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I do not think it is so simply one or the other Fin. In The Hobbit and LotR, Gwaihir and Landroval are given familial relations and ancestries, placing them firmly in the domain of real living creatures, not incarnated spirits. It seems likely to me that Tolkien intended perhaps some of the original Great Eagles, such as Thorondor, to have been incarnated Maiar, but that the race of speaking Eagles themselves were NOT purely spiritual beings. Therefore I think we can find a way to reconcile these two things.
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