Ar-Pharazôn

“We Look towards Númenor That Was, and Beyond to Elvenhome That Is, and To That Which is Beyond Elvenhome and Will Ever Be”. Faramir Prepares to Eat in The Divine Presence.

/ stephencwinter / 2 Comments

The Two Towers by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991, 2007) pp. 882-884

While on the journey to Henneth Annûn, Faramir had spoken to Frodo and Sam about his love for the memory, the ancientry, the beauty and the present wisdom of the city of the Men of Númenor, Minas Tirith, and his desire, therefore, to defend that city against Sauron, the Lord of Darkness. Faramir lives in a big world and before he sits to eat with his guests and his men he leads them all in a simple ceremony in which all stand and face west “in a moment of silence”.

This is the only ceremony that takes place throughout the entirety of The Lord of the Rings until the crowning of the High King of Gondor and of Arnor. There might be an argument to be made that the peoples of Middle-earth are ritually malnourished, an argument that could be made about the West in our own time, but Tolkien had good reason not to give his secondary creation a ritual structure. His creation was a mythical history of our own world but in a world before the incarnation of Christ, the True Myth as he famously explained to C.S Lewis, the moment in which myth and history became one in first century Palestine.

Faramir remembers “Elvenhome that is” as depicted by Alan Lee.

His anxiety was that any attempt to create a ritual life for his sub-creation would at best be inadequate and at worst idolatrous. There is only one place of worship built in the whole of Tolkien’s legendarium and that was built by Ar-Pharazôn, the last king of Númenor, for the worship of Morgoth because Ar-Pharazôn had been seduced by Sauron who had convinced him that Morgoth was the ultimate power of the universe. So the only place of worship was idolatrous and rejected by Elendil, the Elf-friend, and his followers, of whom Faramir was a descendant.

So when Faramir leads his men in a moment of ritual before they sit to eat it is done in silence so that there can be no danger of idolatry, the worship of that which is false. But this does not mean that there is no content to the ceremony and when Faramir explains it to Frodo he shows him the world in which he lives.

“We look towards Númenor that was, and beyond to Elvenhome that is, and to that which is beyond Elvenhome and will ever be.”

Númenor is the memory and the ancientry of which Faramir spoke upon the way. While the Númenor of Ar-Pharazôn was destroyed by a great wave by Eru Ilúvatar at the end of the Second Age Elendil escaped with his followers to Middle-earth and created there the kingdoms of Gondor and Arnor. Elendil honoured the ancient friendship that the Númenorians had enjoyed with the Elves, a friendship that meant that he fought alongside Gil-galad in the last great alliance between Elves and Men that overthrew Sauron taking the Ring from his hand. Faramir recognises this as he speaks of Elvenhome that is, Valinor that lies beyond the wreck of Númenor.

And he also recognises “that which is beyond Elvenhome and will ever be”. He recognises God, Eru Ilúvatar, the source of all being and life. Later when he takes Éowyn into his arms for the very first time he tells her of the wave that destroyed Númenor. In doing this he shows that he understands that Eru had intervened once directly in the affairs of Arda and also feels that something similar has just happened at the moment in which the Ring has gone to the Fire.

Frodo feels “strangely rustic and untutored” when Faramir explains all this to him. He recognises that Faramir lives in a bigger world than he does. Faramir probably lives in a bigger world than any of his men but because they honour him as their leader so too they honour his inner life and that which he believes. He is the greatest holder of the memory, the ancientry, the beauty and the present wisdom of his people. One man holds all of this, a fragile link with it all, but the world in which Faramir lives is not held by him. He is held by it as are his men and his people whether they do so consciously or not. Soon Faramir’s world will be assaulted by the darkness and tested to its very limits. It will stand, not because of its own might, but because of that which stands beneath, around and within it, and will hold it even and especially in its darkest moments.

We Are Not Bound For Ever to the Circles of the World, and Beyond Them There is More Than Memory. The Death of Aragorn and Arwen.

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When Arwen made her choice it was with the greatest of men standing before her in his glory. It was Aragorn that she chose even as she bade the twilight farewell. But Elrond knew that the day would come at the ending when her choice would seem hard.

The years of Aragorn’s life were long beyond that of his people. He was a Númenorean in whom the blood of kings ran true “yet at last he felt the approach of old age and knew that the span of his life-days was drawing to an end, long though it had been.”

This was the point in his existence at which Ar-Pharazôn, the last king of Númenor, sought to grasp hold of immortality for himself by launching an invasion of the Undying Lands. He believed that the Valar withheld the gift of immortality from Men and gave it to Elves maliciously. Indeed he believed that his own mortality and death was a kind of punishment. And although the followers of Elendil rejected Ar-Pharazôn’s rebellion, in the years of Gondor’s decline they too did all that they could to extend their lives. It was Pippin who gazed in wonder at the great stone city of Minas Tirith even as it was falling into decay with empty houses in every street. “They were silent, and no footsteps rang on their wide pavements, nor voice was heard in their halls, nor any face looked out from door or empty window.”

So Aragorn reaches the moment in life in which a choice must be made. He could choose the sullen resentment of Gondor in its long decline and do all that lay within his considerable power to extend his existence for as long as possible. Or he might even choose the way of rebellion as did Ar-Pharazôn or the Witch King of Angmar. But he chooses to embrace his mortality and not to rail against it.

When Arwen realises that she is about to lose Aragorn she suddenly understands the bitterness of Ar-Pharazôn and pities him. “If this is indeed, as the Eldar say, the gift of the One to Men, it is bitter to receive.”

Aragorn recognises that this is the greatest of tests but he bids her not to be overthrown at it who renounced both the Shadow and the Ring long before. “In sorrow we must go, but not in despair. Behold! we are not bound for ever to the circles of the world, and beyond them is more than memory.”

In the early years of the church the Fathers taught that the life of faith begins with the renunciation of despair. This is the great renunciation that opens the way for the daily embrace of goodness, beauty and truth. It is a way that looks the reality of our mortality full in the face and chooses not to be afraid. It is a dying before we die but it is a choice to live. It is the choice not to hold onto life until it becomes stretched out thin. Théoden made this choice when he stepped out of his chair in which he had been withering away and embraced life after the manner of his glorious ancestors. Gollum, on the other hand,  chose the misery of endless existence. Denethor expressed his despair through suicide trying to take Faramir with him. Aragorn turns his face courageously to his mortality and trusts the One who calls him. He does not know what lies ahead. He does not know his own destiny but trusts that love and goodness have the last word.

Arwen is heartbroken at her loss and she is not so sure. Yet she too embraces the mortality that was her choice laying herself to rest on the hill of Cerin Amroth where she chose Aragorn long ago. In a comment on last week’s blog post Tom Hillman suggested that Arwen’s choice might open the door for her people to a destiny that lies beyond the circles of the world. It is a beautiful thought that seems to me to be in keeping with a divine consummation that will unite all things earthly and heavenly. Faery will enrich Humanity and Humankind will open the way to Faery. Of course Tolkien was looking forward to the Incarnation in his great legendarium. The tale of Aragorn and Arwen points to this more than any of his tales. It is a tale of sorrow but not despair and it draws us into its hope even as Arwen’s last words to Aragorn are the calling of the name of his youth, “Estel, Estel!”

Hope! Hope!

Aragorn Commands The Steward of Gondor, “Do now thy office!”

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It was in the year 2050 of the Third Age that Eärnur, the last king of Gondor, rode to Minas Morgul in answer to the challenge of the Witch-King, the Lord of the Nazgûl. No tale was ever told of a battle between them but Eärnur was never seen again. He had no heir but the people of Gondor chose not to make a member of another family their king but to wait for the king’s return. They chose a Steward to govern them “to hold rod and rule in the name of the king, until he shall return”.

A thousand years passed before the War of the Ring and the downfall of Sauron during which the Stewards of the line of Mardil did their office. In all but name they were kings of Gondor but they never sat upon the throne or wore the crown. Tolkien remarks that although “some remembered the ancient line of the north”, the descendants of Elendil and Isildur of the kingdom of Arnor, the Ruling Stewards “hardened their hearts” against a true return of the king. Denethor may have told Boromir that only in places of “less royalty” could a steward have claimed the throne but as we saw in his last days he regarded Aragorn as an upstart. At the end of his life he cried out to Gandalf, “I will not bow down to such a one, last of a ragged house long bereft of lordship and dignity”.

Faramir saw things differently. It was one of the many ways in which he was divided from his father. Faramir may have been tutored by Gandalf, just as Aragorn was, but Gandalf could only teach him because he was already captured by the story of Númenor. There were effectively two stories of Númenor. Perhaps there are always these stories in every human enterprise. One was the story of the desire for power and a growing bitterness about everything that constrained them. At last all the bitterness about these constraints was concentrated upon anger about mortality and about the divinities, the Valar, who seemed to hold life unjustly as a private possession. The Valar, the governors or stewards of Earth on behalf of Illuvatar, the One, became through this belief as no more in the eyes of the kings of Númenor than rivals for power. Sadly this was the story that Denethor nourished in his heart and why he ended his life in despair and denial.

The other story, the story to which both Faramir and Aragorn gave their loyalty, was to Númenor as a gift. The first families of Men who wandered across the mountains into Beleriand in the First Age were befriended by and allied themselves to the Elves in the wars against Morgoth and the darkness. It was because of their faithfulness in those wars that they were given Númenor as a gift. So friendship and faithfulness lay at the heart of this other story and a submission also to the mystery of mortality. While the later kings of Númenor became embittered by this mystery, Elendil the Elf-friend and his followers chose to accept the mystery of mortality as a gift just as Númenor’s separation from the Undying Lands was also a gift.

We live in times in which the limitation of mortality is resented even as it was by Ar-Pharazôn, the last king of Númenor. Recently Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla, argued that humans can only remain “economically viable” as cyborgs while Ray Kurzweil, the director of engineering at Google, argues for human immortality by digital means believing that it will be a possibility by the 2030s. The philosopher, John Gray, describes these immortalizers as “the God-builders”.

Who is faithful to the true story of Númenor, the mystery of mortality, as a gift, as Aragorn and Faramir are? Who awaits the coming of the true king? It is because Faramir nourished his longing for the return of the king in his heart that on the great day when Aragorn comes to Minas Tirith to claim the crown that he is willing to be a true steward and to lay his ruling authority down. It is because of his faithfulness that renewal comes to Gondor.

“Do now thy office!”