Lord Melkor Rightful Master of the Fates of Arda

[davem]

Originally Posted by Raynor

I am not sure what notion of good and evil you apply here. If being good means using free will in accordance with the stated and perceived intent of Eru, then they were good; and if they had reason, then they were able to differentiate this from its opposite, which would constitute evil.
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Then 'good' is simply what Eru decides it is, not some objective standard. In which case all the Ainur could know is what corresponds to the intent of Eru & what does not. How they can make a moral choice on the basis of such limited knowledge is beyond me. They could not even know that Eru was 'good' until they had Melkor to compare him to.

[Bêthberry]

Memory's a bit foggy this morning--not had the requisite jolt of java yet--but wasn't there that Void wherein lay Ungoliant, even before Melkor?

[Raynor]

Originally Posted by davem

Then 'good' is simply what Eru decides it is, not some objective standard.

However, to imply the opposite would mean either that Eru Himself does not know this objective standard, which would go contrary to His presumed status as ultimate possible being, or that He knows it, but He is deceitful - which would also go against what we know of Him as the ultimate source of good.

Originally Posted by davem

In which case all the Ainur could know is what corresponds to the intent of Eru & what does not.

Hm, you lost me here, perhaps you could rephrase, so that I can answer this and the rest of the post.

Originally Posted by Bêthberry

Memory's a bit foggy this morning--not had the requisite jolt of java yet--but wasn't there that Void wherein lay Ungoliant, even before Melkor?

You are referring to the void around Arda, which is different from the original void:

Originally Posted by Of the darkening of Valinor, Silmarillion

The Eldar knew not whence she came; but some have said that in ages long before she descended from the darkness that lies about Arda, when Melkor first looked down in envy upon the Kingdom of Manwe, and that in the beginning she was one of those that he corrupted to his service.

Originally Posted by Footnote to Notes on motives in the Silmarillion, iii, Myths Transformed, HoME X

...the minds of Men (and even of the Elves) were inclined to confuse the 'Void', as a conception of the state of Not-being, outside Creation or Ea, with the conception of vast spaces within Ea, especially those conceived to lie all about the enisled 'Kingdom of Arda' (which we should probably call the Solar System).