Questions about the ring

1. Sauron disguised himself as a benevolent entity and tricked the Elves to make the rings. While he tricked them with benevolent promises, the whole thing was a ruse to control them all via the One Ring.

2. Sauron basically designed the whole set of rings and their powers, tricked the Elves into making them after his design, all while intending to forge the One Ring himself to control all the other ring bearers.

3. He left it to Frodo at Gandalf's behest as Gandalf started to see the Ring having an effect on Bilbo. Gandalf didn't realize it was actually the One Ring until after this.

4. Gandlaf may have trusted Bilbo had he realized what Bilbo had from the start. By the events of the film, Bilbo has had the Ring too long and likely could not complete the task. Gandalf see Frodo as the "next best thing" as Bilbo resisted the pull of the Ring for nearly 60 years when most can't last minutes. Gandalf believes the hobbit simple life of love and comfort makes them less greedy and less susceptible to the temptation of power.

I'm not as knowledgeable a Tolkien scholar as some, but if memory serves...

1. Elven smiths forged all rings other than the One, under the guidance of Sauron, who was at the time disguised as an emissary of the Valar (gods).

2. Sauron was a Maia, which is basically to say a demigod, and he could only pull off the dominion of the One over the others by pouring a large part of his own power into it - meaning, since its creation he was nowhere as powerful as before if he didn't have it on.

3. Gandalf talked him into it, as he wasn't yet sure what it was.

4. Basically, because Gandalf put a lot of faith in things happening for good reasons; Frodo inherited it, and his intuition told him that his carrying it could lead to its destruction. As we know, he was eventually proven right.

What was the quote? Somewhere in the trilogy someone says that the One Ring grants power appropriate to the user, something like that. To a Dark Lord, it'd give the power to rule the world. To a powerful being like Gandalf or Galadriel, it'd give the same level of power, cloaked in the illusion that they could use the damn thing to do good. To a hobbit... it gives long life, and invisibility, and maybe some other tiny powers.

So you see, Gandalf didn't dare touch it, because he knew that it'd mess with his mind, grant him great power that would corrupt him, and make him into a new Dark Lord. Once he realized that Bilbo's ring was indeed The One Ring, he realized that it was as safe in Bilbo's hands as it would be anywhere on Earth, because hobbits are the most decent, mellow, non-magical beings in Middle-Earth. Hobbits couldn't do any real harm with it, and it'd corrupt them far more slowly than a human being, as humans are far more greedy, power-hungry, and grandiose than hobbits. So if Gandalf had faith that certain things were happening for a reason, seeing the One Ring accidentally land in the hands of harmless hobbits would certainly reinforce that faith! Leaving it in Frodo's hands meant that it was not only out of harm's way but comparatively harmless, it was in the hands of the few people in Middle-Earth who might be capable of destroying it.

Basically what others have said already, I do recommend the YouTube channel NerdoftheRings which makes understanding the Second Age and First Age of Middle Earth much easier to comprehend. Amazon's Middle Earth series will be taking place in the Second Age which should also make things more clear. The Tolkien Estate, allowing the use of their works, has also made clear that Amazon must stay true to the source material.

1. It would be a deception that would last for thousands of years. In the Second Age, many thousands of years before the Lord of the Rings (which takes place in the Third Age), Sauron deceives Celebrimbor, an elf master smith in Eregion (south of what would be known as Rivendell), and they forged the rings of power. The Rings of power are handed out to men, dwarves, and elves in various positions of power around Middle Earth.

2. A total of 20 rings were forged, including the One Ring, which Sauron forged in secret, in the fires of Mount Doom, which ruled over the 19 others. The One Ring was linked to the 19 others over vast distances, and could be used to control the wearer. Some saw through Sauron's deception, but not all...

3. Gandalf convinced Bilbo to make the choice to leave the ring behind, and with the strength of Mordor & Isengard increasing there's no telling how far Bilbo would have gotten had he brought the ring to Rivendell.

4. Gandalf knows that Frodo would be least likely to be corrupted by the ring, as Bilbo as well had hardly been corrupted by it and he had it for 70+ years, it would buy Gandalf more time to find out more information on the ring that Bilbo had all these long years, and indeed. Frodo actually has the ring for 17 years. In the film they make it look like perhaps a few weeks or months, but it was actually a very long time between Bilbo leaving the Shire and Gandalf returning to Bag End to test the ring in the fire.