either must die at the hand of the other, Contradiction or Clue?

[saraquel_omphale]

No: HPFGUIDX 139647

Hi Valky, your post reminded me of trying to solve complicated maths 
problems, where I thought, finally, I'm onto something, only to get 
to the point where the next line is `therefore: 5=7' :-)

Valky wrote:
>Something that has had my attention since my first read of HBP, is 
>the line from the prophecy that says either must die at the hand of 
>the other. The reason this bothers me is because Dumbledore claims 
>that he and Harry have both destroyed a piece of Voldemorts soul 
>each, or at least he seems to. And I question, how can Voldemort 
>die at the hands of two people? It contradicts the prophecy.

Saraquel:
What strikes me about this whole situation, is what does it mean to 
be *alive* in JKR's world, and therefore what is death?  I'm going 
to now tie myself in knots, and hopefully take this line of thought 
a little further down its long and convoluted path. 

My take on the horcrux!soul parts, is that they are not truly alive 
and therefore, destroying them is not technically killing them. They 
don't die, they are destroyed.  If the horcrux!soul parts are alive, 
then DD and Harry have already committed murder (yes, I am aware of 
the ongoing discussions about what constitutes murder and what is 
manslaughter, but for this post, I'm going to stick with – killing 
is murder.)

The horcrux!soul parts (I'm sick of typing that out – from now on 
abbreviated to HSPs – Hmmm higher sensory perceptions – well, maybe 
not quite but very nearly!) of the Voldemort's soul appear to be 
stuck in a time warp.  In CoS, the Tom Riddle who emerges from the 
diary, was unaware of who Harry was before Ginny explained it to 
him.  The HSP is Tom Riddle at 16 with no awareness of Voldemort's 
future, only of its past.  Whilst in the diary, the HSP had no body, 
and presumably, no ability to sense the outside world.  Could it 
think?  I'm not sure, but possibly yes, it responded to Ginny.  But, 
that might have been because she made the first move and gave it 
some power of her own.  Difficult to pin that one down. It does not 
appear to have initiated actions itself, but was able to respond.

Also, Voldemort was not aware that the Diary HSP had been destroyed. 
His current life was not affected by its destruction.  So either we 
are saying that there are 7 actually completely independent 
Voldemort's, or we are saying that the HSPs have a complicated 
relationship with their original. 

Contrast that with the experience of Vapormort.  Vapormort most 
definitely continued to be aware of time, place and events. He was 
able to perform spontaneous action – to possess small animals and 
snakes. He continued to live in a straightforward sense, even though 
he did not have a body.  It seems to me that there is a substantial 
qualitative difference.  

Voldemort's remarks on this situation are also interesting:

UK Edition GoF p566
""I was ripped from my body, I was less than spirit, less then the 
meanest ghost 
 but still, I was alive. What I was, even I do not 
know
" 
p567
"I remember only forcing myself, sleeplessly, endlessly, second by 
second, to exist 
 I settled in a faraway place, in a forest, and I 
waited 
 surely, one of my faithful Death Eaters would try and find 
me 
 one of them would come and perform the magic I could not, to 
restore me to a body"

Once Voldemort had a body of any sort, Snake, Quirrel, his foetus 
body, it seems he no longer had to force himself to exist at every 
moment.  He was able, with Quirrel and in the foetus, to think of 
other things, make plans and perform magic etc.  It seems, without a 
body, he was fighting for existence.  Which gets me back to the 
topic that I keep nibbling away at without success – what is the 
relevance of bodies 
. but I digress marginally.

So it seems to me, that the only part of Voldemort that is truly 
alive, and can therefore be killed, is the soul *and* body that is 
walking around calling itself Voldemort. It can continue to exist 
without any of the HSPs, but, if you try and kill it, with any of 
the HSPs still in existence, they somehow anchor the original soul 
part to this world and prevent it from going beyond the veil – i.e. 
dying.

So dying seems to be a two part process – destruction of the body 
and release of the soul to beyond the veil.

Have I got us anywhere?? Maybe now, 4.9 = 5.1  - Recutio ad absurdum!

Saraquel:
Ceridwen, thanks for your reply post to OFH!Snape. As we are limited 
to three posts per day, I thought I'd wait and see if anyone else 
took up a thread and answer them all together.  So I'll get back to 
you.