I am re-reading The Silmarillion by Tolkien. The family received a Lord of the Rings trivia game for Christmas, and some of the children played it on Christmas Day. However, they were disappointed because all of the questions came from the movies, not from the books. So they decided to make up their own questions and create their own game. I was assigned the creation of questions from The Silmarillion because I had read it—-a long time ago. I was looking for trivia questions and became absorbed in the story, and so . . .
I should enjoy watching the movies even more (on New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day) after having read the “pre-history” of Middle Earth. Tolkien was an amazingly creative man. In the introduction to The Silmarillion, Christopher Tolkien, JRR Tolkien’s son, says that his father worked on the stories that make up The Silmarillion for most of JRR Tolkien’s life, from the time he was about 25 years old up through the last years of his life. These legends and myths “became the vehicle and depository of his profoundest reflections.”
The stories themselves repeat in cycles: something beautiful and powerful is created, then marred or destroyed by evil, then re-created in a lesser form, then distorted or broken again. The world itself follows this cycle, as do the “Children of Illuvatar,” elves and men. The elves become less and less good and beautiful and powerful as time passes, and yet they retain something of their original perfection and strength. Men, at first, are wise and strong, but later become more and more corrupt and weakened. It seems that Tolkien believed that the world was not evolving into a better and better place and that humans were not becoming wiser and stronger, but rather that everything was winding down and becoming more and more evil and corrupt and would eventually fall into ruin and have to be re-made in God’s time. But Tolkien also believed (as I do) that all things were and are and ever shall be contained within the wisdom and power of God Himself. In his creation story, Tolkien has Illuvatar(God) say to Melkor (Satan):

“And thou, Melkor shall see that no theme can be played that hath not its uttermost source in me, nor can any alter the music in my despite. For he that attempteth this shall prove but mine instrument in the devising of things more wonderful, which he himself hath not imagined. . . . And thou, Melkor, wilt discover all the secret thoughts of thy mind, and wilt perceive that they are but a part of the whole and tributary to its glory.”

Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father. Philippians 2:9-11