- The survivors of Atlantis arrived on the mainland thousands of years ago.
- They were physically superior to the "lesser men" already living on the mainland.
- They were even more technologically superior to the "lesser men", creating objects and performing tasks that even today would appear magical.
- They rightfully conquered a large part of the mainland.
- They subsequently declined physically, mentally, and technologically due to interbreeding with "lesser men".
All these ideas were embraced whole-heartedly by an important part of the Nazi Party, who saw them as proof of the superiority of the "Aryan race". In fact, the SS sponsored an expedition to Tibet under Ernst Schäfer to prove these ideas and flesh them out in detail.
All these ideas are present in The Lord of the Rings. (Well, strictly speaking, it is The Silmarillion that explicitly identified Númenor with Atlantis.)
For years I have found that disturbing. Likewise disturbing is the tendency of fans of Tolkien to accept the "superiority" of the Númenóreans without batting an eye. However, I have recently come to believe that Tolkien was actually making a strong, if perhaps subtle, anti-Nazi point.
To cut to the point, Tolkien actually did insert a "Superman" into Lord of the Rings: Boromir. Tall, strong, brave, of noble blood, accustomed to command, Boromir was willing to take what he wanted. For the greater good of his Volk, Boromir violated his conscience. Even though he repented in the end, Boromir came much closer to the SS ideal than Aragorn ever did. (I suspect that Nietzsche would have faulted Aragorn for his adoption of "slave morality".) Boromir was also the only member of the fellowship who was no longer alive when Sauron was defeated and Aragorn was crowned. Regardless of what Aragorn said to comfort his dying friend, the Aryan superman had failed.
At the other extreme we have the hobbits. It is actually rather firmly established that hobbits were in fact just an inconspicuous race of men, but men so different that both they and other men thought of hobbits as something altogether different. Númenóreans were tall, but hobbits were tiny; Númenóreans were bold, but hobbits, though rarely cowards, despised adventure; Númenóreans had kings and kingly stewards, but hobbits had scarcely any government at all. Some Númenóreans -- certainly Faramir and Boromir -- had psychic or prophetic dreams, something the hobbits are never shown to have had. The stereotypical hobbit was basically the opposite of the stereotypical Númenóreans; and we all know who were the stereotypical opposites of stereotypical Aryan superman. Yet it was the hobbits who turned out to be the greatest heroes.
This, I think was the point. Frodo was a "type" of Jew in the sense of Catholic typology, which is a kind of metaphorical foreshadowing. For example, King David was a "type" of Jesus Christ because he was both a shepherd and a king, among other things; yet David was also his own person and only hinted at Christ, as opposed to C. S. Lewis's Aslan, who was supposed to be precisely Jesus Christ. The date on which Frodo defeated Sauron -- March 25, which is traditionally believed to be the date of the creation, the Annunciation, and the Crucifixion, is also a very important clue.
So in essence, Tolkien was saying, "You want to believe you are taller, more talented, more psychic, and more adventurous? Fine. For the sake of argument, let's go with that. It still remains true that the Most Important Person Who Ever Lived was one of those you wrongly consider your inferiors, even subhuman."
Of course that is not the only theme of The Lord of the Rings, which was never intended to be the same kind of simplistic book as The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, let alone Pilgrim's Progress, but the presence of this theme is enough to justify the inclusion of otherwise distasteful elements. The tendency of fans of Tolkien to accept the "superiority" of the Númenóreans without batting an eye ... that remains disturbing.
