(July 9, 2023 at 2:37 pm)brewer Wrote: I'll take the Silmarillion over the Bible any day, and twice on Sunday.
“Nine ships there were: four for Elendil, and for Isildur three, and for Anárion two; and they fled before the black gale out of the twilight of doom into the darkness of the world. And the deeps rose beneath them in towering anger, and the waves like unto the mountains moving with great caps of writhen snow bore them up amid the wreckage of the clouds, and after many days cast them away upon the shores of Middle Earth.
“And Erú spake, saying: ‘Behold! These lands are forever yours from the white shores of the sea isles and coastal regions to the green forests, fair plains and valleys, and great mountain ranges.’
“And, thus, did Elendil stand upon the sandy beach of the new land and proclaim: ‘Out of the Great Sea to Middle Earth I have come. Here I shall dwell, and my heirs, unto the ending of the world.’” (The Silmarillion: Akallabêth: 75-77)
Certainly better reading than the Bible.
"The world is my country; all of humanity are my brethren; and to do good deeds is my religion." (Thomas Paine)