# Could some orcs be redeemable?



## Elaini (Feb 9, 2019)

They were bred for slavery to begin with and never got to know freedom. Do you think they're closer to animals that are controlled by their impulses or can they learn to be civil?


----------



## Azrubêl (Feb 10, 2019)

I know Tolkien's main idea with the different traits between races is that each embodies their natural values: elves are lithe for the woodlands, dwarves are stout for mining and hewing, men are strong for building cities, hobbits are short and like food for farming. 

Orcs are monster-like because of their violent and dim-witted dispositions. 

We generally don't see these characterizations being broken, but we see different versions of good and bad examples of each. Maybe there are limited differences that can occur, but that "peaceful orcs" would be like hobbits building Minas Tirith, there would be a thousand things preventing it, and so there would have to be a really strong reason for it to happen. And if it did, what would that say? 

Sounds like an interesting story to think about, like how the Drúedain exist as wild men with different traits.


----------



## Miguel (Feb 10, 2019)

> Those orks who dwelt long under the immediate attention of his will - as garrisons of his strongholds or elements of armies trained for special purposes in his war-designs - would act like herds, obeying instantly, as if with one will, his commands even if ordered to sacrifice their lives in his service. And as was seen when Morgoth was at last overthrown and cast out, those orks that had been so absorbed scattered helplessly, without purpose either to flee or to fight, and soon died or slew themselves. Other originally independent creatures, and Men among them (but neither Elves nor Dwarves), could also be reduced to a like condition. But 'puppets', with no independent life or will, would simply cease to move or do anything at all when the will of their maker was brought to nothing. In any case the number of orks that were thus 'absorbed' was always only a small part of their total. To hold them in absolute servitude required a great expense of will. Morgoth though in origin possessed of vast power was finite; and it was this expenditure upon the orks, and still more upon the other far more formidable creatures in his service, that in the event so dissipated his powers of mind that Morgoth's overthrow became possible. Thus the greater part of the orks, though under his orders and the dark shadow of their fear of him, were only intermittently objects of his immediate thought and concern, and while that was removed they relapsed into independence and became conscious of their hatred of him and his tyranny



There's gotta be many different tribes of them in the 4th age. I like the idea of them becoming independent but not turning into something that would engage in dealings with the other peoples such as trade, military aid, etc. They won't make war on people like before but they're not pals, they're foul. I like to think that some become very wise, among these a few get to be sorcerers/witch doctors and such. Maybe some character/ter's of Men, Avari, Dwarf, Hobbit... gets to hang out with some of them ala Eöl with the Dwarves of the blue mountains.


----------



## Erestor Arcamen (Feb 13, 2019)

Tolkien never wrote about them being redeemable, but he did write about whether they were evil or not. Towards the end of Letter 153:



> [Eru/God] gave special 'sub-creative' powers to certain of His highest created beings: that is a guarantee that what they devised and made should be given the reality of Creation. Of course within limits, and of course subject to certain commands or prohibitions. But if they 'fell', as the Diabolus Morgoth did, and started making things 'for himself, to be their Lord', these would then 'be', even if Morgoth broke the supreme ban against making other 'rational' creatures like Elves or Men. They would at least 'be' real physical realities in the physical world, however evil they might prove, even 'mocking' the Children of God. They would be Morgoth's greatest Sins, abuses of his highest privilege, and would be creatures begotten of Sin, and naturally bad. (I nearly wrote 'irredeemably bad'; but that would be going too far. Because by accepting or tolerating their making — necessary to their actual existence — even Orcs would become part of the World, which is God's and ultimately good.) But whether they could have 'souls' or 'spirits' seems a different question; and since in my myth at any rate I do not conceive of the making of souls or spirits, things of an equal order if not an equal power to the Valar, as a possible 'delegation', I have represented at least the Orcs as pre-existing real beings on whom the Dark Lord has exerted the fullness of his power in remodelling and corrupting them, not making them.



I also found this passage from _Myths Transformed_, section VIII, in _Morgoth's Ring _interesting:



> But even before this wickedness of Morgoth was suspected, the Wise in the Elder Days taught always that the Orcs were not 'made' by Melkor, and therefore were not in their origin evil. They might have become irredeemable (at least by Elves and Men), but they remained within the Law. That is, that though of necessity, being the fingers of the hand of Morgoth, they must be fought with the utmost severity, they must not be dealt with in their own terms of cruelty or treachery. Captives must not be tormented, not even to discover information for the defence of the homes of Elves and Men. If any Orcs surrendered and asked for mercy, they must be granted it, even at a cost.* This was the teaching of the Wise, though in the horror of the War it was not always heeded.
> 
> 
> [footnote to the text] Few Orcs ever did so in the Elder Days, and at no time would any Orc treat with any Elf. For one thing Morgoth had achieved was to convince the Orcs beyond refutation that the Elves were crueller than themselves, taking captives only for 'amusement', or to eat them (as the Orcs would do at need).



Most of this is from this discussion on Reddit that I participated in a while ago.


----------



## Miguel (Feb 13, 2019)

Erestor Arcamen said:


> Tolkien never wrote about them being redeemable, but he did write about whether they were evil or not. Towards the end of Letter 153:
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Of the Drúedain, one will speak with them.


----------



## Olorgando (Aug 21, 2019)

Erestor Arcamen said:


> Tolkien never wrote about them being redeemable, but he did write about whether they were evil or not. Towards the end of Letter 153:
> "... (I nearly wrote 'irredeemably bad'; but that would be going too far.) …"


I think, at least from JRRT's point of view, this is the relevant statement. From his devout Catholicism, and the concept of Eru is consistent with this, any ultimate redemption would rest with the ultimate authority. Here even he as legitimate "sub-creator" shied away from a condemnation that would run counter to his deepest real-world beliefs. Few though they may be, there will be Orcs that are redeemable, yes.


----------



## Erestor Arcamen (Aug 22, 2019)

So interesting (hopefully) question. When Aule created the dwarves, they were like robots, only reacting when he thought about them:



> It is told that in their beginning the Dwarves were made by Aulë in the darkness of Middle-earth; for so greatly did Aulë desire the coming of the Children, to have learners to whom he could teach his lore and his crafts, that he was unwilling to await the fulfilment of the designs of Ilúvatar. And Aulë made the Dwarves even as they still are, because the forms of the Children who were to come were unclear to his mind, and because the power of Melkor was yet over the Earth; and he wished therefore that they should be strong and unyielding. But fearing that the other Valar might blame his work, he wrought in secret: and he made first the Seven Fathers of the Dwarves in a hall under the mountains in Middle-earth.
> 
> Now Ilúvatar knew what was done, and in the very hour that Aulë's work was complete, and he was pleased, and began to instruct the Dwarves in the speech that he had devised for them, Ilúvatar spoke to him; and Aulë heard his voice and was silent. And the voice of Ilúvatar said to him: 'Why hast thou done this? Why dost thou attempt a thing which thou knowest is beyond thy power and thy authority? For thou hast from me as a gift thy own bring only, and no more; and therefore the creatures of thy hand and mind can live only by that being, moving when thou thinkest to move them, and if thy thought be elsewhere, standing idle. Is that thy desire?'
> 
> ...



So why wasn't it the same with Orcs? I understand the first ones were mutated elves so maybe they still had the fëa from the elves but wouldn't the descendants be creations of Melkor without Ilúvatar's gift? Or did the fëa somehow keep being transferred as Orcs multiplied?


----------



## Olorgando (Aug 22, 2019)

I vaguely remember several hypotheses ventilated about the Orcs, not sure which of them by JRRT himself and which by others. One went in the direction that Orcs (and Trolls?) were actually animals which Morgoth had managed to give some semblance of the Eruhini – uprated chimpanzees or something like that. Certainly, a very modern variant was that for Morgoth all that genetic engineering we’re seeing nowadays – and then some – should have been a piece of cake. Now that’s definitely not an idea that JRRT could have had.

That some form of “mind control” always was involved with Morgoth and Sauron (and Saruman and the Nazgûl and …) seems pretty clear at the Black Gate of Mordor, when Sauron’s raving-mad minions (not his Easterling and Southron “allies”) suddenly go all limp when Barad-dûr crashes (now *that’s* a level of extrinsic motivation we don’t see any more today – at least I hope so! 😲 ).


----------



## ArwenStar (Sep 25, 2019)

Probably orcs could be redeemable...
They are told by Sauron & Saruman to obey them, and they are not exactly smart...
Who knows? Maybe they are easily imprinted. If an elf dare.... to create an orc.... and tell it to behave like an elf... if it were not bred with malice, it would have a good heart, right???


----------



## Olorgando (Sep 25, 2019)

Well, character (timidity vs. aggressiveness, tameness vs. wildness / shyness) does have a genetic component, as shown at least in animal breeding. There is this decades-long Soviet / Russian breeding experiment starting in 1959, to be found in Wikipedia under “Domesticated red fox”. In the experiment only the tamest foxes of each generation were allowed to breed for the experiment, and became more and more dog-like over time, including getting a Husky-like curled tail (all wild canids have a straight tail, as it is a very important means of communication for them). As a control group, the least-tamable foxes were also bred with each other, becoming even wilder and shyer of humans, if I remember one magazine article correctly.

The same can be said about the difference between wolves and (some) dogs. Wolves have to take care not to get injured, so are quite averse to taking unnecessary risks. By contrast, not a few dogs, including some sled dog breeds, have become downright suicidal in their aggressiveness, as was noted in one documentary about arctic researchers. One of their dogs, despite the researchers trying to call it back, attacked a full-grown polar bear – which was already shambling away from the campsite – and got a single (basically defensive) bite from the bear for its trouble, which proved to be fatal to the dog a short while later.

JRRT often describes the way Orcs attack as pretty much suicidal (perhaps driven by their masters’ mind control?). So, trying to “tame” Orcs, so to speak, could meet with rather limited success.


----------



## Alcuin (Sep 25, 2019)

In a _Letter_ (#71) sent to his son Christopher Tolkien during World War II, who was stationed in South Africa, JRR Tolkien wrote,


> I think the orcs as real a creation as anything in “realistic” fiction: your vigorous words well describe the tribe; only in real life they are on both sides, of course. For “romance” has grown out of “allegory”, and its wars are still derived from the “inner war” of allegory in which good is on one side and various modes of badness on the other. In real (exterior) life men are on both sides: which means a motley alliance of orcs, beasts, demons, plain naturally honest men, and angels. But it does make some difference who are your captains and whether they are orc-like per se! And what it is all about (or thought to be). It is even in this world possible to be (more or less) in the wrong or in the right.


----------

