The source of Ring-powers

tonyGI wrote:
> You make some very good points. I had not considered that "empty
> longevity" may
> be separate from 'wraithification'.
>
> I wonder if one of the Eldar could face "empty longevity" if they tried
> to avoid Mandos
> (for all time)? Is there a point (in ME) when all must 'go' to be
> renewed ?
>
The Eldar do not face "empty longevity". They fade - quite
independently of Rings and Sauron.

We are told that fully faded Elves are normally permanently invisible
to mortals, and unable to have much effect on matter. They are actually
pretty similar to disembodied spirits of slain Elves, with some
lingering differences like being normally less hostile and also capable
of projecting a visible form when they wish.

One wonders how far normal Elven fading differs from wraithification of
Nazgul.
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In message
<news:1147449328.319113.140110@g10g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>
chornedsnorkack.DeleteThis@hushmail.com enriched us with:
>

<snip>

> The Eldar do not face "empty longevity". They fade - quite
> independently of Rings and Sauron.

Not that there is necessarily anything about the fading that would
exclude emptiness -- that it is longevity is certain: fading is not
equivalent to death, neither in the Elvish sense (unhousing of fëa
which is then summoned to Mandos from where it might be unhoused) or
the Mannish sense (still unhousing of fëa -- interrim stages
uncertain, but ultimately fëa leaving Arda/Eä).

In the case of fading, the fëa consumes the body, but is not
'unhoused' -- the fëa doesn't leave the body as such. Since, however,
the Elvish fëa was, so to speak, 'designed' to be immortal within
Arda[*], it is doubtfull that there would be the same sense of
stretching as that experienced by Bilbo (and probably by Gollum and
the Ringwraiths as well) -- at least as I've understood the
stretching, the problem is that the designated, or even fated, amount
of 'life' (meant as experiences, change, 'quality of life') is
stretched to fit a longer life, and as the period of life becomes
longer and longer, the life-quality becomes thinner and thinner. That
particular effect would, at least, not be perceivable by Elves, whose
designated life-quality was meant to last until the end of Arda (as a
habitable realm).

> We are told that fully faded Elves are normally permanently
> invisible to mortals, and unable to have much effect on matter.
> They are actually pretty similar to disembodied spirits of slain
> Elves, with some lingering differences like being normally less
> hostile and also capable of projecting a visible form when they
> wish.
>
> One wonders how far normal Elven fading differs from
> wraithification of Nazgul.

Yes, all this actually makes it sound very much like the state of the
wraiths, with the exceptions of the stretched 'content of life'[#]
and the absolute domination by Sauron.

The Ringwraiths, like Gollum, Bilbo and Frodo, however, still
retained a material body, which was just shifted into this 'wraith-
world'. The descriptions of Elvish fading, IIRC, deals with the
ultimate consumption of the body by the spirit, which sounds to me as
a slightly different situation, though I would be hard-pressed to
detail the difference since the spirit, when the Elf faded, wasn't
'unhoused' from the body (since that would have resulted in an
immediate summons to Mandos).

[*] I almost wrote that Elves were meant to be immortal within
/Time/, but I seem to recall something along the lines of 'Arda
as a habitable region' (paraphrasing). This made me wonder about
the relation between Time and the life of Arda -- did Tolkien
intend there to be some kind of Doomsday (the last chord of the
music) which would end both Arda and Time, or could Eä, and hence
Time, survive Arda as a habitable region?

[#] I'm still struggling to find an adequate phrase to cover this
concept.

--
Troels Forchhammer
Valid e-mail is <t.forch(a)email.dk>

The idea that time may vary from place to place is a
difficult one, but it is the idea Einstein used, and it is
correct - believe it or not.
- Richard Feynman
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Troels Forchhammer <Troels.RemoveThis@ThisIsFake.invalid> wrote:

<snip and rearrange>

> In the case of fading, the fëa consumes the body, but is not
> 'unhoused' -- the fëa doesn't leave the body as such. Since, however,
> the Elvish fëa was, so to speak, 'designed' to be immortal within
> Arda[*], it is doubtfull that there would be the same sense of
> stretching as that experienced by Bilbo (and probably by Gollum and
> the Ringwraiths as well)

[...]

> [*] I almost wrote that Elves were meant to be immortal within
> /Time/, but I seem to recall something along the lines of 'Arda
> as a habitable region' (paraphrasing). This made me wonder about
> the relation between Time and the life of Arda -- did Tolkien
> intend there to be some kind of Doomsday (the last chord of the
> music) which would end both Arda and Time, or could Eä, and hence
> Time, survive Arda as a habitable region?

This "within time" phrase reminds me of that Letter that Tolkien wrote
about Frodo finding peace within Time, or something:

"[Frodo] went both to a purgatory and to a reward, for a while: a period
of reflection and peace and a gaining of a truer understanding of his
position in littleness and greatness, spent still in Time amid the
natural beauty of 'Arda Unmarred', the Earth unspoiled by evil." (Letter
246, from the drafts of a letter to Mrs Eileen Elgar, dated September
1963)

This "spent still in Time", seems to be similar to the way you are using
"Time" to refer to the experience of enduring in Arda.

But concerning the end of Ea and Time (not sure if treating the end of
Arda separately is allowed - though that is interesting), I think that
anything that survives the end of Ea was truly immortal anyway, in the
sense of being an immortal soul. The immortality of the Elves was
different, being more about their ability to endure during Ea. This
would be different from both Elves and Men (and Dwarves) having immortal
souls, which I've always thought Tolkien, as a Catholic, would have
agreed they have. But maybe not.

> Yes, all this actually makes it sound very much like the state of the
> wraiths, with the exceptions of the stretched 'content of life'[#]
> and the absolute domination by Sauron.

[...]

> [#] I'm still struggling to find an adequate phrase to cover this
> concept.

In a bit I snipped, you said:

"...at least as I've understood the stretching, the problem is that the
designated, or even fated, amount of 'life' (meant as experiences,
change, 'quality of life') is stretched to fit a longer life, and as the
period of life becomes longer and longer, the life-quality becomes
thinner and thinner."

This seems to me to describe it perfectly. If you are looking for a
phrase to cover the "stretching", then I can think of nothing better
than Bilbo's turn of phrase here, talking to Gandalf:

"I feel all thin, sort of stretched, if you know what I mean: like
butter that has been scraped over too much bread." (A Long-expected
Party)

If on the other hand you are looking for a phrase to describe 'content
of life', I suspect that Tolkien might be talking about something like a
soul or spirit being stretched out. Other concepts might also be memory,
consciousness and mind. I've always thought of it as a mental
stretching, but I suppose you could also think of it as a stretching of
that spark of life, the Secret Fire. Talking in Tolkien's terms, I would
have said that the fëa is being stretched, but maybe it is the hroa? Or
maybe both?

Christopher

--
---
Reply clue: Saruman welcomes you to Spamgard

"Do you wonder at that, Ring-bearer? For you know the power of that
thing which is now destroyed; and all that was done by that power is
now passing away. But your kinsman possessed this thing longer than
you. He is ancient in years now, according to his kind; and he awaits
you, for he will not again make any long journey save one." - Arwen
speaking to Frodo about Bilbo (Many Partings, RotK)
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Troels Forchhammer wrote:
> In message
> <news:1147449328.319113.140110@g10g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>
> chornedsnorkack.RemoveThis@hushmail.com enriched us with:
> >
>
> <snip>
>
> > The Eldar do not face "empty longevity". They fade - quite
> > independently of Rings and Sauron.
>
> Not that there is necessarily anything about the fading that would
> exclude emptiness -- that it is longevity is certain: fading is not
> equivalent to death, neither in the Elvish sense (unhousing of fëa
> which is then summoned to Mandos from where it might be unhoused) or
> the Mannish sense (still unhousing of fëa -- interrim stages
> uncertain, but ultimately fëa leaving Arda/Eä).
>
> In the case of fading, the fëa consumes the body, but is not
> 'unhoused' -- the fëa doesn't leave the body as such. Since, however,
> the Elvish fëa was, so to speak, 'designed' to be immortal within
> Arda[*], it is doubtfull that there would be the same sense of
> stretching as that experienced by Bilbo (and probably by Gollum and
> the Ringwraiths as well) -- at least as I've understood the
> stretching, the problem is that the designated, or even fated, amount
> of 'life' (meant as experiences, change, 'quality of life') is
> stretched to fit a longer life, and as the period of life becomes
> longer and longer, the life-quality becomes thinner and thinner. That
> particular effect would, at least, not be perceivable by Elves, whose
> designated life-quality was meant to last until the end of Arda (as a
> habitable realm).
>
Nevertheless, it is clear that the Elves object to fading.

> > We are told that fully faded Elves are normally permanently
> > invisible to mortals, and unable to have much effect on matter.
> > They are actually pretty similar to disembodied spirits of slain
> > Elves, with some lingering differences like being normally less
> > hostile and also capable of projecting a visible form when they
> > wish.
> >
> > One wonders how far normal Elven fading differs from
> > wraithification of Nazgul.
>
> Yes, all this actually makes it sound very much like the state of the
> wraiths, with the exceptions of the stretched 'content of life'[#]
> and the absolute domination by Sauron.
>
> The Ringwraiths, like Gollum, Bilbo and Frodo, however, still
> retained a material body, which was just shifted into this 'wraith-
> world'. The descriptions of Elvish fading, IIRC, deals with the
> ultimate consumption of the body by the spirit, which sounds to me as
> a slightly different situation, though I would be hard-pressed to
> detail the difference since the spirit, when the Elf faded, wasn't
> 'unhoused' from the body (since that would have resulted in an
> immediate summons to Mandos).
>
Bilbo, Frodo and Sam were clearly material when invisible. And Bilbo
exploited the invisibility in his fight with the spiders.

However, the Nazgul appear different. They insisted on wearing robes,
which gave their location away. Yes, the dread and Black Breath would
also give away their presence - but not exactly where their vital parts
were.

We do not hear of Nazgul deliberately going disrobed to fight unseen.

And we are told that the robes actually function to give shape to
Nazgul. So that after involuntarily losing their robes, they are
assumed to be seriously crippled until they can travel to Mordor and
get new robes.

When Elves are bodily slain, their spirits are unhoused, but their
bodies, being fully material, remain as dead meat. Spiders ate Elves
and Melkor considered feeding wolves with Fingolfin. Whereas the
Witch-king, when slain, left no corpse - visible or invisible.

So, just how corporeal are the Nazgul?
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Christopher Kreuzer a écrit :
> "I feel all thin, sort of stretched, if you know what I mean: like
> butter that has been scraped over too much bread." (A Long-expected
> Party)
>
> If on the other hand you are looking for a phrase to describe 'content
> of life', I suspect that Tolkien might be talking about something like a
> soul or spirit being stretched out. Other concepts might also be memory,
> consciousness and mind. I've always thought of it as a mental
> stretching, but I suppose you could also think of it as a stretching of
> that spark of life, the Secret Fire. Talking in Tolkien's terms, I would
> have said that the fëa is being stretched, but maybe it is the hroa? Or
> maybe both?

My reading is tha the butter is the fëa and the bread is the hroa.

--
nfw
> Wasn't Ungoliant committed to creating a world-wide web?
sounds like the sort of evil thing she'd do. she was probably the
first spammer, too. -- Count Menelvagor in RABT--
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In message
<news:1147797925.010537.293800@u72g2000cwu.googlegroups.com>
chornedsnorkack.TakeThisOut@hushmail.com enriched us with:
>

<bigsnip>

> So, just how corporeal are the Nazgul?

About as corporeal as Gollum, Bilbo and Frodo when wearing the One
Ring.

The Ringwraiths were corpreal enough to give shape to their clothes
(both the robes and the invisible clothes they wore underneath), to
ride horses and winged beasts, to walk, wield weapons, knock on doors
(and knock them down) and to provide something for swords to actually
cut into (Merry and Éowyn as well as Tolkien's statements about the
possible outcomes at Weathertop) . . .

This is one (I can't remember other examples just now, but I'm sure
there are some) case where the automatic (or obvious) interpretation
of Gandalf's statements is contradicted by 'observation' elsewhere, and
therefore cannot possibly be true.

The robes gives shape to their nothingness in the same way that the
coat and make-up used by Mr Skinner in the film-version of 'The League
of Extraordinary Gentlemen' -- by providing a shape for eyes to see
where they would otherwise see nothing. Unless the robes carries a
magic spell that allows the wraiths to project their wraith-bodies into
the world of the living (something I'd be rather reluctant to accept).

Why the wraiths should be forced to return to Sauron when unrobed, I
couldn't say -- unless we wish to postulate that the robes are magical
as explained above, or that their fate at the ford did more than just
unrobe and unhorse them (e.g. remove some enchantment that Sauron had
cast on them that, again, projected their wraith-bodies into the world
of the living). At least they would not be able to move very fast at
foot, and they needed horses specially trained to carry them, as normal
animals couldn't stand them.

I don't pretend to be able to answer all questions (as the above and
the collapse/disappearance of the Witch-king's body after his spirit
left it), but there can be no doubt that the Ringwraiths had a
corporeal body beneath the black robes -- whether or not that body
relied on magic is then another question (if it did, then this was not
the spell that the stroke of Merry's blade ended -- Éowyn had a very
real neck to cut regardless of whether she could see it).

We might claim that the Ringwraiths, being fully in the wraith-world
(whereas Frodo etc. were, according to Gandalf in LotR II,1 'Many
Meetings', 'half in the wraith-world' when he wore the Ring) did not
naturally have a corporeal manifestation in the world of the living (so
that their corporeal bodies existed only in the wraith-world -- Frodo
actually saw their bodies in the wraith-world at Weathertop and at the
Ford), but that would require that we invent also invent some kind of
magic that would allow them to manifest themselves corporeally in the
normal world, as they evidently did.

What interpretation to choose must ultimately be a matter of personal
taste, as there is nothing (as far as I am aware) that can decide the
matter. Personally I find it simpler to assume that their bodies were
merely invisible as was Frodo's when he wore the Ring, and that Gandalf
referred to that which was actually seen (by someone who couldn't see
into the wraith-world) when he made that comment about their robes
giving shape to their nothingness.

--
Troels Forchhammer
Valid e-mail is <t.forch(a)email.dk>

It is the theory which decides what can be observed.
- Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
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In message <news:eQcag.69971$wl.56760@text.news.blueyonder.co.uk>
"Christopher Kreuzer" <spamgard.TakeThisOut@blueyonder.co.uk> enriched us with:
>
> Troels Forchhammer <Troels.TakeThisOut@ThisIsFake.invalid> wrote:
>>
>> In the case of fading, the fëa consumes the body, but is not
>> 'unhoused' -- the fëa doesn't leave the body as such. Since,
>> however, the Elvish fëa was, so to speak, 'designed' to be
>> immortal within Arda[*], it is doubtfull that there would be the
>> same sense of stretching as that experienced by Bilbo (and
>> probably by Gollum and the Ringwraiths as well)
>
> [...]
>
>> [*] I almost wrote that Elves were meant to be immortal within
>> /Time/, but I seem to recall something along the lines of
>> 'Arda as a habitable region' (paraphrasing). This made me
>> wonder about the relation between Time and the life of Arda
>> -- did Tolkien intend there to be some kind of Doomsday (the
>> last chord of the music) which would end both Arda and Time,
>> or could Eä, and hence Time, survive Arda as a habitable
>> region?
>
> This "within time" phrase reminds me of that Letter that Tolkien
> wrote about Frodo finding peace within Time, or something:

<snip quotation>

> This "spent still in Time", seems to be similar to the way you are
> using "Time" to refer to the experience of enduring in Arda.

I think of 'Time' in Tolkien's sub-creation as something that is a
basic part of, or quality of, Eä -- much as we might say the Length of
Eä or the Width of Eä and refer to the created universe, we might also
speak of the Time of Eä.

I think of Eä as a full space-time (with however many dimensions you
like <G>), and Time is, in that picture, the quality of Eä that serves
to sequentialize events (notice how that definition neatly gets around
the problem with causation <GG>).

When Tolkien said that Frodo's sojourn in Valinor was 'spent still in
Time', I think he meant that Frodo was still alive (implying that the
Fëar of humans actually left Eä upon death -- going, perhaps, to
somewhere in the Timeless Halls).

When I was speaking about the Elves as being (by intention) immortal
within Time, I considered the possibility that the Elves were supposed
to be alive until the end of Time itself.

> But concerning the end of Ea and Time (not sure if treating the
> end of Arda separately is allowed - though that is interesting)

It was the half-remembered usage of e.g. 'to endure with and within the
created world, while its story lasts' to describe Elvish immortality
that made me consider the possibility of there being a period in Time
/after/ the end of Arda. As a physicist I must of course consider the
time after the end of the solar system as a habitable region in space,
and that view naturally influences my perceptions with respect to
Tolkien as well.

> I think that anything that survives the end of Ea was truly
> immortal anyway, in the sense of being an immortal soul.

That reminds me of something from letter #212: 'true immortality is
beyond Ea'.

> The immortality of the Elves was different, being more about
> their ability to endure during Ea.

The immortality of the Elves is connected to the original intention of
their bodies being capable of enduring to the end of Arda, which is
what I think you mean as well. It is, anyway, more correctly a
longevity of the hröa rather than any true immortality (which, since
that is beyond Eä, must be only for the fëa).

> This would be different from both Elves and Men (and Dwarves)
> having immortal souls, which I've always thought Tolkien, as a
> Catholic, would have agreed they have. But maybe not.

I think that he would agreed that they have. They certainly had souls
(in /Myths Transformed/ there are some considerations about souls in
the context of JRRT's thoughts about Orcs). I think that there are some
indications that the spirits of the Quendi will persist beyond the end
of Arda (the prophecy about the end? I don't remember right now). While
there is, perhaps, nothing definite to tell us that the souls of Elves
and Dwarves were truly immortal (I take it as granted that the souls of
Men were), I would find it difficult to imagine Tolkien having it any
other way

>> Yes, all this actually makes it sound very much like the state of
>> the wraiths, with the exceptions of the stretched 'content of
>> life'[#] and the absolute domination by Sauron.
> [...]
>> [#] I'm still struggling to find an adequate phrase to cover this
>> concept.
>
> In a bit I snipped, you said:
>
> "...at least as I've understood the stretching, the problem is
> that the designated, or even fated, amount of 'life' (meant as
> experiences, change, 'quality of life') is stretched to fit a
> longer life, and as the period of life becomes longer and longer,
> the life-quality becomes thinner and thinner."
>
> This seems to me to describe it perfectly.

Thanks

> If you are looking for a phrase to cover the "stretching", then I
> can think of nothing better than Bilbo's turn of phrase here,

I agree -- it is that passage that gives us the word 'stretched' to
describe this.

<snip>

> If on the other hand you are looking for a phrase to describe
> 'content of life',

That was indeed where my problem lay -- a phrase to describe the
'butter'

> I suspect that Tolkien might be talking about something like a
> soul or spirit being stretched out.

You might be right, but I wasn't thinking of the soul as such. The soul
is, I believe, immortal, and capable of growing, by experience, even
after death.

We have in Danish an adage about burning one's candle in both ends,
which means that one is exerting oneself too much -- that one will
become 'burnt out' too soon. The adage works with the same concept that
I am trying to pin down -- here symbolised through the metaphor of the
candle -- that we have a certain allotment of strength, or life-force,
or life-content, to spend: either in a given period, or in our entire
life.

The concept that I am groping for is not, I think, that of soul or
mind, but something which is tied also to being alive -- something that
can be seen as being consumed during life, and which is consumed faster
in periods with many experiences and events, when one learns much etc.
but which is consumed slower as life becomes uneventful and dull.

Bilbo's complaint, as I read it, is that he has been finding it harder
and harder to enjoy and experience life,

> Other concepts might also be memory, consciousness and mind.
> I've always thought of it as a mental stretching,

I think of it as mental in the way it is perceived by Bilbo, but I
think that the actual 'butter' is something else (well, at least I
can't find an appropriate phrase in Danish either <G>).

> but I suppose you could also think of it as a stretching of that
> spark of life, the Secret Fire.

If only the Secret Fire (or Flame Imperishable) wasn't tied to the fëa
and thus unlikely to be consumed in Time . . .

> Talking in Tolkien's terms, I would have said that the fëa
> is being stretched, but maybe it is the hroa? Or maybe both?

I cannot say that this is, or is not, so, but I don't think that the
fëa covers the concept I've been trying to pin down, i.e. my mental
'picture' of what the 'butter' really is.

--
Troels Forchhammer
Valid mail is <t.forch(a)email.dk>

Your theory is crazy, but it's not crazy enough to be true.
- Niels Bohr, to a young physicist
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Stan Brown wrote:
> Wed, 17 May 2006 14:16:26 GMT from Troels Forchhammer
> <Troels RemoveThis @ThisIsFake.invalid>:
> > Why the wraiths should be forced to return to Sauron when unrobed, I
> > couldn't say -- unless we wish to postulate that the robes are magical
> > as explained above, or that their fate at the ford did more than just
> > unrobe and unhorse them (e.g. remove some enchantment that Sauron had
> > cast on them that, again, projected their wraith-bodies into the world
> > of the living). At least they would not be able to move very fast at
> > foot, and they needed horses specially trained to carry them, as normal
> > animals couldn't stand them.
>
> I think it was the unhorsing, not the unrobing, that forced them to
> return to Sauron. They needed to move fast, and so they had to get
> horses again -- in fact they ended up with even faster steeds.
>
Yes, maybe.

Plus - while Frodo and Sam did notice some sight impairment, the Nazgul
were seriously impaired, and in noon sun completely blind.

But on Weathertop, the Nazgul could not climb the hill on horseback.
Accordingly, they dismounted and attacked on foot.

It would have been advantageous for them to leave their robes behind
with their horses - this would have prevented their adversaries other
than Frodo if Ring-bearing from aiming their swords and flaming brands.
They did not choose to do so.
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Looks like I've missed a great discussion here. Blast. But at least
this degree thingy of mine is getting closer to completion.

Quoth Troels Forchhammer <Troels DeleteThis @ThisIsFake.invalid> in article
<Xns97B84E1A6178T.Forch DeleteThis @130.133.1.4>:
> Stan Brown <the_stan_brown DeleteThis @fastmail.fm> enriched us with:
> > <Troels DeleteThis @ThisIsFake.invalid>:
> >> Stan Brown <the_stan_brown DeleteThis @fastmail.fm> enriched us with:

> >> > What other source could have made those Rings confer
> >> > invisibility and long life? The Elves were not interested in
> >> > creating such things, as we know from the Three, so who would
> >> > have given those powers to the Sixteen if not Sauron?

Hold on: are you suggesting that the Three would _not_ confer long
life to a mortal bearer? But Gandalf explicitly said that (all of)
the Great Rings would do so.

> I think the permanent externalization of power done accidentally by
> Morgoth and deliberately in the One Ring by Sauron is sufficiently
> clearly the exception.

I pretty firmly disagree, actually, though I'm not entirely clear on
what acts fell into what categories. The most explicit statement
about this sort of thing that I know of in Tolkien's work comes in the
story "The Faithful Stone" in UT: the /Drug/ who created the guard
stone suffered along with its hurts, because some of "himself" had
passed into his creation. Christopher Tolkien comments that the
parallel with Sauron's creation of the Ring seemed quite clear.

My take on this, at least tentatively, is that magical "Art" would not
require a permanent investment of personal power, but that magic that
sought to actually change the world or control it would. But I won't
swear that that's entirely self-consistent (I haven't thought through
it carefully), and I'm sure that the boundaries of the categories
would be awfully fuzzy, especially to us mortals.

> The Elven magic was, as Tolkien wrote in one place, Art, and insofar
> as the Elven artist-artisans did 'put something of themselves' into
> their creations, this was in the artistic sense, rather than an
> irretrievable transfer of innate power or energy.

I agree. But I think that the Rings (for example) went far beyond
"Art". Or at least that the Great Rings did.

> > I'm thinking about the cloaks they gave the company...
> > Not invisibility but "unobtrusiveness" was their power.

Again, I agree with this: I can easily see the cloaks working by "Art"
rather than by domination of wills.

> I still think the invisibility was more likely added to the Rings by
> Sauron after he regained them, and as a power it seems to me to be
> more in line with the aspect of the Machine than even the Rings in
> general.

My take on this issue (which, alas, is relatively unpoluted by this
current discussion, since I've only read a few bits of it) is that
when Sauron taught the Elves to make the Rings, he carefully chose the
"technology" that they were based on so that the Rings would have some
of these less desirable effects and presented those to the Elves as
necessary side-effects for the goals that they hoped to achieve. The
Elves weighed the pros and cons and went ahead using Sauron's lore to
make the Sixteen (quite possibly with Sauron's direct aid). But
Celebrimbor, working on his own without Sauron's direct involvement,
found a way to adjust the "technology" behind the Rings to remove the
unwanted invisibility effect (and perhaps other undesirable side
effects as well), and based on that new method, he made the Three. (I
even wonder whether that new realization about the unnecessary flaws
in Sauron's teaching helped him to recognize what Sauron had done when
the One was created.)

I can't support that in detail from the texts (not yet, anyway), but
it seems like a plausible story, at least; I don't know of any
inconsistencies with it.

> > Or perhaps, even, the preservation effect _as_ _designed_ was
> > dangerous to Men and Hobbits, since Celebrimbor intended all the
> > Nineteen for Elves.

That has been my suspicion for a long time. But counter-arguments are
possible.

Steuard Jensen
 >> Stay informed about: The source of Ring-powers 

Quoth Troels Forchhammer <Troels RemoveThis @ThisIsFake.invalid> in article
<Xns97A8E830D76F6T.Forch RemoveThis @131.228.6.98>:
> The way I've managed to make it work for me is to imagine that the
> Ainu spends some innate energy on creating a body, but that this
> energy can, normally, be retrieved when the body is left. When the
> Ainu becomes bound to the body, however, the ability to retrieve the
> energy is lost.

This is one solution that I've been fond of myself. Another is simply
that "being killed" is among the strongest influences to bind an Ainu
to their (now defunct) physical form. So after Sauron was "killed" in
the Akalabeth, he had /much/ more trouble building a new body by force
of will alone (that is, he desperately wanted to use physical hands
(or whatever) instead). After his third death, he couldn't use his
will to build physical things at all any more.

I don't know which solution I prefer; I've been shifting toward the
second recently.

Steuard Jensen
 >> Stay informed about: The source of Ring-powers 

Steuard Jensen <sbjensen.RemoveThis@midway.uchicago.edu> wrote:
> Quoth Troels Forchhammer Troels.RemoveThis@ThisIsFake.invalid:

<snip>

>> I think the permanent externalization of power done accidentally by
>> Morgoth and deliberately in the One Ring by Sauron is sufficiently
>> clearly the exception.
>
> I pretty firmly disagree, actually, though I'm not entirely clear on
> what acts fell into what categories.

I wonder what category the making of the Two Trees (which involved
several Valar) and the making of the Silmarils fall into? Ditto for
Aule's making of the Fathers of the Dwarves, and even the creation of
the world by the Valar - were they doing more than just shaping the
world?

> The most explicit statement
> about this sort of thing that I know of in Tolkien's work comes in the
> story "The Faithful Stone" in UT: the /Drug/ who created the guard
> stone suffered along with its hurts, because some of "himself" had
> passed into his creation. Christopher Tolkien comments that the
> parallel with Sauron's creation of the Ring seemed quite clear.

<snip>

>> The Elven magic was, as Tolkien wrote in one place, Art, and insofar
>> as the Elven artist-artisans did 'put something of themselves' into
>> their creations, this was in the artistic sense, rather than an
>> irretrievable transfer of innate power or energy.

But how far can we apply Elven art to the processes practised by mortals
(such as Dwarves and Druedain and Dunedain), and to the processes
practised by Maiar (Sauron), Valar (Morgoth) and even Eru himself?
Different orders of beings - does that mean different arguments have to
be used?

<snip>

Christopher

--
---
Reply clue: Saruman welcomes you to Spamgard
 >> Stay informed about: The source of Ring-powers 

In message <news:IO1bg.29$25.2147@news.uchicago.edu>
sbjensen.DeleteThis@midway.uchicago.edu (Steuard Jensen) enriched us with:
>
> Looks like I've missed a great discussion here. Blast. But at
> least this degree thingy of mine is getting closer to completion.
>

And good luck with it!

I'm reminded that the traditional 'goodbye and good luck' greeting in
Danish to someone facing a test is an onomatopoietic word based on an
older tradition of spitting after someone for luck. So, if I'm spitting
in your direction, it is only to bring you luck . . .

> Quoth Troels Forchhammer <Troels.DeleteThis@ThisIsFake.invalid> in article
> <Xns97B84E1A6178T.Forch.DeleteThis@130.133.1.4>:
>>

<snip>

>> I think the permanent externalization of power done accidentally
>> by Morgoth and deliberately in the One Ring by Sauron is
>> sufficiently clearly the exception.
>
> I pretty firmly disagree, actually, though I'm not entirely clear
> on what acts fell into what categories.

It was rather vague, wasn't it :-/

I would agree that temporary, reversible, externalisation was not
unique in this way. It is the permanent diminishment of the core being
that I think was unique in the cases of Morgoth and Sauron.

'Permanent' was not really sufficient to cover my meaning, because
power can be freely invested in an object if that power is renewable,
but the special thing about the investments done by Sauron and Morgoth
were that the power was irreplacable -- neither renewable nor
retrievable, and the investment thus resulted in a permanent
diminihment of their fëar (or at least 'permanent' on the scale of the
life of Arda).

> The most explicit statement about this sort of thing that I know
> of in Tolkien's work comes in the story "The Faithful Stone" in UT:

I don't think the externalisation in that case was permanent. The Drûg,
IMO, was not permanently diminished by his creation, and the stone
would, IMO, not have worked any longer after the death of the Drûg.

> Christopher Tolkien comments that the parallel with Sauron's
> creation of the Ring seemed quite clear.

Actually he relates his father's comment:

Of this story, my father remarked: "The tales, such as
The Faithful Stone, that speak of their transferring part
of their 'powers' to their artefacts, remind one in
miniature of Sauron's transference of power to the
foundations of the Barad-dûr and to the Ruling Ring."

But it is not alone the transference of power into an object that is
external to core being that I was referring to. The difference, IMO, is
in the nature of that investment -- once Sauron had invested part of
his native power in the One Ring, that power could not be drawn back
or replaced. He could draw upon it, but not actually retrieve it.

But there would, I think, be other examples that I hadn't thought of
earlier -- the creation of a body by an Ainu, which the Ainu did then
become bound to. Though the power, or energy, in that case went into
the body of the Ainu, I think that the 'core being' of the Ainu is the
fëa only, and the hröa is thus external to the core being.

> My take on this, at least tentatively, is that magical "Art" would
> not require a permanent investment of personal power, but that
> magic that sought to actually change the world or control it
> would. But I won't swear that that's entirely self-consistent (I
> haven't thought through it carefully), and I'm sure that the
> boundaries of the categories would be awfully fuzzy, especially to
> us mortals.

It might be easier to discuss specific cases such as the Faithful
Stone. As I said, I don't think that the transfer of power was
permanent in that case -- the power would, IMO, at the latest go back
to the fëa of the Drûg upon his death.

Other of the greatest artefacts might be the Silmarils and the
Palantíri (both, I think, made by Fëanor). In neither of these cases do
I think that the creator invested any of his personal power in his
artefacts other than in the artistic sense (which is a replenishable
thing, and thus doesn't leave the artist/artisan permanently
diminished).

>> The Elven magic was, as Tolkien wrote in one place, Art, and
>> insofar as the Elven artist-artisans did 'put something of
>> themselves' into their creations, this was in the artistic sense,
>> rather than an irretrievable transfer of innate power or energy.
>
> I agree. But I think that the Rings (for example) went far beyond
> "Art". Or at least that the Great Rings did.

I'll first turn to letter #155, where Tolkien wrote about magic.

Their /magia/ the Elves and Gandalf use (sparingly): a
/magia/, producing real results (like fire in a wet faggot)
for specific beneficent purposes. Their goetic effects are
entirely /artistic/ and not intended to deceive: they never
deceive Elves (but may deceive or bewilder unaware Men)
since the difference is to them as clear as the difference
to us between fiction, painting, and sculpture, and 'life'.

[1] "Greek Goêteia* (Goês*, sorcerer); the English form
Goety is defined in the O.E.D. as 'witchcraft or magic
performed by the invocation and employment of evil spirits;
necromancy.'"
* written with Greek letters in original
"gamma - omicron - eta - tau - epsilon - iota - alpha"
and "gamma - omicron - eta - sigma"
[Letter #155 To Naomi Mitchison (draft - not sent), 1954]

I am not sure that this means that all Elvish art is goetic in nature,
but I agree that the Great Rings (and to some extent all the Rings of
Power) relied on /magia/ ('and the Elves came their nearest to falling
to 'magic' and machinery.') Whether this is beyond mere art? Well, did
they actually fall to "'magic' and machinery" or were they only very
close? I can't agree with 'very far', but beyond that, I cannot say.

On the other hand, if you wish to imply that the Elven smiths invested
some of their own native power into the Rings of Power, other than in
the artistic sense (i.e. a renewable 'energy'), I cannot agree. I can't
really imagine an Elvish Smith being willing to permanently diminish
his own fëa (which he even knows can be reincarnated in time if he
dies).

<snip>

>> I still think the invisibility was more likely added to the Rings
>> by Sauron after he regained them,
[...]
>
> My take on this issue
[...]
> that when Sauron taught the Elves to make the Rings, he carefully
> chose the "technology" that they were based on so that the Rings
> would have some of these less desirable effects
[...]
> But Celebrimbor, working on his own
[...]
> found a way to adjust the "technology" behind the Rings to remove
> the unwanted invisibility effect
[...]
> I can't support that in detail from the texts (not yet, anyway),
> but it seems like a plausible story, at least; I don't know of any
> inconsistencies with it.

We don't really know all that much about the history of the making of
the Rings, so there is some wriggle room for ideas

There is even some inconsistencies in what we do know. For instance in
'Of the Rings of Power and the Third Age' (Silm V), it is said about
the Three (and in particular as explanation of Sauron's desire for
them):
[...] for those who had them in their keeping could ward
off the decays of time and postpone the weariness of the
world.
But in letter #131 Tolkien wrote that 'The chief power (of all the
rings alike) was the prevention or slowing of /decay/'. So, did the
other Rings also have that power, or was it only the Three?

To the best of my knowledge neither idea is contradicted in any text,
and I can see both strengths and weaknesses for both.

Another, related, question is that we don't know for sure whether an
Elf wearing the One would become invisible, though I can't really see
any reason why he shouldn't. This might affect one's judgement with
respect to the source of the invisibility (depending on whether one
would see invisibility as cumbersome or helpful for the Elvish
wielders).

Otherwise the differences seem to lie in the interpretation of
Celebrimbor's role (re-inventing the technology rather enlarges his
role, I think), and in the view on Sauron's perversion of the Rings he
controlled (did it actually involve changing their powers). I am not
aware of anything that could decide these questions either way.

<snip>

--
Troels Forchhammer
Valid e-mail is <t.forch(a)email.dk>

The "paradox" is only a conflict between reality and your
feeling of what reality "ought to be".
- Richard Feynman
 >> Stay informed about: The source of Ring-powers 

In message <news:PU1bg.30$25.2181@news.uchicago.edu>
sbjensen RemoveThis @midway.uchicago.edu (Steuard Jensen) enriched us with:
>
> Quoth Troels Forchhammer <Troels RemoveThis @ThisIsFake.invalid> in article
> <Xns97A8E830D76F6T.Forch RemoveThis @131.228.6.98>:
>>
>> The way I've managed to make it work for me is to imagine that
>> the Ainu spends some innate energy on creating a body, but that
>> this energy can, normally, be retrieved when the body is left.
>> When the Ainu becomes bound to the body, however, the ability to
>> retrieve the energy is lost.
>
> This is one solution that I've been fond of myself. Another is
> simply that "being killed" is among the strongest influences to
> bind an Ainu to their (now defunct) physical form. So after
> Sauron was "killed" in the Akalabeth, he had /much/ more trouble
> building a new body by force of will alone (that is, he
> desperately wanted to use physical hands (or whatever) instead).

Oooh! I /like/ this!

I'm not sure, though, that the two pictures are necessarily mutually
exclusive.

We have the supposition of Tolkien's from letter #200[*] that
building a body uses up some of the inherent energy, and if that
energy was lost upon being killed, that could be combined with what
you say, which I'd like to take a step further to say that it took up
increasingly more energy to rebuild the body the more the Ainu had
become bound to it (I am very fond of the picture of the Ainu
becoming accustomed to using the body for tasks that they would
normally have done by force of will).

[*] (I suppose because each building-up used up some of the
inherent energy of the spirit, which might be called the
'will' or the effective link between the indestructible
mind and being and the realization of its imagination)

The effect would be that the loss of inherent energy (or 'will')
would be greater the more bound the Ainu was to that body, and at the
same time the energy required to rebuild the body would grow. This
could well explain why only the very greatest of Maiar were able to
rebuild after being killed in a body they had grown bound to.

> After his third death, he couldn't use his will to build physical
> things at all any more.

Though, at that time the whole process is exacerbated by the loss of
the power that was bound up in the One Ring.


There are some statements in the later writings that Sauron was
disembodied when he was defeated by Huan and Lúthien. Off the top of
my head, I recall it from the Ósanwe-kenta[#], but I know I've seen
it elsewhere as well (whether in MR, WotJ or PoMe, I don't recall).
This was obviously not incorporated into the story in the published
Silmarillion, but I wondered what 'status' should be attributed to
it? Despite a couple of typescripts, the story of Beren and Lúthien
remained essentially unrevised from the pre-LotR version (not even
correcting the old names to the new), and it would seem that Tolkien
ideas were changing on this point.

[#] From note 5, where the last sentence reads:
'But the first destruction of the bodily form of Sauron
was recorded in the histories of the Elder Days, in the
/Lay of Leithian/.'

--
Troels Forchhammer
Valid e-mail is <t.forch(a)email.dk>

Lo! we have gathered, and we have spent, and now the time
of payment draws near.
- Aragorn, /The Lord of the Rings/ (J.R.R. Tolkien)
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