Thanks, Lyta! Yes, "Frodo's Sacrifice" was one of the all-time great threads. (C7A rules!) It was that thread that *finally * reconciled me with his decision to sail west... which grieved me ever since my first reading at age 12, thirty years ago.
I hope he was happy and healed there. I can't imagine that he wasn't. "A purgatory and a reward", Tolkien called it; very Catholic. Although, considering his "Leaf By Niggle", Tolkien's view of purgatory was not the norm. I have to believe he meant Purgatory" in the sense of purification, and not of suffering-- Frodo had suffered enough!!! (I'm tempted to follow that with an entire paragraph of exclaimation points...)
His generosity and self-sacrifice for the good of the Shire and Middle Earth answers many questions about "morality". I heartily agree that the definition of morality must extend beyond the individual good, beyond the humanistic view.
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...down to the water to see the elves dance and sing upon the midsummer's eve.
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