The Istari Revisited

[Primula Baggins]

So, doubly ironic, then, that the Istari were not trusted to follow the right path themselves, but were "hindered" from using forces which the Valar considered inappropriate?

I think of it more as the Istari being the means by which the Valar chose to act. The point was not to restrain the Istari; the point was to restrain their own actions. The Istari were the tool at hand and had to be limited to fit the task.

In any case, of course, it turned out to be true that not all the Istari were trustworthy.

Superwizard, I am just reading the Sil carefully for the first time, but Unfinished Tales is next.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

It's time for me to repeat the alliterative poem of Tolkien's that I love so much.

Wilt thou learn the lore that was long secret
of the Five that came from a far country?
One only returned. Others never again
under Men's dominion Middle-earth shall seek
until Dagor Dagorath and teh Doom cometh.
How hast thou heard it: the hidden counsel
of the Lords of the West in the land of Aman?
The long roads are lost that led thither,
and to mortal men Manwë speaks not.
From the West-that-was a wind bore it
to the sleeper's ear, in the silences
under night-shadow, when news is brought
from lands forgotten and lost ages
over seas of years to the searching thought.
Not all are forgotten by the Elder King.
Sauron he saw as a slow menace.

As Christopher himself says in UT, "There is much here that bears on the larger question of the concern of Manwë and the Valar with the fate of Middle-earth after the Downfall of Númenor ... ."

[superwizard]

That's great Primula_Baggins! I personally love Unfinished Tales (mainly due to the sections about the Istari and the Plantir).
scirocco you said that The Istari were not trusted but I don't think that's it, they just were not meant to be seen as powerful gods but as helpers in the fight against Sauron. So for that reason they were embodied and given limited power.

[axordil]

scirocco et al--
Letter 156 appears to have been directed more at the notion that Galadriel had more to do Gandalf's new stature than giving him a place to stay and some new duds. While Gandalf was certainly not returned as a non-corporate entity whom Galadriel had to re-house in his old body, there is no question that the White was less constrained than the Grey had been, indeed, than any of the Istari had been. He was less clothed, shall we say.

Besides, hasn't anyone told you that authors are never to be trusted when discussing their own works after the fact?

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I had thought about citing that quote from Letter 156 about Gandalf's nakedness (it appears, after all, directly after one of the quotes from that letter that I did cite). I decided not to do so because, frankly, I like Ax's notion better then Tolkien's on this particular point.

[Athrabeth]

I like Ax's notion as well. There's something fundamentally different about Gandalf after he is sent back that is alluded to in his conversation with Gwaihir:

"A burden you have been," he answered, "but not so now. Light as a swan's feather in my claw you are. The Sun shines through you. Indeed I do not think you need me any more: were I to let you fall, you would float upon the wind."

I've always taken this to mean that Gandalf is now "housed" in some form of body that is closer to the "raiment" the Valar and Ainur wore to express a physical presence, than it is to actual flesh and bone.

I had always understood that the Istari were limited and restricted by their mortal bodies, but had thought it was kind of an unfortunate side-effect. I hadn't previously realised how deliberately the imposition of those bodies was done. Quite, I don't know, Machiavellian of the Valar I would almost say...

The Valar, Machiavellian???

No way.

I think the Valar had finally learned that the "workings" of the Children of Ilúvatar were beyond their ken. They could love Elves and Men; they could revere them and care about them. But they could not really understand their hearts and minds, nor their worldly experience as incarnate beings of Arda (although I think Ulmo came closer than any to really "getting" what the Eruhini were all about). I don't think it was a matter of hindering the powers of the Istari because they were not trusted to follow the "right path"; I think it was more that the Valar really could not discern what the "right paths" for The Children might look like. To discover those paths, to be really open to understanding the needs and desires and "mindset" of those actually walking them (or potentially capable of walking them), the Istari, I believe, had to be given the opportunity to fully experience the journey alongside them.

No, I don't think the Valar were Machiavellian........but I do think they were (as they always seem to be) naive in matters of the Eruhini. I wonder if they were capable of even seeing the risks inherent in the Istari taking on the qualities of corporeal beings: risks that were just as real as those posed by sending Maiar in their "natural state". Would Saruman have fallen if he had not become enamoured with "worldly" comforts and possessions and knowledge, and the idea of securing these for himself as a physically experiential being? Would Radagast have become an "absent-minded professor" of biology if he hadn't felt such an affinity for the physical world he was now, for all intents and purposes, a part of? Gandalf, it would seem, was the only one who truly entered into and maintained an intimate fellowship with the "common folk", suffering their pain, rejoicing in their triumphs, feeling their sorrows.........walking the hard path alongside them, and rejecting the monk-like detachment of Radagast, and the worldly covetousness of Saruman.

Each of the Maiar chosen to take on the errand within Middle-earth had a distinct nature, as did all of The Powers of Arda; each had an innate "personality" and a set of natural inclinations that were just as much a part of their being as the unique genetic legacies of Elves and Men. I find it ironic that Saruman, whose "angelic" nature was obviously not drawn towards Melkor in the beginning, fell after being seduced by the "little" temporal effects of knowledge and power. His fall, I think, is a human one, not an angelic one, reflecting the perils facing all The Children walking upon Arda Marred.

[superwizard]

They could love Elves and Men; they could revere them and care about them. But they could not really understand their hearts and minds, nor their worldly experience as incarnate beings of Arda

I couldn't agree more.

[axordil]

His fall, I think, is a human one, not an angelic one, reflecting the perils facing all The Children walking upon Arda Marred.

So...was Radagast's fate a Fall of either sort? Not to mention Alatar and Pallando...

[superwizard]

axordil what do you mean by the fall of Alatar and Pallando? They did not fail as was suggested by Unfinished Tales but actually succeeded in helping in the war. Had it not been for them Gondor would have fallen a long time before the war of the ring. (for more information please see The Peoples of Middle-earth. (Sorry if I sound rude but I must defend my fellow wizards)

[Voronwë the Faithful]

As is so often the case in Tolkien's vast and complicated canon of writings, there are contradictory evidence on this point. I'm not sure that either can be considered conclusive. But it does appear that Tolkien's final view on the blue wizards was, as superwizard points out, more positive then had previously been the case

In the essays printed in UT, which were probably written in around 1954, Tolkien suggests that the blue wizards might have been ensnared by Sauron or perished. He explicitly states that Gandalf was the only successful Istar, which suggests that the Blue Wizards failed their mission: "Indeed, of all the Istari, only one remained faithful, and he was the last-comer." And of course, the alliterative poem that I quoted above states that of the Five that came from a far country, only One returned (Gandalf), suggesting that he was the only one who was successful.

A few years later, in Letter 211, written in October 1958, Tolkien offered more specific information about their fate:

I think that they went as emissaries to distant regions, East and South, far out of Númenórean range: missionaries to 'enemy-occupied' lands, as it were. What success they had I do not know; but I fear that they failed, as Saruman did, though doubtless in different ways; and I suspect they were founders or beginners of secret cults and 'magic' traditions that outlasted the fall of Sauron."

At this point they were still considered to have failed. However, the "Last Writings" section of The Peoples of Middle-earth (the final volume of HoME) CT prints some notes apparently written in 1972, in which he gives a very different account of the Blue Wizards, even to giving them different names, an earlier arrival in Middle-earth, a different purpose altogether, and (seemingly) a much more successful role:

"The 'other two' came much earlier, at the same time probably as Glorfindel, when matters became very dangerous in the Second Age.(26) Glorfindel was sent to aid Elrond and was (though not yet said) pre-eminent in the war in Eriador.But the other two Istari were sent for a different purpose. Morinehtar and Romestamo. Darkness-slayer and East-helper. Their task was to circumvent Sauron: to bring help to the few tribes of Men that had rebelled from Melkor-worship, to stir -up rebellion...and after his first fall to search out his hiding (in which they failed) and to cause dissension and disarray among the dark East...They must have had very great influence on the history of the Second Age and Third Age in weakening and disarraying the forces of the East...who would both in the Second and Third Age otherwise have ...outnumbered the West."

[Athrabeth]

His fall, I think, is a human one, not an angelic one, reflecting the perils facing all The Children walking upon Arda Marred.

So...was Radagast's fate a Fall of either sort? Not to mention Alatar and Pallando...

I believe that there are at least two distinct possibilities about Radagast. Firstly, I think Radagast's fate could be seen as a kind of "fall". He disconnects from the Children of Ilúvatar and stops walking their path. I think it's also a very human kind of fall, perhaps one of the most common......."head in the sand", "state of denial", "see no evil, hear no evil" "turning a blind eye". Radagast doesn't turn against the Eruhini, or seek to dominate them.....he just disengages from their experience altogether, perhaps because it is so fraught with sorrow and treachery and pain.

I think a second possibility is that he assumes the existence of a kind of 'detached monk'. He actually rather reminds me of an extreme version of a Taoist or Buddhist master - seeking enlightenment through solitary meditation within the natural world. But this too, of course, is a very human reaction to a world filled with such injustice and misery.

[superwizard]

I think a second possibility is that he assumes the existence of a kind of 'detached monk'. He actually rather reminds me of an extreme version of a Taoist or Buddhist master - seeking enlightenment through solitary meditation within the natural world. But this too, of course, is a very human reaction to a world filled with such injustice and misery.

The thing that really disappoints me about Radagast is that he doesn't even seem to defend the very nature that he so loves. Instead of trying to save it he just doesn't do anything. I think that's where he fell because had he cared to defend his trees he would not have left his mission, instead he would have realized that he must help fight against Sauron.

[axordil]

superw--

You have to remeber that I consider HoME in general a marketing gimmick as much as, and perhaps more than, a source of information about the stories of Middle-earth. Really the priority has to be:

1) LOTR--published during the author's lifetime and with his editorial contribution.
2) The Hobbit--same as 1) above but not as consciously integrated with the rest of the stories.
3) Sil and UT--of spotty quality and relevance, due to the fact that JRRT was dead before they were compiled into their published form. While most of them were certainly of publishable quality, there is simply no way to tell if JRRT would have made the exact same calls when it came to what went in and what didn't as his son. But there are passages, and sometimes whole tales (Nin i Hin Húrin, or some of the Númenórean stories in UT) that are as good as anything JRRT published while living.
4) HoME--Some of the background material is fine, but how seriously are we to look at something that includes Strider's predecessor, the hobbit with wooden shoes? There is much in HoME that is plainly at odds with what actually got published, which makes all of it suspect in my estimate. It boils down to author's notes, primarily on dead ends. Roughly 20% of it could have been ethically published...as it is it's really exploitation by CJRT, whether he is capable of seeing it or not.
5) Lost Tales--neither fish nor fowl, a sort of alternative framing more than anything else.

At any rate, Radagast seems to me the opposite end state of the same process that snared Saruman--going native, as it were. You could construct a truth table with those two, Gandalf, and Tom Bombadil to describe the various possibilities for what happens to Ainu who spend a long time amidst mortality.

[superwizard]

axordil you consider The Sil as more accurate than HoME however I always take Tolkien final words as the conical ones. That is why I assume that Alatar and Pallando did not fail. As Voronwë_the_Faithfulpointed out Tolkien's final opinion was that they stayed faithful and that's what I believe.

[axordil]

Well, that was JRRT's final opinion if we listen to CJRT, anyway...

On the other hand, I know when I'm writing, some bits are set fairly early on and others quite flexible until I'm done. If I died in the middle of going through something in the latter class, what was my final opinion might well not have been what ended up in the finished product. That's the danger of relying too heavily on notes and drafts.

But I should add that in some cases I see the Sil and UT as having elements that JRRT left quite unfinished. I don't think he would have left some of the contradictory cosmological evidence in there, for example, given his druthers. So the account of the wizards in UT, while feeling fairly "complete," may well have been superceded by the time of his death.

Still, we have no account of their end, nor of Radagast's, do we? Even in HoME? We only KNOW for certain that Gandalf went back, and that Saruman died.

For those who have read all of HoME: does CJRT anywhere supply a master timeline of when his father was working on what? That is, from which period which excerpts are drawn?

[superwizard]

This is something I read yesterday that interested me. In The UT it says in the chapter The Hunt for the Ring :

In this account, Saruman, in fear and despair, and perceiving the full horror of service to Mordor, resolved suddenly to yield to Gandalf, and beg for his pardon and help.

It then goes to say that Gandalf had gone by then. I know not if this is the final version but still I wish to ask; had Gandalf still been there what do you think would have happened?

[superwizard]

come on any one???

[Alatar]

Who knows? Perhaps they would have ridden to Minas Tirith together and Saruman would have betrayed them at a crucial moment. Perhaps he would have redeemed himself and died in battle with the Witchking.

Anythings possible.

[superwizard]

Who knows? Perhaps they would have ridden to Minas Tirith together and Saruman would have betrayed them at a crucial moment. Perhaps he would have redeemed himself and died in battle with the Witchking.

Anythings possible.

Yes Alatar anything is possible but I was wondering what you think might have happened.
Part of me is inclined to believe that Saruman would have repented and would have used his power to aid Gandalf in the war.
Yet the larger part of me believes that he would not have repented but instead betrayed them to the ruin of all...

[Alatar]

Sorry SW, but I'm not really into fan fiction. Some of the very talented authors here could do a lot with that premise, but its not my forte.