Prophecy, Curses, and the Power of Words in the Middle Earth World

Words are often portents in The Lord of the Rings. An example is when Aragorn told Éomer that they would “meet again, though all the hosts of Mordor should stand between.” It seemed like a throwaway statement, which is understandable, given that Éomer was distraught at Aragorn’s leaving to take The Paths of the Dead. Yet, later at the Battle of the Pelennor Fields, Aragorn meets Éomer again, and Tolkien goes out of his way to tell us that this was the fulfillment of Aragorn’s previous ‘prediction’.

It raises an interesting question about the role of prophecy in The Lord of the Rings. There is a suggestion of some higher entity informing these predictions. Another example is, of course, much more famous than the one above:
“Pity? It’s a pity that stayed Bilbo’s hand. Many that live deserve death. Some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them, Frodo? Do not be too eager to deal out death in judgment. Even the very wise cannot see all ends. My heart tells me that Gollum has some part to play in it, for good or evil, before this is over. The pity of Bilbo may rule the fate of many.” – Gandalf

We know here, of course, that Gandalf was being highly prescient, though he likely didn’t envision the exact role that Gollum would play in the destruction of the Ring. But it was likely more than “his heart” telling him that this would be the case. Indeed, in the same conversation (with Frodo), Gandalf again touches on the hand of providence, or perhaps more aptly, Eru Ilúvatar, when saying, “Bilbo was meant to find the Ring, in which case you were also meant to have it. And that is an encouraging thought.”

The power of the speaker

What is not always clear, however, is the power of the speaker. By that, we can go back to what Aragorn said to Éomer. Did it happen because he saw it happen, or did it happen because he said it would happen? That’s arguably the difference between a prophecy, i.e., a vision of something that will come to pass, and a curse or blessing (not in the Christian sense), the utterance of something that is not revealed by an exterior power but caused by the words themselves.

None of this happens in real-life. One can’t simply say, I am going to buy lottery tickets and win tomorrow, but in Tolkien’s world, there is power in the spoken world, though it depends on who utters it. Isildur’s Curse of the Dead Men of Dunharrow was not a prophecy in the same sense as Glorfindel’s prophecy on the death of the Witch-King of Angmar.

Isildur didn’t foresee that the Oathbreakers would have no rest until they fulfilled their oath to the King of Gondor; his words meant that that would be the case. Glorfindel, who spoke what is perhaps the most famous prophecy in The Lord of the Rings, didn’t curse the Witch-King to die at the hand of Éowyn (and Meriadoc, if we are being precise); he foresaw that it would happen. It’s not clear whether the prophecy came from Glorfindel himself, which cannot be ruled out for such a powerful Elf-Lord, or was shown to him by a higher power, perhaps the Valar, or Eru Ilúvatar.

Free choice drives events in Arda

What makes all of this so much more interesting, one would argue, is that all of the prophecy and cursing in The Lord of the Rings is juxtaposed with characters facing dilemmas that involve free will, even if there are magical forces influencing that free will. Boromir, Grima Wormtongue, Saruman, and Gollum/Smeagol are examples of characters who make choices but choose ‘wrongly,’ whereas Faramir is one of the best examples of a character who chooses wisely.

There are some fantastic pieces written on the above, which we have condensed into a short paragraph. But it’s enough to say that it was one of the things that make The Lord of the Rings a masterpiece: Competing forces of prophecy, fate, providence, doom, or whatever you want to call it, permeate the story, but it remains the free choices of people, from Isildur deciding to keep the Ring to Frodo announcing he would take it to Orodruin to Aragorn deciding he would take the Paths of the Dead, that end up driving it.