But What Does That Mean?

    I left Tuesday’s class feeling quite stuck. Mind scrambled from a multitude of word paths, I looked to my notes to find a similar landscape. Thought after thought regarding the Ainur and their status of being, but no conclusion about what, to put it bluntly, is going on with them. While writing this reflection, I thought about what started this process, which was our human tendency to understand and prescribe meaning to everything, even when it is not there. Let me first make clear that I do not think “lack of meaning” is the reason the Ainur, and many other aspects of the LOTR universe, do not fit perfectly into theology. I do not think we are digging at nothing, even though that might be an easier conclusion to land on (and one I was tempted towards when reading Tolkien's Letter 153 to Peter Hastings). What I hope to accomplish in this post is an analysis of metaphor and allegory so as to have a frame to assist in confronting Tolkien's own allegory.

    What first drove me to this question of metaphor was Dorothy Sayers’s thinking in The Mind of the Maker, surrounding the need for metaphor in human language. Sayers explains that the only means we have to explain things is “in terms of other things” (Sayers 23). Drawing upon things, however, creates a complication as not everything perfectly matches what it is being used to describe. We struggled with this idea during class as we attempted to classify the Ainur as angels. From the power of creation to intelligence, we were always blocked from stating certainly that “yes, the Ainur are angels.” But does this make the comparison so unusable that we must dismiss it? Sayers confronts a similar problem, noting the grievances people take with explaining God in earthly terms, such as Maker or Father: “To complain that man measures God by his experience is a waste of time; man measures everything by his own experience; he has no other yardstick” (24). I take this as permission to continue with the use of our imperfect angel allegory because its flaws do not render it useless. We can still build off of our fuller understanding of angels in order to understand the new concept of Ainur. In this case, it feels okay to run with imperfection through a lack of clarity/depth. But what about when imperfection seems to come through contradiction? I think specifically of Tolkien's Letter 156, a draft to Robert Murrays, where he explicitly calls Gandalf an angel (Tolkien 298). Well… we certainly know Gandalf is not an Ainur, so does this void our classification of Ainur with angels? It may feel like these two beings would have to be mutually exclusive, but this may not have to be the case. Sayers confronts a similar issue and explains that the components “of the world of imagination increase by a continuous and irreversible process, without any destruction or rearrangement of what went before” (29). This quote pertains to the example that Shakespeare did not have to destroy one work in order to create another, but I feel it can be applied to help remedy Tolkien's habit of contradictions. One explanation for allegory or writing choice does not mean the other is untrue; it just means that we have more information to clarify each statement with.

    While getting lost in Tolkien's cryptic descriptions during class, my mind drifted to another text featuring allegory and sometimes explanation. Of course, I am thinking of the Gospels, specifically the Synoptics, as John chooses not to call his allegorical tales parables, and he lacks the story that I want to bring into this conversation. In the Synoptics, the disciples ask Jesus why He speaks in confusing parables to the crowds but reserves the explanations for those close to Him. Quoting Mark, Jesus answers that He does this so that “they may be ever seeing but never perceiving, and ever hearing but never understanding; otherwise they might turn and be forgiven!” (NIV Mark 4:12). Jesus speaks of those who have hardened their hearts to God, not wanting them to seek forgiveness only after listening to Jesus. An undoubtedly confusing moment in which it appears that Jesus is withholding forgiveness from a certain group of people. I would like to begin with a focus on the first half of the quote, in which Jesus explains his motive in these parables is to create a lack of understanding for his listeners. It seems that something similar is happening in LOTR as Tolkien walks us down a road of allegory, yet no explanation. We must press further into his writings to discover an answer, and even then, we do not emerge with a clear interpretation. Is Tolkien trying to treat us like these sinners with hardened hearts? I think our initial motivation to discover the truth proves this is not the case. But what is?

    Explaining Beren and Thingol’s desire for the Silmaril, Shippey concludes this section of Chapter Seven by stating that “words overpower intentions. In any case, intentions are not always known to the intenders. This is the sense of ‘doom’ which Tolkien strives to create from oaths and curses and bargains, and from the interweaving of the fates of objects, people, and kingdoms” (Shippey 270). In such interweaving of words, it may be that Tolkien's intentions have been confused and crossed to the point of invisibility, or at least they are quite foggy. What this does not mean is that there is nothing to be found or that Tolkien meant to bar our understanding. Intentional or not, it is up to us to clear this fog and grasp what we can of the allegory so as to most fully understand what Tolkien has given to us.

—AHW