Part of the mind of Ilúvatar

[Galadriel55]

Originally Posted by Legate of Amon Lanc

The point is, you cannot use the word "contemporary", because there is no *time* when the Valar are created (or "when" the Valar are created).

I don't exactly agree with you here. Of course, I'm venturing into the theoretical world here, and therefore you can disagree back, but here's what I believe. Despite the name (Timeless Void), even that place has time. Maybe not in the same sense as we do, but time still passes. And here's why I think so:

Time does not exist only when nothing happened at any point before. And this "before" is wrong in this sentence, because there is no before ("before what," you may ask - and there's nothing), and therefore no time. In other words, nothing has happened at all - ever. But as soon as something happens - anything, anywhere, doesn't matter (could be something appeared out of thin air, could be a thought that occured, really anything) - right away there is a concept of time: it is divided into before and after the creation/appearance/birth/action of that thing/deed. And when a second thing happens, you can talk of actual values of time, because you have the passage of time in between the two occurances, you can measure time relative to something. You can now use concepts such as how much time before/after/between, difference in time, and etc.

Therefore, when the Valar were created, time was certainly in effect; it was probably in effect even before the Ainur, when only Eru was around.

There is a great but beautiful paradox in the name Timeless Void, since there is a sense of time and a sense of space.

(As an aside, it's something I've mantioned in one of my threads)




More on topic, I think that the "flip sides of the coin" and "Yin-Yang" theories might be on the mark.

Originally Posted by Zil

That being the case, I would think power would be trumped by authority, which should make Manwe the stronger of the two, in my opinion.

Depends. Without power, there is no authority. Authority is, in a sense, power. A powerless authority is an empty title.

I found some things about Manwe in The Sil that may be of interest:

Originally Posted by Ainulindale

...the noblest of the Ainur

Originally Posted by Ainulindale

...[Manwe] was the chief instrument of the second theme that Iluvatar had raised against the discord of Melkor

(This ties in with the Yin-Yang theory.)

Originally Posted by Valaquenta

Manwe and Melkor were brethren in the thought of Iluvatar. The mightiest of those Ainur who came into the world was in his beginning Melkor; but Manwe is dearest to Iluvatar and understands most clearly his purposes. He was appointed to be, in the fullness of time, the first of all Kings: lord of the realm of Arda and ruler of all that dwells therein.

(So firstly, Manwe is "closer" to Eru, and secondly, he is given authority as well as power.)



And since I already ventured into the philosophical and theoretical, I want to thow this idea out there. But it's hard to put into words so I'll use the cliche-ed metaphor. Let's say Eru takes all of Manwe's life and puts it on one side of the scale, and puts all of Melkor's life on the other side of the scale, and the scale would be equal. That doesn't mean that they were always on equal positions in life, but that the "total" is. If Eru determined that in the beginning, well, that's what would happen, unless he changes his mind. And Manwe, being the King of Arda, represents in one being all of Arda, while Morgoth represents all of evil; so you have a continuous battle of good vs evil that goes on for ever until the Dagor Dagorath. And even at that point, there's no guarantee that a new "Melkor" (under a different name and face, of course) wouldn't arise.......

But I guess that's just a variation of the Yin-Yang theory.

[Legate of Amon Lanc]

Originally Posted by Galadriel55

I don't exactly agree with you here. Of course, I'm venturing into the theoretical world here, and therefore you can disagree back, but here's what I believe. Despite the name (Timeless Void), even that place has time. Maybe not in the same sense as we do, but time still passes. And here's why I think so:

Since it's really off topic, just a short clarification here When something is timeless, it is out of the time. We cannot imagine it with our human minds, but that changes nothing about the fact that it can "exist". (In these terms, even the words like "exist" become relative.) Ask the astrophysicists. It is perfectly plausible to imagine Valar coming into be before time, however the concept of "becoming" is closely connected to time in our thinking at least. Indeed, myself, I would say that once the creation comes into place, we have to be inside time. So Eru could be "outside the time", but at the moment of creation of the first Valar, the time would already have to exist (logically). That's what I would vote for, since that makes sense.

However, the mythos clearly states otherwise. So however I don't find it applying to my logic, if I want to keep true to the logic of the tale, I have to forget my logic. The creation of Valar happened before the time, that much is clear - time came into being when Eä was created. If we cannot imagine it, it is our problem So we just have to accept that somehow there was this creation before time, therefore every temporal expression used is a metaphore of the Elvish (and our) language in which the myth is written...