Hi I just wanted to ask a question that hopefully you might like to answer. What are your thoughts on Sauron’s beginnings, before he first joined Melkor? (Also I looked up your username, that is adorable!!)

simaethae:

hey anon, no problem! as you may have gathered I am super into this dreadful character 🙂

anyway, here’s one of my favourite bits of supplementary canon, from Morgoth’s Ring:

[Sauron] did not object to the existence of the world, so long as he could do what he liked with it. He still had the relics of positive purpose, that descended from the good of the nature in which he began: it had been his virtue (and therefore also the cause of his fall, and of his relapse) that he loved order and coordination, and disliked all confusion and wasteful friction. (It was the apparent will and power of Melkor to effect his designs quickly and masterfully that had first attracted Sauron to him.)

(I pick and choose from HoME like everyone else, but I think this makes perfect sense given what we see of Sauron’s character elsewhere.)

so I mean, taking that and Mairon together, I come out with someone very, very certain of himself and of his own beliefs about the world. I think Sauron would have been really frustrated with the Valar’s careful, hesitant attitude to direct intervention – he’s very sure he’s right, why would he hesitate when it carrying through on that?

(he’s also a Maia of Aule in origin, so: the physical world, and technology, which is power over the physical world (particularly in Tolkien). I think this plays in to the idea of him as someone who wants to act and carry through on his plans for the world, and who, unfortunately, is rather less interested in spending time contemplating what the right plan actually is.)

I do think that beginning-of-Arda Melkor was probably a bit less overtly evil than it’s tempting to read him as with hindsight, especially if you’re one of the Ainur. They built lands
and Melkor destroyed them; valleys they delved and Melkor raised them up;
mountains they carved and Melkor threw them down; seas they hollowed and Melkor
spilled them , I mean, that’s not exactly helpful concrit on Melkor’s part but fucking with the Valar’s group project isn’t that bad.

the difference between “knocking down a mountain” and “killing an person”, or between “shaping inanimate metal to your will” and “shaping an elf into an orc,” may not be all that evident to one of the Ainur. I doubt Sauron ever really caught on to that part.

Is there hope for Melkor?(Arda Healed and Melkor Healed)

promin-blog:

What Tolkien meant to do with Melkor after the End of Days?

Easy, you’ll say, Melkor was then supposed to be destroyed once and for all. And while in the text there are certainly indications that Tolkien considered this possibility, there are some other that point in a whole different direction, a direction which ‘limits’ the destruction of Melkor (and his inability to repent) to the Tale of Arda, but doesn’t go beyond it, to Illuvatar’s Halls, which are outside Time.

What do I mean by this? What other possibility is there? Well, Melkor could in the end become Melkor Unmarred, or, more correctly, Melkor Healed, a Melkor who, much like Arda Healed, will transcend the Marring:

‘For Arda Unmarred hath two aspects or senses. The first is the Unmarred that they discern in the Marred, if their eyes are not dimmed, and yearn for, as we yearn for the Will of Eru: this is the ground upon which Hope is built. The second is the Unmarred that shall be: that is, to speak according to Time in
which they have their being, the Arda Healed, which shall be greater and more fair than the first, because of the Marring: this is the Hope that sustaineth.” (HOME 10)

But where is canonical proof that this applies to Melkor, the Marrer himself? Well, this sentence certainly comes to my mind, while it is somewhat easy to overlook it, or interpret it differently:

“And thou, Melkor, shalt see that no theme may be played that hath not its uttermost source in me (…) For he that attempteth this shall prove but mine instrument in the devising of things more wonderful, which he himself hath not imagined.‘” (Silm)

This is a part of Illuvatar’s answer to Melkor of which I talked more in my post ‘Illuvatar’s answer to Melkor’. In that post I argued that Illuvatar, with this answer, does not say he limits Melkor’s free will or creativity, but only reminds him that ‘in the end all His works will end good’ – a creative work (the World), in its entirety, when finished, cannot be evil, but acts of individuals can (this preserves their free will). To have Hope in Tolkien’s world means ‘to have faith that the final work will be good’ – individual evil acts don’t matter. As Tolkien writes in HOME:

“It (Hope) cometh not only from the yearning for the Will of Iluvatar the Begetter (which by itself may lead those within Time to no more than regret), but also
from trust in Eru the Lord everlasting, that he is good, and that his works shall all end in good. This the Marrer hath denied, and in this denial is the root of evil, and its end is in despair.”

Well, if Melkor would indeed stop claiming that Illuvatar ‘is not good, and that his works shall not all end in good’, as illuvatar said he will (“And thou, Melkor, shalt see…”), and if that ‘denial is the root of all evil’, then wouldn’t he be evil no more, if he stops claiming that?

And Melkor would certainly stop claiming that after waking from the dream of Time, once again outside Arda, the art form. Outside Time he finally realizes ‘I have fallen, but the World cannot fall’. And imagine the relief that his mistakes did not matter at all, and the incentive that the next time he will be the one consciously making some other tale ‘more glorious’ by cool creative works.

artworkofolivia:

broken crown, heavy crown

morgoth, (based off my inktober doodle from last year)

shackal-jackal:

Mairon and Melkor before the creation of Arda, or in First era

sulatio:

fuck off melkor!!!!!!!!!! fuck right off!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ok this is how i see him lookin in valinor while hes tryina prove that I’m A Good Guy, Everyone 🙂

cy-lindric:

Valar (pt 1) – Manwë, Varda, Melkor

materassassino very kindly helped me with finding some designs for them and in the end I did something entirely different, sorry about that

Tale of Adanel – Tolkien and religion

promin-blog:

Is Tolkien religious (in his work) in the sense we usually think about someone being religious? As defending the institution of religion, and its internal hierarchy? Or does Tolkien just deal with theology?

I’m here talking about ‘religion’ as a human organization involving a hierarchy (like a priesthood) and some form of regular worship, and theology as a philosophical system (or systems) that stand behind such an organization.

But do all theological systems stand behind a religion? Of course not. And is to some theological systems very alien to stand behind a religion, because religion, by its nature, cannot but exert some kind of power over its followers, however well intended this might be? To those theological systems, isn’t exertion of power always the wrong thing to do? Well, I kind of think this might be the case with Tolkien’s theological system – in its essence, it is the belief that the exertion of power is wrong.

As the Voice (Illuvatar himself) says to the first people:

‘Ye are my children. I have sent you to dwell here. In time ye will inherit all this Earth, but first ye must be children and learn. Call on me and I shall hear; for I am watching over you.’ (Tale of Adanel)

What’s important here are 2 things. First, there is no intermediary – Men’s connection with Eru is direct (“Call on me and I shall hear”). They do not require, let’s say, a priest, to be closer to Eru. In fact, such intermediaries, together with rituals, services and places of worship are proved, in Tolkien’s world, to often be fraudulent and bloody – the first priest actually being Melkor himself:

“Then we took him (Melkor) as teacher. And we believed all that he taught. For we were eager to know about the world and its being: about the beasts and birds, and the plants that grew in the Earth; about our own making; and about the lights of heaven, and the countless stars, and the Dark in which they are set.” (ToA)

Even though the first Men don’t call Melkor here a ‘priest’, he acts like a priest – by not only educating Men about the world around them, which they can experience directly (“about the beasts and birds, and the plants that grew in the Earth”), but also by giving ready answers to the things Men cannot experience directly – as cosmology and the secret of their own existence (“about our own making; and about the lights of heaven…”)
We even, believe it or not, have a ‘sermon’ that he gave to the first Men:

“All that he (Melkor) taught seemed good, for he had great knowledge.
But ever more and more he would speak of the Dark. ‘Greatest
of all is the Dark,’ he said, ‘for It has no bounds. I came out of
the Dark, but I am Its master. For I have made Light. I made the
Sun and the Moon and the countless stars. I will protect you
from the Dark, which else would devour you.’” (ToA)

And, did you notice it? While Melkor (smart as he is) tells the truth about the things Men can deduce themselves, things about the sensory world around them (“all that he (Melkor) taught seemed good, because he had great knowledge”), he lies about the things they can’t deduce themselves – in this way, by being half truthful, he’s ensuring their trust on the half about which they (still) cannot deduce anything on their own.

And Sauron later emulated Melkor’s example in Numenor, even repeating some of his words:

‘And out of it the world was made. For Darkness alone is worshipful, and the Lord thereof may yet make other worlds to be gifts to those that serve him, so that the increase of their power shall find no end.’
And Ar-Pharazôn said: ‘Who is the Lord of the Darkness?’ (Silm)

But let’s get back to this Illuvatar’s quote:

‘Ye are my children. I have sent you to dwell here. In time ye will inherit all this Earth, but first ye must be children and learn. Call on me and I shall hear; for I am watching over you.’ (ToA)

The other important thing about this quote is that Eru here calls for patience in dealing with the world. But he actually doesn’t limit Men’s creativity. He actually calls Men to be creative, to explore the world on their own without his help:

’First seek to find the answer for yourselves. For ye will have joy in the finding, and so grow from childhood and become wise. Do not seek to leave childhood before your time.’

It’s actually Melkor who tried to limit Men’s creativity and exploit it for control:

“He (Melkor) was less swift than we had hoped to teach us how to find,
or to make for ourselves, the things that we desired, though he
had awakened many desires in our hearts.”

It is a very common criticism on Tolkien’s writing that he’s against science. This is not true. He is against power being exerted over others in any way, and machinery is just the most apparent way of exerting control. Tolkien also criticized language as a tool of control (by showing both Melkor and Sauron inventing languages for their slaves – and language is something that, to the Children of Illuvatar, came spontaneously, they themselves created their languages). There was no need for instruction neither in the department of science nor in the department of language, that is, there is no need to instruct Men in creativity, and in “Tale of Adanel” Tolkien shows that there is also no need for instruction in religion, because:

“We understood the Voice (Eru) in our hearts, though we had no
words yet.”

As I said, Tolkien warns against science, against controlled language and against religion not because he thinks that these things are bad, but because he thinks that they are so valuable that they easily become prey to those who don’t wish anymore to just be creative, but to exert control over others (as Melkor wanted).

And it is when Men accept Melkor’s control that the really nasty stuff begins to happen, beginning with him asking them to build him the “House of the Lord”, that is, a place of worship, following him being unable to save them from death, then virtually enslaving them (“so that we had no rest from labour amidst our afflictions (death and disease)”) and later culminating with some rebels being burnt to death just for saying this:

‘Now we know at last who lied, and who desired to
devour us. Not the first Voice. It is the Master that we have
taken who is the Darkness; and he did not come forth from it, as
he said, but he dwells in it. We will serve him no longer! He is
our Enemy.’ (ToA)

And that is also a logical and convincing tale about the origin of the term “Enemy” in Tolkien’s verse!

Okay so, I don’t generally see Melkor as actively pursuing Sauron to
convince him to join his side or anything really, because I usually
interpret Sauron being more like, seeing/hearing Melkor’s stuff and
mulling on it and then going over to him due to his own shitty
opinions/curiosity/ambition and mostly getting all ensnared with
Melkor’s will and influence gradually, later on.

BUT IF I
did, I think I would actually picture it as being more “Do you like
Green Eggs and Ham” than “Join me and together we can rule the galaxy….”

melkorwashere:

huh i forgot about this sketch (drew it like a week ago)

one anon asked me smth like “what if Melkor turning to good after his first imprisonment, but Sauron becomes a Dark Lord anyway” So I thought ~~that it’s a nice idea for fanfiction~~ that this story would have the same end and Sauron will be defeated, killed or executed, and his spirit will become insane or will be sucked into the void – but in this case Melkor is gonna be on the side of the Valar. And I sketched this >_<

Melkor ‘incarnated’ himself (as Morgoth) permanently. He did this so as to control the hroa, the ‘flesh’ or physical matter, of Arda. He attempted to identify himself with it. A vaster, and more perilous, procedure, though of similar sort to the operations of Sauron with the Rings. Thus, outside the Blessed Realm, all ‘matter’ was likely to have a ‘Melkor ingredient’, and those who had bodies, nourished by the hroa of Arda, had as it were a tendency, small or great, towards Melkor: they were none of them wholly free of him in their incarnate form, and their bodies had an effect upon their spirits.

But in this way Morgoth lost (or exchanged, or transmuted) the greater part of his original ‘angelic’ powers, of mind and spirit, while gaining a terrible grip upon the physical world. For this reason he /had/ to be fought, mainly by physical force, and enormous material ruin was a probable consequence of any direct combat with him, victorious or otherwise. This is the chief explanation of the constant reluctance of the Valar to come into open battle against Morgoth. Manwe’s task and problem was much more difficult than Gandalf’s. Sauron’s, relatively smaller, power was /concentrated/; Morgoth’s vast power was /disseminated/. The whole of ‘Middle-earth’ was Morgoth’s Ring, though temporarily his attention was mainly upon the North-west. Unless swiftly successful, War against him might well end in reducing all Middle-earth to chaos, possibly even all Arda.

Tolkien, J. R. R. The History of Middle-Earth X: Morgoth’s Ring. Ed. Christopher Tolkien. (London: HarperCollins, 2002.) 399-400 (Myths Transformed, Text VII “Notes on motives in the Silmarillion, (ii))