Gandalf's forgotten first mission to Middle Earth

Did you know that, according to Tolken Gandal, Saran and the rest of the asari had a previous

mission

to Middle-

earth

that they seemed to have

forgotten

? Let's take a look. Hello everyone, I'm Robert, welcome to Indeep geek on this channel. We dive deep. in the law of tolk and the legendarium, if you are new here, welcome, when Gandal Saran and the other aari came to Middlee around the year one thousand of the third age, it was to help the free peoples of Middle Earth oppose and most of us always have. This is supposed to be the

first

time these five were there, but when you read the account of what happened in Unfinished Tales there is a surprising hint that perhaps this is not the case, we are told that these five Mayans were dressed in bodies like real men. and not fake. but subject to the fears, pains and fatigue of the Earth, capable of hungering and thirsting and being killed, although due to their Noble Spirits they did not die and grew old only through the care and work of many long years and this was done by the Valar Wishing to right the wrongs of old, especially that they had attempted to protect and seclude the Ancient One by his own power and the fully revealed Glory, while now his emissaries were forbidden to reveal themselves in forms of majesty or attempt to govern the wills of men or elves. through an open display of powerful, but coming in weak and humble forms, they were commanded to advise and persuade men and elders to do good and try to unite them in love and understanding.

The men there to advise and help instead of having all the power was not just a random wise decision, it was an attempt, in Tolk's words, to right the wrongs of the past when they tried to protect the elves with all their power on display. , so what happened? so and when and why it was a mistake and who exactly these emissaries were many questions and it has always been a bit of a mystery in the talking circles we have some clues and people have speculated of course but it is only with the publication of the nature of Middle-

earth

last year, a collection of largely unpublished notes from the great man edited by Carl Hostetter for which we got a full answer - in particular, we can see some timelines that Tolken wrote over the course of several months in 1959, that is, a few years. after the publication of The Lord of the Rings, although, as we will see, there is evidence to suggest that this had been on Tolk's mind for a while, so what is this earlier Quest and how did answering this go so wrong?

We have to move forward. Go back in time, when the elves

first

awakened in Middle Earth. Tolken gives us a lot of backstory and history on how it all ended up like this, but basically when they woke up, the Valor were no longer living in Middle-earth and were on their new continent. Aman only visited Middle Earth occasionally, however, someone who was in Middle Earth a lot was Morgoth, so when the elves woke up completely innocent in the world, they were in immediate danger and The Valor was not there to protect them, however. However, in an anal chronicle of The Awakening.

From the first 144 elves in quenan we learn that the melan maya, having been warned in a dream, leaves valanor and goes to

middle

-earth where there she finds and settles with these newly formed elves and presumably protects them from being completely annihilated by morgoth. she remains there with them for perhaps a couple of thousand years, incidentally, for those versed in the sil merilon. Yes, this is the same melon who later captivated and married King Thingol, the elf who protected Dorth with his magic and from whom so many great heroes descended. elwing to Elon El Ross all ties in and perhaps even softens some of the harsher elements of the story that we already know - for example, she and Thingol almost certainly knew each other and perhaps even cared for each other for a long time before she It will captivate him with magic. forcing his people to search for him for so long and so hard, it wasn't just a random encounter in the forest, as it can sometimes seem in the Sil Marilan, anyway, eventually, The Valor also runs into the elves, he he stays with them for a few years and returns to the rest of Valor to decide what to do with them.

This is a pretty complicated decision for Valor. They want to protect the elves from Morgoth, but they know that another war with him would devastate the land they want to bring the elves to. a man's safety, but I respect that AO put them in Middle Earth, they finally decide on a plan to strongly invite, but not force, the elves to come to their land. There is a bit of discussion with three elven emissaries who head west first to check it out. this new land and meanwhile the elves needed protection, so we read this, the Valar send five guardians, great spirits of the Mayar with melan, the only woman, but the chief, these are six, the rest were tendor later, Saran aurin gandal randel radagast palaco and honar.

They are palaco and himar, the later blue wizards, it seems likely given that the other Guardians are the other three aari and linguistically palaco means one with farsightedness, an echo perhaps of palando, one of the blue wizards, and haar alatar sounds similar We don't know for sure, but we do know that Saran Gandal and Radagast were there and they were not the elders we would recognize, but great spirits of Mayo in full power; In other words, and as far as we know, they did their job, the elves were protected and Morgoth generally held out, but to get back to the main narrative here, AR's return with these powerful Guardian Spirits actually sparked some pretty heretical thoughts among the elves, some began to believe that, although Valor clearly exists, they have rightly abandoned Middle-earth as the designated Realm. of the quendi are now becoming jealous and wish to control the quendi as vassals and therefore represent to possess Middle Earth.

Finally, a brave and adventurous young man who is a direct descendant of Tataa is very captivated by these ideas, less so is his friend who is a descendant of Enel. for those keeping track, the rebel finway here is the father of the much later rebel feanor and El, the conformist, is the elf who later marries melan the mayan, so Valor clearly sends the very powerful Guardians Mayar , Gandal, Sarah, etc., to protect the elves. It didn't really reassure the elves of the Valar's good intentions, quite the opposite, in fact a significant number became suspicious and resentful of what happened next.

Well, Valor pressed his invitation hard and most of the elves left for the west, but some did not stay where they were. are and some of those who began the journey stopped along the way some of those who managed to make it to the end decided to stay on an island right next to the co. A man's toast to some of those who made it all the way to the continent and settled in a man who then rebelled and returned led by Fanor, whose seeds Tokin tells us were planted with the earlier murmurings against the Val and the Mayans and At some point those five powerful trusted Mayans were removed from their role. and they returned to what they had been doing before in Aman and time passed Millennia later, when Val decided once again that they wished to help the free peoples of Middle Earth by sending emissaries to aid in the opposition to Sauron, they apparently remembered who they had sent before. and chose to send them again, but going back to that quote, we started with Valor and decided to send them not with all their power like last time, but as elders, because they wanted to right the wrongs of yesteryear, especially the ones they had tried to protect. and isolate the Elder by his own power and Glory fully revealed.

Valor had learned his lesson from the first time Gandal San and company had been to Middle-earth with his and Gloria's power fully revealed. There are indications that perhaps Saran had used that. IM balance of power with the elves to try to force them to do things, the invitation to leave the only home they had ever known and confront the Master, a man, was a show of power and could make the elves wonder if they really had a election and the result was rebellion some rejected the wishes of the valar some apparently left reluctantly and stopped along the way one fell madly in love with one of the meire when she used her power and stayed in Middle Earth with her people The seeds of discontent lingered until Feanor's Rebellion, overall, not what Valor had intended, so when they sent those May back to Middle-earth in the Third Age, they tried a different approach, support, advice and breath dressed in weak and humble forms, at least that was the idea. but why did I call this a Forgotten Mission?

Because for the asari themselves, they told us that, being incarnated, the asari had the need to learn a lot and through slow experience and, although they knew where they came from, the memory of the Blessed realm was for them. He had a vision for them from afar for which, as long as they remained faithful to their original Mission, they longed greatly. Gandal twice says that he has

forgotten

his life before this Quest, apart from the longing to return, although this extra bit of history for Gandalf Saint Radagast and probably the Blue Wizards were written after The Lord of the Rings was published and after having written the essay on the aari and the Unfinished Tales.

It doesn't contradict anything, in fact it seems to fill in some gaps as if Tolken had this in the back of his mind the whole time, but he only developed it on paper later. I already mentioned how this hints that Thingol most likely knew and liked Melan before she captivated him, so perhaps that was just a part of their romance rather than the beginning of it. It also explains why we're told Manway wanted Alin Gandalf. going on the quest in old age because Alin was an Eldar lover who stayed here could mean several things, but the text suggests that Gandal loved those elves. who remained in Middle-earth, which makes a lot more sense if he had spent all that time with them and this adds another layer to that wonderful interaction we have between Kurdan and Gandalf when Gandalf came to Middle-earth in his third age.

Kdan decided to give the ring of power to Gandalf, not the most powerful nor the leader of the aari, why well, yes, Kurdan was gifted with foresight and wisdom, but he also probably met all those asari before on his first

mission

, in fact, Kurdan is the only elf left that we know he has. been there and if he had met Gandalf, even if Gandalf had forgotten him, Kurdan might well have remembered Alin as the wisest of all the Mayar and here he was again, who better to give the ring that could rekindle hearts in a growing world? calm, but perhaps the most significant implication here is not only that, as is often the case with tolken, humility and wisdom are greater than power and strength, but that doing things wrong and correcting them next time as he did The Valor here is understandable and worthy because This time it works well, the Valar Gandal emissaries manage to gain the trust of the elves and the other free peoples of Middle-earth with ears to listen.

Evil is defeated and the invited, unpressured elves finally leave Middle-earth. The mistakes of yesteryear were corrected and committed. full, if you want to see more videos like this diving deep into Tolkin Legendarium, a playlist now appears on the left of your screen or to support this channel, thank you. There's a link to my Patreon page on the right of your screen, that's all. for this time thanks for seeing us see you soon