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Wight
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Re: The role of Fate in Middle Earth
Perhaps the most revealing passage about fate in the Silmarillion:
<blockquote>
Quote:<hr> Therefore he [Illuvatar] willed that the hearts of Men should seek beyond the world and find no rest therein; but that they should have a virtue to shape their life, amid the powers and chances of the world, beyond the Music of the Ainur,
which is as fate to all things else; and of their operation everything should be, in form and deed, completed, and the world fulfilled unto the last and smallest.<hr></blockquote>
It seems then, that the fates of Elves and even those of the Valar themselves were foresung in the Music of the Ainur. They could not be changed, except perhaps by Eru himself. There was one exception - Men. Having been given the gift of Free Will by Illuvatar, it seems they could choose their own destiny. If the lives of Men were fated, it wasn't in the Music.
What we don't know, however, is how much fate was actually in the Music. Is fate a rigid definition of what will happen, in minutest detail, from beginning to end? Or is it more of a loose framework which history simply fits into. Personally, I prefer to believe in the latter.
I expect many of the great events in the history of Arda were fated to take place - The Two Trees and their destruction, the making of the Silmarils, the Oath of Feanor, and the Nirnaeth to name a few. The details, however, would have been left undecided - up to chance. The outcome might have been pre-ordained, but the route to it was not.
Were the lives of Men fated? Certainly the tragic life of Turin seems to be. There are several references made in the tale to Turin's 'Doom'. But I'm inclined to think that the 'Doom' was due to the Malice of Morgoth, just as the fate of Tuor might have been due to the guidance of Ulmo. Of course, it could be that the destinies of Turin and Tuor were fixed because of their involvement with the elves, whose lives were fated. I don't think it can be proved either way.
Most of this (if not all of it) is the merest speculation - buy hey, isn't that what philosophy's all about?
Edit: I seem to have missed Mithadan's post there - he seems to have covered many of my points already. Oh well.
-Voronwë
<font size="2">"For Aldarion had become enamoured of the Great Sea, and of a ship riding there alone without sight of land, borne by the winds with foam at its throat to coasts and havens unguessed; and that love and desire never left him until his life's end."</p>
Edited by: <A HREF=http://www.barrowdowns.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_profile&u=00000143>Voronwe</A> at: 2/9/01 5:16:20 pm