"Life-Debt" Gripe

[shinesse]

No: HPFGUIDX 59288

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Jesta Hijinx" 
<jestahijinx at h...> wrote:
> While at work today, I thought of something I've been meaning to 
post to 
> this list for a while:
> 
> I see relatively frequent, almost casual references to "life 
debts" between 
> characters.  (It's okay - just to save some typing, I know what 
the concept 
> means - I tend to leave out lengthy expository trains of thought 
like that 
> in e-mail when I assume everyone has the same knowledge base I do -
 so 
> please, nobody post a long discussion of the meaning of "life 
debt" and the 
> cultures in which it crops up.  ;-))
> 
> Yet nowhere does the phrase actually appear in canon that I know 
of.  Anyone 
> got a cite they care to share?
> 
> I ask because while a nice idea, I think that it's a tacit 
assumption that 
> might not really hold in the WW on the part of fandom that any of 
these 
> characters owe or feel they owe a life debt to another.  Just 
because it's 
> common among world cultures and in literature (the most recent 
media 
> reference *I* can recall is Qui-Gon Jinn speaking to Boss Nass 
about Jar-Jar 
> Binks in "Phantom Menace") doesn't mean that's how JKR is writing 
in the 
> Potterverse.
> 
> Any thoughts?
> 
> Felinia Beauclerc
> 
now me:
I've always gone by the quote from DD to Harry at the end of PoA.
"You have sent Voldermort a deputy who is in your debt...When one 
wizard saves another wizard's life, it creates a certain bond 
between them..and I'm much mistaken if Voldermort wants his servant 
in the debt of Harry Potter." Ch 22. PoA

I don't remember the entire cemetary scene and I doubt that wormtail 
would help Harry so obviously with all the DE around. I'm sure that 
this debt will come into play in OoP. 

~shinesse~