(urth) (no subject)

[Craig Brewer]

Made me crack open my copy of Tolkien's letters. Some relevant stuff in #153 "To 
Peter Hastings":

"As for 'whose authority decides these things?' the immediate 'authorities' are 
the Valar (the Powers or Authorities): the 'gods'. But they are only created 
spirits - of high angelic order we should say, with their attendant lesser 
angels - reverend, therefore, but not worshipful... [and then adds in a lengthy 
note]: There are thus no temples or 'churches' or fanes int his 'world' among 
'good' peoples. They had little or no religion in the sense of worship. For help 
they may call on a Vala (as Elbereth), as a Catholic might on a Saint, though no 
doubt knowing in theory as well as he that the power of the Vala was limited and 
derivative. But this is a 'primitive age': and these folk may be said to view 
the Valar as children view their parents or immediate adult superiors, and 
though they know they are subjects of the King he does not live in their country 
nor have there any dwelling..."

There's more. But what may be relevant to the discussion of how much Tolkien 
actually worried about matching up his mythology with actual Christian history 
is his long discussion in the same letter about the value of "subcreation" and 
its potential for overstepping the bounds of God's type of Creation. He seems 
very much at pains to point out that he is doing something very humble and not 
at all meant to be actually part of "creating theology" or anything like that. 
He continually reminds the writer who wrote him (a Catholic book store owner) 
that he was writing fiction and not things meant to be taken as "too true."





----- Original Message ----
From: Dan'l Danehy-Oakes <danldo at gmail.com>
To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net>
Sent: Thu, December 16, 2010 12:47:01 PM
Subject: Re: (urth) (no subject)

On Thu, Dec 16, 2010 at 10:42 AM, James Wynn <crushtv at gmail.com> wrote:

> No Adam and Eve. No Cain & Able. No Garden. No Fall. No world-wide flood. No
> Babel. No "first born" in Genesis, although one could argue that there are
> in the Koran. And while the Eldar are reincarnated continuously until then
> end of the world, humanity escapes the "circle of the world" /but no one
> knows where they go/. There's room to APPEND the Second Covenant on to it
> after the fact, but Earth and Middle Earth arrive there from dramatically
> different places.

Au contraire. The creation and earliest days of humanity take place
off stage, so Adam and Eve and the Garden remain a possibility; and
when humans show up in the Elvish lands it is clear that they _have_
fallen (there is a "shadow" upon them of which they do not speak). And
it doesn't say that "no one" knows where humans go when they die -- it
says that _the Elves_ do not know.


> Eh..as you like. But who they are praying to is problematic given the rest
> of Tolkien's subcreation. Praying to one of the Valar seems the most likely,
> but that is problematic in a Judeo-Christian universe.

They don't actually pray, they just face the West silently.


-- 
Dan'l Danehy-Oakes
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