[baud147258]

> Tolkien was never able to definitively pin down the origin and nature of his orcs to his own satisfaction

I think I heard it was because of the Christian roots of his LotR writings: are orcs fully evil and impossible to redeem (which would go against Christian belief on salvation and some of the themes of the LotR) or could they be redeemed, which would be against how they are portrayed in the books.