A Knight in Life

To:
My beloved buddy,
Kitara.



"My Lord, your people will follow you to whatever end."


This one sentence always makes me shiver every time I watch The Lord Of The Rings Trilogy. I love this movie so much, because of its grandness, the painstaking attention they give to optimize every details, and the enormous passion of the crews...it radiates in the whole film.

The line above was said by one of King Theoden's captain. The situation was, King Theoden who had been hypnotized under evil spell for decades was finally awoken by the help of Gandalf the sorcerer. When he awoke, his kingdom was threatened by a huge attack from the evil side, Sauron. He was pushed to choose between fighting back or flee, and he chose the second. He ordered his people to evacuate to Helm's Deep, the kingdom's fortress.

Apparently that was a wrong choice, because Sauron's army chased them, and they were more than ready to attack with an army 10.000 soldiers strong. Helm's Deep was a dead end, so there were no other way to run from there. Because Theoden dismissed his army when he was under spell, his people were mostly pheasants - their force was nowhere near the enemy's. Plus, they had so many women and children. They were all in grave danger because the King failed to make the right decision.

So, the situation finally lead to the night before war. King Theoden stood with his most faithful captain, preparing to fight a (seemingly) losing battle.

And the captain said, "My Lord, your people will follow you to whatever end."

I feel this ironically sad and heroic. Because he knew this could be a battle that sweeps their kingdom to dust, that there were almost no chance of victory, but there he was, standing bravely despite his own fears to proclaim his loyalty to the King no matter what consequences he would suffer.

He surely did not do that for the victory, because if he sought victory, he should fight for the enemy who had every chances to win. He did not do that for the glory either, because if they lose, all Theoden's people will be killed and no one would live to tell others about his brave actions.

I guess he did that because of his unquestionable loyalty to his choices.

As a knight, he must swore a knight's oath, that he would dedicate his life to serve a master - and he chose to serve King Theoden. Of course when he first proclaimed loyalty to the King, he did not know King Theoden would be spelled and the kingdom would degrade to such low-down, nor that he knew they would end up fighting such unfair battle.

But he stayed put. He stood by the King's side when everything went bad. He fought for his King, even when the King lost his mind and started giving irrational orders. He might be disagree a lot with the King's decisions, but he did not leave. Because he had committed himself to serve the King, and that's what he did, no matter what.

He had been loyal to his choices, the whole of it, both the bright sunny sides and the dark scary sides. And that's why I remembered his character, even though he was just doing a tiny part in that colossal movie.

And it got me thinking: can I do that? Can I be loyal to my choices, to every consequences that result from taking it?

Can I commit myself to God, or my country, or a vision of a better world, or a man,

And say, "I will follow you to whatever end?"

Can I be loyal to the nightmare of my choices?



Sincerely,
Galia