Doriath, the doom weaver.

[Hookbill the Goomba]

A thought came to me while reading Turin Turambar, As he enters Doriath it says "and Doom fell upon him" Now, a similar thing happened in Beren and Luthien, when Beren is in Doriath a doom fell upon him also. Then of course there is the final doom of Doriath itself. Am I the only one who sees this pattern?
Is it just the seeds of Morgoth that caused all theses dooms? Or is Doriath in some way responsible? Wright your answers down now!

[Hot, crispy nice hobbit]

Heh, "Doom" is really often repeated around the works of Prof T... I guess he would have wrote "fate" instead, but it did not sound glamorous enough...

Actually, Mandos is the Valar of Doom... He is the ultra-morbid fellow who told Feanor that his dad is dead even before the messenger arrived. But surely when Nienor cried: "Master of Doom by doom mastered.", she actually meant that: "Master of Death by Fate mastered."?

[Hookbill the Goomba]

That’s true, but still, dose Mandos cause Doriath to cause such 'fates' to happen? Is it the fact that things and people from Valinor came thither? A.k.a, Melian and The silmarill. From this one could go into grate detail about the silmarills as a doom Weaver, admittedly there is more evidence there. You see, When Beren's doom came upon him he was later sent on the quest of the silmarill and when Turin was born the quest began... coincidence?

[Hot, crispy nice hobbit]

Actually, the "Doom" had always been there since the Music of the Ainur.

Then Illuvatar spoke, and he said: 'Mighty are the Ainur, and mightiest among them is Melkor; but that he may know, and all the Ainur, that I am Illuvatar, those thing that ye have sung, I will show them forth, that ye may see what ye have done...'

Mandos is the Valar of Doom, but he is not in charge of fate. Eru is. The Silmarils are said to lock the fates of Arda:

and Mandos foretold that the fates of Arda, earth, sea, and air, lay locked within them.

The fate of Beren and Doriath is linked with the Silmarils, because of Thingol's ploy to get Beren killed while stealing them from Morgoth. Maybe Doriath is sort of "jinxed" after the forced entry of Carcharoth?

[Hookbill the Goomba]

Maybe Doriath is sort of "jinxed" after the forced entry of Carcharoth

That’s what I mean. But what I don’t get is the fact that as soon as Turin was sent to Doriath a doom hell upon him. I think that Tolkine was trying to tell us that Doriath was, as you say, "Jinxed", it just seems strange to me. You may be right as it would seem that ever since Beren Broke through the girdle of Melian The fall of Doriath was woven, also as you said when Carcharoth broke through it caused all sorts of unpleasantness. So perhaps Melian's girdle was not so protective as they thought.

[Hot, crispy nice hobbit]

Well, if Melian's girdle (waistband?) is not strong enough to prevent a Man from entering, what hope does it have against a rabid wolf?

But truth to be told, Melian herself foresaw the possibility of having a man entering to steal Luthien away... sounds very, very similar to some of the Greek/European mythology... I think, however, Turin's doom had something to do with Morgoth's curse, though, of course, Morgoth himself sought to bring the curse home.

[Hookbill the Goomba]

I think Morgoth just Cursed everything, fair or foul

[Finwe]

The Doom of Doriath was set into motion the moment that Beren walked in. Melian herself knew that one would come, and a doom far greater than any she could envision would drive him, and that one would pass through her Girdle and enter Doriath. I don't think she was talking about Carcharoth. She was talking about Beren. The downfall of Doriath began when the first seeds of greed were sown in Thingol's heart, when he realized that he could send Beren to fetch a Silmaril from Morgoth. At that moment, he began to desire the Silmarils, and whosoever desired those fateful jewels would bring the Doom of Mandos upon him.

After the main events of the Theft of the Silmaril, Doriath was too shock-ridden to completely recover. It would forever be doomed to fall, thanks to the temptation that its king failed to overcome.

I don't really agreed with the concept of Doriath itself being "jinxed". Rather, I've always believed that the comings of Beren and Turin were not cursed, so much as they set events into motion which led to their eventual dooms. For example, if Turin had never came to Doriath, he would not have caused the death of Saeros and would not have become an out-law, etc. Likewise, if Beren hadn't come to Doriath, he wouldn't have fallen in love with Luthien, and sought for the Silmaril, and all then the ramifications thereof would not have come to pass. I think that the arrival in Doriath was a pivotal point in the lives of several different characters, and that they were not so much cursed by the place as their lives and actions after that point led towards a certain end/doom/fate.

[davem]

In the Ainulindale, its stated that men are not bound by the Music, which is as fate to all things else. So it seems that when Beren & Turin enter Doriath, they both become enmeshed in the Doom of the place & the people, but also in some way, they change it, or at least have some major effect on it.

So, it seems that in some way, they are meant to come there, in that there is some kind of destiny which drives them, but that their own choices change that destiny. Without Beren's appearance ultimately there would be no intervention by the Valar, because Earendel would not have come into posesion of the Silmaril, & so would not have been able to find his way to Valinor to plead for Elves & Men, & Morgoth's victory would perhaps have been assured, & we cannot guess what devastation Glaurung would have wrought. Men, therefore, are effectively 'wild cards' which have unforseen effects.

All of which begs the question - does Illuvatar make use of the freedom of Men, or does he 'direct' their choices to make them do his will? Morgoth attempts to manipulate men - as with Hurin, when he controls what he sees happening to his family, but is Illuvatar equally manipulative?

The Music is a directing force throughout history, but we never know how much Men's freedom can change it - not totally, obviously, as Men live in a world bound to the pattern it sets out, but without their freedom to change it to some degree the whole story would be fixed before it started, & the Music would have been enough, without Arda needing to have been frought into being.

Thingol can only be seduced by the desire of the Silmaril because Beren makes it possible for him to come into posession of it. Beren's love for Luthien makes possible Thingol's destruction, & the destruction of Doriath. But is Beren's love for Luthien determined by the Music, or is it something which changes the Music at that point? Or would Thingol's destruction have come about anyway - would he have come into posession of a Silmaril in some other way?

Flieger makes the freedom of men a major issue, but I don't know how much Tolkien meant by it, or how much thought he gave to the idea. The appearance of Men is a major part in Morgoth's seduction of the Noldor. So, would they have gone down the road they took if Men hadn't been present in the world?

Ultimately, for all the struggles & sacrifices if the Elves, its men who bring about the destruction of Morgoth, through Beren, Turin, Tuor, Earendel, & its Aragorn who leads the forces of the West in the overthrow of Sauron, but how much of what they do is the fulfilment of the Music, how much of it is in despite of the Music, & how much is the result of their behaviour actually changing it?

[Hookbill the Goomba]

All of which begs the question - does Illuvatar make use of the freedom of Men, or does he 'direct' their choices to make them do his will? Morgoth attempts to manipulate men - as with Hurin, when he controls what he sees happening to his family, but is Illuvatar equally manipulative?

Personaly, I do not agree with davem here. For the main reason that J.R.R.T was a Catholic, and Iluvatar is God. So, He beleves in the God given right of Free will to men. You may not be relidjous, but i am, and so was Tolkien, His Stories are in many ways related. It is unlikely that Tolkien would have ment Iluvatar to be manipulative.

[davem]

Manipulative is maybe the wrong word. The question is , how far will Illuvatar permit men to go? In the Athrabeth Finrod tells Andreth that Illuvatar will not allow Morgoth to deprive him of his own - ie Elves & Men. So, to what extent will he intervene if, under Morgoth's influence, men are being lost?

Also, if Illuvatar has a 'plan', an intention, for his creatures, will he allow his creatures to prevent his plan coming into being? Absolute free will is impossible, as the nature of reality imposes restrictions on what we can & cannot do.

Would Illuvatar have allowed the Ring to fall into the hands of Sauron, or Frodo or anyone else to claim it & become a new Sauron? Isn't the destruction of the Ring brought about by the direct intervention of Illuvatar? And isn't that an example of Him manipulating events, if not people? But if Illuvatar manipulates events to prevent Frodo claiming the Ring, isn't he therby taking away Frodo's freedom to claim it? He's not manipulating Frodo into throwing the Ring into the Fire, but he's certainly taking away his freedom to claim it for his own.

[Hookbill the Goomba]

We do get a suggestion of this, alike to how the ring happened to come into the possession of Bilbo in Gollum's cave. As Gandalf says:

"There were other powers at work"

Could this suggest Devine intervention By Iluvatar? Also when Gandalf says:

The Ring was meant to go to Bilbo but not by its maker!

so I would say yes, I think Iluvater would have had some intervention, he would not let Sauron or any who took over from him enslave his children. He would not, say, come down from heaven and destroy Evil himself, he would let The elves or men Do it themselves. As has been said;

A coincidence, or chance happening, is God acting secretly!

However, he would intervene, but give the children the choice of using the interventions wisely or foolishly.

[Tharlionglin]

Doriath got what it deserved and especially Thingol. I viewed him as arogant and his own security was assured by Melian not by his own prowess.

Despite the fact that the Noldor did in fact do great harm to each other and particularily the Teleri, they were still fighting the good fight against Morgoth. While the great Kings of the Eldar and their Kingdoms were systematically destroyed Thingol was happy to sit in his secure thrown offer no sanctuary, or aid, and send of the greatest of men, Beren, to his death.

It was only a matter of time until his big mouth got him in trouble. Iluvater bless the dwarves!

[davem]

But if Illuvatar intervenes, isn't he manipulating events, & thereby taking away the individual's freedom to act? Which simply means that Illuvatar will not allow us complete freedom of action, to do anything we want - not if that would harm others, or the world, or His plans, too much.

There is a danger though in seeing Illuvatar as the same as the God Tolkien worshipped. Put simply, God created Tolkien, but Tolkien invented Illuvatar, so we can't think of Illuvatar as being the same as God. A product of the human imagination cannot be as complex, or as easy to understand, as the Being that created that imagination. In other words, Tolkien may have intended Illuvatar to symbolise God within Middle Earth, but God is bigger than Middle Earth, & God's intentions & actions will be more complex & so, more difficult to understand than Illuvatar's. So, to say that Illuvatar may 'manipulate' people & events in Middle Earth, is not to say that God manipulates people & events in this world. Middle Earth is not an allegory of this world, & an artist must be free to create. Illuvatar has a specific plan for Middle Earth, & works to bring that plan about, directly, & through various agents like the Valar. That plan will not be the same as God's plan for this world (assuming you believe in a God that has a plan), because this world is not Middle Earth, & has a different destiny.

[Hookbill the Goomba]

Middle Earth is not an allegory of this world.

From what Tolkien says in his Forward to Lord of the rings i would have to agree. Tolkien himself says that he hats Allogory in all its forms. I agree that Iluvatar is a reprisentation of God, I always thought of it as being the same God that Tolkien worshiped, as I have recently read "Finding God in Lord f the rings" So i was a little bias that way. Yes, it would be too complex for a mortal to think up God, as it is beyond human understanding. However, i do feel that Tolkien was perhaps giving another slant on things, His descriptions of Iluvatar are very vague, as in the Bible, so it leaves room for exspantion. Plus there is the added Fact that the works of the history of Middle earth (Including Silm) were Edited by his son Christoffer, and he may have had diferent ideas to what his father at first thought.

[drigel]

i think thingols strategy represented the difference in the way the teleri and the nolder viewed the world. His kingdom was the only place in ME during the first age that was unspoiled - until of course the end. A mighty accomplishment - for what its worth - that - i think - is worth a lot, if your an elf

[drigel]

Back to the subject though: the doom wasnt just from the seeds of Morgoth. "Doom" or "fate" (if one buys into that idea) occurs or is manifested by people. The country or land that those people inhabit (to me) is secondary.

There were some major players on the stage of Doriath for many years. Melian, being a Maia who choose to inhabit that land, would (I think) have a tremendous amount of effect on the fate of any around her - more so than "seeds of Morgoth". It was her that prevented Morgoth from sullying that land, EVER. Something no Noldorian prince could say about their territory....

But, by choosing to live in ME, Melian's doom was woven with Elu Thingol, Beren, Blue Mountain Dwarves et al, including Morgoth as well. Taken all together, yea there was some mighty doom in that place. One can see this in the Ruin of Doriath: so sudden and cataclysmic. I think it was the device by which JRRT could best describe something about how no matter how well you try to protect Paradise, there is always someone (including his doom), who is gonna mess it up

[davem]

Hookbill, I've read Finding God in LotR, but I have to say it seems to be more about 'Finding God' than 'LotR' - which is either a good, or a bad thing, depending on your position. I'd point you to 'Following Gandalf' by Matthew Dickerson, or 'Splintered Light' by Verlyn Fleiger, which both go much more deeply into Tolkien's religious side, & how it affected & came through in his writings. Also, if you can get hold of it, 'Secret Fire: the spiritual vision of JRR Tolkien' by Stratford Caldecott, which is a very insightful exploration of Tolkien's Catholicism.


Drigel, fate, or Doom, is one of the most complex issues in Tolkien's work, as far as I'm concerned, because we don't know to what extent people have any choice in what they do, so it makes it difficult to judge their motives. Only Men are said (in Ainulindale) not to be bound by the Music, so how can we judge the Elves. Its almost like the Music sets out everything, & all the beings of ME, apart from Men, have to go along with it. Then men, or a man, come along, do something outside the Music, & so change it, & therefore change the fate of the Elves, & the Elves suddenly get shifted in a different direction, a direction which they are then 'bound' to follow, until men again change things.

But this takes away both freedom & responsibility from the Elves, which makes them little better than robots, which isn't what Tolkien intended, -imo. Flieger does go into this in her two books, but I'm not sure I go along with her totally - though having said that, I haven't got my own explanation all formulated yet.

[drigel]

nice post guys! makes me think (ouch)
To me, Elves were not robots at all. Their fate or doom was just a different variety than mens. Being a part of the Music, their fate was unequivocally linked to that of Arda. Saying that does not mean that they did not have free will. The rebellious Noldor being the exception, the elves imo were always focused on the ideal of "Arda Unmarred". After all, they were there pretty early on - they know what an unpoiled ME is like, an ideal that would be hard to forget if one never dies of old age. This mentality i feel is a reflection of their being bound to the Music.

Morgoth's "ring" was ME itself, thus binding his fate with the elves (whom he desired for his own to rule). Orcs are a manifistation of the link as well. Were those elves doomed to be
corrupted, enslaved and ruined by Morgoth to produce orcs? In hindsight, well yea obviously.

But in hindsight, every player's doom in this story can be fleshed out. Did Eru have a hand in everyones doom? YES I think that was the authors intention. But, as in our reality, the Makers hand and will are hard to fathom at times...

[davem]

In The Athrabeth Finrod distinguishes between two kinds of Hope. He says there is amdir & estel. Amdir seems to correspond to something along the lines of optimism, a belief that in some way it is possible to find hope within the world, to make the world better by one's own actions, which it seems the Elves mostly lack, & by the end of the Third age seems completely absent - they fight the Long defeat', they've seen 'many defeats & many fruitless victories'. This perhaps implies a loss of any sense that they can have any effect in bringing about Arda Unmarred by their own actions, & they have simply chosen to go on fighting because the alternative is seen as simply 'wrong', & therefore while they hold to the ideal, they do so without amdir.

Estel is faith, in Illuvatar, in the idea that something from 'outside', beyond Arda, will intervene to bring about victory of the 'Good', but it will have nothing directly to do with their own actions. They are fighting a 'holding action' till Illuvatar decides it is time to intervene, & bring an end to evil. Illuvatar, in the end, will make everything right, but this seems based in little more than a belief in the goodness of Illuvatar - Illuvatar is good, therefore good will eventually, in some way, at some point be victorious.

It seems to me, if my understanding is correct, that the absence of amdir perhaps grows out of a sense of their own role within the Music, the Doom which is as fate to all in Middle Earth except Men. Men, however seem to posess amdir, because they go on struggling to bring about the victory of the Good through their own actions, as well as posessing estel. This seems to be a major distinction between Elves & Men, & possibly reflects their innate knowledge that they are not bound by the Music, that they can change things.

Maybe the Elves fatalism is what keeps them looking always to the past, & trying to hold back the future, by the Rings, but, as Tolkien says, in doing so they have 'flirted with Sauron'. But this is perhaps their attempt to hold back what they percieve as a change to the Music. They seem to have a strong sense that things should not be permitted to change, & that their task is to stop it happening. All change would perhaps seem 'wrong' to them because it feels like it is forcing them out of their fated path. So even if they aren't robots, perhaps there is something inside them that is trying to force them to behave like robots. Their ideal would almost seem to be to stop time & change, make the world into an 'embalmed' work of art, perfect & pristine, set forever unchanging. If their essential nature cries out for the stability of fate, of the Music, then all change, time itself, could come to seem like an evil.

[drigel]

Hence, the elves have the ability ulitmately to have access to paradise.
excellent analysis davem!

[symestreem]

Interesting, then, that Gilraen should name her child 'Estel' and not 'Amdir'. 'Amdir' would seem to be more in fitting with her attitude and her hope for her son. 'Amdir' also turned out to be more applicable when referring to Aragorn and his becoming king. That is not to say that 'Estel' is not also applicable. Perhaps it was the elves, though, who gave Aragorn this name, and if they lacked 'amdir', then 'estel' would be the only remaining choice. But I hardly think the elves viewed Aragorn as intervention. 'Estel' is a very odd name for Aragorn!

[drigel]

faith, mabye since the line of Isildur has once more been perpetuated...

[davem]

In the Athrabeth amdir is translated 'looking up'. Perhaps as the Athrabeth was written later than LotR Tolkien had developed the idea of two kinds of hope. He did seem to lack Amdir himself, especially later in his life. Estel is a 'higher' form of hope, with a religious dimension that amdir seems to lack. Of course, this would mean that Gilraen is saying she has lost all capacity for estel herself - implying a loss of faith in Illuvatar.

Maybe she is saying that estel is more necessary, & that the Dunedain need to remember that, & not put all their trust in themselves. How close this identifies Aragorn with a 'redeemer', or 'Christ' figure is another question - Shippey has pointed out the similarity in style & wording between the Eagle's song at Minas Tirith, & the Psalms in the King James bible - 'the realm of Sauron is ended forever, & the Black Gate is thrown down, & your King has passed through & he is victorious, & your king shall come again & he shall dwell among you all the days of your lives' etc (not a direct quote - don't have the book to hand). Which is not to get into the old 'allegory' argument, but Aragorn is definitely a kind of 'messiah' figure. Perhaps this is why estel is more applicable to Aragorn than amdir . But I'm really just speculating on all this at the moment, so please shoot me down if you don't agree