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Looking forward to a jam packed weekend!
Redoing my whole setup with some cable management thanks to #lttstore cable ties.Set to receive my replacement RPi 4 today after the one I purchased was DoA - huge shout-out to @[email protected] !
And then, disassembling my old Lenovo laptop to salvage a few parts, again thanks to the #lttstore screwdriver!
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Received my haul from LTTstore.com yesterday!
#lttstore
Going to disassemble and cannibalize my older Lenovo laptop, do some cable management on my current setup and sticker it up soon! -
Saunders and Felagund’s Top Ten(ish) of 2024
By Dr. A.N. Grier
Saunders
Rather than delve into the not-so-good parts of a rollercoaster 2024, which had its share of rough circumstances, I’m using this rare soapbox moment to focus on the positives of another action-packed year of metal. Celebrating ten years of writing at Angry Metal Guy was an achievement that crept up. All these years later I remain beyond stoked and privileged to still be contributing in a small way as the blog has snowballed into the juggernaut it is today.
Unfortunately, I haven’t quite fulfilled my writing productivity goals in 2024. However, even when motivation slips, it still gives me great satisfaction to have a platform to share my thoughts and opinions on the music I love. I cannot match the writing chops or word smithery of our most esteemed scribes. However, honing my craft within my own abilities and drawing inspiration from the excellence of my fellow writers continues to motivate me and hopefully steer listeners toward some great music.
While it may not compete with some of the top-shelf individual years over the past decade, 2024 featured a lot of top-shelf stuff across a multitude of genres sprawled over the heavy spectrum. As per usual, the plethora of releases was overwhelming and again I stumble into the end-of-year chaos with a hefty list of stuff I need to check out or spend more time with. Nevertheless, from the numerous albums, I spent quality time with throughout the year, I eventually arrived at the releases that mattered the most to me, with many gems to no doubt uncover in the end-of-year wash-up. This is probably one of the more eclectic lists I’ve cultivated during my time here. Not sure exactly why that was the case, but a year of fluctuating, uneasy shifts on personal and professional fronts perhaps contributed to the more diverse listening rotation.
To wrap up, a heartfelt thank you to our beloved readership for making this all worthwhile and to all my colleagues/writing buddies and general crew of awesome people comprising the ever-expanding blog. Also shout-out to my list buddy Felagund, here’s hoping our combined powers partially align or otherwise complement and provide some listening inspiration. Lastly, a special heads-up to Angry Metal Guy, Steel Druhm, and the rest of the AMG editors and brains trust for whipping us all into order and doing the behind-the-scenes heavy lifting to keep this great thing chugging along. Cheers.
#ish: Anciients // Beyond the Reach of the Sun – Personal dramas, line-up shuffles, and an extended stint away from the studio failed to hamper the triumphant return of Canada’s progressive-stoner-sludge heavyweights Anciients. Beyond the Reach of the Sun marks a strong return that expands the band’s songwriting vision through a standout collection of ambitious, heavily prog-leaning cuts. Loaded with dazzling guitar work and gripping songwriting, Beyond the Reach of the Sun finds the band recalibrating and hitting their songwriting straps without compromising the genre-splicing traits and character they formed across their first couple of albums. It is not a perfect album by any means, with some niggling elements rearing their head, mostly via the way of some bloat, sequencing issues, and a flat production job. But with songs of the outstanding quality of “Despoiled,” “Is it Your God,” and “The Torch” leading the way, the album’s issues fail to extinguish my overall enthusiasm.
#10. Madder Mortem // Old Eyes New Heart – I came to veteran Norwegian progressive metal outfit Madder Mortem late in the game, just as they appeared to be hitting modern-era career peaks via Red in Tooth and Claw, and most recent album, 2018’s Marrow. Six long years in the wilderness and Madder Mortem return without missing a beat, continuing to pump out expressive, powerfully composed jams of their trademark mix of Goth-tinged progressive/alt metal. Although I enjoyed the album from the outset, if anything it has grown in stature since its early year release. The album’s subtleties and bevy of emotion-charged hooks bury deeper into the brain upon repeat doses. The tough period the band endured prior to the unleashing of Old Eyes New Heart is reflected in the album’s raw, potent swell of emotions and overall depth. This is further reflected in the diverse nature of the colorful songwriting, swinging from bluesy, melancholic restraint (“Cold Hard Rain”), pop-infected prog (‘Here and Now”) to urgent, dramatic, and infectious rock powerhouses (“The Head That Wears the Crown,” “Towers”).
#9. Opeth // The Last Will and Testament – As a longtime Opeth fanboy, it is a cool feeling to be genuinely enthused about a new LP, nearly three decades since their underrated Orchid debut. All the pre-release buzz centered on the return of Åkerfeldt’s famed death growls. While certainly a cool and unexpected touch, the fourteenth album The Last Will and Testament is not merely a nostalgic throwback to the band’s glory days. Instead, Opeth fuses those quirky, vintage prog tools from their modern-era material and fuses them into an intricate concept album that is a significant step up from the past couple of uneven efforts and easily their best work since at least 2014’s Pale Communion. Dazzling musicianship, jazzy licks, and inventively crafted, yet notably more focused and concise writing marked an album that features better production and tighter, punchier songs than the band has written in a while. It is also Opeth’s heaviest, most riff-centric release in many moons. Despite the trademark melancholic moods and darker shades, it also sounds as if the band is having real fun, reinforced by the abundance of bouncy, infectious riffs, shreddy solos, and boisterous grooves littering the album. Likely would have earned higher honors with time, as I still feel there is much more to discover.
#8. Oceans of Slumber // Where Gods Fear to Speak – Previously enjoyed the idea of Texan progressive metal powerhouse Oceans of Slumber, more than the execution and finished product. In particular, 2016’s Winter has grown in stature over the years. Yet for much of their career, it has felt like a case of incredible talent and potential not fully realized. That changed on Where Gods Fear to Speak, arguably the band’s most complete, consistent, and hook-laden release. When I felt the prog itch throughout 2024, Where Gods Fear to Speak was often the go-to. An album of lush, moody, drama-filled compositions, deftly contrasting soaring melodies, and skyscraping hooks with muscular riffage and heftier bouts of aggression, the writing is tighter and more compelling than previous efforts. Cammie Beverly’s scene-stealing vocals may take center stage, but this is very much a complete effort, where the rich soundscapes, brooding atmospheres, and technical musicianship shine brightly. Loaded with killer jams, including stirring highlights, “Don’t Come Back from Hell Empty Handed,” “Wish,” and “Poem of Ecstasy,” Where Gods Fear to Speak finally finds Oceans of Slumber firing on all cylinders.
#7. Pyrrhon // Exhaust – In theory, Pyrrhon should be one of my favorite bands. I used to eat up all manner of skronky, dissonant, and abrasive extreme metal. Perhaps my thirst for the weirder, experimental forms of death metal and dissonance has softened over the years. However, while largely enjoying Pyrrhon’s career up to this point, Exhaust feels like the album I have been waiting for the band to deliver. Exhaust dropped unexpectedly and that element of surprise flowed through another oddball, deranged platter of wildly inventive, chaotic, yet oddly accessible (in Pyrrhon terms) extreme metal. From cautious, challenging early listens, I found myself increasingly compelled to revisit Exhaust on a regular basis, marveling at its flexible, fractured songwriting, nimble musicianship, and raw hardcore punk edge infiltrating the dissonant, experimental death metal at the core of the Pyrrhon experience. Gritty production, perfectly unhinged vocal performance from Doug Moore, and occasional burst of groove and shred of accessibility punctuating the chaos (“First as Tragedy, Then as Farce,” “Strange Pains,” “Stress Fractures”) lend the album a refreshingly addictive edge to counterbalance its abrasive, challenging angles.
#6. Replicant // Infinite Mortality – New Jersey’s Replicant previously exhibited their brawny, yet brainy mix of gnarled dissonance, technicality, and knuckle-dragging street grooves to powerful effect. However, third album Infinite Mortality levelled the playing field as the band upped their game to elite levels of controlled chaos, while the writing remained challenging yet strangely accessible and memorable. In spirit, the ugly mix of harshness, discordance, and headbangable blockbuster grooves reminds me of the great Ion Dissonance. Meanwhile, the contrasting blend of unorthodox melody, jagged dissonance, and stuttering, complex song structures come together with cohesion and blunt force, punctuated by the occasional warped solo. Like a harsh, harrowing soundtrack to a bleak dystopian future, Infinite Mortality is a mean, chunky, technical, and deliciously primal slab of advanced disso-tech-death excellence.
#5. Noxis // Violence Inherent in the System – Notably death metal in 2024 was dominated by brutal, dissonant varieties, designed to scramble brains and challenge minds while battering the listener into submission. Refreshingly, unheralded surprise packet Noxis unloaded a killer debut LP to savor. Drawing from an array of old-school influences and ’90s touchstones without ever aping one particular band or style, Noxis unleashed a nostalgic yet unique death metal platter. Managing to at once sound raw and unclean, technical and brutal, thrashy and proggy, sharp and refined, Noxis blaze their way craftily through memorable, riff-infested wastelands with unbridled aggression, speed, and finesse, rubber-stamped by some exceptional bass work. Remnants of the classic Floridian scene mingle with powerful influences, including early Cryptopsy, later-era Death, Atheist, and Cannibal Corpse, resulting in a finished product that sounds fresh and vital, while containing an endearing, workmanlike old-school charm. It works a treat, and the top-notch and frequently inventive writing reveals impressive depth and character that rewards repeat listens.
#4. Dissimulator // Lower Form Resistance – There are some serviceable, enjoyable thrash-aligned albums in 2024, but one stood head and shoulders above the competition. Comprised of a grizzled bunch of underground Canadian musicians hellbent on fusing advanced technical thrash assaults with sick old-school death-thrash, a fuckton of killer riffs, quirky vocoder action, and razor-sharp hooks, Lower Form Resistance has consistently provided an adrenaline-filled shot of thrash when needing that specific fix. Dissimulator rewires thrash in intricate and intriguing ways, giving me the same giddy rush as past experiences with the likes of Capharnaum, Vhol, and Revocation. Excited to hear what these dudes conjure up next. In the meantime, Lower Form Resistance will continue to keep my thrash cogs oiled through potent bangers like “Warped,” “Automoil & Robotoil,” and “Hyperline Underflow.”
#3. Huntsmen // The Dry Land – After somehow sleeping on 2018 debut American Scrap and subsequently their apparent sophomore slumping second album, I finally righted my wrongs by delving into the strange and wildly unique woodlands of Chicago metal troupe Huntsmen and their phenomenal third LP, The Dry Land. A raw, rustic, and emotionally striking explosion of genre-bending excellence, where blackened sludge, doom, post, prog, folk, and Americana influences coalesce into an intoxicating and frequently thrilling musical formula, rich in detail and emotion. The skilled genre mashing is cohesive and genuine, loaded with surprises, structural twists, dramatic ebbs and flows, deep burrowing hooks, and contrasting vocal trade-offs to seal the deal on a remarkable album. Despite only a small handful of songs comprising the album (six in total), Huntsmen make every moment count, from blazing longer numbers with stunning contrasts and peaks (“This, Our Gospel,” “In Time, All things”) to plaintive folk dusted rock (“Lean Times”), through to the stunningly moving, compact power of “Rain.” Huntsmen occupy a unique space in the metalverse.
#2. Borknagar // Fall – I have a slightly odd history with Norwegian legends Borknagar. I recall being taken by their excellent 2012 album Urd, yet oddly enough I didn’t extend my listening beyond that isolated release. Things changed with 2019’s True North, a typically solid offering that inspired my explorations of portions of their vast and consistently engaging catalog. The twelfth album Fall marks their first album since True North and again features an outstanding line-up of talents, including founding mastermind Øystein Brun, multi-talented keyboardist/clean vocalist Lars Nedland, and ace up their sleeve bass/vocal powerhouse ICS Vortex. Fall smacks of a veteran band not merely content to coast on their laurels but rather carve freshly creative trajectories for their now signature blend of epic prog, triumphant Viking, and icy black metal to thrive. An extra shot of old-school blackened aggression and fuller production boosted an album of consistently high quality. Fall became a true all-occasions album in 2024; often uplifting me when I felt down or giving me a punchy charge when the need arose. Wall-to-wall prime cuts feature, headlined by the storming “Summits,” moody earworm, “The Wild Lingers”, and the striking, epic shimmer of “Moon.” Stalwarts still operating at the top of their game.
#1. Counting Hours // The Wishing Tomb – Not since Fvneral Fvkk’s remarkable Carnal Confessions debut has a doom album struck as hard as the second platter of sadboi misery perpetrated by Finland’s excellent Counting Hours. While doom and its death-doom companion may not always dominate my listening habits, when an album does hit that sweet spot, it usually leaves a profound impact. Few forms of metal generate the emotional resonance of quality doom and Counting Hours tears at the heartstrings through a riveting collection of gorgeously played and executed death-doom ditties, spearheaded by former members of the hugely underrated Rapture. Ilpo Paasela backs up the stellar musicianship, superb guitar work, and tight, addictive songwriting with a stunning mix of emotively raw, stately cleans and rugged death growls. The whole package packs an emotional wallop, yet its soulful edge and hopelessly addictive hooks and sing-along moments prevent a drop too deeply into depressive waters, as such earwormy gems as “Timeless Ones,” “All That Blooms (Needs to Die),” and “Starlit / Lifeless” attest. The Wishing Tomb is an epic album to lose yourself in.
Honorable Mentions:
- Blood Incantation // Absolute Elsewhere – Did I overrate Absolute Elsewhere? Possibly. Is it overhyped? Absolutely. Yet Blood Incantation remains a brave, adventurous band and Absolute Elsewhere represents a welcome return to form from these gifted, star-gazing space cadets. A flawed but effective fusing of their death metal roots with an increased focus on ’70s-inspired progressive rock and trippy psych flourishes.
- 200 Stab Wounds // Manual Manic Procedures – I barely took notice of Cleveland’s 200 Stab Wounds debut LP, but sophomore album Manual Manic Procedures provided one of the real surprise packets in 2024. It very nearly cracked the main list sheerly through heavy rotation. A meaty, adrenaline-charged shot of muscular death into the veins.
- Ripped to Shreds // Sanshi – Another reliably awesome slab of old-school death from Andrew Lee and co. Increasingly shreddy, extravagant solo work and a grindier edge powered one of their best albums yet.
- Nails // Every Bridge Burning – Nails is back and that is a great thing. New line-up, the same mode of short, sharp, blast-your-skin-off aggression, head-caving grooves, and hate-filled energy.
- Unhallowed Deliverance // Of Spectre and Strife – A pleasant surprise and one of the best debut albums in 2024. German tech-slam-brutal death juggernaut Unhallowed Deliverance knocked it out of the park with limited subtlety but a heap of talent, creativity, and songwriting smarts.
- Wormed // Omegon – With Ulcerate’s latest release not quite hitting me on the intense level of others, and having run out of time to properly digest and rank the obvious high-quality new Defeated Sanity, Wormed’s long-awaited return gave me my fix of calculated brutality via futuristic, slammy, technical brutal death executed in typically warped, mind-blowing fashion.
- Khirki // Κυκεώνας – Following up an impressive, well-received debut LP is no easy feat. Kenstrosity steered many of us from the AMG community onto Greek band Khirki’s Κτηνωδία debut in 2021, so I eagerly anticipated Khirki’s return for the second go around. The resulting album met expectations through a fiery, passionate, and eclectic mix of metal, rock, and traditional Greek folk.
- Sergeant Thunderhoof // The Ghost of Badon Hill – A late-year list shaker, underappreciated UK psych-prog-stoner outfit Sergeant Thunderhoof unleased a more restrained, psych-enhanced, and introspective album, showing signs of being a genuine grower since its November release, despite not quite hitting the irresistible highs of 2022’s This Sceptred Veil.
Disappointments o’ the Year:
- Several highly anticipated albums did not quite land the killer blows I was hoping for. Respectable to very good albums, but I expected better from Vola (admittedly a grower), Caligula’s Horse, Ihsahn, and especially Zeal and Ardor.
Non-Metal Picks:
- St Vincent, SIR, Michael Kiwanuka, Allie X, MGMT
Song ‘o the Year:
- Counting Hours – “Timeless Ones”
There were any number of standouts and potential Song o’ the Year candidates that could have nabbed top honors, including several counterparts from Counting Hours’ spectacular sophomore album. In the end, I settled on the (proper) album opener of my album of the year, as the tune that really hooked me initially from an album that captivated my soul. A rich, emotive piece of dark, melodic death-doom with superlative guitar melodies and a chorus for the ages. Honorable mention to Huntsmen’s “Rain.”
Felgund
I don’t know about you, but I’m tired of living in interesting times. But as that wizened sage, Gandalf so wisely reminds us: “So do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.”
So what have I been doing with the time that has been given? A fair amount, as it turns out. 2024 has certainly been a tumultuous year for our small family. On the one hand, the business that I launched in 2023 has been chugging along for well over a year and a half now, and I think I’m far enough along in the process that I feel (at least somewhat) comfortable calling it a success. The baby that we brought home from the hospital is now, inexplicably, a whip-smart 7-year-old. My wife’s career continues to blossom as she continues to moonlight as my business manager. Things are good.
And yet 2024 also proved to be harder than I’d ever imagined. My dad died back in April, an experience that remains both devastating and surreal. He’d had multiple sclerosis for well over a decade, and as I’m sure many of you know, MS is a grasping, grinding petty little disease. But for as much as it stole, it proved incapable of taking away who my father was; it couldn’t quite make off with what made him him. He was my best friend before his diagnosis, and he remained my best friend up until that impossible evening in a hospital room in early April. Truth be told, he’s still my best friend, only now he’s free to walk wherever I see fit to imagine him.
Despite my best efforts, I realized pretty quickly you can’t capture a life in a few paragraphs. I couldn’t do it in his eulogy, and I certainly won’t attempt to do so on a heavy metal blog. But I will share this:
My dad was a carpenter by trade and an artist by choice; he was a fisherman and a cook; he was a handyman, a builder, a designer, and a writer; he taught himself how to play guitar, and he’s perhaps the singular reason why I’m writing for this website today. Because while he wasn’t a fan of metal himself, he instilled in me not only a love for music, but an interest in the process; in the people who create it, the minds that shape it, and the passion that births it.
He played in countless bands in his youth, and I can think of no better way to honor his memory than by sharing some of his music with you all. With Steel’s blessing, I’m embedding a two-song demo (“A Place in Time” and “Street Legal”) ripped from a cassette my old man recorded in the late 80s, so apologies in advance for the questionable quality. He composed both the music and lyrics, played guitar and bass, and sang on both tracks, which were devised when he was perhaps at his Rush fanboy peak. It’s been a delight and a balm hearing his voice again, captured as it was in a moment when he was young, vibrant, and doing what he loved.
So here we are. Despite (or perhaps because of) this, I managed to consume a fair amount of metal this year. And while I was far less productive as a writer than I’d hoped and I wasn’t able to listen to as much as I originally planned, I discovered a plethora of new music here on AMG that soothed what Neil Peart once referred to as his “baby soul.” And surprisingly, I found much of that solace in the discordant, the dissonant, and the off-kilter, as the list below probably reflects. But more importantly, I found compassion, support, and understanding amongst the writing staff here. And while they may not know it, I will be forever thankful for the folks who showed me such boundless kindness during a year that felt decidedly unkind. Thank you, my friends.
Now let’s get to to it. Here are my top ten(ish) albums of 2024.
#(ish). Beaten to Death // Sunrise Over Rigor Mortis – It almost feels like cheating to place an 18-minute album in my Top 10(ish), but here we are. 2024 proved to be a year where my interest in grind and grind-adjacent acts expanded, and this “ish” is the result. While I wasn’t aware of Beaten to Death prior to this release, I was quickly swept away by Sunrise Over Rigor Mortis’ ability to bludgeon its idiosyncratic way into my brain and coil there like the most glorious of infections. Beaten to Death has delivered a concise helping of grinding goodness, with crispy prog edges and a schmear of off-kilter humor. Back catalog, here I come!
#10. Sleepytime Gorilla Museum // Of the Last Human Being – Gardenstale’s gushing review of Sleepytime Gorilla Museum’s fourth album Of the Last Human Being was a tough endorsement to ignore, as was an invocation of Diablo Swing Orchestra. So I threw caution to the wind and leaped headlong into this experimental maelstrom. And I’m so happy I did. Don’t let the runtime dissuade you; Of the Last Human Being doesn’t feel nearly as long as it is, and over that relatively brief timespan, you’re provided with a front-row seat to the aural equivalent of perhaps the most fun kind of performance art. Hard-edged riffs, off-kilter instrumentation, ominous theatrics interlaced with beautiful, sparse melodies, and all capped off by the deranged croons of chief carnival barker Nils Frykdahl. If I’d spent more time with this record it may have placed higher, but as it is, I’m happy it’s making an appearance at the number 10 spot.
#9. Sur Austru // Datura Strǎhiarelor – Despite Twelve underrating this album, I suppose I should commend him for introducing me to Sur Austru in the first place. This Romanian outfit’s third full-length Datura Strǎhiarelor is a potent blend of rumbling, blackened fury, and melodic folk metal, with plenty of flute work, orchestration, choral elements, and plaintive keys thrown in. And, while the gruff, chanting growls might rub some listeners the wrong way, it was this aspect more than any other that first grabbed my attention, and proceeded to keep it. And while I haven’t a clue what the vocalists are shouting at me, the tone and placement in the mix feels just right, especially for this brand of folk-infused black metal. Such is the strength of Sur Austru that this album began as my “ish” before eventually working its way to ninth. Mightly bold of them.
#8. Necrowretch // Swords of Dajjal – Some of the entries on this list were either late discoveries or took some time before they got their dirty little hooks in me. Necrowretch’s Swords of Dajjal was not one of them. As soon as I spun it back in February, it was love at first listen. Swords of Dajjal focuses on the greater deceiver in Islamic mythology, and explores that tradition through the use of ferocious blackened death metal (with perhaps a dollop or two of thrash thrown in). Although, as Carcharodon rightly pointed out in his review, the “blackened” part is doing most of the heavy lifting here. And that’s not a bad thing, as Necrowretch is more than adept at crafting memorable hooks and an engaging atmosphere without sacrificing heft or freneticism. Swords of Dajjal is an unmitigated success, and my only real gripe is that Necrowretch dropped a new platter so early in the year that it may go overlooked on too many end-of-year lists.
#7. The Vision Bleak // Weird Tales – Grier and I may not see eye to eye on music, but what can I say? The man knows his way around gothic metal. So when he awarded a 4.0 to Weird Tales back in April, what was I to do? If you said wait several months before bothering to press play, you’re correct. But folks, I may have been late to the party, but it’s a rager nonetheless. The Vision Bleak has produced an emotive, memorable, downright heart-wrenching concept album; one that is both lush and harsh, both achingly melodic and morosely heavy. Weird Tales isn’t my usual cup of tea, but The Vision Bleak has rejected my assertion by doing what many similar acts appear incapable of doing: cohesively balancing “gothic” and “metal” without lessening the impact of either. A well-earned addition, indeed.
#6. Stenched // Purulence Gushing from the Coffin – While Rots-giving may have been tarnished by a less-than-stellar release from Rotpit back in November, I’ve moved on since then, and am now proudly celebrating Stenched-mas. The Manly n’ Mighty Steel reviewed this one-man grimy death outfit last month, and even though I was still smarting from my failed attempt to poach Purulence Gushing from the Coffin for myself, I can’t in good conscience deny how hard this globular mass of funerary muck rips. From the first track to the last, you’ll be rocking a near-permanent stank face, and you can’t blame that solely on the fungal miasma wafting from your speakers. The truth is, Stenched has delivered a masterclass in riff-heavy, moss-encrusted death metal; the kind that’s perfect to drag your knuckles to. Purulence Gushing from the Coffin is the exact kind of no-frills, all-guts death metal I needed in 2024, and that’s why it’s sitting pretty at 6.
#5. Aklash // Reincarnation – How are we already at the Top Five? And what better way to kick off this most treasured of positions than with the melodic black metal stylings of Aklash on their fourth album Reincarnation? Aklash received a solid write-up in June’s Stuck in the Filter by our very own Kenstrosity, and their most recent outing has continued to climb higher and higher on my list the more I’ve spun it. Part black metal, part progressive metal, part trad metal (epic choruses included), Reincarnation packs a wallop in just a short 37 minutes. overflowing with varied instrumentation and keen lyrical chops, grandiose in scope and medieval in tone, yet more personal than it has any right to be, Aklash is firing on all cylinders here, and, as such, is perfectly suited for anyone’s top 5.
#4. Devenial Verdict // Blessing of Despair – And, just like that, more death metal rears its ugly head. I’m still surprised at how high up Devenial Verdict’s sophomore album landed on my list, primarily because their 2022 debut Ash Blind failed to connect. But Blessing of Despair seems to have arrived just in time for my increasing flirtation with the cruel mistress that is dissodeath. As such, I found myself utterly taken with Devenial Verdict’s latest, overflowing as it is with equally heavy doses of discordant ferocity and mournful melodicism. And while Blessing of Despair is an undeniably heavy record, it makes sure to leave plenty of room for quieter moments, where slower sections and sparse instrumentation have room to bloom and breathe. This approach not only results in a wonderfully balanced album but ensures the bludgeoning that’s sure to follow is all the more impactful. Consider me reformed.
#3. Aborted // Vault of Horrors – I’m fairly certain that any death metal fan worth their salt is legally required to include the latest Aborted release on their end-of-year list. Over 25 years and 12 albums into their carnal career, these death metal titans need no introduction. Blood-drenched, gore-soaked, and happily grindy, Aborted are in a league all their own, and it shows on Vault of Horrors. The music remains tight and explosive, building a menacing atmosphere that pervades only the stickiest of grindhouse theaters. Besides, with songs dedicated to classics like Return of the Living Dead, Hellraiser, and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, how could I do anything other than include this gem of an album in my top 3? I for one welcome our horror-themed overlords.
#2. Noxis // Violence Inherent in the System – What began as a random pick from the promo sump by one Kenstrosity quickly rose to become a favorite of the death metal maniacs (those with good taste, anyway) on the AMG staff. Now, more importantly, it’s nabbed the second-highest honor on my year-end list. Noxis’ first full-length album Violence Inherent in the System sounds like the product of a much more experienced band. The songwriting is top-notch, the performances are big and bold without being overwrought, and the sticky riffs stay wedged in your mind long after the album ends. And yet for all of its bombast, Noxis is still able to infuse their debut with oodles of atmosphere, not to mention a level of balance between death metal orthodoxy and fresh bells and whistles (and horns) that would make even Thanos grimace in jealousy. Special attention must also be paid to Joe Lowrie’s snare tone and Dave Kirsch’s godlike bass performance.
#1. Pyrrhon // Exhaust – I suppose I was always destined to end up here, I just didn’t know it right away. Pyrrhon’s fifth full-length Exhaust didn’t initially grab me the way some of my other entries did. However, on repeat spins, I found myself falling deeper and deeper into its frenetic, dissonant embrace, discovering both nuances and subtleties amidst the proggy cacophony. On an album that thoroughly explores the universal theme of exhaustion, be it physical, mental, social, or economic, Pyrrhon’s brand of noise-tinged death metal feels like the ideal tool with which to scrawl their livid manifesto. But what truly sets Exhaust apart is its unrelenting groove, stoked by Pyrrhon’s inventive capacity to not only feature but to uplift its unique brand of melodicism amidst the unrelenting maelstrom. It’s hard to overstate just how critical this aspect is to Exhaust’s success, especially since it would have been so easy to excise. But Exhaust’s manic ferocity, which swerves jerks, hops, and heaves, is all the better for it. And while its charms were initially lost on me, I found it easier and easier to finally succumb to its tremulous tendrils. Any record with that kind of staying power (not to mention a theme so applicable to my own experiences this past year) has more than earned my top spot for 2024.
Honorable Mentions:
- Defeated Sanity // Chronicles of Lunacy – Defeated Sanity is a brutal tech death stalwart at this point, and now seven albums in, Chronicles of Lunacy only further cements that status. Chronicles of Lunacy provides the listener with track after aggressively intricate track exploring lunacy in its many forms, but the real treat here is Lille Gruber’s masterful performance on the drums.
- Full of Hell // Coagulated Bliss – while I don’t think I’ve become a complete grind convert, albums like Full of Hell’s Coagulated Bliss and Beaten to Death’s Sunrise Over Rigor Mortis certainly set me on the path to one day become a proud proselytizer. You can’t deny Coagulated Bliss’ infectious groove and whirlwind pace, although I agree with the Dolphin’s rating adjustment.
- Undeath // More Insane – no, it’s not as good as It’s Time…to Rise from the Grave, and there’s no reason to pretend that it is. Nor does it need to be. While More Insane may not reach the lofty heights of its predecessor, it still showcases an Undeath doing what it does best, while also hinting at an undeniable ability to evolve into an even sharper, more fetid OSDM beast.
- 200 Stab Wounds // Manual Manic Procedures – while I wasn’t entirely kind in my review of 200 Stab Wounds’ debut, Mark Z suggested I take their follow-up Manual Manic Procedures for a spin, and I’m glad I did. It’s clear they’ve grown as artists, and their sophomore effort reflects that heightened maturity. Keep stabbing on, your crazy diamonds!
- Mamaleek // Vida Blue – I’m confident this album captures what it would sound like if Tom Waits listened to too much Ashenspire before leaving for the recording studio. Long, difficult, and bold, I found myself returning again and again to Vida Blue no matter how challenging I found the experience. While this album didn’t make my top 10, I’m convinced a future Mamaleek release will.
Song o’ the Year:
- Noxis – ”Skullcrushing Defilement”
This song goes hard. Exceptionally hard. In truth, there are any number of tunes from Violence Inherent in the System that fit the “Song o’ the Year” bill, but I had to give the edge to “Skullcrushing Defilement.” Not only does it begin with an absolutely searing bass solo, but it sets the stage for the four-string onslaught that’s to come. There’s a noticeable Cannibal Corpse influence that I can’t help but love here, alongside heaping doses of maniacal melodicism, turbocharged technicality, and an earworm chorus to boot. Abandon all cervical spines, ye who enter here.
#200StabWounds #2024 #Aborted #Aklash #AllieX #Anciients #Archspire #Atheist #BeatenToDeath #BlogPosts #BloodIncantation #Borknagar #CaligulaSHorse #CannibalCorpse #Capharnaum #CountingHours #Crytopsy #Death #DefeatedSanity #DevenialVerdict #DiabloSwingOrchestra #Dissimulator #Dissonance #FullOfHell #FvneralFvkk #Huntsmen #Ihsahn #Khirki #Lists #MadderMortem #Mamaleek #MGMT #MichaelKiwanuka #Nails #Necrowretch #Noxis #OceansOfSlumber #Opeth #Pyrrhon #Rapture #Replicant #Revocation #RippedToShreds #Rotpit #SaundersAndFelagundSTopTenIshOf2024 #SergeantThunderfoot #SIR #SleepytimeGorillaMuseum #StVincent #Stenched #SurAustru #TheVisionBleak #TomWaits #Ulcerate #Undeath #UnhallowedDeliverance #Vhöl #Wormed #ZealAndArdor
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Gandalf the Pink #LordOfTheRings #BuildABear
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@nward ahhh Gandalf the grey. I see what you’re going for. #usetheforce
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Step Into 1985: C64 BBS Nostalgia with 300-Baud Guy and 'Gandalf' the Floppy Drive
#Commodore64 #RetroComputing #VintageTech #C64BBS #C64#FloppyDrive #80sComputers #Snobsoft #OldSchoolTech #BBSRevival
https://theoasisbbs.com/step-into-1985-c64-bbs-nostalgia-with-300-baud-guy-and-gandalf-the-floppy-drive/?feed_id=2491&_unique_id=67e6a033db5d7 -
Step Into 1985: C64 BBS Nostalgia with 300-Baud Guy and 'Gandalf' the Floppy Drive
#Commodore64 #RetroComputing #VintageTech #C64BBS #C64#FloppyDrive #80sComputers #Snobsoft #OldSchoolTech #BBSRevival
https://theoasisbbs.com/step-into-1985-c64-bbs-nostalgia-with-300-baud-guy-and-gandalf-the-floppy-drive/?feed_id=2491&_unique_id=67e6a033db5d7 -
Step Into 1985: C64 BBS Nostalgia with 300-Baud Guy and 'Gandalf' the Floppy Drive
#Commodore64 #RetroComputing #VintageTech #C64BBS #C64#FloppyDrive #80sComputers #Snobsoft #OldSchoolTech #BBSRevival
https://theoasisbbs.com/step-into-1985-c64-bbs-nostalgia-with-300-baud-guy-and-gandalf-the-floppy-drive/?feed_id=2491&_unique_id=67e6a033db5d7 -
Step Into 1985: C64 BBS Nostalgia with 300-Baud Guy and 'Gandalf' the Floppy Drive
#Commodore64 #RetroComputing #VintageTech #C64BBS #C64#FloppyDrive #80sComputers #Snobsoft #OldSchoolTech #BBSRevival
https://theoasisbbs.com/step-into-1985-c64-bbs-nostalgia-with-300-baud-guy-and-gandalf-the-floppy-drive/?feed_id=2491&_unique_id=67e6a033db5d7 -
3. Gandalf the Grey™ & Balrog™
[Set #40631: Coming Soon on January 1, 2023 → https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/gandalf-the-grey-balrog-40631]
#BrickHeadz #LordOfTheRings #Lego #NewLegoSet #NewLegoSetJan23
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Blog: “Lord of the Rings is Pagan…” is One of the Dumbest Takes I’ve Ever Heard.
I know, I know…everybody is jumping on Jack Posobiec for this comment, but as a Tolkien fan and writing nerd, I’m jumping on the bandwagon of defending what is one of the greatest Christian works of fiction to have ever graced God’s green Earth.
But first, some backstory. On a recent episode of his podcast, Human Events Daily, Posobiec made the comment that LOTR is not overtly Christian, (which to some extent is true; I’ll get to that in a sec) and went so far as to say that it’s overtly pagan. He said: “There’s nothing overtly Christian about ‘Lord of the Rings.’ […] there’s no church in it, there’s no faith in it, there’s no Christ figure — there’s none of these things. And honestly, ‘Lord of the Rings,’ if it’s anything, […] is overtly pagan.” He also cited as further evidence of LOTR not being Christian that Tolkien notoriously didn’t like C.S. Lewis’ use of allegory in The Chronicles of Narnia series.
However, to begin our analysis of if Lord of the Rings (and the surrounding books such as The Hobbit, The Silmarillion, The History of Middle Earth, etc.) is Christian or not, we must define what necessarily constitutes a “Christian” story. Is it the values of the story and the intent of the author that make it Christian, or is it the use of often painfully obvious allegory or messaging that makes it Christian?
Personally, I do believe that it’s a mix of both, but I lean more towards the intent of the Christian author to show Christ and the Gospel in some way, be it subtle or overt, and the values of the story that make it Christian. To quote Martin Luther: “The Christian shoemaker does his duty not by putting little crosses on the shoes, but by making good shoes.” A similar thing goes for Christian storytelling. If you can find a way to put in Christianity without making so painfully obvious that Dora the Explorer could find it, and people can find the Christian themes, then you’ve done your job. But if you make it so obvious that the story eventually feels less like a story and more like Christian propaganda, then you’ve lost not only the point of the story, but you also lose the non-Christian readers who may have otherwise been interested.
In the case of Tolkien and Lewis, while Lewis leaned towards overt allegory for his books, Tolkien – who was not a fan of allegory – leaned towards weaving Christianity into the fabric of the story subtly. According to Tolkien himself in Letter 142, “The Lord of the Rings is of course a fundamentally religious and Catholic work; unconsciously so at first, but consciously in the revision.” And while, yes, while The Lord of the Rings does take from Norse myths, and much of the subtlety of the Christian themes have been lost on people who wish to make it more pagan than it was intended to be (something that Tolkien worried about happening), Christ is still there.
Take, for instance, the characters of Gandalf and Aragorn. An argument can be made that these characters intentionally represent Jesus in different ways. Starting with Gandalf, according to The Silmarillion (which provides the background lore for The Lord of the Rings) he is of the Maiar, or the angelic beings that serve under the Valar (which you can think of as the archangels.) Because of Sauron’s following in the footsteps of Melkor (Morgoth), Gandalf was sent to Middle Earth to help the people fight against Sauron. While not a perfect representation of Christ, the image of a divine being living in the body of a mere mortal (very much like the hypostatic union) is stark. Even more like Christ is Gandalf’s death fighting the Balrog in the Mines of Moria and resurrection as “Gandalf the White,” an image of Christ’s death, resurrection, and glorification. Heck, one could even say that Gandalf the White is a sort of allegory for Christ’s second coming, when He will finally defeat Satan once and for all.
As for Aragorn, he is another Christ figure. At first, he’s a ranger, a seemingly random dude from the Dunedain (the descendants of the Numenorians who fled to Middle Earth after Numenor was destroyed). Bilbo’s description of him of, “All that is gold does not glitter,” is a parallel to Isaiah 53:2’s description of Jesus’ humble state. Further, his journey in the Path of the Dead and his dual role of healer and warrior is similar to Christ’s role of redeemer and conquering king that we see in Revelation, especially when he returns to the throne as a glorious king.
Further, one could also argue that Frodo and Sam are representative of Christ and the everyday Christian. As Frodo struggles on his mission to destroy the Ring, Sam is there helping him along the way. This is similar to how, as Christians we struggle to live godly lives, but Christ is there helping us through the Holy Spirit to stay on the straight-and-narrow.
Thus, while Tolkien never overtly named these characters as Christ figures, it is still obvious if you are willing to look at it through a Christian lens.
Further, to say that there is no faith in The Lord of the Rings is untrue. While faith is never fully defined or developed in LOTR, within the larger context of Tolkien’s legendarium, there absolutely is a faith – especially amongst the elves – that is deeply reflective of Tolkien’s belief in Catholicism.
The best example of this that I can think of is the Elves’ hymn to Elbereth Gilthoniel. This isn’t a song about some random person. In the larger legendarium, Elbereth is essentially a Mary-like figure to the elves, making this hymn very much like “Ave Maria.” When Sam calls out to her in Shelob’s cave, it’s essentially like saying a Hail Mary.
Even more damning for Posobiec’s statement are the allusions to Eru Iluvatar, the God of Tolkien’s legendarium, within The Lord of the Rings. According to The Silmarillion, The Book of Lost Tales, etc. Eru was seldom worshipped by the Elves because his name was considered to holy too utter. As Finrod says in “The Athrabeth” (which I will get to) in the book The History of Middle Earth: Morgoth’s Ring, “For that name we do not utter ever in jest or without full intent.” However, despite this, both the elves and men understood that Eru was the only one deserving of praise and believed the worship of any other to be evil. In fact, the men of Numenor had the mountain of Meneltarma dedicated to the worship of Eru in the Three Prayers that were held around the year.
Most interestingly, however, when thinking about faith in the world of Middle-Earth is that, Tolkien, in writing “The Athrabeth,” a lengthy dialogue between Finrod Felagund (Galadriel’s brother) and the human woman, Andreth, incorporated the idea that Eru Illuvatar would one day enter the world to save the Edain (mankind.) Though it’s better if you read the entire dialogue, I’ll include this excerpt from The History of Middle Earth: Morgoth’s Ring pages 318-323:
“This then, I propound, was the errand of Men, not the followers, but the heirs and fulfillers of all: to heal the Marring of Arda [the world of Middle-Earth], already foreshadowed before their devising; and to do more, as agents of the magnificence of Eru: to enlarge the Music and surpass the Vision of the World!
“For that Arda Healed shall not be Arda Unmarred, but a third thing and a greater, and yet the same. I have conversed with the Valar who were present at the making of the Music ere the being of the World began. And now I wonder: Did they hear the end of the Music? Was there not something in or beyond the final chords of Eru which, being overwhelmed thereby, they did got perceive?
“Or again, since Eru is forever free, maybe he made no Music and showed no Vision beyond a certain point. Beyond that point we cannot see or know, until by our own roads we come there, Valar or Eldar [Elves] or Men.
“As may a master in the telling of tales keep hidden the greatest moment until it comes in due course. It may be guessed at indeed, in some measure, by those of us who have listened with full heart and mind; but so the teller would wish. In no wise is the surprise and wonder of his art thus diminished, for thus we share, as it were, in his authorship. But not so, if all were told us in a preface before we entered in!”“What then would you say is the supreme moment that Eru has reserved?” Andreth asked.
“Ah, wise lady!” said Finrod. “I am an Elda [elf], and again I was thinking of my own people. But nay, of all the Children of Eru. I was thinking that by the Second Children we might have been delivered from death. For ever as we spoke of death being a division of the united, I thought in my heart of a death that is not so: but the ending together of both. For that is what lies before us, so far as our reason could see: the completion of Arda and its end, and therefore also of us children of Arda; the end when all the long lives of the Elves shall be wholly in the past.
“And then suddenly I beheld as a vision Arda Remade; and there the Eldar completed but not ended could abide in the present for ever, and there walk, maybe, with the Children of Men, their deliverers, and sing to them such songs as, even in the Bliss beyond bliss, should make the green valleys ring and the everlasting mountain-tops to throb like harps.”Then Andreth looked under her brows at Finrod: “And what, when ye were not singing, would ye say to us?’ she asked.
Finrod laughed. “I can only guess,” he said. “Why, wise lady, I think that we should tell you tales of the Past and of Arda that was Before, of the perils and great deeds and the making of the Silmarils! We were the lordly ones then! But ye, ye would then be at home, looking at all things intently, as your own. Ye would be the lordly ones. ‘The eyes of Elves are always thinking of something else,’ ye would say. But ye would know then of what we were reminded: of the days when we first met, and our hands touched in the dark. Beyond the End of the World we shall not change; for in memory is our great talent, as shall be seen ever more clearly as the ages of this Arda pass: a heavy burden to be, I fear; but in the Days of which we now speak a great wealth.” And then he paused, for he saw that Andreth was weeping silently.
“Alas, lord!” she said. “What then is to be done now? For we speak as if these things are, or as if they will assuredly be. But Men have been diminished and their power is taken away. We look for no Arda Remade: darkness lies before us, into which we stare in vain. If by our aid your everlasting mansions were to be prepared, they will not be builded now.“
“Have ye then no hope?” said Finrod.“What is hope?” she said. “An expectation of good, which though uncertain has some foundation in what is known? Then we have none.”
“That is one thing that Men call ‘hope’,” said Finrod. “‘Amdir’ we call it, ‘looking up’. But there is another which is founded deeper. ‘Estel’ we call it, that is ‘trust’. It is not defeated by the ways of the world, for it does not come from experience, but from our nature and first being. If we are indeed the Eruhin, the Children of the One, then He will not suffer Himself to be deprived of His own, not by any Enemy, not even by ourselves. This is the last foundation of Estel, which we keep even when we contemplate the End: of all His designs the issue must be for His Children’s joy. Amdir you have not, you say. Does no Estel at all abide?“
“Maybe,” she said. “But no! Do you not perceive that it is part of our wound that Estel should falter and its foundations be shaken? Are we the Children of the One? Are we not cast off finally? Or were we ever so? Is not the Nameless the Lord of the World?“
“Say it not even in question!” said Finrod.
“It cannot be unsaid,” answered Andreth, “if you would understand the despair in which we walk. Or in which most Men walk. Among the Atani, as you call us, or the Seekers as we say: those who left the lands of despair and the Men of darkness and journeyed west in vain hope: it is believed that healing may yet be found, or that there is some way of escape. But is this indeed Estel? Is it not Amdir rather; but without reason: mere flight in a dream from what waking they know: that there is no escape from darkness and death?“
“Mere flight in a dream you say,’ answered Finrod. ‘In dream many desires are revealed; and desire may be the last flicker of Estel. But you do not mean dream, Andreth. You confound dream and waking with hope and belief, to make the one more doubtful and the other more sure. Are they asleep when they speak of escape and healing?”“Asleep or awake, they say nothing clearly,” answered Andreth. ‘How or when shall healing come? To what manner of being shall those who see that time be re-made? And what of us who before it go out into darkness unhealed? To such questions only those of the (as they call themselves) have any guess of an answer.”
“Those of the Old Hope?” said Finrod. “Who are they?”
“A few,” she said; “but their number has grown since we came to this land, and they see that the Nameless can (as they think) be defied. Yet that is no good reason. To defy him does not undo his work of old. And if the valour of the Eldar fails here, then their despair will be deeper. For it was not on the might of Men, or of any of the peoples of Arda, that the old hope was grounded.““What then was this hope, if you know?” Finrod asked.
“They say,” answered Andreth: “they say that the One will himself enter into Arda, and heal Men and all the Marring from the beginning to the end. This they say also, or they feign, is a rumor that has come down through years uncounted, even from the days of our undoing.”“They say, they feign?” said Finrod. “Are you then nor one of them?”
“How can I be, lord? All wisdom is against them. Who is the One, whom ye call Eru? If we put aside the Men who serve the Nameless, as do many in Middle-earth, still many Men perceive the world only as a war between Light and Dark equipotent. But you will say: nay, that is Manwe and Melkor; Eru is above them. Is then Eru only the greatest of the Valar, a great god among gods, as most Men will say, even among the Atani: a king who dwells far from his kingdom and leaves lesser princes to do here much as they will? Again you say: nay, Eru is One, alone without peer, and He made Ea, and is beyond it; and the Valar are greater than we, but yet no nearer to His majesty. Is this not so?”
“Yes,” said Finrod. “We say this, and the Valar we know, and they say the same, all save one. But which, think you, is more likely to lie: those who make themselves humble, or he that exalts himself?”
“I do not doubt,” said Andreth. “And for that reason the saying of Hope passes my understanding. How could Eru enter into the thing that He has made, and than which He is beyond measure greater? Can the singer enter into his tale or the designer into his picture?““He is already in it, as well as outside,” said Finrod. “But indeed the “in-dwelling” and the “out-living” are not in the same mode.”
“Truly,” said Andreth. “So may Eru in that mode be present in Ea that proceeded from Him. But they speak of Eru Himself entering into Arda, and that is a thing wholly different. How could He the greater do this? Would it not shatter Arda, or indeed all Ea?”
“Ask me not,” said Finrod. “These things are beyond the compass of the wisdom of the Eldar, or of the Valar maybe. But I doubt that our words may mislead us, and that when you say ‘greater’ you think of the dimensions of Arda, in which the greater vessel may not be contained in the less.“But such words may not be used of the Measureless. If Eru wished to do this, I do not doubt that He would find a way, though I cannot foresee it. For, as it seems to me, even if He in Himself were to enter in, He must still remain also as He is: the Author without. And yet, Andreth, to speak with humility, I cannot conceive how else this healing could be achieved. Since Eru will surely not suffer Melkor to turn the world to his own will and to triumph in the end. Yet there is no power conceivable greater than Melkor save Eru only. Therefore Eru, if He will not relinquish His work to Melkor, who must else proceed to mastery, then Eru must come in to conquer him.
“More: even if Melkor (or the Morgoth that he has become) could in any way be thrown down or thrust from Arda, still his Shadow would remain, and the evil that he has wrought and sown as a seed would wax and multiply. And if any remedy for this is to be found, ere all is ended, any new light to oppose the shadow, or any medicine for the wounds: then it must, I deem, come from without.“
“Then, lord,” said Andreth, and she looked up in wonder, “you believe in this Hope?“
“Ask me not yet,” he answered. “For it is still to me but strange news that comes from afar. No such hope was ever spoken to the Quendi. To you only it was sent. And yet through you we may hear it and lift up our hearts.” He paused a while, and then looking gravely at Andreth he said: “Yes, Wise-woman, maybe it was ordained that we Quendi, and ye Atani, ere the world grows old, should meet and bring news one to another, and so we should learn of the Hope from you: ordained, indeed, that thou and I, Andreth, should sit here and speak together, across the gulf that divides our kindreds, so that while the Shadow still broods in the North we should not be wholly afraid.”
This should be of interest to any who wish to say that The Lord of the Rings is pagan as Tolkien wrote LOTR as a mythology for Britian and some very devoted Tolkien fans have even tried to line up where the events of Tolkien’s lore would’ve lined up with our real-world history. As such, what Finrod says in this lengthy excerpt is – if we are to treat Tolkien’s work as a mythological history of Europe – a sort of prophecy about the coming of Jesus. It’s also interesting to note that in Tolkien’s idea of what the end of Middle Earth would look like, it was very much like what we see in Revelation. A battle called the Dagor Dagorath would happen, Melkor would be slain, and it would all culminate in the world being remade.
From this, we can see that by its own merits – without even taking into account what Tolkien himself said about the faith woven into his work – that The Lord of the Rings and the larger legendarium, as a mythology for Britian, is a Christian work, or, at the very least, a Catholic one. It has a faith that, even if it is not shown overtly, is shown throughout the story in various forms. Though it is true that Tolkien was influenced by the Greek and Norse myths when creating his secondary world, The Lord of the Rings and its history is still a fundamentally Christian work.
Until next time,
M.J.
#Blog #Books #Catholicism #Christianity #ChristopherTolkien #faith #Fantasy #god #JRRTolkien #JackPosobiec #jesus #LordOfTheRings #LOTR #OpinionPeice #Paganism #Response #Review #TheHobbit #TheSilmarillion #Theology #Tolkien #Writing -
Blog: “Lord of the Rings is Pagan…” is One of the Dumbest Takes I’ve Ever Heard.
I know, I know…everybody is jumping on Jack Posobiec for this comment, but as a Tolkien fan and writing nerd, I’m jumping on the bandwagon of defending what is one of the greatest Christian works of fiction to have ever graced God’s green Earth.
But first, some backstory. On a recent episode of his podcast, Human Events Daily, Posobiec made the comment that LOTR is not overtly Christian, (which to some extent is true; I’ll get to that in a sec) and went so far as to say that it’s overtly pagan. He said: “There’s nothing overtly Christian about ‘Lord of the Rings.’ […] there’s no church in it, there’s no faith in it, there’s no Christ figure — there’s none of these things. And honestly, ‘Lord of the Rings,’ if it’s anything, […] is overtly pagan.” He also cited as further evidence of LOTR not being Christian that Tolkien notoriously didn’t like C.S. Lewis’ use of allegory in The Chronicles of Narnia series.
However, to begin our analysis of if Lord of the Rings (and the surrounding books such as The Hobbit, The Silmarillion, The History of Middle Earth, etc.) is Christian or not, we must define what necessarily constitutes a “Christian” story. Is it the values of the story and the intent of the author that make it Christian, or is it the use of often painfully obvious allegory or messaging that makes it Christian?
Personally, I do believe that it’s a mix of both, but I lean more towards the intent of the Christian author to show Christ and the Gospel in some way, be it subtle or overt, and the values of the story that make it Christian. To quote Martin Luther: “The Christian shoemaker does his duty not by putting little crosses on the shoes, but by making good shoes.” A similar thing goes for Christian storytelling. If you can find a way to put in Christianity without making so painfully obvious that Dora the Explorer could find it, and people can find the Christian themes, then you’ve done your job. But if you make it so obvious that the story eventually feels less like a story and more like Christian propaganda, then you’ve lost not only the point of the story, but you also lose the non-Christian readers who may have otherwise been interested.
In the case of Tolkien and Lewis, while Lewis leaned towards overt allegory for his books, Tolkien – who was not a fan of allegory – leaned towards weaving Christianity into the fabric of the story subtly. According to Tolkien himself in Letter 142, “The Lord of the Rings is of course a fundamentally religious and Catholic work; unconsciously so at first, but consciously in the revision.” And while, yes, while The Lord of the Rings does take from Norse myths, and much of the subtlety of the Christian themes have been lost on people who wish to make it more pagan than it was intended to be (something that Tolkien worried about happening), Christ is still there.
Take, for instance, the characters of Gandalf and Aragorn. An argument can be made that these characters intentionally represent Jesus in different ways. Starting with Gandalf, according to The Silmarillion (which provides the background lore for The Lord of the Rings) he is of the Maiar, or the angelic beings that serve under the Valar (which you can think of as the archangels.) Because of Sauron’s following in the footsteps of Melkor, (Morgoth) Gandalf was sent to Middle Earth to help the people fight against Sauron. While not a perfect representation of Christ, the image of a divine being living in the body of a mere mortal (very much like the hypostatic union) is stark. Even more like Christ is Gandalf’s death fighting the Balrog in the Mines of Moria and resurrection as “Gandalf the White,” an image of Christ’s death, resurrection, and glorification. Heck, one could even say that Gandalf the White is a sort of allegory for Christ’s second coming, when He will finally defeat Satan once and for all.
As for Aragorn, he is another Christ figure. At first, he’s a ranger, a seemingly random dude from the Dunedain (the descendants of the Numenorians who fled to Middle Earth after Numenor was destroyed). Bilbo’s description of him of, “All that is gold does not glitter,” is a parallel to Isaiah 53:2’s description of Jesus’ humble state. Further, his journey in the Path of the Dead and his dual role of healer and warrior is similar to Christ’s role of redeemer and conquering king that we see in Revelation, especially when he returns to the throne as a glorious king.
Further, one could also argue that Frodo and Sam are representative of Christ and the everyday Christian. As Frodo struggles on his mission to destroy the Ring, Sam is there helping him along the way. This is similar to how, as Christians we struggle to live godly lives, but Christ is there helping us through the Holy Spirit to stay on the straight-and-narrow.
Thus, while Tolkien never overtly named these characters as Christ figures, it is still obvious if you are willing to look at it through a Christian lens.
Further, to say that there is no faith in The Lord of the Rings is untrue. While faith is never fully defined or developed in LOTR, within the larger context of Tolkien’s legendarium, there absolutely is a faith – especially amongst the elves – that is deeply reflective of Tolkien’s belief in Catholicism.
The best example of this that I can think of is the Elves’ hymn to Elbereth Gilthoniel. This isn’t a song about some random person. In the larger legendarium, Elbereth is essentially a Mary-like figure to the elves, making this hymn very much like “Ave Maria.” When Sam calls out to her in Shelob’s cave, it’s essentially like saying a Hail Mary.
Even more damning for Posobiec’s statement are the allusions to Eru Iluvatar, the God of Tolkien’s legendarium, within The Lord of the Rings. According to The Silmarillion, The Book of Lost Tales, etc. Eru was seldom worshipped by the Elves because his name was considered to holy to utter. As Finrod says in “The Athrabeth” (which I will get to) in the book The History of Middle Earth: Morgoth’s Ring, “For that name we do not utter ever in jest or without full intent.” However, despite this, both the elves and men understood that Eru was the only one deserving of praise and believed the worship of any other to be evil. In fact, the men of Numenor had the mountain of Meneltarma dedicated to the worship of Eru in the Three Prayers that were held around the year.
Most interestingly, however, when thinking about faith in the world of Middle-Earth is that, Tolkien, in writing “The Athrabeth,” a lengthy dialogue between Finrod Felagund (Galadriel’s brother) and the human woman, Andreth, incorporated the idea that Eru Illuvatar would one day enter the world to save the Edain (mankind.) Though it’s better if you read the entire dialogue, I’ll include this excerpt from The History of Middle Earth: Morgoth’s Ring pages 318-323:
“This then, I propound, was the errand of Men, not the followers, but the heirs and fulfillers of all: to heal the Marring of Arda [the world of Middle-Earth], already foreshadowed before their devising; and to do more, as agents of the magnificence of Eru: to enlarge the Music and surpass the Vision of the World!
“For that Arda Healed shall not be Arda Unmarred, but a third thing and a greater, and yet the same. I have conversed with the Valar who were present at the making of the Music ere the being of the World began. And now I wonder: Did they hear the end of the Music? Was there not something in or beyond the final chords of Eru which, being overwhelmed thereby, they did got perceive?
“Or again, since Eru is forever free, maybe he made no Music and showed no Vision beyond a certain point. Beyond that point we cannot see or know, until by our own roads we come there, Valar or Eldar [Elves] or Men.
“As may a master in the telling of tales keep hidden the greatest moment until it comes in due course. It may be guessed at indeed, in some measure, by those of us who have listened with full heart and mind; but so the teller would wish. In no wise is the surprise and wonder of his art thus diminished, for thus we share, as it were, in his authorship. But not so, if all were told us in a preface before we entered in!”“What then would you say is the supreme moment that Eru has reserved?” Andreth asked.
“Ah, wise lady!” said Finrod. “I am an Elda [elf], and again I was thinking of my own people. But nay, of all the Children of Eru. I was thinking that by the Second Children we might have been delivered from death. For ever as we spoke of death being a division of the united, I thought in my heart of a death that is not so: but the ending together of both. For that is what lies before us, so far as our reason could see: the completion of Arda and its end, and therefore also of us children of Arda; the end when all the long lives of the Elves shall be wholly in the past.
“And then suddenly I beheld as a vision Arda Remade; and there the Eldar completed but not ended could abide in the present for ever, and there walk, maybe, with the Children of Men, their deliverers, and sing to them such songs as, even in the Bliss beyond bliss, should make the green valleys ring and the everlasting mountain-tops to throb like harps.”Then Andreth looked under her brows at Finrod: “And what, when ye were not singing, would ye say to us?’ she asked.
Finrod laughed. “I can only guess,” he said. “Why, wise lady, I think that we should tell you tales of the Past and of Arda that was Before, of the perils and great deeds and the making of the Silmarils! We were the lordly ones then! But ye, ye would then be at home, looking at all things intently, as your own. Ye would be the lordly ones. ‘The eyes of Elves are always thinking of something else,’ ye would say. But ye would know then of what we were reminded: of the days when we first met, and our hands touched in the dark. Beyond the End of the World we shall not change; for in memory is our great talent, as shall be seen ever more clearly as the ages of this Arda pass: a heavy burden to be, I fear; but in the Days of which we now speak a great wealth.” And then he paused, for he saw that Andreth was weeping silently.
“Alas, lord!” she said. “What then is to be done now? For we speak as if these things are, or as if they will assuredly be. But Men have been diminished and their power is taken away. We look for no Arda Remade: darkness lies before us, into which we stare in vain. If by our aid your everlasting mansions were to be prepared, they will not be builded now.“
“Have ye then no hope?” said Finrod.“What is hope?” she said. “An expectation of good, which though uncertain has some foundation in what is known? Then we have none.”
“That is one thing that Men call ‘hope’,” said Finrod. “‘Amdir’ we call it, ‘looking up’. But there is another which is founded deeper. ‘Estel’ we call it, that is ‘trust’. It is not defeated by the ways of the world, for it does not come from experience, but from our nature and first being. If we are indeed the Eruhin, the Children of the One, then He will not suffer Himself to be deprived of His own, not by any Enemy, not even by ourselves. This is the last foundation of Estel, which we keep even when we contemplate the End: of all His designs the issue must be for His Children’s joy. Amdir you have not, you say. Does no Estel at all abide?“
“Maybe,” she said. “But no! Do you not perceive that it is part of our wound that Estel should falter and its foundations be shaken? Are we the Children of the One? Are we not cast off finally? Or were we ever so? Is not the Nameless the Lord of the World?“
“Say it not even in question!” said Finrod.
“It cannot be unsaid,” answered Andreth, “if you would understand the despair in which we walk. Or in which most Men walk. Among the Atani, as you call us, or the Seekers as we say: those who left the lands of despair and the Men of darkness and journeyed west in vain hope: it is believed that healing may yet be found, or that there is some way of escape. But is this indeed Estel? Is it not Amdir rather; but without reason: mere flight in a dream from what waking they know: that there is no escape from darkness and death?“
“Mere flight in a dream you say,’ answered Finrod. ‘In dream many desires are revealed; and desire may be the last flicker of Estel. But you do not mean dream, Andreth. You confound dream and waking with hope and belief, to make the one more doubtful and the other more sure. Are they asleep when they speak of escape and healing?”“Asleep or awake, they say nothing clearly,” answered Andreth. ‘How or when shall healing come? To what manner of being shall those who see that time be re-made? And what of us who before it go out into darkness unhealed? To such questions only those of the (as they call themselves) have any guess of an answer.”
“Those of the Old Hope?” said Finrod. “Who are they?”
“A few,” she said; “but their number has grown since we came to this land, and they see that the Nameless can (as they think) be defied. Yet that is no good reason. To defy him does not undo his work of old. And if the valour of the Eldar fails here, then their despair will be deeper. For it was not on the might of Men, or of any of the peoples of Arda, that the old hope was grounded.““What then was this hope, if you know?” Finrod asked.
“They say,” answered Andreth: “they say that the One will himself enter into Arda, and heal Men and all the Marring from the beginning to the end. This they say also, or they feign, is a rumor that has come down through years uncounted, even from the days of our undoing.”“They say, they feign?” said Finrod. “Are you then nor one of them?”
“How can I be, lord? All wisdom is against them. Who is the One, whom ye call Eru? If we put aside the Men who serve the Nameless, as do many in Middle-earth, still many Men perceive the world only as a war between Light and Dark equipotent. But you will say: nay, that is Manwe and Melkor; Eru is above them. Is then Eru only the greatest of the Valar, a great god among gods, as most Men will say, even among the Atani: a king who dwells far from his kingdom and leaves lesser princes to do here much as they will? Again you say: nay, Eru is One, alone without peer, and He made Ea, and is beyond it; and the Valar are greater than we, but yet no nearer to His majesty. Is this not so?”
“Yes,” said Finrod. “We say this, and the Valar we know, and they say the same, all save one. But which, think you, is more likely to lie: those who make themselves humble, or he that exalts himself?”
“I do not doubt,” said Andreth. “And for that reason the saying of Hope passes my understanding. How could Eru enter into the thing that He has made, and than which He is beyond measure greater? Can the singer enter into his tale or the designer into his picture?““He is already in it, as well as outside,” said Finrod. “But indeed the “in-dwelling” and the “out-living” are not in the same mode.”
“Truly,” said Andreth. “So may Eru in that mode be present in Ea that proceeded from Him. But they speak of Eru Himself entering into Arda, and that is a thing wholly different. How could He the greater do this? Would it not shatter Arda, or indeed all Ea?”
“Ask me not,” said Finrod. “These things are beyond the compass of the wisdom of the Eldar, or of the Valar maybe. But I doubt that our words may mislead us, and that when you say ‘greater’ you think of the dimensions of Arda, in which the greater vessel may not be contained in the less.“But such words may not be used of the Measureless. If Eru wished to do this, I do not doubt that He would find a way, though I cannot foresee it. For, as it seems to me, even if He in Himself were to enter in, He must still remain also as He is: the Author without. And yet, Andreth, to speak with humility, I cannot conceive how else this healing could be achieved. Since Eru will surely not suffer Melkor to turn the world to his own will and to triumph in the end. Yet there is no power conceivable greater than Melkor save Eru only. Therefore Eru, if He will not relinquish His work to Melkor, who must else proceed to mastery, then Eru must come in to conquer him.
“More: even if Melkor (or the Morgoth that he has become) could in any way be thrown down or thrust from Arda, still his Shadow would remain, and the evil that he has wrought and sown as a seed would wax and multiply. And if any remedy for this is to be found, ere all is ended, any new light to oppose the shadow, or any medicine for the wounds: then it must, I deem, come from without.“
“Then, lord,” said Andreth, and she looked up in wonder, “you believe in this Hope?“
“Ask me not yet,” he answered. “For it is still to me but strange news that comes from afar. No such hope was ever spoken to the Quendi. To you only it was sent. And yet through you we may hear it and lift up our hearts.” He paused a while, and then looking gravely at Andreth he said: “Yes, Wise-woman, maybe it was ordained that we Quendi, and ye Atani, ere the world grows old, should meet and bring news one to another, and so we should learn of the Hope from you: ordained, indeed, that thou and I, Andreth, should sit here and speak together, across the gulf that divides our kindreds, so that while the Shadow still broods in the North we should not be wholly afraid.”
This should be of interest to any who wish to say that The Lord of the Rings is pagan as Tolkien wrote LOTR as a mythology for Britian and some very devoted Tolkien fans have even tried to line up where the events of Tolkien’s lore would’ve lined up with our real-world history. As such, what Finrod says in this lengthy excerpt is – if we are to treat Tolkien’s work as a mythological history of Europe – a sort of prophecy about the coming of Jesus. It’s also interesting to note that in Tolkien’s idea of what the end of Middle Earth would look like, it was very much like what we see in Revelation. A battle called the Dagor Dagorath would happen, Melkor would be slain, and it would all culminate in the world being remade.
From this, we can see that by its own merits – without even taking into account what Tolkien himself said about the faith woven into his work – that The Lord of the Rings and the larger legendarium, as a mythology for Britian, is a Christian work, or, at the very least, a Catholic one. It has a faith that, even if it is not shown overtly, is shown throughout the story in various forms. Though it is true that Tolkien was influenced by the Greek and Norse myths when creating his secondary world, The Lord of the Rings and its history is still a fundamentally Christian work.
Until next time,
M.J.
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Blog: “Lord of the Rings is Pagan…” is One of the Dumbest Takes I’ve Ever Heard.
I know, I know…everybody is jumping on Jack Posobiec for this comment, but as a Tolkien fan and writing nerd, I’m jumping on the bandwagon of defending what is one of the greatest Christian works of fiction to have ever graced God’s green Earth.
But first, some backstory. On a recent episode of his podcast, Human Events Daily, Posobiec made the comment that LOTR is not overtly Christian, (which to some extent is true; I’ll get to that in a sec) and went so far as to say that it’s overtly pagan. He said: “There’s nothing overtly Christian about ‘Lord of the Rings.’ […] there’s no church in it, there’s no faith in it, there’s no Christ figure — there’s none of these things. And honestly, ‘Lord of the Rings,’ if it’s anything, […] is overtly pagan.” He also cited as further evidence of LOTR not being Christian that Tolkien notoriously didn’t like C.S. Lewis’ use of allegory in The Chronicles of Narnia series.
However, to begin our analysis of if Lord of the Rings (and the surrounding books such as The Hobbit, The Silmarillion, The History of Middle Earth, etc.) is Christian or not, we must define what necessarily constitutes a “Christian” story. Is it the values of the story and the intent of the author that make it Christian, or is it the use of often painfully obvious allegory or messaging that makes it Christian?
Personally, I do believe that it’s a mix of both, but I lean more towards the intent of the Christian author to show Christ and the Gospel in some way, be it subtle or overt, and the values of the story that make it Christian. To quote Martin Luther: “The Christian shoemaker does his duty not by putting little crosses on the shoes, but by making good shoes.” A similar thing goes for Christian storytelling. If you can find a way to put in Christianity without making so painfully obvious that Dora the Explorer could find it, and people can find the Christian themes, then you’ve done your job. But if you make it so obvious that the story eventually feels less like a story and more like Christian propaganda, then you’ve lost not only the point of the story, but you also lose the non-Christian readers who may have otherwise been interested.
In the case of Tolkien and Lewis, while Lewis leaned towards overt allegory for his books, Tolkien – who was not a fan of allegory – leaned towards weaving Christianity into the fabric of the story subtly. According to Tolkien himself in Letter 142, “The Lord of the Rings is of course a fundamentally religious and Catholic work; unconsciously so at first, but consciously in the revision.” And while, yes, while The Lord of the Rings does take from Norse myths, and much of the subtlety of the Christian themes have been lost on people who wish to make it more pagan than it was intended to be (something that Tolkien worried about happening), Christ is still there.
Take, for instance, the characters of Gandalf and Aragorn. An argument can be made that these characters intentionally represent Jesus in different ways. Starting with Gandalf, according to The Silmarillion (which provides the background lore for The Lord of the Rings) he is of the Maiar, or the angelic beings that serve under the Valar (which you can think of as the archangels.) Because of Sauron’s following in the footsteps of Melkor (Morgoth), Gandalf was sent to Middle Earth to help the people fight against Sauron. While not a perfect representation of Christ, the image of a divine being living in the body of a mere mortal (very much like the hypostatic union) is stark. Even more like Christ is Gandalf’s death fighting the Balrog in the Mines of Moria and resurrection as “Gandalf the White,” an image of Christ’s death, resurrection, and glorification. Heck, one could even say that Gandalf the White is a sort of allegory for Christ’s second coming, when He will finally defeat Satan once and for all.
As for Aragorn, he is another Christ figure. At first, he’s a ranger, a seemingly random dude from the Dunedain (the descendants of the Numenorians who fled to Middle Earth after Numenor was destroyed). Bilbo’s description of him of, “All that is gold does not glitter,” is a parallel to Isaiah 53:2’s description of Jesus’ humble state. Further, his journey in the Path of the Dead and his dual role of healer and warrior is similar to Christ’s role of redeemer and conquering king that we see in Revelation, especially when he returns to the throne as a glorious king.
Further, one could also argue that Frodo and Sam are representative of Christ and the everyday Christian. As Frodo struggles on his mission to destroy the Ring, Sam is there helping him along the way. This is similar to how, as Christians we struggle to live godly lives, but Christ is there helping us through the Holy Spirit to stay on the straight-and-narrow.
Thus, while Tolkien never overtly named these characters as Christ figures, it is still obvious if you are willing to look at it through a Christian lens.
Further, to say that there is no faith in The Lord of the Rings is untrue. While faith is never fully defined or developed in LOTR, within the larger context of Tolkien’s legendarium, there absolutely is a faith – especially amongst the elves – that is deeply reflective of Tolkien’s belief in Catholicism.
The best example of this that I can think of is the Elves’ hymn to Elbereth Gilthoniel. This isn’t a song about some random person. In the larger legendarium, Elbereth is essentially a Mary-like figure to the elves, making this hymn very much like “Ave Maria.” When Sam calls out to her in Shelob’s cave, it’s essentially like saying a Hail Mary.
Even more damning for Posobiec’s statement are the allusions to Eru Iluvatar, the God of Tolkien’s legendarium, within The Lord of the Rings. According to The Silmarillion, The Book of Lost Tales, etc. Eru was seldom worshipped by the Elves because his name was considered to holy too utter. As Finrod says in “The Athrabeth” (which I will get to) in the book The History of Middle Earth: Morgoth’s Ring, “For that name we do not utter ever in jest or without full intent.” However, despite this, both the elves and men understood that Eru was the only one deserving of praise and believed the worship of any other to be evil. In fact, the men of Numenor had the mountain of Meneltarma dedicated to the worship of Eru in the Three Prayers that were held around the year.
Most interestingly, however, when thinking about faith in the world of Middle-Earth is that, Tolkien, in writing “The Athrabeth,” a lengthy dialogue between Finrod Felagund (Galadriel’s brother) and the human woman, Andreth, incorporated the idea that Eru Illuvatar would one day enter the world to save the Edain (mankind.) Though it’s better if you read the entire dialogue, I’ll include this excerpt from The History of Middle Earth: Morgoth’s Ring pages 318-323:
“This then, I propound, was the errand of Men, not the followers, but the heirs and fulfillers of all: to heal the Marring of Arda [the world of Middle-Earth], already foreshadowed before their devising; and to do more, as agents of the magnificence of Eru: to enlarge the Music and surpass the Vision of the World!
“For that Arda Healed shall not be Arda Unmarred, but a third thing and a greater, and yet the same. I have conversed with the Valar who were present at the making of the Music ere the being of the World began. And now I wonder: Did they hear the end of the Music? Was there not something in or beyond the final chords of Eru which, being overwhelmed thereby, they did got perceive?
“Or again, since Eru is forever free, maybe he made no Music and showed no Vision beyond a certain point. Beyond that point we cannot see or know, until by our own roads we come there, Valar or Eldar [Elves] or Men.
“As may a master in the telling of tales keep hidden the greatest moment until it comes in due course. It may be guessed at indeed, in some measure, by those of us who have listened with full heart and mind; but so the teller would wish. In no wise is the surprise and wonder of his art thus diminished, for thus we share, as it were, in his authorship. But not so, if all were told us in a preface before we entered in!”“What then would you say is the supreme moment that Eru has reserved?” Andreth asked.
“Ah, wise lady!” said Finrod. “I am an Elda [elf], and again I was thinking of my own people. But nay, of all the Children of Eru. I was thinking that by the Second Children we might have been delivered from death. For ever as we spoke of death being a division of the united, I thought in my heart of a death that is not so: but the ending together of both. For that is what lies before us, so far as our reason could see: the completion of Arda and its end, and therefore also of us children of Arda; the end when all the long lives of the Elves shall be wholly in the past.
“And then suddenly I beheld as a vision Arda Remade; and there the Eldar completed but not ended could abide in the present for ever, and there walk, maybe, with the Children of Men, their deliverers, and sing to them such songs as, even in the Bliss beyond bliss, should make the green valleys ring and the everlasting mountain-tops to throb like harps.”Then Andreth looked under her brows at Finrod: “And what, when ye were not singing, would ye say to us?’ she asked.
Finrod laughed. “I can only guess,” he said. “Why, wise lady, I think that we should tell you tales of the Past and of Arda that was Before, of the perils and great deeds and the making of the Silmarils! We were the lordly ones then! But ye, ye would then be at home, looking at all things intently, as your own. Ye would be the lordly ones. ‘The eyes of Elves are always thinking of something else,’ ye would say. But ye would know then of what we were reminded: of the days when we first met, and our hands touched in the dark. Beyond the End of the World we shall not change; for in memory is our great talent, as shall be seen ever more clearly as the ages of this Arda pass: a heavy burden to be, I fear; but in the Days of which we now speak a great wealth.” And then he paused, for he saw that Andreth was weeping silently.
“Alas, lord!” she said. “What then is to be done now? For we speak as if these things are, or as if they will assuredly be. But Men have been diminished and their power is taken away. We look for no Arda Remade: darkness lies before us, into which we stare in vain. If by our aid your everlasting mansions were to be prepared, they will not be builded now.“
“Have ye then no hope?” said Finrod.“What is hope?” she said. “An expectation of good, which though uncertain has some foundation in what is known? Then we have none.”
“That is one thing that Men call ‘hope’,” said Finrod. “‘Amdir’ we call it, ‘looking up’. But there is another which is founded deeper. ‘Estel’ we call it, that is ‘trust’. It is not defeated by the ways of the world, for it does not come from experience, but from our nature and first being. If we are indeed the Eruhin, the Children of the One, then He will not suffer Himself to be deprived of His own, not by any Enemy, not even by ourselves. This is the last foundation of Estel, which we keep even when we contemplate the End: of all His designs the issue must be for His Children’s joy. Amdir you have not, you say. Does no Estel at all abide?“
“Maybe,” she said. “But no! Do you not perceive that it is part of our wound that Estel should falter and its foundations be shaken? Are we the Children of the One? Are we not cast off finally? Or were we ever so? Is not the Nameless the Lord of the World?“
“Say it not even in question!” said Finrod.
“It cannot be unsaid,” answered Andreth, “if you would understand the despair in which we walk. Or in which most Men walk. Among the Atani, as you call us, or the Seekers as we say: those who left the lands of despair and the Men of darkness and journeyed west in vain hope: it is believed that healing may yet be found, or that there is some way of escape. But is this indeed Estel? Is it not Amdir rather; but without reason: mere flight in a dream from what waking they know: that there is no escape from darkness and death?“
“Mere flight in a dream you say,’ answered Finrod. ‘In dream many desires are revealed; and desire may be the last flicker of Estel. But you do not mean dream, Andreth. You confound dream and waking with hope and belief, to make the one more doubtful and the other more sure. Are they asleep when they speak of escape and healing?”“Asleep or awake, they say nothing clearly,” answered Andreth. ‘How or when shall healing come? To what manner of being shall those who see that time be re-made? And what of us who before it go out into darkness unhealed? To such questions only those of the (as they call themselves) have any guess of an answer.”
“Those of the Old Hope?” said Finrod. “Who are they?”
“A few,” she said; “but their number has grown since we came to this land, and they see that the Nameless can (as they think) be defied. Yet that is no good reason. To defy him does not undo his work of old. And if the valour of the Eldar fails here, then their despair will be deeper. For it was not on the might of Men, or of any of the peoples of Arda, that the old hope was grounded.““What then was this hope, if you know?” Finrod asked.
“They say,” answered Andreth: “they say that the One will himself enter into Arda, and heal Men and all the Marring from the beginning to the end. This they say also, or they feign, is a rumor that has come down through years uncounted, even from the days of our undoing.”“They say, they feign?” said Finrod. “Are you then nor one of them?”
“How can I be, lord? All wisdom is against them. Who is the One, whom ye call Eru? If we put aside the Men who serve the Nameless, as do many in Middle-earth, still many Men perceive the world only as a war between Light and Dark equipotent. But you will say: nay, that is Manwe and Melkor; Eru is above them. Is then Eru only the greatest of the Valar, a great god among gods, as most Men will say, even among the Atani: a king who dwells far from his kingdom and leaves lesser princes to do here much as they will? Again you say: nay, Eru is One, alone without peer, and He made Ea, and is beyond it; and the Valar are greater than we, but yet no nearer to His majesty. Is this not so?”
“Yes,” said Finrod. “We say this, and the Valar we know, and they say the same, all save one. But which, think you, is more likely to lie: those who make themselves humble, or he that exalts himself?”
“I do not doubt,” said Andreth. “And for that reason the saying of Hope passes my understanding. How could Eru enter into the thing that He has made, and than which He is beyond measure greater? Can the singer enter into his tale or the designer into his picture?““He is already in it, as well as outside,” said Finrod. “But indeed the “in-dwelling” and the “out-living” are not in the same mode.”
“Truly,” said Andreth. “So may Eru in that mode be present in Ea that proceeded from Him. But they speak of Eru Himself entering into Arda, and that is a thing wholly different. How could He the greater do this? Would it not shatter Arda, or indeed all Ea?”
“Ask me not,” said Finrod. “These things are beyond the compass of the wisdom of the Eldar, or of the Valar maybe. But I doubt that our words may mislead us, and that when you say ‘greater’ you think of the dimensions of Arda, in which the greater vessel may not be contained in the less.“But such words may not be used of the Measureless. If Eru wished to do this, I do not doubt that He would find a way, though I cannot foresee it. For, as it seems to me, even if He in Himself were to enter in, He must still remain also as He is: the Author without. And yet, Andreth, to speak with humility, I cannot conceive how else this healing could be achieved. Since Eru will surely not suffer Melkor to turn the world to his own will and to triumph in the end. Yet there is no power conceivable greater than Melkor save Eru only. Therefore Eru, if He will not relinquish His work to Melkor, who must else proceed to mastery, then Eru must come in to conquer him.
“More: even if Melkor (or the Morgoth that he has become) could in any way be thrown down or thrust from Arda, still his Shadow would remain, and the evil that he has wrought and sown as a seed would wax and multiply. And if any remedy for this is to be found, ere all is ended, any new light to oppose the shadow, or any medicine for the wounds: then it must, I deem, come from without.“
“Then, lord,” said Andreth, and she looked up in wonder, “you believe in this Hope?“
“Ask me not yet,” he answered. “For it is still to me but strange news that comes from afar. No such hope was ever spoken to the Quendi. To you only it was sent. And yet through you we may hear it and lift up our hearts.” He paused a while, and then looking gravely at Andreth he said: “Yes, Wise-woman, maybe it was ordained that we Quendi, and ye Atani, ere the world grows old, should meet and bring news one to another, and so we should learn of the Hope from you: ordained, indeed, that thou and I, Andreth, should sit here and speak together, across the gulf that divides our kindreds, so that while the Shadow still broods in the North we should not be wholly afraid.”
This should be of interest to any who wish to say that The Lord of the Rings is pagan as Tolkien wrote LOTR as a mythology for Britian and some very devoted Tolkien fans have even tried to line up where the events of Tolkien’s lore would’ve lined up with our real-world history. As such, what Finrod says in this lengthy excerpt is – if we are to treat Tolkien’s work as a mythological history of Europe – a sort of prophecy about the coming of Jesus. It’s also interesting to note that in Tolkien’s idea of what the end of Middle Earth would look like, it was very much like what we see in Revelation. A battle called the Dagor Dagorath would happen, Melkor would be slain, and it would all culminate in the world being remade.
From this, we can see that by its own merits – without even taking into account what Tolkien himself said about the faith woven into his work – that The Lord of the Rings and the larger legendarium, as a mythology for Britian, is a Christian work, or, at the very least, a Catholic one. It has a faith that, even if it is not shown overtly, is shown throughout the story in various forms. Though it is true that Tolkien was influenced by the Greek and Norse myths when creating his secondary world, The Lord of the Rings and its history is still a fundamentally Christian work.
Until next time,
M.J.
#Blog #Books #Catholicism #Christianity #ChristopherTolkien #faith #Fantasy #god #JRRTolkien #JackPosobiec #jesus #LordOfTheRings #LOTR #OpinionPeice #Paganism #Response #Review #TheHobbit #TheSilmarillion #Theology #Tolkien #Writing -
Blog: “Lord of the Rings is Pagan…” is One of the Dumbest Takes I’ve Ever Heard.
I know, I know…everybody is jumping on Jack Posobiec for this comment, but as a Tolkien fan and writing nerd, I’m jumping on the bandwagon of defending what is one of the greatest Christian works of fiction to have ever graced God’s green Earth.
But first, some backstory. On a recent episode of his podcast, Human Events Daily, Posobiec made the comment that LOTR is not overtly Christian, (which to some extent is true; I’ll get to that in a sec) and went so far as to say that it’s overtly pagan. He said: “There’s nothing overtly Christian about ‘Lord of the Rings.’ […] there’s no church in it, there’s no faith in it, there’s no Christ figure — there’s none of these things. And honestly, ‘Lord of the Rings,’ if it’s anything, […] is overtly pagan.” He also cited as further evidence of LOTR not being Christian that Tolkien notoriously didn’t like C.S. Lewis’ use of allegory in The Chronicles of Narnia series.
However, to begin our analysis of if Lord of the Rings (and the surrounding books such as The Hobbit, The Silmarillion, The History of Middle Earth, etc.) is Christian or not, we must define what necessarily constitutes a “Christian” story. Is it the values of the story and the intent of the author that make it Christian, or is it the use of often painfully obvious allegory or messaging that makes it Christian?
Personally, I do believe that it’s a mix of both, but I lean more towards the intent of the Christian author to show Christ and the Gospel in some way, be it subtle or overt, and the values of the story that make it Christian. To quote Martin Luther: “The Christian shoemaker does his duty not by putting little crosses on the shoes, but by making good shoes.” A similar thing goes for Christian storytelling. If you can find a way to put in Christianity without making so painfully obvious that Dora the Explorer could find it, and people can find the Christian themes, then you’ve done your job. But if you make it so obvious that the story eventually feels less like a story and more like Christian propaganda, then you’ve lost not only the point of the story, but you also lose the non-Christian readers who may have otherwise been interested.
In the case of Tolkien and Lewis, while Lewis leaned towards overt allegory for his books, Tolkien – who was not a fan of allegory – leaned towards weaving Christianity into the fabric of the story subtly. According to Tolkien himself in Letter 142, “The Lord of the Rings is of course a fundamentally religious and Catholic work; unconsciously so at first, but consciously in the revision.” And while, yes, while The Lord of the Rings does take from Norse myths, and much of the subtlety of the Christian themes have been lost on people who wish to make it more pagan than it was intended to be (something that Tolkien worried about happening), Christ is still there.
Take, for instance, the characters of Gandalf and Aragorn. An argument can be made that these characters intentionally represent Jesus in different ways. Starting with Gandalf, according to The Silmarillion (which provides the background lore for The Lord of the Rings) he is of the Maiar, or the angelic beings that serve under the Valar (which you can think of as the archangels.) Because of Sauron’s following in the footsteps of Melkor (Morgoth), Gandalf was sent to Middle Earth to help the people fight against Sauron. While not a perfect representation of Christ, the image of a divine being living in the body of a mere mortal (very much like the hypostatic union) is stark. Even more like Christ is Gandalf’s death fighting the Balrog in the Mines of Moria and resurrection as “Gandalf the White,” an image of Christ’s death, resurrection, and glorification. Heck, one could even say that Gandalf the White is a sort of allegory for Christ’s second coming, when He will finally defeat Satan once and for all.
As for Aragorn, he is another Christ figure. At first, he’s a ranger, a seemingly random dude from the Dunedain (the descendants of the Numenorians who fled to Middle Earth after Numenor was destroyed). Bilbo’s description of him of, “All that is gold does not glitter,” is a parallel to Isaiah 53:2’s description of Jesus’ humble state. Further, his journey in the Path of the Dead and his dual role of healer and warrior is similar to Christ’s role of redeemer and conquering king that we see in Revelation, especially when he returns to the throne as a glorious king.
Further, one could also argue that Frodo and Sam are representative of Christ and the everyday Christian. As Frodo struggles on his mission to destroy the Ring, Sam is there helping him along the way. This is similar to how, as Christians we struggle to live godly lives, but Christ is there helping us through the Holy Spirit to stay on the straight-and-narrow.
Thus, while Tolkien never overtly named these characters as Christ figures, it is still obvious if you are willing to look at it through a Christian lens.
Further, to say that there is no faith in The Lord of the Rings is untrue. While faith is never fully defined or developed in LOTR, within the larger context of Tolkien’s legendarium, there absolutely is a faith – especially amongst the elves – that is deeply reflective of Tolkien’s belief in Catholicism.
The best example of this that I can think of is the Elves’ hymn to Elbereth Gilthoniel. This isn’t a song about some random person. In the larger legendarium, Elbereth is essentially a Mary-like figure to the elves, making this hymn very much like “Ave Maria.” When Sam calls out to her in Shelob’s cave, it’s essentially like saying a Hail Mary.
Even more damning for Posobiec’s statement are the allusions to Eru Iluvatar, the God of Tolkien’s legendarium, within The Lord of the Rings. According to The Silmarillion, The Book of Lost Tales, etc. Eru was seldom worshipped by the Elves because his name was considered to holy too utter. As Finrod says in “The Athrabeth” (which I will get to) in the book The History of Middle Earth: Morgoth’s Ring, “For that name we do not utter ever in jest or without full intent.” However, despite this, both the elves and men understood that Eru was the only one deserving of praise and believed the worship of any other to be evil. In fact, the men of Numenor had the mountain of Meneltarma dedicated to the worship of Eru in the Three Prayers that were held around the year.
Most interestingly, however, when thinking about faith in the world of Middle-Earth is that, Tolkien, in writing “The Athrabeth,” a lengthy dialogue between Finrod Felagund (Galadriel’s brother) and the human woman, Andreth, incorporated the idea that Eru Illuvatar would one day enter the world to save the Edain (mankind.) Though it’s better if you read the entire dialogue, I’ll include this excerpt from The History of Middle Earth: Morgoth’s Ring pages 318-323:
“This then, I propound, was the errand of Men, not the followers, but the heirs and fulfillers of all: to heal the Marring of Arda [the world of Middle-Earth], already foreshadowed before their devising; and to do more, as agents of the magnificence of Eru: to enlarge the Music and surpass the Vision of the World!
“For that Arda Healed shall not be Arda Unmarred, but a third thing and a greater, and yet the same. I have conversed with the Valar who were present at the making of the Music ere the being of the World began. And now I wonder: Did they hear the end of the Music? Was there not something in or beyond the final chords of Eru which, being overwhelmed thereby, they did got perceive?
“Or again, since Eru is forever free, maybe he made no Music and showed no Vision beyond a certain point. Beyond that point we cannot see or know, until by our own roads we come there, Valar or Eldar [Elves] or Men.
“As may a master in the telling of tales keep hidden the greatest moment until it comes in due course. It may be guessed at indeed, in some measure, by those of us who have listened with full heart and mind; but so the teller would wish. In no wise is the surprise and wonder of his art thus diminished, for thus we share, as it were, in his authorship. But not so, if all were told us in a preface before we entered in!”“What then would you say is the supreme moment that Eru has reserved?” Andreth asked.
“Ah, wise lady!” said Finrod. “I am an Elda [elf], and again I was thinking of my own people. But nay, of all the Children of Eru. I was thinking that by the Second Children we might have been delivered from death. For ever as we spoke of death being a division of the united, I thought in my heart of a death that is not so: but the ending together of both. For that is what lies before us, so far as our reason could see: the completion of Arda and its end, and therefore also of us children of Arda; the end when all the long lives of the Elves shall be wholly in the past.
“And then suddenly I beheld as a vision Arda Remade; and there the Eldar completed but not ended could abide in the present for ever, and there walk, maybe, with the Children of Men, their deliverers, and sing to them such songs as, even in the Bliss beyond bliss, should make the green valleys ring and the everlasting mountain-tops to throb like harps.”Then Andreth looked under her brows at Finrod: “And what, when ye were not singing, would ye say to us?’ she asked.
Finrod laughed. “I can only guess,” he said. “Why, wise lady, I think that we should tell you tales of the Past and of Arda that was Before, of the perils and great deeds and the making of the Silmarils! We were the lordly ones then! But ye, ye would then be at home, looking at all things intently, as your own. Ye would be the lordly ones. ‘The eyes of Elves are always thinking of something else,’ ye would say. But ye would know then of what we were reminded: of the days when we first met, and our hands touched in the dark. Beyond the End of the World we shall not change; for in memory is our great talent, as shall be seen ever more clearly as the ages of this Arda pass: a heavy burden to be, I fear; but in the Days of which we now speak a great wealth.” And then he paused, for he saw that Andreth was weeping silently.
“Alas, lord!” she said. “What then is to be done now? For we speak as if these things are, or as if they will assuredly be. But Men have been diminished and their power is taken away. We look for no Arda Remade: darkness lies before us, into which we stare in vain. If by our aid your everlasting mansions were to be prepared, they will not be builded now.“
“Have ye then no hope?” said Finrod.“What is hope?” she said. “An expectation of good, which though uncertain has some foundation in what is known? Then we have none.”
“That is one thing that Men call ‘hope’,” said Finrod. “‘Amdir’ we call it, ‘looking up’. But there is another which is founded deeper. ‘Estel’ we call it, that is ‘trust’. It is not defeated by the ways of the world, for it does not come from experience, but from our nature and first being. If we are indeed the Eruhin, the Children of the One, then He will not suffer Himself to be deprived of His own, not by any Enemy, not even by ourselves. This is the last foundation of Estel, which we keep even when we contemplate the End: of all His designs the issue must be for His Children’s joy. Amdir you have not, you say. Does no Estel at all abide?“
“Maybe,” she said. “But no! Do you not perceive that it is part of our wound that Estel should falter and its foundations be shaken? Are we the Children of the One? Are we not cast off finally? Or were we ever so? Is not the Nameless the Lord of the World?“
“Say it not even in question!” said Finrod.
“It cannot be unsaid,” answered Andreth, “if you would understand the despair in which we walk. Or in which most Men walk. Among the Atani, as you call us, or the Seekers as we say: those who left the lands of despair and the Men of darkness and journeyed west in vain hope: it is believed that healing may yet be found, or that there is some way of escape. But is this indeed Estel? Is it not Amdir rather; but without reason: mere flight in a dream from what waking they know: that there is no escape from darkness and death?“
“Mere flight in a dream you say,’ answered Finrod. ‘In dream many desires are revealed; and desire may be the last flicker of Estel. But you do not mean dream, Andreth. You confound dream and waking with hope and belief, to make the one more doubtful and the other more sure. Are they asleep when they speak of escape and healing?”“Asleep or awake, they say nothing clearly,” answered Andreth. ‘How or when shall healing come? To what manner of being shall those who see that time be re-made? And what of us who before it go out into darkness unhealed? To such questions only those of the (as they call themselves) have any guess of an answer.”
“Those of the Old Hope?” said Finrod. “Who are they?”
“A few,” she said; “but their number has grown since we came to this land, and they see that the Nameless can (as they think) be defied. Yet that is no good reason. To defy him does not undo his work of old. And if the valour of the Eldar fails here, then their despair will be deeper. For it was not on the might of Men, or of any of the peoples of Arda, that the old hope was grounded.““What then was this hope, if you know?” Finrod asked.
“They say,” answered Andreth: “they say that the One will himself enter into Arda, and heal Men and all the Marring from the beginning to the end. This they say also, or they feign, is a rumor that has come down through years uncounted, even from the days of our undoing.”“They say, they feign?” said Finrod. “Are you then nor one of them?”
“How can I be, lord? All wisdom is against them. Who is the One, whom ye call Eru? If we put aside the Men who serve the Nameless, as do many in Middle-earth, still many Men perceive the world only as a war between Light and Dark equipotent. But you will say: nay, that is Manwe and Melkor; Eru is above them. Is then Eru only the greatest of the Valar, a great god among gods, as most Men will say, even among the Atani: a king who dwells far from his kingdom and leaves lesser princes to do here much as they will? Again you say: nay, Eru is One, alone without peer, and He made Ea, and is beyond it; and the Valar are greater than we, but yet no nearer to His majesty. Is this not so?”
“Yes,” said Finrod. “We say this, and the Valar we know, and they say the same, all save one. But which, think you, is more likely to lie: those who make themselves humble, or he that exalts himself?”
“I do not doubt,” said Andreth. “And for that reason the saying of Hope passes my understanding. How could Eru enter into the thing that He has made, and than which He is beyond measure greater? Can the singer enter into his tale or the designer into his picture?““He is already in it, as well as outside,” said Finrod. “But indeed the “in-dwelling” and the “out-living” are not in the same mode.”
“Truly,” said Andreth. “So may Eru in that mode be present in Ea that proceeded from Him. But they speak of Eru Himself entering into Arda, and that is a thing wholly different. How could He the greater do this? Would it not shatter Arda, or indeed all Ea?”
“Ask me not,” said Finrod. “These things are beyond the compass of the wisdom of the Eldar, or of the Valar maybe. But I doubt that our words may mislead us, and that when you say ‘greater’ you think of the dimensions of Arda, in which the greater vessel may not be contained in the less.“But such words may not be used of the Measureless. If Eru wished to do this, I do not doubt that He would find a way, though I cannot foresee it. For, as it seems to me, even if He in Himself were to enter in, He must still remain also as He is: the Author without. And yet, Andreth, to speak with humility, I cannot conceive how else this healing could be achieved. Since Eru will surely not suffer Melkor to turn the world to his own will and to triumph in the end. Yet there is no power conceivable greater than Melkor save Eru only. Therefore Eru, if He will not relinquish His work to Melkor, who must else proceed to mastery, then Eru must come in to conquer him.
“More: even if Melkor (or the Morgoth that he has become) could in any way be thrown down or thrust from Arda, still his Shadow would remain, and the evil that he has wrought and sown as a seed would wax and multiply. And if any remedy for this is to be found, ere all is ended, any new light to oppose the shadow, or any medicine for the wounds: then it must, I deem, come from without.“
“Then, lord,” said Andreth, and she looked up in wonder, “you believe in this Hope?“
“Ask me not yet,” he answered. “For it is still to me but strange news that comes from afar. No such hope was ever spoken to the Quendi. To you only it was sent. And yet through you we may hear it and lift up our hearts.” He paused a while, and then looking gravely at Andreth he said: “Yes, Wise-woman, maybe it was ordained that we Quendi, and ye Atani, ere the world grows old, should meet and bring news one to another, and so we should learn of the Hope from you: ordained, indeed, that thou and I, Andreth, should sit here and speak together, across the gulf that divides our kindreds, so that while the Shadow still broods in the North we should not be wholly afraid.”
This should be of interest to any who wish to say that The Lord of the Rings is pagan as Tolkien wrote LOTR as a mythology for Britian and some very devoted Tolkien fans have even tried to line up where the events of Tolkien’s lore would’ve lined up with our real-world history. As such, what Finrod says in this lengthy excerpt is – if we are to treat Tolkien’s work as a mythological history of Europe – a sort of prophecy about the coming of Jesus. It’s also interesting to note that in Tolkien’s idea of what the end of Middle Earth would look like, it was very much like what we see in Revelation. A battle called the Dagor Dagorath would happen, Melkor would be slain, and it would all culminate in the world being remade.
From this, we can see that by its own merits – without even taking into account what Tolkien himself said about the faith woven into his work – that The Lord of the Rings and the larger legendarium, as a mythology for Britian, is a Christian work, or, at the very least, a Catholic one. It has a faith that, even if it is not shown overtly, is shown throughout the story in various forms. Though it is true that Tolkien was influenced by the Greek and Norse myths when creating his secondary world, The Lord of the Rings and its history is still a fundamentally Christian work.
Until next time,
M.J.
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Blog: “Lord of the Rings is Pagan…” is One of the Dumbest Takes I’ve Ever Heard.
I know, I know…everybody is jumping on Jack Posobiec for this comment, but as a Tolkien fan and writing nerd, I’m jumping on the bandwagon of defending what is one of the greatest Christian works of fiction to have ever graced God’s green Earth.
But first, some backstory. On a recent episode of his podcast, Human Events Daily, Posobiec made the comment that LOTR is not overtly Christian, (which to some extent is true; I’ll get to that in a sec) and went so far as to say that it’s overtly pagan. He said: “There’s nothing overtly Christian about ‘Lord of the Rings.’ […] there’s no church in it, there’s no faith in it, there’s no Christ figure — there’s none of these things. And honestly, ‘Lord of the Rings,’ if it’s anything, […] is overtly pagan.” He also cited as further evidence of LOTR not being Christian that Tolkien notoriously didn’t like C.S. Lewis’ use of allegory in The Chronicles of Narnia series.
However, to begin our analysis of if Lord of the Rings (and the surrounding books such as The Hobbit, The Silmarillion, The History of Middle Earth, etc.) is Christian or not, we must define what necessarily constitutes a “Christian” story. Is it the values of the story and the intent of the author that make it Christian, or is it the use of often painfully obvious allegory or messaging that makes it Christian?
Personally, I do believe that it’s a mix of both, but I lean more towards the intent of the Christian author to show Christ and the Gospel in some way, be it subtle or overt, and the values of the story that make it Christian. To quote Martin Luther: “The Christian shoemaker does his duty not by putting little crosses on the shoes, but by making good shoes.” A similar thing goes for Christian storytelling. If you can find a way to put in Christianity without making so painfully obvious that Dora the Explorer could find it, and people can find the Christian themes, then you’ve done your job. But if you make it so obvious that the story eventually feels less like a story and more like Christian propaganda, then you’ve lost not only the point of the story, but you also lose the non-Christian readers who may have otherwise been interested.
In the case of Tolkien and Lewis, while Lewis leaned towards overt allegory for his books, Tolkien – who was not a fan of allegory – leaned towards weaving Christianity into the fabric of the story subtly. According to Tolkien himself in Letter 142, “The Lord of the Rings is of course a fundamentally religious and Catholic work; unconsciously so at first, but consciously in the revision.” And while, yes, while The Lord of the Rings does take from Norse myths, and much of the subtlety of the Christian themes have been lost on people who wish to make it more pagan than it was intended to be (something that Tolkien worried about happening), Christ is still there.
Take, for instance, the characters of Gandalf and Aragorn. An argument can be made that these characters intentionally represent Jesus in different ways. Starting with Gandalf, according to The Silmarillion (which provides the background lore for The Lord of the Rings) he is of the Maiar, or the angelic beings that serve under the Valar (which you can think of as the archangels.) Because of Sauron’s following in the footsteps of Melkor, (Morgoth) Gandalf was sent to Middle Earth to help the people fight against Sauron. While not a perfect representation of Christ, the image of a divine being living in the body of a mere mortal (very much like the hypostatic union) is stark. Even more like Christ is Gandalf’s death fighting the Balrog in the Mines of Moria and resurrection as “Gandalf the White,” an image of Christ’s death, resurrection, and glorification. Heck, one could even say that Gandalf the White is a sort of allegory for Christ’s second coming, when He will finally defeat Satan once and for all.
As for Aragorn, he is another Christ figure. At first, he’s a ranger, a seemingly random dude from the Dunedain (the descendants of the Numenorians who fled to Middle Earth after Numenor was destroyed). Bilbo’s description of him of, “All that is gold does not glitter,” is a parallel to Isaiah 53:2’s description of Jesus’ humble state. Further, his journey in the Path of the Dead and his dual role of healer and warrior is similar to Christ’s role of redeemer and conquering king that we see in Revelation, especially when he returns to the throne as a glorious king.
Further, one could also argue that Frodo and Sam are representative of Christ and the everyday Christian. As Frodo struggles on his mission to destroy the Ring, Sam is there helping him along the way. This is similar to how, as Christians we struggle to live godly lives, but Christ is there helping us through the Holy Spirit to stay on the straight-and-narrow.
Thus, while Tolkien never overtly named these characters as Christ figures, it is still obvious if you are willing to look at it through a Christian lens.
Further, to say that there is no faith in The Lord of the Rings is untrue. While faith is never fully defined or developed in LOTR, within the larger context of Tolkien’s legendarium, there absolutely is a faith – especially amongst the elves – that is deeply reflective of Tolkien’s belief in Catholicism.
The best example of this that I can think of is the Elves’ hymn to Elbereth Gilthoniel. This isn’t a song about some random person. In the larger legendarium, Elbereth is essentially a Mary-like figure to the elves, making this hymn very much like “Ave Maria.” When Sam calls out to her in Shelob’s cave, it’s essentially like saying a Hail Mary.
Even more damning for Posobiec’s statement are the allusions to Eru Iluvatar, the God of Tolkien’s legendarium, within The Lord of the Rings. According to The Silmarillion, The Book of Lost Tales, etc. Eru was seldom worshipped by the Elves because his name was considered to holy to utter. As Finrod says in “The Athrabeth” (which I will get to) in the book The History of Middle Earth: Morgoth’s Ring, “For that name we do not utter ever in jest or without full intent.” However, despite this, both the elves and men understood that Eru was the only one deserving of praise and believed the worship of any other to be evil. In fact, the men of Numenor had the mountain of Meneltarma dedicated to the worship of Eru in the Three Prayers that were held around the year.
Most interestingly, however, when thinking about faith in the world of Middle-Earth is that, Tolkien, in writing “The Athrabeth,” a lengthy dialogue between Finrod Felagund (Galadriel’s brother) and the human woman, Andreth, incorporated the idea that Eru Illuvatar would one day enter the world to save the Edain (mankind.) Though it’s better if you read the entire dialogue, I’ll include this excerpt from The History of Middle Earth: Morgoth’s Ring pages 318-323:
“This then, I propound, was the errand of Men, not the followers, but the heirs and fulfillers of all: to heal the Marring of Arda [the world of Middle-Earth], already foreshadowed before their devising; and to do more, as agents of the magnificence of Eru: to enlarge the Music and surpass the Vision of the World!
“For that Arda Healed shall not be Arda Unmarred, but a third thing and a greater, and yet the same. I have conversed with the Valar who were present at the making of the Music ere the being of the World began. And now I wonder: Did they hear the end of the Music? Was there not something in or beyond the final chords of Eru which, being overwhelmed thereby, they did got perceive?
“Or again, since Eru is forever free, maybe he made no Music and showed no Vision beyond a certain point. Beyond that point we cannot see or know, until by our own roads we come there, Valar or Eldar [Elves] or Men.
“As may a master in the telling of tales keep hidden the greatest moment until it comes in due course. It may be guessed at indeed, in some measure, by those of us who have listened with full heart and mind; but so the teller would wish. In no wise is the surprise and wonder of his art thus diminished, for thus we share, as it were, in his authorship. But not so, if all were told us in a preface before we entered in!”“What then would you say is the supreme moment that Eru has reserved?” Andreth asked.
“Ah, wise lady!” said Finrod. “I am an Elda [elf], and again I was thinking of my own people. But nay, of all the Children of Eru. I was thinking that by the Second Children we might have been delivered from death. For ever as we spoke of death being a division of the united, I thought in my heart of a death that is not so: but the ending together of both. For that is what lies before us, so far as our reason could see: the completion of Arda and its end, and therefore also of us children of Arda; the end when all the long lives of the Elves shall be wholly in the past.
“And then suddenly I beheld as a vision Arda Remade; and there the Eldar completed but not ended could abide in the present for ever, and there walk, maybe, with the Children of Men, their deliverers, and sing to them such songs as, even in the Bliss beyond bliss, should make the green valleys ring and the everlasting mountain-tops to throb like harps.”Then Andreth looked under her brows at Finrod: “And what, when ye were not singing, would ye say to us?’ she asked.
Finrod laughed. “I can only guess,” he said. “Why, wise lady, I think that we should tell you tales of the Past and of Arda that was Before, of the perils and great deeds and the making of the Silmarils! We were the lordly ones then! But ye, ye would then be at home, looking at all things intently, as your own. Ye would be the lordly ones. ‘The eyes of Elves are always thinking of something else,’ ye would say. But ye would know then of what we were reminded: of the days when we first met, and our hands touched in the dark. Beyond the End of the World we shall not change; for in memory is our great talent, as shall be seen ever more clearly as the ages of this Arda pass: a heavy burden to be, I fear; but in the Days of which we now speak a great wealth.” And then he paused, for he saw that Andreth was weeping silently.
“Alas, lord!” she said. “What then is to be done now? For we speak as if these things are, or as if they will assuredly be. But Men have been diminished and their power is taken away. We look for no Arda Remade: darkness lies before us, into which we stare in vain. If by our aid your everlasting mansions were to be prepared, they will not be builded now.“
“Have ye then no hope?” said Finrod.“What is hope?” she said. “An expectation of good, which though uncertain has some foundation in what is known? Then we have none.”
“That is one thing that Men call ‘hope’,” said Finrod. “‘Amdir’ we call it, ‘looking up’. But there is another which is founded deeper. ‘Estel’ we call it, that is ‘trust’. It is not defeated by the ways of the world, for it does not come from experience, but from our nature and first being. If we are indeed the Eruhin, the Children of the One, then He will not suffer Himself to be deprived of His own, not by any Enemy, not even by ourselves. This is the last foundation of Estel, which we keep even when we contemplate the End: of all His designs the issue must be for His Children’s joy. Amdir you have not, you say. Does no Estel at all abide?“
“Maybe,” she said. “But no! Do you not perceive that it is part of our wound that Estel should falter and its foundations be shaken? Are we the Children of the One? Are we not cast off finally? Or were we ever so? Is not the Nameless the Lord of the World?“
“Say it not even in question!” said Finrod.
“It cannot be unsaid,” answered Andreth, “if you would understand the despair in which we walk. Or in which most Men walk. Among the Atani, as you call us, or the Seekers as we say: those who left the lands of despair and the Men of darkness and journeyed west in vain hope: it is believed that healing may yet be found, or that there is some way of escape. But is this indeed Estel? Is it not Amdir rather; but without reason: mere flight in a dream from what waking they know: that there is no escape from darkness and death?“
“Mere flight in a dream you say,’ answered Finrod. ‘In dream many desires are revealed; and desire may be the last flicker of Estel. But you do not mean dream, Andreth. You confound dream and waking with hope and belief, to make the one more doubtful and the other more sure. Are they asleep when they speak of escape and healing?”“Asleep or awake, they say nothing clearly,” answered Andreth. ‘How or when shall healing come? To what manner of being shall those who see that time be re-made? And what of us who before it go out into darkness unhealed? To such questions only those of the (as they call themselves) have any guess of an answer.”
“Those of the Old Hope?” said Finrod. “Who are they?”
“A few,” she said; “but their number has grown since we came to this land, and they see that the Nameless can (as they think) be defied. Yet that is no good reason. To defy him does not undo his work of old. And if the valour of the Eldar fails here, then their despair will be deeper. For it was not on the might of Men, or of any of the peoples of Arda, that the old hope was grounded.““What then was this hope, if you know?” Finrod asked.
“They say,” answered Andreth: “they say that the One will himself enter into Arda, and heal Men and all the Marring from the beginning to the end. This they say also, or they feign, is a rumor that has come down through years uncounted, even from the days of our undoing.”“They say, they feign?” said Finrod. “Are you then nor one of them?”
“How can I be, lord? All wisdom is against them. Who is the One, whom ye call Eru? If we put aside the Men who serve the Nameless, as do many in Middle-earth, still many Men perceive the world only as a war between Light and Dark equipotent. But you will say: nay, that is Manwe and Melkor; Eru is above them. Is then Eru only the greatest of the Valar, a great god among gods, as most Men will say, even among the Atani: a king who dwells far from his kingdom and leaves lesser princes to do here much as they will? Again you say: nay, Eru is One, alone without peer, and He made Ea, and is beyond it; and the Valar are greater than we, but yet no nearer to His majesty. Is this not so?”
“Yes,” said Finrod. “We say this, and the Valar we know, and they say the same, all save one. But which, think you, is more likely to lie: those who make themselves humble, or he that exalts himself?”
“I do not doubt,” said Andreth. “And for that reason the saying of Hope passes my understanding. How could Eru enter into the thing that He has made, and than which He is beyond measure greater? Can the singer enter into his tale or the designer into his picture?““He is already in it, as well as outside,” said Finrod. “But indeed the “in-dwelling” and the “out-living” are not in the same mode.”
“Truly,” said Andreth. “So may Eru in that mode be present in Ea that proceeded from Him. But they speak of Eru Himself entering into Arda, and that is a thing wholly different. How could He the greater do this? Would it not shatter Arda, or indeed all Ea?”
“Ask me not,” said Finrod. “These things are beyond the compass of the wisdom of the Eldar, or of the Valar maybe. But I doubt that our words may mislead us, and that when you say ‘greater’ you think of the dimensions of Arda, in which the greater vessel may not be contained in the less.“But such words may not be used of the Measureless. If Eru wished to do this, I do not doubt that He would find a way, though I cannot foresee it. For, as it seems to me, even if He in Himself were to enter in, He must still remain also as He is: the Author without. And yet, Andreth, to speak with humility, I cannot conceive how else this healing could be achieved. Since Eru will surely not suffer Melkor to turn the world to his own will and to triumph in the end. Yet there is no power conceivable greater than Melkor save Eru only. Therefore Eru, if He will not relinquish His work to Melkor, who must else proceed to mastery, then Eru must come in to conquer him.
“More: even if Melkor (or the Morgoth that he has become) could in any way be thrown down or thrust from Arda, still his Shadow would remain, and the evil that he has wrought and sown as a seed would wax and multiply. And if any remedy for this is to be found, ere all is ended, any new light to oppose the shadow, or any medicine for the wounds: then it must, I deem, come from without.“
“Then, lord,” said Andreth, and she looked up in wonder, “you believe in this Hope?“
“Ask me not yet,” he answered. “For it is still to me but strange news that comes from afar. No such hope was ever spoken to the Quendi. To you only it was sent. And yet through you we may hear it and lift up our hearts.” He paused a while, and then looking gravely at Andreth he said: “Yes, Wise-woman, maybe it was ordained that we Quendi, and ye Atani, ere the world grows old, should meet and bring news one to another, and so we should learn of the Hope from you: ordained, indeed, that thou and I, Andreth, should sit here and speak together, across the gulf that divides our kindreds, so that while the Shadow still broods in the North we should not be wholly afraid.”
This should be of interest to any who wish to say that The Lord of the Rings is pagan as Tolkien wrote LOTR as a mythology for Britian and some very devoted Tolkien fans have even tried to line up where the events of Tolkien’s lore would’ve lined up with our real-world history. As such, what Finrod says in this lengthy excerpt is – if we are to treat Tolkien’s work as a mythological history of Europe – a sort of prophecy about the coming of Jesus. It’s also interesting to note that in Tolkien’s idea of what the end of Middle Earth would look like, it was very much like what we see in Revelation. A battle called the Dagor Dagorath would happen, Melkor would be slain, and it would all culminate in the world being remade.
From this, we can see that by its own merits – without even taking into account what Tolkien himself said about the faith woven into his work – that The Lord of the Rings and the larger legendarium, as a mythology for Britian, is a Christian work, or, at the very least, a Catholic one. It has a faith that, even if it is not shown overtly, is shown throughout the story in various forms. Though it is true that Tolkien was influenced by the Greek and Norse myths when creating his secondary world, The Lord of the Rings and its history is still a fundamentally Christian work.
Until next time,
M.J.
#Blog #Books #Catholicism #Christianity #ChristopherTolkien #faith #Fantasy #god #JRRTolkien #JackPosobiec #jesus #LordOfTheRings #LOTR #OpinionPeice #Paganism #Response #Review #TheHobbit #TheSilmarillion #Theology #Tolkien #Writing -
“There was sorrow then too, and gathering dark, but great valour, and great deeds that were not wholly vain.” — Gandalf the Grey
Also by Freeman Ng: BRIDGE ACROSS THE SKY, an Angel Island novel. https://www.AngelIslandNovel.com
Reposts of strips from my first-term collection, TRUMPBERT: OUR LONG NATIONAL NIGHTMARE (https://www.Trumpbert.com) most weekdays. New strips every Sunday.
#dilbert #parody #trump #satire #comic #webcomic #Georgia #specialElection #JonOssof #RaphaelWarnock
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“There was sorrow then too, and gathering dark, but great valour, and great deeds that were not wholly vain.” — Gandalf the Grey
Also by Freeman Ng: BRIDGE ACROSS THE SKY, an Angel Island novel. https://www.AngelIslandNovel.com
Reposts of strips from my first-term collection, TRUMPBERT: OUR LONG NATIONAL NIGHTMARE (https://www.Trumpbert.com) most weekdays. New strips every Sunday.
#dilbert #parody #trump #satire #comic #webcomic #Georgia #specialElection #JonOssof #RaphaelWarnock
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“There was sorrow then too, and gathering dark, but great valour, and great deeds that were not wholly vain.” — Gandalf the Grey
Also by Freeman Ng: BRIDGE ACROSS THE SKY, an Angel Island novel. https://www.AngelIslandNovel.com
Reposts of strips from my first-term collection, TRUMPBERT: OUR LONG NATIONAL NIGHTMARE (https://www.Trumpbert.com) most weekdays. New strips every Sunday.
#dilbert #parody #trump #satire #comic #webcomic #Georgia #specialElection #JonOssof #RaphaelWarnock
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“There was sorrow then too, and gathering dark, but great valour, and great deeds that were not wholly vain.” — Gandalf the Grey
Also by Freeman Ng: BRIDGE ACROSS THE SKY, an Angel Island novel. https://www.AngelIslandNovel.com
Reposts of strips from my first-term collection, TRUMPBERT: OUR LONG NATIONAL NIGHTMARE (https://www.Trumpbert.com) most weekdays. New strips every Sunday.
#dilbert #parody #trump #satire #comic #webcomic #Georgia #specialElection #JonOssof #RaphaelWarnock
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Using Grok for "general learning" … you might as well ask for a SS commander or Hitler himself as your history teacher. Grok is completely biased.
Currently, #ElonMusk configured Grok to insert ramblings about "white genocide" into each of its replies, and this is not the first time that #Musk tuned Grok to his hateful Nazi ideology.
If you're still watching or listening to the Lex Fridman podcast, you're supporting/enabling someone who supports ultra right-wing ideology and fascism. Yes, fascism. Lex had Balaji Srinivasan on his show, to name just one asshole Lex platformed. What need I say more?
Personally, I had multiple co-workers tell me, "I watched RFK Jr. on the Lex Fridman podcast. He made total sense to me, he's not the conspiracy theorist everyone says he is." I "lost" a couple of colleagues who I had thought decent to this propaganda.
It's like Aragorn warns in the LotR when they mistake Gandalf the White for Saruman: Don't let Saruman speak. His words would put a spell on you. And before you know it, you're hailing and praising fascists.
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I have bought a 3D printer, but the amounts that we need to print is bringing me to a conclusion, that I need another 3D printer, maybe two
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Rad bych zde vypustil moje zkusenosti ze 14 dni mlsani yerba mate 2x denne:
1. Myslel jsem si, ze se mi dobre pracuje vecer. Ale kdyz si k tomu dam mate, tak mi prijde ze muj fokus se jeste trochu zuzi na praci, coz je super, mozna placebo, who knows, i don't care
2. Nemam nutkani pit alkohol vecer (ani v jine casti dne)
3. Vice se tesim na praci a veci okolo, predtim jsem se tesil jenom na programovani jako takove, ted se tesim az usednu k pohodli memu stolu, hodim nohy na deku a jsem happy -
Merlin + Gandalf = The Demon Prophet Surtr!
Just as the title says XD I don't know how this emoji generator is called but this time i have decided to create my own meme since i do see a lot of people doing stuff based from this emoji generator.
Pic made & edited by me!
#TheDemonKingwholosthisjob #Unembloyeddemonking #lordoftherings #MerlinLuciferIII #MerlinLucifer #merlin #lucifer #demonprophetsurtr #surtr #gandalf #anime #manhua #chibi #fanart #madebyme #edit
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🧙♂️✨ Become the Gandalf of your LAMP stack! SQL injections, XSS, brute force, bots... they shall not pass. 🛑
In this article, written by CrowdSec Ambassador Killian Prin-Abeil, learn how to secure your applications with open source WAFs like CrowdSec & ModSecurity.
Check it out 👉 https://crowdsec.net/blog/become-the-gandalf-of-your-lamp-server
#cybersecurity #WAF #webapplicationfirewall #opensource #LAMP
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Have some #gandalf for the evening 🤗 #lordofthering #tolkien #drawing #art #leanderZeichnet #lotr
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I just spend some time on something useless but fun:
I often use the invidious instance of nerdvpn.de and they have a bot protection called Gandalf. I wrote a little script that automatically replaces its background with the gandalf nod gif using a data url...that was totally worth the time!
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Ah yes, the mystical art of `sed`—where typing gibberish suddenly makes you feel like the Gandalf of text files. 🧙♂️✨ Because who doesn't want to spend their time whispering sweet nothings to a language from the 70s, right? 😜📜
https://julienlargetpiet.tech/articles/sed-a-powerfull-mini-language-from-the-70s.html #sed #wizardry #textfiles #programming #humor #retrotech #HackerNews #ngated -
Our heir and general, Rocco Rex, takes on his biggest role yet: Gandalf fighting the Balrog!
Requested by our friend and fellow streamer Serefiina (go check her out!), we’ll be tackling this mighty prompt together.🧙 Will 3 hours be enough to capture the drama and glory?
Come find out! ✨https://twitch.tv/imperorthefirst
#ArtStream #TwitchArt #digitalart #newartist #beginnerart #twitch #stream
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Hevensday 25 Afteryule 7490
on this day in history:
Gandalf casts down the Balrog, and passes away.
His body lies on the peak of Zirakzigil, 1419.
