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What Tolkien knew about your dumb, boring life: the study guide
The water was always the miracle; this guide walks the argument of the video slowly, gives you the passages in full, and hands you the practice for the day you cannot feel any of it.
By Tim Barber·
Photo by Marija Zaric on Unsplash
A study companion to the video
What J.R.R. Tolkien Knew About Your Dumb, Boring Life.
Watch it first if you can, then read with your Bible open.
Start here
I watched all of The Lord of the Rings in one sitting. Twelve hours. Then I walked into my kitchen, and the kitchen looked like a stack of Tuesdays. If you have ever felt that drop, the fall from a story that mattered into a life that seems not to, this guide is for you.
This is the written companion to the video. It is built to be read with a Bible open and a pen nearby. It moves in the same three movements the video does, but it goes further into the research, the passages, and the practice than a video can. Read "The teaching" straight through first. Then come back for the passages and the questions, one sitting at a time.
The question that threads the whole thing is Sam Gamgee's, from the stairs of Cirith Ungol in The Two Towers: "I wonder what sort of a tale we've fallen into?" I am going to answer it three times.
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Now to the passages themselves. Read each one slowly, in full, with your Bible open beside you.
Unlock the full guide
Get the whole study guide
Seven more sections: the teaching, key terms, the glossary, every passage in full, questions to sit with, where to go deeper, and a PDF you can print.
The next step is a conversation. Bring what you wrote to the community, or go back to the video.
