[Draugohtar]

Originally Posted by jallanite

True, Tolkien writes this.

Tolkien also states in Letter 142 (emphasis mine):

The Lord of the Rings is of course a fundamentally religious and Catholic work; unconsciously so at first, but consciously in the revision. That is why I have not put in, or have cut out, practically all references to anything like ‘religion’ to cults or practices, in the imaginary world. For the religious element is absorbed into the story and the symbolism.

I refer you again to my earlier posting. I never speak of Allegory, period, thus I will disregard your commentary re: this issue, later.

Now onto this point: Symbolism. I rest my case.

First, Tolkien places his stories in a world which is largely secular in which prayer and worship is largely unknown to the Men of whom he treats, and unknown to the Hobbits. From Letter 165:

I am in any case myself a Christian; but the ‘Third Age′ was not a Christian world.

It's irrelevant whether the Third Age is or is not a Christian world. The question is whether the the underlying 'truth' of existence in Tolkien's fictional universe, is fundamentally Christian. The answer appears to be yes.

By this I do not mean it is an alternate universe 'version' of Christianity, but rather that 'good', 'bad' and the nature of truth are defined along very Christian lines.

[/INDENT]In short his work may be a Roman Catholic and religious as it is possible to be in a fictional place and time before Jesus was even born and not even Judaism existed and where religion itself is represented as almost unknown. There is a single all-powerful God, but he is represented as very distant from the affairs of the world at that time.

That is, the work is in reality not very Roman Catholic or religious beyond the working out of the plot in this pre-Christian time, and even there much that Tolkien put in that represented his own understanding of Roman Catholicism was common morality and not specifically Christian.

Your reasoning escapes me, Tolkien spends every quote you have referred us to affirming the fundamentally Catholic nature of the work, and yet you simply assert to the contrary? Further you can't 'reclaim' people's philosophies for 'common morality,' when they themselves do not root their beliefs, expressed in literature, there.

I am very tired of commentators attempting to bring in Christianity where one sees only common morality, or uncommon morality, which need not be especially Christian.

I'm sure you are, and yet we cannot escape the fact that Tolkien, whilst avoiding allegory at every turn, wrote a 'fundamentally Catholic' work. It's that simple my friend.

You then use the Galadriel/Virgin Mary example. I don't find this very interesting. The truth is as the author states, I don't see why this requires further discussion. Those attempting to read beyond this explicit explanation, are on a futile quest, we can all agree.

And interpreting it as though it were true to specific Roman Catholic beliefs, or Christian beliefs, also often produces nonsense. You mentioned Christ figures all over the place. Where? Frodo, whom Tolkien himself admits failed in his task when he reached the limits of his strength. Aragorn? The resurrected Gandalf (but apparently not the resurrected Beren and Lúthien)?

Resurrected figures who are not related to Jesus appear in medieval tales and folk tales and even in the Christian Bible. For example, in the Finnish Kalevala the hero Lemminkäinen is killed when he attempts to slay the black swan of Tuoenela, the river of death. His body is ripped into eight pieces and thrown into the river. Lemminkäinen’s mother rakes up the body, puts it back together, and brings him back to life using nectar from heaven obtained through a bee. The Welsh romance of Peredur, which we know Tolkien studied, brings in the three sons of the King of Suffering who each day are slain by a monster known as an Addanc but are resurrected in the evening by magic baths in which their corpses are placed by their three lady loves. The Grimm’s fairy tale “The Juniper Tree″, which Tolkien liked very, very much, has its protagonist slain near the beginning but brought back to life at the end.

The interesting question would then be why the resurrection featured in the LOTR is so very different from these other mythologies you refer to?

I roughly explained their Christ-natures as well, why not read what I wrote?

Of course Tolkien would never write a figure as an allegory of Christ. You clearly struggle to understand the Christ figure concept. Moses, for example, is considered a Christ figure. Yet he wasn't crucified, didn't get into the promised land and wasn't always that popular with the almighty.

As for Beren and Luthien - not everyone is a Christ figure. I don't believe I claimed: everyone in Tolkien's work is a Christ figure. I would also argue their resurrection is fundamentally different from that of Gandalf. Gandalf's is due to the direct intervention of Eru; B and L are via the limited intervention of the Valar.

The so-called Chistianity in The Lord of the Rings is more subtle than much Christian interpretation which is nonsense. Christ-figures I see as such nonsense.

You are of course, welcome to your opinion. However I suspect this stems from a misunderstanding of the term quite frankly. We aren't talking Christ allegories, or even Christ himself (Aslan) in the Lord of the Rings.