[Thalion]

Tolkien has said in Letters that Bombadil represents "something that was otherwise left out..." of the Lord of the Rings. I am inclined to read that statement along with all descriptions and comments about Tom in the following light:

Tolkien was attempting to write a "mythology" in all of his works. Not just a mythology for England, but a mythology and a set of stories that would look older and more complete than any other that had previously existed. He was doing this in an attempt to give a background for many myths and legends that we have currently or have had throughout time that share many elements (such as the Volsung Saga sharing similar elements with Beowulf, Nibelungenlied, the Poetic Elder and Edda, Atlantis, ect, ect, ect...)...as can be seen from his ideas concerning the fact that he was the translator and that all of these tales had to have come from specific sources (Bilbo's Red Book of Westmarch, Aelfwine/Eriol traveling to Erressea, ect), Tolkien was very concerned with giving "legitimacy" to his stories in that they could be percieved as "ancient" tales or stories which eventually were interpreted over the years as those tales that we currently interprent as legends and mythologies spread across Europe...

...but combined with this, Tolkien also had a love of languages...specifically Gothic and Welsh (Sindarian) and Finnish (Quenya)...but he also believed in the concept of an Ur Language, or a language above all languages...philologists, for years, have been attempting to trace back languages and make edcuated gueses concerning the earliest languages and how we can see similarities in many languages spread throughout the entire globe (similar in fashion to how we see similarities in legends spread throughout the globe)...however, an Ur language is the idea of a language that not only predates all other languages but also is a language that is that of God himself...as such, the Ur language when spoken would represent commands or actions more so than descriptions...for examples...saying the real and original word for"chair" in the Ur language would not only necessarily communicate to all others the exact thought of what a chair is just by the expression of that word, but may also cause such an object to come into being...

WHERE AM I GOING WITH THIS?

1) Look at Tom's sing-song type language...his words become commands...Old Man Willow lets the hobbits go, and so does the Barrow-Wight...Tom's expressions are like commands in a similar fashion to the idea that the Ur language would not only convey thought but would also cause things to come into being (or in Tom's case, do his bidding)...HOWEVER, Tolkien, also in his religious beliefs, would consider it blasphemy to imbody God in such a being as Tom Bombadil (or any other character for that matter)...yet, he would probably agree that the Ur language could only be spoken by God himself (save many for Angels, for which there is some conjecture still abounding)...therefore, how can Bomdabil speak an Ur language and not be God?

2) Now look to the first part of my post, the mythologies section...in all of these intertwining stories there are always things that stand out as pure mysteries to translators or interpretors...they just have no clue what they are or how they got into the story...Tom can be considered this...an Enigma? YES, but much more...Tom is an enigma because no tale of history or legendarium can be complete...its humanly impossible to be infallible...there will always be gaps and holes that can't be filled or explained even by the best of explanations...Tom is this hole, this gap, this thing unexplained...he represents "things otherwise left out"...meaning that Tolkien's world without Tom is nearly perfect...but with Tom, there is a big gaping mystery that no one can officially solve...Tom exists to give a realistic tone to the idea that one set of stories can fully resolve all mysteries that have existed in legends for the history of the world...one human story can't explain this...Tom shows us that...Tom shows us that human are fallible (including Tolkien) and therefore no tale written by humans is complete and perfect...