Faramir

“Is There Any Hope? For Frodo, I Mean; Or at Least Mostly for Frodo.” Pippin Wonders if There is Any Hope Remaining.

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The Return of the King by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991) pp. 796-797

After the counsel in the chamber of the Lord of the City all go to their rest and Gandalf and Pippin to the chamber that they share together. And there in the privacy of that room Pippin speaks at last, asking the question that is closest to his heart.

“Tell me,” he said, “is there any hope? For Frodo, I mean; or at least mostly for Frodo.”

Of course, when Pippin says “mostly for Frodo”, what he implies is an unspoken question.

Is there any hope for me? For any of us? And we do not blame him for this. We would all ask the same question. Pippin’s love for Frodo is not diminished in any way by his asking it.

And in his reply Gandalf acknowledges what we have been thinking about in the last few posts. He acknowledges that Denethor is right. He acknowledges that any hope that there has ever been that Frodo will succeed in his mission was foolish. But we will not go back to the alternative that Denethor says could and should have been done, that the Ring should have been brought to Minas Tirith by Faramir and that it should have been hidden there until “the uttermost end of need”. We have considered this and recognised that this too would have been foolish, even wicked, that if the Ring had come to Denethor it would have overthrown his considerable mind and almost certainly would not have prevented Sauron’s inevitable victory.

And so all the alternative there is is two forms of foolishness. So is there any hope?

Gandalf ponders Pippin’s question and, as he does so, he begins to find reasons to go on hoping, reasons that may be smaller than the biggest reason of all, that the Divine Power does not will that Frodo should fail, but big enough to give reason not to give in but to resist.

Sauron has launched his assault upon Minas Tirith before he is ready and while Frodo is still free. Now his attention will not be solely upon the borders of his own land, defending them against any attack, but upon Minas Tirith.

And Gandalf wonders why he is doing this now, and so he thinks back to the Stone of Orthanc that Pippin looked into and which he gave to Aragorn to keep.

“Ah! I wonder. Aragorn? His time draws near. And he is strong and stern underneath, Pippin; bold and determined, able to take his own counsel and dare great risks at need. That may be it. He may have used the Stone and shown himself to the Enemy, challenging him, for this very purpose.”

Indeed, we know that this is precisely what Aragorn has done, and why he has taken the Paths of the Dead, bringing with him the host of Oath Breakers to the port of Pelargir to relieve its defenders from the siege of the Corsairs of Umbar and to bring the fleet at anchor there up the Anduin to aid the defenders of Minas Tirith. This would indeed be a reason for hope but even if Aragorn were to succeed it would only bring a little hope, perhaps very little hope as Denethor will later assert.

And Pippin has one more question. Why have Frodo and Sam taken up with Gollum of all the creatures in the world, and why are they trying to enter Mordor by way of Cirith Ungol?

“And I could see that Faramir did not like the place he was taking them to any more than you do. What is wrong?”

And here at last Gandalf comes, in his response, closer to the greatest cause for hope of all. For even though he fears the way that Frodo and Sam have taken with their treacherous guide he must acknowledge that he does not know a better way. There is no better way. All ways into Mordor are defended and unassailable, or if they are less defended it would take so long to achieve as to render any success almost meaningless for there will be nothing to return to.

So, there is no hope except for the greatest hope of all, that a power greater than any upon Arda has willed that through the most unlikely of all means, by means of a treacherous guide, Frodo and Sam should achieve their task. But to desire this end is almost too much for anyone without falling into the most terrible pride or complacency. The best way remains to take one brave small step and then another.

“There are evil days ahead. To sleep while we may.”

“A Fool’s Hope”. Denethor’s Reflections on Frodo’s Mission to Take the Ring to Mount Doom.

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The Return of the King by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991) pp. 793-796

Let us begin these thoughts by acknowledging one thing. Denethor is right. Frodo’s mission to take the Ring to the fires of Mount Doom is “a fool’s hope”. There is almost no possibility that he will succeed. For such a thing to happen the most unlikely succession of events would have to take place, so unlikely that we might as well say now that there is no chance of success.

Let us imagine a few possibilities. Let us imagine that Frodo is left paralysed by a monster so terrible that no creature has ever escaped her grasp. Then let us imagine that a company of orcs carry his body into their fortress who then slaughter each over the spoils that they find upon him. And then let us imagine that somehow he is able to stagger across Mordor which now resembles something like a vast military encampment. And then at the end, at Mount Doom, let us imagine that his most bitter enemy attacks and takes the Ring from him before falling into the abyss of the fiery mountain and destroying it.

If anyone ever imagined that such a thing could happen, if anyone were ever to plan such a thing, or anything like that, then we would have to call that person a fool. Or even worse than a fool. For to make such a plan would surely be something more akin to a very cruel joke. A joke that would be at the expense first of all of Frodo and Sam, and then at the expense of the whole world.

No, Denethor is right. When Gandalf asks him what his wisdom is we hear these words; and these words are true.

“Enough to perceive that there are two follies to avoid. To use this thing is perilous. At this hour, to send it in the hands of a witless halfling into the land of the Enemy himself, as you have done, and this son of mine, this is madness.”

These words are true. But there are certain reflections that we must make regarding what Denethor says. We agree with him about the madness of Frodo’s mission. And we agree that to use the Ring is perilous. But now we must debate with him a little further.

Let us begin with the words, “witless halfling” and set aside our reaction, even in poor Pippin’s presence, to the insult to hobbits that Denethor makes, and consider that word, witless.

The Oxford Professor of ancient languages who wrote this word knew far more than just the way in which we use it in common parlance today. He knew that it means far more than just being another word for stupid. He knew that our Old English forebears understood wit as being linked to our ability to see. Someone without wit would be therefore someone who was either incapable of seeing or someone who chose not to do so. And here we go back to the Council of Elrond when the wise decided to take a course of action that was beyond seeing, not because it was the best course of action, but because there was nothing else that they could do.

And here we must give consideration to that other word that Denethor uses, the use of the word, perilous. And here we see that beneath Denethor’s wisdom there lies something darker. For to describe a course of action as perilous is not the same thing as to dismiss it altogether. We might choose to enter a burning building in order to rescue a child knowing that what we do is perilous, but we choose to do it because it is the right thing to do. And as soon as we hear Denethor use that word we know that he thinks that there might be circumstances, perilous perhaps, in which he might use the Ring. We have returned to the words that we considered in the last piece on this blog, the words, “uttermost end of need”. And now we know that Denethor has already considered the circumstances in which he would use the Ring, and we know that these circumstances are inevitable. That the “uttermost end of need” will most certainly come.

And so we have these two words, witless and perilous. We must choose between them. We must choose between a course of action whose end we cannot possibly see, and a course of action that is entirely inevitable. And suddenly we know that we must do all we can to turn our backs upon the inevitable and to throw away our lives in doing the unforeseeable. We must do as Gandalf does, and this son of Denethor, and allow a witless hobbit to go into Mordor to do the impossible.

“If You Had Received This Thing, It Would Have Overthrown You.” Because Denethor Desires the Victory of Gondor Above Everything He Has Not the Strength to Resist the Ring.

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The Return of the King by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991) pp. 793-796

In the last piece on this blog I thought about how Faramir refused to think of the struggle against Sauron simply in terms of winning and losing. For him it was not enough just to want the victory of Gondor. If Gondor were to win by doing evil, for Faramir this would not be a victory worth having. A victory achieved by evil means would mean that evil would be the victor and good would be defeated.

There have been many critics of Tolkien’s work who have dismissed it as a nothing more than a struggle between good and evil, as if such a struggle is merely something banal, and nothing that is at all noteworthy. I suspect that they never read this scene with its debate between father and son, between Denethor and Faramir. For once you have understood the debate it becomes so much harder to say something like, “my country right or wrong”.

We first saw the debate in Faramir when he first met Frodo and Sam. When once he had satisfied himself that the hobbits were not servants of the enemy, or that they had been involved in some way in the death of Boromir, his brother, he began to share with them his own personal philosophy recognising perhaps, particularly in Frodo, one who might be a friend to his soul, to the deepest level of his being. Perhaps it was the same thing that led Goldberry to recognise Frodo as an “Elf-friend”.

And in sharing his personal philosophy we learnt this. That Faramir had no desire merely for Gondor’s greatness. Of course he works for victory, but this is how he understands it.

“I would see the White Tree in flower again in the courts of the kings, and the Silver Crown return, and Minas Tirith in peace: Minas Anor again as of old, full of light, high and fair, beautiful as a queen among other queens: not a mistress of many slaves, nay not even a kind mistress of willing slaves… I would have her loved for her memory, her ancientry, her beauty, and her present wisdom”.

I hope that you noticed that phrase: “Not a mistress of many slaves, nay not even a kind mistress of many slaves”. This is so far from his father’s philosophy. It is so far from, “my country right or wrong”.

Denethor may say that he knows that to use the Ring is perilous. He is no fool and has insight into the malignant power of the Ring. But he overestimates his own power to master it. What would he do with the Ring?

“It should have been kept, hidden, hidden dark and deep. Not used, I say, unless at the uttermost end of need”.

And with those words, “the uttermost end of need” we see how Denethor would inevitably fall were the Ring to come to him. We know that Denethor would inevitably judge at some point in the war that the “uttermost end of need” had indeed come. He would judge that defeat was inevitable. Indeed he has almost reached this point already. Then he would take the Ring and attempt to use it against its maker, but his strength would not be enough. Neither strength to use the Ring to defeat the Enemy, nor strength to master the Ring itself and not to mastered by it. As Gandalf says to him:

“You are strong and can still in some matters govern yourself, Denethor; yet if you had received this thing, it would have overthrown you. Were it buried beneath the roots of Mindolluin, still it would burn your mind away, as the darkness grows, and the yet worse things follow that soon shall come upon us.”

Even now, the Ring is burning Denethor’s mind away, even though he does not possess it, just as it burns Saruman’s mind, and Gollum’s for that matter. Simply the desire to possess it and to possess the power that it can give is enough. It is this that is slowly overthrowing Denethor and which Faramir has overcome because Faramir has already won the great victory. He has chosen what is the highest and the best, what is good and beautiful and true.

“Ever Your Desire is To Appear Lordly and Generous as a King of Old”. Is This True of Faramir? What is The Difference Between Appearance and Reality?

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The Return of The King by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991) pp. 793-796

The words in this title are spoken by Denethor to Faramir. They are spoken in the private chamber of the Steward of Gondor and as well as Denethor and Faramir, Gandalf and Pippin are present too. That these characters should be gathered together at this meeting is not just a useful plot device. We all know by now that the story that Tolkien tells is almost always told through the eyes of the hobbits. There are very few scenes in the story in which one or another of them is not present. But Denethor has other reasons why he wants a hobbit present now. He is an intelligence gatherer, always seeking to build the most comprehensive picture of events possible. Later on we will learn that this desire almost cripples him as a man of action, but now it is enough to know that Pippin, the halfling out of ” northern legends” needs to be present. Denethor wants him there.

And it is there that he learns, along with Denethor and Gandalf, of Faramir’s encounter with Frodo and Sam in Ithilien, and how, just two days before the hobbits had set off with Gollum as their guide to the Morgul Vale and to Cirith Ungol. Gandalf makes little effort to hide his interest, indeed to hide his concern. It is the welfare of Frodo and Sam that matters most to him at this moment, and with their welfare the welfare of their mission, and the welfare of the world.

Denethor has other concerns. For him the issue that matters most is the welfare of Gondor. How can Gondor survive the attack that it is about to meet? How can Gondor emerge victorious from this war? Compared to those questions every other matter is of little or no importance. We will think more about this in a later blog, especially when we think about the Ring of Power, that we know is now on its way into Mordor, and which, for a little while, was in Faramir’s hands, even though he never even wished to look upon it.

But now we are thinking of Faramir himself. In the last two pieces that I wrote on this blog I wrote about him as a leader of men, about how his men would follow him, trust him, even in the most dangerous of circumstances. How his men would feel themselves greater than they really were, how they would know themselves as faithful. But what manner of man is this leader? Denethor shows what he thinks about this here.

“I know you well. Ever your desire is to appear lordly and generous as a king of old, gracious, gentle. This may well befit one of high race, if he sits in power and peace. But in desperate hours gentleness may be repaid with death.”

Denethor might be speaking of contemporary politics here. Indeed he is effectively accusing Faramir of playing a political game, of making a bid for power. He is aware of how his son is regarded by the people of Gondor. They may respect the Lord of the Tower but they love his son. We may never see a popularity poll in Gondor. Such things did not exist. But if they did it would probably show that Faramir is more popular than Denethor. How could he not be when in full view of the walls of Minas Tirith, the nearest that Gondor could come to a live broadcast, they watch him risk his own life to save that of his men? No wonder that crowds gathered at the gate to cheer for him and for Gandalf.

But we have seen enough of Faramir to know that his character and his appearance are of one kind, of one reality. He is as he appears to be. He appears “lordly and generous as a king of old, gracious, gentle” because that is what he truly is. For him this is not a luxury that belongs to a time of leisure, a pleasant thing to be cast aside when times are desperate, as Denethor puts it. He believes that victory for Gondor only has meaning if Gondor lives up to its highest qualities. Can there be ever victory for its own sake, victory because the only thing that matters is that our side rather than our opponents are the winners? If we win but behave like orcs, then the orcs have won, whoever may win the actual battle. Faramir refuses to think like this, and he refuses to act like this. He may never become a king but he behaves as a true king and not a false one.

“A Captain That Men Would Follow.” Some More Thoughts on Faramir of Gondor and Leadership.

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The Return of the King by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991) pp. 790-793

I attended a workshop during the last week on the subject of Peace during which the facilitator asked us to imagine a situation in which Vladimir Putin, that is the Russian military, were to appear on the horizon. She then asked us what we do. Would we fight? I was fairly sure that I would despite my advancing years. There is so much that I love that I would want to defend, and the actions of the Russian military in Ukraine have taught me that they would show little mercy if they were to succeed in conquering my country or any part of it.

But then our workshop leader asked another question. Would I send my children to fight? Immediately I knew in my gut that this was a completely different question altogether, and as I pondered it, and am still pondering it, I knew that the reason why it was different centred around that word, sent. Could I send my children, in this case, my two daughters, into danger? This isn’t just a matter of gender. I am perfectly aware that women as well as men are participants in modern warfare. But I want to argue here is that there is a big difference between sending and leading. Quite literally, a leader goes in front of those who follow but sending is something quite different.

Pippin recognises this quality of the leader in Faramir when he meets him for the first time. As we saw in the last post, he knows that Faramir “is a captain that he would follow, even under the shadow of the black wings.” He has already seen Faramir go back to give aid to his men who had been thrown from their horses after the attack by the Nazgûl riding upon their steeds of the air. He could have chosen to flee for his life and to abandon his men. He could have argued that it was more important that the heir to the Steward of Gondor owed it to his people to preserve his own life, even at the cost of his men, but he does not do this. Beregond was not surprised. This is what he expects of his captain. But he does not take what Faramir does for granted. He honours, even loves his captain, for that is what a captain who leads and does not send inspires in his followers.

Denethor recognises the difference himself. At a later point in the story, he is together in the tower with Gandalf and Pippin and speaks of the Dark Lord who will wait in Barad-dur until victory is won by his armies.

“So do all great lords, if they are wise, Master Halfling. Or why should I sit here in my tower and think, and watch, and wait, spending even my sons?” (The Return of the King p.800)

And so, we have this contrast through the story. Théoden leads his men into battle, transforming them from a beaten rabble into a mighty army simply by virtue of his presence at their head. Aragorn leads his followers even on the Paths of the Dead because he goes at their head and does not send them. Dáin Ironfoot and Brand of Dale fall at the head of their men at the gates of Erebor repelling the attack of the forces of Mordor, just as Thorin Oakenshield fell at the Battle of the Five Armies as recorded in The Hobbit.

So I return to the question with which I began these thoughts. Would I fight if an enemy attacked my country? All my instincts say to me that I would. I would fight in order to protect all that I love, and above all, I would fight to protect my family even if it proved to be a fight in vain. But would I send my children to fight, even as a country might send its sons and daughters to fight for it? With the same desire to protect my own children I could never send them to take any risk that I was not first willing to take. I could never make them stand in front of me, but I would always be willing to stand between them and danger. This, I believe, is what it means to lead.

And there is one last word, as my friend and commentator, Kate Splieth, pointed out to me this week, a word that we can use in addition to leading and sending and maybe it is the best word of all. It is the word, with, a word that we know we can use concerning Faramir. His men know that he will always be with them, and they love him for this above all. And it is the word most used in the gospels about the relationship of God with God’s people. “And lo I am with you always…”

“He Was a Captain That Men Would Follow, That He Would Follow, Even Under the Shadow of The Black Wings.” Some Thoughts on Leadership as Faramir Returns to Minas Tirith.

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The Return of the King by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991) pp. 788-793

“How are the people to know they are faithful, unless their captains tell them?” So wrote Richard Hooker, the Anglican theologian of the 16th and early 17th century who wrote the first major defence of the newly established Church of England under the reign of Queen Elizabeth I.

I don’t think that Pippin is a thinker, one given to deep reflection, but he has a good and faithful heart, and he needs to know that he is doing something right and of value. And that is the last thing that he feels that he is doing as he waits for war to break upon him. He may have been dressed in the livery of the Guard of the Tower, a high honour in Gondor. He may too have the honour of waiting upon the Steward of Gondor as his esquire. But deep down he feels of little use.

“Why did you bring me here?” he asks Gandalf. And the answer that Gandalf gives to him brings him little comfort.

“You know quite well… To keep you out of mischief; and if you do not like being here, you can remember that you brought it upon yourself.”

Gandalf, of course, is speaking of the incident in which Pippin looked into the Stone of Orthanc and so saw Sauron himself and nearly gave away the whole mission of the Fellowship of the Ring. Much good came of that but it was all unintended, certainly by Pippin. He is no traitor, but he has been very foolish, and Gandalf intends that he should not forget this and so he might learn every lesson that he can from his foolishness.

Pippin feels a very small and insignificant figure among many great captains. There is Gandalf, of course, and then there is the frightening figure of Denethor, and the mighty Aragorn. But then comes the Lord Faramir, and Pippin responds to him in a way that he does not to any of the mighty ones that I have just mentioned.

Faramir is first seen leading his men towards the gate of Minas Tirith across the Pelennor Field, and as he does so, he is attacked by five fell riders of the air, by five Nazgûl riding upon their terrible steeds that swoop down upon the retreating soldiers. All the horses of Faramir’s men rear in terror and throw their riders but Faramir is able to master his and to return to the aid of the others. But for all his courage all would have been lost had it not been that Gandalf rode towards them upon Shadowfax and with a shaft of white light rising upwards from his hand drove away the attackers and so brought the soldiers safely back to the city.

All within the city walls are stirred by what they have witnessed and many rush to the gate where Gandalf and Faramir enter. Pippin is among them and when he reaches the gate he sees Faramir at close quarters for the very first time.

“Pippin pressed forward as they passed under the lamp beneath the gate-arch, and when he saw the pale face of Faramir he caught his breath. It was the face who has been assailed by a great fear or anguish, but has mastered it and now is quiet.”

Pippin is immediately reminded of Boromir, Faramir’s brother, who died in Pippin’s defence and who Pippin liked and admired. But I think there is something more that is happening here. As Pippin gazes upon Faramir’s face we read:

“He knew now why Beregond spoke his name with love. He was a captain that men would follow, that he would follow, even under the shadow of the black wings.”

And I know that I would have followed such a captain too when I was a young man. I have met some leaders for whom I have had considerable respect, even some that I would have loved to be picked out by and to follow them on some great venture, but I am not sure that I have ever met a Faramir. I wish that I had. I wonder if Tolkien ever did, or did the character of Faramir that he created, that he unexpectedly discovered as he wrote The Lord of the Rings, represent someone that he wished that he could have met.

It is such a captain to whom the people will always look in order to know that they are faithful and of worth. Happy the people who can find such a captain especially in time of need.

“The Darkness Has Begun. There Will Be No Dawn.” Pippin Has Nothing to Do But Wait for the Beginning of War.

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The Return of the King by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991) pp. 750-755

I have always found these pages in The Return of the King difficult to read. Like everyone else in the story I am waiting for the battle to begin. Not that I love stories of battle. Actually the older I get the less I like them. It’s just that waiting is so very difficult. What do you do as you wait for something that is too big to put out of your mind but you know that it is going to happen whether you want it to or not.

Even Gandalf seems to be distracted and unable to concentrate his considerable mind. At the end of the chapter that we have been reading and thinking about Pippin very much does not want to be alone. He wants to see Gandalf again, a figure from the familiar world of the Fellowship that set out from Rivendell and which has shared so much together. But when Gandalf arrives in the dead of night and Pippin tells him that he is glad to see him back Gandalf’s grumpy response is to say: “I have come back here, for I must have a little peace, alone. You should sleep in a bed while you still may.” In other words, leave me alone, Pippin!

Poor Pippin. There is so much difference between a bed that is a place of profound rest after great struggle, as is the bed on the Field of Cormallen for Frodo and Sam after their terrible trials, and a bed, however comfortable, that is but a brief pause before a time of trial. As Gandalf puts it with brutal succinctness, “the night will be too short.”

For Pippin, indeed for Gandalf too, there is no escape from this time of waiting except to pass through it. Pippin may want some kind of company in order to distract himself from himself but so too does Gandalf.

“When will Faramir return?” he asks himself, searching in the darkness for some piece that is missing in the vain hope that it will make sense of everything. Gandalf might just have asked, when will Théoden, or Aragorn, arrive? He might even ask, when will Frodo and Sam complete their task? And for poor Pippin there is the nagging ache that lies deep within his soul that is the unanswered question, where is Merry?

And that is the problem when all is said and done. I might be able to ask the question, but that does not mean that my question can be answered. Or, at the very least, it does not mean that I have any power within myself to answer that question. Gandalf cannot make anything happen that can quieten his troubled mind. All that he can do is to wait.

Some well meaning guides might suggest a mindfulness technique at this point. If only Gandalf or Pippin could focus on a mantra of some kind or a sacred word, then all will be well. But all would not be well. The forces of Mordor would still be about to arrive and that can never be good whatever we might do to prepare to meet it. And Faramir, Théoden and Aragorn would still be somewhere unknown.

Pippin is going through an initiation. He has been ever since he passed his first uncomfortable night in the fields of the Shire after setting out with Frodo and Sam from Bag End. How that night, the night before the hobbits encountered the Nazgûl for the very first time, must seem like paradise as Pippin waits through a night after which there will be no dawn. But that is the point in an initiation. Its whole purpose is to teach you how to die before you die. It teaches you to live light to everything except for the things that really matter. It teaches you what those things really are. They aren’t the accumulation of wealth, not even of power. As Gildor Inglorien said to Frodo on the second night of the journey across the Shire, take those who you can trust. In other words, friendship matters far more than power.

On the night before the outbreak of war Pippin feels very much alone and afraid. He is forced to endure it by himself. But he will emerge from this experience as one who can be a source of great strength to others. Later, Faramir will have reason to be grateful for his friendship, so too will Merry who will not be left to die alone on the battlefield, and Aragorn who will not be killed by the troll on the field before the Black Gate of Mordor. This night may be desperately hard to endure but, along with all the other things that Pippin has to pass through, it will make him the “very valiant man” as he was introduced to Ingold and his men at the beginning of The Return of the King.

“A Waiting Silence Broods Above the Nameless Land.” All is Prepared for Frodo to Enter Mordor.

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The Two Towers by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991, 2007) pp. 908-909

It was at the end of their sojourn in Lothlórien that the Fellowship was addressed by Galadriel on the matter of the journey that they were about to resume.

“Sleep in peace! Do not trouble your hearts overmuch with thought of the road tonight. Maybe the paths that you each shall tread are already laid before your feet, though you do not see them.”

Some of the Fellowship seem to do as Galadriel bids them. We hear little report of anxious thought on the part of Merry and Pippin although they both regard the journey to Mordor as folly and wish to go to Minas Tirith. And apart from declaring their intention to go with Frodo to the end neither Legolas or Gimli say anything of their preference for the road ahead. Sam, of course, will go with Frodo wherever he goes but shrewdly guesses that Frodo will cross the Anduin to fulfil the mission that was given him by the Council in Rivendell. “He knows he’s got to find the Cracks of Doom, if he can. But he’s afraid.” Boromir wants Frodo to come to Minas Tirith, at least that is what he has long said to himself until at last he is confronted by the truth within his heart that he desires to possess the Ring itself. And Aragorn is torn between his desire to go to the city that he believes to be his destiny while knowing that since the fall of Gandalf in Moria he has to guide Frodo the best he can.

The events that befall them all at Parth Galen throw all their plans into disarray. Boromir’s treachery and the attack by the orcs of Isengard sends Frodo across the river to the Emyn Muil fleeing from Boromir and he is only just caught by Sam before he does so. Merry and Pippin are taken prisoner by the orcs and are carried across the plains of Rohan before escaping into Fangorn Forest just in time to meet Treebeard the Ent. Aragorn realises that he can do little more for Frodo and decides to follow the orcs and their prisoners and Legolas and Gimli go with him. Boromir falls trying to defend Merry and Pippin and seeking to right his own wrong. And, of course, there is one other character who does not so much think but is driven by desire for the Ring and that is Gollum and he follows Frodo. Soon, much against both of their wills they will become companions upon the journey.

I will leave my readers to ponder the paths that each of the characters will take after the chaos of the breaking of the Fellowship but we can assert that none of them quite expected that they were to follow the paths laid before them in quite the manner in which they did. As small stones that begin an avalanche Merry and Pippin awaken the anger of the Ents and bring about the fall of Isengard. Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli meet Gandalf in Fangorn, liberate Théoden, King of Rohan, from bondage, and he leads his people to victory over Saruman and then to the relief of the siege of Gondor at the Pelennor Fields.

And, perhaps most unplanned for and most unexpected, Sauron becomes convinced that one of his enemies possesses the Ring and will try to use it against him. He sees Pippin in the Palantir of Orthanc, something that was no-one’s plan, and assumes that this is the hobbit who bears the Ring and that he is a prisoner within that fortress. And then Aragorn chooses to reveal himself to Sauron in the Palantir as the heir of Isildur and wrests control of the stone that is rightfully his from Sauron.

We must assume that Sauron is deeply shaken by his encounter with Aragorn. Until this point he has used the palahtiri to dominate others, both Saruman, who he wins to his side, and Denethor, who he leads to despair, although never treachery. Now he is defeated in a battle of wills by the heir of the one who cut the Ring from his finger. He needs to move quickly and decisively and so he prepares an attack upon Minas Tirith from the stronghold of Minas Morgul to be commanded by his most deadly of captains, the Witch King of Angmar, the Lord in the Nazgûl. All his forces are withdrawn either into Minas Morgul or directed to the Black Gate (the Morannon) in the north of Mordor. As Faramir says, “My scouts and watchers have all returned, even some that have crept within sight of the Morannon. They all find a strange thing. The land is empty. Nothing is on the road, and no sound of foot, or horn, or bowstring is anywhere to be heard. A waiting silence broods above the Nameless Land.”

It is as if everything has been arranged with the exact purpose of allowing Frodo to walk into that land unhindered. We will think more about this next week. Now we know that Frodo has to take full advantage of the opportunity that has been given to him.

“I Looked For no Such Friendship as You Have Shown. To Have Found it Turns Evil to Great Good.” The Redeeming Friendship of Frodo and Faramir.

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The Two Towers by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991, 2007) pp. 908-909

Friendship is one of the great themes of The Lord of the Rings. Friendship mattered deeply to Tolkien as he had known close friendship in his younger years and then lost those friends in the slaughterhouse of the trenches of the Great War of 1914-18. Early in Frodo’s perilous journey from the Shire came a moment in the cottage of Crickhollow when his friends revealed to him that they knew that he was leaving the Shire and that he was in danger. At first Frodo was dismayed. He had intended to go alone with Sam and in secret. But then Merry replied:

“You can trust us to stick to you through thick and thin- to the bitter end. And you can trust us to keep any secret of yours- closer than you keep it yourself. But you cannot trust us to let you face trouble alone, and go off without a word. We are your friends, Frodo.”

And later in the story, Gandalf defended the right of Merry and Pippin to go with the Fellowship of the Ring from Rivendell.

“It is true that if these hobbits understood the danger, they would not dare to go. But they would still wish to go, or wish that they had dared, and be shamed and unhappy. I think, Elrond, that in this matter it would be well to trust rather to their friendship than to great wisdom.”

Of course, Gandalf might have reminded Elrond of his own words at the conclusion of the Council when Elrond recognised that Frodo, the hobbit, had been chosen by a Power greater than his own to carry the Ring to Mordor. It was Elrond who saw that this was “the hour of the Shire-folk” but maybe he did not grasp the true extent of what he had recognised. Maybe he did not see that it was the strength that lies within and above such things as pity, mercy and friendship that would, in words that he himself spoke, “shake the towers and counsels of the great”.

But it is in the very nature of such things as friendship that they have a fragility, a vulnerability, that do not belong to such things as power and control. In his famous treatise on leadership, The Prince, Niccolo Machiavelli wrote, “It may be more pleasant to be loved than feared, but it is safer to be feared than loved.” Every lord in Tolkien’s story would understand the truth of those words, even Elrond, and it was in the breaking of trust by Boromir when he tried to take the Ring from Frodo that Frodo’s heart was broken. It was a brokenhearted Frodo who met with Faramir in Ithilien and who learned that this man was not only a mighty captain of Gondor but also Boromir’s brother. Frodo was quickly drawn to this man and longed to put his trust in him but the memory of Boromir’s face transfigured by desire for the Ring was too fresh a memory. It was only Sam’s mistake in revealing that Frodo carries the Ring of Power that both made Frodo terribly vulnerable once more but also allowed Faramir to show his nobility and utter trustworthiness.

So it is that when Frodo bids Faramir farewell as he begins his journey to Mordor once more that he says to his new friend: “It was said to me by Elrond Halfelven that I should find friendship upon the way, secret and unlooked for. Certainly I looked for no such friendship as you have shown, To have found it turns evil to great good.”

After Boromir’s betrayal of friendship at the breaking of the Fellowship Frodo attempted to make his journey to Mordor alone and, unwillingly, he had to make three bonds of trust of varying kinds along the way. First he found that he could not go without Sam and it is this friendship that will carry him all the way to Mount Doom. Secondly, he found that he has to trust a guide who would eventually betray him and he knows this to be his fate. But third he would form a deep bond with the brother of the man who betrayed his trust. This is the great evil to which Frodo referred in the words he spoke to Faramir and this is the great good to which that evil is turned. That Frodo will begin the last stage of his journey with the friendship of Faramir in his heart and not the betrayal of Boromir will give him a strength that he will need throughout the terrible ordeal that awaits him.

“Do Not Go to Cirith Ungol!” Some Further Thoughts on an Impossible Decision.

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The Two Towers by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991, 2007) pp. 904-907

I have read this passage from The Lord of the Rings many times over the last fifty years or so and I don’t think I ever quite realised before the pivotal role that it plays in the whole story. Frodo has come to trust Faramir and here this noble figure is offering him safety and the chance to be free completely of the malicious character that is Gollum.

Tolkien reflected on this in a letter that he wrote to Michael Straight early in 1956, replying to a number of questions that Straight had asked him before writing a review for New Republic and he did so in terms of the 6th petition of The Lords Prayer, “Lead us not into temptation”. (The Letters of J.R.R Tolkien Harper Collins 2006 pp. 232-237).

Tolkien compared this petition with the 7th, “But deliver us from evil” and commented that the 6th is both harder and less often considered. Tolkien writes that “the ‘salvation’ of the world and Frodo’s own salvation is achieved by his previous pity and forgiveness of injury. At any point any prudent person would have told Frodo that Gollum would certainly betray him, and could rob him in the end. To ‘pity’ him, to forbear to kill him, was a piece of folly, or a mystical belief in the ultimate value-in-itself of pity and generosity even if disastrous in the world of time”.

So, when Faramir, the “prudent person” says to Frodo that if he chooses to abandon Gollum he will have Gollum escorted to any point on the borders of Gondor that Gollum might name, Frodo replies “I have promised many times to take him under my protection and to go where he led.” Frodo cannot break faith even though it is folly to keep it. Utter folly.

See how Kryztov Marczak imagines the chaos in Shelob’s Lair below the Tower of Cirith Ungol. The path that Frodo must take.

As we saw last week Frodo goes through with Faramir the options that are available to him. To return to the Black Gate is simply impossible and there is no-one apart from Gollum who could guide him into Mordor. And what of returning with Faramir to Minas Tirith?

“Would you have me come to Gondor with this Thing, the Thing that drove your brother mad with desire? What spell would it work in Minas Tirith? Shall there be two cities of Minas Morgul, grinning at each other across a dead land filled with rottenness?”

At the last Faramir respondes with the only words upon which both he and Frodo can agree completely.

“It is a hard doom and a hopeless errand.”

But Faramir hopes, beyond hope, that one day he and Frodo might sit “by a wall in the sun, laughing at old grief”. The thought is a tender one and one can only hope that both Frodo and Faramir were comforted from time to time by it on the hard roads that each of them were to take in the weeks ahead, roads that were to take both of them to the verge of death and then to new life beyond them. The Lord of the Rings does not recount these happy conversations but in other writings Tolkien speaks of times like this and we can only hope that the two heroes were able to enjoy one another’s company in this way.

Both Frodo and Faramir have to make choices that are folly. Faramir allows Frodo to go free, bearing the Ring of Power, in the company of a treacherous guide, into Mordor itself. His father cannot forgive him for this and we must think that he dies unreconciled with his son. Frodo goes on with Gollum and is betrayed by him in Shelob’s Lair in Cirith Ungol and attacked and wounded by him in the Cracks of Doom; and Frodo has to live in the knowledge that at the end he did not have the strength to cast away the Ring and was only saved by Gollum’s attack. But both make their choice in freedom in Henneth Annûn. As Tolkien reflected in his letter to Michael Straight, Frodo’s choice (and we must add, Faramir’s also) is a “piece of folly”. But Tolkien also opens the possibility that Frodo’s decision not to kill, or even abandon, Gollum has a mystical quality to it. This quality comes from the belief that any act of goodness has meaning in eternity “even if disastrous in the world of time”. In The Lord of the Rings this eternal quality breaks into the story at the moment when Gollum takes the Ring into the Fire to unmake it. In the stories in which we live we cannot tell what consequences our own choices for goodness will have. Perhaps we will only see disaster in the world of time but we are called to choose the good anyway and to trust.