I don't think execution is an act of compassion for the executed, although you can say that some manners of execution such as lethal injection are more compassionate than others such as being drawn and quartered.

I think that capital punishment is an issue of justice. There is a big difference between me as an individual deciding to extend grace and forgiveness to someone who has hurt me, and an authority/government doing the same. If Aragorn forgives everyone their crimes, he wouldn't have a kingdom, he'd have an anarchic mess.

I'm not trying to convince anyone here to swing to my views -- this is not the forum for that. But I want to make sure that the views I've already stated are not misunderstood. Compassion means to feel for someone, similar to sympathy or empathy. I feel compassion for Gollum to the extent that I know what it is like to feel curious, to be an outcast, and to be overwhelmed by a temptation. I feel no compassion for Gollum when it comes to murdering, because I don't know what that feels like at all.

In regards to murder, my compassion is reserved solely for the victim, and those who grieve for that person. I think it would be a terrible distortion of Tolkein's values both as they are expressed in his writings and as he learned them through Christianity, if we someone come to imagine that a victimizer is somehow more sympathetic and deserving of grace than a victim is deserving of justice.

: The second thing is that according to Myers-Briggs, I'm an INTJ or INTP (one answer swung the score the two times I took it). I can no longer remember what all the letters mean, however, the humerous 'prayer' for my personality type is, "LORD, help me to consider others' ideas, WRONG THOUGH THEY BE!" I hope that doesn't come out too strong in how I express my beliefs here.

The humorous prayer for the INFJ was, "Lord help me to finish what I start today and to ... " :-)

I'm an iNtuiting Feeling Idealist (subtype Counselor), and you are an iNtuiting Thinking Rationalist (subtype Mastermind) assuming you correctly remember your score, and that they were correct (16% failure rate). We are both also introverted (the I) and decisive (the J). The vast majority of people on the web, as well as those who enjoy reading and writing, tend to be Introverted iNtuitives of some sort.

I thought a lot about how to respond to this, and other than a direct reply, I'm going to save the rest for a new thread, since this diverges to far from the "How does Tolkein applicable to your life." Please look for "Temperament and Tolkein."

Blessings,

Galadriel