What does it mean to lament? What does lament mean to you? At a basic level, to lament is to express sorrow or grief—usually visibly or audibly (or both), often in prayer or song or poetry. Lament can also express a deep sense of longing, which is a cousin if not a twin of grief. We can lament with wailing and sackcloth, or with quiet tears and a wordless moan. We can lament alone, but (importantly) we also lament with others as part of community. The word lament can be used intransitively—that is, without a direct object: without a particular thing that we are said to be lamenting. It can also be used transitively: we can lament something. We might lament the sufferings and sorrows of others, or we might lament our own pain and the grief we have experienced. We may also lament our own sins and the sufferings our sinfulness has caused to others as well as to ourselves.
And here an important point needs to be made, contradicting the so-called “comforters” of Job, the Bible’s most iconic human sufferer—though very much in keeping with the message of the book of Job: although our own sins or choices may indeed cause suffering to ourselves, for many of us most of the time, our suffering is caused not directly by our own sin, but by the sins of others (directed against us or not), or by the fallen state of the world. Think about cancer, floods, fires, wars and violence, or a drunk driver who path crosses ours or that of a loved one. Indeed, those who follow the example of Jesus in this world often suffer, not because of their own sin, but because they love.
And so we lament. Or at least God invites us to lament, though sometimes we refuse the invitation.
Although the words lament or lamentation appear only four times in The Lord of the Rings, a thread of lamentation is woven throughout J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-earth writings. The importance of lament—though not the word itself—is seen especially well in the character of Gandalf and in his leadership. The portrayal of the Grey Pilgrim who becomes the White Wizard offers profound wisdom to thoughtful readers, especially in a modern world and modern church that for many reasons often ignores or even disdains lament. Before turning to Gandalf, however, it is worth examining the four explicit references to lament in The Lord of the Rings all well as a few examples of lament (both with and without the word) in two others of Tolkien’s best-known Middle-earth writings: The Hobbit and The Silmarillion.
The first reference in The Lord of the Rings is easy to miss and may seem unimportant. It comes near the start of the Fellowship’s quest after they leave Rivendell and are passing through the land of Hollin. After Gandalf comments about both the evil that has befallen the region and the wholesome air about it now, Legolas gives the following reply:
“That is true. But the Elves of this land were of a race strange to us of the silvan folk, and the trees and the grass do not now remember them. Only I hear the stones lament them: deep they delved us, fair they wrought us, high they builded us; but they are gone. They are gone. They sought the Havens long ago.” (Book II, Ch. 3)
Legolas is referencing an age and history long past involving the fall of the race of elves known as the Noldor, their subsequent exile from Aman and the West, and the great suffering that resulted from their evils. These are the tales recounted in The Silmarillion involving the people of Galadriel including the ancestors of Elrond, and the greatest and longest lasting sorrows of their entire history—a grief carried by an entire people. Echoes and hints of this story run through The Lord of the Rings. For readers unfamiliar with this history, one primary hint is Legolas’s mention of the (Grey) Havens where elves go in hopes of departing Middle-earth and going into the West, which for Galadriel would end a very long exile.
Back in Chapter 3 of Book I, Gildor Inglorion of the House of Finrod (Galadriel’s brother) also references this when he speaks to Frodo of the exile and of the coming departure from Middle-earth when they will “return over the Great Sea”. Then in “Farewell to Lórien” (Book II, Ch.8), Galadriel sings in the common tongue of this history and of her own sorrows. The song begins on a joyful note remembering the ancient Elven home of Tirion in the West: “I sang of leaves, of leaves of gold, and leaves of gold there grew: / Of wind I sang, a wind there came and in the branches blew.” But her words turn quickly to loss, as she recounts her exile from Aman while also foreseeing the forthcoming loss of her beautiful realm of Lórien. “While here beyond the Sundering Seas now fall the Elven-tears. / O Lórien! The Winter comes, the bare and leafless Day.” The “Sundering Seas” refer to the barrier that the angelic powers established to enforce the exile, which Galadriel mourns. The song ends with a question of anguished longing: “What ship would bear me ever back across so wide a Sea?” And a short time later, Galadriel sings again of the same history and suffering, but this time in “the ancient tongue of the Elves beyond the Sea.” The Lord of the Rings text describes the first of these songs as “sad and sweet” but does not explicitly refer to either as a lament. However, in his personal letters Tolkien makes several references to the Elvish song as “Galadriel’s lament” or “the lament of Galadriel”—making it, in a way, a fifth reference to something explicitly referred to as lament (if we consider Tolkien’s letters).The words of this lament were so powerful that they remained “graven in [Frodo’s] memory,” and he would later recall them. The end of the third stanza and start of the fourth have the lines:
Sí vanwa ná, Rómello vanwa, Valimar!
Namárië! Nai hiruvalyë Valimar
As Frodo would later translate, “Now lost, lost to those from the East is Valimar! Farewell! Maybe thou shalt find Valimar” (Book II, Ch.8).
Returning to Legolas’s comments in Hollin in reply to Gandalf. Although I wrote extensively about Tolkien’s Environmental Vision in Ents, Elves, and Eriador (co-authored with my friend Jonathan Evans), there is something going on in this passage that I had not noticed before. The italicized words in Legolas’s speech represent what he hears from the stones themselves, in a history too far in the past for trees or grass to remember. Then Legolas follows this with words not printed in italics, which presumably are his own. These don’t so much explain the lament as they do join the lamentation. Thus we see one of the image-bearing children of the Creator, Ilúvator, echoing the groaning of creation!
I have often thought (and written in other past books such as A Hobbit Journey) that Tolkien’s Middle-earth writings frequently reflect themes from Romans 8. As I read Legolas’s words of the stones themselves lamenting, I am reminded of Romans 8:22–23 which in the NIV reads, “We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies.” We will return to Romans 8 later, but it is worth noting that Tolkien’s first explicit reference to lament involves, not humans or elves or dwarves or hobbits, but stones. And this is immediately followed by one the Elven race—referred to in Tolkien’s mythology as the Firstborn Children of the Ilúvatar—taking up that lament.
Skipping for a moment the second reference to lament in The Lord of the Rings, the third reference describes the words of Bregalad the Ent, friend of Treebeard, mourning the loss of beloved trees.
“O rowan fair, upon your hair how white the blossom lay!
O rowan mine, I saw you shine upon a summer’s day,
Your rind so bright, your leaves so light, your voice so cool and soft:
Upon your head how golden-red the crown you bore aloft!
O rowan dead, upon your head your hair is dry and grey;
Your crown is spilled, your voice is stilled for ever and a day.
O Orofarnë, Lassemista, Carnimírië!” (Book III. Ch.4)
The poem’s reference to rowan trees (and not just the ents who shepherd them) having voices that can be “stilled” is suggestive of Psalm 148:7–9 which speaks of “fruit trees and all cedars” joining in the chorus of voices praising the Lord. Of course, a voice that can praise the Lord can also groan in lament. Certainly, Bregalad’s song as well as Psalm 148 suggests that non-human creatures such as trees have spiritual value and can be morally wronged.
Immediately following this poem, we then find the narrator’s comment describing the song as a lament. “The hobbits fell asleep to the sound of the soft singing of Bregalad, that seemed to lament in many tongues the fall of trees that he had loved.” So here, as in Romans 8:20–21, we have part of creation (namely, the rowan trees), “subjected to frustration”—that is, suffering from the consequences of evil. And then the walking, speaking tree shepherds taking up the lament for that loss.
I find the fourth reference to lamentation interesting for different reasons. The passage is another well-known and oft-quoted one. King Théoden has fallen. His niece Éowyn (in disguise as the soldier Dernhelm) seeks to guard his body from the Ringwraith and his dragon-like mount. The Ringwraith addresses Éowyn in a “cold voice”: “Come not between the Nazgûl and his prey! Or he will not slay thee in thy turn. He will bear thee away to the houses of lamentation, beyond all darkness, where thy flesh shall be devoured, and thy shrivelled mind be left naked to the Lidless Eye” (Book V, Ch.6). Two of the four references to lament or lamentation come in the voice of the narrator. One earlier reference is from a character within the story, namely Legolas. This is the only time the word is used by an evil character and used in a disdainful way as a dark threat. Readers might be tempted to conclude that since a Ringwraith speaks of a “house of lamentation” as though Sauron maintained such a place, that lamentation must be evil. But lamentation itself is not at the core of the threat, but rather the sort of suffering that would lead Éowyn to lament: having her flesh devoured and her mind tortured. In fact, lamenting such evil and suffering would be an appropriate response. The fact that the Ringwraith is derisive about lamentation suggests that evil doesn’t understand the true value of lament. Indeed, it suggests to me something deeper. This reference to lamentation by a Ringwraith suggests that those in power see lament as something done only by the weak—and that, we see, is a view held by one who is profoundly evil. By contrast, the good and wise characters of the story see lament as a proper response to pain and suffering, and something appropriately done even by those like Galadriel who have great power.
Before we look at the second of the four references to lamentation, it is also worth mentioning that there are many other examples of what is clearly a form of lamentation: a grieving or mourning or outward expression of sorrow and loss, or a reference to such a time of lamenting. I have always been moved by Treebeard’s long lament over the loss of the Entwives and his beloved Fimbrethil. He concludes his story by noting: “Some said they had never seen them; and some said that they had seen them walking away west, and some said east, and others south. But nowhere that we went could we find them.” And then, this unhasty ent who can take all day just saying his name, says simply and briefly, “Our sorrow was very great” (Book III, Ch. 4). The simplest sentences are often the most powerful ones. It is as though the sorrow of the ents is too great even to put into words.
Even the book The Hobbit, though it might be described as the lightest of Tolkien’s Middle-earth writings and most accessible to a younger audience, contains examples of lament. Again we find that dwarves, elves, and men, as well as hobbits are portrayed expressing grief aloud—grief over suffering resulting from the evils of the dragon, and grief also over suffering caused by the evils of their own kind. Near the start of the tale, when the company finds its way to Rivendell, we read of Elrond’s response to the Dwarves’ quest when he looks at their map of Lonely Mountain.
He took it and gazed long at it, and he shook his head; for if he did not altogether approve of dwarves and their love of gold, he hated dragons and their cruel wickedness, and he grieved to remember the ruin of the town of Dale and its merry bells, and the burned banks of the bright River Running. (Ch.3)
Elrond, who earlier was described as very wise, doesn’t need to approve of all the values of the dwarves in order to grieve the violence done to them or the suffering resulting from the “cruel wickedness” of the dragon Smaug.
And then we have Thorin. As noted in the introduction, one form of lament is to grieve over one’s own sins and the suffering they cause. Thus, repentance is a form of lament—an idea seen in some of the Psalms of David. We see this later the story in Thorin’s famous parting words to Bilbo. “I would take back my words and deeds at the Gate.” In an echo of Elrond’s words about “dwarves and their love of gold,” Thorin continues with a recognition that Bilbo’s values proved more wholesome than his own, which is as close as Thorin comes to acknowledging the harm caused by his own greed: “If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world” (The Hobbit, Ch.18)
Bilbo also expresses lament at the end of the battle, as one “filled with sorrow”. Unlike Thorin, he does not grieve over his own evil. Though he does worry that he made “a great mess of that business with the stone,” he recognizes that he cannot really be blamed (Ch.18). Nor does he grieve primarily over his own hardship. Rather, his grief is over the sorrows of the world and the deaths of friends. Indeed, there is a progression in his character in which he goes from imagining from the “songs of many battles” that even “defeat may be glorious” (Ch.17), to realizing that even in victory “it seems a very gloomy business” that fills him with “more sorrow than joy” (Ch.18).
Not surprisingly—since it tells the history to which the lament of Galadriel refers, and is in many ways the deepest of J.R.R. Tolkien’s mythic work which his son Christopher in his Foreword pointed out was “the vehicle and depository of his profoundest reflections”—The Silmarillion contains numerous references to lamentation. The Quenta Silmarillion (or Tale of the Silmarils) references lamentation thirteen times, including mentions of: voices lifted in lamentation over the suffering resulting from evil, lament over fallen heroes and loved ones, and an entire Year of Lamentation related to a battle known as the Nirnaeth Arnoediad or “Tears Unnumbered”. When Ungoliant destroys the Two Trees of Valinor, the narrator tells us, “Then many voice were lifted in lamentation; and it seemed to those that mourned that they had drained to the dregs the cup of woe that Melkor had filled to them. But it was not so” (Ch. 9). The tale also references songs—similar to that of Galadriel in The Lord of the Rings—composed explicitly as lamentations, including the Aldudénië (a lament for the Two Trees composed by Elemmirë), the Noldolantë (a lament of the Fall of the Noldor, composed by Maglor), and a lament for the Children of Húrin. Elves, dwarves, and men are all shown lamenting.
But the most instructive reference to lament comes in the Valaquenta, the second part of published The Silmarillion which continues the story of the creation of Middle-earth by the divine being Eru Ilúvatar by telling of the angelic Valar who enter into creation to serve it from within. Describing the great Music of the Ainur through which Ilúvatar’s brings the physical universe Eä into being, the narrator tells of the role of the Vala named Nienna in the music. “So great was her sorrow, as the Music unfolded, that her song turned to lamentation long before its end, and the sound of mourning was woven into the themes of the World before it began” (Valaquenta). Thus, even the angels—the Valar themselves—mourn aloud and in song, expressing their grief as lamentation.
And this brings us back to the second of the four references to lament in The Lord of the Rings. The reference comes after the fall of Gandalf when the Fellowship reaches the safety of Lothlórien.
Now as the companions sat or walked together they spoke of Gandalf, and all that each had known and seen of him came clear before their minds. As they were healed of hurt and weariness of body the grief of their loss grew more keen. Often they heard nearby Elvish voices singing, and knew that they were making songs of lamentation for his fall, for they caught his name among the sweet sad words that they could not understand. (Book II, Ch.7)
Note that this lamentation is taken up by a community of many voices, singing together in shared grief. It is interesting to note that the words are both sad and sweet; I read in this wording a suggestion that there is goodness in being able to lament and express grief, especially in community. The story certainly offers hints in the passage associating lament with the process of healing; first their bodily hurts and weariness must be tended, and then they will be ready to lament, and in that lament also find spiritual healing from their griefs. Legolas, in refusing to translate the Elvish lament, even suggests that his own “grief was still too near,” (Book II, Ch.7) and needed to be expressed first in tears before it could be put into song—another suggestion that lament is a part of a healthy process of dealing with grief.
Now the person who brings the community together in lament is Gandalf. That he does so through his death and is not present makes him not less significant to this act of lament but more; for even in his death Gandalf’s impact as a leader is seen in how those who knew him respond to loss. To understand this aspect of Gandalf’s leadership, we must look back to the beginning days of Middle-earth and see how he was shaped and prepared to be the wise leader he was, who profoundly impacted the lives he touched. And this brings us to a deeper look at Nienna. As told in the Valaquenta in a more complete quote of the passage referenced above:
Mightier than Estë is Nienna, sister of the Fëanturi; she dwells alone. She is acquainted with grief, and mourns for every wound that Arda has suffered in the marring of Melkor. So great was her sorrow, as the music unfolded, that her song turned to lamentation long before its end, and the sound of mourning was woven into the themes of the World before it began. But she does not weep for herself; and those who hearken to her learn pity, and endurance in hope.
Again, we note here that lamentation is not just a feeling of sorrow, “great” though that sorrow was, but an outward expression of it. This passage refers to “the sound of mourning” and notes that it was woven into the great music and the very “themes of the World.”
More importantly though—and this gets us closer to the core of this essay—is what Nienna was mourning and how her lamentation impacted her action. She mourned “every wound that Arda has suffered.” This includes suffering of animals, of trees, of the earth itself, and also of the Children of Ilúvatar—all created things within the physical universe. And again, the story makes a point to say that she “does not weep for herself.” Certainly, it is not evil to weep for oneself and one’s own sorrows, and there are examples of characters who do that (both biblically and in Tolkien’s works). But one who weeps only for themself and does not care about the sufferings of others might rightly be called selfish or narcissistic. Nienna is at the other end of the spectrum; all her weeping is for the sufferings of others.
Then comes a vital point: those who listen to Nienna’s lamentation “learn pity”—which is another strong indication that Nienna herself models pity. In a 2025 essay for The Washington Institute titled “The Hobbit and Compassion (in an Increasingly Compassionless World)”, I wrote about Tolkien’s portrayal of pity. Sympathy is what we might call an intellectual step of understanding the sufferings or hardships of others. Empathy is not merely trying to understand others’ hardships intellectually, but actually feeling them (emotionally) along with the sufferer. Compassion is when empathy moves us to action: caring for the suffering person enough to do something: to attempt to alleviate their suffering. Thus the progression from sympathy to empathy to compassion (words which all share the same Latin root pati) is a move from thinking to feeling to acting.
Although the word pity used in this passage has, since Tolkien’s lifetime, taken on some newer connotations of condescension that many view negatively, while Tolkien was writing his great Middle-earth Legendarium, the word “pity” was a synonym for “compassion”. One of the central values of lamentation is that it forms in those who practice it a virtue of compassion. Lamenting, especially for the hardships of others, can move us to action.
And the passage suggests even more in what for many readers may be a surprising contrast. At its core—and this is especially true of Christian lament—lament is an act of hope. Christians lament because they believe they are heard, and not only heard but heard by a God who loves them and may be moved to act. In his book Dark Clouds, Deep Mercy: Discovering the Grace of Lament, author Mark Vroegop writes, “Belief in God’s mercy, redemption, and sovereignty create lament. Without hope in God’s deliverance and the conviction that he is all-powerful, there would be no reason to lament when pain invaded our lives. . . . Lament is rooted in what we believe. It is a prayer loaded with theology. Christians affirm that the world is broken, God is powerful, and he will be faithful. Therefore, lament stands in the gap between pain and promise.” He goes on to say, simply but wisely, “To cry is human, but to lament is Christian.” And in Middle-earth, we are told, “those who hearken to [the lamentation of Nienna] learn pity, and endurance in hope.”
Now if Nienna was a central figure in Tolkien’s continuing narratives, and we could witness this played out in her story, I might focus this essay with Nienna. But after the Valaquenta, her name largely disappears from the Middle-earth narratives. Her influence, however, does not. Shortly after this passage, we come upon a very short paragraph of two sentences describing one of the Maiar—angelic beings in nature like the Valar, of less power and authority, but in at least a couple cases very central to the tales of Middle-earth. “Wisest of the Maiar was Olórin. He too dwelt in Lórien, but his ways took him often to the house of Nienna, and of her he learned pity and patience.” That is the full paragraph. Who is this character, Olórin? Readers of The Lord of the Rings might recognize the name, though it appears only once. Faramir, when he learns from Frodo of Gandalf’s death, recounts some memories of the wizard including a few of his many names: “Mithrandir among the Elves, Tharkûn to the Dwarves; Olórin. . . in the West that is forgotten, in the south Incánus, in the North Gandalf.”
So the Olórin who spent time with Nienna is indeed the wizard Gandalf. It is thus Gandalf, we are told, who was “Wisest of the Maiar”. Where did such wisdom come from? The rest of the short paragraph is suggestive of an answer. Gandalf spent time with Nienna, and was nurtured in practices of lament! And from her practices of lament, he learned “pity and patience” and presumably also the “hope” that was mentioned earlier. We see this repeatedly in The Lord of the Rings: Gandalf practices lament, and models or encourages it among those around him, and then he turns lament into action through both hope and compassion.
Consider just a few of Gandalf’s interactions—with Frodo, Aragorn, Théoden, and Pippin—none of which use the word lament, but all of which illustrate a practice of lamenting, and show why it is important. From almost the start of the story, Gandalf expresses important ideas to Frodo in one of the best-known and most oft-quoted passages of the book. After he describes how Sauron is once again rising, and a dark time will be coming upon Middle-earth, Frodo memorably laments, “I wish it need not have happened in my time.” Notably, Gandalf does not contradict him, or tell him he should be cheerful and happy. He does not diminish Frodo’s lament. Instead, the wizard affirms its validity and even joins him. “So do I, and so do all who live to see such times.” He even goes on to give more reasons for Frodo to grieve, stating how “the Enemy is fast becoming very strong. . . . We shall be hard put to it. We should be very hard put to it” (Book I, Ch. 2). Yet the wizard turns that lament not into a reason for Frodo to despair, or give in to what might seem like inevitable evil and defeat, or hide his head in the sand and pretend everything is fine, but rather to do what they can in the battle against evil, regardless of how bleak it might seem. He will also go on repeatedly to give Frodo (and anybody else whose path he crosses) reasons for hope even while affirming both the danger and the reality of the suffering. Gandalf then models his words to Frodo by living in hope and by doing everything he himself can.
Similar ideas arise in a later dialogue with Aragorn, when they meet in the Forest of Fangorn after Gandalf’s resurrection. Aragorn suggests a plan of action—namely continuing his pursuit of Merry and Pippin. Gandalf replies, “That is not the road that you must take. I have spoken words of hope. But only of hope. Hope is not victory. War is upon us and all our friends, a war in which only the use of the Ring could give us surety of victory. It fills me with great sorrow and great fear: for much shall be destroyed and all may be lost” (Book III, Ch.5). That last line, coming out of Gandalf’s own “great sorrow”, is another expression of lament: “much shall be destroyed and all may be lost.” This shows that one aspect of lament is honesty: recognizing the sorrow and loss in the world, and saying of what is that it is. Lament is truth-speaking. Failure to lament is a form of dishonesty, if not with others then at least with oneself. And yet his lament follows expressions of hope. They are not exclusive. And then flowing out of the lament for the sorrow and loss that the world will surely know, both Gandalf and Aragorn and all with them are moved to act in ways to minimize that sorrow. Indeed, the entire conversation stems from the question of what they should do in light of the hard times.
Only a few days later after the Battle of Helm’s Deep when the company is on its way to Isengard, we read of the dialogue between Gandalf and King Théoden after Théoden sees Ents for the first time. Again, Gandalf speaks words of hope: “You should be glad, Théoden King, for not only the little life of Men is now endangered, but the life also of those things which you have deemed the matter of legend. You are not without allies, even if you know them not.” Théoden responds with words that can be read as lament—not for what has already happened, but for what will happen. “Yet also I should be sad. For however the fortune of war shall go, may it not so end that much that was fair and wonderful shall pass for ever out of Middle-earth?” Gandalf does not deny the truth of Théoden’s words, or dismiss the sadness as somehow inappropriate or unimportant. Indeed, in words reminiscent both of what he spoke to Frodo and what he spoke to Aragorn, he speaks of the sorrows of the world and the suffering caused by evil as real and meaningful things. And yet in the same breath, even as he has renewed Théoden’s hope, he now renews the need for action. “It may. The evil of Sauron cannot be wholly cured, nor made as if it had not been. But to such days we are doomed. Let us now go on with the journey we have begun!” (Book III, Ch.8)
A fourth dialogue doesn’t portray lament as such, but it does suggest something profound about lament and hope, and about the character of Gandalf. As with most scenes in The Lord of the Rings, we see it through the eyes of a hobbit. This time, it is Pippin. They are standing atop the walls of Minas Tirith and the armies of Sauron close in on the city early in Book V. It is one of the darkest times of the tale when—from the point of view both of readers of the story and characters within the story—things are at their most desperate. Frodo has been bitten by Shelob, taken prisoner by the orcs, and separated from Sam. Merry and Pippin have been separated from each other and both are facing grim tasks. Aragorn, with Legolas and Gimli and a band of Rangers, are traveling the Paths of the Dead, the very name of which brings dread to any who hear it. And Minas Tirith is about to be besieged. Pippin asks a simple question about whether he spoke well in front of Denethor. The description of Gandalf’s response and what Pippin sees in it is one of my favorite moments in the story (though admittedly, I have several such favorites.)
‘You did indeed!’ said Gandalf, laughing suddenly; and he came and stood beside Pippin, putting his arm about the hobbit’s shoulders, and gazing out of the window. Pippin glanced in some wonder at the face now close beside his own, for the sound of that laugh had been gay and merry. Yet in the wizard’s face he saw at first only lines of care and sorrow; though as he looked more intently he perceived that under all there was a great joy: a fountain of mirth enough to set a kingdom laughing, were it to gush forth.
Understanding Gandalf at this point provides an important clue to understanding the relationship between hope and lament. Keep in mind that Gandalf, in Tolkien’s mythology, is what we might in our world call an incarnate angel: a spiritual being who was present with the Ilúvatar when the physical world was sung into being, and who dwelt in Aman with the Valar and especially with Nienna. Gandalf has not only what we might think of as tremendous human experiential knowledge, but he has spiritual knowledge as well. And so while he is full of “care and sorrow” for the dangers and suffering of the world, he can also experience both hope and joy because he knows the Creator. The hope and joy do not make the pain and sorrow irrelevant. Indeed, love itself makes the pain of others more significant. But it does mean that the pain and sorrow do not lead to despair, for Gandalf has reasons for his hope and his joy. I can think of no better description than to say that the wizard had spiritual sight. He could see the same physical reality as Frodo, hence the care and sorrow, but he could see the spiritual reality as well.
And as the impact of Nienna’s example of lament in hope can be seen in the life of Olórin whom she mentored, and who learned from spending time with her, so too can the importance of Gandalf’s leadership—including his taking lament seriously—be seen in the lives of those who spent time with him.
Consider again the second example of lament in The Lord of the Rings. It follows the death of Gandalf. Those who knew the wizard eventually lift their voices in lament, for they understand that lament is a good and appropriate thing. Their lament does not mean they have lost hope; they all continue on with the quest. Lament is part of their hope, but also recognizes that the pain and loss are real, and can and should be voiced. And, moreover, lamenting in community is an important part of lament. Before giving Frodo’s words, the narrator introduces his song as such:
It was Frodo who first put something of his sorrow into halting words. He was seldom moved to make song or rhyme; even in Rivendell he had listened and had not sung himself, though his memory was stored with many things that others had made before him. But now as he sat beside the fountain in Lórien and heard about him the voices of the Elves, his thought took shape in a song that seemed fair to him. (Book II, Ch.7)
We have already touched on this scene, but to previous observations I note also that Frodo (unlike Bilbo) was not one frequently “moved to make song or rhyme”, and yet he does so here. Lament seems to be something of such importance that it brings an expression in words even from Frodo.
Even Sam shows this impact. Of course, all four of the hobbit heroes grieve when they return to the Shire at the end of their adventures in The Lord of the Rings, but Frodo and Sam are most clearly shown as grieving. At some point after they have been back for a while, and Saruman and the ruffians are gone, and they’ve done a fair bit of restoration work but there is still much to be done, the narrator notes near the start of the final chapter:
The trees were the worst loss and damage, for at Sharkey’s bidding they had been cut down recklessly far and wide over the Shire; and Sam grieved over this more than anything else. For one thing, this hurt would take long to heal, and only his great-grandchildren, he thought, would see the Shire as it ought to be. (Book VI, Ch.9)
So Sam (like Bregolad) is lamenting the loss of the trees—a hurt that would take long to heal, and is yet another example of the suffering of creation due to the “reckless” evil of Saruman. And we also see that when nature suffers, so do people. Sam also grieves that it would not be until his great-grandchildren were grown that folks would again “see the Shire as it ought to be.” Immediately after, however, the narrator then adds: “Then suddenly one day, for he had been too busy for weeks to give a thought to his adventures, he remembered the gift of Galadriel. He brought the box out and showed it to the other Travellers (for so they were now called by everyone), and asked their advice” (Book VI, Ch.9). Sam was a person of hope. And as soon as Saruman and the ruffians were gone, he began work restoring the Shire. If we follow the narrative closely, it is as though the very act of lament is what moves Sam to more action, to heal the very hurts of the world that he has been grieving. And, like Frodo’s choice to give up himself to save the Shire (and all of Middle-earth) in response to his lament that evil was happening in his time, so Sam also gives up something precious to help heal the wounds of the earth; he shares his precious soil that was the gift to him from Galadriel. And in so doing, he also brings hope to others.
I have written this essay about the portrayal of lament in Middle-earth in part because I have always been deeply moved by J.R.R. Tolkien’s writing. Among the most moving passages to me are those in which the characters experience and express sorrow and loss, and we find that hope and joy can live in the midst of lament. Or, to put it another way, it is how Tolkien as an author portrays hope and goodness without denying the sorrows of the world.
But another and perhaps more important reason I write this essay is that the wisdom in Tolkien’s portrayal of lament is a deeply biblical wisdom. Consider, for example, that a large percentage of the Psalms contain expressions of lament. In some, it may be only a verse here or there expressing sorrow to God, as in Psalm 119 when in the midst of a long ode to the goodness of God’s Word, the author (in verses 81–85) suddenly and perhaps unexpectedly lifts up his sorrows, speaking as one whose soul faints, whose eyes fail, who still waits for God’s promises to be fulfilled, who has not felt God’s comfort, and who has been persecuted by enemies who dig pits for him. In the center of this lament is the beautiful poetic imagery of one who feels “like wineskin in smoke”—a reference to how a shepherd may sterilize his wineskin by holding it over a fire. (This imagery inspired a song I wrote titled “Wineskin in Smoke” and recorded during the first year of the Covid pandemic.) Other Psalms like 38, 41, 42, 43, and 51 lean more fully into lament, repeatedly asking “When will you comfort me?” and “How long must I wait?” In Psalms 42 and 43, the psalmist cries out with a sense of God’s absence using imagery of a thirsty deer in a desert while speaking of tears being food day and night, and of a downcast soul. The Psalms as a whole contain both personal laments and communal laments or laments of communal suffering. In some, the psalmist is aware of his own sin as the cause of suffering. In others, the psalmist expresses his innocence. Many express a deep sense of abandonment. In one form or another, the question “How long, O Lord” runs through the Psalms.
In his translation The Message, Eugene Peterson renders Psalm 130:1–2 as follows: “Help, God—I’ve hit rock bottom! Master, hear my cry for help! Listen hard! Open your ears! Listen to my cries for mercy.” In his book A Long Obedience in the Same Direction, Peterson comments on the Psalms in general and on Psalm 130 in particular. It is worth quoting a longer passage in full:
By setting the anguish out in the open and voicing it as a prayer, the psalm gives dignity to our suffering. It does not look on suffering as something slightly embarrassing that must be hushed up and locked in a closet (where it finally becomes a skeleton) because this sort of thing shouldn’t happen to a real person of faith. And it doesn’t treat it as a puzzle that must be explained, and therefore turn it over to theologians or philosophers to work out an answer. Suffering is set squarely, openly, passionately before God. It is acknowledged and expressed. It is described and lived.
If the psalm did nothing more than that, it would be a prize, for it is difficult to find anyone in our culture who will respect us when we suffer. We live in a time when everyone’s goal is to be perpetually healthy and constantly happy. If any one of us fails to live up to the standards that are advertised as normative, we are labeled as a problem to be solved, and a host of well-intentioned people rush to try out various cures on us. Or we are looked on as an enigma to be unraveled, in which case we are subjected to endless discussions, our lives examined by researchers zealous for the clue that will account for our lack of health or happiness. The gospel offers a different view of suffering; in suffering we enter the depths, we are at the heart of things; we are near to where Christ was on the cross.
And so we find in Psalm 130 not so much as a trace of those things that are so common among us, which rob us of our humanity when we suffer and make the pain so much more terrible to bear. No glib smart answers. No lectures on our misfortunes in which we are hauled into a classroom and given graduate courses in suffering. No hasty Band-Aid treatments covering up our trouble so that the rest of society does not have to look at it.
Neither prophets nor priests nor psalmists offer quick cures for the suffering: we don’t find any of them telling us to take a vacation, use this drug, get a hobby. Nor do they ever engage in publicity cover-ups, the plastic-smile propaganda campaigns that hide trouble behind a billboard of positive thinking. None of that: the suffering is held up and proclaimed—and prayed.
Peterson is making a very important point. Many point to the Psalms as guides to prayer. And yet many Christians and churches seem uncomfortable with the lament, despite how much of the book of Psalms is devoted to it; even when we sing songs based on Psalms of lament such as 42 and 43, the sense of longing seems to be lost, or turned into more of a proclamation of our goodness because we desire God rather than an expression of feeling dry and thirsty and abandon like a deer in a desert. (Hitoshi Yamaguchi’s beautiful song “Why Are You Cast Down” does a wonderful job, I think, capturing the mood of Psalms 42-43.)
Of course, lament isn’t limited to the Psalms. The book of Job is full of the lament of its eponymous character.
God assails me and tears me in his anger
and gnashes his teeth at me;
my opponent fastens on me his piercing eyes.
People open their mouths to jeer at me;
they strike my cheek in scorn
and unite together against me.
God has turned me over to the ungodly
and thrown me into the clutches of the wicked.
All was well with me, but he shattered me;
he seized me by the neck and crushed me.
He has made me his target;
his archers surround me.
Without pity, he pierces my kidneys
and spills my gall on the ground.
Again and again he bursts upon me;
he rushes at me like a warrior. (Job 16:9–14)
Importantly, it is in the midst of Job’s long lament that we read one of the most beautiful biblical expressions of hope and faith in all of Scripture, and one that points ahead to coming messiah.
Even now my witness is in heaven;
my advocate is on high.
My intercessor is my friend
as my eyes pour out tears to God;
on behalf of a man he pleads with God
as one pleads for a friend. (Job 16:19–21)
Is it possible that lament itself is what opens up Job’s eyes—and the eyes of the readers—to this hope and promise? Certainly, we could see in Job a model for Gandalf’s own expressions of lament even in the context of hope.
And we could go on. Lamentations (as the name of the book suggests) is an entire book devoted to corporate lament. Consider also the prophets. Jeremiah communicates not only his own expressions of lament (for example, in 4:7–8), but also commands the people to lament (7:28–29). Notably, Jeremiah even conveys the words of God lamenting in 9:7–10.
Centuries later, Jesus tells us in the Sermon on the Mount, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted” (Matthew 5:4). And then Jesus himself also models lament. In one of those wonderful examples of divine timing, the morning I was finishing my final edits on this essay, my daily devotion came from Mark Roberts, writing for Fuller Theological Seminary’s De Pree Center. In a devotion titled “Sharing the Heart of Jesus”, Roberts wrote about Luke 19:41–44, which he cited in the NRSV.
As [Jesus] came near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, “If you, even you, had only recognized on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. Indeed, the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up ramparts around you and surround you, and hem you in on every side. They will crush you to the ground, you and your children within you, and they will not leave within you one stone upon another; because you did not recognize the time of your visitation from God.”
Roberts writes, “The Greek verb used here suggests, not just a few tears, but painful sobs. Jesus was demonstrably grieving.” Demonstrably grieving is, indeed, a definition of lament.
So why, then, is lament so hard? Why do we resist it if it’s so clearly biblical? There may be as many reasons as there are people. One reason may be that our lament often makes others uncomfortable. I suspect that most of us have experienced or witnessed people saying very unhelpful and even hurtful things to grieving people. When we have experienced that enough, it just becomes easier to keep our grief to ourselves. The church needs to be better at lamenting together, and at coming around others in their lament. But I do think there is another explanation and it relates to bad theology. In the modern world, I often refer to it as prosperity theology: a teaching that if we just have enough faith in God, or are righteous enough, God will protect us from suffering. In the most blunt form, it is expressed in terms of wealth and health; follow God and he’ll give you material blessings and keep you from getting sick. Of course, if you believe that, you will be very hesitant to express any sort of sorrow, because to express that something is wrong would be like a confession that you are not faithful enough or not righteous enough.
I called this a “bad theology” of the “modern world.” But this destructive teaching is as old as the Bible. And so, too, are the biblical responses to this teaching, making it clear that it is wrong. Job’s so-called “comforters” were convinced that Job was suffering because he had sinned—and they said so aloud, turning themselves from comforters to accusers. The entire book of Job makes it clear that they were wrong! So, too, with the Pharisees of Jesus’ day, who assumed that a man’s blindness must have been a punishment either his own sin’s or his parents—though they weren’t sure which. Jesus’s answer makes it clear that they, too, were wrong (John 9:1–3).
Of course, those who are wealthy and powerful—and this would include especially religious leaders, both in the ancient world and in the modern world, who want to justify their personal wealth—are all too happy to promote this false message, connecting their wealth to their righteousness, and connecting the poverty or suffering of others with their sins. The problem is: it is a false and unbiblical message. Do we sometimes suffer because of our own sin? Certainly. The story of David in 2 Samuel 11 makes that clear. But the same story also points to the suffering of a lot of other people as a result of David’s sin—the entire nation, in fact, as seen in the rest of 2 Samuel, along with Bathsheba and her murdered husband Uriah. While Jesus’s words in Matthew 5:10–12 at the end of the Beatitudes make it clear that it is often actually our very righteousness and our following of Jesus that will lead to our persecution and suffering.
And we are back once more to Gandalf, and J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings, and one final passage. We looked earlier at the story of the Vala named Nienna in the Valaquenta. Nienna’s dwelling where Gandalf’s character was shaped was, in a way, a house of lamentation where sorrow and suffering were mourned—and by one who was not afraid to raise the mourning in song to the Creator. Yet for the Ringwraith who confronted Éowyn, a house of lamentation was seen as a place of evil and punishment.
The Ringwraith is not the only evil character with such a worldview. Earlier in the tale, when Wormtongue is trying to belittle and undermine Gandalf in front of Théoden, he refers to the wizard as “Master Stormcrow” and then as “Láthspell”, which in the language of Rohan (represented to readers using Old English) means something like “loathsome message”, which would actually be the opposite of the gospel, which comes from Old English gód spell meaning “good message”. Thus Wormtongue goes on to deride Gandalf saying, “Ill-news is an ill guest.”
Bad news is not same as lament, but there are three connections. First, as noted earlier, lament is a practice of speaking truth about hard and painful things, as well as about our own feelings. Gandalf is often a messenger who comes speaking truth about hard things. And Wormtongue seeks to silence him, preferring to hear only happy messages. Lament gives voice to the hard things. Second, when Gandalf brings difficult news—or “ill news” as Wormtongue would say—he does so to move people to necessary action. Which is precisely what he does in Meduseld. What Gandalf and Aragorn set in action there ends up saving the world. When we, like Nienna, mourn for a wounded and suffering world, it should move us to live and act in ways that help alleviate the suffering
And third, while it is true that Gandalf often comes with hard news, he always brings hope. Hope is a repeated conversation through the entire story. The fault of Denethor at the end wasn’t that he grieved, but that he grieved without hope. Lament may deal with hard things also, but it is rooted in hope. We lament because we believe there is a loving God who hears us. It is not in vain to express our sorrows. The Spirit himself may take our wordless groans and bring them to the throne.
Then we come to the final chapter of the story, “The Grey Havens”, named after the scene where much of the chapter takes place and which the earlier poem referenced. Boarding a ship at the Havens, Frodo departs from Middle-earth along with Elrond, Galadriel, Gandalf, Gildor, and others in a moment of both joy (for the exile of Galadriel and Gildor has ended) and sorrow (for there are many painful partings: Frodo from his friends, Elrond from his daughter Arwen, and Galadriel from her spouse Celeborn). Pondering this scene, I think Gandalf’s wisdom has impacted even Galadriel, who indeed always thought and spoke highly of the wizard and his wisdom. Like the many Psalms that express lament as questions to God—“Why are you so far off? How long must we wait?”—so too was Galadriel’s lament expressed in a question: “What ship would bear me ever back across so wide a Sea?” And it was expressed also in hope—at least for Frodo: “Farewell! Maybe thou shalt find Valimar. Maybe even thou shalt find it. Farewell!” (Book III, Ch.8). Here, at the end, she is given an answer to her question, and the fulfillment of that hope spoken in lament; here is the ship that will carry her back across that Sea, and the ship that will carry Frodo also to Valimar.
At the end of the tale, Gandalf says to Merry, Pippin, and Sam, when they must part, “Go in peace! I will not say: do not weep; for not all tears are an evil.” Indeed, if we have been paying attention to all that Gandalf has said and done throughout the books, and all that Tolkien has expressed, we must realize this is a profound understatement. While we live in a wounded world, tears and weeping are good and holy things. And recognizing and modeling that was a big part of Gandalf’s wisdom.
