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Originally Posted by TheMisfortuneTeller
I've always felt grateful to Professor Tolkien for largely keeping his own personal religious -- i.e., animist -- beliefs out of his published literary creations.
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Last time I checked, he was a Catholic
. But I think I get what you mean by
animist - if you're trying to extrapolate his personal beliefs from his work, traces of animism can certainly be found there (e.g. Old Man Willow, Caradhras...); but that may be largely inherent in the mythological form he chose, and I'd be wary to simply label the man himself as an animist based on that.
Quote:
Originally Posted by TheMisfortuneTeller
Perhaps this reflects the rigorous criticism that he regularly solicited and received from his great friend and colleague, the atheist C. S. Lewis.
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... whom Tollers converted back to Christianity. Just saying.
Quote:
Originally Posted by TheMisfortuneTeller
At any rate, and as numerous others have noted, Tolkien's studied ambiguity towards -- if not indifference to -- religious practices in his fictional Middle-earth make this fantasy world more universal and acceptable in its appeal, particularly since historic religious traditions -- especially the Single Spook variety -- tend mostly to function as atavistic amplifiers of tribal xenophobia, more often than not engendering fear and loathing of the dreaded "OTHER" than any sort of benign impulse towards human brotherhood. Religion in Middle-earth would only have made bad things worse, so kudos to Professor Tolkien for letting the good things get along well enough -- as they usually do -- without this unnecessary encumbrance.
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Oh boy. Talk about a mumak in a porcelain shop. Not that I entirely disagree, but wording it like that may lead to ... interesting responses.