Quote:
Originally Posted by Lalwendë
But would being an Ainu mean that? There's a quote somewhere (a comment made by Gandalf or Elrond) that Tom too would suffer should Sauron succeed in his aims, which suggests he is not part of the hierarchy we know about. He's not logical and doesn't 'fit' neatly. The question is - would he too suffer because he is not an Ainu or in spite of him being an Ainu?
|
Hm, you're right. Indeed Gandalf (who to me is the voice of Tolkien in the books) does note that Tom lacked the power to defeat Sauron. That would point away from the Ainu idea, I think.
Also, having finally acquired
HOME #1, I recall that in the early drafts of
LOTR, Farmer Maggott was to have been related to Bombadil in some way.
That would have take away from Tom's singularity in the ME cosmology.
If Tom was not Eru, then it follows he must have been some other sort of created being. Would Eru have made a
unique creature like Tom for some opaque purpose? What would that purpose have been? Bombadil was known to some of the Elves, Dwarves, and Men, who had all given him names at some point, but his actual contributions to ME history appear to be negligible. And hobbits, who lived next door to him, were entirely (as far as we are told) unaware of his existence.
Or, was Tom (with Goldberry too, perhaps) part of some other
race that was largely unknown to Middle Earth's primary historians, the Eldar? It's possible, at least. After all, hobbits themselves flew under the radar of the majority of ME's denizens for countless years. And to add fuel to the fire, could Beorn have been some sort of "half-Bombadil"?
*I do of course know the RL reason for Tom's appearance in the books; Tolkien made that quite clear in letter and other writings. But I do love wild speculation whenever I can find a cause for it.
