Ilúvatar. ‘Do you wonder at this?’ he said. ‘Behold! thy creatures now live, free from thy will! For I have seen thy humility, and taken pity upon your impatience. Thy making I have taken up into my design.’ This is the Elvish legend of the making of the Dwarves; but the Elves report that Ilúvatar said thus also: ‘Nonetheless I will not suffer my design to be forestalled: thy children shall not awake before mine own.’ And he commanded Aulë to lay the fathers of the Dwarves severally in deep places, each with his mate, save Dúrin the eldest who had none. There they should sleep long, until Ilúvatar bade them awake. Nonetheless there has been for the most part little love between the Dwarves and the children of Ilúvatar. And of the fate that Ilúvatar has set upon the children of Aulë beyond the Circles of the world Elves and men know nothing, and if Dwarves know they do not speak of it. Footnotes 1 - In narrative, as soon as the matter becomes 'storial' and not mythical, being in fact human* literature, the centre of interest must shift to Men (and their relations with Elves or other creatures). We cannot write stories about Elves, whom we do not know inwardly; and if we try we simply turn Elves into men. 2 - [A note apparently added later:] It was also the Elvish (and uncorrupted Númenórean) view that a 'good' Man would or should die* voluntarily by surrender with trust before being compelled (as did Aragorn). This may have been the nature of unfallen Man; though compulsion would not threaten him: he would desire and ask to be allowed to 'go on' to a higher state. [Footnote continues into discussion of Mary as unfallen.] *3 - One, the eldest, alone, and six more with six mates. <hr></blockquote> I apologize for the length of the post, but I couldn't bear to cut it up more than I did (there were a few paragraphs before the point I chose to begin my citation). I don't really have any points to push with this addition, I just thought it was a very interesting letter and should not be left out of this (rather off-topic) discussion. -obloquy </p>