A new Horcrux theory.

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 138732

>Vivian wrote:
> <snip> I wonder if Lily knew that her death was inevitable and
preplanned her sacrifice? Maybe she planned to protect Harry by
splitting her soul in half so that she could remain inside 
> Harry and protect him. (Didn't Dumbledore mention that he only knew
of one wizard who actually split their soul in half? Maybe he meant 
> Lily?) Maybe Lily performed the horcrux ritual in advance so that
when Voldemort attempted to kill Harry she would sacrifice herself
into Harry, while also causing Voldemort's destruction. 
> 
> I like this a lot. Voldemort was brought down by a mom who would do 
> anything to protect her son. Just like what Narcissa did to Snape.
> The vow was his downfall too. Never underestimate a mother's love
for their child!


Carol responds:
While I agree that Lily knew her death was inevitable and planned her
self-sacrifice (as I've posted elsewhere, I think she put some sort of
protective charm on him that could only be activated if she sacrificed
her life to save his), the idea of Lily conducting a Horcrux ritual,
which we've been told is the Darkest of Dark Magic and requires murder
as a prerequisite just doesn't fit. I think what she did (Love magic?)
is more like a Protego, which deflects a hex back on the caster, but
strong enough, in combination with sacrificial love, to deflect an AK.

Narcissa says she's desperate and will do anything to protect her son,
but even if she stood in front of him to protect him from an AK, I
don't think that would cause the next AK aimed at her son from killing
him. But she's not thinking in terms of self-sacrifice. Instead, she
resorts to persuading Snape to help her son even if it means *Snape's*
life rather than her own. (Greater love hath no man than to give his
life for a beautiful woman's arrogant and deluded son?) Anyway,
Narcissa isn't into self-sacrifice, which didn't work out well for
Mrs. Crouch, in any case. Something more is involved (and I do think
there's a protective Charm we don't know about), but it can't be a
Horcrux spell. Lily's love is pure and untainted and so is her soul.
She hasn't committed murder (required to create a Horcrux) and doesn't
have the evil will to cast an AK. Maybe it made a difference, too,
that her son was an innocent toddler rather than a DE who had helped
to Crucio the Longbottoms.

As for splitting the soul, according to DD, that happens as the result
of murder, not of creating the Horcrux, which (after a complex Dark
Magic incantation) encases and protects the piece of soul split off by
the act of murder. A mortal human Horcrux makes no sense, even from
Voldemort's perspective, and certainly not for Lily, whose very name
implies purity. She would not resort to a spell so evil that
Dumbledore has removed (almost) all references to it from the Hogwarts
library, nor would she commit murder (the necessary prerequisite) to
protect her son. (Narcissa might commit murder, but even she wouldn't
create a Horcrux, which would require a fragment of *Draco's* soul to
make him immortal.)

Also, DD says he's only known one other wizard who's created a Horcrux
(surely Grindelwald), not one other wizard who's split his soul in
half. The DEs do that every time they kill someone, and Snape (who
"slithered out of action" so many times before) has split his,
too--unless there's some way around it. (I don't think Snape wants
immortality and is planning to make a Horcrux, though!)

I have what seems like a stupid question, but I have to ask it. Does
the soul somehow replenish itself (like the poisoned thought Pensieve)
so that the soul fragments are equal, each (including the one inside
himself) one/seventh of the whole and yet infinite? That being the
case, LV could go on making Horcruxes for each murder till infinity.
Or do the Horcruxes follow the law of diminishing returns? IOW, the
first Horcrux took half his soul (which doesn't make perfect sense
since he'd already committde four murders, counting Moaning Myrtle);
the next took half of that (one/fourth), leaving him with the
remaining fourth, which in itself was fragmented from the other
murders. The third Horcrux would have been an eighth, leaving him with
another eighth, and so on. The fragment of soul that burst out of him
at GH must have been infinitesimal if that's the case. No wonder he's
so far removed from humanity, setting aside the changes in his
appearance that reflect the mutilation of his soul.

So as I see it, murder splits the soul, but the split soul normally
remains within the body. What the consequences are for an ordinary
murderer who doesn't make Horcruxes is hard to guess, but those of
creating Horcruxes are evidently far worse. DD speaks of the power of
Harry's pure and untainted soul, which indicates the danger to him of
committing murder or, I think, of deliberately casting any Dark curse.
If he doesn't resist the temptation to cast Crucios and Sectumsempra
and other Dark curses, he's going to taint his soul, and if he AKs
Snape or LV, he will split it. His power, like Lily's, is the power of
purity and Love, and he'd better learn that soon or it's all over.

Carol, who doesn't believe in accidental Horcruxes, either