The Iron Fist of Will - (more) additional thoughts

[Ceridwen]

No: HPFGUIDX 142460

bboyminn:
> 
> At this point let me pause to make a note to Ceridwen on the nature 
of
> possession. We have actually seen various forms of possession in the
> books, but only one form, true possession, counts. We have seen 
Ginny
> possessed by Tom Riddle, but that wasn't possession in its truest
> form. Tom had no corporeal body at the time, so in a sense it was 
the
> spirit of Tom as captured by the Diary that possessed Ginny. To some
> extent we have seen mental 'possession' in the form of the Imperius
> Curse and other 'mind links' but again that is not true possession.
> The 'possessed' person is not fully possessed by the person in 
charge,
> only by the /will/ of the person in charge.
> 
> The only true possession we have seen clearly is when Voldemort
> possessed Harry in the Ministry of Magic battle in OotP. I'm not 
sure
> how you view it, but the only logical way I can see it is that
> Voldemort merged his body with Harry's. In the truest sense, two
> bodies became one. That has to be how it was because if Voldemort 
had
> only mentally possessed Harry, then Voldemort would have been very
> vulnerable. While his mind was in Harry, his body would have been
> outside Harry and very vulnerable to attack by Dumbledore. Voldemort
> can't afford to leave his body unprotected, so the only thing that
> makes reasonable sense is that Voldemort melded his own body into
> Harry's. That's true possession. Now Voldemort can't be attacked
> without attacking Harry. In a  sense, he was using Harry's body as a
> sheild.

Ceridwen:
I see possession as the deliberate overtaking of a body by a spirit 
entity.  I don't see physical bodies merging at all.  I have no idea 
what Voldemort was supposed to have done with his body at the MoM, 
other than to keep on fighting with it while a part of him engaged 
Harry.  And that's only with a minute's thought since you brought it 
up.  While I can suspend disbelief at the idea of flying on brooms, 
waving a wand and making colored lights lift, slash, kill or heal, 
tapping a teacup to create a gerbil, and all the other spells 
consigned to the realm of 'magic' in the HP books, the whole physics 
involved in merging bodies would blast the story to pieces.  I would 
be out of it totally.  My contempt would know no bounds.  I would 
feel as if JKR had been playing games not only with something fun 
like magic, but with reason itself.  Melting together?  Maybe, if the 
fire's hot enough.  Being frozen to one another?  Sure, given enough 
time.  But not the sudden, unannounced, ability to merge bodies.  Up 
until that point it's always been a mind thing.  I don't see why it 
would change.

Ceridwen.