Book Review: “The Messiah Comes to Middle Earth” by Philip Ryken

The Messiah Comes to Middle Earth by Philip Ryken is a collection of lectures given by Ryken that explore the notions of prophet, priest, and king in The Lord of the Rings trilogy.

In the first lecture, Ryken explains the notion of the threefold office of Christ found in Lord of the Rings as an amalgam of different characters therein. Then, he goes over the notion of the threefold office in the early church and Scripture. Gandalf the Grey is seen as the prophet. This doesn’t necessarily mean what we often think–foretelling the future–but rather the sharing of wisdom. Gandalf “sees the present in true perspective” (15). After going over ways Gandalf may be seen as prophet, he looks at some applications that can be made. A response is offered by Sandra Richter.

The office of priest is found, Ryken outlines, in the priesthood of all believers reflected in Sam, Frodo, and others. He ties this doctrine into the Reformation and draws out the notions of priesthood as bearing burden and sacrifice unto death. A response is offered by Jennifer Powell McNutt.

Regarding the office of king, Aragorn is the plain choice, though Ryken has already alluded to how some of these roles intertwine in other characters in the previous lectures. Prophecy is one aspect of a king fulfilled, and Ryken relates that in LOTR to that in the Bible. William Struthers offers a response here.

The Messiah Comes to Middle Earth is a practice of literary apologetic and intertwining myth with our reality. It’s brief, to the point, and applicable.

Disclaimer: I was provided with a copy of the book for review by the publisher. I was not required to give any specific kind of feedback whatsoever.

Links

Be sure to check out the page for this site on Facebook and Twitter for discussion of posts, links to other pages of interest, random talk about theology/philosophy/apologetics/movies and more!

Book Reviews– There are plenty more book reviews to read! Read like crazy! (Scroll down for more, and click at bottom for even more!)

SDG.

——

The preceding post is the property of J.W. Wartick (apart from quotations, which are the property of their respective owners, and works of art as credited; images are often freely available to the public and J.W. Wartick makes no claims of owning rights to the images unless he makes that explicit) and should not be reproduced in part or in whole without the expressed consent of the author. All content on this site is the property of J.W. Wartick and is made available for individual and personal usage. If you cite from these documents, whether for personal or professional purposes, please give appropriate citation with both the name of the author (J.W. Wartick) and a link to the original URL. If you’d like to repost a post, you may do so, provided you show less than half of the original post on your own site and link to the original post for the rest. You must also appropriately cite the post as noted above. This blog is protected by Creative Commons licensing. By viewing any part of this site, you are agreeing to this usage policy.