A Mortal Life

[Telcontar_Dunedain]

I'm not sure about the living with Eru thing maybe they just stayed in the Halls of Mandos.

[Haradrim]

so kind of like an everlasting retirmemnet homne. Man that would suck.It would be like being in the waiting room forever. Playing cards and reading out of date magazines, and watching bad tv and playing Bingo.

[Telcontar_Dunedain]

You've changed your tune now.

[Haradrim]

well yeah before they went to eru now they are stuck in the hall f MAndos. It would be great for awhile but then it would get insanely boring.

[Telcontar_Dunedain]

I'll try and check it up for definite.

[Haradrim]

where would that be so I can help check it out too.

[Telcontar_Dunedain]

Not sure. I'll check out my Tolkien book later and then post the answer unless someone else knows.

[Haradrim]

yeah everyone feel fre to help us figure this out. I dont have all the books so unless its in the Sil or LOTR or Hobbit or UT 1 then I cant do it.

[Telcontar_Dunedain]

Haven't found it yet but I'll keep looking.

[Sister Golden Hair]

From the Silmarillion, Houghton Mifflin edition, 1977.

It is one with the gift of freedom that the children of Men dwell only a short space in the world alive, and are not bound to it, and depart soon whither the Elves know not. Whereas the Elves remain until the end of days, and their love of the earth and all the world is more single and more poignant therefore, and as the years lengthen ever more sorrowful. For the Elves die not until the world dies, unless they are slain or waste in grief (and to both these seeming deaths they are subject); neither does age subdue their strength, unless one grow weary of ten thousand centuries; and dying they are gathered to the halls of Mandos, in Valinor, whence in time they may return. But the sons of Men die indeed, and leave the world; wherefore they are called the Guests or the Strangers. Death is their fate, the Gift of Iluvatar, which as Time wears even the Powers shall envy.

Immortal were the Elves, and their wisdom waxed from age to age, and no sickness nor pestilence brought death to them. Their bodies indeed were of the stuff of Earth, and could be destroyed; and in those days they were more like to the bodies of Men, since they had not so long been inhabited by the fire of their spirit, which consumes them from within in the courses of time. But Men were more frail, more easily slain by weapons or mischance, and less easily healed; subject to sickness and many ills; and they grew old and died. What may befall their spirits after death the Elves knew not. Some say that they too go to the halls of Mandos; but their place of waiting there is not that of the Elves, and Mandos under Iluvatar alone save Manwe know whither they go after the time of recollection in those silent halls beside the Outer Sea.

The fate of Men after death, maybe, is not in the hands of the Valar, nor was all foretold in the Music of the Ainur.

The years of the Edain were lengthened, according to the reckoning of Men, after their coming to Beleriand; but at the last Beor the Old died when he had lived three and ninety years, for four and forty of which he had served King Felagund. And when he lay dead of no wound or grief, but stricken by age, the Eldar saw for the first time the swift waning of the life of Men, and the death of weariness which they knew not in themselves; and they grieved greatly for the loss of their friends. But Beor at the last had relinquished his life willingly and passed in peace; and the Eldar wondered much at the strange fate of Men, for in all their lore there was no account of it, and its end was hidden from them.

[Sister Golden Hair]

From Morgoth's Ring, Ainulindale, Volume 10, The Histories of Middle-earth series.

But Melkor has cast his shadow upon it, (death) and confounded it with darkness, and brought forth evil out of good, and fear out of hope. Yet it is said that they (Men) will join in the Second Music of the Ainur, whereas Iluvatar has not revealed what he purposes for Elves and Valar after the World's end, and Melkor has not discovered it.

From: The Later Quenta Silmarillion.

But the Elves can nonetheless suffer the severence of spirit from body, which is 'death'. Thus it may be said that the essential distinction between the (possible) death of Elves and the (inevitable) death of Men is a difference of destiny after death. From their beginnings the chief difference between Elves and Men lay in the fate and nature of their spirits. The fear of the Elves were destined to dwell in Arda for all the life of Arda and the death of the flesh did not abrogate that destiny.

[Attalus]

Well, that certainly ought to settle it.

[Telcontar_Dunedain]

Wow, thanks SGH I'm no longer confused.

[Haradrim]

Nifty well that settles that. So Melkor made men fear death and cast shadow over it becasue he envied them in way. But after the second music will Eru still exist so will wherever men go exist after the second music?

[Sister Golden Hair]

Originally Posted by Haradrim

Nifty well that settles that. So Melkor made men fear death and cast shadow over it becasue he envied them in way. But after the second music will Eru still exist so will wherever men go exist after the second music?

Well, of course Eru will exist, he's God. There is no way to know what is supposed to happen. Only Eru, Mandos, and Manwe know. In the Athrabeth though, Finrod and Andreth speculate a great deal on their ideas of what may be in store for both Elves and Men in Arda Remade.

[Haradrim]

But what happens to dwarves and orcs?

[Telcontar_Dunedain]

I'm guessing that dwarves go to Aule their creator but I don't have a clue about orcs.

[Haradrim]

Yeah maybe the Halls of AUle. I wonder if orcs go to mans heaven but lik eevil mans heaven or something

[Sister Golden Hair]

Originally Posted by Haradrim

Yeah maybe the Halls of AUle. I wonder if orcs go to mans heaven but lik eevil mans heaven or something

There is no such thing as the "Halls of Aule." There is only the halls of Mandos and since the Dwarves became accepted by Eru as his Children and one of the speaking races of Middle-earth, they too would go to the halls of Mandos after death.

[Beren3000]

Originally Posted by Sister Golden Hair

they too would go to the halls of Mandos after death.

Doesn't it say somewhere in the appendices that dwarves had their own legends about their origin (which we know of) and their fate after death?
Doesn't that imply that they are destined to a different fate than the elves?