[davem]

And yet the question remains, if creatures can be held accountable for their freely willed choices & actions, can their creator? Does Eru bear any responsibility for His choices - from His creation of a 'flawed' Arda, down to His choice of Frodo to bear the Ring?

He seems to allow freedom of action to His Children up to a point - the point that His plan seems to be put at risk - then He simply takes it away :Frodo claims the Ring, the Nazgul will then, as Tolkien shows in Letters, sieze it & surrender it to Sauron, so, at that point, Eru steps in & puts everything right (or rather, puts His plan back on course). So, we are free to do what we want - except change the Music. But then, how much freedom do we actually have? Eru will step in to manipulate events & even individuals. It almost seems that to Eru, the 'plan', the Music is more important than the freedom of His children.

But maybe this is to avoid complete anarchy? But then why give His Children freedom at all if He has already decided what will be permitted & what will not? Will the Children ever be allowed to grow beyond childhood, or will their Father always be running things - a 'benevolent dictator', in Plato's words?

Lyta, I think Tolkien did think of God as being seperate from His creation, & intervening (directly) only at specific times, but retaining overall control of the direction of the Universe. But we come then to what Tolkien understood God's nature to be. If we take one of his fellow TCBSite GB Smith's elegies for Rob Gilson we find: 'Tolkien & the Great War'

' One piece declares a stark view of Divine providence: Gilson's death is "a sacrifice of blood outpoured" to a God whose purposesare utterly inscrutable & who "only canst be glorified/ By man's own passion & the Supreme pain"'

Does Tolkien share this view of God? And are we seeing this 'gloryfication' of Eru in Frodo's 'passion & Supreme pain'? But isn't this too close to saying Eru is some kind of ego maniac, some kind of mad dictator, glorying in the suffering of His slaves? Or some kind of Ozymandias, declaring 'look on my works, ye mighty & despair'? And if that is the case, who could blame the athiests for laughing at his broken statue?

Do we find Eru to 'loving' & self sacrificing? Do we even find the Valar to be so. Certainly not in what we would consider to be a Chistian sense. But perhaps we are dealing here with a vision of the Divine which has come out of loss - of parents, friends & the 'blue remembered hills' of a lost, irretrievable childhood. Why has God allowed so much loss - was Smith right? Does our suffering 'glorify' God? Or does God not really care for us - which is the worse option? And, as long as Eru puts everything right in the end, isn't that enough (well, perhaps - as long as we don't question too deeply, & hold to our faith & trust - estel).

Of course, we could step back & see the story of Frodo as the story of 'Everyman'. We all have to take up our Ring (or our Cross) & walk our own via Dolorosa, be broken before we can be re-made. And maybe it is for our own good, & has to be that way, & we have to be free to fall. But we come back to the point - does Eru bear any responsibility for the suffering of His Children? By creating sentient Children, capable of suffering, & putting them into a world where they will suffer, does Eru in any sense have to at least account for Himself to His children?

Perhaps that is the reason for Eru's incarnation which the Athrabeth speaks about. Not as in Christianity, to save mankind from the consequence of its sin, but simply to suffer alongside His Children. Perhaps that in itself is Eru's calling Himself to account. Perhaps in that act He is suffering alongside Frodo, not saving him.