On Friends

We have reached the end, of our text.  The final chapter is "The Grey Havens" and I am again embarrassed to be reminded the Grey Havens are not across the Sea - it's just the port in Middle Earth that one takes there.  Ah well.

We follow Frodo as he goes to Grey Havens.  In usual Frodo fashion he tries to slip away.  He tells Sam to join him on a journey not mentioning Sam will have to return without him.  When they arrive, however, they are met by Merry and Pippin, who tell them Gandalf gave away Frodo's secret.

‘Yes,’ said Gandalf; ‘for it will be better to ride back three together than one alone."

When Frodo and Gandalf (as well as Bilbo and many Elves) have sailed away:

At last the three companions turned away, and never again looking back they rode slowly
homewards; and they spoke no word to one another until they came back to the
Shire, but each had great comfort in his friends on the long grey road.

Everything in life is better with friends.  When I was growing up a friend whom I emailed a lot with had this as his signature: "Shared with friends joy is doubled and sorrows are halved."  

Friends are a critical support system for making the harder choice.  Any sorrow resulting from your choice can be shared with others and not carried alone and any joy of course will be also multiplied.  But also, have you ever met a good person with no friends?  You may have - they exist.  But the amount of good they can do is limited.  Sometimes we can make the world better by acting.  But sometimes we make the world better through our words - persuading people of one thing or another to change their actions.  You are less likely to listen to someone who isn't your friend, and even less so if they have no friends.  

But friends also provide support by rejuvenating us.  Generally I think the text teaches that ethics is "doing the harder thing."  By definition the harder thing takes more energy.  But the harder choice isn't always the ethical one.  That's why it's important to discuss with friends - so when we are faced with a hard choice we can determine if it is the kind of hard choice worth making.  Friends can help us determine the right thing to do and give us the motivation to make that harder choice.  And if we err our friends can point this out to us and support us in righting our past wrongs.

It is noteworthy on their way home the hobbits don't speak to each other but are comforted nonetheless; Their sorrows are reduced.  We may think we need to do things with our friends, but this may miss the point.  It's great to do that, and certainly doing things is better if you're with friends, but there's also something about just seeing and being with a friend.

We are so used to content being thrown in our face we think we need to compete with it - we hope our friend has a good enough time with us they'll want to come back.  But this presents a "Like and Subscribe" aspect to friendship.  Friends are not check-boxes to mark off, nor are they teachers giving us grades, nor clicks or views to accrue.  They are other people we co-exist on this planet with.  We're social creatures and we should make time for them for its own sake.  We don't need to do something else so we can invite them.

So maybe it is the case friends are like check-boxes to mark off.  You then should expect that mark to fade and need to be renewed.  That analogy doesn't quite click for me, but I can't think of a great one, so let's get weird with it:  Spending time with your friend is like drying off your hands with a towel.  The towel will eventually airdry.  When it's reached that point, reach out to them again.

We often want any time together to be an event.  But that takes time and planning and energy - which is a harder thing.  But that's not necessary to see friends.  Just invite them over, or text them, or video call them, or hang out with them on Fortnight or some other virtual space.  Be with them however works.

We assume others are busy and happy and if they aren't reaching out then that's on purpose, rather than an error of omission.  "If my friends wanted to see me they'd ask to see me more often."  But perhaps they are thinking this of you?  And so this mutual deference leads to a drifting a part.  An overbearing friend is unpleasant, but it's easier to negotiate because you're already talking.   Silence, I have found, is the real killer.  It's one thing I appreciate about Facebook - liking someone's post keeps us in touch in a simple, but tangible, way.

Find time for your friends.  Being in the presence of others, even just sharing silence on the phone, connects us to them and the world at large.  And while I do think it's important to make ethical choices for its own sake - I worry significantly about the personal and societal moral rot of reduced standards - ultimately the only reason to do the right thing is for the sake of the world and its most important inhabitants:  Other people.

This had been a patreon-supported project, but that proved too annoying to maintain.  If you would like to financially support this project, drop $1.11 (or any amount, I suppose) into my Venmo!

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On the necessity of losing innocence

This week we read "The Scouring of the Shire," a chapter that describes the ultimate reversal of Middle Earth.  Sauron is destroyed.  Middle Earth is at peace, united by the King.  Everything is good everywhere - except in the Shire.  The Shire is on the edge of ruin.

Throughout this cycle we have talked repeatedly about power.  It is bad to want it, bad to have it, and bad to use it, because it is inherently corrupting.  The Ring's power isn't corrupting - the Ring is corrupting because it motivates one to seek power.  The only right application of power is specific and finite.  Raise an army to confront an evil in the world, destroy it, and then dissolve the army.  Be Cincinnatus.  No mission creep is allowed.

But while power is inherently bad, the text does not forbid it.

As I've said before (though I can't seem to find where) in Middle Earth evil self-destructs and good becomes corrupted.  Everything fades.  It would not be surprising to discover, generations later, Aragorn's line fails its promise.  But that doesn't undo the good he did.  What is better?  To take power and risk corruption or to live forever under a boot, hoping for its self-destruction, and maintaining your innocence throughout?

The hobbits return to the Shire and learn it has been taken over by ruffians - Big Folk from outside.  Rules have been installed to control the hobbits.  The harvests are stolen (euphemistically called "gathered").  Some Hobbits are promoted to be Shirrif's, to legitimize the operation and do the work the men don't want to do.  The Shire's gates are locked and guarded throughout the night.  This is not the Shire our hobbits left.

The Hobbits still in the Shire do not stir against their new lords, though as we'll see they very clearly detest them.  They don't want to risk losing, obviously.  But I think it is because they are so used to being innocent and ignorantly cared for.  The Creative Wizard's countryside ideal is too good, too removed from the responsibilities of power, and thus risks its own destruction.

The returning Hobbits have a different relationship with power.  They have seen it used for ill, and they have seen it used for good and then (better yet!) put aside when the task is done.  They know what can be done.  Moreover, I think they cannot live without it being done.  It would be impossible for these four to live under the oppression the other hobbits have accepted.  They know what can be and so they set about fighting back.  These four quotes, which happen at a distance from each other but I'll still presented chronologically, neatly demonstrate the trajectory of events following the return of Frodo and company:

[Merry] sprang from his pony, and seeing the notice [of rules] in the light of the lanterns, he tore it down
and threw it over the gate. The hobbits backed away and made no move to open it.
Come on, Pippin!’ said Merry. ‘Two is enough.’ Merry and Pippin climbed the gate, and the hobbits fled.

‘If I hear not allowed much oftener,’ said Sam, ‘I’m going to get angry.’
‘Can’t say as I’d be sorry to see it,’ said Robin [a shirriff] lowering his voice.
If we all got angry together something might be done.

Said Merry "Now!  Wake all our people! They hate all this, you can see: all of them
except perhaps one or two rascals, and a few fools that want to be important,
but don’t at all understand what is really going on."

‘Seems almost too easy after all, don’t it?’ said Cotton [after a victorious confrontation against some men].

After a few more victories, the hobbits discover Saruman is behind it all.  He confronts them in the Shire and laughs at the destruction he has caused, calling it vengeance for the destruction they wrought on his home.  The hobbits want to kill him, but Frodo demands they let him go in peace so he might one day realize his error and repent.  They reluctantly agree.

Grima is with Saruman, and Frodo offers him a place to stay if he'll abandon Saruman.  He appears about to take it but then Saruman kicks him.  Finally pushed too far he lunges at Saruman and slits his throat.  In response some hobbits fire arrows at Grima, killing him.  The Shire is free again.

Saruman's evil caused his own destruction.  But the hobbits' innocence is corrupted by the needless killing of Grima.  But ultimately, I think this is a small price to pay.

I heard a quote this week that really fits into this chapter.  'Power means you have forfeited your innocence'.  It's from a great talk by Yossi Klein Halevi, an Israeli, about the tradeoffs of being a Jew in 1945 and of being a Jew in 1948.  I recommend you listen to the whole thing, but the essence is: Being an innocent victim is easy, taking action is hard and fraught with risks.

Frodo's offer of amnesty seems magnanimous, but I think it is out of place.  Indeed, Treebeard already released him from Orthanc believing he was "safe from doing any more harm.  Saruman showed no sign of guilt then or now.  Frodo is only giving Saruman an opportunity to recover his strength and return.  He is hoping for a similar eucatastrophe - but that is not an ethical approach to life.

I've long wondered why Frodo has to leave the Shire.  He doesn't seem excited go to the Grey Havens - it's not presented as a reward for a job well done.  But now I think I have an answer:  He's been so close to power that he now wants nothing to do with it.  He wants the Shire to remain as it was, powerless and innocent, but it will not.  It must take responsibility for its own existence - even if that means it will sometimes act wrongly.

Being innocent and suffering under evil is easy.  One can get used to anything, including suffering.  Suffering can give us meaning!  But willingly suffering when you could overthrow your oppressors is just abdicating your power.  Suffering doesn't make you better.  Power should be used responsibly.  Powerlessness has no merit.

Frodo - and the Elves he is leaving with - are too focused on purity.  The Elves want Middle Earth to be purely good and Frodo wants it to be purely just.  These are great goals to strive for, but the purity is going to cause problems.  For one thing, purity contradicts any compromise.  In a world full of different nations of men (as well as dwarves, hobbits, and the other races) disagreements will come up.  Accomodation, not purity, must guide the coming years.  And that's going to require tolerance of mistakes.

Innocence is a crutch, and a necessary one for a time.  We are all born innocent.  But eventually, we must gather the power available to us and use it to the best of our ability.  When we encounter others with power we will cooperate or conflict with them.  But, if we are wise, this dialectical approach will push us all to greater moral heights than we could have reached on our own.  Sometimes we will be right, and sometimes we will be wrong.  Mistakes are not a failing, but a necessary step towards improvement.  To demand purity is to refuse to participate in the world as it is.

It reminds me that at the beginning of our text we were shown how Bilbo is not the right hero for this Quest.  He was too immature.  Well, Frodo is too innocent for the coming age of Middle Earth.  Even his one transgression, to put on the Ring, was met with such ferocity from Gollum we are compelled to feel he was overwhelmed by evil, rather than a willing agent.  Frodo was right for the Quest, which took 183 days.  But regular life requires a different approach.  To achieve right in the world we must sometimes be willing to admit we, personally, are falling short, and need to change.  Evil self-destructs and good becomes corrupted.  But what if instead, when the good falls short, we are able to admit the flaw and begin anew.  We are not perfect and will not be perfect.  But we can become better.

"To achieve morality we must, at least sometimes, diminish ourselves?"  Perhaps that's what Frodo is doing - leaving so Middle Earth can make the mistakes he knows he will find intolerable.

This had been a patreon-supported project, but that proved too annoying to maintain.  If you would like to financially support this project, drop $1.11 (or any amount, I suppose) into my Venmo!

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