‘In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.’ Tolkien admitted that he wrote these words absentmindedly on the back of an exam paper he was marking. Such spontaneous inspiration suggests the work of the subconscious mind, and if the subconscious mind, then a more mysterious source of inspiration may well be at work. Peter Kreeft has suggested that The Lord of the Rings is a divinely inspired work , and in the broadest sense this has to be true. Inspiration comes from earthly experience just as much as from heavenly guidance, and Tom Shippey has shown how the very word ‘hobbit’ emerged from the context of Tolkien’s lifelong interest in words and language.  The idea of little people who turn out to be the greatest would also have sprung from Tolkien’s devout Catholic faith. Not only does the gospel say that we have to be little to get into the kingdom, (Matthew 18:4) but the apostle John constantly refers to the faithful as ‘little children’. (e.g. I John 2:28) Furthermore, Tolkien would have been well aware that one of the Catholic saints most in the ascendant during his lifetime was the apostle of the ‘little way.’ Thérèse of Lisieux teaches that, ‘To be little means recognising one’s nothingness, expecting everything from the good God, as a little child expects everything from its Father.’ 

Now Tolkien was not writing a book about saints and going to heaven. Apart from a minor character saying grace before a meal, there is nothing in The Lord of the Rings which is remotely religious in the conventional sense of the word. Nevertheless Tolkien was clear that his Christian faith provided the underlying matrix for the story. In 1953 he wrote that The Lord of the Rings, ‘is of course; a fundamentally religious and Catholic work; unconsciously so at first, but consciously in the revision.’  Tolkien didn’t want to write a religious book, he wanted to create a myth for the English people. But the myth he has created is a very Christian myth. At the heart of The Lord of the Rings is a Christian worldview that gives a foundation for the entire story. David Mills has observed that a story can be Christian to the degree in “which Providence works as Providence, that is, to which it includes the requirements of obedience and the acceptance of permanent loss involved in the Christian teaching of Providence and shows it at work in the plot.’  Frodo, the hero of the Lord of the Rings, exhibits this obedience to a full extent.

Shippey has observed that Tolkien’s work, while set in an archaic, fantasy world is unmistakably modern.  Frodo’s struggle to obey the call of Providence is also modern. From the beginning of his stewardship of the Ring, Frodo is filled with angst. He is uncertain and disturbed by his destiny. After Gandalf tells him of the Ring’s origins, ‘Frodo sat silent and motionless. Fear seemed to stretch out like a vast hand, like a dark cloud rising in the East and looming up to engulf him. “This ring!” he stammered. “How, how on earth did it come to me?”’  and after Gandalf reveals what must happen to the Ring Frodo cries, ‘I am not made for perilous quests! I wish I had never seen the Ring! Why did it come to me? Why was I chosen?’  It is this very reluctance to be a hero that seals Frodo’s status as the most excellent modern hero. His greatness is one that is filled with existential self-doubt and a despair which is only punctuated from time to time with glimmers of hope. The Lord of the Rings is no easy fantasy with a sentimental, happy ending and Frodo is no bluff super-hero who sets off on an easy quest to defeat the bad guys. Frodo struggles with his inner doubts and fears as much as he does with the dreadful burden of the Ring and the dark power of Sauron.

Frodo’s reluctance to play the hero is not cowardice. It is the mark of his humility, for humility is a simple realistic assessment of oneself. In contrast, both pride and false humility are unrealistic about the self. In The Lord of the Rings Boromir is the best example of pride. He really does believe that the he would be able to use the Ring for a good purpose, ‘the Ring would give me power of Command. How I would drive the hosts of Mordor, and all men would flock to my banner!’  False humility also has an unrealistic assessment of the self. Gollum exhibits the grovelling subservience of false humility while all the time he is using his subservience as a tool to manipulate others and regain the Ring. Gandalf and Galadriel also have the necessary self-knowledge to be humble. Like Boromir, they are both tempted, to take the Ring and use it for good, but both of them know they are not innocent enough to bear the Ring without it corrupting them. Even Sam, for the short time that he holds the Ring is tempted by the vision of ‘Samwise the Strong, Hero of the Age.’  Frodo alone, while weighed down by the burden of the Ring, is not tempted to use it for his own long term glory, until at the last moment he weakens and the Ring’s power infests his heart.

The humility of Frodo can be contrasted with the hubris of the classical hero. Hubris is that overweening self-confidence which eventually provides for the hero’s potential downfall. This hubris is linked with the tragic flaw in the classic hero. In a tragedy the hero’s flaw combined with hubris brings about the hero’s defeat or even death. Hubris is linked with the tragic flaw because it does not allow the hero to see his tragic flaw and change it. This means the classic hero lacks that realistic self-assessment on which real humility depends. Frodo is totally lacking in hubris. Instead, throughout The Lord of the Rings he is full of fear, dread, confusion and self-doubt.  

What keeps Frodo from being a weak character is his obedience. The word obey has its roots in the verb ‘to listen’ and Frodo listens to the call of what can only be called Providence at the crucial stages of his journey. That he obeys the call is the mark of Frodo’s true strength. True obedience is always linked with courage, and Frodo constantly moves forward in obedience despite his fear. Finally obedience is linked with faith—not religious faith per se, but faith as a quality of positive trust in Providence. For Frodo these traits of obedience, courage and faith come to a climax at the Council of Elrond. There he hears the voice of Providence, and then he hears the real Frodo—almost like a disembodied voice—respond in positive courageous obedience to the call. After the Council had decided that the Ring must be taken to the Cracks of Doom, ‘a great dread fell upon him [Frodo] as if he was awaiting the pronouncement of some doom that he had long foreseen and vainly hoped might after never be spoken….At last with a great effort he spoke, and wondered to hear his own words as if some other will was using his small voice. “I will take the Ring,” he said, “though I do not know the way.”’ 

In creating a character who responds to the voice of providence with genuine humility and obedience Tolkien has created a new kind of mythic hero. Many writers have created Christ-figures and The Lord of the Rings is not without its own (Aragorn the triumphant returning King, Gandalf who returns from the dead) but Frodo’s heroism is compelling not because it typifies Christ, but because it exemplifies the heroism of the Christian saint. Frodo steps out even though he does not know the way and the saint also, like Frodo, walks by faith not by sight. (2Cor. 5:7) Frodo goes through the utter darkness driven only by his obedience and courage. 

Compare Frodo’s journey through uncertainty and doubt to Thérèse of Lisieux who wrote, ‘Jesus took me by the hand and brought me into a subterranean way, where it was neither hot nor cold, where the sun does not shine, and rain and wind do not come; a tunnel where I see nothing but a brightness half-veiled…I do not see that we are advancing towards the mountain that is our goal, because our journey is under the earth; yet I have a feeling that we are approaching it, without knowing why.’  The path of the humble soul is always uncertain. What seems to be progress may only be the advance of pride. Up until the very last moment Frodo is unsure whether he is making progress and doubts whether he will succeed. Again Thérèse says,  ‘I learned very quickly that the farther one advances along this road, the farther from the goal one believes oneself to be.’ 

Even Frodo’s failure at the Cracks of Doom is a paradoxical sign of his saint-like calling. He has advanced in genuine humility and sheer dogged obedience, then when the final test comes Frodo seems to fail. He who has never yielded to the temptation to use the Ring for his own ends rises up and says, ‘I have come, but I do not choose now to do what I came to do. I will not do this deed. The Ring is mine!’  He puts on the ring and disappears, only to have Gollum leap for the ring, bite off his finger and plunge with the Ring into the pit.  It has often been remarked how the turn of the plot at this stage is a sign of the strange workings of Providence. Frodo seems to fail the test in the last moment, but  Frodo (and before him Bilbo) had spared the life of Gollum, and this act of humble mercy redounds for his salvation at the crucial point.

Similarly, Thérèse faced the worst kind of desolation and trial during her final illness. ‘Look!’ she cries to her sisters on her deathbed, ‘Do you see the black hole where we can see nothing? Its in a similar hole that I am as far as body and soul are concerned. Ah! what darkness!  She was tempted not only to despair, but to suicide. Yet it was her earlier unceasing habits of faith, obedience and courage which enabled her to say in her final terrible days, ‘What a grace it is to have faith! If I had not had any faith, I would have committed suicide without a moment’s hesitation.’ 

Frodo’s humility not only leads to the triumph over Mordor, but Frodo himself is transformed. The Frodo who returns to the Shire is much more like the classical hero. He rides in and takes command with confidence. There is no fear, confusion or doubt about him. Frodo says to the ruffians who have invaded the Shire, ‘I see that you’re behind the times and the news here…. Your day is over…the Dark Tower has fallen, and there is a King in Gondor. Isengard has been destroyed and your precious master is a beggar in the wilderness. The King’s messengers will ride up the Greenway now, not bullies from Isengard.’  In his transformation Frodo shows that the authentic hero is one who has gone through the darkness of doubt, fear, rebelliousness and arrogance to conquer with the weapons of faith, courage, obedience and humility. The authentic hero attacks the enemy with his humility intact, but with the added quality of real self-confidence.

Finally, Tolkien presents us with a Christian hero and type of the Christian saint because Frodo, in his faithful obedience and humility lives out the way of sacrificial love. Redemptive suffering lies at the heart of the Christian way, and like the saint who emulates the Master by taking up his cross, Frodo is the wounded hero. Although he has saved the Shire he cannot stay and enjoy it. As he departs for the Grey Havens he explains to a tearful Sam why he can’t stay in the Shire. ‘I have been too deeply hurt Sam. I tried to save the Shire, and it has been saved, but not for me. It must often be so Sam when things are in danger. Some one has to give them up, lose them, so that others may keep them.’ 

In giving us a humble hero Tolkien reminds us that it is the foolish things of God which overturn the wisdom of the world. Things are not what they seem. As Bilbo blurts out at the Council of Elrond, ‘All that is gold does not glitter/ Not all those who wander are lost.’  The small ones turn out to be mighty while the mighty are fallen. It is the secret agents of the world who hold the key to final victory. The hidden soul who overturns the power of evil is the essential theme of The Lord of the Rings, and this theme is echoed in the gospel and in the little saint of Lisieux who writes, ‘To find a thing hidden, we must be hidden ourselves; so our life must be a mystery.’ These are the secret ways of the Spirit which eventually bring down even the worst powers of Mordor.  The triumph of the halfling Frodo is an inspiration to every soul who attempts the little way. Each one who does can be encouraged by the words of Elrond, ‘The road must be trod, but it will be very hard. And neither strength nor wisdom will carry us far upon it. This quest may be attempted by the weak with as much hope as the strong. Yet such is the oft the course of deeds that move the wheels of the world. Small hands do them because they must, while the eyes of the great are elsewhere.’ 

Check out  St Benedict and St Thérèse –The Little Rule and the Little Way.