"Tears Unnumbered Ye Shall Shed”: Subcreation, Free Will, the Fall, and Grief

At its core, the stories in The Silmarillion are Tolkien’s exploration of a prideful “desire to make things” (Shippey 273) through subcreation, free will, and the fall. Tolkien all but confirms this at the end of Letter 153, where he wrote:

“I might say that in my myth I have used ‘subcreation’ in a special way … to make visible and physical the effects of Sin or misused Free Will by men. Free Will is derivative, and is [therefore] only operative within provided circumstances; but in order that it may exist, it is necessary that the Author should guarantee it, whatever it betides … He gave special ‘sub-creative’ powers to certain of His highest created beings … Of course within limits, and of course subject to certain commands or prohibitions.” (Letters, pg. 290).

Beyond confirming the motivation behind the stories in The Silmarillion, this quote hints at what I believe to be the core theme of this part of The Silmarillion: the possibility for subcreation to become sin as a result of free will. Tolkien elucidates this most clearly as he discusses the Valar and Fëanor. Many of the Valar, alone or with others, engage in distinct acts of subcreation throughout The Silmarillion (putting aside the fact that all participated in the Ainulindalë). Varda forges of the stars (both generally and specifically just before the awakening of the Elves. Yavanna subcreates the trees, beasts, the Ents and the Eagles (with Manwë, and with the Ents, Eru’s sanction), and the Two Trees (with Nienna). Aulë subcreates the many ores of Arda, the Two Lamps (with Varda) and the Dwarves (with Eru’s retroactive sanction). Together, the Valar fashion Valinor, the Pélori Mountains, and the city of Valimar after Melkor’s attack on Almaren. Melkor subcreates the Orcs, Wolves, Trolls, and Dragons. After Arda is made physical, Melkor and the rest of the Valar subcreate at cross purposes as they try to shape Arda into their respective desired forms. Fëanor, of course, subcreates the Silmarils and many things besides. This propensity for subcreation in and of itself shows its importance in Tolkien’s world.

However, three specific episodes of subcreation stand out from the rest: Aulë’s subcreation of the Dwarves, Fëanor’s subcreation of the Silmarils, and Melkor’s subcreation of the Orcs, as they delineate when, to Tolkien, a subcreative fall can occur. Aulë attempts to create (not subcreate) the Dwarves because he is impatient for the coming of the Children of Ilúvatar, and wants students to teach his crafts. After Aulë makes them, however, Ilúvatar reminds him that he cannot create independent life with its own free will; the Dwarves would live only when Aulë thought of them and otherwise be idle. From this, we can glean two ways in which subcreation can be criminal: if the subcreator attempts to usurp the role of the Creator, and/or if the subcreator creates beings but does not give them free will (either through coercion or lack of power to do so). Melkor’s “creation” of the Orcs by corrupting Avari Elves is similar to Aulë’s in both of those aspects (though Melkor denies the Orcs their existing free will as corrupted Elves, while Aulë is unable to give the Dwarves free will as he lacks the ability). Both let their “pride of making” drive them to intentional criminality. However, they differ in one critical respect: intention. Melkor subcreates the Orcs out of a desire for power and to dominate Middle-earth. Aulë, meanwhile, subcreated the Dwarves out of a desire to spread his arts; he explicitly tells Ilúvatar when confronted that he “did not desire … lordship” over the Dwarves (The Silmarillion 43). This, I think, is why Aulë can be redeemed while Melkor cannot: he had good intentions even though he did a bad thing. This lines up with Letter 153, where Tolkien says that “things [are] not necessarily evil, but … the nature and motives of the … masters” (Letters, pg. 284). So, it is intention that can make a redeemable action irredeemable, consigning the doer to a subcreative fall

In Fëanor, Tolkien exemplifies subcreative fall: he begins with the intentions of Aulë, but gradually becomes more and more akin to Melkor (through Melkor’s corruption), showing that even well-intentioned subcreators can fall. Young Fëanor is described as “work[ing] with delight, foreseeing no end to [his] labours,” showing he takes joy in his work, just as Aulë does (The Silmarillion 65). However, there are also seeds of “Melkor-intention” in Fëanor: he desired to “master minds” rather than to “understand” them, and was only restrained from doing so, from seeking domination rather than art, by his wife, Nerdanel (The Silmarillion 64). Melkor, as he seeks to sow distrust between the Valar and the Noldor, explicitly seeks to play on this trait (The Silmarillion 68). As a result of Melkor’s rumors, that seed of “Melkor-intention” starts to grow. Fëanor becomes increasingly prideful and possessive of the Silmarils: he wears them only at “great feasts” and keeps them locked away under guard at all other times (The Silmarillion 69). He permits only his father and sons to see them, depriving the rest of Valinor of their beauty. He forgets “that the light within them was not his own” – elevating himself from subcreator to Creator (The Silmarillion 69). The most important aspect of Melkor’s corruption, however, is that he tells the Noldor of weapons, and they begin forging “swords and axes and spears” (The Silmarillion 69). By introducing weapons to the Noldor, Melkor turns their subcreation from art into weapons of war and power. Noldorin subcreation then becomes fully Melkorian. Melkor causes a subcreative fall that precedes, and itself causes the actual fall of the Noldor: without swords, Fëanor could not have been exiled for threatening Fingolfin, and then everything plays out differently. Additionally, without swords, the Kinslaying of Alqualondë would not have happened. This is significant, as the Kinslaying is what caused the fall of the Noldor (not their departure from Valinor): Maglor calls his lament of Alqualondë “the Fall of the Noldor” (The Silmarillion 87). 

The Kinslaying at Alqualondë by Ted Nasmith

Of all the episodes of subcreation thus far in The Silmarillion, the only two in which this desire for power was present are Melkor’s and Fëanor’s. In every other episode, the subcreation is driven by desire for art or to protect others. In those episodes, none of the subcreators loses any of their power as a result of their subcreation. However, Fëanor and Melkor, who have experienced a subcreative fall, do. Included in the Prophecy of the North is the provision that: 

“those that endure in Middle-earth … shall grow weary of the world with a great burden, and shall wane, and become as shadows of regret before the younger race that cometh after” (The Silmarillion 88). 

The fulfillment of this Prophecy occurs just as predicted in The Lord of the Rings, when the Dominion of the Elves ends, the Elves either go West or fade into the forests, and the Dominion of Men begins. Similarly, of Melkor, we are told that: 

“as he grew in malice, and sent forth from himself the evil that he conceived in lies and creatures of wickedness, his might passed into them and was dispersed, and he himself became ever more bound to the earth” (The Silmarillion 101). 

As a result, it seems like there are consequences to a subcreative fall. Such a fall necessitates turning from art to power. It is therefore fitting that the consequence of a subcreative fall is the loss of power: what the doer sought, they lose. The sense I get, especially from the description of Melkor’s diminishment, is that this occurs because power requires coercion. Varda subcreates the stars, sets them in motion, and lets them be. Melkor, however, seeks to pervert Arda to his will specifically. So, he constantly has to expend his power keeping what he has already corrupted in its unnatural state. 

As Tolkien said in Letter 153, these subcreative falls can only happen because Ilúvatar has instituted free will, and “guarantee[s] it, whatever it betides” (Letters, pg. 290). These subcreative falls result in significant grief and suffering. However, as we know from the Ainulindalë, everything that occurs in Eä serves to increase its beauty. But how can grief be positive? Tolkien answers this question through the Vala Nienna, whose sole province is grief. Nienna mourns “every wound that Arda has suffered in the marring of Melkor,” but she does not “weep for herself” (The Silmarillion 28). Rather, her weeping, her grief is transformative: “those who hearken to her learn pity, and endurance in hope” and “she brings strength to the spirit and turns sorrow to wisdom” to those in Mandos (The Silmarillion 28). Nienna, then, transmutes suffering into wisdom, hope, and pity, all positive qualities. Nienna is counted among the Aratar, the High Ones of Arda, so Tolkien clearly felt that her role of grief-transmutation was essential. This is supported by the pivotal role Nienna plays at times. First, she weeps on Ezellohar before Yavanna’s subcreation of the Two Trees (The Silmarillion 38). Nienna’s grief-borne wisdom is thus made prerequisite to the reestablishment of light and the beginning of the Count of Time in Arda. Second, her tears wash away the stain of Ungoliant (The Silmarillion 79) from Ezellohar.  Meanwhile, Ungoliant’s Unlight was able to overcome Tulkas’s strength and Manwë’s sight. Nienna is therefore extremely powerful.

The sole named recipient of Nienna’s grief-borne wisdom we have is the Maia Olórin, whose “ways took him often to the house of Nienna,” where he learned “pity and patience” (The Silmarillion 31). Uncoincidentally, he is the “wisest of the Maiar” (The Silmarillion 30). Olórin, of course, is Gandalf. In Middle-earth, Olórin “was the friend of all the Children of Ilúvatar, and took pity on their sorrows; and those who listened to him awoke from despair and put away the imaginations of darkness” (The Silmarillion 31). Gandalf, then, is to the people of Middle-earth what Nienna is to those in the Halls of Mandos. Perhaps that is why Tolkien remarked that Gandalf was the only one of the Istari to complete their mission. Through Nienna, then, and through Gandalf her trainee, the grief and suffering arising from free will can be turned towards ends of beauty, cleansing, and wisdom. And so the beauty of Eä is increased.

- WRM

Music as Creative Force

    The Ainulindalë is Tolkien’s creation myth, told by the Valar to the Elves, and passed down by men to our time, published posthumously in the Silmarillion. As Tolkien continuous to craft a mythology for his own time and people, contiguous with the mythology he knew and loved, the story naturally parallels exactly the creation myth of the Bible. Tolkien takes the existing narrative of how the world came into being, and presses it through the filter of his extrapolation of this same mythology, through the game of telephone of the Valar and the Elves, to present a new version of what is essentially the same myth found in Genesis. There are two striking points of departure (elaboration?) from the account in Genesis, and these are the concept of sub-creation and the use of music. Sub-creation is detailed in previous posts. The participation of the Ainur in creation is more prevalent in Tolkien’s account, though its roots can certainly be found in Job, or even arguably in Genesis, with God’s “let us create.” The participation of the Ainur also comes from medieval Christian mythology, in which angels are understood to have been created first, and to have participated in the act of creation. The creation of the angels is also detailed in the book of Jubilees. The use of music strikes me in a particularly profound way. The trajectory of my undergraduate career is focused on music: what it is, how it affects us, and why it is so important. Tolkien situates music in mythology with a profoundly significant role: it is the tool and method of creation itself

    When any novice reads any of Tolkien’s work, the use of music is immediately relevant. At times it is even tedious. In The Lord of The Rings, or even The Hobbit, one can find lines of verse supposedly set to a tune that stretch on sometimes for pages. It is obvious that Tolkien finds music to be significant. In readingThe Lord of The Rings, there are many oddities like this which are not what a reader might expect. The genius of Tolkien is such that each one is justified and explained in his greater mythology. The explanation for the importance of music in Tolkien’s ancient world, of course, is found in the Ainulindalë. Music, in Tolkien’s mythology, is the language and method of creation. This has huge significance for Tolkien’s world. If creation is riddled with music, or indeed if music is the very fabric of creation itself, then the presence of music throughout Tolkien’s work is the characters reaching into a primeval language that pervades all of creation. In a real sense the world is made up of music. In singing, the characters participate in the creation. This also mirrors the idea of Tolkien’s sub-creation. To make music is to participate in creation in a significant way. It represents the act of creation itself, and creates something real. In the same way that Tolkien sees his writing as creating something “real” in a meaningful sense, by participation in God’s own creation, when the characters create music they are participating in the creation of the Ainur and creating something “real” in their music.

    Tolkien’s creation myth is inspired by the Christian creation myth, but also by medieval Christian mythology, in particular the idea of the music of the spheres and medieval angelology. In the middle ages the idea that the universe was one big instrument was very popular. The notion of the circular and rhythmic motion of the planets naturally led to the popular idea that the universe produced a music that could not be identified, but if all else was silent would be easily audible. This music was seen as an integral part of the world. It was the music of existence and of the universe. Thus the significance of music is drawn from the fact that all the world is an instrument and creates its own music, so the music is a participation in the vibration of the universe, and by extension of our souls. Essentially music is the resonant frequency of creation. It is obvious how Tolkien weaves this idea into his mythology, and this is the significant point of departure from the genesis account. Tolkien directly says that all of creation is a song, or a “theme” as it says in his text: a theme created by Ilúvatar but participated in by the Ainur. If all of creation is simply a song, and this creation is a song, then it makes sense that creation would continue to ring with this music. Beautiful music is in harmony with this “music of the spheres”, and there is music, such as the music of Melkor, which is not in harmony with this music. 

    Music is undoubtably a hugely powerful force, even today. Tolkien, in the Anulindalë, provides a fascinating explanation for why this is, in situating music is as the form and fabric of creation. But Tolkien is not inventing this idea, drawing the concepts from scripture, faith, and medieval mythology. But the real incredible work of Tolkien is in his synthesis, creating a new interpretation of existing material that is contiguous, consistent, and self contained, lining up seamlessly with existing mythology while also adding new depth. Tolkien’s work of a mythology for England is accomplished in his modern yet ancient interpretation of existing mythology. Even more significantly, he expands on mythology, weaving antiquated Christian thought into his own mythology. Tolkien’s creation and writing is a deep understanding of existing thought and mythology, in a true sense creating something very real out of what already exists, describing how he invented nothing, but received everything and only had to write what already existed.

—CO

The Discord of Creation

            Towards the end of Thursday’s lecture, we were given some audio examples of the Music of Creation and the music of Melkor. While I do have a fondness for two of the Creation pieces we listened to — Jupiter being something I played back in high school and Ma Vlast being one of my personal favorite Romantic era pieces — I gravitated towards Melkor’s music more. Perhaps it is because I am, in fact, a metalhead, and metal is one of my favorite genres of music; I thought “Into the Storm” is a good song, with good instrumentation. In my mind, I did not really understand why it would be considered an example of the Music of Melkor, as “Into the Storm” was not the discord-filled piece of music I would expect the Music of Discord to be. 

            So this got me thinking about what really is Melkor’s music, and is it really as disharmonious as it is presented? Surely there is one clear answer, for Tolkien writes it in The Silmarillion: 

“Some of these thoughts he now wove into his music, and straightway discord arose about him, and many that sang nigh him grew despondent, and their thought was disturbed and their music faltered; but some began to attune their music to his rather than to the thought which they had at first. Then the discord of Melkor spread ever wider, and the melodies which had been heard before foundered in a sea of turbulent sound” (16).

The Music of Melkor is discord. It is discordant, unharmonious yet has a strange power over the other Ainur, to the point where they join in in singing Melkor’s music. It is persuasive, much like the serpent to Adam and Eve when they ate the apple in the Garden of Eden. It is different from the Music of The One, as the thoughts that make up Melkor’s music were as a result of Melkor thinking differently than Ilúvatar’s song. It is the antithesis of The Song of Creation, where creation is the elves and men, the rivers and the greenery and all that is good in the form of a pleasant melody sung by all of the Ainur. We can, with very reasonable judgement, say that the music of the Ainur is much more akin to sacred music than not. After all, Tolkien, in a letter to his son, remarks upon the well of which the fidelis are supposed to draw “nourishment” from, the story which all other stories come from. If there is no Genesis, then there is no rest of anything, really. 

            The story of Genesis has much importance in the mind of Tolkien, that is certain. But why does the music sound the way it does? Why does Melkor’s music sound the way it does?

            I am of the belief that there is some degree of bias in this point of view, for Tolkien expressed his fondness for Genesis and his disdain for the “modern” music of when this letter was written (1945). He tells his son that “I read eagerly all the details of your life, and the things you see and do — and suffer, Jive and Boogie-Woogie among them. You will have no heart-tug at losing that (for it is essentially vulgar, music corrupted by the mechanism, echoing in dreary unnourished heads)...” using the concept of brain nourishment that was introduced earlier. To me, the concept of “Boogie-Woogie” being “vulgar” was odd, as I see it more as music that the older generations look towards as music that is pure and uncorrupted while they push that rock and other harder forms of music, much like “Into the Storm”, is vulgar and the antithesis of all that is holy. In other words, what the music of Melkor is is derived from the person who is making the judgment. For Tolkien, the music of discord seemed to be more akin to the loud and fast melody of big-band jive and the boogie-woogie bugle boy. If anything, the concept of Jive being hailed on the same level of vulgarity and discord as the Music of Melkor feels more akin to the satanic panic of the 80s, where the older generation viewed Twisted Sister and Motley Crue as what I can deem as “Melkorian” — it was loud, brash, fast, and unlike anything before it, hymns and jive and all.

The Music of Creation for Tolkien is derived from his love of the Book of Genesis and an appreciation of classical music, for he writes in the Silmarillion,  “Then the voices of the Ainur, like unto harps and lutes, and pipes and trumpets, and viols and organs, and like onto countless choirs singing with words, began to fashion the theme of Ilúvatar to a great music…”, a combination of instruments usually used in more classical arrangements. Brass is used in a melodic way in The Planets while they are used in a seemingly disjointed and even crazy way in Jive. Harps, lutes, organs, and viols are connected to religious music and hymns sung during mass. This is no mere accident, as describing the music more akin to the hymns of the Bible emphasizes the holy nature of this music. Paired with the similarities between the Ainulindae with both the books of Genesis and Jubilees, it cannot be denied that there is Catholic musical influence as well as classical music influence in the Music of the Ainur. It is beautiful, do not get me wrong, and it does feel appropriate for music of the Gods. However, the vague nature of the Music of Melkor does indeed leave some room for question. For Tolkien it would have most likely been the music of which he speaks of to his son, the popular music of the time if you will. In class on Thursday it was power metal, and to some of my classmates it would be the “sounds” of Lou Reed. 

And yet, I find myself enjoying the music of Melkar more. I find myself more drawn to thrashing, layered guitars and groovy basslines and sharp drums — think Metallica, Megadeth, Slayer… the list goes on and on. Even now as I am writing this I have Stone Temple Pilot’s Core blaring in my headphones. It may be that my head is “unourished”, too cut off from the well of knowledge and creation and corrupted by the vulgarity of rock n’ roll. However, I find a rhythm, a beat, harmonies and melodies. Even a song that I would consider “Music of Melkor” in the sense of disharmony and lyrics, Megadeth’s “The Skull Beneath The Skin”, is a personal favorite of mine due to the way it sounds. It is discord making its way into harmonies, something that, while seen as the antithesis of creation, itself is a creation of something that is appealing to my unnourished mind. I like discord in my music, but that does not lead me to turn towards evil. To me it is the music that drives my creations like my writing and even this assignment. While the music can lead to the misery, in my eyes the discord is discord only to those who judge it so. 

 

-NPM

(Also, Melkor’s Music to me is more akin to Lou Reed, like most of my classmates have said.)

Whose Mythology Is This?

Tolkien's account of creation opens with the Ainulindalë, the Elves' telling of how the world was sung into being. The passage that describes this moment reads: 

Then the voices of the Ainur, like unto harps and lutes, and pipes and trumpets, and viols and organs, and like unto countless choirs singing with words, began to fashion the theme of Ilúvatar to a great music; and a sound arose of endless interchanging melodies woven in harmony that passed beyond hearing into the depths and into the heights, and the places of the dwelling of Ilúvatar were filled to overflowing, and the music and the echo of the music went out into the Void, and it was not void. (Tolkien, The Silmarillion, ed. Christopher Tolkien [Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2014], 15)

What stopped me in this passage is the final clause: and it was not void. The Void is, by definition, empty. And yet. What the Ainulindalë does in that final clause is let us see, for a moment, that Tolkien’s work as a philologist and his work as a myth-maker are part of the same story. Read against Tolkien’s philological work, the Ainulindalë stops being a work of fiction and starts looking like scripture. 

The surprise, when you read the biblical texts alongside the Ainulindalë, is how much Tolkien didn’t have to invent. In Job 38:4-7, God answers Job out of the storm with a series of rhetorical questions about creation, one of which slips in a strange detail: 

⁴ “Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation?
    Tell me, if you understand.
⁵ Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know!
    Who stretched a measuring line across it?
⁶ On what were its footings set,
    or who laid its cornerstone—
⁷ while the morning stars sang together
    and all the angels [NIV note: Hebrew the sons of God] shouted for joy? (Job 38:4-7 NIV)

            The morning stars singing, the sons of God shouting for joy—Tolkien’s Ainur are already here, in embryo. The difference is structural: in Job the angels sing while God creates; in the Ainulindalë, the Ainur sing, and the singing is the creation itself. That difference matters: in Job the angels are witnesses to a creation they do not make, while in the Ainulindalë the Ainur are sub-creators whose song is the thing itself. This is Tolkien’s own word, ‘sub-creation’, and he means it theologically: to make is to participate in the Maker’s making. And Job is the generous account here; the other accounts say less, not more. 

            Genesis is the starkest example. The opening verses gives us creation in its quietest form; there is no music and no chorus—only God’s voice: 

¹ In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. ² Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.

³ And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. ⁴ God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. ⁵ God called the light “day,” and the darkness he called “night.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day. (Genesis 1:1-5 NIV)

There are no singers here. No morning stars, no sons of God, no chorus, only the voice of God moving over the deep. And yet the tradition knows they were there. Job tells us the morning stars were singing; other texts, such as Jubilees, fill in what Genesis leaves out. What Tolkien does in the Ainulindalë is put everything in one place. The scattered tradition: Genesis's formless deep, Job's singing stars, Jubilees's angelic orders, is gathered into a single account. This is what compilers and commentators have always done: gather the scattered fragments of scripture into a single telling. Tolkien is doing the same work, in the same register. And this move is not only something Tolkien does at cosmogonic scale. He does it with single words, single names, single lines of Old English poetry.

The clearest example is Eärendil. The name comes from a single line in Crist I, an Old English religious poem Tolkien read as an undergraduate at Oxford: 

Eala Earendel engla beorhtast ofer middangeard monnum sended

[“Hail Earendel, brightest of angels, / sent to men over Middle-earth.”]

(Crist I, lines 104-5)

From this one line, Tolkien grew his entire mythology. Tolkien took the word and imagined. What makes his move scholarly genius is in the transformation of Earendel into Eärendil. To scholars of Old English, the meaning was unimportant; to Tolkien it was the beginning. Tolkien created a half-elven hero sailing the heavens carrying a Silmaril, who becomes the Morning Star, Venus. This is the work of a philologist at the highest level, taking the inherited tradition of Old English poems and scripture, understanding and iterating upon them, to create a mythology that is our own. The work Tolkien does to create the story of Eärendil is of the same type he does to tell the story of creation in Ainulindalë. Tolkien draws upon the writing itself. Look to the Ainulindalë passage we started with, which features four clauses beginning with ‘and’, piling up like the verses of Genesis 1. These stylistic features create a new story that immerses the reader in totality. From this, his work stops being fiction and starts looking like scripture. The understanding of “Whose mythology is this?” is shaped to really be our own as we travel deeper into Faerie.

-       BN 

Sub-Creation or Idolatry?

You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below.  (Exodus 20:4)

The true intent of the Second Commandment goes beyond the literal prohibition of images. Images in themselves are not fundamentally forbidden (otherwise, all of Christendom would have been nations without visual art -  despite earlier assumptions about Jewish aniconism, which has now been proved inaccurate); rather, what is strictly prohibited is for a man-made image to substitute for God and become the object of worship - that is, idolatry. Christianity as a monotheistic religion, affirms Yahweh the one and only true God. In either political or theological pan, idolatry carries a sense of infidelity: it is the defection into polytheistic paganism and the fabrication of false gods. Either way, idolatry is an intolerable transgression within Christian doctrine. 

As a devout Catholic, Tolkien could not have been unaware of the Second Commandment - how, then, did he understand and put it into practice himself?

In Letter 131, Tolkien clearly expressed his deep passion for myth and his grief that his own country had no stories that bound up with its own language and soil. In his envision,“myth” is supposed to be something relatively self-standing and independent from “religion” (specifically Christianity in this context). For this reason, he did not approve the Arthurian legend as an English mythology, for its explicit involvement in Christian religion.

To remedy this poverty, Tolkien set out to “create” a native English mythology (apologize for using the word “create”. Tolkien might not like it; for Tolkien, Middle-earth is less an invention than a kind of recollection of a lost world—Númenor, after all, is truly real). The opening chapter of The Silmarillion, the Ainulindalë, recounts how Eru, the One—also known as Ilúvatar—brought the cosmos (Eä) into being through the Great Music. Within the corpus of Middle-earth writings, this chapter holds a position roughly analogous to that of Genesis within the Biblical tradition. It appears almost as a self-contained cosmology, a kind of parallel universe that stands alongside, and at times seemingly apart from, the Christian world.

Ilúvatar—isn’t he a “false god” openly forged by Tolkien? He appropriates the title of “the One,” seemingly displacing God as Creator, even echoing biblical language—“Let these things Be!”alongside “Let there be light”. One might argue that no one would really believe in Ilúvatar in the same way they believe in God; yet historically, those who venerated icons at the altar did not think of themselves as worshipping idols either. To a certain extent, strictly speaking, Tolkien’s very act of writing appears to carry the risk of transgressing the Second Commandment—of substituting a man-made figure in place of the divine.

Nevertheless, it is clear that Tolkien himself believed that God permits and even encourages His people, while remaining faithful to Him, to create and cherish other mythic figures; legend-makers are not necessarily idolatros. This point can be further illustrated through a detail in the Ainulindalë: 

“Now the Valar took to themselves shape and hue; and because they were drawn into the World by love of the Children of Ilúvatar, for whom they hoped, they took shape after that manner which they had beheld in the Vision of Ilúvatar, save only in majesty and splendour. (Tolkien, The Silmarillion, “Ainulindalë”)

This excerpt forms an antithesis to Genesis 1:27—“God created mankind in his own image” (personally, I take it as a parallel device Tolkien employed in purpose). In Genesis, Man is the mirror-image of God, the self-portrait of the Creator; whereas in Ainulindalë, the formless Valar were incarnated in the manner of Man: the divine, in turn, becomes the mirror-image of Man.

Although the text does not explicitly state whether mankind was created in Ilúvatar’s own image, it nonetheless implies a more complex dynamic: Man is not merely a passive bearer of divine likeness, but also an active participant in shaping how the divine is perceived through visible forms. The relationship between Creator and Creation is therefore far more intricate than it first appears, and far more worthy of reflection than a unilateral model of resemblance.

The metaphor of “self-portrait” I used above is quite dubious upon closer examination. When we describe Man as God’s self-portrait, we are in fact reducing ourselves - animate beings - to inanimate objects. The fundamental difference between God the Creator and human craftsman lies precisely in the fact that the Creator can bring forth life, while man-made idols are nothing more than lifeless, immovable wood and gold, “having eyes but cannot see, having ears but cannot hear.” Regarding ourselves as merely an inanimate artwork of God is therefore a profanation of His creative power. 

When the Creator’s Creation is not a lifeless object but a multitude of living beings, the relationship between the two can no longer be taken as a simple hierarchy of subordination. On the one hand, the Creator gives form and life to his Creation; on the other, the Creator also relies on his Creation’s recognition and faith to establish his image and authority. It is not only Man that relies on faith in God, but God also, in a sense, depends on Man’s faith. Created in the image of God, Man is given the divine responsibility for completing Creation. 

Tolkien approached this divine duty through what he called “sub-creation.” According to him, the truly faithful shall not merely “worship the great Artifact,” but rather realize his or her potential as a “sub-creator”, a “legend-maker” (Mythopoeia). Beyond obedience and reverence lies a higher state of devotion, “sub-creation.” It entails an active engagement with, reflection upon, and even questioning of the Truth (when needed) that God represents. 

Tolkien’s Ainulindalë was by no means composed to replace Genesis—how, then, could Eru Ilúvatar be an man-made idol who challenges, or even displaces God? Rather, Ainulindalë serves as a likeness of Genesis - a likeness of Truth that channels the terrestrial with the divine, guiding Man toward the Truth. 

It’s worth noting that this is not an original interpretation and practice of the Second Commandment unique to Tolkien. Both waves of Byzantine Iconoclasm ended in the victory of the iconophiles. In their defense of icons, John of Damascus argues that “since our analogies are not capable of raising us immediately to intellectual contemplation, we need familiar and natural points of reference.” (John of Damascus, 26) God’s revelation would not spontaneously descend from above to those who wait passively, but must be acquired through active engagement in a dialogue with the divine. The image—as a likeness of the archetype—is a reflection of the divine and a vessel of God’s revelation.

The “image,” in a narrow sense, refers to the icons placed in churches (the icon of Christ). Yet in a broader sense, it encompasses any form of interaction between the faithful and God: Job’s questioning of God when confronting unexplained suffering, or Tolkien’s own act of writing as a form of “retrospection” of the Creation in Genesis. The image does not lead the believer astray from faith, as the iconoclasts feared; rather, it grounds a more genuine understanding of, and more intimate relationship with, God. After all, how could true faith possibly fear the believer’s reflection upon it?

-YC

Work Cited:

Tolkien, J. R. R. The Silmarillion. Edited by Christopher Tolkien, Houghton Mifflin, 2001. ISBN 978-0-544-33801-2.

Tolkien, J. R. R. The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien: A Selection. Edited by Humphrey Carpenter and Christopher Tolkien, Houghton Mifflin, 1981.

Tolkien, J. R. R. The Silmarillion. Edited by Christopher Tolkien, Houghton Mifflin, 2001. ISBN 978-0-544-33801-2.

The Holy Bible: Genesis. New Revised Standard Version, Oxford University Press, 1989.

The Holy Bible: Exodus. New Revised Standard Version, Oxford University Press, 1989.

Tolkien, J. R. R. “Mythopoeia.” In Tree and Leaf, HarperCollins, 2001.

John of Damascus. Three Treatises on the Divine Images. Translated by Andrew Louth, St Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2003.