Posted by Lollipop010900:
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I am pretty sure that the two ways elves can die are by murder or grief. I think Arwen would have died by the latter even if she was not mortal.
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This might be true, but Aragorn was prety sure that this would make a big difference (see below). Anyway Arwen made clear that the decision was no longer hers: Sche had choosen long before and their was for her no way to revoke that choise. It is not the lack of a ship that prevented her from going to Aman but no Elve would be allowed to take her onto such a journey.
The difference between such as death of an Elve as you discribe it and the death of a mortal (as Arwen had become) is that of the fate after the fea (or soul) departed from the body:
For both Men and Elves the first yourney would lead to the halls of Mandos. We know that Elves could refuse the sumon of Mandos, and would then be doomed to exist on to the end of Arda as body less ghosts. We know also that Men could do the same with help from mightier beings at least temporary (e.g. the Nazgūl, Gandalf's discription of the final result of the wound by the Morgul-knive, the dead men of Dunharrow). [I personaly doubt fery much that Men could refuse by their own or at leats they could only refuse the first part of the journey and would then be forced to the second part with out preparation.]
In the Halls of Mandos the differences start:
Elves would stay their until Mandos found them fit for a reincarnation, or if the Elve disiered it or Mandos judge him or her in that way, they would stay there until the end of Arda. The reincarnation was done by the Valar by recreating the body of which each fea had a kind of imprinted memory that the Valar could read. Since re-embodyment was done in Valinor only a few reincarnated Elves were ever seen in Middle-Earth (e.g. Glorfindel). What fate waited for the Elves at the End of the world was unknown (even to the Valar).
Men would only stay in the Halls of Mandos for a short time [probably the lenght of that time was again judged by Mandos]. Then the fea of Men would journey on beyond the circles of the world into the presence of Ilśvatar. At the end of the world Men would take part in the second music of the Ainur.
Respectfuly
Findegil