Anglo-Saxon Poetry, Professor Tolkien, and the Premortal Existence
Yesterday the Lovely One told me she was stuck on Paul’s teaching Romans that we were coheirs with Christ. Contrast with Christ in the premortal councils saying that the glory would be all the Father’s. So what exactly does Christ have that we can inherit with him?
My off the cuff response was that Christ disclaiming payment doesn’t prevent him getting gifts and that anyway glory isn’t a commodity. Glory is earned respect and ironically Christ being willing to save us for pure love without reward means even more glory accrues to him.
Two hours later I cracked open my new book, the Battle of Maldon, by Tolkien. It consists of an alliterative two person verse drama about the aftermath of the Battle of Maldon, and then some comments on the poem itself.
In a remarkable display of serendipity or synchronicity, what Tolkien had to say was all apt to the question the Lovely One had.
As you may recall, the verse fragment we have of the Battle of Maldon has a Viking band landed on a sort of island connected to the mainland by a causeway or elevated ford. Earl Beorhtnoth and his household band and his levy have the causeway strongly defended. The Vikings are going to get slaughtered if they try to cross. However, the Vikings suggest they be allowed to cross over without blows so they can have a fair fight on the land, and Earl Beorthnoth agrees. Once crossed over, fighting starts, the Earl gets slain, and the household band fight to the last around his body, as is right.
Tolkien draws a contrast between the Earl’s glory and the household band’s glory. The Earl desired glory so greatly that he allowed the Vikings to cross over in plain defiance of his duty, so that he could have greater glory in beating them “in a fair fight.” The band, on the other hand, did not desire glory, at least not as much. They fought to the last principally because it was their duty, given the situation their lord had put them in. And therefore, says Tolkien, their glory was greater.
Referring to the most famous lines from the poem, where one old retainer in the household band encourages his friends to fight on to death saying–
Hearts must grow bolder, minds keener,
Spirit stronger, as our might wanes
(from my memory)—Tolkien writes
The words of Beorhtwold [the retainer] have been held to be the finest expression of the northern heroic spirit, Norse or English; the clearest statement of the doctrine of uttermost endurance in the service of indomitable will…. Yes the doctrine appears in this clarity, and (approximate) purity, precisely because it is in the mouth of a subordinate, a man for whom the object of his will was decided by another, who had no responsibility downwards, only loyalty upwards. Personal pride was therefore in him at the lowest, and love and loyalty at their highest.
For this ‘northern heroic spirit’ is never quite pure; it is of gold and alloy. Unalloyed it would direct a man to endure even death unflinching, when necessary: that is when death mah help the achievement of some object or will, or when life can only be purchased by denial of what one stands for. But since such conduct is held admirable, the alloy of personal good name was never wholly absent.
In short, Tolkien points out that trying to manufacture glory diminishes glory.
Let me put a placeholder here to say that I don’t completely agree though I’m still working out why; it has something to do with how differently the incident would be if the Earl’s vaunt had succeeded and he had beat the Vikings in a ‘fair fight’ without excess loss of his own men’s life. At the same time Tolkien is making a good, commonsense argument, at the very least a mostly correct argument, that has interesting implications for the way we understand the premortal councils and Christ’s character. I cannot reject as coincidence the serendipity of the way the two came to my attention back to back.
(I have a feeling Tolkien’s point connects in some way to Christ having atoned twice.
P.S. There is a great deal of that ‘Northern spirit’ of undaunted doing more with less in the war chapters of Alma and in Mormon and Moroni.
Filed under: We transcend your bourgeois categories | No Tag