Why is the rejection of the One Ring...

[Revan]

by Galadriel make the ban from her of returning to the West when I thought it was Earendil’s plea to the Valar on behalf of the Two Kindreds that lifted the Ban of the Noldor. It seems I was right on that account. But a few excerpts from the Letters of Tolkien shed some light on the subject.


In Letter #297 after explaining that the Exiles were followers of Feanor’s rebellion and then that the Valar listened to the pleadings of Earendil it says: “The Exiles were allowed to return—save for a few chief actors in the rebellion of whom at the time of the L.R. only Galadriel remained.” The footnote to that excerpt says: “her (Galadriel) personal ban lifted, in reward for her services against Sauron, and above all for her rejection of the temptation to take the Ring when offered to her.”


Well, there’s two questions there that kind of intrigued me; the fact that Tolkien calls Galadriel a chief actor in Feanor’s rebellion when to me it seems all she did was follow along with everyone else because she wanted lands to rule in Middle-earth. Then too there’s the fact that Tolkien calls it a personal ban on her. So the nature of the ban seems to have changed from a collective group to an individual restriction. Letter #320 explains why:


“At the end she proudly refuses forgiveness or permission to return.”


It seems that both forgiveness and permission were extended to her, but she refused them, and thus did not benefit from Earendil’s plea. My question, which you will see later, ties in with the rebellion spoken of in Letter #297 is why was rejection of the One Ring the second thing that lifted the ban from her?


I have some ideas on this as you no doubt have guessed, but I suppose I’ll leave it there for now.

[Variol Farseer]

It seems to me that rejecting the Ring was a test that she set herself. Clearly Galadriel wrought great wonders with her own Ring, and as she said to Frodo:

I do not deny that my heart has greatly desired to ask what you offer. For many long years I had pondered what I might do, should the Great Ring come into my hands, and behold! it was brought within my grasp.

It must have taken all her strength and all her willpower to refuse the Ring after coveting it so long. Until she passed that test, I think she was not convinced in her own mind that she was worthy to return to Valinor. Indeed, she must not even have been certain she wanted to return. After all, the Ring could make her Queen of Middle-earth, but that power could never pass over the Sea; the Valar would not permit it. But once she refused the Ring, nothing else in Middle-earth could tempt her to stay.

I think there may be another reason. Galadriel was the first person to give aid to Gandalf when he returned from death, naked and alone. She sent Gwaihir the Windlord to search for him and bring him back to Lórien to be healed and outfitted for his last great journey. Since Gandalf was the emissary of the Valar, and clearly had the authority to give or withhold passage on the last ship, he must have made the decision to let her go into the West. But if Galadriel had not faced the great temptation and refused the Ring, pride or shame might have prevented her from asking him to make room for her.

[Revan]

Excellent answer Variol Farseer!

[High Lord Tolkien]

Galadriel is a sad victim of constant rewriting on Tolkiens part.
His latest writings had her taking no part in the exodus and she wasn't under the Doom of the Noldor.

She got permmision from the Valar to go to ME before the kinslaying but she didn't get a chance to leave before it happened or something like that.
So she was only guilty by association.

Her's is the most confusing read of all.
But I think Tolkien really wanted to beef up her importance somehow.
IMHO.

[Warmark Troy]

Galadriel was one of the leaders of the Noldor at the time of their Exodus from the Undying Lands.
She rabble roused with Feanor in the councils calling the people to go to war - thus she was culpable.

However she did not personlly partake of the kinslaying on the Teleri (and had no part whatsoever in the other two kinslayings).
She also did not speak the oath of Feanor and thus escaped the Doom of Manwe.

By the Third Age Galadriel was the only member left of the house of Feanor in Middle Earth. she had the option to return to the Undying Lands but had no reason to go.

Galadriels reasons for going to Middle Earth to begin with were political. She wanted to rule territory of her own. Being a woman even a princess in the 'Undying Lands' would condemn her to a live of endless social engagements.
In the end she got her wish, as the male heirs slowly exhausted themselves in war she became Queen of the Noldor in Middle Earth bolsters by Sindar and other elves living in Middle Earth.

She maintained her realm in Lorien where she ruled in her own name for as long as she could. she returnhed to the undying Lands only because her ring was drained of power by the destruction of the One Ring and she could not longer prevent the mortal world from encroaching on her domain.

Galadriel's thirst for power is noted in the conversation with Frodo. However also note that Galadriel did touch the rings power. While she was wise enough not to take the ring, her desire for power and standing was still enough for her to want to taste the power of the ring. Thus unlike Gandalf and Elrond, Galadriel made the 'foolish' move of drawing power from the ring. Gandalf could possibly have done the same, but did not dare toy with the ring this way. However it says a lot about Galadriel that she gave it a go.

She also returned because she had completed the ancient war against evil by two notably actions in the War of the Ring.

1. She empowered the hobbit Sam Gamgee via her vial to attack Shelob. Shelob was greatly weakened by this attack, especially the application of light. This form of magic wound did not heal and robbed Shelob of much of her power. This has the knock on effect of removing intelligence from the race of Spiders (in Mirkwood) and reduced them to just dangeerous large animals.
This was important because Shelobs grandmother Ungoliant destroyed the trees with Melkor. Using light to defeat Shelob was a closure to the ancient feud between the Eldar and Ungoliant.

2. After the downfall of Sauron, Galadriel assaulted Dol Guldur. While this appears to be no great feat as Saurons armies were leaderless and the Nazgul destroyed it is very significant. Dol Guldur was a lesser tower than Minas Morgul (Numenorean manufacture) or Barad-dur (magically constructed). Dol guldur was of mortal and non magical construction built by orcs during the centuries of Saurons weakness when he barely had enough power to command the Nazgul. It was probably no stronger than a normal medieval castle but as it was not built by sorcery it was not unmade with the ring.
It is noteworthy that it was Galadriel and not Celeborn who assaulted this castle. Now Galadriel would not have had the power of her ring to back her up. So why did she attack? She led the assault because she was a potent magician in her own right and most of all because Dol Guldur was the last of the strongholds of evil, a descendent if you will of Utumno. She was the last of the Noldor royalty, by destroying the last of Saurons striongholds herself she was proclaiming Noldor victory over the forces of Shadow. A completion of the wars to destroy the domains of Melkor and Sauron.
Tolkien does not stress overly this side of Galadriel, its mentioned only in passing.

When Galadriel had to return to the Undying Lands she would at least remain a royal, who had been a queen and a commander of armies and had millenia of experience of living and ruling in middle earth. Thus she had far more influence in court than if she never went and had remained behind.

[High Lord Tolkien]

Warmark Troy, what is this from?
I'd love to read it.

[Variol Farseer]

Very strange theory. There is nothing in Tolkien about the 'endless social engagements' of princesses of the Eldar. The Tale of Years states that it was Celeborn who led the assault on Dol Guldur, though after it was taken, 'Galadriel threw down its walls and laid bare its pits'. And there was never any time at which Galadriel called herself Queen of anything, except in her fantasy of ruling Middle-earth if she took the One Ring.

And I have never heard anyone suggest that she 'made the "foolish" move of drawing power from the ring'. That would have been tantamount to taking it, for as Gandalf said to Saruman: 'Only one hand at a time can wield the One, and you know that well, so do not trouble to say we!' As far as we know, the powers of the Great Rings were accessible only to those who had physical possession of a Ring. The Rings granted long life to mortals by mere possession, whether worn or not: cf. Bilbo and Gollum. But most of the powers, and certainly all of the greater ones, could be wielded only by one wearing the Ring.

Warmark Troy's ideas are in some respects plausible and elegant, but the available evidence suggests that they do not much resemble what was in Tolkien's mind.

[Zahir]

Tolkien did indeed do a lot of rethinking about all kinds of details, both in The Sil and in LOTR. The difference is he actually finished the latter. Who knows what the former might have eventually looked like?

Earlier drafts of LOTR included Aragorn as a hobbit named Trotter, with Boromir actually siding with Saruman, etc.

Myself, I like the essential story I gleam from what we have--of a proud lady of the Noldor royal house, who joined in Feanor's rebellion yet held herself back from the worst of his crimes. One gets the impression she changed a great deal in the process of reaching Middle Earth, so that she played almost no part in the great War of the Jewels. I suspect this was because of two things: The Crossing of the Ice tempered her great spirit by suffering, not only her own but that of others. And in Doriath she met a Dark Elf in the court of the King--Celeborn. I like to think Celeborn tempered her as well, a great and good Elf who had all the virtues the Eldar could have had had they remained in Middle Earth from the very beginning. It is interesting that although she could claim the throne of the Noldor in Middle Earth, she never did. Perhaps that was her way of resisting the temptation to power she knew gnawed somewhere deep in her soul. Methinks maybe Mandos knew that her crisis was yet to come, hence knew she would refuse the offer of pardon. When she did, the Valar withdrew it, imposing an exile not be lifted for another seven thousand years.

[High Lord Tolkien]

I don't know.
I'm in the "what he wrote last is what he wanted" camp (my quotes) myself.

And his last few drafts of Galadriel were quite different from what we got in Christopher Tolkien's Silmarillion.

Zahir, my idea of Zahir mirrors your own.
Although you give Celeborn as a character more credit than I do.
He too has an unclear rewritten origin.

That's the problem with reading all his notes.
It ruins all the good first impressions I had of these characters.
"ruins" meaning "I don't like multiple origins".

Yeah, and "Trotter" bugs the heck out of me too!
But I'm a little odd.

[Warmark Troy]

Very strange theory. There is nothing in Tolkien about the 'endless social engagements' of princesses of the Eldar. The Tale of Years states that it was Celeborn who led the assault on Dol Guldur, though after it was taken, 'Galadriel threw down its walls and laid bare its pits'. And there was never any time at which Galadriel called herself Queen of anything, except in her fantasy of ruling Middle-earth if she took the One Ring.

Yes, this is in the appendix to the Return of the King. It is noteworthy that Galadriel was there at the siege, not sitting back in Lorien doing her needlework as was a womans place.

Tolkien didnt write modern PC fantasy. If a woman took up arms or wielded power it was unusual and explained. we are too used to the D&D idea when 50% of adventurers are female and there is no difference in the sexes. Tolkien was a medivalist and the attitides of the time run strongly through his books.

No I dont think she scaled the walls, at least not when orks were still fighting. But she was there and did orchestrate its destruction. I also think her own spellpower might have been useful in a direct practical sense though her presense was mainly for a closure to the Noldor's wars against the Dark Lords.