[Lord of Angmar]

"If what I have talked about is the case, then every mood and way of thinking is reflected in the all-encompassing mind of Illuvatar;"

It seems to me that your view is that Eru's creation do not have free will at all. They are not independent creations, they are different manefestations of Eru's own personality. In other words, creation is a physical manefestation of Eru's personality. Manwe represents this part of Eru, while Melkor represents another. That the battle between good and evil represents the battle within Eru himself.

In other words, nothing is an original creation. Clearly, this is not the case.

I do not think that was Gwaihir's point at all. He was stating that Iluvatar understands every mood and every type of thought that lies within his creations. Surely every type of mood and every type of thought within the minds of his Children is reflected somewhere in his mind, the source of his creation.

Just because Eru came up with the idea of the Ainu and used his thoughts to create them does not mean that each Ainu represents a component of Eru's personality.

While the Ainur may not have each individually acquired one "component" of Eru's being, surely they gleaned from his mind and his inner thought a good deal. They were influenced by him as his creations and as his labourers, living for ages upon ages in a world first conceived by him. They had no other source of personality definition but Eru and Ea, their Creator and His Creation.

You say that the Ainur did not receive different separate components, yet for the Valar this may be somewhat the case. Each Vala loves a different part of the world, and each has vastly different character traits (silent Mandos, hearty and jovial Tulkas, stern and subtle Aule, etc.). Surely this is some indication that different facets of the mind of Iluvatar were passed onto the Ainur.

I agree, Nils, with what you are saying about the 'fallen' state, although I do not agree that this was Gwaihir or Saucepan Man's meaning when they suggested that evil was within the Creator Himself.

Tolkien, as a Christian, would be inclined to believe that the state of being 'fallen' from paradise or from wisdom is, in essence, the state of being evil. It is shown time and again in all of his 'evil characters'. Melkor is the original, the Fallen Angel, the Lucifer of Tolkien's world, as it were. In him the seed of 'evil' lived, planted there at the beginning from somewhere deep in the heart and thought of Iluvatar. From him all evil things grew; it was he who corrupted Sauron, the 'Lesser Angel', if you will, the Maia. It was he who broke the minds of and corrupted the Elves or Men (depending on what source you decide to look at) and 'created' the orcs. The Balrogs were originally Maiar, and they became 'fallen' beings too, serving the Dark Lord. The Nazgul and Saruman were also 'fallen', the former from noble Kings of Men and the latter from being a friend and helper to the foes of Sauron.

In my mind, nothing started out 'evil', but when Iluvatar conceived of the possibility of evil, of rebellion against his will, then it became a reality, and thus was bestowed (knowingly or just by chance) upon one of the Ainur, Melkor, who just so happened to be the most powerful. It was he who then brought evil into Ea, falling from the ranks of the Valar and being totally encompassed by evil. If there was anything in Middle Earth that was 'inherently' evil, it was Morgoth, who, it is stated in the Silmarillion and in Morgoth's Ring, was, after his imprisonment in the Ring of Doom, totally incapable of redemption. He was the original in that 'fallen' state, and all other evil beings 'fell' as a direct or indirect result.

I hope my ideas makes sense to people. What I am trying to say is that, while evil first was conceived in Eru's mind, it was the reflection of this idea into the mind of Melkor which actually CREATED evil as an entity in Ea. It was possible for Eru to understand evil without being in a 'fallen' state.

[ August 01, 2003: Message edited by: Lord of Angmar ]