The prophesy...sorry for being boring

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 90236

 > Carol:
 > You're still taking your "born with the power" interpretation for
 > granted. Nowhere does the prophecy say that "the one" is born with
 > the power. (In fact, he hasn't even been born when the prophecy is
 > spoken.) 
 
> Whizbang:
> 
> The one had the power when the prophesy was delivered.  "The one 
> with the power to vanquish the dark lord approaches."  At that 
> moment, as Trelawney spoke and Dumbledore listened, the one was 
> approaching with the power. <snip>

Carol:
The prophecy was delivered before Harry was born. He could not
possibly have had the power to defeat the Dark Lord as a fetus--or
even as a fifteen-month-old baby. And we don't know that the voice
speaking the prophecy, which we agree isn't Trelawney's, is speaking
*in* the present *about* the present. It's using the present tense,
but it's presenting a prophecy and prophecies deal with the future.
(For all we know, the all-knowing voice may be speaking from a
different perspective, in a different time.) I think you may be taking
the words too literally. The chief characteristic of that prophecy is
ambiguity, and if we try to pin a literal meaning on it, we are bound
to be wrong.)

I've made all my arguments and hope you'll forgive me for dropping the
argument now. My interpretation still seems valid to me as a
*possible* explanation for the events at Godric's Hollow, which are
not the fulfillment of the prophecy, only its initiation. We don't
know how the prophecy will be fulfilled; it hasn't happened yet. As
long as you believe that Harry was born with the power to defeat
Voldemort, nothing I can say will convince you to look at the rest of
my argument and consider the *possibility* that his life was saved,
and the curse deflected onto Voldemort, by a charm his mother placed
on him. I think the clues point in that direction, but I suppose for
you they'll remain red herrings.

Let me ask you one last question, though. Do you also think that Harry
was born with the ability to speak Parseltongue and that none of LV's
powers were transferred to Harry at Godric's Hollow? Is The Boy Who
Lived, in your view, no different than he was before the encounter
with Voldemort except for being an orphan and having a scar? What
about the scar itself linking him to Voldemort?

I think that the Harry who lived with his mother and father and the
Harry who survived the AK are very different people--or rather, Harry
is someone special, someone "marked" for a special fate, *after* the
attempted AK but not before. And even now, at sixteen as of Book 5, he
still does not have the power to destroy Voldemort except as partially
developed potential. All he has now is the ability to survive whatever
Voldemort does to him until the time foretold in the prophecy arrives.

Carol