[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by davem

Isn't that a theme that runs through the whole story - that evil si ultimately self defeating, & brings its destruction on itself. Good doesn't win out because its more powerful but because evil contains the seeds of its own destruction. Shelob defeats herself through her pride & fury. Sauron plants the seeds of his ultimate destruction by his creation of the Ring, etc....

Yes, and Melkor is ultimately defeated because he has fallen so far into his evil ways that by the end of it he cannot even leave his throne room. Thinking this way, you might soon start to wonder why anybody ever bothered challenging evil, if it was doomed to self destruct in any case. But it always needs a helping hand in order to be destroyed or defeated. Shelob does land on the point of the sword, but if Sam had not dared to place the sword there then she would have eaten him.

Frodo gazed in wonder at this marvellous gift that he had so long carried, not guessing its full worth and potency. Seldom had he remembered it on the road, until they came to Morgul Vale, and never had he used it for fear of its revealing light. Aiya Earendil Elenion Ancalima! he cried, and knew not what he had spoken; for it seemed that another voice spoke through his, clear, untroubled by the foul air of the pit.

But other potencies there are in Middle-earth, powers of night, and they are old and strong. And She that walked in the darkness had heard the Elves cry that cry far back in the deeps of time, and she had not heeded it, and it did not daunt her now.

I was interested how when Frodo speaks Shelob is not daunted. But when Sam speaks it seems to have more effect. What's the difference? Frodo appears to examine the Phial, even to use it with knowledge, as a weapon. But when Sam uses it, does he use it more innocently? It seems that the effect on Sam is to strengthen his own will, to make him more courageous; perhaps this hints at the fact that the Hobbits were not entirely under the control of another force. That would link to what I say above, that even though evil does sow the seeds of its own destruction, it still needs the courage of those who oppose it to destroy it.

As to how the Phial works, I have to admit I'm thinking along the lines of Sanwe again. The Phial is a device of Light primarily, but it is when holding it and thinking of Galadriel that the Hobbits utter their invocations. Galadriel has filled the Phial with water from her fountain, which holds the light of Earendil, and she is the bearer of the Ring of Water. If, as I have pondered on before, the Three (and the other rings too) are invested with powers of sanwe, then the Phial could also hold this power along with its powers of Light. I think that both Frodo and Sam open their minds out to the Elves/Galadriel and that she or they answer through them. Note also that the One has a reverse effect when worn, seeming to convey fear instead, the sense that the mind is open and naked.

Is it good that Good forces have such an influence on mortals? Frodo and Sam have accepted the challenge of taking this burden to Mount Doom, and yet it is also semeingly fated that they should have to do this. I like to think of them as akin to Aragorn, who also is fated to take on a burden, and who like the Hobbits accepts his burden come what may. In fact, are many of the characters we meet in LotR truly free? Many of them seem to be fated to take their part in particular circumstances. Their freedom comes in with how they deal with the situations they are thrust into. Going back again to what I said about the destruction of evil, it cannot be defeated if it is just left alone, nor can any of the characters we meet play their parts if they refuse to take part in the first place.

I think that this is part of the nature of 'stories'. What would be the point of reading about an Eowyn who made the choice of stopping home in Edoras? Or a Sam who did not snoop at open windows?

Originally Posted by Kuruharan

Also notice the, well, almost providential manner in which this whole business falls out. Frodo and Sam were trapped between two large parties of orcs in unfamiliar territory with little potential for cover. They had One Ring to split between them. Chances are, had Frodo escaped Shelob unscathed, one or the other of them would have been spotted (whichever didn’t have the Ring obviously) and the Quest would have been in deep doo-doo. Instead, Frodo is poisoned and taken prisoner and Sam escapes through use of the Ring. However, Frodo is taken in the direction he was intending to go, into Mordor. Through the loot the orcs find on his body, the garrison of Cirith Ungol is destroyed, which would have been a terribly difficult obstacle for Frodo and Sam to get past had things gone otherwise.

As Kuruharan says, what happens to Frodo is ultimately a great stroke of luck. It couldn't really be otherwise or the story would turn out differently. I think where I've got to in all that I've said here is that yes, the characters are subject to fate, and yes, they must also willingly choose to follow that fate rather than stay at home with their feet up, but at the root of everything, they are indeed pawns, but they are Tolkien's pawns. I shan't say any more because that's a big hole I've climbed into.