Who is Tom Bombadil? (Guest: Father Chris “Tom Bombadil” Perella)

“Old Tom Bombadil is a merry fellow, Bright blue his jacket is, and his boots are yellow. None has ever caught him yet, for Tom, he is the Master: His songs are stronger songs, and his feet are faster.” - The Fellowship of the Ring

This week we’re joined by one of my favorite Twitter Priests! Father Chris Perrella is a priest from the diocese of Bridgeport, Connecticut, but he goes by Father Tom Bombadil online and when I was thinking up who I wanted to chat with for this episode, he was the first person I thought of!

In this episode, we discussed different theories to the ultimately unanswerable question: Who is Tom Bombadil?

 I really truly love that Tolkien chose to leave Tom Bombadil as such a mystery, but there are a lot of different fan theories about who he truly is. 

Tom Bombadil Theories

• Tom represents and un-fallen Adam

• Tom is one of the Maiar

• Tom is the embodiment of Arda, a Father Nature figure

• Tom is the embodiment of the Music of the Ainur

In this episode, we discussed these theories and which we felt were most likely. What do you think of these? Do you have any other Tom Bombadil theories?

In the end, we can’t really truly know, but it’s one of those fun elements of studying Tolkien that I enjoy!