👁️Sauron In Numenor And Morgoth Temple

[John]

I am Not trying To Offend Anyone in Terms Of Faith, But I always wondered Can Sauron In Numenor telling People To Worship Morgoth Be Compared To The Antichrist And His False Prophet In The Book Of Revelation? If Yes Why and How? If Not Why? And What Other Bible Themes Are There in The Works Of Tolkien? Please explain in Detail.

 

[Aldarion]

I think that is almost certainly the inspiration. You have a False Prophet (the dragon) and then you have a false God (the Beast). And in Numenor you have a False Prophet (Sauron) and a false God (Morgoth).

 

[1stvermont]

I am Not trying To Offend Anyone in Terms Of Faith, But I always wondered Can Sauron In Numenor telling People To Worship Morgoth Be Compared To The Antichrist And His False Prophet In The Book Of Revelation? If Yes Why and How? If Not Why? And What Other Bible Themes Are There in The Works Of Tolkien? Please explain in Detail.

"Satan promised Eve deathlessness, secret knowledge, and enhanced power if she would disobey God and eat of the forbidden fruit [Gen 3 4-5]. In Middle-earth the dark lord Sauron promises much the same as he tempts the kings of Numenor to turn from the worship of Eru Iluvatar, set sail for the undying lands forbidden to them and claim the immortality he suggests is theirs by right of their greatness. It's all a lie, of course, and leads to their destruction. The creator, in his wisdom, decrees that humans would be mortal...Tolkien refers to its tragic end as "the second fall of man."
-Jonathan Witt and Jay W The Hobbit Party: The Vision of Freedom That Tolkien Got and the West Forgot Ignatius Press San Francisco 2014

The fall of the great Númenóreans in the second age is described multiple times to varying degrees in the letters of J.R.R Tolkien as well as The Silmarillion. In The Hobbit Party, authors Jonathan Witt and Jay Richards show what led to the fall of Numenor was its form of government and moral decay. It is hard not to see the parallels to England's transformation, or The West in general, and its fall as it began distancing itself from Christianity and tradition.

While the Numenorieans were still loyal to "the west", the Valar who govern for Eru and the Eldar [elves], they would sail to Middle-earth from their island realm off of the western coast of Middle earth teach men [they were an advanced civilization blessed with long life] and trade with them. They did not dominate Middle-earth or seek expansion because "Eastward they must sail, but ever West their hearts returned."

Before its fall, Numenor seemed to resemble a feudal monarchy as ancient law was the true ruler, and it was made up of six regions that all had their own Lords. Yet also it seemed to have elements of a nationalist monarchy or at least a mighty king at the head, as described below Tolkien in letters 244. The king was not just a feudal lord among many, but a true monarch. The King of Numenor also had the council of the scepter to advise the king. It was not a perfect place or perfectly governed. Thus, we read in Unfinished Tales, "Numenor was not an earthly paradise." But it was a monarchy and the great realm of men.

"A Númenórean King was a monarch, with the power of unquestioned decision in debate; but he governed the realm with the frame of ancient law, of which he was administrator (and interpreter) but not the maker. In all debatable matters of importance domestic, or external, however, even Denethor had a Council, and at least listened to what the Lords of the Fiefs and the Captains of the Forces had to say. Aragorn re-established the Great Council of Gondor."
-J.R.R Tolkien Letters 244

The Númenóreans became the single most powerful realm in the second age, so much so that Sauron's armies were afraid to face open war with them. They were friends with the elves and helped them against Sauron. Eventually, even Sauron was taken captive back to the island realm of the Númenóreans. Ar-pharazon made Sauron a vassal, and Sauron had to swear "an oath of fealty." However, Sauron used deceit [he could still appear in a pleasant form at this time] and appeared as if he wanted to help, and initially he did. He found favor in the king for his help and knowledge and rose in power second to only the King of Numenor. But Sauron would lead the Numornirans away from friendship with Eru, the powers of Valinor, and the elves.

In the example of the fall of the Numenoreans, Tolkien seems to be warning the people of England of what is happening closer to home. In Numenor, the central point of the downfall was the desire of many to live eternally as the elves and Valar do, but other themes are also important. The loss of morality, their view of life, their loss of religious liberty to worship the one true God was replaced with false worship, moral decay, the teaching of atheism, and increased governmental control.

Sauron taught the Numenorean people that Eru was a "phantom devised in the folly of their [Valar] hearts, seeking to enchain men in servitude to themselves." That worship formally given to Eru and the powers of the West, would now turn towards Melkor and his demon Sauron who "strove ever for the dominion of Middle-earth, to become a king over all kings and as a God unto men."

Tolkien wrote in Myths Transformed, "Sauron was not a "sincere" atheist [knowing Eru from creation], but he preached atheism because it weekend resistance to himself." Just as all demons know God, for they have seen him James 2.19. A quote attributed to Chesterton says, "When people stop believing in God, they don't believe in nothing, they believe in everything." And this is the case with the Numnerians, who disregarded truth and replaced it with the lies of Sauron.

"In LOTR, the conflict is not basically about "freedom," though that is naturally involved. It is about God and his sole right to divine honor. The Eldar and the Numenoreans believed in the one, the true God, and held worship of any other person an abomination. Sauron desired to be a god-king, and was held to be this by his servants."
-J.R.R Tolkien Letters 184

Hebrews 10.31 says, "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God," and 12.29 says, "For our God is a consuming fire." Proverbs 1.7 reads, "the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge." If the Numenorian leadership no longer loved "the west," they at least feared them for a time. In The Silmarillion, we read, "Kings and their people had not yet abandoned wisdom, and if they loved the Valar no longer at least they still feared them." Even at the beginnings of the rebellion against the Valar they did not wholly outlaw the elvish tongue, "because of ancient custom, which the kings feared to break utterly, least evil befall." The title he took as "lord of the west" Herunumen, was maintained in the high elven speech out of fear.

But eventually, Sauron destroyed the places of worship and public memorials to Eru and the Valar; he replaced them with what became a human sacrifice area to Morgoth. The rulers attacked free speech by outlawing the elvish tongue, stopped maintaining the white tree, and eventually burned it in the same area they sacrificed those who were faithful to the Valar.

In Morgoth's Ring, we read that formerly Biblical holidays were celebrated, such as Firstfruits [Leviticus 23], where "at each first gathering of fruits Manwe made a high feast for the praising of Eru." But the Numonrians no longer followed the Valar nor worshipped God and so no longer kept the holidays. Their material gains were no longer gifts from God, but a way to power for themselves.

Under Sauron's influence, Numonorians began to worship wealth, power, pleasure and materialism. Before there fall into materialism, the great and wise Numonrian King Meneldur told his son Aldarion who was discontent and sought riches far away "what need have we of more silver and gold, unless to use in pride...the need of the King's House is for a man who knows and loves his people." But over time, the leadership "progressed" and was no longer about serving the people but using its position and wealth to generate more wealth and power. These greedy kings were no longer content; they desired power and conquest. No peoples, no gods, no other rulers, nor tradition and law would stand in their way.

The tyrant Ar-pharazon went against traditional law and forced the marriage of Miriel so he could become king. Miriel should have inherited authority as the only child "by right and the laws of the Numenoreans" ; she would have been the fourth ruling Queen of Numenor. But Ar-pharazon violated laws as a tyrant forced her marriage to gain the scepter.

In the appendix, A of The Lord of the Rings, we read the evil Numonrian king Ar-Pharazon like Sauron, desired "kingship of the world." His "heart filled with the desire of power unbounded," he became an absolute king and took the title "king of men" and took no council of Valar or Lords. In other words, customs, God, and law were pushed out, and man became absolute.

Sauron then played the part of a modern politician in a democracy dividing the people by leading them to anger and violence against each other. He divided those who had vast material objects against those who had not. While also promising wealth beyond imagining that he could never actually produce. The government no longer served its people as it should but drove discontentment and anger, and Numenor became a place where the people were forced to serve the government. The kings of Numenor became "proud men eager for wealth," and "they appeared now rather as lords and masters and gatherers of tribute than as helpers and teachers." In time, when they traveled to Middle-earth "they hunted men and took their goods and enslaved them."

We see the "evils" so common in Tolkien's writings that lead to moral and spiritual decay on display during the fall of the Numenoreans. Expansion of government, worship of money, militaristic, the degradation of the natural world, and industry beginnings as they seek economic and military dominance.

"Begin to seek wealth rather than bliss...They now made settlements on the west-shores, but these became rather strongholds and 'factories' of lords seeking wealth, and the Númenóreans became tax-gatherers carrying off over the sea evermore and more goods in their great ships. The Númenóreans began the forging of arms and engines."
-J.R.R Tolkien Letters 131

The "faithful," those who stayed true to the Valar and elves, were called "rebels"by those in authority. When Sauron and the king sought to destroy all the memorials of the Eldar and Valar, Isildur did a "deed for which he was afterward renowned." Against rules made by Sauron and the king he snuck into the court where everyone was forbidden to enter past the guards and took from the white tree [Nimloth- a symbol of the West] a fruit that hung from it. He escaped the guard despite receiving many wounds, and the fruit later sprouted to become the white tree of Gondor.

Elendil's father, Amandil was in council with Ar-apharazon and after getting information about the kings plans to invade Valinor. Amandil said he would betray the king in an attempt to sail into the West to speak with Manwe, king of the Valar, if he thought Manwe needed a messenger. Also, "Elendil refused the summons of the king" for war, and by his disobeying, he saved the lives of the faithful who eventually settled in Middle-earth and formed the realms of Arnor and Gondor. The rangers, such as Strider, were the remnant of the northern kingdom of Arnor in the third age.

The faithful followed the narrow way Matt 7 13-14. Many times in Middle-earth history, the majority of men sided with Sauron or Morgoth. In the first age, "The Edain alone of the kindreds of men fought for the Valar, whereas many others fought for Morgoth." In the second age, much of Middle-earth was covered in darkness and under the shadow. In the third age, the Easterlings, Haradrim, Wildmen of Dunling, and others fought for Sauron against the free peoples. But the majority being wrong, it did not stop the faithful Numenoreans from being on the right side. The corrupt Numonorians become so bad that king Ar-Pharazon builds the most significant fleet ever and attacks Valinor itself in a quest for power and dominance. Eru comes to the Valar's aid and drowns the massive fleet, and the island of Numenor is flooded under the sea.

"Elendil, a Noachian figure, who has held off from the rebellion, and kept ships manned and furnished off the east coast of Númenor, flees before the overwhelming storm of the wrath of the West, and is borne high upon the towering waves that bring ruin to the west of the Middle-earth."
-J.R.R Tolkien letters 131

Elendil, [a descendant to Aragorn] Tolkien said acted as Noah had during the flood by saving the faithful [2 Peter 2.5] from the wrath of Eru as his judgment was poured out on the wicked. Where Noah and his sons found grace [Gen 6.8] The Silmarillion says "By grace of the Valar Eledil and his sons and their people were spared

 

[Olorgando]

Sauron then played the part of a modern politician in a democracy dividing the people by leading them to anger and violence against each other.

That rang a bell. Seventh Age 2017 to 2021 ...

 

[Ealdwyn]

I am Not trying To Offend Anyone in Terms Of Faith, But I always wondered Can Sauron In Numenor telling People To Worship Morgoth Be Compared To The Antichrist And His False Prophet In The Book Of Revelation? If Yes Why and How? If Not Why? And What Other Bible Themes Are There in The Works Of Tolkien? Please explain in Detail.

Well, no. This is as bad as people trying to read allegories of the First or Second World War in LotR - and Tolkien was fairly clear on his feelings about allegory.
Alhough there are themes in his work that draw from his faith, I think it would be a mistake to read any specific parallels to the stories in the Bible.

 

[Aldarion]

Well, no. This is as bad as people trying to read allegories of the First or Second World War in LotR - and Tolkien was fairly clear on his feelings about allegory.
Alhough there are themes in his work that draw from his faith, I think it would be a mistake to read any specific parallels to the stories in the Bible.

Tolkien was also quite clear on the First World War being one of things which influenced his writings. The Marshes of the Dead should make that obvious, if nothing else.

War Without Allegory: WWI, Tolkien, and The Lord of the Rings - World War I Centennial

Site of the United States WWI Centennial Commission, and the Doughboy Foundation, building the National WWI Memorial in Washington, D.C.

www.worldwar1centennial.org

Tolkien’s grandson on how WW1 inspired The Lord of the Rings

For the 125th anniversary of his birth, Simon Tolkien describes how the Great War lives on in his grandfather JRR Tolkien's stories.

www.bbc.com

The National Interest: Blog

nationalinterest.org

But you are correct that it is not an allegory - Tolkien did draw inspiration from World War I., and there are some parallels, but Mordor is not Germany nor is the War of the Ring in any way allegorical to the World War I. Closest thing to an obvious allegory I can find is with Numenorean imperialism and European colonialism of the time, but even that I would merely file under the category of "inspiration".

 

[Alcuin]

There is an extensive discussion of Sauron’s positions vis-à-vis Morgoth and Eru in Morgoth’s Ring in the section “Myths Transformed” in a long essay, “Notes on motives in the Silmarillion”. In it, Tolkien wrote

Sauron could not, of course, be a “sincere” atheist. Though one of the minor spirits created before the world, he knew Eru, according to his measure. He probably deluded himself with the notion that the Valar (including Melkor) having failed, Eru had simply abandoned Eä, or at any rate Arda, and would not concern himself with it any more. It would appear that he interpreted the “change of the world” at the Downfall of Númenor, when Aman was removed from the physical world, in this sense: the Valar (and Elves) removed from effective control, and Men under God’s curse and wrath. …

Sauron was not a “sincere” atheist, but he preached atheism, because it weakened resistance to himself (and he had ceased to fear God’s action in Arda). … Melkor, and still more Sauron himself afterwards, both profited by … the services of “worshippers”. … To wean one of the God-fearing from their allegiance it is best to propound another unseen object of allegiance and another hope of benefits, propound to him a Lord who will sanction what he desires and not forbid it.
​

This last may be Tolkien’s own insight, or it might be colored by the advances of Marxism and Fascism in the late nineteenth to mid-twentieth centuries, when both movements achieved precisely this outcome. At any rate, this is what the “shadow” on Númenor achieved as well, so that when Ar-Pharazôn brought Sauron to Númenor as his “hostage” (in fact, Sauron was both willing and eager to be taken to Númenor: he could never hope to get there by force, possibly not even by stealth) fifteen centuries after snaring three Númenórean lords with Rings of Power so that they began the corruption of the minds of the Númenóreans, the Kings’ Men, the (apparently sizable) majority of the population were ready and eager to hear a new god propounded to them that sanctioned rather than forbade their desires.

 

[Olorgando]

At any rate, this is what the “shadow” on Númenor achieved as well, so that when Ar-Pharazôn brought Sauron to Númenor as his “hostage” (in fact, Sauron was both willing and eager to be taken to Númenor: he could never hope to get there by force, possibly not even by stealth) fifteen centuries after snaring three Númenórean lords with Rings of Power so that they began the corruption of the minds of the Númenóreans, the Kings’ Men, the (apparently sizable) majority of the population were ready and eager to hear a new god propounded to them that sanctioned rather than forbade their desires.

Agreed. But what the Númenóreans had apparently fallen victim to, by my memory of JRRT's writing, in those fifteen centuries you mention, is the worship of what is mentioned in Exodus: the golden calf.
Short aside: that what the Israelites managed to create while Moses was away was only enough for a calf shows that they were not absconding from Egypt (as the myth states) with fabulous riches. An object of veneration of about the (diffusely "known") time and region would have been a full-sized bull ...
And whatever the current fates of Fascism and Marxism may be (neither is entirely dead, though their founders might be scratching their heads at what nowadays claims to be a successor), the Golden Calf set is very alive and well. Meaning everyone not belonging to that set may be alive, but certainly are not feeling well.
One could, as I do, translate "Golden Calf" into dangerous-to-deadly parasites ...

 

[Aukwrist]

There is a sort of parallel between the Faithful in Numenor, and the English Catholics of the period 1535 to 1681. The second and third phases of Numenorean power are at least reminiscent of the expansion of English, then British, power after 1604, with the Treaty of London that ended hostilities with Spain. A rough parallel to civil war in Numenor might be the unwise involvement of Catholics in rebellions and plots against Elizabeth I and James VI and I.

Certain bioethical developments in recent times have more than a whiff of Sauron's fane to Morgoth about them.

It is of course out of the question to suggest that there any allegories here - human wickedness comes in forms that tend to be much the same from culture to culture.

If we are after Biblical echoes, Revelation 6.12-17 (and its source in Hosea 10) seems to be drawn on in both the description of the Downfall, and of the final fall of Sauron:

12And I saw when He opened the sixth seal, and there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the whole moon became like blood, 13and the stars of heaven fell to the earth, as a fig tree casts its unripe figs, being shaken by a great wind. 14And heaven departed like a scroll being rolled up, and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.

15And the kings of the earth, and the great ones, and the commanders, and the rich, and the powerful, and every slave and free, hid themselves in the caves, and among the rocks of the mountains. 16And they say to the mountains and to the rocks, “Fall on us and hide usb from the face of the One sitting on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, 17because the great day of Theirc wrath has come, and who is able to stand?”

Revelation 6 Berean Literal Bible

There is a general parallel between the Numenoreans, and the Children of Israel: for both are rebellious in the midst of prosperity.

 

[Hisoka Morrow]

..in fact, Sauron was both willing and eager to be taken to Númenor: he could never hope to get there by force, possibly not even by stealth...

But according to the prologue of Fellowship Of The Ring(book version), one the reasons why Sauron surrendured was that he's no match against the Numenorean making he have no choice but only inciting the Numenorean to rebel against Valar, wasn't it? Or Numenorean was only powerful enough to defeat but not enough to capture him, were them? Correct me if I was mistaken.

..In the example of the fall of the Numenoreans, Tolkien seems to be warning the people of England of what is happening closer to home...

Exactly, in particuliar the case of Germany's majority of churches even support Nazis, as a lesson to England churches from submission to Marxism and Fascism, right?(I'm pretty sure there're no "visible dcline" such as decreasing of christains number took places in England during that time, but those unseen enemies are always the deadliest)

...Short aside: that what the Israelites managed to create while Moses was away was only enough for a calf shows that they were not absconding from Egypt (as the myth states) with fabulous riches...

Thus the Golden Calf was designed to satisfy the Isrealites' demand of wealth, wasn't it? I thought it's design to fill the Isrealites' sense of security according to the traditional account I got, correct me if I was wrong.