From: Troels@ThisIsFake.invalid   
      
   In message   
      
   Mike Scott Rohan  spoke   
   these   
   staves:   
   >   
   > On Sunday, 27 May 2012 13:00:07 UTC+1, Stan Brown  wrote:   
   >>   
   >>  From his letters to his English and German publishers there's no   
   >> question that he abhorred anti-Semitism in general and Nazi anti-   
   >> Semitism in particular.   
   >   
   > I don't disagree; but let's not forget that Tolkien inherited a   
   > burden of implicit anti-semitism simply by being brought up a   
   > Catholic (and largely by a priest) at that time.   
      
   I am always (as I have also said in another post), rather dubious of   
   the inference you are implying here. Yes, Tolkien was definitely   
   brought up by a Catholic priest after his mother died, and I am   
   willing to accept that at that time anti-semitic views were common   
   among Roman Catholics in England, but we can infer very little from   
   that.   
      
   And while it is indeed true of the context, I would still need   
   something firmer before accepting, for instance, that Fr. Francis or   
   his charge ever shared such views (i.e. that being a Jew somehow will   
   make you a lesser person -- above and beyond what any devout   
   Christian must think of any non-Christian).   
      
   > Tolkien didn't acquire violent prejudice, but I do think he did   
   > absorb a certain... attitude, one which he manifested occasionally,   
   > as in his view of Jews as apart and rootless.   
      
   That appears to me to be more complex. As I understand it, Tolkien   
   had some ideas about the unity of language, people /and physical   
   lands/ (a unity where, I think, he saw the /tales/ in that language   
   about these lands and that people as the glue that keeps things   
   together) that are probably not shared by many linguists.  In that   
   view, I think it would be a pitiable thing to move a people from   
   their lands and have them still, between themselves, speak the   
   language of that land, but in other affairs speak the language of the   
   people in whose lands they live (I am here trying to describe my   
   impression of how Tolkien viewed the Jews' situation -- I cannot say   
   to what degree this is precise, neither to his view nor to the actual   
   reality of the Jews).   
      
   In any case, whatever the origin of such a view on Jews, I would not   
   classify it as anti-semitism or racist.   
      
   I do make a distinction here that is perhaps not always obvious. In   
   order to retain our sanity, we all rely on generalisations and on   
   hearsay when forming our image of groups of other people. It may be   
   the people in the next village, or it may be the North Koreans, but   
   there is no way that we can deal with the full complexity of the   
   human race without generalisations, nor that we can experience   
   everything first hand.   
      
   This will inevitably lead to misperceptions -- some of these may even   
   be rather extreme, but while such erroneous beliefs may be seen as   
   prejudice (insofar as it is a prior judgement of facts, but not a   
   prior judgement of worth or guilt), I cannot accept that they   
   constitute anything that is regrettable or harmful.   
      
   The view of Jews as 'apart and rootless' may very well be erroneous,   
   but there is nothing wrong with holding an erroneous belief (of fact)   
   as long as you do not have access to information that would lead you   
   to correct your beliefs: the poor people of the medieval times who   
   believed the Earth to be the centre of Creation were not themselves   
   to blame for this belief: not until Kepler 'made' the planetary   
   orbits elliptic were there any observational evidence that the   
   heliocentric model was better than the geocentric.   
      
   The harmful or regrettable, in my opinion, occurs when you start   
   appreciating people less because they belong to a certain group. It   
   is quite natural to appreciate 'my group' (whatever that may be) more   
   than other, so the point is when people distinguish between different   
   groups of 'others' and believe that the members of one such group of   
   others is worth less as human beings than the members of other groups   
   of others. If Tolkien had believed that Jews were in some way worth   
   less as human beings than, say, Moroccans or Chinese, then I would   
   classify this as anti-semitic or racist, but I have not come across   
   any evidence that he held such a belief, however much he may have   
   been wrong about his 'factual knowledge' of the Jewish people.   
      
   > This he was able to put aside entirely and honestly, though, when   
   > confronted with true anti-semitic persecution. Meeting and liking   
   > Jewish colleagues undoubtedly helped him, too.   
      
   Undoubtedly. And maybe Fr. Francis, with German, Spanish, English and   
   Welsh ancestors  mixed in the cosmopolitan Cádiz region, was one of   
   the more enlightened Roman Catholic priests who taught the Tolkien   
   boys /not/ to accept the anti-Jewish beliefs that were held by   
   others.   
      
   In any case, as you say, the evidence suggests that Tolkien was not   
   anti-semitic.   
      
   --   
   Troels Forchhammer    
   Valid e-mail is    
   Please put [AFT], [RABT] or 'Tolkien' in subject.   
      
       Five exclamation marks, the sure sign of an insane mind.   
    - /Reaper Man/ (Terry Pratchett)   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)