Absolute Good in Lord of the Rings

[Groin Redbeard]

I find it entertaining and humorous that many Christians will fight tooth and nail for the sacrosanct rights of an innocent human fetus, but will abandon babies outside of the womb to the torments of hell because their parents don't subscribe to a particular religious view. Why bother stopping abortions when these 'seeds of Satan' will only grow up to be carbon copies of their demonic parents? Don't answer, I was only speaking rhetorically.

You cannot make a response like that and not get a response. A child of innocence is in God’s hands, but to kill an unborn child because the parents don’t want what the Bible describes as a blessing from God is no less than murder. I don’t expect you to get that though, life is so cheap in with all the relativism people nowadays.

Originally Posted by Morthoron

So, on Numenor, could you tell which newborn infant was Sauronic or one of the Faithful? Were the Sauronic babies given knives so that they could join in on the human sacrifice, making it a family affair, like a picnic? Tell me, Groin, suppose your parents were from some Satanic group (like the Democrats, for instance).

Heaven forbid!

Originally Posted by Morthoron

Does this guilt by association automatically make you a lifelong Democrat as well? Or is there such a thing as free will, which is a supposed tenet of many major religions? Could it be possible that you have an epiphany later on in life and become a Republican, thus joining the righteous select on the path to conservative Heaven rather than liberal Hell? Oh, sorry, you don't get to make that choice, God just wiped out your family in a thunderstorm of indignation.

Well if my parents worshipped a god who allowed human sacrafice, if they believed that they were entitled to the glories of God, if they believed that they could take Valinor by force and took steps to see these plans through, do you really think that that is a good house to live under? It would be far better to have that family destroyed and for the child to be called up to sit at God’s throne. You can argue it both ways Morthoron: is it more merciful to let the infant be raised by a clearly evil family in a clearly evil sociaty until he is old enough to actually take accountability and be damned, or is it more merciful for God to destroy that sociaty and for you, still as a child, to be brought to be in heaven? Remember, Sauron twisted the facts about death making it something to be feared while Eru gave it to Man as a blessing. That was pure genious on Tolkien’s part for writing that.

Sorry if I got off topic, I'll join in on the discussion if I think of anything.

[Morthoron]

Originally Posted by Groin Redbeard

You cannot make a response like that and not get a response. A child of innocence is in God’s hands, but to kill an unborn child because the parents don’t want what the Bible describes as a blessing from God is no less than murder. I don’t expect you to get that though, life is so cheap in with all the relativism people nowadays.

Oh, I understand you more than you know, Groin: life is sacred on the inside, but cheap on the outside (where smug folks wash their hands in self-satisfaction, and say "Our job is done here, they are in God's hands now" -- a very Dickensian workhouse mentality). Perhaps if more folks cared for the latter, there would be less of the former.

Originally Posted by Groin Redbeard

Well if my parents worshipped a god who allowed human sacrafice, if they believed that they were entitled to the glories of God, if they believed that they could take Valinor by force and took steps to see these plans through, do you really think that that is a good house to live under? It would be far better to have that family destroyed and for the child to be called up to sit at God’s throne. You can argue it both ways Morthoron: is it more merciful to let the infant be raised by a clearly evil family in a clearly evil sociaty until he is old enough to actually take accountability and be damned, or is it more merciful for God to destroy that sociaty and for you, still as a child, to be brought to be in heaven? Remember, Sauron twisted the facts about death making it something to be feared while Eru gave it to Man as a blessing. That was pure genious on Tolkien’s part for writing that.

Wow, just...wow. It is that type of thinking that eventually leads to genocide. I am reminded of Robert of Geneva (nicknamed 'The Butcher', who, not surprisingly later became a pope). When his mercenary forces took the heretical city of Cesena, Robert ordered the butchering of every last man, woman and child. When one of his captains suggested that there were many innocents in the city, Robert shrugged and said, "What belongs to God He will take care of," and the slaughter continued unabated.

With your concept in mind, we should have slaughtered all the infants in Nazi Germany. After all, their country was waist-deep in the blood of human sacrifice. Would it have been merciful to wipe out every blonde-headed, blue-eyed German baby, Groin? Hitler, like Sauron, also twisted the facts quite masterfully.

Originally Posted by Andsigil

To be fair, the last time Christians did this in the name of Christianity was when, exactly?

If you're looking for Christian intolerance and the heartless slaughter that follows, one needn't go back to the Crusades to find Christian barbarity, Andsigil. Let's see, there were Christians slaughtering Muslims in Serbia, Christian Hutus committing massacres in Rwanda, Protestants and Catholics slaughtering each other in the name of Christ in Northern Ireland, Christians and Muslims butchering each other in the Lebanese civil war. Would you like me to continue?

Originally Posted by Andsigil

If you're looking for hearltess slaughter you'd find more results studying the proclivities of atheists in the 20th and 21st centuries. Under the guise of communism, and with modern weaponry, they've amassed quite a record.

Blind faith in any creed that will not allow mutual respect for another creed inevitably leads to genocide. It is the same among Stalinists and Maoists as with Nazis, Hindus (if you recall, it was because of religious intolerance that Gandhi was assassinated), Muslims, Christians and Jews. White Anglo-Saxon Protestant Americans were just as culpable in the extermination of the Indians and the near elimination of their animistic religions.

I am sorry for the digression, I will not continue it further.

[Andsigil]

Originally Posted by Morthoron

If you're looking for Christian intolerance and the heartless slaughter that follows, one needn't go back to the Crusades to find Christian barbarity, Andsigil. Let's see, there were Christians slaughtering Muslims in Serbia, Christian Hutus committing massacres in Rwanda, Protestants and Catholics slaughtering each other in the name of Christ in Northern Ireland, Christians and Muslims butchering each other in the Lebanese civil war. Would you like me to continue?

Continue all you want. These are drops in the bucket. Besides,

-Hutus didn't slaughter in the name of Christianity. They slaughtered in the name of Hutu.
-Maronites were generally on the receiving end in Lebanon. That's why they're nearly extinct since that trouble began.
-And deconstructing the Balkan conflict into a simple religious conflict is rather oversimplified. One could just as easily argue that it was Christians who came to stop the conflict.

In any event, these are all candles next to the sun. Pol Pot, alone, accounts for more than this. We haven't even discussed China yet. Or the Soviets. I think more people died in Kolymaa and the Lubyanka than did in the Balkans. The atheist communists have indeed worked very hard to set the bar high.

To tie this in with Tolkien, I've already said that that kind of mechanical, systemic slaughter is reminiscent of Mordor to me. Perhaps Tolkien was as much a prophet as Orwell.

I am sorry for the digression, I will not continue it further.

Ahh, good. I got the last word, then. Since I made a Tolkien tie-in, I'll stop as well... just as soon as I get to this other post.

[Cailín]

I understand that the discussion of good and evil is of considerable interest and many may feel personally involved. However, I have to agree with davem and wish to stress that we are dealing with a fictional world, which is created by the author's voice alone and which is not neccessarily compatible with contemporary ideas of good and evil.

I see that there is some discussion over the term absolute as well. Rikae interprets the quoted article in the same way I did: it seems Pennington is looking for some divine entity. However - and please forgive me Morthoron, for again mentioning Harry Potter: I have no wish to cause psychological trauma - his insistence that Voldemort (who is human and surely not Satan himself) represents the darkest evil would lead me to believe that there is leeway for imperfection here.

My own thoughts were definitely Manwë, if the Silmarillion was included and Gandalf (the White and Improved Version) in Lord of the Rings. It seems sensible to say that Gandalf and Sauron, being equal in the hierarchy of beings, are pitted against each other in this battle. However, I am not too eager to simplify Lord of the Rings and it is difficult to see it as a stand-alone novel, because there are clearly so many other powers at work (the Balrog, Bombadil, Galadriel) to ignore them and focus on Sauron and Gandalf as the two extremes.

I will certainly include a link to this thread in my footnotes. There is a tendency to over-simplify fantasy in discussions on the genre in general. Thanks to all contributors so far.