[Rumil]

Hi all,

interesting thoughts from Nikkolas, welcome to the Downs!

I think Morth has made a telling contribution, that the Downfall of Numenor was based on various legends. And it is of course a morally repugnant act by Eru, no matter whether you are 'within' or 'outside' the book setting. Unless of course all those too young to consciously choose Sauron/Melkor-worship were somehow packed onto Elendil's ships, which seems unlikely. However, this does follow the patterns of some of our oldest legends. Eru is indeed a vengeful God it seems.

The Valar, to be fair, though wise and powerful, are neither omniscient or omnipotent. They get things wrong, make mistakes and errors of omission, fail to judge character well etc etc. Somewhat like the Olympian Gods they are a bit 'human'. Maybe thats what gives them some character. As Legate says they see the need to avoid intervening in Middle Earth after they nearly destroyed the place in their original war against Morgoth before the awakening. Torn between desire to help and fear of destruction, they don't always make the best decisions.

The infighting of the Noldor and Sindar bizarrely makes me think of 'The Great Escape', the bit where Bartlett is trapped by the Gestapo wishing him 'good luck' in English and he automatically replies in English and thus gets caught. Every time I watch it I hope he's not going to fall for it! Much like every time I read the Sil, I'm muttering ' nooooo! don't be so damned stupid yet again!', Turin makes me think of Basil Fawlty, the amazing talent he has for doing exactly the wrong thing at exactly the wrong time.

Elves are too remote from mortals, the Valar even more remote, and Eru is ultimately remote.