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Originally Posted by Lalwende
If so, that's quite fabulous, as Men were created to respond to and to resist Melkor's themes.
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Both races were created in the third theme:
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Originally Posted by Ainulindale, Silmarillion
For the Children of Iluvatar were conceived by him alone; and they came with the third theme, and were not in the theme which Iluvatar propounded at the beginning, and none of the Ainur had part in their making.
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That no Ainu had a part in their making is reinforced in the letters too (such as #200). I would have problems with picturing the Eruhini as a generated response by Melkor; Tolkien holds that their intrusion is the chief one; moreover:
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Originally Posted by idem
And they saw with amazement the coming of the Children of Iluvatar, and the habitation that was prepared for them; and they perceived that they themselves in the labour of their music had been busy with the preparation of this dwelling, and yet knew not that it had any purpose beyond its own beauty.
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which implies that the Children existed in design before the themes.
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Originally Posted by Lalwende
But this is Eru, and we cannot possibly hope to know Tolkien's own relationship with God and if he saw God as the source of all in the Real World, including Darkness, but if Eru is his representation of his own God then he may well have done.
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I presume he does; the closest he comes to confessing this, that I know:
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=Letter #153]I have represented at least the Orcs as pre-existing real beings on whom the Dark Lord has exerted the fullness of his power in remodelling and corrupting them, not making them. That God would 'tolerate' that, seems no worse theology than the toleration of the calculated dehumanizing of Men by tyrants that goes on today.
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this theme of respect of Free Will by the Creator is also mentioned previously, in regards to the literary works:
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Originally Posted by idem
Free Will is derivative, and is.'. only operative within provided circumstances; but in order that it may exist, it is necessary that the Author should guarantee it, whatever betides : sc. when it is 'against His Will', as we say, at any rate as it appears on a finite view.
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Morality implies free will, which implies possibility of evil - even at grand scales, such as that of angels, with all their terrible effects.