Life Debts was Why has DD never suggested Snape thank Harry

[dungrollin]

No: HPFGUIDX 117542



> Ces wrote: 
> > Snape is at least honorable in the fact that he is paying off a 
> > wizard's debt to someone he hates.  Perhaps he's doing it so he 
> > can hate James in peace - that's his decision and he has to live 
> > with it.  But he is paying off that debt to someone who is only 
> > seeing the bad in him.  Who knows what a little thanks from both 
> > to each other 
> > could do.
> > 
> 
> Potioncat:
> I think, but I don't remember who I stole this idea from (oblivate 
> seems to have worked poorly and backward at that) that there is no 
> such thing as a Life Debt. 
> 
> I can't find the cannon where I hide my copy of SS/PS, so I can't 
> quote it. But DD says something along the line of 'having a 
> strange idea that he owes your father a debt for saving his life.' 
> Harry and almost all of us have taken that bit of conversation and 
> worked out an elaborate idea of how and when Life Debts are 
> formed.  But I don't think they exist at all. 
> 
> There is one other (I think only one) time that it is mentioned in 
> canon, and that is when Harry tosses it up to Snape and Snape 
> insists that James was in on the prank.
> 
> Does anyone who is better prepared and more persuasive have any 
> ideas?

Dungrollin:

I don't have my books with me, either, but the main canon in support 
of the idea is at the end of PoA, when DD's explaining that saving 
Pettigrew's life wasn't such a bad thing.  He says something along 
the lines of 'When one wizard saves another wizards life, a certain 
bond is formed.' And then later 'This is magic at its deepest and 
most mysterious.' And some stuff about Voldy not being too pleased 
that one of his servants owes Harry a debt. (Was it 'a debt'? 
Or 'his life'? Was it 'a certain bond' or 'a deep magical bond'?)

It's a short step from that to, knowing that James saved Snape's 
life, assuming that the same 'certain bond' existed between the two 
of them.

IIRC at the end of SS/PS, DD doesn't call it a strange idea, but 
neither does he mention anything about the debt being magical.  
Perhaps someone with their books can quote what he does say...

The phrase 'life debt' doesn't occur in canon anywhere, but it's a 
less cumbersome way of describing this bond (coined by whom?), which 
is most definitely canonical. 

What we don't have, is any canon that says life debts are passed 
down the generations, nor what happens if you repay them or not.  
Nor do we know how directly one must be involved to count for the 
award (one could concoct a situation in which a tiny action 
eventually had the unintended consequence of saving a wizard's life -
 would that count too?).

I flirted with the idea that there's some magical penalty if you are 
in a position to save someone's life (someone to whom you owe a life 
debt) and you don't - i.e. through your inaction the person who 
saved your life dies.  Nothing solid though, it's all speculation.

Dungrollin
Who really shouldn't reply to posts like this when away from her 
books.