Who do you think Tom Bombadil really was

[HerenIstarion]

Wight
Posts: 212
Re: Tom Bombadil

I'm going to have a long talk with Bombadil: such a talk as I have not had in all my time. He is a moss-gatherer, and I have been a stone doomed to rolling. But my rolling days are ending, and now we shall have much to say to one another.

Gandalf talking to hobbits, The Return of the King, ch7

From which it can be assumed that Bombadil was truly a maia, likewise Gandalf, as Gandalf would not compare himself to a creature of different order, would he?

it does disprove the maian theory. Unless he's some mutant super-maia, which I doubt.

why?

The ring, being a ring of power, had ability to seduce personalities wishing to obtain the power. Gandalf was afraid to take the ring, cause he wished power to cure the hurts of Arda and pain of its inhabitants, and Bobmbadil needed power not (setting the borders of his realm himself and within those being an absolute master. Ring would not add anything to that, so the ring was not able to seduce him (i.g. Melian's power inside the borders of Doriath).

...but what they are really like, and what lies beyond them, only those can say who have climbed them.