Iluvatar’s Presence, and Signs and Visions (Lord of the Rings)

In Return of the King, chapter “The Land of Shadow,” Sam and Frodo are creeping slowly through Mordor, and everything around is gloom and dark, in every literal way imaginable, in a landscape comparable only to the horrors of war (with reference indeed to Tolkien’s experience of World War I). Suddenly Sam has a moment of experiencing the transcendent, a look beyond what is “under the sun.”

Sam saw a white star twinkle for a while. The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach. His song in the Tower had been defiance rather than hope; for then he was thinking of himself. Now, for a moment, his own fate, and even his master’s, ceased to trouble him.

At a similar dark hour, when Sauron’s forces are coming against Minas Tirith, Pippin experiences that moment of hope and joy, in the face of Gandalf:

Pippin glanced in some wonder at the face now close beside his own, for the sound of that laugh had been gay and merry. Yet in the wizard’s face he saw at first only lines of care and sorrow; though as he looked more intently he perceived that under all there was a great joy: a fountain of mirth enough to set a kingdom laughing, were it to gush forth.

These scenes and many others reflect our moments of joy and hope (in the midst of trials), those experiences of God’s presence here in our fallen world: the beauty of a star, or the experience of a nice sunny day and recalling that feeling of a vacation trip and being at ease and at peace with God.  Just as in our world, throughout Lord of the Rings Iluvatar reveals Himself to the characters in various ways, such as in moments of beauty and calm, as well as in providential signs, or dreams and visions of future scenes.

Looking for a Sign

In another situation, Aragorn the new king of Gondor looks for a sign, and is dismayed because the expected answer still has not come. Iluvatar’s purpose unfolds in an unexpected way.  In our world too, we sometimes look for a particular sign, an indication of God’s direction and will for our lives – and the answer to the prayer, the request, does come, though often not as we expect.  From book six of Return of the King:

[Aragorn] ‘The Tree in the Court of the Fountain is still withered and barren. When shall I see a sign that it will ever be otherwise?’

‘Turn your face from the green world, and look where all seems barren and cold!’ said Gandalf.

Immediately, when Aragorn looked in that direction, there was the sign: the sapling tree.

as he looked he was aware that alone there in the waste a growing thing stood. …

I have found it!  Lo, here is a scion of the Eldest of Trees!  But how comes it here?

Dreams and Visions

Then there is Frodo’s dream of the green country, at the house of Tom Bombadil — and its fulfillment in the Grey Havens:

Either in his dreams or out of them, he could not tell which, Frodo heard a sweet singing running in his mind; a song that seemed to come like a pale light behind a grey rain-curtain, and growing stronger to turn the veil all to glass and silver, until at last it was rolled back, and a far green country opened before him under a swift sunrise.  The vision melted into waking.

Like the apostle Paul, who could not tell if he was in or out of the body when he had a great vision (2 Corinthians 12:2-3), so Frodo knew what he saw, but could not tell if it occurred in dreams or “out of them.”  And Frodo similarly received many sufferings, as did the apostle Paul — as part of the package deal, for those who receive visions must also be kept humble.

Nothing more is said about this vision, until the very end.  But there at the end, Frodo finally arrives in the place of rest (heaven), the destination of those on the ship in The Grey Havens:

And the ship went out into the High Sea and passed on into the West, until at last on a night of rain Frodo smelled a sweet fragrance on the air and heard the sound of singing that came over the water.  And then it seemed to him that as in his dream in the house of Bombadil, the grey rain-curtain turned all to silver glass and was rolled back, and he beheld white shores and beyond them a far green country under a swift sunrise.

In Lord of the Rings – and also in the rest of Tolkien’s legendarium – we have such abundance of literary material, and the many story incidents that we can relate to, noting the parallels to our world and life experience.  These events are just a sampling, of the seemingly endless supply for our analysis and enjoyment.

Readers, please share, some other examples of these types of things — Iluvatar’s presence, in special scenes, and signs and visions.

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Comfort, and Be Not Afraid, in Middle Earth

“Comfort, Comfort my people,” is a well-known Bible verse, the beginning of Isaiah 40 and the great “gospel of Isaiah,” the second major part of the book of Isaiah. In my readings through Lord of the Rings, the idea of “Be not afraid” and “comfort” sticks out, coming up so many times throughout the hobbits’ journey. Just as “do not fear” is the most repeated commandment in the Bible, so Tolkien included this idea in the world of Middle Earth. Indeed, the words comfort and variation comfortable occur 145 times in The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings.

Often the word “comfort” simply comes out in the conversation, such as telling someone to “take comfort in that thought” that has just been shared. When Merry was Gandalf’s passenger, and — rather like the child in the back seat on a long road trip asking “are we there yet?” — mentioned that the rag-tag was tired and would like to lie down, Gandalf replied with several comments about Saruman (The Two Towers, Book 3, The Voice of Saruman), including this: “If it is any comfort to your pride, I should say that, at the moment, you and Pippin are more in his thoughts than all the rest of us.”

When Sam thought Frodo had died, and had decided to leave Frodo and venture forward on his own, Sam lifted up the Phial for one last look at his master’s face, and with the bitter comfort of that last sight Sam turned and hid the light and stumbled on into the growing dark.

Then, when darker times approach, and the world situation is looking bleaker and more dangerous, Gandalf speaks comfort to those around him. As described by Pippin, an event during the first days of his ride with Gandalf on Shadowfax, their flight to Minas Tirith: And hardly had they reached its shelter when the winged shadow had passed over once again, and men wilted with fear. But Gandalf had spoken soft words to him, and he had slept in a corner, tired but uneasy, dimly aware of comings and goings and of men talking and Gandalf giving orders.

A short time later, after Gandalf tells Pippin some of the lore of Minas Tirith and Gondor, Pippin stirred uneasily. “Sleep again, and do not be afraid!” said Gandalf. “For you are not going like Frodo to Mordor, but to Minas Tirith, and there you will be as safe as you can be anywhere in these days.”

Related to this, Pippin is an interesting character study. Behind all the cheer and “hobbit pertness,” and his getting into trouble by doing ill-advised things such as throwing a pebble down an open pit in the ground, and then the evil of stealing the Palantir stone from Gandalf, we find out that Pippin also has some natural timidness and he is often fearful, a quality brought up from time to time, including in book 5 of Return of the King, where much of the narrative is told from his perspective.

Here again I observe one of the many differences from the Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings films — the character of Pippin in the films is that of an arrogant, obnoxious hobbit, not really all that likable. I’ve started reading Matthew Dickerson’s Following Gandalf (published in 2003, and written after the first of the three movies had been released), and he noted a similar thing about the first Peter Jackson film and the portrayal of some of the other characters. As Dickerson pointed out, Jackson’s movie provided incomplete and inaccurate portrayals of Elrond and Galadriel: “the overall images we get of Elrond and Galadriel in the films are not predominantly ones of kindness, love, or understanding—the words used by Tolkien to describe them—but images that are harsh and sinister.” Based on such observations in Following Gandalf, I suspect that in Dickerson’s updated version, A Hobbit Journey, written several years later, he included more such comparisons, of where the later Jackson movies so twisted and distorted the characters in Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings.

So, reader interaction time:  what are some other incidents in Lord of the Rings that stick out to you, that show the theme of comfort in fearful, distressing situations?

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