The doom of the Ring

[Zigûr]

Originally Posted by Leaf

Here comes, finally, my question to you: Do you think that it's plausible to say that the Ring, due to his very nature, settled his own doom? Is evil, with it's inherent immutable determination and fatalism eventually disadvantaged?! In the end it was Gandalf's way of thinking that saved the day. Frodo took his careful indecision towards Gollum to heart and, "irrationally", trusted this advice. The Ring itself, on the other hand, condemned Gollum beyond a doubt and issued a non-revocable death sentence, so to speak.

I think you've outlined the complexities very well, but I would certainly argue that the Ring being accidentally self-destructive is a major part of that complex. I've read elsewhere the argument that the reason Gollum fell was because the Ring was still doing Frodo's will, and thus enacting that proclamation, because it was technically still on Frodo's finger after Gollum regained it, even if the finger was no longer attached to Frodo himself!

I think you make a good point in terms of the irrevocable and absolutist nature of the evil will. Note that one the earliest and most primal instances of "evil" in the narrative of the legendarium is Melkor's desire "to have subjects and servants, and to be called Lord, and to be a master over other wills." [The Silmarillion That desire to control is arguably an evil motive.

Correspondingly, because, as Inzil has observed, evil brings about good, evil is innately to some degree self-destructive. Thus, I would argue, it is within that sphere for the "controlling" element of evil to be self-destructive. Thus the Ring's proclivity towards certainty and the absolute contributes to its own destruction.

Personally I read the voice not as Sam's imagination but some strange combination of Frodo and the Ring, perhaps a kind of projection of Frodo were he to wield the Ring properly. But that's merely my interpretation.