The Council of Elrond

It is But a Trifle That Sauron Fancies. Gloín tells of the mission of the messenger of Mordor.

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The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991) pp. 234-36

One by one the company who are the Council of Elrond tell of how it is that they have come to Rivendell and as each listens to the other they begin to learn the truth of what Elrond says of how it is that they are sitting there on that October morning.

“You have come and are here met, in this very nick of time, by chance as it may seem. Yet it is not so. Believe rather that it is so ordered that we, who sit here, and none others, must now find counsel for the peril of the world.”

And so it is that Gloín is the first to give an account of why he is in Rivendell that day. A messenger of Sauron had come to the Kingdom under the Mountain seeking news of hobbits. For “one of these was known to you on a time”. That hobbit, of course, is Bilbo and the messenger seeks him because of the Ring. Although it is not stated explicitly it is clear as we read Gloín’s account that the messenger is a Ringwraith, one of the nine, the Nazgûl. His breath came “like the hiss of snakes” and all who stand near by shudder. Sauron wishes for his embassy to have a maximum impact and requires a herald who will be a cause of fear in all who hear him.

But if Sauron’s intention is to create fear what he achieves is to inspire resistance. The messenger’s mention of hobbits serves only to remind Dáin Ironfoot, the King under the Mountain, of his bond of obligation to Bilbo without whom he would never have gained his crown. And it serves also to remind him and the other chieftains of the dwarves of the alliance that fought the Battle of the Five Armies and the shelter and counsel that Thorin Oakenshield’s party received at Rivendell during their journey. For we should not assume that just because Gloín and his companions are present at the Council that this represents a normal state of affairs in which ambassadors go to and fro between the hidden valley and the lonely mountain. If there is an ambassador whose labour in making alliances between the free peoples of Middle-earth is bearing fruit on this day in Rivendell then it is Gandalf, the Grey Pilgrim, the one who encouraged Thorin to make his journey to Erebor and who, for some strange reason, had him take a hobbit with him. And it was Gandalf who brought together the men of Dale and Esgaroth, the elves of the Woodland Realm and the dwarves to defeat the orcs of the Misty Mountains. Gandalf has followed hunches, grasped at straws, and held onto fool’s hopes many times and for many years before this moment, many times before the decision is made that will be the outcome of this Council.

Sauron too has been a builder of alliances over many long years. He is gathering them together for the great war even as the Council deliberates. He knows that many of the peoples of Middle-earth are not natural allies for all Gandalf’s efforts. There has been little love between elf and dwarf through the ages, much suspicion and sometimes outright hostility and even war. The dwarves have fought many battles against orcs through the centuries but apart from the Battle of the Five Armies they have fought them alone and they have usually felt alone in the world. Sauron’s alliance building is usually a mixture of threat and gift and so it is with the dwarves. The threat is war and the gift is of two of the rings of power once held by dwarf lords, rings that greatly increased their wealth. What choice will the dwarves make in the war that is to come?

It was no accident that Elrond placed Frodo and Gloín together at the table top of highest honour at the feast the night before. Gloín, the companion of Thorin Oakenshield had to become acquainted with the heir of Bilbo, the Ringbearer. He had to be reminded bodily of the bond between dwarves and hobbits, with the family of Bilbo.

“You have done well to come,” Elrond says to Gloín after Gloín speaks of his fears. “You will hear today all that you need in order to understand the purposes of the Enemy. There is naught that you can do, other than to resist, with hope or without it. But you do not stand alone. You will learn that your trouble is but part of the trouble of all the western world.”

Here is The Hobbit, Frodo Son of Drogo. The Council of Elrond Begins.

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The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991) pp. 233,234

Surely every action that Elrond takes and every word that he speaks tells that he knows that there can be but one outcome to the council that he has called to take place on the day after the feast and Frodo’s recovery from his wound. The feast itself, held in Frodo’s honour, at which he is seated at the table of highest honour; the seat at Elrond’s very side at the Council and the words with which Elrond announces him to the gathering all point to the central role that Frodo is going to have to play in the story.

“Here, my friends, is the hobbit, Frodo son of Drogo. Few have ever come hither through greater peril or an errand more urgent.”

Elrond must not impose his will upon the Council. The deliberations must be, as that word implies, deliberate. Every part of the story that has led each member to be there that morning must be told and must be heard. And every teller of the story and every one who hears and who deliberates must be granted honour. Elrond is the one who will chair the debate because he is Lord of Rivendell, of Imladris, because he has played so central a part in the long history that on this day will reach its climax and because of his lineage; but he knows that unless every single person gathered there is prepared to give their assent to the decision that will conclude the discussion all will be in vain.

For gathered together on this day are representatives of all the free peoples of Middle-earth. elves of every kind, dwarves, the descendants of Númenor, and most surprisingly of all, hobbits. Some of them are well aware of their dignity and their right to be parties to the decisions that will be made. Glorfindel, mighty hero of the conflicts of every age, one who lives at once, and has great power, in the worlds of both the Seen and the Unseen; and Boromir, Son and Heir to the Steward of Gondor, ruler of the greatest of all the kingdoms of humankind, these know their dignity. So too do Galdor of the Grey Havens and Erestor of Rivendell, high in the counsels of their lords. Others who have gathered there represent peoples whose essential dignity is perhaps more contested. Gloín from the dwarf kingdom of Erebor, the Lonely Mountain, and his son, Gimli, are of an ancient people who have played their part in the history of Middle-earth but who have always kept themselves apart, making alliances from necessity rather than desire. And Legolas, son of Thranduil of the woodland realm in Mirkwood, is described here as strange, surely here drawing upon the older meaning of that word as one who is a stranger whether by accident or by choice. Like the dwarves of the Lonely Mountain Thranduil and his people have kept apart from the great alliances except, as in the Battle of the Five Armies, by necessity.

And last, and most certainly until that day, least among the free peoples of Middle-earth, are the hobbits. The dwarves and the elves of the woodland realm, both peoples at the fringe of the great story, know Bilbo because of his part in the events that led to the fall of Smaug and the great victory at the Battle of the Five Armies, but to the descendants of Númenor and to the High Elves, hobbits have not been of any importance. Even Aragorn and Glorfindel might be forgiven for regarding them as being completely out of their depth in events too great for them to comprehend or to be a part of. After all, their main knowledge of hobbits has come from the need to rescue them from danger. Only Gandalf has really made it his business to get to know hobbits and this interest has largely been regarded as an eccentric curiosity on his part.

Is it through Gandalf that Elrond has changed his mind about hobbits? Surely it is that, that and his acquaintance with Bilbo and his wise perception of the events that have led to this moment, and so it is that with emphasis, addressing each one present, he introduces Frodo as the hobbit, as one who has come to Rivendell heroically, through great peril and on the most urgent of errands. Thus he addresses Gloín, Legolas and Boromir, all travellers from afar who have come upon errands themselves. Frodo is at the centre of the Council and Frodo will be its outcome.

“We Are Your Friends, Frodo.” A Conspiracy Unmasked.

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The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991) pp. 96-105

If Frodo has a fault, and I will allow my readers to decide whether or not it really is a fault, it is that he has a sense of himself that he, and he alone, must shoulder the burden of this quest. In my imagination I picture him sitting alone by the fire in his study in Bag End, sucking on the stem of his pipe, and seeing himself walking alone in the wild towards a far horizon as the light fades about him. And already he is nursing a feeling of desolate loneliness but he is also beginning to enjoy a feeling of greatness that, if anything, grows with the loneliness. The lonely hero is a figure much loved in the mythology of Europe and, as my North American readers will confirm, travelled across the Atlantic to the vast empty spaces of that continent. Indeed, it was as if this kind of hero was just waiting for those vast spaces in order to be reborn there.

Of course, the reason that I can picture Frodo almost starting to enjoy this sense of having “a high and lonely destiny” is that I have been drawn to the temptation of wanting to be this kind of hero myself. And I also think that I have evidence within The Lord of the Rings to support my case. You will remember how, in the Council of Elrond, Frodo heroically chooses the task of taking the Ring to Orodruin in Mordor and how, straight away, Sam cries out, “But you won’t send him off alone surely, Master?” And you will remember how, after Boromir tries to seize the Ring, Frodo announces to himself, “I will go alone. At once.”

Thankfully, Frodo always fails in his attempts to “go alone”. Even without Sam’s intervention at the Council Elrond swiftly decides that Frodo cannot go alone and creates The Fellowship of the Ring, the nine walkers who will oppose the nine riders, the Nazgûl. And it is Sam, the confounded nuisance, who prevents him from going alone to Mordor after the breaking of the Fellowship. But now, at the very beginning of the journey, it is Frodo’s friends who keep him from trying to go alone.

Of course they have no idea what lies ahead of them but then, as Gandalf remarks to Elrond later on, “neither does Frodo”. Indeed, he emphasises, “Nor do any of us see clearly. ” We are all spared the burden of knowing what lies ahead for us. We are neither robbed of the surprise of joy nor of knowing what pain or sorrow lies before us. Joy cannot be joy unless it comes to us by surprise and who would wish to rob their days of what contentment that can be enjoyed by knowing the sufferings of the future?

What Merry and Pippin and Sam have to offer is not their foreknowledge but their friendship. Frodo makes a blustery speech about not being able to trust anyone once he realises that his secret has been long known. Merry answers him magnificently. “You can trust us to stick to you through thick and thin- to the bitter end… But you cannot trust us to face trouble alone, and go off without a word. We are your friends, Frodo.” And it is friendship that will prevail against all the power of the Enemy and not might nor even wisdom.

Friendship will take Merry into combat against the very foes that pursue them when he decides not to allow Éowyn to fight the Lord of the Nazgûl alone and it is through friendship and not might that he enables Éowyn to prevail against him. And it is friendship that takes Pippin to the high place in Minas Tirith where Denethor would take the life of his own son so that he need not die alone in his despair. It is through friendship, not might, that Pippin saves the life of Faramir. And it is through friendship that Sam brings Frodo step by intolerable step through the deserts of Mordor to Mount Doom before he carries him up the slopes of the mountain. It is not good to be alone. We were made for friendship, for belonging.