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Clashing Perspectives of World Order in JRR Tolkien's Middle-Earth

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Clashing Perspectives of World Order in JRR Tolkien's Middle-Earth ABSTRACT Fate, Providence, and Free Will: Clashing Perspectives of World Order in J. R. R. Tolkien’s Middle-earth Helen Theresa Lasseter Mentor: Ralph C. Wood, Ph.D. Through the medium of a fictional world, Tolkien returns his modern audience to the ancient yet extremely relevant conflict between fate, providence, and the person’s freedom before them. Tolkien’s expression of a providential world order to Middle-earth incorporates the Northern Germanic cultures’ literary depiction of a fated world, while also reflecting the Anglo-Saxon poets’ insight that a single concept, wyrd, could signify both fate and providence. This dissertation asserts that Tolkien, while acknowledging as correct the Northern Germanic conception of humanity’s final powerlessness before the greater strength of wyrd as fate, uses the person’s ultimate weakness before wyrd as the means for the vindication of providence. Tolkien’s unique presentation of world order pays tribute to the pagan view of fate while transforming it into a Catholic understanding of providence. The first section of the dissertation shows how the conflict between fate and providence in The Silmarillion results from the elvish narrator’s perspective on temporal events. Chapter One examines the friction between fate and free will within The Silmarillion and within Tolkien’s Northern sources, specifically the Norse Eddas, the Anglo-Saxon Beowulf, and the Finnish The Kalevala. Chapter Two shows that Tolkien, following Boethius’s Consolation of Philosophy, presents Middle-earth’s providential order as including fated elements but still allowing for human freedom. The second section shows how The Lord of the Rings reflects but resolves the conflict in The Silmarillion between fate, providence, and free will. Chapter Three explores the extent to which a person can respond before powers of fate, such as the Ring and also deterministic circumstances. The final chapter argues that providence upholds the importance of every person by cooperating with his or her free will, not coercing it; however, providence reveals its authority over all things, including fate, by working through the person’s final failure before fatalistic powers. Copyright © 2006 Helen Theresa Lasseter All rights reserved TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS iv DEDICATION vii EPIGRAPH viii 1. CHAPTER ONE: Introduction 1 2. CHAPTER TWO: Tension Between Fate and Free Will in The Silmarillion Introduction 21 3. CHAPTER THREE: Interpreting the Roles of Providence and the Person in The Silmarillion 69 4. CHAPTER FOUR: Free Will’s Response to Fate in The Lord of the Rings Introduction 110 5. CHAPTER FIVE: Providence and the Person in The Lord of the Rings Introduction 164 6. CHAPTER SIX: Conclusion Failure and Eucatastrophe as the Providential Design 213 WORKS CITED 224 iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS When I first began the doctoral program at Baylor University, I had no idea that seven years later I would have written a dissertation on J. R. R. Tolkien. Nor did I know seven years ago that I would meet so many good mentors and friends, people providentially brought into my life, people I have come to respect and love, people I would like now to thank sincerely. First, I would like to acknowledge my gratitude and debt to my director, Ralph Wood, who through the writing of his own book, The Gospel According to Tolkien, first helped me to see that I could write a dissertation on Tolkien. My thanks to him for working with me over the past few years to bring it to a completion. The dissertation is stronger because of his editorial guidance. I am also grateful to Jeannette Denton for her assistance as my second reader, particularly when my dissertation had more of the Northern Germanic focus to it than its final version turned out to have. I appreciate Thomas Hibbs’s work in serving as my third reader. I am indebted to David Lyle Jeffrey for his interest in and advice towards my work, as well as for guiding me in the ways of “scriptural literacy.” Working as an editor at Baylor Press, I repeatedly saw that our authors acknowledged the assistance of Carey Newman, the Press director, in helping them find the essence of their idea and its applicability to a reader. I now join the ranks of many in expressing my gratitude to Carey for his direction and encouragement. iv My gratitude and appreciation also goes to the members of the 2004 Lilly Fellows Program, “Tolkien and the Virtues”: Phil Donnelly, Scott Moore, Susan Colon, Peter Candler, Mike Thomas, Germaine Walsh, Joe Tadie, and Charles Bressler. Our conversations during that seminar helped developed my thoughts on this dissertation. Particularly, my thanks go to Mike, Charles, and Germaine. Mike, thank you for your assistance with narratology and narrative theory and directing me to the work of Mieke Bal. Charles, thank you for your encouragement and the conversations we had regarding laughter and Tolkien. Germaine, thank you for your excellent feedback on the legendarium and for helping me better understand the elvish perspective on existent in The Silmarillion. Without the support of friends and family, any person engaged in such a long- term work would quickly abandon the effort. Tolkien points us to the importance of fellowship and community, and I am grateful to my small but strong one. Many thanks to Rob and Heather Miner and their children (Annie, Sebastian, Sophie, Emma, Maria, Louisa, and now Lily!): for your support, prayers, good humor, and solid advice—I am indebted and am most blessed by your friendship. Thanks to my adopted Texas family, the Vaverek-Baughman clan, who repeatedly opened their home to me as an oasis. Seana, thank you for reading and listening, even though you’re not a fan! Thanks, too, to my dear friend, Melissa Holm née Barry, whom I met my first year at Baylor, and who has remained a friend through the years. Thanks to Arōd for his continued protection of the Bree-folk. May they continue in blissful ignorance of your role in protecting them from the evil lurking on their border: “Day shall come again!” v My deep gratitude goes to Fr. Timothy Vaverek. This work reflects our discussions on Tolkien and providence, and echoes some of his homilies, too; I would not have been able to find full expression for the ideas but for his help. Thank you for your spiritual guidance and practical wisdom. The support and love of my family has been a constant always. Thanks to my brothers—John, William, Austin, and Benjamin; and to my sister, Kate, and my sisters- in-law, Janet, Beth, and Leticia. God hears the prayers of children; so I particularly thank my nieces and nephews—Helen, Edward, Teresa, Samuel, Margaret, Rollin, William, and Sarah. Jamais arriere! My deepest gratitude and love to my dear parents, Rollin and Ruth, for their help and support during the dissertation process, and particularly for encouraging me to complete it during adverse circumstances. Thank you for all that you have done for me, but above all, for raising me well and showing me from early on the beauty of truth, goodness, and love. vi For my parents, Rollin and Ruth, who gave me the Faith Fiat Voluntas Tua God has created me, To do Him some definite service. He has committed some work to me, Which He has not committed to another. I have my mission. I may never know it in this life, but I shall be told it in the next. I am a link in a chain, A bond of connections between persons. He has not created me for naught. I shall do good—I shall do His work, I shall be an angel of peace, A preacher of truth in my own place, while not intending it, If I do but keep his commandments. Therefore, I will trust him. Whatever I am, I can never be thrown away. He does nothing in vain. He knows what he is about. He may take away my friends. He may throw me among strangers. He may make me feel desolate, Make my spirits sink, Hide my future from me—still, He knows what he is about. — John Henry Cardinal Newman (1801–1890) CHAPTER ONE Introduction Amid the ruins of the First World War lay the nineteenth-century’s promise of Progressivism. Science and rationalism had replaced religious faith in providence for defining the course of world history; yet, in the wake of the War’s devastation, Progressivism faltered and a more ancient and perennial understanding of fate controlling human life reemerged in England. Most writers and thinkers came to believe that human efforts were ultimately meaningless and human beings inescapably subject to chaotic or mechanistic forces within a purposeless universe. The Christian concept of providence was not only something most nineteenth- and twentieth-century English writers and poets had already dismissed, but something that seemed absurd in the face of the War’s horrors. Yet amidst this growing resignation to fate within the artistic culture of England, J. R. R. Tolkien created a fictional world at the heart of which is a gracious deity with a providential design for the world. Tom Shippey names Tolkien the “Author of the Century” because Tolkien’s work confronts “the origin and nature of evil” (Author ix; cf. also Road 329). I would suggest that Tolkien addresses the nature of evil by examining a deeper question: what is the principle of order defining a world in which radical evil and suffering continue to flourish? The answer to this question is integral for understanding a person’s place in the world. Tolkien’s great contribution to the twentieth century was to answer the despair of materialism and determinism.
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