[Raynor]

I've a feeling you're arguing mostly for the sake of the argument, as you've cut out the parts I wrote that can answer your questions.

I am sorry if you feel that way about my post, it was not my intention. Concerning your statement that Morgoth was the rote cause of "evil", my understanding is best expressed in this (bolded) passage, from a version of Ainulindale in BOLT 1:

Through him has pain and misery been made in the clash of overwhelming musics; and with confusion of sound have cruelty, and ravening, and darkness, loathly mire and all putrescence of thought or thing, foul mists and violent flame, cold without mercy, been born, and death without hope. Yet is this through him and not by him; and he shall see, and ye all likewise, and even shall those beings, who must now dwell among his evil and endure through Melko misery and sorrow, terror and wickedness, declare in the end that it redoundeth only to my great glory, and doth but make the theme more worth the hearing, Life more worth the living, and the World so much the more wonderful and marvellous, that of all the deeds of Iluvatar it shall be called his mightiest and his loveliest.

Even in the published Silmarillion, Eru makes a similar statement about Melkor being but an instrument in his design.

Besides, the Valar would remain untouched by the marring as they are all spirit and without a 'hroa' drawn from ME.
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The choice between good and evil is a direct result of Melkors marring IMO.

I don't know how to reconcile these two statements of yours. If the ability per se to choose between good and evil appears only because of Melkor's marring, and if the valar are not affected by the marring, then how could they have this ability to choose?

In Arda Unmarred the Children were meant to be pure and to do only what is good and natural for them, by the resoning in MR.

Hm, where is that said?

But if you mean the ability to do right or wrong, than they weren't meant to have a free will, as they could do only what is good according to their nature.

In my opinion, the foremost sign of the existence of a fea would be the very ability to discern and choose between good and evil, and, again, I know of no reference about the Eruhini not having this ability by nature, for better or for worse. I don't see how Melkor could change in such a fundamental way the very essence of these beings - Ainulindale, at least, makes it clear that "none of the Ainur had part in their making". Not only did he modify them, he added to them this, what I believe, greatest manifestation of the spirit, the moral choice.

Furthermore, don't you agree that even small choices can carry a moral aspect, one choice being morally superior to another, no matter the triviality of the issue - like say, sleeping instead of helping, in general choosing comfort over responsibility?

I might also add that another sign of the Eruhini being conceived by Eru alone is that the elves were created with a body to endure until the end of time, but this wasn't made to take into calculation the marring of Melkor.

I believe the closest we can come to reconciling these positions is that Melkor was a great source of making conflicts, thus creating a much greater necessity (not the ability per se) to choose.

Feanor was able to choose only as a result of the marring. In Arda Unmarred Feanor would never have acted as he did, as the thought to do so never would have occured to him.

But this is the essence of the problem; even if he may not have had to act (or react), he still retained the ability to do so, regardless of the existence of Melkor and his marring. Moreover, the lack of marring does not guarantee that certain thoughts would not come to someone, or that that everybody would have the strength to resist temptations, however trivial they may be.

Besides, Ungoliant is an intentional enigma, much like Tom Bombadill.

Hm, I know of Tom being said to be an intended enigma, in the Letters, but not of Ungoliant; there are "credible" sources of information regarding her, unless we consider all maiar, and by extension all spirits, an enigma.

How do you think the curse of Morgoth did work?

Seeing that Isildur to put under a "spell" an entire people, who remained so long after his death, I would say that the "mistery of names" allows, in certain conditions of "legitimacy", to do such things. However, with Melkor being evil and having evil reasons, I would say it was mostly his power at work at a "causal" level, if I am allowed to say so. I also allow for the possibility that the curse was just a piece of the puzzle, allowed to take effect to test those were greatly endowed - "unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required".