My first encounter with J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings series was a little too late in life. I was a Junior in highschool when I first saw the films. (Sadly I didn’t actually read the books until I was twenty three.) In the middle of the most academically challenging year of my highschool career, I reached for the things many sixteen year-olds find solace in: escapism in fantasy, adventure (stories of battles on horseback and arcane elven magic are far more compelling when you spend most of your time studying for Chemistry tests), and of course, romance. Like many girls my age, I dreamt of finding my own dark, mysterious ranger– bonus points if he resembled Viggo Mortensen. Lovers of the books know that the Peter Jackson films are far from perfect, but one of the things that grieves me most is the exclusion of one of the most beautiful love stories I’ve read. It’s not Aragorn and Arwen’s forbidden love–which reads as little more than a typology of Beren and Luthien–but the tale of Eowyn and Faramir.
Eowyn, a beautiful and hard-nosed Shieldmaiden and niece of the King of Rohan first falls in love with the ranger Aragon. Of course, this love develops from afar. He is valiant and admirable and she becomes infatuated. But the love is one-sided. Aragorn rejects her and she heads to fight in the Battle of Pelennor, fully expecting death. After the battle in which she kills the Witch-King of Angmar, Eowyn suffers a fatal blow and is taken to rehabilitate in the Houses of Healing, albeit restlessly. She desires to fight, at one point even arguing with the Warden that “those who have not swords can still die upon them” (ch 5).
Also in the Houses of Healing is Faramir, the younger son of the Steward of Gondor. Like Eowyn Faramir is also rejected, not by a lover but by his father, the Steward of Gondor, who attempts to burn him alive. Though more noble than his brother Boromir, Faramir is second best in his father’s eyes. After incurring his own fatal wounds, he meets Eowyn in the Halls–and though she still harbors feelings for Aragorn, he begins to love her. At first glance, this is far from a Hollywood romance. As Faramir falls in love with the solemn lady in white, Eowyn gloomily meets his advances with ice.
It’s important to note that Eowyn never truly loved Aragorn. To her he was an idea–not a real man who she could know, and much more importantly, neither was he a man who could truly know her. It was his prowess and success that attracted her. At best, it was a crush; at worst, her feelings stemmed from a desire for glory.
As Eowyn and Faramir convalesce in the Houses of Healing, she sees herself as more prisoner than patient. She tells Faramir bitterly, “…I do not desire healing,’ she said. ‘I wish to ride to war like my brother Eomer, or better like Theoden the king, for he died and has both honour and peace.’” Though she rejects his love, Eowyn and Faramir become friends. They walk together in the garden, speaking, sitting in silence, healing.
Then one day, Faramir speaks his heart. He sees right through her:
“‘You desired to have the love of the Lord Aragorn. Because he was high and puissant, and you wished to have renown and glory and to be lifted far above the mean things that crawl on the earth. And as a great captain may to a young soldier he seemed to you admirable. For so he is, a lord among men, the greatest that now is. But when he gave you only understanding and pity, then you desired to have nothing, unless a brave death in battle. Look at me, Eowyn!’
And Éowyn looked at Faramir long and steadily; and Faramir said: ‘Do not scorn pity that is the gift of a gentle heart, Éowyn! But I do not offer you my pity. For you are a lady high and valiant and have yourself won renown that shall not be forgotten; and you are a lady beautiful, I deem, beyond even the words of the elven-tongue to tell. And I love you. Once I pitied your sorrow. But now, were you sorrowless, without fear or any lack, were you the blissful Queen of Gondor, still I would love you. Éowyn, do you not love me?’
Then the heart of Éowyn changed, or else at last she understood it. And suddenly her winter passed, and the sun shone on her.”
It is only when we feel the paralyzing light of exposure and the sweetness of grace that we can consider ourselves truly known, and it is only when we are understood in this way that we are truly loved.
Thus, the most beautiful love stories are not the sweeping romances driven solely by eros but those where grace and understanding even in the midst of brokenness powerfully break through the shame and regret of the beloved, forming the strong base that is unconditional agape love.
And it is God’s love that operates in just this way.
The true House of Healing, then, is at the side of Jesus, reclining at the table and leaning against his breast; it is putting our fingers in his hands and side and accepting His grace in exchange for our many doubts; it is standing on the banks of the Sea of Galilee with Peter saying, “yes Lord, I love you” after denying him three times.
Through the sacred act of confession the Lord is able to bear our burdens and heal us. He gives beauty for our ashes and anoints our unworthy heads with His holy oil. He draws us to Himself knowing full-well that we are beggars unable to pay for His bread–but then he calls Himself “bread”–the zoe Bread of Life. Eowyn’s winter passes when she realizes that Faramir loves her in a way that Aragorn could not. He has seen her in her sadness and mourning. He has been the recipient of her ice and still longed to bring her into the sun. Miraculously, Faramir’s confession prompts a surprising change of heart in the once-grave Shieldmaiden. She cries, “I will be a shield- maiden no longer, nor vie with the great Riders, nor take joy only in the songs of slaying. I will be a healer, and love all things that grow and are not barren.’”
With love comes healing, and with healing, the desire to heal. The Gospel writer John writes that Christ’s love is the grand catalyst; we love because we were first loved and made lovely (1 John 4:19)
In the end, Eowyn admits that she no longer desires to be Queen. They embrace above the garden wall in the sight of many–an emblem of grace and the restorative power of unconditional love. When we accept the love of Christ, our desires change and we respond by laying our crowns at His feet.
Sixteen year-old me knew infatuation (especially for fictitious rangers), but she did not fully know love because she had not yet allowed Love to know her. Allowing Christ in to see the crooked, cobwebbed parts of my heart has been a process spanning many years, and I expect it will continue for the rest of my life. I have put up barriers of my own and followed after lesser-loves who could not give me what my heart needed. Yet He pursued me, patiently healing my heart, walking with me in my mourning until I could finally accept that He, in fact, was the sun.
Kayley Chartier 