Tolkien's Faith--Luke 24:31-32

Day 13

The metaphysics of being a Christian or anything else for that matter is too complicated to contemplate so I don’t–ever.

Usually.

Except, I do, a lot, in my mind, ask what the heck is going on with me, with Karen, with us, with the world, with everyone we know and love.

I ask myself, “Why am I this way?” and “What am I going to do?”a lot, and then before I know it, I’ve done SOMETHING to fill up THAT moment in time.

Are my actions and thoughts Christian-like because I’m Christian, informed by The Word or are my thoughts and actions what they are, bubbling up from instinct and biology and I come around later to fit a Christian taxonomy on them?

For instance, I can tell when I’m speaking with a believer and when I’m speaking with a non-believer.

Can’t you?

I find the language of a believer to be totally different from a non-believer–words like “faith”, “hope”, “Heaven”, “prayer”,  and “blessed” abound.

Non-believers don’t use words like “Scripture” or “Gospel”, and they won’t say “God” or “Jesus Christ” unless they stub their toe or spill their drink.  🙂

In  Tolkien’s Faith:  A Spiritual Biography, Holly Ordway discusses at length how J.R.R. Tolkien’s works, particularly The Lord of the Rings flowed from his Catholic faith.

She writes:

“Tolkien’s reticence in portraying the Incarnate God sprang not only from the fact that the “Third Age” is a pre-Christian age but also from a deep sense of humility at this central Christian mystery:  “The Incarnation of God is an infinitely greater thing than anything I would dare to write.”

I find people off-putting when they march up to me and proclaim what they believe like they are wearing a giant sandwich board.

The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings sagas are so popular because they don’t proclaim to readers the Christian faith.

The Lord of the Rings is an allegory for the Christian faith because Tolkien was a Christian and that’s how he told stories.

Ordway describes Tolkien’s theme in The Lord of the Rings:

“[Tolkien] wrote, on several occasions, that the theme of The Lord of the Rings is in fact, “Death and the desire for deathlessness.”  The abuse of power was a major element in the story, he explained, but not at its heart:  “The real theme for me is about something much more permanent and difficult:  “Death and Immortality.”

There are many instances where the characters of Middle-earth grapple with the same life issues we do–like dealing with death and the abuses of the powerful.

Except they’re wizards, hobbits, elves, and dwarves.  🙂

Gandalf the Grey, for instance, falls into a chasm fighting the evil demon Balrog.

When Gandal returns in the Fangorn Forest, having been “sent back”, he is Gandalf the White and his friends,  Aragorn, (heir to the throne of Gondor), Gimli (the Dwarf), and Legolas (the Elf), don’t recognize him at first.

This encounter resonates for a Christian because it is similar to what happens with Jesus on the road to Emmaus, (Luke 24:13-35), specifically when Jesus’ disciples finally have their eyes opened and they recognize Him.

Luke 24:31-32 And then their eyes were opened and they recognized Him; and He vanished from their sight. 32 They said to one another, “Were our hearts not burning within us when He was speaking to us on the road, while He was explaining the Scriptures to us?”

Like Jesus being resurrected, Gandalf comes back, but not as Gandalf the Grey–but as Gandalf the White.

Christopher Watkin describes Jesus’ resurrection in Biblical Critical Theory:  How The Bible’s Unfolding Story Makes Sense of Modern LIfe and Culture:

“The resurrection is not a resuscitation.  Jesus did not come back to life; He went forward to new life.  His resurrection is not a return to the same existence that He had before He was crucified, like the resuscitation of Lazarus…whom Jesus brought back to life but who later died a normal death.”

I think Christians will approach Tolkien’s work differently than non-believers.

I feel bewildered by the circumstances of my life more often than I’m comfortable with–but I feel I can untangle myself through the study of Scripture and reorienting myself to Jesus.

This is normal for believers, I think.

Even if the resurrected Jesus is not visible.

Niels Henrik Gregersen writes in The Extended Body: The Social Body of Jesus according to Luke:

“Their eyes are prepared by his words, but they do not see until their fellowship is renewed in the breaking of bread. Jesus has broken bread before in the company of publicans and sinners, now he does so with the slow of heart and the unbelieving, before disappearing from their sight as a concrete bodily figure. Apparently, understanding and faith can only come with the absence of his resurrected body. At the moment of this new transfiguration, only the social body is present, of which they themselves are a part—indeed, which they themselves are.”

My lens to experience the world is different now.

My heart burns from within with Christ’s illumination.

I see Him where I am.  

Lord, we thank You for the revelation of Jesus in our lives, wherever we encounter Him–in a book or a movie, or in others.

Lord, help us open our eyes so that we can recognize Your presence in our lives.  May we experience the burning passion in our hearts like the disciples on the road to Emmaus.

Amen