# Talk:Tolkien's moral dilemma

Maybe I'm just not following something here, but this article (and especially its title) seems founded in the implicit claim that Tolkien himself recognized such a dilemma. I don't see that sourced here, so this comes across as a literary analysis essay more than an encyclopedia article. Mangoe (talk) 14:30, 1 September 2025 (UTC)

On the contrary, Tolkien felt it acutely, and made repeated strenuous efforts over many years to try to find a resolution, as the 'Dilemma' section and especially the 'Tolkien's search for a resolution' document in detail. Chiswick Chap (talk) 14:43, 1 September 2025 (UTC)
Where's the source that quotes him as saying that? Mangoe (talk) 16:23, 2 September 2025 (UTC)
The article is full of primary (Tolkien) sources and secondary (scholarly) sources which support it and discuss it in detail.
Tally 2010 for example says directly:
"Yet, as dedicated readers discern, Tolkien could not resist the urge to flesh out and "humanize" these inhuman creatures from time to time. In such examples as those I discuss below, Tolkien presents Orcs who have human - even humane - qualities, notwithstanding their generally negative characteristics. This fact makes it a bit disturbing, then, that Tolkien's heroes, without the least pang of conscience, dispatch Orcs by the thousands. Indeed, letters and unpublished manuscripts reveal that Tolkien himself struggled with the metaphysical and moral problems he had set up by inventing and using Orcs as he does." (emphasis added)
Hartley 2014 similarly states:
"If orcs are 'rational incarnates' they must possess fëar, and if so, their spirits must be provided for upon their death, as are the other Freeborn Peoples, opening the possibility for some sort of 'orcish' redemption. Tolkien developed neither of these concepts, not because he did not think to but because both completely contradict the narrative fact of the orcs themselves. In other words, orcish cosmology is permanently incompatible with orcish existence. Tolkien understood these implications and realized rather quickly that the situation would not do at all." (emphasis added)
Shippey 2005 (p. 439) writes:
"The theological status of the orcs continued to give Tolkien anxiety after publication of LOTR, see Morgoth's Ring pp. 408–24." (emphasis added)
On those pages in Morgoth's Ring, J. R. R. Tolkien stated :
[of Orcs:] Their nature and origin require more thought. They are not easy to work into the theory and system. ... only Eru could make creatures with independent wills, and with reasoning powers. But Orcs seem to have both: they can try to cheat Morgoth/Sauron, rebel against him, or criticize him. ? Therefore they must be corruptions of something pre-existing. ... but Eru would not sanction the work of Melkor so as to allow the independence of the Orcs. (Not unless Orcs were ultimately remediable, or could be amended and 'saved'?)" ... But again – would Eru provide fëar for such creatures? For the Eagles etc. perhaps. But not for Orcs. (emphasis added)
Perhaps you would find it useful to study these and the many other sources cited in the text before stating that there's no evidence. All the best, Chiswick Chap (talk) 16:30, 2 September 2025 (UTC)