[Marileangorifurnimaluim]

I thought you'd seize that thought (I would, if I were holding up the other side of the discussion). [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img]

It's a cruel set-up, but not ill-intentioned, to doom the Numenoreans. The Valar were both powerful and strikingly innocent. Again and again they failed to take into account the possible negative consequences of their actions. They never imagined when they went to fetch the elves to Valinor that some might not come, or what might happen by splitting the firstborn. Never pictured what harm Morgoth could do in their midst. They never dreamed Feanor would not give up the Silmarils. And for all of their power, they were helpless to stop Ungoliant, or save Feanor from his own impassioned foolhardiness.

Their power was immense, yet still limited. Like us when confronted with an ant with a broken leg. For all the fancy things that we can do, invent computers, what have you, we can't fix something that small. And if try to intervene, we make matters worse.

Eru alone was all-powerful, but once the song was sung he did not directly intervene, and the fate of men specifically he left to their own hands.

As far as Sauron alone being to blame.. weeellllll.. I dunno. Ar-Pharazon was pillaging and enslaving most of the known world. They would not have assailed Valinor, true. But the majority of the Numenoreans were up to no good in any case. They had become corrupt already, which is why they were ripe for Sauron's lies.

-Maril