The Power and ‘Place’ of Words Spoken: In Middle Earth and Ancient Civilization

One great thing I like about having an electronic edition of The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings, is the ability to do word-studies on various themes — similar to Bible word-studies; in this case to see Tolkien’s vast use of language and Middle Earth themes.  From my recent re-reading through Lord of the Rings, I am again struck by the importance of the spoken word, and the idea of words having power.  Numerous examples abound, including Saruman’s voice which has power to deceive, or the word “key lock” at the gates of Moria, and the general idea of vows and oaths taken, a topic I explored in this previous post.

As pointed out in podcast episode 16 of Amon Sul, one interesting aspect of the story is the many times that speaking is with reference to NOT speaking about a particular thing:  namely, the Black Riders / Ringwraiths.  We first see it with Gandalf in the second chapter of Fellowship of the Ring, where Gandalf is sitting by Frodo’s fireplace telling Frodo the history of the ring:

‘Last night you began to tell me strange things about my ring, Gandalf,’ he said.  ‘And then you stopped, because you said that such matters were best left until daylight.  Don’t you think you had better finish now?’  and then,when reading to Frodo the writing on the ring:  The letters are Elvish, of an ancient mode, but the language is that of Mordor, which I will not utter here.

and again in the very next chapter when Pippin asks the elves about the Black Riders: let us not discuss this here; then later Gildor speaks privately about the riders to Frodo.  Throughout Lord of the Rings, people are cautioned not to speak about certain things openly: Gandalf speaking the words of Mordor at the Council of Elrond, for instance.  After Sam questioned the amount of time they had spent in Lothlorien, Legolas talked about the slow passing of time in Lorien, and then this interesting dialogue where Frodo speaks too casually about the elven ring:

“But the wearing is slow in Lorien,” said Frodo.  “The power of the Lady is on it.  Rich are the hours, though short they seem, in Caras Galadhon, where Galadriel wields the Elven-ring.”

“That should not have been said outside Lorien, not even to me,” said Aragorn.  “Speak no more of it!”

Clearly, these great matters are so grave, as to require certain spaces or places where they can be talked about.  Words, and especially spoken words, seemingly have the power of blessing and cursing, and such power is more than just a mere wish or hopeful thought.  Similarly, in C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia, the “deplorable word” in The Magician’s Nephew was what destroyed the world Charn.  We are never told the specific “word” but the idea again is of spoken words having power to destroy a world.

In our world, of course, it was the spoken word of God that created this world.  God spoke the world into existence.  And He later came in the flesh, the incarnate Word.  I think also of the ancient world, in which people who put great importance on spoken curses (as well as blessings).  The Old Testament especially is replete with references to spoken curses as well as blessings.  Jacob did not want a curse to fall on him, for deceiving Isaac and claiming to be Esau – Rebecca allowed the curse to fall on her instead.  Then in Judges 17 we see a son greatly concerned because of a curse his mother had spoken, regarding silver that had been taken from her.  We also have God’s promised blessings and curses put on the people of God (Leviticus and Deuteronomy), as part of their covenant with God, and again these blessings and curses were to be spoken publicly before the assembly.

As for Tolkien’s idea of words not being spoken in particular places, but sometimes allowed in other, more private and prepared places, I am also reminded of an interesting point from early church history.  The early church had the writings which became the New Testament canon, writings which were circulated among believers and available to unbelievers.  But they also had their own traditions, and particular practices, which were only dealt with orally, and only in their places of worship.  As application of Jesus’ words in Matthew 7 about not casting your pearls before swine, the early church leaders considered certain matters of such special, sacred importance, that these teachings were not to be written down and available to the unbelieving (swine and dogs) and were not for discussion (verbally) with unbelievers, but were only for the catechumens and the church congregations, as in this excerpt from St. Basil (4th century):

Of the dogmas and sermons preserved in the Church, certain ones we have from written instruction, and certain ones we have received from the Apostolic [oral] Tradition, handed down in secret [i.e., discreetly]. Both the one and the other have one and the same authority for piety, and no one who is even the least informed in the decrees of the Church will contradict this. … Is this not the silent and secret tradition? … Is it not from this unpublished and unspoken teaching which our Fathers have preserved in a silence inaccessible to curiosity and scrutiny, because they were thoroughly instructed to preserve in silence the sanctity of the Mysteries [i.e., Sacraments]? For what propriety would there be to proclaim in writing a teaching concerning that which it is not allowed for the unbaptized even to behold?

And summarized in a current-day look at this early church history  (Know the Faith, by Michael Shanbour):

Generally, however, dogma was neither preached to unbelievers nor written down for fear that it would be misunderstood, trivialized, and mocked, subjected to petty curiosity that is demeaning to holy things. As St. Basil the Great puts it, “Reverence for the mysteries is best encouraged by silence.” Although counterintuitive to our modern minds, the Church was very reticent to “throw pearls to swine” (Matt. 7:6), lest that which is holy be trampled upon. . . . Therefore the dogmas of the Church were purposely kept discreet and unwritten. Catechumens were instructed not to write down on paper what they were hearing and not to share dogma with unbelievers. The Church’s more intimate teachings and many of her practices were taught only by word of mouth or not spoken of at all until one had entered the Church and experienced her inner life. Even the Lord’s Prayer was not taught to catechumens (let alone unbelievers) until after or just prior to their baptism.

The parallels between the ancient world and ideas brought out in Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings (and in C.S. Lewis’ Narnia series) continue to fascinate me.  So much of what made Tolkien’s writing so successful and well-received, comes from his expertise in the history and literature of the ancient, pre-modern world.

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The Silver Chair (Chronicles of Narnia): Praying to Aslan, Facing East

After many years, I’m rereading the Chronicles of Narnia.  Voyage of the Dawn Treader, and The Silver Chair, are the stories I best remember, in large part due to the BBC dramatizations from the early 1990s, of which I especially appreciated The Silver Chair.  So, to this day, I still have mental pictures of the young teenagers who played Eustace and Jill, and of course Tom Baker (who I remembered and loved from my earlier Dr. Who fandom days, in his 7 years as the 4th Doctor) as Puddleglum.  The BBC versions were low-budget compared to Hollywood movies, but quite faithful to the original stories, and provided 3 hour renditions of both The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe and The Silver Chair, giving short shrift of only 1 hours to Prince Caspian and 2 hours to Voyage of the Dawn Treader.  The last one in this BBC mini-series, The Silver Chair, was the best quality in my opinion.

Reading the books again is a good refresher, to include parts omitted or slightly changed in the 3 hour BBC version; the audio book of The Silver Chair is slightly over 5 hours, so at least the 3 hour dramatization gets relatively close, as compared to most movie dramatizations of popular books.

The descriptions of The Experiment House are classic C.S. Lewis comments against the problems of modernism and progressivist, anti-Christian thought, that was one of Lewis’ key focus throughout his fiction and non-fiction writings.  I’m also noticing how Jill, early in the adventure, complains a lot and desires the comforts of home such as a bed with blankets and hot baths.  That strong desire for comfort indeed becomes a major failure and plot point, how they end up at the giants’ castle and then have to escape from it.  This same desire for comfort and dislike for adventure, of course, is also brought out regarding Bilbo Baggins in The Hobbit — though not to the extreme exhibited by Jill and even Eustace, to the point of wrong, sinful choices made in order to achieve the desired comfort.

Another interesting point I had forgotten, but now note the significance of:  behind the gym, when Eustace in conversation with his classmate Jill considers formally asking Aslan if they can go to Narnia, he makes a special point about the proper position for making such a request.  Their request is in effect a type of prayer, though Lewis never uses the actual term prayer.  But a petition is certainly a large part of what is involved in prayer.    How Aslan should be asked, included hands stretched forward with palms down — as Eustace had observed done on Ramandu’s Island near the end of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader — and facing to the east.

As an aside, this scene also is one of the examples cited by modern feminists and secularists, of the supposedly sexist dialogue in C.S. Lewis’ writing:  Eustace’s line to Jill, that girls don’t know their direction on a compass.  Not mentioned by these critics, is Jill’s retort that Eustace himself obviously didn’t know — at that particular location they were at — which direction was east; and later in the story, the narrator author admits that he does not know if such lack of compass directions is true of all girls, but that it was true for Jill in particular.

In all my years growing up as a Protestant Christian, then coming to saving faith as a Protestant (Evangelical) Christian as a young adult and the many years since then as a Protestant Christian, I had never known the significance of facing east in prayer.  (I had heard this about cemetery plots, but nothing else.)  In prior readings of The Silver Chair I probably attributed this point to the internal plot of the Narnia story itself, since in the previous book, Voyage of the Dawn Treader, the characters did indeed quite literally sail East to Aslan’s country.  However, as I recently learned, as part of my study of Eastern Orthodox Christianity (the faith of the early church and its adherents to this day), it has always been a significant part of Orthodox Christian practice to pray facing this particular compass direction, of East.  Just as in Judaism before it, synagogues would face the direction of Jerusalem and the direction of East was held in high regard, and as the men of Gondor in Middle Earth turned in the specific direction of West toward Numenor in their prayer and moment of silence (link: previous post), the early Church saw significance of praying to the East.  As St. Basil observed in the 4th century (in his work, On the Holy Spirit):

For example, let us especially make note of the first and commonest thing: that those who hope in the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ should sign themselves with the Sign of the Cross. Who taught this in Scripture? Which Scripture instructed us that we should turn to the east in prayer? …Is this not the silent and secret tradition?   … Is it not from this unpublished and unspoken teaching which our Fathers have preserved in a silence inaccessible to curiosity and scrutiny, because they were thoroughly instructed to preserve in silence the sanctity of the Mysteries [i.e., Sacraments]? For what propriety would there be to proclaim in writing a teaching concerning that which it is not allowed for the unbaptized even to behold?

For further explanation of why the early Church (and Orthodoxy to this day) face East in their prayers, here are two helpful articles:  Why Orthodox Churches Face East and Why do the Altars of Orthodox Churches Face East? 

Returning to C.S. Lewis and this story detail (the children facing East when making their petition to Aslan):  I find this interesting, as another piece fitting quite well into the picture of C.S. Lewis as being closest in his beliefs to Eastern Orthodoxy, as I also have recently learned from other online sources.  For further reference, here is a podcast episode and an article regarding C.S. Lewis’ beliefs and Eastern Orthodoxy.

I’m still re-reading The Silver Chair, and looking forward to finding even more story incidents that allude to early church practices.  I already know about this one (near the end of The Silver Chair), mentioned in this free online book Know the Faith: A Handbook for Orthodox Christians and Inquirers:

In C.S. Lewis’s The Silver Chair, from his Chronicles of Narnia series, we encounter a beautiful description of a most natural, God-inspired act of icon veneration. Finding his formerly blackened shield now immaculate and revealing the blood-red image of the lion (Aslan, Lewis’s Christ figure), Prince Rilian addresses his small band of fellow travelers: “Now by my counsel, we shall all kneel and kiss his likeness, and then all shake hands one with another, as true friends that may shortly be parted.” The solemn act of love and reverence for the one who had delivered them from the delusion of the green witch was appropriately followed by acts of reconciliation and forgiveness.

I welcome any reader thoughts here — your thoughts about the Narnia movies (either the BBC series or other versions), as well as your comments about the overall story.

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