Sauron vs. Your Mama - A Discussion of Power in Middle-earth

[davem]

Originally Posted by Raynor

Eru, obviously

So effectively we cannot judge Eru - whatever he does is 'good' simply because he does it - or in other words there is no objective standard of good & evil, 'Good' is whatever Eru says it is, & evil is whatever Eru says it is. Slaughtering tens of thousands of Numenoreans is 'good' (it cannot simply be 'necessary', let alone 'the lesser of two evils' - because if Eru commited the 'lesser of two evils he would still be committing evil. The slaughter of the Numenoreans is a morally 'good' act because Eru commits it, & Eru is the source of Good. Note, you can't argue that the destruction of Numenor (or Gollum) was intended to bring about a good result - you have to argue that the act itself was good, otherwise you are arguing that Eru will commit 'not-good' (ie 'evil') acts)

However, this is what the work is now, as Tolkien last intended for us to see it.

But TH was not written with the later intention in mind. You seem to be arguing that Tolkien 'reinterpreted' TH, & imposed a new meaning on it. Well & good, but the reader of TH in the period 1937 - 1954 (ie pre- publication of LotR) would not have read it in that way. You seem here to be arguing for the 'purposed domination of the author' (not to mention the Author), which is something Tolkien himself rejected.