Dumbledore's Trust in Snape - spoilers added

[GKJPO]

No: HPFGUIDX 67808

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "magicgrizzlybear" 
<magicgrizzlybear at y...> wrote:
> It seems strange that Dumbledore has some sort of blind trust in 
> Snape, much like they are related or something. Perhaps Snape was 
> Dumbledore's son and had some sort of teenage rebellion to join the 
> Death Eaters. Then he later wised up and went to work for his dad 
at 
> Hogwarts, though he still doesn't get the Dark Arts job probably as 
> punishment or to resist temptation? However, he still sticks around 
> as penance to Dumbledore and will do whatever he can to help his 
> father. I mean, Dumbledore had to have some kind of life outside 
the 
> school, and being the son of one of the teachers there would have 
had 
> to make Snape ambitious to separate himself somehow...well, 
whatever 
> you think, it's food for thought...

I don't see how Dumbledore could be his father.  In OOP when Harry 
rebounds the memory reading spell on him, we see Snape's father 
yelling at him and his mother.  We learn that Snape had a really 
rotten childhood - not that that gives him any excuse to act like a 
jerk.  

In at least the last 2 books, the question of why Dumbledore trusts 
Snape hascome up.  I don't think there's an answer from Dumbledore on 
that yet - though he did give the tiniest bit of info to Harry at the 
end of the book when speaking in reference to Snape and James.  I 
believe it will become very important.  In OOP, Snape does actually 
show his activites for the good side - tracking DE movements, 
reporting back to the Order and alerting the Order when Harry and 
crew goes on their rescue mission. 

I also think that JKR's comments on Snape at her OOP reading were 
very revealing - we obviously haven't heard the last of this story 
line yet.

Kristen