Íluvatar's opponents?

[Aratlithiel]

My point exactly. (Oh, what a can of worms we've opened here!) The Bible barely touches on the issue of Lucifer and his fall from grace. You must research Jewish lore and angelic studies if you want to learn anything about the rebellion. I can refer you to some excellent resource materials if you're ever interested in tackling it (I must warn you that I minored in Theological Studies so if you ask for it, you'll get it with both barrels!). I could type about it for hours, but since this is a Tolkien forum, I'll spare you.

If He intended or required evil to occur, He could not be a pure spirit which He is.

OK, then how can he be perfect? Evil did, indeed occur, which was not his intention - therefore, Eru was mistaken and thus not perfect.

Not only does Eru use the free will of others for His purpose, but He is an omnipotent God! He’ll let Gollum (and everyone else) make the wrong decisions, but He will also punish them for those decisions. He can still let them exercise their free will but may push them into a lava pit either as punishment or because that’s what He wants.

That's a very contradictory statement and not in keeping with the image of a just deity. And how does this fit in with a perfect deity? Doesn't perfection imply kindness and mercy as well as omniscience? If Eru created a being who had so little will to resist the Ring, how could he possibly punish that being for succumbing to the very weakness he created in it? The whole idea of Eru's divine plan is that everything that happened to the Ring, Eru MEANT to happen. Therefore, Isildur was MEANT to deny his opportunity to destroy it and to die in the river, Deagol was MEANT to find the Ring and be slain by Smeagol, Bilbo was MEANT to pick it up in the cave and Frodo was MEANT to carry it to Mt. Doom, fail to destroy it and then Gollum was MEANT ro attack him and unwittingly accomplish the task. So, in order to accomplish all this, we need to start out with a weak-willed Smeagol. Are you really saying that Eru created him for just this purpose and then punished him for carrying it out? Not to mention, of course, that every bit of this totally negates the concept of free will.