[Voronwe]

<font face="Verdana"><table><TR><TD><FONT SIZE="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Wight
Posts: 233</TD><TD></TD></TR></TABLE>
I was going to post this in 'The Books', but considering its nature, I thought that this might be a more appropriate place for it.

After reading 'Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth' which, I might add, I found to be one of the most interesting, not to mention moving, of all of Tolkien's writings, I was struck with a number of questions.

It seems to me that there are two different conceptions involving the death of Men: The Elvish and the 'Mannish'. Which of these, if any, is the 'right' one? I do not mean to imply a textual contradiction in Tolkien's works - in fact, Athrabeth shows he meant there to be two opinions, to emphasise the 'gulf' that lay between elves and men.

The Elvish conception, and the one which appears in the published Silmarillion, is that Men received death as an original gift of Eru; that their mortality was their 'true nature' and that they had lived short lives as long as they existed.

Men (or at least the Edain), appear to see things differently. Athrabeth shows us that they believed they were not mortal in the beginning. As Andreth puts it, &quot;We were not made for death, nor born ever to die. Death was imposed upon us&quot;. Among men there is a myth of a Fall, caused by Morgoth, which resulted in Death being 'imposed' upon an entire race forever. Certainly rather different from the Elvish account given in the Silmarillion.

Of particular interest to me was the 'Tale of Adanel', which is the myth of the Fall itself. Briefly, Men were created by Eru, seduced by Morgoth so that they began to worship him, whereupon Eru changed their nature so that they died soon and came to Him to know the truth.

Are these two ledgends, those of the 'Gift' and the 'Fall' completely separate and incompatible? Having not read all of Tolkien's writing on the subject, I don't think I'm really qualified to answer that, but nonetheless, allow me to propose a brief theory (probably wrong!) that brings them together.

In the beginning, could it have been that the nature of Men was to live in Arda, still as 'Guests', with an indefinate lifespan and yet having the freedom to depart Arda and go to Eru, in both body and spirit, when they became weary of the world? Then, Men were seduced by the evil of Melkor, and began to fear leaving the world. Thus, to allow men to escape from Melkor's evil, even if they were dominated by it and subject to it, Eru imposed a short life and inescapable death upon mankind, so they would all leave the world and know the truth about Melkor. Looked at like this, death might seem like a gift from Eru to man, giving them freedom and escape even from Morgoth's domination.

This theory does not seem to match the Christian myth of the fall, the one that Tolkien would be familiar with, leading me to suspect that it was perhaps not quite when he intended. But I don't know what his intentions were. I would like to hear some other opinnions on this subject, which I believe to be something which underlies a great deal of Tolkien's work.

I imagine that in the main text of a New Silmarillion only the Elvish idea of mortality would be included, since the Silmarillion was compliled from Elvish historys. Does the Athrabeth have a place too, to show the opinnion of a different race? It appears Tolkien thought it did when he noted it should be included as the 'last item' in an appendix to the work, but being unfamiliar with this project I don't know if you intend it to be included.

Comments on any of this would be greatly appriciated.


-Voronwë
<font size="2">Down the sunlit breath of Day's fiery death
He sped from Westerland.</p>