Quote:
|
What about the scalpel of free thought?
|
Only when it's guided by knowledge and skill. You wouldn't put a scalpel into a child's hands, would you?
It's a peculiarity of the last forty years to teach pupils that they don't need to know anything to come up with valid theories. If my free thought leads me to think that Gandalf was lifted from
The Dukes of Hazzard, my knowledge that
The Hobbit was out decades before the T.V. series ought to tell me that I'm wrong. It's no different with any other sort of parallel: if you don't know the subject then your theories can only be good by sheer luck. Knowing the area guides theories and makes them less likely to be rubbish.
davem: as for Tolkien's comments on the Paternoster being reflected in the scene at the Sammath Naur, Frodo has forgiven the trespasses of another (Gollum), hence he does not suffer the full penalty for his own failure: Frodo is shown mercy just as he in turn showed mercy to Gollum, which seems a fair interpretation of those lines. Admittedly I doubt that was at the forefront of Tolkien's mind as he wrote the scene.