Talk:Eru Ilúvatar

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[edit] Eru == God ?

The claim that Eru is identical to the God of Judaism, the God of Christianity, and the God of Islam is bizarre. Tolkien knew Eru was fictional, and believed that at least one of the others was not. -- Someone else 02:09 Feb 21, 2003 (UTC)

  • Linguistically Eru is a cognate of the Semitic El or Elohah,depending on the language of origin,the designation can be pronounced E-ROO or EL-U.Sochwa 21:08, 10 September 2006 (UTC)
Cognate? Between Semitic and an invented language? Sorry, no. (The etymology of "Eru" is from the word for "one", anyway. Plain false cognate.) At best you could speculate that Tolkien was inspired (consciously or not) by the Semitic, but that would be pure guesswork, unless you have a reference. -- Perey 08:55, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Not so fast. We should remember what Tolkien did for a living -- he was , many of Tolkien's words are derived from ancient and/or dead languages. Theoden, for example, is directly taken from Anglo-Saxon meaning 'king' or 'chief'... and 'Eru' actually is derived from 'aer' (that should be an "ash" the 'ae' stuck together to make the 'ahh' (as in "cat" sound), which, not surprisingly, among other things means 'one. Semitic languages belong to the same family as other Indo-European languages, so there could be something to that... keep an open mind. Ryecatcher773 02:13, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Semitic languages do not belong to the Indo-European language family -- they are a subfamily of the Afro-Asiatic family. [1] -- Paroche 23:02, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I was dubious about this too, but the statement is half-right in that Eru was the supreme god and creator, so he is more like the Christian god and less like, say, Odin. The inclusion of a super-god in the pantheon is actually kind of an interesting anachronism in Tolkien's pagan-North-Europe-derived mythology. Perhaps when I finish reading the History of Middle-Earth I'll have a cogent way to rephrase this statement. Stan Shebs 02:41 Feb 21, 2003 (UTC)

If anything, I think the system of emanations of Eru that Tolkien devised was Gnostic at its base, but I leave it to you to find a way to characterize the Theology of Eru<G> -- Someone else 02:53 Feb 21, 2003 (UTC)
That's because JRRT's mythology is not "pagan-North-Europe-derived". At best, it's "pagan-North-Europe-inspired" or "-influenced". dab 10:30, 29 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Robert Foster's Complete Guide to Middle-earth defines Ilúvatar as God. He may not be "identical" to the ?real God (although how could you tell?!), but is Tolkien's fictionalised version of the all-wise, all-knowing and all-compassionate God within the "sub-created" world of Middle-earth. Lee M 00:48, 1 Dec 2003 (UTC)


My opinion, as a fan of Narnia and of Middle-Earth, as well as a Christian and a science-fiction fan, is that the Ainulindale was intended as the cosmological creation story of Middle-Earth, analogous to the first three chapters of Genesis in the Bible; a similar story shows up in The Magician's Nephew. I think that, though a Christian, Tolkien wanted to be true to the literary style of the Norse mythology that was dear to him. Thus he made Eru Ilúvatar, a monotheistic God, and the Ainur, created beings of tremendous power and intelligence. While Ilúvatar is infinite, they are finite, no matter how powerful they are. They can be called gods rightly, but never Gods. This is similar to the view of the Old Testament portrayal of other gods as merely demons (fallen angels); thus Melkor's battle is against the harmony of Eru, as Satan's battle is against the righteous rule of God, and Tash against Aslan, not as Loki against other nigh-immortals. In support of this view, I offer the point that C. S. Lewis, in his Narnia series, included dryads and naiads and even a river god, small "g". Your thoughts? -- BlueNight 04:08, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Agreed. I think "Eru = God" is as untenable as any other allegorical interpretation of the legendarium. There are clear influences, but ultimately Eru is not the Christian God (or any other deity) pasted in. He's as much a representation of Tolkien as the Author as he is of God. (Incidentally, why is "He" capitalised several times in the article? This isn't from Tolkien, and is usually only done by adherents of a particular religion; do we have some Eruists here? ;) --Perey 11:20, 3 Oct 2004 (UTC)
"Eru = God" is not an "allegorical" interpretation. What is your understanding of "allegorical"? For Tolkien, myth is diametrically opposed to allegory. Ainulindale is a myth in which God is referred to as Eru. Allegory would be if we say, the Ring is the Nuclear Bomb, Gandalf is Jesus Christ, Sam is really Tolkien, and Tom Bombadil is the Warwickshire countryside spirit. (Oops, Bombadil "is" the Warwickshire countryside spirit, but the other examples would be allegories detested by JRRT). dab 10:26, 29 Oct 2004 (UTC)
I meant of course that "Eru is the Christian God" is allegory. "Eru is a God-figure", and "Bombadil is a countryside spirit", are mythical, but saying either is that particular real-world God or countryside spirit is as allegorical as "Gandalf is Jesus". --Perey 22:20, 31 Oct 2004 (UTC)
well, in the case of God, there is some difficulty in defining "real world". Eru was certainly intended to be identical with the "Christian God" (who is of course imagined as "the" God, and doesn't need "Christian" as a specification), but in pre-Christian times, seeing that Middle-Earth is intended to be *this* Earth, in a setting several millennia BC. dab 07:10, 1 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Also, Eru in the Silmarillion is an 'allegory' for God just as much as the horses and birch trees appearing in the LotR are 'allegories' for horses and birch trees: "Eru" is Quenya for "God", just like "roch" is Sindarin for "horse": that's not an allegory, it's just a name given in another language. dab (ᛏ) 10:47, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Well, Tolkien did indeed say that Eru was the God of his series, however, his influence seems to be mainly from Christianity (his religion), and Norse mythology, I'd say Odin. However, he used excessive allegories, so possibly it is meant as the Christian God, but before Christianity. Hard to explain, but I think that's it. However, I highly doubt Gandalf is allegory for Jesus. IronCrow 20:28, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Erusse estelinya (talk • contribs) 22:11, August 23, 2007 (UTC).

I agree with the following sentence, though I thought it safe and reasonable to broaden the wording from "Catholic" to "Christian": "Tolkien understood Eru not as a fictional deity but as a name in a fictional language for the actual monotheistic God of Christian faith, although in a fictional context." - Erusse estelinya 22:10, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] legendarium???

What is meant by "legendarium"? Why use such an uncommon term? older ≠ wiser 14:58, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

You can see what it means by clicking on legendarium. As for why use it - it's because Tolkien himself used this term. Ausir 15:04, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

[edit] recent removals

I do not think the removals by Steuard were very helpful. It's always easier to just delete stuff than to correct, expand and rearrange. The "Ainur and Maiar" could have been corrected to "Valar and Maiar" rather than simply cut. The parallels with Lewis may have deserved a section of their own. The question of creation of sapient beings runs through Tolkien's works (Creation of Orcs etc.) and would also deserve a section on its own. The Tom Bombadil issue keeps cropping up and this is the right place to discuss it. I agree that the article was not "finished" but if you just cut awkward stuff rather than improving it, WP would shrink dramatically! As User:Steuard says, he doesn't "have much time to spend on this Wikipedia thing", he should maybe be content to make less sweeping changes. dab 09:42, 29 Oct 2004 (UTC)

  1. I think the comparisons with Lewis are quite relevant to this article.
  2. Creation questions also belong in this article, I think. I'd like to merge Children of Ilúvatar here and expand to explain the concept. Comments?
  3. Perhaps the question about Tom Bombadil would fit better into Tom Bombadil? [[User:Aranel|Aranel ("Sarah")]] 16:45, 29 Oct 2004 (UTC)
I understand your concerns, and I did share and consider them to some degree; I probably should have explained my deletions here on the talk page at once. On the other hand, part of Wikipedia's philosophy is "be bold", and I acted with the knowledge that if people strongly disagreed with my edits, the previous version was preserved in the page's history. Let me address each of the concerns that you raised in a bit more detail.
  • I hesitated between changing "Ainur and Maiar" to "Ainur" or to "Valar and Maiar", and my final choice was driven by my desire for both conciseness and accuracy. Not only is "Ainur" shorter, but there were Ainur who were neither Valar nor Maiar. I suspect that most of those never entered Ea, but I know that there are readers who believe that some Ainur in Ea were neither Valar nor Maiar. (Moreover, why _shouldn't_ we call the Ainur who never left "heaven" angels?) Saying just "Ainur" neatly avoids those issues, and is perfectly accurate.
  • Parallels between Lewis and Tolkien might well deserve a section or even an article of their own, but I honestly don't feel that the connection is significant when it comes to Eru. Both Eru and the "Emperor over the sea" are based strongly on the Christian concept of God (if not exclusively so), and the Christian concept of God (at least in the first person of the trinity) is "physical[ly] separat[ed] from the world He created". Thus, I don't see any value or importance in mentioning a Tolkien-Lewis connection here any more than I would see a value in mentioning any other author whose fiction involves a Christian-like God. I don't think that Tolkien's decision to separate God from his creation was inspired by Lewis, nor vice versa, despite their mutual influence in many other ways.
  • The more I think about it, the more I am starting to agree with you that sapient beings deserve their own discussion here. It's a very interesting question, and it seems that Tolkien never really settled the details in his own mind. And I must admit that my decision to delete that sentence was made in part because I was daunted by the prospect of writing a full discussion of it, though it was also based on my perception that the sentence should not be left as it stood because it was not NPOV. On the other hand, if someone does write a full discussion on this point without expanding the rest of the article as well, it would probably be the biggest section of the article, which would in my opinion give the article a rather unbalanced emphasis. At that point, I would feel like we would either want to move it to its own article ("Sapient beings in Middle-earth"?) or seriously expand the rest of the article. But I guess your point is well taken: the article won't ever get fleshed out if people simply remove the stubs of its future form.
  • As for Tom Bombadil, again you're probably right that the (non-)connection deserves to be mentioned here. My decision to remove it was based on my feeling that the "Who (or what) is Tom Bombadil?" controversy shouldn't be allowed to bleed over into essentially unrelated articles, at least in the case of thoroughly unlikely or discredited theories. (After all, the vast majority of people coming to the Eru article are looking for information on Eru, not on Tom Bombadil.) Thus, possible Bombadil connections should probably not be included in the articles on Beren, Thingol, Tulkas... or Eru Ilúvatar (yes, I've seen all of those advocated in the past). Still, you may be right that the Eru-Bombadil connection comes up often enough that it should be mentioned here at least briefly; we'll have to think about the best way to present it. (I would suggest putting it in a very distinct paragraph or section, to make it clear that it doesn't "flow" from the rest of the article.)
Finally, regarding that comment on my user page, it's certainly true: I don't have a whole lot of time to spend here. Still, if you look at my contributions, I have made at least a few reasonably substantial contributions to the Tolkien material here. I'm still fairly new and I'm sure that I've got a lot to learn about Wikipedia and its culture, but I think on the whole I've behaved pretty well. :) In any case, I'll look forward to your reply.--Steuard 17:07, Oct 29, 2004 (UTC)
  • thanks for your detailed reply, Steuard. I hope you don't take my allusion to your user page wrongly, I know I feel very annoyed myself when people try to dig up personal information from my user page to hurl at me in a dispute. I just did that because you seemed to have deleted stuff in passing, without bothering to give your reasons. Of course nothing is lost, and I could just have reverted, had I really been that unhappy, after all. So I hope you'll excuse the slightly sarcastic tone of my previous comment.
  • the "Valar and Ainur" point is too minor to argue, no problem.
  • the Lewis part was not "mine" anyway, and I tend to agree with you.
  • so let's maybe restore the 'sapience' and 'Bombadil' stuff (I understand your Bombadilian concerns, though, but it's very brief, and even if a non-issue, it proves a diehard non-issue).
cheers, dab 17:27, 29 Oct 2004 (UTC)
No problem, and no offense taken. I did feel like I should have explained myself more fully earlier, so I'm glad that you brought it up and encouraged me to do so. --Steuard 21:08, Oct 29, 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Middle-earth canon

moved to Template talk:Mecanon — please see my reply there. dab 13:15, 30 Oct 2004 (UTC)

That page was later archived to Talk:Middle-earth canon/archive2 Carcharoth 01:34, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Finnish mythology

Finnish mythology is not the same or part of Norse mythology. Ausir 08:00, 15 May 2005 (UTC)

I expect the blanket term 204.209.209.129 was aiming at was Scandinavian, rather than Norse, mythology. (But Scandinavian mythology redirects to Norse mythology anyway. Guess this is an instance where Finland is meant to be excluded.) The question is, what 'broader generalisation' does he or she refer to in the edit summary? Finnish mythology seems to fit fine. -- Perey 20:24, 15 May 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Opening of Discussion for Rewrite

I think this article needs more work. In particular, I don't see any real discussion of Eru's relationship to creation, save insofar as he is called 'creator'. I want to see something about the relationship between his thoughts, the secret fire, and the beings that result. Furthermore, the discussion should limit itself wholly to Eru, and not go off on tangents as to the nature of Huan - that ought to be in a Huan article (though I do see the relevance of some of the Bombadil stuff). There are also significant problems with saying that Eru 'delegated' creation to the Ainur - that is wholly incorrect. It shows a fundamental misunderstanding of the Music and of the relationship between the Creator and the created. A better discussion could be had on the etymology of Eru and Iluvatar. I post now to see what people think.black thorn of brethil 07:43, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

p.s. Finland is not a part of Scandinavia, nor are Finns Scandinavians (save, possibly, the Swedish-Finns, who aren't really Finns, and so don't matter for this point!)

[edit] Power of Eru

Is eru truly omnipotent like it says in the article or have thete been more powerful forces in Arda-Taracka

Eru was Tolkien's representation of 'God' within the framework Middle-earth. So no, there weren't any more powerful forces. --CBDunkerson 15:15, 14 May 2006 (UTC)
but just because you are god doesn't mean that something mo0re powerful can exist his creations overpowered him-Taracka
That depends on the conception of God. Eru seems to have been a reflection of the traditional Christian God, who truly is considered to be omnipotent, quite outside any questions of "who is more powerful than whom?"--Steuard 04:24, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
Let me put it this way: I am a certain percentage more powerful than an ant. I am a certain percentage more powerful than a chihuahua (dog). The ant may be (let's say) .002% as powerful as I am. The dog may be 5% as powerful as I am. A tiger may be 150% to 300% as powerful as I am. With an omnipotent being, such a comparison is not possible. The Ainur Manwe may be 5,000,000,000,000% as powerful as the average hobbit, but they are both infinitesimally as powerful as Eru. Eru is infinitely powerful, so He is infinitely more powerful than anyone or anything else. He may not have been shown using that power, or He may have delegated the administration of His creation to the Ainur, but they are not as powerful as He is.

eru is not omnipotent-Taracka

How are you defining omnipotent? Let's assume Eru is the monotheistic God of Tolkien's faith, but in the universe of Tolkien's tales. If you are defining omnipotent as "able to do anything", then Eru fits that description. But if you are using the skewed definition "He controls everything", well, by creating [[free will], He precluded perfect control. Omnipotence is not omnicontrol.
Just because there are beings of great power on Arda, and no obvious actions of Eru documented in the LOTR mythos, it does not follow that they are more powerful. The Silmarillion, in the Ainulindale section, clearly shows Eru in charge. Melkor, a character analogous to Satan, corrupts the song, but it is shown that Eru anticipated the corruption to His benefit. For example:
"Melkor’s attempts to disrupt with the use of fierce heat and severe cold do nothing to ruin Water (as Melkor must have hoped), but rather leave the World with the beauties of snow and frost and clouds and rain; this does no less than push Manwë and Ulmo more closely together."
Now, in both Christianity and Tolkien's universe, corruption eventually gets so bad (thanks to free will) that the monotheistic creator scraps the current universe and starts a new one. The second universe, free from corruption and populated by those who have learned from the lesson of the first, and who dare not corrupt it, lasts forever after that. BlueNight 22:05, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Tolkien as Eru

it is quite possible that eru is Tolkien as he shaped and guided middle earth an author is the omnipotent god of their universe-Taracka

I don't think that Tolkien would have taken that approach. In various writings he seemed to connect Eru pretty strongly with the Catholic God that he believed in, and to my mind it just doesn't feel like him to elevate himself to that level.--Steuard 13:42, 23 May 2006 (UTC)


[edit] A few points for Discussion

There are a couple of places in this article that might benefit from some development. I hope I am not being opaque or pretentious with the following; I have put a lot of thought into it and would like to see what some of you think.

1. In the Opening', we have "[Eru] has delegated most direct action within Eä to the Ainur." I worry that this misses the point of sub-creation, and that it gives too much of the Gnostic feel to Eru. That is, it makes it sound like Eru created sapient beings and set them loose in the universe with no further plan or direct involvement on His part: very Gnostic (or at least Deistic), and very un-Catholic. It's my take on things that the sapient beings of Eä are able to uncover specific possibilities for realization that existed first as 'conceptual realities' in the mind of Eru, and that thus His absolute 'involvement' in the living history of Eä is existence itself, Being itself. Each sapient being in Eä is able (at some point in its life) to take material reality and explore its formal possibilities, to then choose a possibility and see it made manifest. But the possibilites and the necessary connections between them (all causes and their effects) were played out in the mind of Eru before Time. This view is of anything BUT a disconnected God - it rather a wholly, absolutely involved God. After all, there is an inevitability to the outcomes - a tone that goes against (in a sense) the idea of the disconnected Prime Mover. Furthermore, the Ainur have long since finished the work of their 'creation' in Eä; that was what the Music was all about. This makes them less independent actors or agents in the World and more fated beings following a template.
2. In Eru as Creator God, there is not enough of the creation of the Ainur and the events of Ainulindalë, and too much on the natures of Huan et al. The former is the only place that Eru has a surface role, and the latter is all better used in other articles. Also, the Ainur were not wholly familiar with the Music – each had a narrow view, the Vision was taken away before they completely understood it. Lastly, there are the 'adjustments' to the Music that the so-called free-agency of Men makes. All these things are important, and explain things like Dragons and other historical events that seem not to have been foreseen by those who were present at the Vision of the Music.
3. Comparison of Eru to other Gods is risky. Certainly, Eru as mythological creator being is commensurable with other non-fictional beings of the sort, but that is about it. More on this later.

Hope this wasn't too babbly. Cheers. black thorn of brethil 03:51, 24 May 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Recent edits

Satanel has not come to understand the relationship between Tolkien and Myth, at any level. This contibutor has tried before to remove any use of the terms 'myth', 'mythology(ies)', 'mythic' etc. from articles on Tolkien's fiction. At one point, I considered the issue settled; apparently not. If anyone has any problems with understanding Tolkien's works as 'fictional mythology(ies)', please discuss it here. black thorn of brethil 17:02, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] power of eru

There were beings that were more powerful. -- Myer Link 21:18, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Wha????

I am a big fan of Tolkien and his works and I've NEVER heard of that in any of his books and nor do I see it in any of the Wikipedia articles about the Tolkien Universe. Please Explain and give me some sources if this is true. Anker99 04:59, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] The first sentence incorrect

The first sentence reads: "Eru Ilúvatar is the Elvish name for God in the legendarium of J.R.R. Tolkien." However, strictly speaking it's incorrect: Eru is the Elvish name, Iluvatar is (if you will) his true name, but, unless I am mistaken (or not remembering my mythology correctly), the Elves do not call him "Iluvatar". I would correct it, but I can't come up with any good succinct alternative. It would seem to me it might be best just to avoid the "... name for God" for two reasons: (1) because "Eru Iluvatar" is a mixture of at least two tongues (I am going to guess Elvish and the Common, since Tolkien "translated" all his work into the Common speech), so it's hard to give it a correct attribution to a particular group of people, (2) IMHO, this is an oversimplification. In one sentence, Eru Iluvatar is NOT a god of any religion (a case in point: which religion claims death is given to Men as a gift, not punishment?). In a paragraph, it can be explained that many of his aspects were taken from other monotheistic religions, but the first sentence should not begin by identifying Eru Iluvatar with God (that is, either of Christianity or Judaism, as is the common convention when the word "god" is capitalized). novakyu 03:52, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

It's been a day, but I went ahead and made the change. Please let me know if 1) anyone has evidence that "Ilúvatar" is Elvish; 2) there is a better characterization of Ilúvatar in one sentence. novakyu (talk) 08:43, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
Egh. Eating my own words here, but I was wrong about "Iluvatar". It turns out it is Quenya, formed from "iluve" meaning "the whole, the all", and "atar" meaning "father", according to the "Appendix: Elements in Quenya and Sindarin" of Silmarillion. I still think it's better not to identify Eru with any God in the first sentence (hence I am leaving it as it is), but perhaps a section about meaning of the name could be added? novakyu (talk) 07:56, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Quendi and Atani/Eldar and Edain

I've changed "The Eldar (ie. Elves) and the Edain (ie. Men) were created by Eru" to "The Quendi (ie. Elves) and the Atani (ie. Men) were created by Eru". Admittedly, these were originally all-encompassing terms (Eldar being the name given by Oromë's, the Star-folk, and Edain being the Sindarin of Atani), but both became restricted to a subset of those who had travelled west. This doesn't do well with the context, which is talking about Elves and Men being the Children of Ilúvatar — the Avari and the Haradrim were Eruhíni as much as were the Vanyar and the Numenóreans. Nyttend (talk) 00:38, 16 January 2008 (UTC)