#religious ring

[visiongold-jewelry]

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[hustlebonezzz]

My disease, my infection I am so impure

Reptile - Nine Inch Nails

[thenotoriousscuttlecliff]

"Orcs are pure evil" feels more like a Jackson movie viewpoint than a Tolkien one because those movies had a very simplistic, black and white view of the Orcs. They were just the Dark Lords cruel minions who only lived to fight, eat, and kill. Tolkien's conception of them was more nuanced. They weren't pure evil, more a pitiful people, virtually broben beyond all repair by the cruelty of their maker.

There were Orcs in LOTR who talk about being sick of fighting for Sauron and wanted to just leave. He also wasn't no opposed at all to the idea that there were Orc women:

The writers of Rings of Powers seem to subscribe more to Tolkien's view of the Orcs than Jackson's, showing us the deep rooted tragedy of the Orcs. They're not saying that Orcs are actually good, but only that they are not simply just one thing.

[wigmund]

After spending five minutes in the darkness of a total solar eclipse, I completely understand why some cultures would flip the fuck out over the event.

Daylight starts to dim over an hour or so and then suddenly you're in twilight-level darkness while overhead is a perfectly black void ringed by great silver streams of solar corona arcing off into space and sometimes the red glint of solar flares on the lunar edge.

[patientno7]

My piece for @eldenzine 🌹

[theywontletmebeprincipal]

[steve-needs-a-hug]

Halbrand as a pseudo-Jesus figure & Annatar as a pseudo-Christ

There's something eerily compelling about what the Rings of Power has done with these two guises of Sauron and how he's able to inspire trust, faith, and devotion in Galadriel and Celebrimbor. In the show, Sauron believes himself to be the one who needs to save or redeem Middle-Earth. The effectiveness in his manipulation of these characters involuntarily reminds me of the exploitative and manipulative nature of Evangelical Christianity and how powerfully it markets itself as the one way to solve people's deepest existential problems. So I thought about some parallels between Sauron's two main guises or personas in the show, and how Jesus and/or Christ is popularly depicted or understood (especially in Evangelical spaces). To me this helps illustrate why RoP!Sauron's deception is so effective, while exposing some unsettling issues I have with Evangelicalism.

Halbrand as a pseudo-Jesus

Halbrand was presented to Galadriel (as well as us the audience) as a scruffy, humble, ordinary man. Although more glamorous depictions of Jesus were common in Catholic art, the recent Evangelical trend has been to portray a humanized down-to-Earth Jesus (e.g., in The Chosen series, Jesus sweats, cries, gets hungry and tired and frustrated). Scripture allegedly described Jesus as humble and unexceptional in appearance and growing up through adversity and suffering (Isaiah 53). Halbrand is (ostensibly) a smith's aide, Jesus was a carpenter - both trades involving working and crafting with one's hands. It's then "revealed" that Halbrand comes from a lost royal lineage and Galadriel hails him as the King who can save his people from enslavement to an evil overlord - Jesus came from the line of the legendary King David and was hailed as King of Jews, expected to rescue his people from the Roman Empire's oppression.

Halbrand's surface-level resemblance to Aragorn, heir to the throne of Gondor, can't be ignored either (this is partly why I found the character of Halbrand so insufferable in s1, he seemed like an Aragorn knockoff to me!). It's also been argued that Aragorn is a Jesus-like figure, though he turns out to be one of the most legendary fantasy heroes rather than one of the most notorious supervillains (Sauron).

Galadriel grows to trust Halbrand and view him as her friend and possibly the only person who truly understands her. Celebrimbor also develops a close friendship with Halbrand as they work together. Evangelicalism emphasizes a "personal relationship" with Jesus as your very own friend (some even lean towards a lover) who knows everything about you and helps you with your problems and gets you what you want. Jesus' disciples were also close personal friends with him while possessing little understanding of his true divine nature.

Annatar as a pseudo-Christ

Now this is where things get a lot more interesting. In 2x02, Halbrand reveals his "true nature" to Celebrimbor in an awe-inspiring display. This goosebumps-inducing moment is akin to a religious experience for Celebrimbor, who instinctively bows in reverence to this angelic figure. Christ has also been depicted and described as arriving with the clouds (Revelation 1:7), and I'm sure the religious symbolism of this scene was not lost on many viewers. Even though Annatar seems to be a powerful emissary of the divine, he still tells Celebrimbor that they are to be equal partners in their work to save Middle-Earth. An important tenet of Christianity is that Christ desires to partner with humanity to accomplish His works. This all sounds well and good to Celebrimbor, but Sauron's ultimate mode of "saving" Middle-Earth is to enslave all its peoples and creatures to his will.

Annatar is known in Tolkien's lore as the Lord of Gifts (in the episode he describes himself to Celebrimbor as "a sharer of gifts"). His gift is the knowledge of the way of Middle-Earth's salvation. Evangelical devotionals and sermons frequently refer to salvation of the soul as a "free gift" Christ offers to humanity. (I can go on about how this phrase is a redundant tautology - oops, there's another one - but that's a whole other discussion.) I will suffice to say that the term "free gift" reads like a salesperson's marketing pitch and it bothers me. Evangelicalism as a whole feels like a colonial mission converted into a giant media marketing operation - its glossy veneer of concert-like megachurch services, prepacked apologetics, and friendly approachability often conceal sinister things (exploitation, corruption, discrimination, abuse, the list goes on).

Sauron chose to prey on two vulnerable people with potential for influence - Galadriel and Celebrimbor, both feeling isolated and slighted by their people and striving for a deeply personal and important goal that feels just out of their reach. However, he didn't force himself on them. They chose to let him in, and as a result he took advantage of their trust. In Christianity, God is described as someone Who stands at the door and knocks, and for those who choose to open the door to Him, He will come in and share a meal with them as friends (Revelation 3:20). This is more or less exactly what Celebrimbor did in 2x02 when he allowed Halbrand in, gave him food and wine, and called him his friend. This was the most eerie parallel to me, inspired by some great analyses I've read about how Sauron is depicted in the show thus far.

In season 1 Sauron as Halbrand laid his strategy bare to Galadriel - give your opponent the means of mastering their greatest fear, so you can master them. I can't help but feel that this is what organized religion does - providing the sense of assurance, safety, and emotional comfort that people desperately need, in exchange for gaining control over their life choices and even their thought patterns through rules, dogma, and pressures of social conformity. Shaping minds and bending wills sounds pretty Sauron-like to me. [Disclaimer: This is not meant to be a dunk on religion as a whole, just a reflection as I work through unlearning and critically inspecting beliefs I grew up with.]

[sealrock]

are you there, O 'lone? it's me, your most wretched daughter.

[icanmakewords]

Seeing people hate on Alicent for being “uninteresting” while the basis of her story is one I can trace back to so many women in my family as recent as my grandmother and even my mother to a degree is actually insane to see

[baizhus-big-naturals]

god's gift

[hustlebonezzz]

Continuation from this post

Stoli is a funny little tarnished mailwoman until a man with mommy issues and red hair enters the chat ✨👐😗

[doctorcanon]

Bossman doesn't give compliments lightly. So when he pays you one, he means it.

So with Four's Letterman and Legend's Kilt, I got the idea of putting Time and Twilight in some Industrial Clothes. Also Time gets a compression sleeve on his left arm. Specifically a Shock Doctor one, so it's the good shit.

[nurbrotheadfull]

I rushed so hard to finish it before having to go to school

Anyways, did anyone else’s religious family have some weird hatred for yoga?? Mine always told me it’s the work of the devil or some shit

[asklesbianonceler]

I'm not off this vibe yet I'm sorry. I loooooove religious motifs. I used to go to the MFA three times a week to draw the Della Robias and what not

[elswing]

PHARAZÔN TOSSING MÍRIEL INTO THE OCEAN WITH A GIANT FUCKING SEA WORM INSTEAD OF GIVING HER A NORMAL TRIAL WHILE EÄRIEN STANDS BESIDE HIM. ooooooooh my girl is not beating the evil human sacrifice temple designer allegations......... oooooooh my lovely evil girlfriend who is so lovely and also So evil.........