Quote Originally Posted by Grim Portent View Post
That would be me.
irst off is that during the singing the Ainur are basically unaware of what they're doing. Illuvatar has them create a world without actually informing them that they are creating a world, so all the discord Melkor has added was done without any informed ill intent.
Melkor may not have known he was creating a world, but he knew what Eru was trying to do and he knew that he was going against it. He knew that he was creating discord, but he did it anyway. I think it's fair to describe that as "ill intent".

To steer this away from real-world religion, may be a better analogy is real-world crime. As I understand it, very few people start off as cold-blooded serial killers. They start with torturing animals and other things, only over time stepping up to bigger and bigger crimes, if they are not checked by conscience, friends, or the legal system. Melkor's following the same trajectory. He started out good but he continued to follow his base instincts and desires over his better nature, becoming worse and worse, training himself into evil, and bringing others down with him.

Respectfully,

Brian P.