Doom and Fate

Lhunithiliel · Feb 5, 2003

***Lhun withdraws to think...
To think about God, about fate, about faith, about how splendid the human mind can be, about why does it not always "work" in favour of this world the bodies live in, about whether the Elves could be the representation of this mind as Tolkien had seen it ......or whether they are his vision of Man's good will and creative imagination.....
AND
about what exactly "the great question of life" is ....

Perhaps I'll take the first ship to the "restaurant at the end of the universe" and will talk to that cow there....Perhaps she knows the answer??????!!!!!! ********

But I'll be back....when something "flashes" crystal clear.

Walter · Feb 5, 2003

The Dilemma which Tolkien addresses so aptly is this:

The "illusion" - or maybe the hope or wishful thinking or the postulate - is the "eternal harmony" of hröa and fëa (≈body and soul).

Men's souls are not confined to Arda (the Universe), they could be eternal, but their bodies perish after a short while. Even if we assume the latter would be because of the "fall" there remains the problem that an "earthly" body can hardly claim "eternal" life. So Menkind clearly fails to fulfil this "harmony"

The Eldar have it for the time Arda (the Universe) lasts, which may appear long, but compared to eternity it is still only a short timespan. And they - mostly - believe that for them there is nothing beyond that, hence they fail to fulfil the "harmony" forever.

So, Men have only "part of the harmony" but it is "eternal" (in case of the soul) and Elves have the "harmony" but it is not "eternal".

Other "logical discrepancies" on this issue are: the possibility of re-incarnation for the Elves, and the bond between body and soul in a way where the fëa can "uplift" the hröa.

I think that the Athrabeth in many ways expresses the dissensus between Tolkien the Philologist (or maybe the Philosopher) and Tolkien the Catholic.

----
Lhun, yes maybe the cow, the mice clearly not...

----
Eriol, which "later stories" are you referring to regarding the faded elves?

Eriol · Feb 5, 2003

This relationship between Elves and latter 'Faeries' was an impression I got from my first reading of the Letters, some 3 years ago. I went there to delve for quotes that supported it, and only went so far as Letter 160. There we go:

Letter 131:

... But to those creatures which in English I call misleadingly Elves*

*FOOTNOTE: Intending the word to be understood in its ancient meanings, which continued as late as Spenser -- a murrain on Will Shakespeare and his damned cobwebs.

He furthers this point on Letter 151:

... Also I now deeply regret having used Elves, though this is a word in ancestry and original meaning suitable enough. But the disastrous debasement of this word, in which Shakespeare played an unforgivable part, has really overloaded it with regrettable tones, which are too much to overcome.

And again in Letter 151:

Only the Eldar (or High-Elves) could sail thither, forsaking time and mortality, but never returning...

Which appears to imply that the lesser Elves remained on Middle-Earth (Europe). This becomes explicit in Letter 154:

...But the promise made to the Eldar (the High Elves -- not to other varieties, they had long before made their irrevocable choice, preferring Middle-Earth to paradise) (...) :That they should always be able to leave Middle-Earth, if they wished, and pass over the Sea to the True West, by the Straight Road, and so come to Eressëa -- but so pass out of time and history, never to return.

Up to then my assertion seemed on firm ground. But then I found this counter quote in Letter 144:

But I suppose that the Quendi are in fact in these histories very little akin to the Elves and Faeries of Europe...

In my mind this is relating to Shakespeare's Elves, but I see room for doubt. So the answer to Walter's question:

Eriol, which "later stories" are you referring to regarding the faded elves?

would be: stories about Europe's Elves before the 'debasement of the word inflicted in large part by Shakespeare'. I don't know much about Nordic mythology and can't add anything else.

Regarding the question of the thread, some other quotes from the Letters for your pleasure:

Letter 131:

I think you will like this quote Lhun...

Anyway all this stuff* is mainly concerned with Fall, Mortality, and the Machine. With Fall inevitably, and it occurs in several modes. With Mortality, especially as it affects art and the creative (or as I should say, sub-creative) desire which seems to have no biological function, and to be apart from the satisfactions of ordinary biological life with which, in our world, it is indeed usually at strife.

*It is, I suppose, funndamentally connected with the problem of the relation of Art (and Sub-creation) and Primary Reality.

still Letter 131:

The doom of Elves is to be immortal, to love the beauty of the world, to bring it to full flower with their gifts of delicacy and perfection, to last while it lasts, never leaving it even when 'slain', but returning -- and yet, when the Followers come, to teach them, and make way for them, to 'fade' as the Followers grow and absorb the life from which both proceed. The Doom (or Gift) of Men is mortality, freedom from the circles of the world. Since the point of view of the whole cycle is Elvish, mortality is not explained mythically: it is a mystery of God of which no more is known than that 'what God has purposed for Men is hidden': a grief and an envy to the immortal Elves.

I call your attention to the different spellings of the word 'doom', as well as to the use of the word 'God' (not 'Eru').

Letter 153:

Immortality and Mortality being the special gifts of God to the Eruhíni (in whose conception and creation the Valar had no part at all) it must be assumed that no alteration of their fundamental kind could be effected by the Valar even in one case: the cases of Lúthien (and Túor) and the position of their descendants was a direct act of God. The entering into Men of the Elven-strain is indeed represented as part of a Divine Plan for the ennoblement of the Human Race, from the beginning destined to replace the Elves.

I have been re-reading the Letters for the last few days, and will keep you informed if I find anything else of interest.

(all the quotes are from the 1981 edition)

Walter · Feb 6, 2003

Thanks, Eriol, it seems I just misread your former statement "the 'fairies' of later stories were in Tolkien's mind faded Elves" because I was assuming you meant "Tolkien's later stories" and there later (regarding to the Athrabeth) would mean post 1960, where I could only think of "Smith..." (but that doesn't seem to really fit, IMO) and the essay "On Fairy Stories" (which can hardly be considered a "story").

When Tolkien "invented" his Elves he certainly borrowed from the early Celtic-, but mainly from the Nordic-mythology. I think the Poetic Edda to be the oldest source for elves. But certainly Tolkien gave them a new "identity" with much more depth and character and also a distinct "history".

Tolkien's idea of "fairies" as "faded Elves" seems to be a rather early one (hence I was puzzled by your "later stories"), since Christopher in his comments to "The Cottage of Lost Plays" says:

Yet it is to be observed that in early notes Elves and Men are said to have been 'of a size' in former days, and the smallness (and filminess and transparency) of the 'fairies' is an aspect of their 'fading', and directly related to the domination of Men in the Great Lands.

Niniel · Feb 8, 2003

thetolkien.forum/showthread.php?threadid=9620
This thread is also about the different 'task' of Men and Elves, it might be useful. The idea of fairies as 'faded Elves'is also clear in LOTR, where Galadriel says something like 'we will fade so that we are only visible 'for those who have eyes to see'; I always took this as referring to the idea that the Elves who stay in ME are reduced to 'fairies' in the mind of Men.

Áramandë Amaniel · Aug 20, 2022

I thought I might revive this thread...

This is an intriguing topic indeed...

The Doom of the Eldar is perhaps most obviously referred to through the Doom of Mandos in The Silmarillion, after the Noldor have committed the First Kinslaying at Alqualonde. The first opening words are "Tears unnumbered thou shalt shed...so that not even the echo of your lamentation shall pass over the mountains" - not only is this a reference to the future Nirnaeth Arnoediad (Battle of Unnumbered Tears), but is also, in more metaphorical terms, an overall "signpost" of sorts as to what fate the the Noldorin Elves have now entangled themselves within.

Essentially, by this point, they have broken themselves off from the Valar, and Aman, entirely. Considering that the future actions of the Oath of Féanor would bring grief and sorrow amongst the Eldar in general, and referring again to the Prophecy that "The Dispossessed shall they be for ever", it suggests of how the Noldorin Exiles have walked upon a path that they cannot now return (with the exception of the Host of Finarfin, who repent and turn back to Valinor), and that what has been done has been done - there is no returning, and what must happen, will happen. Even the Noldor later realise that the power of Morgoth is too great for them alone to defeat - that they shall fall by the hands of the Dark Enemy, and that no aid would be given to them due to the decision that they have made for themselves. In essence, they are doomed to fall upon this path of fate.

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