Thursday, July 21, 2011

On Being Seelie

Any time one decides to set an FRPG in an pseudo-historical setting, such as Averoigne, one must deal with elves, dwarves, halflings, etc. A choice must be made: to have demi-humans or not. If they are included, they must be explained — especially if the pseudo-historical setting is Christian because the salvation of Christ is intrinsically tied to His incarnation as a human.

I have long been a fan of demi-humans. When I first began to play with the Holmes edition all those years ago my first character was an elf and my best friend's was a dwarf. Though my friends and I gravitated towards human characters as we grew older, I have always enjoyed the sense of whimsy and mystery they can bring into a game (they also can transform a "hopeless" character into something dangerous as the halfling Pawnchee has demonstrated in my Lost Colonies campaign). Therefore, I am not particularly interested in "punting" the issue of demi-humans by not including them in my version of Averoigne.

This brings me to the word seelie. With the world of FRPGs we associate this word strongly with fey creatures and their two rival courts who may or may not be benevolent toward humans. If we look at the etymology of the word, however, we find three very interesting meanings: happy, lucky and blessed. I am particularly interested in that last word, especially given this depiction of Christ by the Pre-Raphaelite William Hunt:



I defy anyone to deny that this doesn't have at least a passing resemblance to how Tolkien describes his high elves.

The word unseelie, therefore, means unholy. There are two primary examples of unholy beings that frequent the forests of Averoigne: vampires and lycanthropes. These two can be seen as men who have actively denied God's image and likeness within themselves. Vampires have chosen to seek immortality sans God and lycanthropes (literally wolf-men) have denied their own free-will to make moral choices — they give themselves over to being beasts and beings of pure instinct.

This suggests that the fey, rather than being faeries, elves, dwarves, goblins, etc. are actually bodiless powers (aka angels and demons) who either bless or corrupt normal human beings who then become elves, dwarves, goblins, etc. I imagine that the normal trajectory would look something like this:

  • A child is "touched" and begins to display outward signs of being an elf, dwarf or halfling.
  • This child would then never quite fit into normal human society. Society may even fear the child.
  • The child would then have three options: embrace their gift (and possibly get ostracized), hide their gift in order to fit in (the origin of half-elves?) or reject it.
  • Those that embraced their gift but are ostracized are tempted by unseelie fey to take revenge. Those that give in are twisted (the origin of orcs, etc.)
  • Those that reject their gift will also be tempted by the unseelie fey to do whatever it takes to get rid of their gift. These will also be twisted.
  • Subsequently, those that are twisted have two options: repent or no.
  • Those that refuse to repent become monsters.

The one wrench in this whole set-up is the elf, who is able to cast arcane magic. Given that arcane magic is naturally corruptive (especially when not done in conjunction with divine magic and/or the church), the origin of the elven "gift" is most likely not seelie. Quite possibly, the reason people fear the "touched" is due to the very reason that most, if not all, elves are unseelie from the outset…

4 comments:

Alex Osias said...

FrDave, I had also come to similar conclusions in my notes and writings on Elves and Dwarves. Am working on my rationale on how they're related to the High Elves and High Dwarves, but thank you for your insights as well!

paul said...

"because the salvation of Christ is intrinsically tied to His incarnation as a human."
I think, Fr. Dave, that the salvation of Christ is connected to His becoming part of the created order. Christ saves all of creation and the demi-humans benefit from this as well.
Love your blog.
Paul

FrDave said...

Paul,

I don't disagree; however, Christ specifically chooses to become a human being, not a horse or a rock. The reason for this is that we have the unique role in creation of being endowed with the image and likeness of God. All of creation is saved through humanity through Christ becoming human — Christ restores the fullness of the image and likeness. Therefore, when dealing with a fantasy setting that accepts the existence of Dwarves and Elves and accepts Christianity, one must decide whether or not that image and likeness uniquely sits in humanity. If it is unique, what does that mean for elves and dwarves? If it isn't, elves and dwarves are somehow part of a wider understanding of humanity. How, then, are they related and how did they become distinctly elf or dwarf?

Anthony said...

"If it is unique, what does that mean for elves and dwarves? If it isn't, elves and dwarves are somehow part of a wider understanding of humanity. How, then, are they related and how did they become distinctly elf or dwarf?"

It's a really interesting question, Tolkien provides one possible answer: Elves and Humans (IIRC) were the creations of Eru/Iluvatar, while Dwarves were the "unauthorized" creations of Aule, a Valar or "archangel." That Aule did this out of love for Eru's creation and not rebellion, unlike Morgoth, was one reason the Dwarves were allowed to live -- though their destiny is different from that of Elves and Men.

In a fantasy world with Christianity, perhaps something similar occurred.