The Liberty to Bind Oneself: Chesterton and The Oath of Fëanor

Authors

Matthew McKenna, Ave Maria UniversityFollow

Abstract

This paper does two things. First, it reads the oath of Fëanor in The Silmarillion through the lens of Chesterton’s philosophy of oaths, and suggests that Tolkien was speculatively influenced by Chesterton on this topic. It accomplishes this by an exposition of Chesterton’s philosophy of vows followed by an in-depth exposition of the oath of Fëanor throughout The Silmarillion. Its thesis is that the oath of Fëanor works according to the mode of Chesterton’s philosophy of oaths, that is, the oath compels the oath-taker to act. Viewing the oath of Fëanor through the framework of Chesterton’s philosophy of oath helps to make it explicit to the reader how the oath drives the sons of Fëanor to commit many evil acts. Secondly, this paper responds to a claim regarding the oath of Fëanor made by Alexander Bruce. This shows one practical benefit of reading the oath of Fëanor through the lens of Chesterton’s philosophy of oaths by highlighting the diminished freedom of the sons of Fëanor.

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.

ORCID ID

0000-0002-8694-2730