Inherent Evil

[The Saucepan Man]

If you are going to say "no they must have souls", but Eru (represented by Tolkien) says "no they don't", then I don't believe Eru need live up to your expectation.

Well, I'm with the Windlord on this one. I first read LotR many years ago, before the Letters or the HoME series were ever published. And I formed an impression of Orcs as rational beings based upon how I understood the Book to be portraying them (which , I think, reflected author's intention at the time of writing).

To see the Orcs as anything other than rational beings makes a mockery, to my mind, of the scenes where they are conversing, in particular (as I have said) the conversation between Shagrat and Gorbag. And, as I understand it, if the Orcs are sentient beings, then they have souls.

Having said that, I don't think you gave my comment about having Man's soul much thought.

No, because it is said in the Silmarillion that they were, in origin, Elves. [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img]