[davem]

Originally Posted by Raynor

Again, ignoring the continuous appearance of Men, which goes on until the end of Creation. Also, you seem to discard, again, Gandalf reimbodied, or the destruction of the One Ring - without these, none may have seen the end of Sauron's tyranny.

Unless, of course, Eru had removed him as had been done with Morgoth...

You also ignore all the other arguments I have presented on his continuous intervention, without providing a single time a counter-argument or proof. I have already given a refference where the attitude of denying the goodness of Eru is, in this work, the source of evil. You just keep repeating this one statement, oblivious to what I say. It is proving tiresome. May I kindly ask you to review your approach?

But its not convincing anybody. Eru may have shown such 'concern' as you state, but he also slaughtered many thousands of his children, innocent as well as guilty & allowed many evil Numenoreans to survive in mainland colonies.

First of all, considering the magnitude of forces, and that Sauron himself was caught by surprise and that he rose out of the sea depths after he was killed, I would say that no trace of the event, as you describe, would have remained surfaced.

So the possibility that the bodies may not have been seen makes the killing more acceptable?

So, we should think about implications? How about the implications of the actions of the numenoreans. You seem intent on vivid description. How would you describe to yourself "spilling of blood and torment and great wickedness, men made sacrifice to Melkor"? Can you depict how a normal Numenorean party of hunting people in M-E would generally go about? How about a casual day in the life of a taken slave? What would be, in your own imaginations, the stages of cruelly slaying people? May I also kindly request that you keep these images to you?

And thus Eru is justified because two wrongs make a right?

So, I am curious davem, how would you have gone about ending this tragedy? Remember, you have already used anything in your arsenal already. You have used lightnings, even to strike people, even to set the temple on fire. But to no avail. You have sent clouds in the forms of eagles (perhaps eagles themselves in the last day). Nothing. Warnings don't work. The tragedies continue. The power of Sauron increases daily. They set out to attack and possibly destroy the most sacred land, the land of the governors of creation, home to some of your other Children. What do you do davem?

Oh, some 'God thing' - which doesn't involve mass murder. I'm sure, for instance, that destruction of the Fleet alone would have had the desired effect, without killing the civilians. And your position requires us to accept that every single one of the Numenoreans willingly went along with the attrocities, which must at least be open to doubt. I do not accept that any children on the Island can be held to have been guilty enough to justify their deaths while Nuemnoreans who actually did go along with the attrocities were spared by virtue of their being on the mainland.

And, also, keep in mind that you have given your Children a gift, which you should not take back. You have given them free will.

Have to say that the most effective way of taking away someone's free will is to drown them.

How do you go about? Can they really be saved in any manner while embodied?

Isn't that how they justified burning heretics & witches?

I truly doubt that; Sauron didn't waste his power for nothing, they were his both mentally and phisically. So? Let's recap: mounting tragedies, attack on Valinor, (most likely) impossibility of saving corrupted Men while still embodied, who, most importantly, wouldn't want to be saved... how do you cut this knot? I am looking forward to your creative opinion.

Destroy the fleet, spare the civilians.

An ongoing tragedy ends, both in Numenor - and for many people in Middle Earth - why don't we "ask" these what they thought? M-E sees the dawn of a new day, and era, Sauron is diminished in power, and the numenoreans go "home". What do you think about these implications? How would you solve this with less costs?

You miss the point. Eru intervened & killed people. Innocent & guilty. The buck stops with him. You're making him out almost to be the helpless victim of circumstances beyond his control. He is responsible - a fact you seem to keep ignoring. We have to deal with the fact that Eru is a God who will do something like that.