Wizards and (false) prophets

Eliza

Member
I've enjoyed the past few weeks' discussions of Saruman, his deception regarding the fate of the One Ring, and the probability that he intentionally misled Gandalf and others into believing that the Valar (or, if we want to stick to the concepts explicit in this text, some power for good that exists beyond Middle-earth) had dealt with the Ring pretty permanently. I've been struck in a new way by what a profound betrayal this really is, both of Saruman's peers, and of those he is ostensibly serving. It occurred to me that Saruman has many of the characteristics of the "false prophets" often discussed in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament.

Simply put, a false prophet would be someone who falsely claims to speak for (or at least with direct knowledge from) the divine. That seems to fit Saruman's intimation that the Ring had been intentionally carried out to sea. Further, false prophets often make claims that are directly antithetical to the truth (i.e., the divine message listeners should actually be absorbing), and tend to lure people away from what they've already been told about what they should be doing. Again, this seems to fit with Saruman's actions in trying to convince Gandalf et al. that the Ring isn't actually their problem...even though they're supposed to be working against Sauron and all his devices. Moreover, false prophets' messages tend to be self-serving (in biblical precedents, false prophets tend to fare well in the world by telling political leaders just what they want to hear). This certainly fits for Saruman, assuming he had an eye on finding the Ring for himself all along.

What really makes this comparison work for me, though, is our discussion of how Saruman's words "lulled" Gandalf into a false sense of security. This seems like a classic false prophet move: convince people in power that everything's fine and they don't need to change what they're doing--when, in fact, they need to take action against evil. As Gandalf narrates Saruman's reassurances that the Ring isn't a problem, alongside his admonishments to patience, I keep thinking of the famous indictment of biblical false prophets who "speak 'peace, peace,' but there is no peace."

For me, looking at Saruman as something like a false prophet raises a lot of interesting questions and further trains of thought. For one thing, it would cast Gandalf as (among other things) a true prophet. This works rather well, too, I think, insofar as he is a character who gives insight into the divine will (e.g., "you were meant to find the Ring...") and urges others to oppose evil and defend good.

Any thoughts as to the value of this analogy? In particular, I wonder if this paradigm could be at all helpful for thinking about Tolkien's evolving conception of the Wizards (Gandalf and Saruman in particular). As we've often noted, when he wrote LoTR, Tolkien hadn't yet identified the Wizards as Maiar or angelic beings. Yet they they seem to have evolved beyond the "old guys who do cool magic things," and to have some sort of knowledge or connection with the transcendent. Could the role or image of a prophet provide a sort of conceptual bridge between "just some guy" and "full-on angelic power"? I wouldn't assume this to be conscious on Tolkien's part, but given his religious worldview, I would think the idea of prophets--true or false--could feed his imagination (much as one could point to various messianic themes or images in his work, without seeing any one character as a Christ-figure).

I realize this is a pretty niche perspective, but I'm curious as to whether anyone else has thought along these lines.
 
Among Christian commentators, it's pretty common to see the threefold role of Christ (king, priest, and prophet) raised as applicable (most are careful not to use any variation of the word "allegory") to Aragorn, Frodo, and Gandalf. I don't think this should be dismissed out of hand: Tolkien's background as a devout believer in Christianity would prep him to have those templates of heroism imprinted onto his creative soul. I would doubt that Tolkien began with the *conscious* idea of making Gandalf a prophet -- and the History of Middle Earth texts seem to prove me correct -- but the archetype would be one that Tolkien was intimately familiarly with. It would be completely natural for his "wise old man" character to share certain characteristics with an Old Testament prophet, and that those similarities would strengthen as Tolkien elevated Gandalf's character and nature.

Also, I really want you to write a paper on this.
 
I think this is an excellent idea for further thought, especially since we'll be doing the Inferno next. False prophets are in the middle of the 8th circle after all. ;)
 
Hi Eliza,

I like your ideas on the similarities between Gandalf and Saruman and true prophets and false prophets. There is a lot in that. However, I think even first-time readers must be concluding that though Gandalf and Saruman may be 'prophets' of a sort, they are not exactly like Old Testament Prophets. Minorly, they do not tend to prophesize the future. Majorly, it should be becoming clear by now that they are something somewhat different from mortal men. Although not explicitly stated yet, we have already the impression that Gandalf is living longer than Men do. He was lighting off fireworks at the Old Took's parties back when Bilbo was a lad, He seems to have appeared to be an old man then. It is now about 118 years later. I think we must suspect that Gandalf and Saruman are not exactly human, or, if human, are very magical and unusual humans.
 
For what it's worth, Old Testament prophets often did live to be remarkably old. Perhaps most famously, Noah lived to be 950.

There is probably more to be said paralleling Antediluvian lifespan and Numenorean, but still, extremely long-lived prophets fit comfortably within the Christian tradition.
 
Hi Flammifer. All good points! I definitely don't think there's a one-to-one correlation (Wizard=prophet) by any means. And I think you're right that most new readers probably aren't thinking of Gandalf as a normal human by the time they get here in LotR.

Just to clarify one point that I didn't address in my original post: I actually wasn't thinking of the prophetic role primarily in terms of foretelling the future. While you get some of that from the biblical examples I'm thinking of, a lot of their output is much more about the present, offering a divine perspective on what's going on in society. (For example, Hebrew prophets tended to get themselves in hot water by telling political elites that they weren't pleasing God by performing religious rituals and sacrifices while also oppressing the poor.) In some Christian contexts the term "prophetic" is still used in this sense of providing moral or spiritual commentary on society, especially in the context of condemning injustice and hypocrisy.

Anyway, that's more what I had in mind with regard to any prophet-like characteristics of Gandalf -- not so much that he foretells the future, but that he speaks into his current situation with moral authority, urging his contemporaries to stand against evil. I'm not sure I articulated that very well earlier. :)
 
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