# Galadrial as Christ...okay, this is a new one.



## Firawyn (Dec 31, 2009)

I was talking to a fellow Tolkien nerd the other day, who is not on TTF but I told him he aught to be... 


And he told me about somewhere he heard people talking about the idea that Galadrial's temptation with the Ring of power, was comparable to Christ being tempted in the wilderness. 

I can see the idea...that in both cases it was a test before they would be able to "ascend", so to speak.

Any thoughts on this one? I couldn't recall this particular idea ever being discussed here...and I'm an antique here, according to some.


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## HLGStrider (Dec 31, 2009)

Interesting, but once you get past "they were both temptations" the similarity ends there. For one thing Christ's temptation was to prove that he could remain sinless in the face of the extraordinary. Galadriel's was a second chance. She needed to prove that she had put aside the pride of her youth and could turn down power when presented with it. 

That said, temptation is a big theme in Christianity, so I'm sure as a Catholic it would've been part of Tolkien's worldview. Even when you aren't trying to represent your worldview, it does effect what you see as "dramatic" or what you feel will provide closure to a situation. Galadriel's temptation provides dramatic closure.


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## Alcuin (Dec 31, 2009)

Frodo “tempted” Gandalf as well as Galadriel, and in much the same spirit in “Shadow of the Past” in _FotR_:


> You are wise and powerful. Will you not take the Ring?


It was not so much that Frodo himself tempted Gandalf, but rather the Ring that tempted Gandalf. Virtually the same words come out of Frodo’s mouth when he offers the Ring to Galadriel:


> You are wise and fearless and fair, Lady Galadriel… I will give you the One Ring, if you ask for it. It is too great a matter for me.


Yet Frodo was reluctant to show the Ring to Bilbo and the Council of Elrond; he virtually accused Sam of theft when his faithful servant revealed that he had rescued it in the Tower of Cirith Ungol. 

There is one other time when Frodo willingly gives up the Ring: to Tom Bombadil. And note Tom’s demand, calling it “the precious Ring”,


> “Show me the precious Ring!” [noparse][Tom][/noparse] said suddenly...: and Frodo, to his own astonishment, drew out the chain from his pocket, and unfastening the Ring handed it at once to Tom.


Tom did not fear the Ring or worry that it might gain dominance over him: he had renounced power. That might be a point of discussion here or in another thread; but Galadriel had not renounced worldly power when Frodo offered her the Ring. Gandalf declined to accept it, perceiving that he would dare to use it in desperation, and so fall. Saruman, who never even saw it, was overcome by lust for power, and fell without coming into physical contact with it. 

Note the difference with Aragorn. 


> “…If I was after the Ring, I could have it – NOW!”
> 
> He stood up, and seemed suddenly to grow taller. In his eyes gleamed a light, keen and commanding.
> 
> …he said, … “I am Aragorn son of Arathorn; and if by life or death I can save you, I will.”


Frodo did not offer Aragorn the Ring, even at the Council, though he expected Aragorn to demand it:


> “…it belongs to you, and not to me at all!” cried Frodo … as if he expected the Ring to be demanded at once.
> 
> “It does not belong to either of us,” said Aragorn; “but it has been ordained that you should hold it for a while.”


Aragorn’s responses in Bree and Rivendell reveal that he understands the situation regarding “ownership” of the Ring, possession of the Ring, and possession _by_ the Ring. He is both King of the Númenóreans and the adopted son of Elrond of Rivendell, and his wisdom and insight preclude is claiming the Ring. He has authority of his own, and like Bombadil, will not step outside the bounds set for him. But Frodo never _offered_ him the Ring, and seemed alarmed when he thought Aragorn might claim it.

The encounter with Faramir parallels that with Aragorn. Sam begins by losing control of his tongue,


> “Boromir … wanted the Enemy's Ring!”
> 
> …said Faramir, … “So that is the answer to all the riddles! The One Ring that was thought to have perished from the world. And Boromir tried to take it by force? And you escaped? And ran all the way – to me! … A chance for Faramir, Captain of Gondor, to show his quality! Ha!” He stood up, very tall and stern, his grey eyes glinting.
> 
> …“Alas for Boromir! It was too sore a trial!” he said. … “…I am not such a man. Or I am wise enough to know that there are some perils from which a man must flee. …”


Faramir, faithful Steward of the Faithful Dúnedain of Gondor, proved himself there. His reaction to the Ring is very like that of Aragorn’s. But as with Aragorn, Frodo was not willing to part with the Ring: he fumbled for his sword. 

Boromir failed at the test, as his brother Faramir observed. He redeemed himself by obeying Aragorn’s order to protect Merry and Pippin; it cost him his life. Denethor, like Saruman, fell prey to lust for power without ever coming into contact with the Ring; his end was quite different from both his elder son’s and Saruman’s. Unlike Boromir, he refused to accept Aragorn’s rule and so died (unredeemed?) in willful defiance of the rightful king. 

The point: the Ring did not seek to possess Aragorn or Faramir, or else they were not vulnerable to its lure of lust for power. Elrond either was not vulnerable to its temptation (he never sought rule in Middle-earth), or else his temptation is not revealed to the reader. Gandalf quickly and forcibly rejected it. Galadriel was truly tempted: in the past, she had sought power in Middle-earth (at least according Tolkien’s older tellings of her tale in the two or three decades prior to 1970), and it was only with effort based upon deliberate intent that she rejected it. The cost of rejection was her ambitions, her pride, her dreams of glory; her reward was redemption and permission to return to her home.


> …she was shrunken: a slender elf-woman, … whose gentle voice was soft and sad.
> 
> “I pass the test,” she said. “I will diminish, and go into the West and remain Galadriel.”


The Ring was a test for the Wise: Saruman, Boromir, and Denethor fell, but Boromir was willing to renounce himself and his ambitions, and found redemption. Aragorn, Faramir, and Bombadil were not tempted: they remained within the bounds set for them. Bombadil not only rejected the Ring, he showed Frodo that its potency had limitations. Likewise, Samwise (his name means “Half-wise”) twice rejected the Ring, recognizing the vision of “Samwise the Strong” as a deception, then willingly returning it to Frodo; such action made him, as Aragorn said in his letter in the “Epilogue” (_Sauron Defeated_), “Master Samwise who ought to be called Full-wise”. Gandalf vigorously and immediately rejected it. Galadriel rejected it, but seemed truly tempted; only by explicitly rejecting power was she able to overcome temptation, a rejection that left her visibly “shrunken: a slender elf-woman, … whose gentle voice was soft and sad.” Those who passed the test received reward: peaceful death, return to the Uttermost West. Those who failed met other ends. 

The Ring seems to have _sought_ powerful keepers. Though surprised in both cases, Frodo was unwilling to surrender the Ring to Aragorn or Faramir. He resisted Boromir. But in the cases of Gandalf and Galadriel, he _offered_ it to them. Bombadil was bold enough to ask for it, and “Frodo, to his own astonishment, … handed it at once to Tom.” It was the Ring, I think, that delivered itself to Tom, and the Ring that urged him to offer it up to Gandalf and Galadriel. 

On the other hand, when Gollum – and even Bilbo and Sam – approached Frodo, Frodo reacted violently. The Ring itself may have rejected another “weak” bearer.

The One Ring inspired lust for itself and for power: that was part of its design: it was “The Precious.” This inspired lust preserved it by Isildur’s hand when Gil-galad and Elendil defeated Sauron. Sméagol killed Déagol for it, and tried to kill both Frodo and Sam. Boromir was briefly willing to kill Frodo for it near Parth Galen. Saruman was willing to betray all Middle-earth to have it; killing his friend Gandalf would have been a small price, though Gandalf believed he was to be sent to Mordor. 

The Ring preferred stronger keepers to weaker ones. And I think the Ring’s preference, acting through Frodo, caused him to immediately hand it to Bombadil and willingly offer it to both Gandalf and Galadriel.

That does not make Galadriel a Christ-figure: Christians would reply that all of us are subject to temptation. Rather, it reveals the Ring as a source of evil in and of itself. As Elrond told Boromir at the Council, 


> It … is altogether evil.


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## Turgon (Jan 1, 2010)

Great post Alcuin!

It's a strange thing then that the Ring seemed willing to offer itself to Gandalf and Galadriel when they, had they taken the Ring, were potential rivals for Sauron and could have replaced him as Dark Lord. Whereas Boromir, who would have served the Ring's purpose better, is rejected. Whether Boromir had kept the Ring himself or surrendered it to Denethor I have the feeling it would have found its way to Sauron in the end. In that respect it seems as if the Ring is working against its purpose of returning to its rightful master. Unless the Ring somehow 'knew' of what was spoken at the Council and realised Frodo was taking it to Mordor?


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## Confusticated (Jan 1, 2010)

This brings up the old question, is the ring sentient.

Perhaps it only wanted Sauron for its own glory. It being an evil tyrannical thing, could not have know loyalty. Might have came up against its master the instant it had no fear of him?


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## Astrance (Jan 1, 2010)

And there's another question, too : could Sauron have been able to _create_ a sentient thing ?
Remember how Morgoth never _created_ the Orcs, only twisted and corrupted existent beings. In the legendarium, only Eru has the power to fully create something.

However, Aulë did create the Dwarves — and the Father of the Dwarves had a will and a mind of their own, because they cried when Aulë tried to smite them with his hammer. So maybe it would be possible to create a being or a thing with a mind and an independent conscience. However, since Eru was already having a chat with Aulë about the aforesaid bearded ones, maybe he had just granted them free will...

But even if we were to suppose no one, however mighty, could create a sentient thing, maybe the One Ring just bore a part of Sauron's mind. Sauron being evil and treacherous himself, he would have been unable to put any seed of loyalty in the wretched thing. That's more the way I see it — evil being evil towards himself, because it's, well, evil.


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## Ithrynluin (Jan 1, 2010)

A related note, copied from this thread:

Another interesting piece of information, linking Galadriel to Christian images of the Virgin Mary:



> Father Roben Murray, grandson of Sir James Murray (the founder of the Oxford English Dictionary) and a close friend of the Tolkien family, had read pan of The Lord of the Rings in galley-proofs and typescript, and had, at Tolkien's instigation, sent comments and criticism. He wrote that the book left him with a strong sense of 'a positive compatibility with the order of Grace', and compared the image of Galadriel to that of the Virgin Mary. He doubted whether many critics would be able to make much of the book – 'they will not have a pigeon-hole neatly labelled for it'





> For instance I was born in 1892 and lived for my early years in 'the Shire' in a pre-mechanical age. Or more important, I am a Christian (which can be deduced from my stories), and in fact a Roman Catholic. The latter 'fact' perhaps cannot be deduced; though one critic (by letter) asserted that the invocations of Elbereth, and the character of Galadriel as directly described (or through the words of Gimli and Sam) were clearly related to Catholic devotion to Mary. Another saw in waybread (lembas)= viaticum and the reference to its feeding the will (vol. III, p. 213) and being more potent when fasting, a derivation from the Eucharist. (That is: far greater things may colour the mind in dealing with the lesser things of a fairy-story.)





> I was particularly interested in your remarks about Galadriel. .... I think it is true that I owe much of this character to Christian and Catholic teaching and imagination about Mary, but actually Galadriel was a penitent: in her youth a leader in the rebellion against the Valar (the angelic guardians). At the end of the First Age she proudly refused forgiveness or permission to return. She was pardoned because of her resistance to the final and overwhelming temptation to take the Ring for herself.



This is from the Letters, but I forget which one (don't have them with me).


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## Firawyn (Jan 1, 2010)

Nóm said:


> This brings up the old question, is the ring sentient.
> 
> Perhaps it only wanted Sauron for its own glory. It being an evil tyrannical thing, could not have know loyalty. Might have came up against its master the instant it had no fear of him?



You guys must have talked this one out a LONG time ago because this is the first I've heard of it. I never really considered the idea of the Ring being sentient, but now that I think of it....


Okay, I know some of you are Trek fans so at least some of you will understand my comparison here. In Star Trek, the Next Generation, there's an episode called "Skin of Evil", in which Tasha Yar is killed by a creature called Armus, who was, basically, all that was evil in a race of titans that lived on the planet Vagra II...

So here's what I'm thinking. Perhaps the Ring of Power was like Armus...all that was evil in Sauron, bound into the form of a ring. We know Sauron was a Maia once upon a time, so we know he wasn't just born evil. He was corrupted by Melkor. What if the Ring was made by Sauron not only for the sake of the power it would provide, but also for the containment and therefore assurance that his evilness would linger on, even if he was destroyed physically...

Any Harry Potter fans here seeing where JKRowling might have pulled the idea for Horcruxes from? 

That is my thought on the matter.




*points at self* Nerd Alert.


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## Alcuin (Jan 1, 2010)

_(So long it’s broken into two parts. Here’s part 1…)_



Sharkey said:


> This is from the Letters, but I forget which one (don't have them with me).



The first quote is from the introduction to _Letter_ 142. The second is from _Letter_ 213. The third is all that is published of _Letter_ 320. 

The first citation relates that in a letter to Tolkien, family friend Father Murray compared Galadriel to the Virgin Mary

In the second quotation, Tolkien does not attribute a connection between Elbereth or Galadriel and the Virgin Mary, or between lembas and Eucharist. Rather he reports that some readers who had written to him made those connections. 

In the third citation, Tolkien observes that Galadriel is not an allusion to the Virgin Mary, but as you cite, “a penitent: … a leader in the rebellion against the Valar... [noparse][/noparse]he proudly refused forgiveness… She was pardoned because of her resistance to the final and overwhelming temptation to take the Ring for herself.” Hence her statement to Frodo, “I will diminish, and go into the West and remain Galadriel.”

From this we can deduce that had Galadriel taken the Ring, she would have ceased to be Galadriel: she would have consumed by the Ring: it would have possessed her rather than she possessing it. Worse for her, Tolkien says (in _Letter_ 246, which has an extensive discussion on the matter) that even with the Ring, 


> …only Gandalf might be expected to master [noparse][Sauron][/noparse] – being an emissary of the Powers and a creature of the same order…
> 
> …Galadriel conceived of herself as capable of wielding the Ring and supplanting the Dark Lord. … It was part of the essential deceit of the Ring to fill minds with imaginations of supreme power. _[noparse][Cf: Sam and his vision of “Samwise the Strong”.][/noparse]_
> 
> … the Ring and all its works would have endured. It would have been the master in the end.


I think Tolkien is implying that Galadriel’s imagining that she could supplant Sauron was a “deceit of the Ring”. 



Firawyn said:


> You guys must have talked this one out a LONG time ago because this is the first I've heard of it. I never really considered the idea of the Ring being sentient, but now that I think of it....


Whether or not the Ring was sentient is an old argument that, ten years ago or so, raged as a flame war in rec.arts.books.tolkien. The heated debate between Steuard Jensen and Michael Martinez is particularly well-known. (Jensen’s recitation of the thread is here.) Other examples can be found, many right here on TTF (this list of TTF threads on the subject is by no means exhaustive):


Can the Ring think
Is the Ring a Passive Device?
The Ring Speaks?, whether Frodo or the Ring (as the “Wheel of Fire”) remonstrated Gollum on Mount Doom
For myself, I do not regard the Ring as sentient. Tolkien himself called it “a machine” in _Letter_ 131 (the longest of the letters, written to publisher Milton Waldman). In part of his description, he says that _The Lord of the Rings_


> …is mainly concerned with Fall, Mortality, and the Machine. … these … lead to the desire for Power, for making the will more quickly effective, – and so to the Machine (or Magic). By the last I intend all use of external plans or devices (apparatus) instead of development of the inherent inner powers or talents — or even the use of these talents with the corrupted motive of dominating: bulldozing the real world, or coercing other wills. The Machine is … more closely related to Magic than is usually recognized.


Tolkien uses the word to describe lembas, too, since we’ve touched on that subject (_Letter_ 210), as well as the Eagles (same letter). I was going to elide (use three dots to represent skipping text, “…”) “By the last I intend all use … coercing other wills” in the quotation to avoid all the grief of typing, but I think it is very important to this discussion. Other things in the story qualify as machines, too, but the Ring is quite clearly an “external … device … with the corrupted motive of dominating … or coercing other wills.” 

The argument might be presented that, although a “machine”, the Ring might still be sentient: after all, Tolkien used the same word in _Letter_ 210 to describe lembas and Eagles, and the Eagles are alive. However, I think that in _Letter_ 210, which is a (scathing) critique of Morton Grady Zimmerman’s proposed screenplay for _ Lord of the Rings_, the word “machine” refers to a plot device, while in _Letter_ 131, he is discussing something far more profound: Man’s rebellion “against the laws of the Creator” (which is elided from the quotation I gave). In this context, we must include the Elves’ rebelling “against the laws of the Creator”, too, and I think that is what the Rings of Power represent: the Elves trying to prevent their fate in Arda (i.e., their “fading”) from progressing, and so falling prey to Sauron’s necromancy through the Rings. (We cannot suppose that any of the Rings of Power were originally intended for Men by the Elves of Hollin who made them.) 

I am of the opinion that the Ring is comparable to a highly sophisticated computer. It _appears_ sentient, but it isn’t. The _will_ and _power_ behind it, however, are Sauron’s own, full of his evil purpose. While the Ring lasts, Sauron cannot be vanquished (unless a new Ring-lord was able to keep it from him; Tolkien seems to say in _Letter_ 246 that only Gandalf (or, by implication, Saruman) had the power to retain the Ring if Sauron himself confronted him). Sauron put in it “best part of the strength that was native to him in his beginning,” according to Gandalf (_RotK_, “Last Debate”), but Elrond said at the Council that strength was “altogether evil”. Only another Maia might overcome Sauron’s dominance of the bearer through the Ring – so even Galadriel could not keep it from its maker –, but the taint of evil was so great, even Gandalf would have become evil. 

The Ring can make itself known to its servants if they are looking for it: think internet _ping_. (E.g., the Woody End, the Prancing Pony in Bree, the chase across Eriador, the near-encounter on the bridge to Minas Morgul.) It tries to reveal itself by causing its wearer to put it on. (E.g., Woody End, Weathertop, Minas Morgul, and Sammath Naur.) Its servants may be able to influence a Mortal through it by manipulating him or his surroundings. (E.g., when Frodo fell in the Prancing Pony in Bree.) It deludes bearers and potential bearers with dreams of power. (E.g., Boromir, Galadriel, “Samwise the Strong”, “_The_ Gollum”.) Of course, this last may simply be an extension of Sauron’s own warped personality: he does appear to have been something of a megalomaniac. But the _ping_ing character and the inducement to put on the Ring when it is least in a bearer’s best interests – not to mention its primary protective/defensive mechanism, _“My Precious”_ (which might also be an extension of Sauron’s personal feelings toward it), are all very similar to computer programs. By that I mean that the Ring responds to situations with in reasonably predictable patterns: Frodo was not at all surprised to see his hand move toward the Ring when the Witch-king crossed the bridge at Minas Morgul: he could not prevent it until he touched the Phial of Galadriel, which was full of the light of a Silmaril, a more potent power than the evil Ring. All through Mordor it beat on his psyche without ceasing.


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## Alcuin (Jan 1, 2010)

_( Here’s part 2…)_

Compare Tolkien’s observation about machinery and magic to Arthur C. Clark’s Third Law of Prediction (which is often attributed to Isaac Asimov):

> _Tolkien:_ The Machine is … more closely related to Magic than is usually recognized.





> _ Clark:_ Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.


I think the Ring, which is not a mere plot device but rather the dingus that has to be smuggled (or delivered) in the Quest story, is a Machine, not a person. But the personality and character of its maker and rightful owner – in this sense, Bilbo and Frodo really are thieves, withholding from Sauron what is rightfully his to prevent him from taking what is rightfully hisn’t, namely domination of Middle-earth and its inhabitants, Elves, Dwarves, and Men (and Hobbits) – comes through. Sauron does seem to have had a rather overwhelming personality, and he was, after all, a type of fallen angel, a demon (like the Balrog), and so it should not be wondered that his evil power works his will through his masterwork regardless of who wears the Ring: this is, after all, a fairy-story, a myth. 

But to return at last (after a long and wearying read – my apologies) to the original theme of the thread, I think Varda Elbereth is more symbolic of the Virgin Mary than Galadriel. The Elves made pilgrimages to the Tower Hills to look into the last of the palantíri of Arnor to glimpse her, and it was returning from one of these pilgrimages that Gildor Inglorion and his (Noldorin) companions met Frodo, Sam and Pippin just in time to save them from the Khamûl the Black Easterling in the Woody End. But Tolkien seems inclined to reject that comparison in _Letter_ 213 (quoted by *Sharkey* and recited at the beginning of this post, which is now long ago) along with any comparisons between the Virgin Mary and Galadriel; but the influence seems to be there. * Sharkey* quoted it, and I elide it, 


> I am … in fact a Roman Catholic. The … ‘fact’ perhaps cannot be deduced; though one critic (by letter) asserted that the invocations of Elbereth … (or through the words of Gimli and Sam) were clearly related to Catholic devotion to Mary. Another saw in waybread (lembas) = viaticum and the reference to its feeding the will … and being more potent when fasting, a derivation from the Eucharist. (That is: far greater things may colour the mind in dealing with the lesser things of a fairy-story.)


These things surely _colored Tolkien’s mind_ when he was writing _The Lord of the Rings_. There are a vast number of theological differences between Catholic devotion to Mary and Elvish devotion to Elbereth, but the form Elvish devotion to Elbereth takes in Tolkien’s subcreation strikes one as an echo of the real world.

_ (I hope this was not TLDR for too many of you. If it was, feel free to throw brickbat.)_


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## Aernil (Jan 7, 2010)

Stockholm said:


> However, Aulë did create the Dwarves — and the Father of the Dwarves had a will and a mind of their own, because they cried when Aulë tried to smite them with his hammer. So maybe it would be possible to create a being or a thing with a mind and an independent conscience. However, since Eru was already having a chat with Aulë about the aforesaid bearded ones, maybe he had just granted them free will...



The free will of the dwarves indeed came from Eru, not Aule



> And the voice of Ilúvatar said to him: ...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.
> 
> Then Aulë answered: ...As a child to his father, I offer to thee these things, the work of the hands which thou hast made. Do with them what thou wilt. But should I not rather destroy the work of my presumption?'
> Then Aulë took up a great hammer to smite the Dwarves; and he wept.
> ...


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## Bucky (Jan 14, 2010)

I really don't get this talk of The Ring being 'sentient' as if it 'chose' or 'controlled 'who Frodo would offer itself to or not. There's simply nothing in TLOR text to back this up..........

Gandalf plainly tells Frodo that The Ring was "trying to get back to it's master" when it fell off Gollum's hand, "only to be picked up by the most unlikely person imaginable, Bilbo from the Shire".

Therefore, The Ring was subject to Sauron's call (which Gandalf also said Sauron was exerting) and not it's own decisions.


Just another wild UUT (utterly unsustainable theory). But, a pretty good one at that.

As for Galadriel being an image of Christ in TLOR, as a Christian, I don't see that as much as parts of Gandalf (raised from the dead) Frodo (the selfless sacrifice for other's) Aragorn (The Return of the King through the Pathes of the Dead) and Sam (the suffering servant).


And, for the record, Jesus certainly did not 'ascend' because He suceeded in refusing the temptation of the devil for 40 days.......

He ascended and is seated at the right hand of The Father because He took the penalty for our sins on the cross, was found worthy as a sacrifice for those sins & was raised from the dead.


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