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the lord of the rings - Did Eru Ilúvatar trip Gollum?


The LOTR wiki lists four times Eru Ilúvatar intervened in the history of Arda:



  1. creating Elves and Men

  2. removing Aman from the spherical Earth

  3. resurrecting Gandalf

  4. making Gollum trip




In a letter written by Tolkien, he stated that Eru again intervened, this time in the Third Age, causing Gollum to trip and fall into the fires of Mount Doom while still holding the One Ring, thus destroying it.



Is this correct? If so, what letter is this, and exactly what did Tolkien say?



Answer



Yes, as we can see on Letter #192, Eru certainly took over after Frodo was done with the assigned task.


Tolkien mentions that Frodo did take the Ring to a certain point (where no other being could) and then another power took over to decide the fate of the Ring.



Frodo deserved all honour because he spent every drop of his power of will and body, and that was just sufficient to bring him to the destined point, and no further. Few others, possibly no others of his time, would have got so far. The Other Power then took over: the Writer of the Story (by which I do not mean myself), 'that one ever-present Person who is never absent and never named' (as one critic has said).

See Vol. I p. 65. 2 A third (the only other) commentator on the point some months ago reviled Frodo as a scoundrel (who should have been hung and not honoured), and me too. It seems sad and strange that, in this evil time when daily people of good will are tortured, 'brainwashed', and broken, anyone could be so fiercely simpleminded and self righteous.



(Emphasis mine)



Exact quote is from the second link here, page 270; cannot post the direct link


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