Was Melkor Bipolar?

[Cirdan]

And was Melkor tired, depressed and suicidal? -the other "pole"?

https://health.google.com/health/ref/Bipolar+disorder

Melkor was evil, the Satanic, fallen 'angel'.

[Morthoron]

Originally Posted by Cirdan

Melkor was evil....

Och, go on with ye then! He weren't evil, he were jus' misunderstood.

[Nerwen]

Originally Posted by Morthoron

Och, go on with ye then! He weren't evil, he were jus' misunderstood.

Curse you, Morth! I was just about to post that myself!

[Pitchwife]

Originally Posted by Ren the Unclean

I have always found the evil characters interesting.

Wouldn't have guessed that from your screen name...

Originally Posted by Nerwen

At most you can say something like, "he had the symptoms of X" or "might have been diagnosed with Y if he'd been a real person".

Or you could have been charitable and assumed that this was what he meant. I know what you mean though concerning the hype about some disorders - back in the good old days it was en vogue to talk and write about Hamlet's Oedipus complex, nowadays it's ADHD, Bipolar and Asperger's. (I dimly remember a thread from some years ago that proposed Bilbo and Frodo were Aspies...)

Originally Posted by Cirdan

And was Melkor tired, depressed and suicidal? -the other "pole"?

This is were Ren's diagnosis fails, I think. I'm sure Melkor was a hell unto himself, but he had lots of energy, and all his aggression was turned outside, none on himself.

Originally Posted by Morthoron

I wonder if one can even state a divinity or angelic being (albeit, a fictional deity) can exhibit any form of mental illness or ailments whatsoever.

If I remember correctly, Tolkien himself said somewhere in Morgoth's Ring that M. was insane by the time of the War of Wrath, contrasting him with Sauron, but I don't have the book to quote it.

Anyway, welcome to the Downs, Ren! Being undead by nature, you should feel at home here.

[Durelin]

Yes, I would echo Cirdan and say that Melkor was way too focused to be bipolar. Beside the fact that bipolar disorder as far as I know can't be boiled down to mood swings or simply being at one or other end of a spectrum of 'feeling'...

Where I guess you could also go with this is what personality traits were meant to emphasize his evilness? And then...oh no, on to shaky territory, talking about what the author intended...what traits did Tolkien associate with evilness? I don't think Tolkien was the type to sit down and sympathize with his evil Maiar, though...

Or simply, evil is insanity. And obviously insanity doesn't equal having some sort(s) of disorder(s) -- but the idea of insanity. Mythical and literary insanity rather than psychological and technical. It is everything that is not right.

(But actually I don't think Charlie Sheen is too bad of a comparison since I think he is quite purposeful in his insanity, both the feigned and real.)

[Cirdan]

Melkor's traits of "evilness": discordant, resentful, selfish, hateful, harmful/destructive.

[Sarumian]

Originally Posted by Durelin

. Or simply, evil is insanity.

I think, this is it. And more of that, as we are talking not about someone evil but about the one who begot evil. Unable to control his own wrath, Melkor is insane, though his insanity is not a disease, e. g. not something that happened to him, but something he was developing in his soul (or allowed it to be developing) - his hate, anger, violence and deceit seems resembling not a disease but an addiction to drugs or alcohol .

We know that in the begining Melkor was not evil. He was the most powerful and beautiful Ainu, and his power was probably his downfall. When music of Ainur came to being Melkor tried to impose the theme of his own as he thought he could create something better than other Ainur together. Thus he brought about diharmony and Eru had to step in to resolve it.

When Vallar were sent to shape Arda, Melkor again intended to carry out his own project. At that moment he was not evil yet: he wanted to prove he was the best to do the job. But the poison of envy started to corrupt him as he wanted to do everything himself, not collaborating with other Vallar. And then he was trapped: all he could achieve was disrupting and impeding. His choice was either to admit his failure or to fight desperately for the control of Arda (or, at least, Middle Earth) in order to re-shape it in the future. The more he fought, however, the more creative power he wasted. And finally it was only a fight for posession and revenge. That was an ultimate evil and a pure insanity.

I don't think we can diagnose Melkor with a human disease. Tolkien tried to give us an idea of what happens to a soul once great but heavily damaged.

[Bêthberry]

Tolkien does not write within the contemporary model of disease. He writes within the old model of moral failing.

I cannot recall any passage in The Silm which suggests any addiction in Melkor nor any reference to drugs or alcohol.

Tolkien writes within a moral universe, not a medical universe. Melkor succumbs to his own grandiose desires for power, control, domination, personal self-satisfaction, pride. Those terms are not found, if I recall correctly, in the Wiki discussion of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th ed. It might be tempting to think of him in these contemporary terms, but Tolkien's conceptual universe is very different.

[Sarumian]

Originally Posted by Sarumian

his hate, anger, violence and deceit seems RESEMBLING not a disease but an addiction to drugs or alcohol .

Sorry for quotung myself, but I didn't say Melkor was an alcoholic or a drug addict. My idea was that the way he succumbed to his own dark side is more alike to developing an addiction, it was not as if he fell ill.

[Bêthberry]

Originally Posted by Sarumian

I don't think we can diagnose Melkor with a human disease. Tolkien tried to give us an idea of what happens to a soul once great but heavily damaged.

Originally Posted by Sarumian

My idea was that the way he succumbed to his own dark side is more alike to developing an addiction, it was not as if he fell ill.

I agree with your first statement here-- --that diagnosis with a human disease is not applicable. I meant to reply generally to Ren the Unclean's thread idea of applying modern medical diagnoses to a work which is morally-based and that got tied in with your allusion. It's really tempting to apply modern notions of psychology to texts, but I think it tends to shift the focus of the work away from its compelling questions of the nature of wrong-doing. I don't have my Silm at hand, but I will try to come back when I do to explain in more detail why I think this notion does not do credit to Tolkien's depiction of Melkor's failing.

However, since you have expanded on your post, Sarumian, I would point out that modern medical diagnosis regards addiction as a disease. It is not an illness caused by viruses or bacteria, but is thought of as a psychiatric disorder. It is an illness under those terms.

Is it possible we are arguing the same side of the discussion but getting mixed up with terminology?

[Sarumian]

Originally Posted by Bêthberry

Is it possible we are arguing the same side of the discussion but getting mixed up with terminology?

Yes, I quit agree with you. It is difficult to discuss divine matters without terminology issues. At some point there's no other way but through analogy of some kind, I believe. I don't see a crime in finding likelyhood between two things, but for me it's rather a matter of further questions about roots and reasons (poor old Smeagol ) And if I wanted to work something out of this finding, I would rather ask why Tolkien used those characteristics typical for the disorder to describe the Father of All Troubles? Honestly, I am not ready to give an answer at the moment.

I am sorry, my comment was aborted for some technical reasons and I had to restore it.

[Galadriel55]

Applying modern medicine, psycology, whatever to the legendarium would be the same as asking where exactly are the tectonic plate boundaries in ME. And vice versa: we don't have SOOO may things that ME does - like we don't have the semi-magical athelas. You can't diagnose Morgoth with a disease from our world.

[Ren the Unclean]

Originally Posted by Sarumian

We are talking not about someone evil but about the one who begot evil.

This is a really powerful insight. I think it describes, in one statement, who Melkor was. He's not just a character who became evil. He's the original architect of evil.

And I think you guys are right - Tolkien's writing should be interpreted in moral terms rather than medical, as tempting as it is to view his world through scientific eyes. (I like technology. I like machines. I'm guessing I shouldn't try to pick up a Silmaril.)*


Continuing to ask, "What is the nature of evil?" I'm beginning to believe that power itself is a big part of the nature of evil. By which I mean, my guess is that an ordinary person, if he were suddenly given great power, would have a very hard time *not* being evil.

Mildly negative traits that aren't so terrible in an ordinary person could become sources of great evil in a person having significant power. If an ordinary person with character traits not normally considered dangerous (anger, selfishness, impatience, being controlling, etc.) became extremely powerful, all of a sudden their actions, resulting from their character and temperament, could have a lot more impact and a lot more potential for harming others.

Power is a multiplier, and it seems to multiply the dark side more than the light.

This thought has given me enormous respect for the characters who are powerful and are *not* evil, Elrond and Aragorn for example. But I remain most in awe of Manwe. His power is staggering, yet he's got to be the nicest guy around. How does he do it? I'm no longer assuming it's easy.



*joke, refering to Tolkien's model of "English countryside = good", "technology & development = evil"

[Galadriel55]

Originally Posted by Ren the Unclean

*joke, refering to Tolkien's model of "English countryside = good", "technology & development = evil"

Well, that's also some interesting insight. If we consider English countryside to be the Shire, then the most-good, maybe even the happiest people, are hobbits, and not Elves, Men, or even Valar. Maybe because they are content with what they have and resent having any kind of power (over sitting at the head of the table, that is. ).

What do you think?

[Bêthberry]

Originally Posted by Ren the Unclean

And I think you guys are right - Tolkien's writing should be interpreted in moral terms rather than medical, as tempting as it is to view his world through scientific eyes. (I like technology. I like machines. I'm guessing I shouldn't try to pick up a Silmaril.)*

. . . .

Mildly negative traits that aren't so terrible in an ordinary person could become sources of great evil in a person having significant power. If an ordinary person with character traits not normally considered dangerous (anger, selfishness, impatience, being controlling, etc.) became extremely powerful, all of a sudden their actions, resulting from their character and temperament, could have a lot more impact and a lot more potential for harming others.

If you are going to consider the moral terms of LotR, then it is not possible to claim that some traits would not be considered dangerous in an ordinary person. Every trait that is a traditional sin is harmful and wrong in every person, regardless of their social or political status. Such traits are wrong because they destroy charity in the heart of the beholder as well as leading to harm of others. Anger, for instance, is one of the traditional "deadly sins". See Wikipedia on the seven deadly sins.. (They are in distinction to the main virtues of faith, hope and charity, the last of which is the greatest according to Paul--there are other, "cardinal" virtues as well. See Wiki on Seven Virtues.).

Characters like Melkor are studies in pride, anger, envy, greed while Gollem appears to be a study in lust, gluttony and envy.

Originally Posted by Ren the Unclean

Power is a multiplier, and it seems to multiply the dark side more than the light.

Mellkor was the most gifted and the least humble. Yet Aule, who was able to sub-create--something Melkor could not do--was also able to admit wrong and apologise.