The Dior Dilemma

[Ivriniel]

Some New Matters have popped up since reading the thread.

I loved reading the Letters quote in the post about Tolkien's comments in an 'seeming' unifying of the divided lineage in Aragorn and Arwen, and in relation to the Choice of the Peredhil. Poor Dior. He does leap out as an anomaly, no matter which way you look at it.

Mandos's decree was one about Doom, and it annexed (seemingly) two Elven bloodlines (Earendil Elwing), based on wording of Canon, as presented in the Silmarillion, and as published.

Although the Decree is seemingly basic, it is a precedent with implications: some are temporal (Dior being born prior to it, yet the reincarnation headache), physical (Maia bloodline is present, and (jokingly - is Elwing then the reason Vingilot flies), metaphysical (Elven/Human Unions and the question of Fea) and Spiritual (Valar Worship ideas, and their implications).

In relation to questions of 'Doom' (and Dior's was tied up with the Silmaril. Presumably, being Elwing's forebear he is well within right of claim of the Choice of the Peredhil. Why didn't he get it? Was it because Mandos doesn't 'know' who and who is not living (yet he mans the forts after death - shunting souls this way and that). Presumably he nabbed Dior and put him somewhere. (Upstream I read about possibility of reincarnation).

I add in the presence of Maia blood, as a glaring reason to ponder Dior as having High Doom. Canon is silent, mostly, about Dior, but with such strong basis in Canon-onic (is that a word?) features about the whole area, I would posit that a simple emendation to Annals was highly likely about any of the several areas raised here, had Tolkien been permitted to publish the Silmarillion before he died.

Then, as has been pointed out that the presence of human blood, "however small in measure" is it "disrupts" immortality, or is it alters "Doom--of Kindreds" (i.e., that latter is a question about the Gatekeeper - Mandos).

So - there is the double-Doom interaction question (your 'contributions to major events + your bloodline Doom).

These are questions broader than Dior's fate and I have put them here and at the Half-Elven Foundation.

[Ivriniel]

A second brief post to put the questions:

On Doom: presumably any union with half-elven offspring (noting that Mandos, the Gatekeeper watches the living and the dead) can, by way of Doom can access the equivalent of the descendants of Earendil and Elwing. Why should Mandos never give it consideration again, after a first precedent? (Gilmith is the burning exception to Canon because it is a *fourth* union of Elves and Men. Then Dol Amroth is also a *fifth*, because it's peoples are, I suspect, blended with Elves from Edhellond).

In general, Doom in Middle Earth went to any heroic being. Exemptions to the Grace of passage (related topic) of access to the Straight Road also exist in Frodo, Bilbo - and Sam (Ringbearers), Gimli (significant bond to an Elf during a period of critical history).

Because an actual physical 'body' of half-half can sustain immortality, this also implies that 3/4 casts, etc can also. (That earlier comments raising the item about 'degree of blood'. This must mean that the presence of some human blood does not disrupt potential for immortality.

It is either of a Door Keeping event (Mandos watches the living and the dead) or is it a function of Fea, because some Fea are exceptionally potent, burning or radiant. Presumably this must affect questions of Doom as well.

[William Cloud Hicklin]

presumably any union with half-elven offspring (noting that Mandos, the Gatekeeper watches the living and the dead) can, by way of Doom can access the equivalent of the descendants of Earendil and Elwing.....

...resumably, being Elwing's forebear [Dior] is well within right of claim of the Choice of the Peredhil.

Why would you say that? Manwe was very explicit as to who got the Choice. (Remember also, from the point of view of the Valar as well as the Elves, Men get the better deal: mortality is the Gift of Iluvatar to Men, a gift not even the Valar can take away.)

Also, what is this Doom you speak of? The only text I'm aware of where Tolkien talks of Doom almost as a force, is in Ulmo's conversation with Tuor in the long UT version: and there it is very clearly the Curse of Mandos upon the exiled Noldor he's talking about.