Tolkien, Sauron and Evil
compiled by Rogorn from the Letters
of J.R.R. Tolkien
‘Evil labours with vast power and perpetual
success, but in vain,
preparing always only the soil for unexpected good to sprout in.’
[Tolkien wrote the above to his son Christopher in 1944, in the middle
not only of WWII, but also of the writing of TTT.]
EVIL AT THE CREATION OF THE TALE
‘The desire to express feelings about good, evil, fair, foul in some
way, to rationalize it, and prevent it just festering, in my case it
generated Morgoth and the History of the [Elves], lots of the early
parts of which were done in grimy canteens, at lectures in cold fogs,
in huts full of blasphemy and smut, or by candle-light in bell-tents,
even some down in dugouts under shell fire.’
EVIL IN THE TALE
‘In my story I do not deal in Absolute Evil. I do not think there is
such a thing, since that is Zero. I do not think that at any rate any
'rational being' is wholly evil. Satan fell. In my myth Morgoth fell
before Creation of the physical world. In my story Sauron represents as
near an approach to the wholly evil will as is possible. He had gone
the way of all tyrants: beginning well, at least on the level that
while desiring to order all things according to his own wisdom he still
at first considered the (economic) well-being of other inhabitants of
the Earth. But he went further than human tyrants in pride and the lust
for domination, being in origin an immortal (angelic) spirit.’
‘You can make the Ring into an allegory of our own time, if you like:
an allegory of the inevitable fate that waits for all attempts to
defeat evil power by power. But that is only because all power magical
or mechanical does always so work.’
‘It seems clear to me that Frodo's duty was 'humane' not political. He
naturally thought first of the Shire, since his roots were there, but
the quest had as its object not the preserving of this or that polity,
such as the half republic half aristocracy of the Shire, but the
liberation from an evil tyranny of all the 'humane' – including those,
such as 'easterlings' and Haradrim, that were still servants of the
tyranny.’
SIMPLE-MINDED GOOD AND EVIL?
‘Some reviewers have called the whole thing simple-minded, just a plain
fight between Good and Evil, with all the good just good, and the bad
just bad. Pardonable, perhaps (though at least Boromir has been
overlooked) in people in a hurry and with only a fragment to read and
of course without the earlier-written but unpublished Elvish histories
[The Silmarillion]. The Elves are not wholly good or in the right. Not
so much because they had flirted with Sauron, as because with or
without his assistance they were 'embalmers'. In their way the Men of
Gondor were similar: a withering people whose only 'hallows' were their
tombs. But in any case this is a tale about a war, and if war is
allowed (at least as a topic and a setting) it is not much good
complaining that all the people on one side are against those on the
other. Not that I have made even this issue quite so simple: there are
Saruman, and Denethor, and Boromir; and there are treacheries and
strife even among the Orcs. [Besides], in this 'mythology' all the
'angelic' powers concerned with this world were capable of many degrees
of error and failing, between the absolute Satanic rebellion and evil
of Morgoth and his satellite Sauron, and the fainéance of some
of the
other higher powers or 'gods'. The 'wizards' were not exempt. Indeed,
being incarnate, they were more likely to stray, or err. Gandalf alone
fully passes the tests, on a moral plane anyway (he makes mistakes of
judgement). Since in the view of this tale and mythology, Power, when
it dominates or seeks to dominate other wills and minds (except by the
assent of their reason) is evil, these 'wizards' were incarnated in the
life-forms of Middle-earth, and so suffered the pains both of mind and
body.’
‘So I feel that the fiddle-faddle in reviews, and correspondence about
them, as to whether my 'good people' were kind and merciful and gave
quarter (in fact they do), or not, is quite beside the point. Some
critics seem determined to represent me as a simple-minded adolescent,
inspired with, say, a ‘With-the-flag-to-Pretoria’ spirit, and wilfully
distort what is said in my tale. I have not that spirit, and it does
not appear in the story. The figure of Denethor alone is enough to show
this; but I have not made any of the peoples on the 'right' side,
Hobbits, Rohirrim, Men of Dale or of Gondor, any better than men have
been or are, or can be. Mine is not an 'imaginary' world, but an
imaginary historical moment on 'Middle-earth' – which is our
habitation.’
COMPARISON WITH CHRISTIAN GOOD AND EVIL
‘With regard to The Lord of the Rings, I cannot claim to be a
sufficient theologian to say whether my notion of orcs is heretical or
not. I don't feel under any obligation to make my story fit with
formalized Christian theology, though I actually intended it to be
consonant with Christian thought and belief, which is asserted
somewhere, where Frodo asserts that the orcs are not evil in origin. We
believe that, I suppose, of all human kinds and sons and breeds, though
some appear, both as individuals and groups to be, by us at any rate,
unredeemable. I suppose a difference between this Myth and what may be
perhaps called Christian mythology is this: in the latter the Fall of
Man is subsequent to and a consequence (though not a necessary
consequence) of the 'Fall of the Angels', a rebellion of created
free-will at a higher level than Man; but it is not clearly held (and
in many versions is not held at all) that this affected the 'World' in
its nature: evil was brought in from outside, by Satan. In my Myth the
rebellion of created free-will precedes creation of the World
(Eä); and
Eä has in it, subcreatively introduced, evil, rebellions,
discordant
elements of its own nature already when the Let it Be was spoken. The
Fall or corruption, therefore, of all things in it and all inhabitants
of it, was a possibility if not inevitable. Trees may 'go bad' as in
the Old Forest; Elves may turn into Orcs, and if this required the
special perversive malice of Morgoth, still Elves themselves could do
evil deeds. Even the 'good' Valar as inhabiting the World could at
least err; as the Great Valar did in their dealings with the Elves; or
as the lesser of their kind (as the Istari or wizards) could in various
ways become self-seeking.’
SAURON AND THE REAL WORLD
We are attempting to conquer Sauron with the Ring. And we shall (it
seems) succeed. But the penalty is, as you will know, to breed new
Saurons, and slowly turn Men and Elves into Orcs.
NAME
There is no linguistic connexion, and therefore no connexion in
significance, between ‘Sauron’, a contemporary [Elvish] form of an
older *θaurond- derivative of an adjectival *θaurā (from a base √THAW)
'detestable', and the [real-world] Greek σαύρα 'a lizard'.
FIRST AGE
The theory, if one can dignify the modes of the story with such a term,
is that he was a spirit, a minor one but still an 'angelic' spirit.
According to the mythology of these things, that means that, though of
course a creature, he belonged to the race of intelligent beings that
were made before the physical world, and were permitted to assist in
their measure in the making of it. Those who became most involved in
this work of Art, as it was in the first instance, became so engrossed
with it, that when the Creator made it real (that is, gave it the
secondary reality, subordinate to his own, which we call primary
reality, and so in that hierarchy on the same plane with themselves)
they desired to enter into it, from the beginning of its 'realization'.
They were allowed to do so, and the great among them became the
equivalent of the 'gods' of traditional mythologies; but a condition
was that they would remain 'in it' until the Story was finished. They
were thus in the world, but not of a kind whose essential nature is to
be physically incarnate. They were self-incarnated, if they wished; but
their incarnate forms were more analogous to our clothes than to our
bodies, except that they were more than are clothes the expression of
their desires, moods, wills and functions. Some had attached themselves
to such major artists and knew things chiefly indirectly through their
knowledge of the minds of these masters. Sauron had been attached to
the greatest, Melkor, who ultimately became the inevitable Rebel and
self-worshipper of mythologies that begin with a transcendent unique
Creator.
In the Silmarillion and Tales of the First Age Sauron was a being of
Valinor perverted to the service of the Enemy [Melkor] and becoming his
chief captain and servant. He repents in fear when the First Enemy is
utterly defeated, but in the end does not do as was commanded, return
to the judgement of the gods. He lingers in Middle-earth. Very slowly,
beginning with fair motives: the reorganising and rehabilitation of the
ruin of Middle-earth, 'neglected by the gods', he becomes a
reincarnation of Evil, and a thing lusting for Complete Power – and so
consumed ever more fiercely with hate (especially of gods and Elves).
Sauron was of course not 'evil' in origin. He was a 'spirit' corrupted
by the Prime Dark Lord (the Prime sub-creative Rebel) Morgoth. He was
given an opportunity of repentance, when Morgoth was overcome, but
could not face the humiliation of recantation, and suing for pardon;
and so his temporary turn to good and 'benevolence' ended in a greater
relapse, until he became the main representative of Evil of later ages.
SECOND AGE
Sauron should be thought of as very terrible. The form that he took was
that of a man of more than human stature, but not gigantic. In his
earlier incarnation he was able to veil his power (as Gandalf did) and
could appear as a commanding figure of great strength of body and
supremely royal demeanour and countenance. But at the beginning of the
Second Age he was still beautiful to look at, or could still assume a
beautiful visible shape – and was not indeed wholly evil, not unless
all 'reformers' who want to hurry up with 'reconstruction' and
'reorganization' are wholly evil, even before pride and the lust to
exert their will eat them up. But many Elves listened to Sauron. He was
still fair in that early time, and his motives and those of the Elves
seemed to go partly together: the healing of the desolate lands. Sauron
found their weak point in suggesting that, helping one another, they
could make Western Middle-earth as beautiful as Valinor. It was really
a veiled attack on the gods, an incitement to try and make a separate
independent paradise. Gil-galad repulsed all such overtures, as also
did Elrond. But at Eregion great work began – and the Elves came their
nearest to falling to 'magic' and machinery. With the aid of Sauron's
lore they made Rings of Power ('power' is an ominous and sinister word
in all these tales, except as applied to the gods). Sauron dominates
all the multiplying hordes of Men that have had no contact with the
Elves and so indirectly with the true and Unfallen Valar and gods.
Thus, as the Second Age draws on, we have a great Kingdom and evil
theocracy (for Sauron is also the god of his slaves) growing up in
Middle-earth. He rules a growing empire from the great dark tower of
Barad-dûr in Mordor, near to the Mountain of Fire, wielding the
One
Ring.
THE ONE RING
But to achieve this he had been obliged to let a great part of his own
inherent power (a frequent and very significant motive in myth and
fairy-story) pass into the One Ring. While he wore it, his power on
earth was actually enhanced. But even if he did not wear it, that power
existed and was in 'rapport' with himself: he was not 'diminished'.
Unless some other seized it and became possessed of it. If that
happened, the new possessor could (if sufficiently strong and heroic by
nature) challenge Sauron, become master of all that he had learned or
done since the making of the One Ring, and so overthrow him and usurp
his place. This was the essential weakness he had introduced into his
situation in his effort (largely unsuccessful) to enslave the Elves,
and in his desire to establish a control over the minds and wills of
his servants. There was another weakness: if the One Ring was actually
unmade, annihilated, then its power would be dissolved, Sauron's own
being would be diminished to vanishing point, and he would be reduced
to a shadow, a mere memory of malicious will. But that he never
contemplated nor feared. The Ring was unbreakable by any smithcraft
less than his own. It was indissoluble in any fire, save the undying
subterranean fire where it was made – and that was unapproachable, in
Mordor. Also so great was the Ring's power of lust, that anyone who
used it became mastered by it; it was beyond the strength of any will
(even his own) to injure it, cast it away, or neglect it. So he
thought. It was in any case on his finger. Sauron would not have feared
the Ring! It was his own and under his will. Even from afar he had an
effect upon it, to make it work for its return to himself. In his
actual presence none but very few of equal stature could have hoped to
withhold it from him. Of 'mortals' no one, not even Aragorn.
The Ring of Sauron is only one of the various mythical treatments of
the placing of one's life, or power, in some external object, which is
thus exposed to capture or destruction with disastrous results to
oneself. If I were to 'philosophize' this myth, or at least the Ring of
Sauron, I should say it was a mythical way of representing the truth
that potency (or perhaps rather potentiality) if it is to be exercised,
and produce results, has to be externalized and so as it were passes,
to a greater or less degree, out of one's direct control. A man who
wishes to exert 'power' must have subjects, who are not himself. But he
then depends on them.
NÚMENOR
Ar-Pharazôn, as is told in the 'Downfall' or Akallabêth,
conquered a
terrified Sauron's subjects, not Sauron. Sauron's personal 'surrender'
was voluntary and cunning: he got free transport to Numenor! He
naturally had the One Ring, and so very soon dominated the minds and
wills of most of the Númenóreans. (I do not think
Ar-Pharazôn knew
anything about the One Ring. The Elves kept the matter of the Rings
very secret, as long as they could. In any case Ar-Pharazôn was
not in
communication with them). Sauron had recourse to guile. He submitted,
and was carried off to Númenor as a prisoner-hostage. But he was
of
course a 'divine' person (in the terms of this mythology; a lesser
member of the race of Valar) and thus far too powerful to be controlled
in this way. He steadily got Arpharazôn's mind under his own
control,
and in the event corrupted many of the Númenóreans,
destroyed the
conception of Eru, now represented as a mere figment of the Valar or
Lords of the West (a fictitious sanction to which they appealed if
anyone questioned their rulings), and substituted a Satanist religion
with a large temple, the worship of the dispossessed eldest of the
Valar (the rebellious Dark Lord of the First Age).
Then, Sauron was defeated by a 'miracle': a direct action of God the
Creator, changing the fashion of the world, when appealed to by
Manwë.
Though reduced to 'a spirit of hatred borne on a dark wind', I do not
think one need boggle at this spirit carrying off the One Ring, upon
which his power of dominating minds now largely depended. That Sauron
was not himself destroyed in the anger of the One is not my fault: the
problem of evil, and its apparent toleration, is a permanent one for
all who concern themselves with our world. The indestructibility of
spirits with free wills, even by the Creator of them, is also an
inevitable feature, if one either believes in their existence, or
feigns it in a story. Sauron was, of course, 'confounded' by the
disaster, and diminished (having expended enormous energy in the
corruption of Númenor).
THIRD AGE
Sauron was always de-bodied when vanquished. He needed time for his own
bodily rehabilitation, and for gaining control over his former
subjects. He was attacked by Gil-galad and Elendil before his new
domination was fully established. After the battle with Gil-galad and
Elendil, Sauron took a long while to re-build, longer than he had done
after the Downfall of Númenor (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 impossibility of
re-building after the destruction of the Ring, is sufficiently clear
'mythologically' in the present book.
SAURON’S SERVANTS AND ALLIES
Orcs (the word is as far as I am concerned actually derived from Old
English orc 'demon', but only because of its phonetic suitability) are
nowhere clearly stated to be of any particular origin. But since they
are servants of the Dark Power, and later of Sauron, neither of whom
could, or would, produce living things, they must be 'corruptions'.
They are not based on direct experience of mine; but owe, I suppose, a
good deal to the goblin tradition (goblin is used as a translation in
The Hobbit, where orc only occurs once, I think), especially as it
appears in George MacDonald, except for the soft feet which I never
believed in. The name has the form orch (pl. yrch) in Sindarin and uruk
in the Black Speech.
The giant spiders were themselves only the offspring of Ungoliante the
primeval devourer of light, that in spider-form assisted the Dark
Power, but ultimately quarrelled with him. There is thus no alliance
between Shelob and Sauron, the Dark Power's deputy; only a common
hatred.
SAURON’S FOES
Of the others only Gandalf might be expected to master him – being an
emissary of the Powers and a creature of the same order, an immortal
spirit taking a visible physical form. In the 'Mirror of Galadriel', it
appears that Galadriel conceived of herself as capable of wielding the
Ring and supplanting the Dark Lord. If so, so also were the other
guardians of the Three, especially Elrond. But this is another matter.
It was part of the essential deceit of the Ring to fill minds with
imaginations of supreme power. But this the Great had well considered
and had rejected, as is seen in Elrond's words at the Council.
Galadriel's rejection of the temptation was founded upon previous
thought and resolve. In any case Elrond or Galadriel would have
proceeded in the policy now adopted by Sauron: they would have built up
an empire with great and absolutely subservient generals and armies and
engines of war, until they could challenge Sauron and destroy him by
force. Confrontation of Sauron alone, unaided, self to self was not
contemplated. One can imagine the scene in which Gandalf, say, was
placed in such a position. It would be a delicate balance. On one side
the true allegiance of the Ring to Sauron; on the other superior
strength because Sauron was not actually in possession, and perhaps
also because he was weakened by long corruption and expenditure of will
in dominating inferiors. If Gandalf proved the victor, the result would
have been for Sauron the same as the destruction of the Ring; for him
it would have been destroyed, taken from him for ever. But the Ring and
all its works would have endured. It would have been the master in the
end. Gandalf as Ring-Lord would have been far worse than Sauron. He
would have remained 'righteous', but self-righteous. He would have
continued to rule and order things for 'good', and the benefit of his
subjects according to his wisdom (which was and would have remained
great). Gandalf is a 'created' person; though possibly a spirit that
existed before in the physical world. His function as a 'wizard' is an
angelos or messenger from the Valar or Rulers: to assist the rational
creatures of Middle-earth to resist Sauron, a power too great for them
unaided.
SAURON’S ROLE
In my story Sauron represents as near an approach to the wholly evil
will as is possible. He had gone the way of all tyrants: beginning
well, at least on the level that while desiring to order all things
according to his own wisdom he still at first considered the (economic)
well-being of other inhabitants of the Earth. But he went further than
human tyrants in pride and the lust for domination, being in origin an
immortal (angelic) spirit. Sauron desired to be a God-King, and was
held to be this by his servants, by a triple treachery: 1. Because of
his admiration of Strength he had become a follower of Morgoth and fell
with him down into the depths of evil, becoming his chief agent in
Middle Earth. 2. when Morgoth was defeated by the Valar finally he
forsook his allegiance; but out of fear only; he did not present
himself to the Valar or sue for pardon, and remained in Middle Earth.
3. When he found how greatly his knowledge was admired by all other
rational creatures and how easy it was to influence them, his pride
became boundless. By the end of the Second Age he assumed the position
of Morgoth's representative. By the end of the Third Age (though
actually much weaker than before) he claimed to be Morgoth returned. If
he had been victorious he would have demanded divine honour from all
rational creatures and absolute temporal power over the whole world.
To attempt by device or 'magic' to recover longevity is thus a supreme
folly and wickedness of 'mortals'. Longevity or counterfeit
'immortality' (true immortality is beyond Ea) is the chief bait of
Sauron – it leads the small to a Gollum, and the great to a Ringwraith.
