Christian motifs but not Christian allegory? (Was: JKR a Calvinist? Potterve

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 121556


I signed off earlier:
 Carol, not at all willing to read the book as a religious 
> allegory  but wondering how JKR's version of Christianity can be 
> used to help us interpret the books
> > 
> 
> Tonks here:
> Yes there was a post that was quoting an interview with JKR and she 
> said something like 'if I told what I believe than the intelligent 
> reader whether 8 or 80 would know what the books are about.'
> 
> Granger in his book "The Hidden Keys to Harry Potter" says that JKR 
> is an Inkling like Lewis and Tolkien, and I agree. Lewis said "let 
> sleeping dragons lie", when talking about the writings being made 
> for the subconscious mind, and slipping past the ego.  And so does 
> JKR in "never tickle a sleeping dragon". 
> 
> It was clear to me from the first book, that there was something 
> going on in the writing from a Christian perspective. The books are 
> not allegory. There is a concept in hypnosis that all you have to do 
> to put a person into a trance (like the one we are all in) is to 
> cause an internal search. What I mean by that is this: When JKR 
> writes about a giant delivering a little baby boy on a flying 
> motorcycle to the Muggle world while the magi (magi=wizard= 
> Dumbledore and McGonagall) watch on, she is not telling the 
> Christmas story as we know it, but close enough to cause an internal 
> search in our mind.  Maybe we don't *get it* on a conscious level, 
> but the part of us that needs to hear does.
> 
> Now my view of what is being taught in the books is somewhat 
> different from Hans, but both of us see this subconscious connection 
> and are hoping that the whole world is changed by the message that 
> is quietly sneaking past the *dragon*.  I think that JKR is one of 
> the greatest gifts we have been given.  (One could even say that she 
> is fulfilling her destiny.) She brings the Christ child alive for 
> us, but some do not see that yet.  And it is OK if they never do, as 
> long as that deep part of them that needs to hear it does.

Carol again:
I remember seeing the quote you're talking about and I'm sure we could
find it easily enough through a search at the Lexicon. But your
approach, though not as allegorical as Hans's, is still a bit less
flexible, if you understand my meaning, than what I had in mind.

I'm just trying to find out JKR's worldview as a Christian--her views
on morality (other than her liberal political perspective, which
anyone who reads her interviews can't help but be familiar with), and
on the soul and the afterlife, etc. I think, though, that she's using
other mythologies (Greek and Celtic/Druidic, maybe others) to shroud
her meaning. There's no overt religious teaching in the Potterverse,
though there's a secularized Christianity that probably resembles that
in Muggle Britain (Father Christmas = Saint Nicholas, mangled
Christmas carols, St. Mungo's Hospital, chocolate Easter eggs). I
don't interpret Harry as an overt Christ figure (though if he
sacrifices himself to save the WW I'll have to rethink that position),
but I think the soul, the afterlife, the nature of fate or destiny,
the nature of evil (or sin?) all tie in with this worldview I'm trying
to discover, going against my own natural instincts by looking outside
the text. (Looks over her shoulder for Nora.) We might also consider
virtues vs. vices in this context. Is ambition a vice in the Christian
view? It isn't one of the Seven Deadly Sins. And what about the
"qualities" Del mentioned, resourcefulness and determination? Not
traditional Christian cardinal virtues but surely regarded by most
Christians, and indeed most people, as desirable traits?

Someone asked about the properties of holly, the wood Harry's wand is
made of. Surely the Christian symbolism regarding holly (a
resurrection symbol, its berries symbolizing the blood of Christ) is
as relevant as the Druid death/rebirth symbolism from which it's
derived. The association of the holly wood with rebirth or
resurrection matches the symbolism of the Phoenix feather core.
(Someone had a post on the symbolism of the Phoenix in Catholic
tradition; I believe Geoff noted that the tradition has not been
carried into Protestantism, which in essence rejects the older pagan
elements and during the Reformation, condemned Catholicism for
incorporating them. JKR, however, seems to have brought them back in.)
Interestingly, yew, the wood from which Voldemort's wand is made, is
also associated with death and rebirth and was often planted around
English churchyards. but Voldie, we know, isn't interested in anything
like the Christian afterlife. He wants earthly immortality. Do the yew
and the holly reflect conflicting views of eternal life, one earthly
and one spiritual?

What I'm trying to get at in this overlong post is that the Christian
elements are *there* in the text (along with the mythological
elements) and may be closer than, say, Druidism, to what JKR actually
believes. I'm not going for an allegorical reading but for what
Tolkien calls "applicability," which he says resides in the reader but
which I think resides in the relation between the reader and the text.
And it doesn't hurt to have just a smidgen of the author's intentions,
or at least an awareness of her philosophy, to help us use these
elements to produce a valid (but by no means dogmatic) reading of the
books.

Carol, noting with regard to a different thread that it's impossible
to have a "revisionist" reading of a work in progress since the
standard reading can't possibly exist yet