Could the Valar bestow gifts upon others.

[-Grimgorironhide-]

Greetings everyone.

I have a small question that I am fairly curious about and that is down to were the valar able to bestow gifts or blessings to one which they deemed worthy of such and if so what limits did they have of what gifts they could bestow?

I.e Say could Yavanna gift one with the power to heal or could one gift the power to foresee events (aka malbeth the seer).

What are your thoughts on this?

cgeers.

[Iracundus]

The Valar created Numenor and gave it to the ancestors of the Numenoreans. The Numenoreans also had their lifespan extended. However both these acts could be debated as to whether it was truly the Valar's own gifts or whether these were through Iluvatar's direction. At the very least, the extension of the life span would likely be through Iluvatar's direction as the Valar had no direct role in their creation so such a fundamental change had to have come from above.

[ForgottenLore]

Magic per se doesn't really exist in Middle Earth. What some races perceive as magic (elven cloaks, the ring, nifty stuff Gandalf did, Sauron's big cloud cover for his armies) is all just a deeper understanding of how the world works and the application of that knowledge.

So, the Valar could teach someone how to do things that others would find "magical", but that is about it really. In fact i believe they did this early on, before Morgoth really screwed everything up and they decided strict non-interference was the way to go.

This is also basically what Sauron was doing when he instructed the elves in ringlore.

So basically, they probably could, but after the very early first age they wouldn't.

It sounds like your asking if you could use D&D style clerics in a Middle Earth game, and no, I don't think that would fit.