Frodo at Sammath Naur

[Lyta_Underhill]

No, Frodo is saying 'I came here to destroy the Ring, but now I've changed my mind, & I'm going to keep it'. As did Isildur. Both knew, on some level, that it was wrong, but it was too hard to resist.

I agree with you, davem, on the point that neither Frodo nor Isildur 'disappears' when he claims the Ring. I am merely saying that they could do no other, since the pressure to claim the Ring was too great for them to bear at this point. They succumb, but they do not go somewhere else, while the 'Ring claims itself.' I couldn't really say where the semantics break down.

'Sin is the preference of an immediately satisfying experience to the declared pattern of the Universe'.

This seems to imply that the 'declared pattern' of the Universe is ultimately followable by incarnate beings, but I think Tolkien's point is that incarnate beings cannot hope to succeed on this path without intervention (grace) from a higher power--that they are too weak to bear some burdens without help. Perhaps the fact that the Ring was lost to the attackers of Isildur and his Dunedain was also a sort of 'grace,' so that Isildur did not wholly fail in his task to keep the Ring away from Sauron's minions (but he succeeded, albeit temporarily, in a way he could never have imagined nor desired.)

More later...I take my leave. [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img]
Cheers,
Lyta

<font size=1 color=339966>[ 11:33 AM February 02, 2004: Message edited by: Lyta_Underhill ]