Elrond the Priestly, Fatherly Figure: The Fellowship Sets Out

As I continue through the Lenten Lord of the Rings reading schedule, again so many themes pop up.  A few observations now, from the first three chapters of book 2 of Fellowship of the Ring — the chapters set in Rivendell, before the Fellowship departs.

As I’ve learned more about the ancient Christian faith, including the role of priests within both Eastern Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism (a particular reference point for J.R.R. Tolkien from his early life), I notice Elrond depicted as a priest and father-figure, the ideal that Tolkien was certainly familiar with–such as the priest who became his guardian after his mother died.

Just as such priests provide direction and counsel to the young people under their spiritual care, as to what spiritual activities each person should attempt, so Elrond provides the initial guidance and blessing to the Fellowship. Elrond considers who should and should not be a part of the Company, weighing various factors such as representing the many free peoples, as well as the abilities of each person, and their maturity (or lack thereof). He hears Frodo affirm his previous vow, to be the Ring-bearer. Similar to the role of a father-figure or priest, Elrond feels that the younger hobbits should assist in a way more suited to their abilities, to help strengthen the Shire in its peril; and Elrond’s heart is against including the youngest hobbit, Pippin, in the Fellowship. Gandalf advises differently — to consider their friendship rather than their might — and when Pippin insists on going, that unless Elrond locks him up in prison or sends him home tied in a sack, he will follow the Company, Elrond concedes the matter, though without a strong blessing: Let it be so then. You shall go, Elrond sighs. Iluvatar’s Providence overrules (Romans 8:28) in the end, and it is through the course of what later happens to Merry and Pippin that other great, unexpected benefits come — but in the meantime, Pippin especially later has his time for regret: ‘I wish I had taken Elrond’s advice,’ muttered Pippin to Sam. ‘I am no good after all. There is not enough of the breed of Bandobras the Bullroarer in me: these howls freeze my blood. I don’t ever remember feeling so wretched.’

Elrond continues to advise and pronounce blessing on the Company, including this charge and counsel just before they depart:

The Ring-bearer is setting out on the Quest of Mount Doom. On him alone is any charge laid: neither to cast away the Ring, nor to deliver it to any servant of the Enemy nor indeed to let any handle it, save members of the Company and the Council, and only then in gravest need. The others go with him as free companions, to help him on his way. You may tarry, come back, or turn aside into other paths, as chance allows. The further you go, the less easy will it be to withdraw; yet no oath or bond is laid on you to go further than you will. For you do not yet know the strength of your hearts, and you cannot foresee what each may meet upon the road.

Clearly, many in the Company do not know the strength of their own hearts, and will be tested as they journey south. Pippin soon realized the weakness of his own heart. Gimli later found the greatest testing of his heart, in his desire to remain in Lothlorien, with the Lady Galadriel. Sam must choose more than once, between another strong love — the pony Bill, and then his father and the Shire in trouble — and staying with Frodo. Of Boromir, the verse of St. Paul in 1 Corinthians 10:12 is fitting: “Let him who thinks he stands take heed, lest he fall.”

Frodo will treasure up the words of the wise — of Elrond, as well as Gandalf – at later critical moments of his quest, for the decision he must make. He remembers Elrond when he later meets up with Faramir: you may find friends upon your way when you least look for it.

Through their experiences on the road together, they will all meet challenges and temptations and difficulties. Yet Elrond, the priestly, fatherly figure back at Rivendell, gives them his blessing as they set out into the unknown:

Look not too far ahead! But go now with good hearts! Farewell, and may the blessing of Elves and Men and all Free Folk go with you. May the stars shine upon your faces!

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Hobbits in the Shire: Iluvatar’s Providence and Protection

The Lenten Lord of the Rings blog has some great thoughts and themes for consideration, from the first chapters of Fellowship of the Ring, the adventures of Frodo and his friends starting in the Shire, then the taking on of the quest, and then as they travel through the Shire.  In the quest motif, from its beginning through later events, it is indeed easy to see parallels to the experience of Lent (as a type of pilgrimage or journey), as well as more generally to our Christian lives as pilgrims in this world, on a journey passing through (this world is not our home) as our journey takes us through times of joy and gladness, and feasting, as well as difficulties.  The themes noted at the Lenten LOTR site (see posts The Real Choice for day 2 and A Slow Start for day 3 readings) include the value of conversations and different types of conversations, festive holiday times, good people versus dangerous, evil people, mercy, the quality of good friends such as Elfs, and even the theme of mushrooms as an embodiment of home.

Another theme that sticks out to me, is the work of Providence, and how the hand of Iluvatar is working to bring various characters onto the scene, and often in the nick of time to avert disaster.  If the evil Sauron were the only power, along with the natural course of events, Frodo with the Ring should have been caught by the Black Rider long before they reached Buckland.  It is as though something restrains the Black Rider each time.  The Black Rider shows up to visit Hamfast Gamgee, instead of coming next door where Frodo is.  The first time along the road, Frodo almost puts on the Ring, but just then the Rider backs away.  The next time, they are saved when a company of elves “just happens” to show up along the road at the same moment as a Black Rider.  Obviously it works as part of a story, the sub-creation.  If things occurred as they “naturally” ought to have — and as it often seems in real life, where we don’t always see the “happy coincidences” that occur in fiction — the story would have ended even before the quest had started.

Yet the same quality, of people arriving, and unexpected events, occurs in the many stories in our world’s history, and in some of the great events told in the Bible.  The story of David and his band of followers, pursued by King Saul and his army, has some similarities.  One time, Saul’s men are very close to capturing David, when a messenger intervenes, such that Saul and company must back off and go elsewhere.  Saul is kept from harming David time and time again.  Satan can only do as much harm to Job as God will allow; there is a restraint on the worker of evil.  Wars among nations have gone differently due to seemingly small, unexpected events, such as the betrayal plans of Benedict Arnold falling into the hands of the American side.  When Queen Esther asked for a one-day delay answer to King Ahasuerus, the next night and day of Providential events changed the outcome.

So in our daily lives, often God brings people to us, at the “right” moment — a “chance” meeting with an acquaintance, an encouraging word at the right time when the person is depressed, information from one person is shared (in a blog post, or other online post) that answers another person’s particular situation.  One person’s need for a job to be done is filled in the person with the right skills, there at the needed time. Unexpected hospitality comes, such as Frodo experiences from both the elves (and particularly Gildor) and Farmer Maggot, who are provided at the right time, companions for the situations at hand.  Through all of this we marvel at the providence of Iluvatar.

 

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The Lord of the Rings Prologue: Table of Nations, Pipeweed, and Other Matters

Continuing from my last post, an introduction to the Lenten Lord of the Rings, for today, a look at the Prologue to The Lord of the Rings.   As noted at the Lenten Lord of the Rings site, we can relate to many general ideas brought out here: contentment versus difficulty, beginnings, calendars, and what things are important in defining a people-group (such as Hobbits in this case) such as their clans and the importance of family relationships.

The Hobbit origins are described in a way similar to our early history, even with three different branches of hobbits:  Harfoots, Stoors, and Fallohides, and how they spread out over a region.  The origins and descriptions have resemblance with our earliest history such as the Table of Nations in Genesis 10.  Here, the different groups of Hobbits described in terms of key characteristics: slight physical variations (the closest that Lord of the Rings gets to the idea of races of men), and which ones were friendly with Elves, which ones preferred to stay in one place, which ones preferred water, or were skilled in handicrafts.

An attentive reading of the Prologue tells us several things about what will happen to the characters.  For all the critics’ comments about Tolkien’s abundance of unmarried young men and under-representation of women and families, here we learn that Merry and Pippin did (later) have families, of which they are heads. A great-grandson of Pippin is mentioned, as are Sam’s descendants, and a grandson of Faramir.  Without giving out too many spoilers (for those who have yet to read the story, or who have never even seen any movie adaptations), Tolkien reveals that Elrond and Galadriel had since departed, with Celeborn remaining behind in Rivendell, but “there is no record of the day when at last he (Celeborn) sought the Grey Havens.”  By the absence of mention of Frodo in later years, we have implied what will later be revealed, that Frodo will not be around in those future years in Middle Earth.

The different characters and groups provide the variety of life and wonder, reflecting the great variety that Iluvatar has set into our own world as well.  Meriadoc is a historian, and Peregrin one with librarian tendencies, to collect manuscripts.  The people of Middle Earth, like our Medieval Age, have their scribes.  Unlike the history of the Elves (brought out in The Silmarillion), the Hobbits’ life circumstance has been overwhelmingly one of peace and leisure — the trials of plague and war have occurred, but long ago beyond their memory.  Yet for all the lack of challenge, a life most similar in our world to certain times of medieval Europe and especially of the relatively peaceful and prosperous 19th century Victorian England, “ease and peace had left this people still curiously tough.”  The Hobbits embody the ideal of Christendom and Christian people, showing us a quality not realized in human history, yet a key characteristic of a spiritual people, of those who are not in bondage merely to the cares of this world — and also the Lenten spirit of turning from the world and giving up the normal, comfortable things of life:  “they were, perhaps, so unwearyingly fond of good things not least because they could, when put to it, do without them, and could survive rough handling by grief, foe, or weather in a way that astonished those that did not know them well and looked no further than their bellies and their well-fed faces.”

I continue to marvel at the inner consistency of every detail within the story of Middle Earth.  Tobacco pipe-smoking is something associated with our early-modern world (including the early 20th century in England), yet a New World product from the West, native to North America.  Tolkien has an explanation even for this anomaly, in the words of Meriadoc:  “observations that I have made on my own many journeys south have convinced me that the weed itself is not native to our parts of the world, but came northward from the lower Anduin, whither it was, I suspect, originally brought over Sea by the men of Westernesse.”  The pleasure that men have enjoyed in their smokes is of course conveyed as a relaxing event for hobbits and even Gandalf the wizard.  My recent reading of a travel journal from a young British man who walked through Europe in the early 1930s (see this post)  also shows some of the enjoyment that Tolkien, also a British man of that time and place, experienced from “pipeweed,” as shown in a few excerpts from the traveler, then-19 year old Patrick Leigh Fermor:

The weather had changed so much, we could lie on the grass there, talking and smoking cigars and basking under a cloudless sky like the lizards, watching the water flow past on its way to the Danube.

I found a hollow lined with leaves among the willow-trunks about three yards from the water and after a supper of Kövecses-remains and a new loaf from my baker friend and watercress from a stream, I stuck a candle on a stone to fill in my diary. It burned without a tremor. Then I lay, gazing upwards and smoking with my rucksack for a pillow, wrapped in my greatcoat in case of cold later on.

The diary lays a lot of stress on cigar- and pipe-smoking; I had forgotten the latter. I think they were both slightly self-conscious symbols of emancipation and maturity. I always seem to be ‘puffing away thoughtfully’ or ‘enjoying a quiet pipe,’ in these pages.

As far as I know, Tolkien never wrote up such an origins explanation for another new world item in his pre-historic world: potatoes.  But potatoes get less mention in Lord of the Rings than the tobacco.

I had not read the Prologue to Lord of the Rings in a few years, so today’s read was a great refresher.  Up for tomorrow:  chapters 1 and 2 of Fellowship of the Ring.  I’ll be noting interesting thoughts as I continue reading, though I may not have the time for blog posts for each day in this Lenten reading journey.

 

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Lord of the Rings 2023: A Lenten Reading

As I mentioned last fall in this post about Ritual Participation, there is a blog dedicated to calendar readings of the Lord of the Rings each year during Lent.  Over the years I have done several annual readings, not every year, but sometimes for a few years in a row, such as when I returned to Lord of the Rings in 2016 (after absence of several years) and then read through The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings again in 2017 and 2018 (in audio format), followed by reading through the Lord of the Rings: One Volume Kindle edition during the first half of 2022.

It is nearing the start for the 2023 Lenten Lord of the Rings reading — it starts this coming Monday, February 13, with the first reading in the Prologue –On Hobbits, and other matters.   Over the next two months I’ll be reading per this schedule – a fast pace though do-able with a combination of audio and print versions.  Every reading it seems, brings out new considerations, great themes and devotional thoughts.  Since I’ve been getting an intro to Tolkien scholarship (Tolkien: A Celebration, and Following Gandalf, plus several podcast episodes of Amon Sul) as well this last year, it’ll be interesting to see what associations come to my mind, what new insights I’ll discover as I read it this time.

Check out this blog post with links to various devotionals from the first reading: many Lenten thoughts here, from the content of the prologue, regarding our comfort and being sheltered; perseverance; the things that define us; beginnings, and Calendars.

This recent essay from Joseph Pearce at The Imaginative Conservative, The Death and Resurrection of Bilbo Baggins, is also interesting — more particular to The Hobbit and Bilbo Baggins, but also fitting as about Hobbits and Bilbo’s character before and after his great adventure.

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Tolkien: A Celebration — Intro to Tolkien Scholarship

I’m gradually delving into the world of Tolkien scholarship: what people have written about J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth legendarium.  I previously read one of Matthew Dickerson’s books, Following Gandalf, a good introduction to treatment of themes found in Tolkien’s writing.  Now I’m reading through the essays in Tolkien: A Celebration, essays published shortly after the centenary of Tolkien’s birth (1992, 100 years after his birth), a good sampling of different ideas and directions that people have taken in academic study of J.R.R. Tolkien.  Indeed the possibilities seem endless, with what different people find to relate to in Tolkien’s writings.  Podcast episodes also provide introduction to various authors in this field, such as this Amon Sul podcast I recently listened to; the author, Dr. Lisa Coutras (Tolkien’s Theology of Beauty: Majesty, Splendor, and Transcendence in Middle-Earth mentions that Tolkien: A Celebration was her introduction to Tolkien scholarship.

Tolkien, as is so well known, “cordially disliked” allegory, and distinguished formal allegory from application — preferring the latter, in the imagination and application of the reader, instead of the single, particular meaning dictated by the author (as in formal allegories).  The essays in this volume certainly expand on the area of application; as generally the case with essay collections, some of these are more helpful than others.

The second essay in this volume, “Over the Chasm of Fire: Christian Heroism in The Silmarillion and The Lord of the Rings,” by Stratford Caldecott, includes basic summary of events in The Silmarillion (for those who may not be familiar or have forgotten these stories), and offers insights regarding the loss of Beren’s hand:

Beren must lose his hand before Luthien can put hers in its place.  That is the way grace works: our own hand, our own ability to grasp and act, can only take us so far.  In reality as in story, life itself must be renounced, every sacrifice accepted, for the sake of love, before love can finally conquer even death, and man be united with grace beyond the grave.

and then, relating this to the account of Frodo and Sam at Mount Doom:

The desire to grasp is finally renounced; the grasping Shadow falls into the Fire and is forgiven.  Frodo has lost a finger, and humble Sam may see him as the great hero, but by that remark and the spirit it reveals it is Sam himself who is conformed to Beren One-Hand; Sam, not Frodo, whose touch will bring the Shire back to life in a golden age.

The next essay, “Modernity in Middle Earth,” is actually about how Tolkien expressed a concern that so many of us resonate with, getting to the heart of the things of most value, versus the progressive values of moderns and post-moderns.  The essay points out what is behind the most common criticism of Lord of the Rings: the dominant charge against Tolkien has been that of escapism and/or reaction; and the overwhelming majority of these critics, as is evident from their other writings, subscribe to the very same values of modernity — statism, scientism, economism, and secularism — which are implicated in the pathological dynamic that so alarmed Tolkien, and still deeply worries his readers today.  This can certainly be applied, as a way of understanding ordinary people around us who do not “get” Tolkien — as with a close family member who outwardly professes Christianity, yet has a scientific, 21st century technology and secondary causes, modernist outlook on life, and has read The Lord of the Rings but doesn’t see anything of particular worth there, preferring current-day authors of secular novels.

Another essay (“The Lord of the Rings — A Catholic View”) comes up with a rather unusual application — at least one I had never considered.  Isildur can be compared to three failed monarchs who held to the traditional construct of Church and State at a time when modernism was coming in strong —  Charles I of England (Anglican in early 17th century England), Louis XVI (Catholic, late 18th century monarch during the French Revolution), and Nicholas II (last of the Tsars, Eastern Orthodox, early 20th century), as another ruler who desired to uphold the traditional kingdom, yet had a personal weakness or flaw that brought about his downfall.  Granted that Catholics want to claim Tolkien as “one of our own,” but I tend to agree with others who have observed that what Tolkien created — though as Tolkien said it was a Catholic work, unconsciously so at first, more consciously in the revisions — was not something that put his Catholicism up front and center.  As the Amon Sul podcast host says, it’s great that Catholics want to promote Tolkien, but that’s not the main point about Tolkien and what he accomplished.

Some of the essays are written at the popular level (such as the opening one from George Sayers link: previous post), others at a somewhat higher reading level, and a few at a more academic level–notably, The Art of the Parable, which I’ll need to reread to fully appreciate its content.  The essay on time and death is also really good, noting the sadness and the pride that entered the elves, unfallen beings who nevertheless were not fully content and desired the higher station of the Valar:  an essay that brings to mind the wonderful fact of Christ’s Incarnation and Resurrection, and the difference in the Middle Earth stories as a time before those events.

I’m just over halfway through Tolkien: A Celebration, and enjoying the many different ideas, applications, and different literary features of interest within Tolkien’s legendarium.  a

 

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Ritual Participation, and a Lent Reading of Lord of the Rings

An interesting point brought up in an Amon Sul podcast (episode #24), in relation to myth and story:  in our modern world, people often focus on “how can I relate to this person?” and similar questions.  As for example, which character in Tolkien’s world am I most like, or which one do I want to be like?  Modern people often ask, how do I relate to such people who are not ordinary, who do not have “ordinary” lives such as mine?  So it is in our modern, very psychologized world.  This can be seen as a symptom of modernism with its stress on individualism and lack of community.  A key part of community life, in contrast with our age, is that of ritual participation: the repeated, common experiences of a group of people, such as in observances in the calendar each year.  Such was the experience in pre-modern societies, whether pagan or in the early and then medieval Church.

In our age, science fiction and fantasy fiction lend themselves to a type of ritual participation: dressing up in costume, going to Star Trek or other sci-fi or fantasy conventions, for instance.  I remember my early days attending such events every year.  Lord of the Rings is another entry into ritual participation:  Doxamoots and related convention gathering events, but also the simple pleasure of the repeated experience found in re-reading through Lord of the Rings every year or at set times of the year.

On this note, I have even come across a reading schedule for Lord of the Rings.  It’s like a yearly Bible reading schedule, but for all the days of Lent (about 2 months) – and with specific chapters for assigned reading each day.  The schedule is even adjusted each year, with the 2023 reading schedule available here.  Various blogs have followed the Lent schedule, with posts related to the reading in the Lent schedule, such as this post from a few years ago, and also this post from 2015.  There’s even a Lenten Lord of the Rings podcast that provides daily updates, brief “devotional” thoughts on each day’s reading.

It’s certainly an aggressive schedule, one that I’m not sure if I’d be able to complete every day, but I think I’ll give it a try.  I may include audio book reading, with the audio book version (unabridged) I have (read by Rob Inglis).  Of course, Lent season is still four months away, and I completed this year’s reading of Lord of the Rings a month or so ago, to start on The Silmarillion now.

What are some other ideas and reading schedules for Lord of the Rings reading, or for reading of Tolkien’s other works?

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