DD as spiritual leader? (was:Canon for BADD ANGST)

[jwcpgh]

No: HPFGUIDX 81218

<snips>
> Sandy:
> Just who is Dumbledore? And what religion are most wizards? It's 
> pretty obvious they're not pagans; I'm pagan, and they're not...I 
> think. So who is the supreme spiritual authority in the WW? Fudge? 
> No, it's Dumbledore. He knows more about everything than anybody. I 
> have to conclude that if this is the only hope--if the cataclysm, 
the 
> Phoenix pyre is what's left to weigh against NO hope--then yes, the 
> end justifies the means. (And if someone not God has to make the 
> decision, then is that person even more damned than Voldemort? Even 
> if he does it out of love? Dumbledore saves the world by destroying 
> it and is stuck for eternity in Azkaban-beyond-the-veil. (Bangy 
> enough for you bangers?))
> 
>snip> 
 I think the reason we all (me, too) don't want to go with 
manipulating, lying, megalomaniac Dumbledore is that we want, we 
*need* him to be "better" than that. We need him to save the world 
and retain his nobility even if he loses his life. Even if he has to 
sacrifice Harry, or let Harry sacrifice himself. Even without a God 
in the WW, we want to believe that Dumbledore would leave the flood, 
the purge, to Him. <snip>

Laura:

Wow, Sandy.  The admin elves may have to start a theology subgroup!
*smiles*

JKR has carefully avoided any reference to spirituality, spiritual 
practice or organized religion of any brand, at least in my reading 
of the HP books.  Christmas and Easter are entirely secular 
holidays.  There is no moment of prayer, no chapel, no holy book.  So 
I think it's assuming too much to suggest that DD is the spiritual 
head of the WW.  What we know about him is that he is deeply and 
widely respected, that he has fought dark lords and dark magic all 
his life (okay, at least since 1945) and that he believes that non-
magical creatures and magical non-humans deserve as much respect as 
wizards and witches.  But there's no evidence that DD has any 
interest in, or control of, ritual spiritual practices in the WW, if 
any exist, or that the WW looks to him for guidance on all moral 
issues.  So I don't accept your suggestion that DD is the spiritual 
leader of the WW.

If it's DD who saves the world, then the scope of the books, it seems 
to me, is a lot smaller than if there is a group fighting LV.  Sure, 
there's already the Order, but what I mean is that they have to be 
doing the fighting of their own free will, and not because DD has 
insight that no one else can reach.  If the books are ultimately 
about LV vs DD, with Harry as a weapon, or LV vs. God with DD as a 
weapon, then they become a lot less interesting to me.  The struggle 
to create a moral, just world is one that each of us has to wage on a 
daily basis.  We can't leave it to our leaders (religious, political 
or otherwise) to bring about a better world, even if they're people 
of extraordinary moral power and clarity.  We *all* have to do it.  

In the theology to which I belong (Judaism), God has stopped 
intervening directly in human events.  This happened during the time 
of the Torah (the 5 books of Moses, which Christians and others refer 
to as the old testament), but according to our tradition, once those 
events were over, we were on our own.  God wanted us to grow up and 
take responsibility for the taks God had set before us-to perfect the 
world. 

Now I know JKR isn't Jewish, but I think she's showing us a world in 
which humans are ultimately responsible for the state of their 
world.  If they mess it up, they have to fix it-or it doesn't get 
fixed.  The age of floods is over.  The fate of the WW lies in the 
hands of each witch and wizard, and that's what Pip's arguing.  DD 
wants to force the WW to see that the choice, and the power, is 
theirs.