Phl 361K

Fall ’03

Questions for Reflections and Discussion: Lothlorien (Oct. 7 & 9)

FOTR

1. Galadriel expresses an asymmetry between light and darkness: the light perceives the very heart of darkness, but its own secret has not been discovered. (p. 456) How does this embody a Boethian conception of the difference between good and evil?

2. What exactly does the mirror of Galadriel do? Why is it significant that Galadriel qualifies “what will happen” with “what may happen”? Does the mirror reveal mere possibilities? How then to explain the fact that it did in fact reliably predict the future in each case? (pp.f 468ff)

3. Galadriel makes an odd statement about the mirror: some things it reveals “never come to pass unless (sic) one acts to prevent them.” (p. 470) Is this a typo or slip of the pen? Did Tolkien mean that some things never come to pass if one acts to prevent them, or did he intend the paradoxical “unless” (“if not”)? Or did he inadvertently omit a “no” -- “unless no one acts to prevent them”? Or, was the paradox intentional? (Think about the fulfillment of the prophecy about Oedipus.)

4. In the Silmarillion, the Silmarils represent sub-creation gone disastrously wrong. Recall that Earendil’s star is in fact one of these Silmarils. Why does the light of Earendil’s star (p. 488) play such a purely positive role in the Lord of the Rings? Discuss how this illustrates the principle of good as the inadvertent by-product of evil.

The Silmarillion

1. From the Elves’ perspective, Men most resemble Melkor (p. 42). Is this perception accurate or fair? If so, what makes Men particularly vulnerable to Melkor’s influence?

2. Why is it significant that the Elves first appear when Middle-Earth is in a state of perpetual twilight?

3. How do both Melkor and Feanor illustrate the principle that the corruption of the best is the worst? Why is this principle a corollary of the Boethian conception of good and evil?

4. Is Melkor’s successful deception of Manwe consistent with the superiority of good over evil? Why are Ulmo, Feanor and Galadriel able to penetrate the very heart of darkness, and yet the supposedly superior Manwe unable to?

5. Discuss the theme of discord and the overcoming of discord? Why is this such a consistent theme in Tolkien’s work? (QS, Chapter 7)

6. How does Feanor represent the perils of sub-creation? Was Tolkien himself in danger of a “greedy love” toward his own creation? Is Feanor an alter ego?

7. Is Ungoliant consistent with a Boethian conception of evil? What is the metaphysical status of Ungoliant’s “unlight”, a darkness that “seemed not a lack but a thing with being of its own, for it was indeed made by malice out of Light, and it had power to pierce the eye, and to enter the heart and mind, and strangle the very will.” (p. 76) Is this Manichaean?

8. Are family loyalties a good or bad thing? Did Fingolfin do well in pledging that he would follow Feanor? (ch. 8) Did Fingon and Turgon do right in staying with their Noldor relatives? (pp. 88-89)

9. How does Melkor/Morgoth illustrate the principle that wickedness is its own punishment, a form of misery (as Boethius argued)?

10. Why did Manwe forbid the Noldor to leave but do nothing to stop them?

11. Is the Doom of the Noldor pronounced by Mandos a prophecy or a curse? (p. 88)

12. Trace the downward spiral of Feanor toward cold-hearted malice.

Birzer, pp. 53-57

1. Why did Tolkien avoid any direct depiction of the Fall of Man?

2. In the dialogue “Finrod Ah Andreth”, why does Finrod reject Andreth’s theory that Morgoth is responsible for Man’s mortality? In the world of Tolkien’s Ea, is Finrod’s reasoning sound?

3. According to Finrod, Iluvatar will use the errors of Melknor and of Men to make something still better than what had existed before. Tolkien wrote in a letter to Christopher, “evil labours with vast powers and perpetual success -- in vain; preparing always only the soil for unexpected good to sprout in.” Discuss the paradox of the “felix culpa” (the happy or fortunate sin). Can evil really be evil if its ultimate consequences are always for the better? Does this view undermine the motivation for resisting evil?

Shippey, pp. 161-168.

1. In Tolkien’s allegory of the tower, what does being “able to look out at the sea” signify?

2. How does Shippey argue that the LOTR is not an allegory about WWII? Is he right? Are the correspondences he concedes (‘peace in our time’, ‘the war to end all wars’, the Maginot line, ‘gatherers and sharers’) plausible?

Unfinished Tales, “Galadriel and Celeborn”

1. What is the significance of the evolution of Galadriel’s character during Tolkien’s lifetime (especially the gradual diminution of her guilt with respect to the defiance of the Valar)?

2. Is Galadriel’s desire to found a realm in Middle-Earth for her own rule comparable to Satan’s decision (in Paradise Lost) to rule in hell rather than serve in heaven?

Boethius, pp. 150-169.

1. What is the apparent conflict between divine foreknowledge and free will? Why does Boethius think Augustine’s solution (that things are foreseen because they will happen, not vice versa) is inadequate? Distinguish between the problem of causation and necessity.

2. Why is there an apparent conflict betweent the quality of future events (their intrinsic uncertainty) and the quality of God’s knowledge (its absolute certainty)? How does Boethius (“Philosophy”) propose to resolve this conflict? (Book V, Part IV) Is he successful?

3. Why would the loss of freedom of the will be a disaster, from the moral point of view?

4. Explain Boethius’s view of the progression: sense, imagination, reason, intelligence, divine wisdom. Why is it important for his account that the human mind is not merely a passive receiver of impressions from the environment (as the Stoics hypothesized)? (pp. 159-160)

5. Philosophy claims that reason can know the future only when it has a certain and predestined occurrence, but not so in the case of intellect. What does he mean by the “boundless immediacy” of the “highest knowing”? (162)

6. How does Boethius distinguish between being eternal “foreknow” anything?

7. What does Boethius mean by the distinction between simple and conditional necessity? Could this distinction have resolved the paradox without the detour through God’s timelessness? Why or why not? What does Boethius’s theory imply about the present necessity of God’s timeless knowing of future events?

8. How significant is Boethius’s claim that God is a “spectator” of our use of free will? Is this compatible with God’s sovereign control of the details of history?

9. Could Boethius’s theory be used to explain the many apparent cases of prevision of the future in Tolkien’s world? Why or why not?

Nelson Pike

1. What is Pike’s argument that divine foreknowledge and human free will are incompatible? Is his argument sound? Does it apply to Boethius’s solution?

Lewis, The Problem of Pain

1. Is Lewis convincing in his argument that there are real limits to what omnipotence can do?

2. Does Lewis establish that real freedom of the will requires a “relatively independent and inexorable nature”? Is this consistent with the possibility of miracles?

3. Is it true that it is absolutely impossible that matter be “equally convenient and pleasurable to everyone”? (p. 32)

4. Does the question “Would it have been better for me never to have existed?” have any meaning? Could it be answered? On what basis?

5. Why is it impossible for God to be selfish? Why is the distinction between what we want and what we need important for Lewis?

6. Is Lewis’s attempt to reconcile the Fall of Man with evolution successful?

7. What is the relationship between the Fall of our ancestors and our own moral and spiritual condition, according to Lewis?

8. Does Lewis offer a plausible defense of the existence of hell? Does it make sense to concede that hell represents the defeat of omnipotence? Lewis suggests that the damned “fade away into nonentity.” (p. 127) Relate this to the Boethian theory of evil.

Augustine, On the Free Choice of the Will

1. Augustine asks, “Did Adam abandon God because of his folly, or did he become foolish because he abandoned God?” How does Augustine answer?

2. Augustine proposes that there is some intermediate state between wisdom and folly. Does this make sense? Was it defensible for God to create Adam in this intermediate state rather than in a state of wisdom?

3. Why is it impossible for human beings to reverse by free will what free will created (namely, the fall into sin)?

Hick, Evil and the Love of God

1. Hick argues that “the idea of an unqualifiedly good creature committing sin is self-contradictory and unintelligible.” He argues that the self-creation of evil ex nihilo is absurd. Would Augustine, Boethius or Lewis agree? Is Hick right?

2. Is Hick’s Irenaean theodicy superior to Augustine’s? Can the Fall have been an “understandable lapse”, the product of immaturity? What does Hick mean by saying that the Fall was “virtually inevitable”? (p. 32)

Davidson, “What Metaphors Mean”

1. What are Davidson’s argument that metaphors mean what they literally mean, and no more? Are his arguments convincing?

2. Discuss Max Black’s account of the second layer of meaning in metaphors. Is it comparable to the meaning of myth or of allegory (a synthesis of ideas or a synthesis of percepts, in Barfield’s terms)?

3. Davidson distinguishes between the meanings of words and the use of words. Why is meaning limited to ordinary, literal meaning? Is there an element of behaviorism or scientism in Davidson’s position?

4. What can you glean from this article about Davidson’s views about universals? Is he a realist or a nominalist?

5. Does Davidson have an adequate account of how metaphors accomplish what he says they do? What is his account of the aftermath of the “death” of a metaphor? (p. 252) Can Davidson explain why a literal paraphrase of metaphors is impossible?

6. How would Barfield or Tolkien respond to Davidson’s account? Is Davidson close to C. S. Lewis’s early view of mythology, according to which they are “lies breathed through silver”?