Preaching, and the "Quartet for the End of Time"

Our church has hosted a Chamber Music Festival this weekend: three days, three concerts. I wish I could write at length about them, but (for once) I am speechless.

The best I can do is one tangential thought, stemming from their performance of the Quartet for the End of Time (O. Messiaen). It is based on a passage from the Revelation of St. John the Divine:

And I saw another mighty angel, come down from heaven, clothed with a cloud: and a rainbow was upon his head, and his face was at it were the sun, and his feet as pillars of fire... and he set his right foot upon the sea, and his left foot on the earth, And cried with a loud voice, as when a lion roareth: and when he had cried, seven thunders uttered their voices... And the angel which I saw stand upon the sea and upon the earth lifted up his hand to heave, and sware by him that liveth for ever and ever, who created heaven, and the things that therein are, and the earth, and the things that therein are, and the sea, and the things which are therein, that there should be time no longer... (10:1-6)

The Quartet is about an hour's music on this vision, with movement titles such as “Liturgy of crystal,” and “Abyss of birds,” and “Dance of fury, for the seven trumpets,” and “Praise to the immortality of Jesus.”

Those who preach tend to avoid the Revelation of St. John. Many in the liberal denominations such as my own seem embarrassed by it. At best, they dismiss it, as one liberal preacher did in my hearing, as a text that used the medium of apocalypse to give hope to communities oppressed by persecution, with the subtext that it has no meaning whatsoever for us, two thousand years later. The judgmental aspects are, of course, to be ignored, for “God is love” and would never pour out his wrath on the world in the manner described at length in the book.

Preaching fails with this book because it is, at its heart, mystical vision. Words, other than the direct and plain words of the text itself, fail to convey what is of significance. It may be that Music is the best form for exegesis of this great and wonderful document. Three examples come to mind, beginning with the Messiaen Quartet:

-- The final choruses of Messiah, from “Worthy is the Lamb” through the Amen (G. F. Handel: Revelation 5:12-14)
-- Quartet for the End of Time (Revelation 10:1-6)
-- “And I saw a new heaven” (Edgar Bainton: Revelation 21:1-4)

What better exegesis of these passages could there be?

The Day of Pentecost, and some language lessons

In recent weeks, I have renewed my attention to Hebrew. My goal has always been to read the Psalms in their proper tongue, so I decided to jump into the river, ready or not. Through Biblio.com, I purchased a parallel-language Sefer Tehillim (Book of Psalms), and when at home, I have been reading the appointed Psalms for the Daily Office out of it.

Psalm 78 on the fifteenth of the month took me around three hours.

I read a half-verse, compare it with the fairly literal English on the facing page and do my best to match up the words so that I have a good sense of how the Hebrew is going – but I avoid looking at the Lexicon or making any serious effort to parse out the verb tenses and forms. And I move on to the next half-verse.

I have nearly completed one cycle through the month, and I hope that the second and subsequent cycles will be easier.

This has proven to be a good complement to more detailed work with individual psalms. I have been working through the Psalms of Degrees (120 through 134) for about a year, and had gotten thoroughly bogged down, finding little time for the task since December, though I recite one of them each day in the Midday Office (that is, on the days when I pray this office, which is only about half of my days). This work of careful study followed by more-or-less regular recitation seems to have laid the foundation for what I am doing now. Should I live long enough, I would like to work through the entire Psalter in detail. I am not optimistic about getting around to it.

And next time the holy Torah comes around in the readings for the Office (January 2012), I would like to read it in the proper tongue, at the “surface” level of working with a parallel English/Hebrew text as I am doing with the Psalms. I am not optimistic about that, either.

But this raises a dilemma: I cannot imagine reading the Pentateuch in anything other than the Authorized Version (KJV). It is too beautiful to give up, even for the original tongue.

I should not wish to lose the glories of our various languages. Hebrew is unutterably beautiful, as I am learning. So is German, which I dearly love, the language of Luther and Gerhardt. And Latin, the holy and venerable language of the Western Church. And Spanish. And, not least, English, the language of the Authorized Version, the Book of Common Prayer, Shakespeare, Watts, and Wesley.

I once thought that all of our words in this life would one day come to an end, inadequate for the glory that is to be revealed, and that may indeed be so. But now I think that the Day of Pentecost gives the clue – indeed, Acts 2 revels in it, with its listing of “Parthians, and Medes, and Elamites” and all the rest. In it, “the Curse of Babel is undone.” Rather than giving up our languages, we retain them all, and through the grace of the Spirit, understand them all, every language of this “great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and peoples, and tongues.” (Rev. 7:9)

It seems to me that none of these tongues will be lost, but rather transformed, even as our physical bodies will be sown in corruption and raised in incorruption (I Cor. 15:42).

It seems to me also that our songs will undergo a like transformation. As any choral musician knows, the song is inseparable from its text, in its proper language. We will, it is promised, “sing a new song to the LORD.” But in some manner, we will continue to sing Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme, and Gloria in excelsis Deo, and “My Shepherd will supply my need: Jehovah is his name” -- and Ashirah l'Adonai b'chaiyaiv: Azam'rah leilohai b'odi (Psalm 104:33 – I will sing to the LORD as long as I live; I will praise my God while I have my being.)

Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. (I Cor. 2:9)

JRRT, Part Three

I love this book.

For generations, many people of English-speaking lands lived with two books: the Holy Bible, and the Pilgrim’s Progess. This excellent book of John Bunyan’s has fallen out of favor, though it continues to be filled with treasures for those who find it. I submit that for my generation, Tolkien has served the function that Bunyan did for his time. Other books come and go; this one bears with repeated readings through a lifetime.

My older sister opened this door to me by giving me her copy of The Hobbit when I was in my early teens; looking at it as I write, I see her name inscribed on the cover, almost faded into obscurity. It, and the three volumes of LOTR which I soon purchased (95 cents apiece), are all in the old Ballantine paperback edition with the 1960’s psychedelic cover art. Through high school and college, I had on my wall a large poster which combined the three covers (which, together, make a sort of mural). Somewhere in graduate school and marriage, it disappeared; I am sorry to have lost it, though I cannot imagine what I would do with it now. But I still have the books; I have resisted purchasing better copies because these volumes are old friends, now beginning to fall to pieces. In these forty years, I suppose I have read them a dozen times or more.

At differing stages of life, I have found different connections with this tale. My first reading was nonstop, staying up all night for about a week and sleepwalking through my days at school and other responsibilities. I was caught up in the sheer adventure of it, and when I reached the end, I started right over for a second reading.

In subsequent readings, I have become increasingly aware of the author’s craft. In an essay, the author C.J. Cherryh analyzed one chapter, “Fog on the Barrow-Downs” (FOTR I.8), in terms of pacing, the alternation of light and dark, sentence structure, and much more; all are handled with consummate skill, and the entire trilogy would reward analysis of this sort. These details are part of what makes the book impossible to put down. Tolkien is, as Cherryh says elsewhere, “the grandfather of us all” in his craftsmanship.

Songs are scattered through the book, with their own two-page Index buried in the Appendices. They range from the silly songs beloved of hobbits to bits of ancient Tales from the Eldar Days and the fell songs of the Rohirrim, full of blood and ruin. It took me many readings and at least a score of years before I began to love them; many of them are now among my favorite parts of the Tale. They often say much that could not be expressed in prose and in every case are characteristic of those who sing them. I suspect that the Author labored long on them.

The greatest glory of all is the world behind the story, Middle-Earth. Perhaps no one but Tolkien could have made such a place, the fruit of a lifetime of imaginative “sub-creation.” Much of it flows directly from the real World of trees and rivers and mountains and living creatures, described with loving respect. Much is drawn from the “Cauldron of Story” of northern European folklore, and especially the ancient Languages which Tolkien loved, which are behind the Languages of Middle-Earth, and thus the names of people and places therein. The songs, the maps, the appendices -- all add to the sense that “long ago in the quiet of the world, when there was less noise and more green” (The Hobbit, chapter 1), there was such a place as the Forest of Fangorn or the City of Gondor with its white tower. One might easily imagine that we are in a distant continuation of that Story. I have never encountered another work of fiction with this level of verisimilitude, even among those writings which are acknowledged as the great classics of literature.

Probably every writer making a secondary world, a fantasy, every sub-creator, wishes in some measure to be a real maker, or hopes that he is drawing on reality: hopes that the peculiar quality of this secondary world (if not all the details) are derived from Reality, or are flowing into it. If he indeed achieves a quality that can fairly be described by the dictionary definition: ‘inner consistency of reality,’ it is difficult to conceive how this can be, if the work does not in some way partake of reality. The peculiar quality of the ‘joy’ in successful Fantasy can thus be explained as a sudden glimpse of the underlying reality or truth. It is not only a ‘consolation’ for the sorrow of this world, but a satisfaction, and an answer to that question, ‘Is it true?’ ... But in the ‘eucatastrophe’ [or “happy ending”] we see in a brief vision that the answer may be greater -- it may be a far-off gleam or echo of evangelium in the real world. (from the Epilogue to the essay “On Fairy-Stories”)

It is for this “far-off gleam or echo of evangelium” that I now read the books. I hear this echo in the merry chatter of Tom Bombadil, in the Hall of Fire at Rivendell, in the Golden Wood, in the long slow songs of the Ents, in the blowing of the horns of Rohan “like a storm upon the plain and a thunder in the mountains” (ROTK I.5), in the quiet voice of Samwise Gamgee holding his master’s bleeding hand amid the ruin of Orodruin, and at the last the “sound of singing that came over the water” from the “far green country under a swift sunrise.”

Appendices:

The Lord of the Rings, with The Hobbit, are not all that there is of Middle-Earth. I love The Silmarillion with almost equal intensity, and “Leaf by Niggle.”
This little story is generally paired with the essay “On Fairy-Stories” as “Tree and Leaf.” It is my favorite depiction of the process of artistic creation, and Purgatory. I will say no more: read the essay and the story, if you haven’t. A more systematic discussion of the concept of “subcreation” can be found in Dorothy L. Sayers' excellent book The Mind of the Maker.

And there are the contributions of others, not least the movies shepherded into creation by Peter Jackson. I have never been a fan of Peter Jackson, and I cringe at some of the choices he made in adapting the books into movies. He deserves credit, nonetheless, for tirelessly pursuing this task, negotiating the quicksands of finance, conflicting personalities, impossible schedules and all else involved in making a motion picture, and evoking fine work from hundreds of others. I think that most of the strength of the movies came from this last, the people who brought their skills to the project. I will mention only two examples:

- the soundtrack to LOTR, by Howard Shore. When I do not have time to properly re-visit Middle-Earth by reading the books, often I will play some of this music. It is an achievement of Wagnerian scope, and much of it is as ingrained in me as any of the classical works of music that I love.

- the work of Alan Lee, as conceptual designer, set decorator, and art director for the movies. One of my prized books is “The Lord of the Rings Sketchbook” (Houghton Mifflin, 2005). Like the Howard Shore music, these drawings and paintings can transport me into Middle-Earth in an instant. It is peculiar to me that Lee’s pencil sketches and drawings seem more effective than his more finished paintings, several of which are reproduced in the book. But the pencil sketches seem to be his strength as an artist. An example of them in the movies comes in the closing credits to ROTK: Lee sketched pencil portraits of all of the leading characters, strongly evocative portraits. A couple of them are reproduced in the book; I wish more of them were there.

The Road goes ever on and on...

The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it begun,
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet,
And whither then? I cannot say. (FOTR I.1)

I will never be heroic. Nor will I undertake a Quest upon which the world depends. For these things I am grateful.

But a Task has been entrusted to me, and I must discharge it to the best of my ability, as must we all. That Task involves more than a little “sub-creation,” through the medium of music. Each time that I sit down at the organ or piano, or sing, or lead others in singing, I am thereby creating, or helping others create, little “sub-creations,” each with their own character, for music is an art that exists only when it is played or sung. When all goes well, a Bach Fugue, or a Nunc Dimittis by Stanford or Gibbons, or a congregation singing an unaccompanied hymn stanza can be “a sudden glimpse of the underlying reality or truth” just as fully in their way as LOTR. I have gained encouragement in this task from Niggle the Painter, and from the Author who wrote these things in, as he said, “a period in which I had many duties which I did not neglect, and many other interests as a learner and teacher that often absorbed me” (from the Foreward to the Ballantine edition).

And I have been much encouraged in every aspect of life by Frodo Baggins, Samwise Gamgee, Aragorn, Eowyn of Rohan, Faramir, Legolas and Gimli, and many others in both the LOTR and the Silmarillion. This encouragement is very much akin to what one gains from the Communion of Saints. I do not think that it demeans either the real Saints whom we revere and follow or the imaginative creatures of fiction to say so.

... in God’s kingdom the presence of the greatest does not depress the small.... The Evangelium has not abrogated legends; it has hallowed them, especially the ‘happy ending.’ The Christian has still to work, with mind as well as body, to suffer, hope, and die; but he may now perceive that all his bents and faculties have a purpose, which can be redeemed. (from the Epilogue: “On Fairy-Stories”)

The Queen's Birthday

V. O Lord, save the Queen
R. And mercifully hear us when we call upon thee.

The Queen's Birthday

For many years, R.B. (a member of our parish) hosted a Tea for the Queen’s Birthday. It would be at a local park, complete with a brass quintet playing “Rule, Britannia” and other appropriate music. Ladies were expected to wear hats and gloves; gentlemen to wear ties and jackets. Expatriate Britons from hundreds of miles around came, along with many of us Yanks. It was always an Event of the first magnitude.

R.B.’s funeral was earlier this spring, so he did not make it to Her Majesty’s eighty-fifth birthday. But I would expect that he might have been looking on from the Upper Gallery seats in heaven, probably bursting with pride at young Prince William in his red uniform and bearskin hat, and the beautiful young Princess Catherine, the new Duchess of Cambridge.

R.B., we miss you.

I am an American. I am proud of our nation. Thomas Jefferson and George Washington are among my heroes. But sometimes I wish we had someone like Queen Elizabeth.

My favorite portrayal of her is outside Parliament in Ottawa, a statue which I have admired in person.

Ever a lover of horses, she is astride “Centennial,” who formerly served in the RCMP and was given to her by the people of Canada in honor of their centennial. Here is another photo.

Her role is almost entirely ceremonial; the reins of government are in other hands. But as Prime Ministers come and go, she has been a rock of stability, and, in her way, represents Great Britain to the world.

And she appears to take seriously her role as Fidei defensor, Defender of the Faith. A turning point for me in my appreciation of the monarchy was a day when I was browsing in the library at graduate school, and happened on a program from her coronation in 1953. It was an Anglican ceremony of Holy Communion complete with the Proper Preface for Coronations, a far cry from the manner in which we inaugurate Presidents.

I love the rubric at the beginning of the text that “Care is to be taken that the Ampulla be filled with Oil for the anointing, and together with the Spoon, be laid ready upon the Altar in the Abbey Church.” I can well imagine the Altar Guild at the Abbey seeing to this detail.

Archbishop: Will you to the utmost of your power maintain the Laws of God and the true profession of the Gospel?

Will you to the utmost of your power maintain in the United Kingdom the Protestant Reformed Religion established by law?

Will you maintain and preserve inviolably the settlement of the Church of England, and the doctrine, worship, discipline, and government thereof, as by law established in England?

And will you preserve unto the Bishops and Clergy of England, and to the Churches there committed to their charge, all such rights and privileges, as by law do or shall appertain to them or any of them?

Queen: All this I promise to do.

There was much fine choral music, beginning with Parry’s “I was glad” and including the newly-composed settings of “O taste and see” and “All creatures that on earth do dwell” by Vaughan Williams.

We have nothing like this in the United States. I wish we did.

(I can hear Mr. Jefferson off in the distance muttering something about separation of Church and State…)

A prayer for the Queen’s Majesty (from the BCP services of Matins and Evensong)

O Lord, our heavenly Father, high and mighty, King of kings, Lord of lords, the only Ruler of princes, who dost from thy throne behold all the dwellers upon earth: Most heartily we beseech thee with thy favour to behold our most gracious Sovereign Lady, Queen ELIZABETH; and so replenish her with the grace of thy Holy Spirit, that she may alway incline to thy will, and walk in thy way. Endue her plenteously with heavenly gifts; grant her in health and wealth long to live; strengthen her that she may vanquish and overcome all her enemies; and finally after this life she may attain everlasting joy and felicity; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

JRRT, Part Two

As mentioned last time, there are many places in LOTR where one can easily find parallels to the Christian narrative which is the Story in which we live. Here are a few:

The nature of Evil:

The beginning of the Silmarillion, the “Ainulindale,” is the creation myth of Middle-Earth, beginning “There was Eru, the One, who in Arda is called Iluvatar...” And the creation begins in Music.

... the music and the echo of the music went out into the Void, and it was not void. Never since have the Ainur made any music like to this music, though it has been said that a greater still shall be made before Iluvatar by the choirs of the Ainur and the Children of Iluvatar after the end of days.

Melkor, who had “the greatest gifts of power and knowledge” among the Ainur, seeks to defile the Song, filling it with discord. But Iluvatar, the One, responds with a new theme:

... it seemed at first soft and sweet, a mere rippling of gentle sounds... but it could not be quenched, and it took to itself power and profundity. And it seemed at last that there were two musics progressing at one time ... and they were utterly at variance. The one was deep and wide and beautiful, but slow and blended with an immeasurable sorrow, from which its beauty chiefly came.... The other ... was loud, and vain, and endlessly repeated ... and it essayed to drown the other music by the violence of its voice, but it seemed that its most triumphant notes were taken by the other and woven into its own solemn pattern. (The Silmarillion, p. 5)

Through the ensuing ages of the world, servants of Melkor continue his work of defilement. It seems inherent to Evil that it hates everything that is alive. It hates the green Earth and all the free creatures that walk in the light. It cannot create; it can only pervert. The Orcs and other servants of the Dark Lord delight in wanton destruction. Saruman, especially, can be seen as a representative of the scientific materialism that is destroying the natural environment.

Then there is Gollum. All of us, I think, have some of Gollum within us. Even he is given an opportunity for redemption. I will speak later of Frodo as a Christ-figure; it is perhaps in his pity on this miserable creature whom he has every reason to hate that Frodo is most like our Lord.

Through most of the tale, Evil seems to be stronger than that which is Good. And that brings us to:

The operations of Divine Providence: “What some would call chance”

“Behind this there was something also at work, beyond any design of the Ring-maker. I can put it no plainer than by saying that Bilbo was meant to find the ring,and not by its maker. In which case you also were meant to have it. And that may be an encouraging thought.” (Gandalf, speaking to Frodo: FOTR I.2, “The Shadow of the Past”)

The prayer of Grace at meals:

Faramir and his company face west in silence before their meals.

‘So we always do,’ he said, as they sat down: ‘We look toward Numenor that was, and beyond to Elvenhome that is, and to that which is beyond Elvenhome and will ever be. Have you no such custom at meat?’ ‘No,’ said Frodo, feeling strangely rustic and untutored. (TTT II.5, “The Window on the West”)

The Sacrament of Holy Communion:

There are many analogies between this and Lembas. I have written on this elsewhere.

Devotion toward Our Lady:

In this matter, Galadriel, the “Lady of the Golden Wood” is a figure of the Blessed Virgin Mary, as is Elbereth.

After leaving Bag End, the three Hobbits are almost discovered by a Black Rider. He slinks away as Elves approach. They sing of Elbereth “in the fair Elven-tongue, of which Frodo knows only a little, and the others know nothing. Yet the sound blending with the melody seemed to shape itself in their thought into words which they only partly understood ... The song ended. ‘These are High-Elves! They spoke the name of Elbereth!’ said Frodo in amazement.” (FOTR I.3, “Three is Company”)

This is the experience that many Catholics and other persons of faith have upon hearing liturgical chant in Latin, the ancient tongue of the Western Church: “the sound blending with the melody seemed to shape itself in their thought into words.” The song which the Elves sang, “A! Elbereth Gilthoniel!” is a close analogue to the chant Ave Maris Stella. JRRT doubtless heard this sung at the close of Compline on many occasions. Even as the name of Elbereth identified the singers as High-Elves, so does the name of the Blessed Virgin Mary, uttered in song and prayer, identify a Catholic (or Orthodox) Christian.

When Aragorn, Gimli, and Legolas encounter the Riders of Rohan, Eomer speaks ill of the Lady, in a way that JRRT and other Catholics often encountered from Protestants who misunderstand Marian devotion. Gimli answers “‘... let Gimli the Dwarf Gloin’s son warn you against foolish words. You speak evil of that which is fair beyond the reach of your thought, and only little wit can excuse you.’” (TTT I.2, “The Riders of Rohan”)

Later, they appear before Theoden, King of Rohan. Wormtongue speaks of the “Sorceress of the Golden Wood” and her “webs of deceit.” This was enough to push the already-simmering Gandalf into action. But first, he sings:

“In Dwimordene, in Lorien
Seldom have walked the feet of Men,
Few mortal eyes have seen the light
That lives there ever, long and bright.
Galadriel! Galadriel!” (TTT I.6, “The King of the Golden Hall”)

Visions of the Heavenly Places:

One of the treasures of JRRT’s writings is his uncanny skill in place-description, often in only a few words. There are many examples in LOTR of places that, for me, have become visions of the “fair and blessed country” which we seek. Some emphasize one aspect, some another, for we can do no more than this: “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard...” (I Corinthians 2:9)

The two most prominent examples are Rivendell and Lorien. The first emphasizes the blessedness of coming Home to “a perfect house, whether you like food or sleep or storytelling or singing, or just sitting and thinking best, or a pleasant mixture of them all” (FOTR II.1, “Many Meetings). The second emphasizes the natural order, freed at last from bondage to sin and death. “It seemed to them that they did little but eat and drink and rest, and walk among the trees, and it was enough” (FOTR II.7, “The Mirror of Galadriel”).

There are others, from the house of Tom Bombadil to the forest dwellings of Treebeard and Quickbeam, and the city of Minas Tirith, especially as Boromir speaks of it as he dies and Pippin later sees it for the first time, “the Guarded City, with its seven walls of stone so strong and old that it seemed to have been not builded but carven by giants out of the stones of the earth” (ROTK I.1, “Minas Tirith”).

I have spoken somewhat of this elsewhere.

Christ-figures: Frodo, Gandalf, Strider

All three represent various aspects of our Lord Jesus Christ. Frodo is the “suffering Servant” in many respects, especially in the last parts of ROTK as he and Sam make their way across the Plains of Gorgoroth and up the mountain.

Gandalf, in his fall into the depths of Moria struggling with the Balrog, ultimately overcoming it, and (as it were) returning from death as Gandalf the White, is Christ in his defeat of the Enemy, descent into Hell, and Resurrection.

Strider is the true King, hidden from view, returning to his rightful patrimony in a manner akin to the Second Coming of Christ for which we long (e.g., Revelation 19:11-21). “When the King returns” had become a figure of speech in Gondor; few actually expected it. And some would prefer that it never happen.

So it is with our Lord for whom we wait. Mention of his return in majesty to "judge both the quick and the dead" is most often met with derision.

The Life Everlasting:

“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.” (ROTK Appendix A.v, “a part of the Tale of Aragorn and Arwen”)

And the ship went out into the High Sea and passed on into the West, until at last on a night of rain Frodo smelled a sweet fragrance on the air and heard the sound of singing that came over the water. And then it seemed to him that as in his dream in the house of Bombadil, the grey rain-curtain turned all into silver glass and was rolled back, and he beheld white shores and beyond them a far green country under a swift sunrise. (ROTK II.9, “The Grey Havens”)

The Hobbit, and The Lord of the Rings, by J. R. R. Tolkien

“In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. . . .”

This is a tale that begins as something akin to a beast-fable such as "The Wind in the Willows." Here we have little creatures with furry feet who live in snug little holes with round doors, and Dwarves who, when one encounters them at the beginning of "The Hobbit," are much like their equivalents in “Snow White” and similar tales: “Dwalin and Balin, and Kili and Fili, and Dori, Nori, Oir, Oin, and Gloin, and “Bifur, Bofur, Bombur, and especially Thorin!” (The Hobbit, Chapter 1, “An Unexpected Party”). We have a Wizard, who is a slightly comical fellow with bushy eyebrows. And we have Bilbo Baggins, as unlikely a character for High Fantasy as can be imagined.

One of the marvels of this tale is the manner in which it moves from the comfortable environs of Bag End and Hobbiton to the world of Men and Elves and the great affairs of the wise and strong, of good and evil. As late as the “Sign of the Prancing Pony” (The Fellowship of the Ring: Part I, Chapter 9, or for brevity here and elsewhere: FOTR I.9) the whole tale could be taken as a children’s story: a pleasant diversion, but nothing of import.

The gradual change into a grown-up tale, which I consider worthy to stand alongside the likes of the Odyssey and Iliad of Homer, is foreshadowed in “The Shadow of the Past” (FOTR I.2), and comes irrevocably with Strider (FOTR I.10):

“All that is gold does not glitter,
Not all those who wander are lost. . . .”

Then again -- another marvel of this tale -- the homely atmosphere of a children’s fable never quite leaves the story, for these little hobbits are at the center of it. They are neither strong nor valiant, and the Powers of the world consider them to be of no import, not even as potential slaves. But, as it proves, they alone can save the world. And in so doing, “these hobbits will sit on the edge of ruin and discuss the pleasures of the table, or the small doings of their fathers, grandfathers, and great-grandfathers, and remoter cousins to the ninth degree” (TTT I.8, “The Road to Isengard”).

This is not an Allegory.

The Shire of the Hobbits, lovely though it is, is only a small corner of the wide world. Its people are inconsequential. Are they not like the Children of Israel, in their small homeland on the edge of empires? For, through much of the Tale in which we are part, the Story centers in the Kingdom of Judah, an unlikely and backwards little place, by the time of Hezekiah and the last Kings perhaps forty by ninety miles in extent, hardly larger than the county in which I reside (and smaller than the Shire). But it is through this nation, from beginning to end a strange and unlikely people, most often the object of scorn and derision, and always on the edge of extinction by one Final Solution or another, that salvation has come to the world.

Tolkien insisted, repeatedly, that LOTR was not an Allegory. Neither is it an overtly Christian tale in the manner of the "Chronicles of Narnia" or "Perelandra" Many Tolkien fans are positively anti-Christian, and enjoy the books without any thought of connections with Christianity. But the tale is suffused with it, and that is one of its greatest strengths.

I could easily multiply examples for many pages; a few must suffice. And those few must wait for another time.

[Part Two; Part Three]