Why take a body? Why make a Ring?

[littlemanpoet]

Okay, this has been hashed through before, but I want to address it anyway.

I can see why a Man might want to have the sword that he has made be given magical (Elvish?) power.

But why would a Maia want a body? Why would a spiritual being want to confine his power to a Ring, or any other material object?

I want to stay away from any such nonsense as "Tolkien got it wrong", so let's assume he knew what he was doing and he had a reason (at least one!) for Sauron to want to have a Ring to confine his power, and that Maiar wanted to have bodies. Why? What's so great about bodies?

Are there answers within the pages of LotR? The Hobbit? The Sil? HoME? the Letters?

[Folwren]

Don't get mad at me for this, and don't quote me, either, but...

I've heard (don't necessarly believe it myself) that demons and other spirits and the like who sometimes posses people enter into a physical body so that they can interact and touch (physically and through the mind with words and feelings and such) other people and/or things. So that, more easily, they can influence what happens. Whereas, when they are mere spirits floating around, they have no anchor, no real, tangible power.

That being said, perhaps Sauron took a form so that he did have some power with the other beings of Middle-Earth? Maybe when he was a spirit, he could not interact with the inhabitants of the world half so well as he could when he had a body.

As to binding his powers into the Ring....I don't know. I believe there have been discussions here about Wizards' staffs. That they didn't need them, perse, to perform their 'magic', but it gave them something to channel their powers through. Perhaps it works the same with Sauron. Perhaps having something through which to channel his power made it easier to use said power. You know he wasn't powerless without that Ring. But we also know, that with it, his power was redoubled (or more than doubled....).

Maybe?

-- Folwren

[Raynor]

But why would a Maia want a body? Why would a spiritual being want to confine his power to a Ring, or any other material object?

Cf Silmarillion, Sauron "walked behind [Melkor] on the same ruinous path down into the Void"; Sauron must have followed Melkor's modus operandi:

Originally Posted by Notes on motives in the Silmarillion, Myths Transformed, HoME X

Melkor 'incarnated' himself (as Morgoth) permanently. He did this so as to control the hroa, the 'flesh' or physical matter of Arda. He attempted to identify himself with it. A vaster and more perilous, procedure, though of similar sort to the operations of Sauron with the Rings... But in this way Morgoth lost (or exchanged, or transmuted) the greater part of his original 'angelic' powers, of mind and spirit, while gaining a terrible grip upon the physical world.

I've heard (don't necessarly believe it myself) that demons and other spirits and the like who sometimes posses people enter into a physical body so that they can interact and touch (physically and through the mind with words and feelings and such) other people and/or things. So that, more easily, they can influence what happens.

Sauron was called the Necromancer, and he learned his skill from Melkor himself; we also have the evil elvish souls, who, after death, could attempt to inhabit other bodies, but not through the lawful ways, set by Manwe, as told in Laws and customs of the Eldar, HoME X.

Perhaps having something through which to channel his power made it easier to use said power.

From the begining, the purpose of the one ring was to 'govern' the elven rings, cf Of the rings of power, Silmarillion. Tolkien doesn't give a measure of how much his power increased through the one ring, only that it was "enhanced"; however, we are told, through Gandalf, in the Last Debate, that should Sauron recover it, his victory would be so complete "that none can foresee the end of it while this world lasts", something I doubt would have happened without the ring.

[dancing spawn of ungoliant]

An interesting topic you have there.

In Sil it says that the valar could choose whether to be without a form or pick an appearance of a male or female - or an appearance that came from their own thoughts. It also says that when the valar were without a form, even the Elves couldn't see them clearly, and that makes me assume that other races didn't possibly perceive even that much.

Now, I could imagine that when interacting with the people in Middle-earth, having a body was only practical. I don't know if it was easy to sense the presence of a vala or maia if it didn't have a visible form, and apparently it wasn't quite clear who they really were even when they had a body - take Gandalf, for example, or Sauron in his pretty form. But surely it's easier to suck up to important characters or boss people around if they can see you.

When Melkor saw that the valar were happy and blessed in their visible bodies and they enjoyed what Middle-earth had to offer, he became jealous and took a form, too. And if Melkor had a body, it seems natural that Sauron mimicked him and took one as well.

Why would a spiritual being want to confine his power to a Ring, or any other material object?

Maybe putting his powers into the Ring wasn't so much a purpose than an inevitable consequence. Again, using the Sil as a source, it says that Sauron didn't like the Elves (well, duh) and he was afraid of the Númenoreans who occasionally dropped by in Middle-Earth. He wanted to have power over all the other rings and therefore the amount of power that he put in the One Ring had to be superior to the other rings, too. Could there have been some other way to rule the other rings, then? That I don't know.


edit: cross-posted with Raynor.

[Raynor]

Concerning the shapes the valar assumed, it is stated in the Letters:

Originally Posted by Letter #212

It was because of their love of Ea, and because of the pan they had played in its making, that they wished to, and could, incarnate themselves in visible physical forms, though these were comparable to our clothes (in so far as our clothes are a personal expression) not to our bodies. Their forms were thus expressions of their persons, powers, and loves. They need not be anthropomorphic (Yavanna wife of Aule would, for instance, appear in the form of a great Tree.) But the 'habitual' shapes of the Valar, when visible or clothed, were anthropomorphic, because of their intense concern with Elves and Men.

In Sil it says that the valar could choose whether to be without a form or pick an appearance of a male or female

Apparently, they didn't have a choice over the gender of their body:

Originally Posted by Ainulindale, Silmarillion

But when they desire to clothe themselves the Valar take upon them forms some as of male and some as of female; for that difference of temper they had even from their beginning, and it is but bodied forth in the choice of each, not made by the choice, even as with us male and female may be shown by the raiment but is not made thereby.

[mormegil]

Regarding the body I agree that it was to have influence and control in the physical world.

Regarding the ring, we can easily see and know that by pouring his power into an artifact his power increased more than the original value. But why a ring? A couple ideas I had is the concept of a ring in the representation of something intimate like a marriage. Sauron had pledged himself to this cause and essentially created a marriage convenant...it's a bit of a stretch but understandable too. Also, rings are not easy to loose if they fit you and you don't take them off. Generally they are easy to guard and you always know it is on. Also it's, especially Sauron's ring, is a fairly innocuous object and doesn't immediately draw attention unto itself.

[Boromir88]

Just to point out one thing that I think is worth mentioning about Sauron taking on a 'physical body.' It appears to be a necessary thing if you want to interact or effect the physical world, you must have a body of your own. Let's take the Witch-King when he is killed for example, as Tolkien tells us in Letter 246:

'Witch King had been reduced to impotence'

If the Ring is destroyed Tolkien writes to Milton Waldman:

...if the One Ring wwas actually unmade, annihilated, then its power would be dissolved, Sauron's own being would be diminished to a vanishing point, and he would be reduced to a shadow, a mere memory of malicious will.

For another example Gimli doubts the Dead Army's weapons would have any 'bite' to them. Which I would agree with Gimli, because the Dead Army are spirits who's body has left them...with their weapon being fear, though they could not physically interact (as in stab, punch, round-house kick - whatever) since they had no bodies.

So, for Sauron to have some sort of interaction with the people on Middle-earth a physical body would be necessary. As Raynor and Spawn explain, not only for 'fighting' purposes, but also to appear fair and noble to get people to do what he wants.

As stupid as the concept of Sauron putting so much of himself into the Ring to the point where if it was destroyed he would forever remain a shadow...unable to reform again. It really wasn't something that was all that stupid:

1) The Ring could only be destroyed in the place it was made, Mount Doom, and more specifically it appeared to have to be destroyed in the Sammath Naur.

2) However you want to see the destruction of the Ring (as Eru getting involved and causing Gollum's fall, Gollum accidentally slipping...etc whatever it is). We have to realize the Ring's destruction was an act or extraordinary strength and will that Tolkien thinks only Frodo could have done during this time (that is getting the Ring to Mount Doom:

'Frodo deserved all honour because he spend every last drop of his power of will and body, and that was just sufficient to bring him to the destined point, and no further. Few others, possibly no others of his time, would have got so far. The Other Power then took over: the Writer of the Story (by which I do not mean myself), 'that one ever-present Person who is never absent and never named' (as one critic has said).~Letter 192

Not only did Sauron believe that destroying the Ring by someone's free will was impossible, Tolkien thought so as well:

I do not think that Frodo’s was a moral failure. At the last moment the pressure of the Ring would reach its maximum - impossible, I should have said, for any one to resist...~Letter 246

So, while putting pretty much all your power into one Ring, so much that if it was destroyed (or someone else mastered it) you also were essentially destroyed (though not completely) seems rather foolish. It really wasn't. Sauron was able to enhance his own power, desired to control all the Ring's of Power (to a certain extent I'd say he was successful), and the very fact that this little Ring had to be destroyed in one specific place...which to do so was beyond anyone's free will, we see it wasn't all that stupid at all.

Edit: X-posted with morm

[The Saucepan Man]

Agree with all that is said about taking on a physical body to interact with the physical world. In most cases, the Ainur retained tha ability to abandon their earthly body and revert to their natural form. My understanding however is that, the more an Ainu indulged in taking on a physical form, the greater the likelihood that it would become permanent. This, I assume, is what happened to Sauron.

As for the One Ring, while its main purpose was to gain control (via the other Rings of Power) over the Free Peoples of Middle-earth (and particularly the Elves), it also, as Boro has indicated, made Sauron practically invulnerable. Having taken on a physical body, that body could not permanently be destroyed while the One Ring remained in existence (or, if it was, he was able subsequently to rehouse his spirit in another). And given that virtually no one could willingly destroy the One Ring or master it to the exclusion of Sauron, it made him more or less invincible.

But for two brave Hobbits and a wizened proto-Hobbit with dual-personality disorder ...

[Tarpaladin]

Originally Posted by Boromir88

So, while putting pretty much all your power into one Ring, so much that if it was destroyed (or someone else mastered it) you also were essentially destroyed (though not completely) seems rather foolish. It really wasn't. Sauron was able to enhance his own power, desired to control all the Ring's of Power (to a certain extent I'd say he was successful), and the very fact that this little Ring had to be destroyed in one specific place...which to do so was beyond anyone's free will, we see it wasn't all that stupid at all.

A similar sort of thing occurs in the Harry Potter series with Lord Voldemort. By splitting his soul into seven pieces he makes his mortal self impossible to kill, but if the Horcruxes containing the six split pieces are destroyed and then his physical body is killed, he gets not even a normal death but is reduced to something less than a ghost, a mere seventh of a shadow of a soul. Pretty much fits the description in Tolkein's letters about what happens to Sauron when the One Ring gets toasted.