Some Christians are leery of fantasy, even of Tolkien's, which contains wizards, wraiths, and the demonic Sauron, who is, in fact, the Lord of the Ring.  Might reading this sort of thing lead to meddling in the occult?  In the debate over Harry Potter, defenders but also some critics of J.K. Rowling's wildly popular children's novels about a school for witches are saying that The Sorcerer's Stone is no different from The Lord of the Rings.

But there is a difference.  As Richard Abanes, author of Harry Potter and the Bible, points out, Tolkien's Gandalf is not a wizard at all, in the Harry Potter sense; rather, in the Middle Earth universe, he is a being roughly equivalent to an angel.  In the Silmarilion, in which Tolkien gives the background and the details of his imaginary realm, he begins with a  Genesis-like creation story, along with a fall.  He writes of one God who makes all of Middle Earth and fills it with beings with natural - not occult - power of their own.

As pastor Joel Brondos points out, the themes of the two fantasies are practically opposites.  Harry Potter is about an outcast boy who seeks and acquires power.  The Lord of the Rings, on the other hand, is about the rejection of power.  The whole point of the story, on which the whole plot depends, is that the power of the Ring, because it has been forged by the Dark Lord, must not be used.  Though the temptation to use its occult power is great, to do so corrupts the user, even if it were used for a good end.

                                                                            Gene Edward Veith, World Magazine, December 8, 2001