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Old 01-14-2018, 03:03 PM   #5
Balfrog
Haunting Spirit
 
Join Date: Nov 2014
Posts: 87
Balfrog has just left Hobbiton.
Huinesoron


"The fact that 'thirty pieces of silver' is such an obvious source for the 30 silver pennies led me to start looking for other possible explanations (what can I say? I'm contrary)."

Yes – now the author points it out – it sounds obvious. But I haven't see any published books by the so called 'experts' that have mentioned it before. Nor do I see anything much on the forums out there. Indeed, hardly anything at all. So maybe not so obvious???

By the way - love the way you think. Except Aragorn was referred to as “crownless” not 'half-a-crownless'. Which would lead me to deduce that Tolkien thought the matter was binary – i.e either fully a King or fully not.


lindil

" I will take your version H!

The gospel reference just doesn't fit."



Really - that seems so definitive!
Love to see an explanation.


Saurondil


"Seems to me either too far-fetched, or mistaking the things of common life for specifically Christian allusions."



I must say that first sentence puts me off reading the rest of your post – even though by its length – I know you put some decent effort in.

So really???
Thirty silver pennies and its connection biblically – is something Tolkien would have been unaware of???

How's about a mixture of subtle and not so subtle symbolic embedments?
Is that beyond belief - or do we all know Tolkien so well that we can definitively say one way or the other?


When it comes to:

“… the religious element is absorbed into the story and the symbolism.”
– The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, Letter #142

Then the 30 silver pennies it's either a logical fit or not.
I'm not a rocket-scientist – but I don't think I need to be one to arrive at a rational conclusion.



lindil, Huinesoron, Saurondil


I think its worthwhile reading Ms. Seth's post again - and carefully. The insertion of specific amounts of coinage along with type - is extremely rare in TLotR. Just on that basis one can reasonably deduce there was something behind it.
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