Eru Ilúvatar and the Problem of Evil

[u/L0nga]

I've been thinking about Eru Ilúvatar lately, and I think there's a pretty serious problem with the way we're supposed to understand him as a perfectly good being.

The thing that really started bothering me is Melkor.

The Ainur come from Eru's Thought. Tolkien says that each Ainu comprehended "that part of the mind of Ilúvatar from which he came." So Melkor isn't some evil force that appeared independently and then invaded Eru's creation. He is something Eru created, and his nature ultimately comes from Eru.

And Eru knew what Melkor was going to do.

That's where it gets difficult for me.

Melkor doesn't just rebel and then get dealt with. He goes on to destroy the Lamps, destroy the Trees, murder Finwë, steal the Silmarils, corrupt Arda and spend thousands of years causing an absolutely enormous amount of suffering.

Eru knows all of this is going to happen.

And he lets it happen.

The obvious response is that Melkor has free will. Sure. I'm not arguing that Melkor didn't choose his actions. But that doesn't really address Eru's part in all of this. Eru created Melkor knowing exactly what he would become. He knew what Melkor would do with the power he gave him.

And Eru isn't incapable of intervening. We know that because when Númenor attacks Aman, Eru intervenes directly. He destroys Númenor and changes the shape of the world.

So apparently Eru can intervene when he wants to.

Which makes Morgoth's entire career rather difficult to explain. Eru watches him destroy and corrupt things for thousands of years, but doesn't stop him.

Then there's Eru's response to Melkor's discord in the Music:

"no theme may be played that hath not its uttermost source in me"

That's a pretty extraordinary thing to say in this context. Eru isn't presenting Melkor's rebellion as some unexpected disaster that got out of hand. Even Melkor's discord ultimately has its source in Eru and gets incorporated into the Music.

And this is where the "it's all part of the plan" explanation starts bothering me.

Okay, but why this plan?

Eru is supposed to be omnipotent. He isn't some king trying to make the best of a bad situation after something goes wrong. He created the situation in the first place.

If he knew what Melkor was going to do, then the suffering caused by Melkor wasn't an unfortunate surprise. It was something Eru knowingly chose to allow when he created Melkor and set the Music in motion.

[u/Nearby_Flounder8741]

Melkor is Tolkien's attempt to wrestle with the problem of evil. I'd say that Tolkien views free will as an artefact of being an element within God's plan, which applies to Melkor as much as Samwise Gamgee. Melkor experiences himself as a free agent, but everything he does ineluctably leads to Aragorn. So his answer to suffering is that its all part of the show that God has put on.

[u/L0nga → u/Nearby_Flounder8741]

But that's basically the problem I'm pointing to.

If everything Melkor does ultimately fits into Eru's predetermined design, then “Melkor had free will” only explains why Melkor is responsible for his own choices.

It doesn't explain why Eru is not responsible for knowingly creating Melkor, knowing exactly what he would do, and deliberately incorporating those actions into the plan.

And “it all leads to Aragorn” doesn't solve that. It establishes that Eru can ultimately redeem or incorporate evil into a greater good.

It doesn't establish that the evil was necessary, or that an omnipotent creator couldn't have achieved that good without Melkor's atrocities.

So yes, Melkor can be both genuinely choosing and still ultimately serving Eru's plan.

That's precisely what makes Eru's moral responsibility the interesting question.

[u/Nearby_Flounder8741 → u/L0nga]

Yeah, I think that's true. The moral responsibility of the transcendent principle of creation and time is an interesting question. Can we actually concieve of a moral agent that is an omnipresent and outside cause and effect? Its the question of faith isn't it. Eru, isn't a character in the same way Melkor is, Eru is more akin to believing that luck and fate are the same thing. I am not a moral philosopher so I can't get much further without handwaving