Dumbledore's Death & HP Religious Comparison.

[Steve]

No: HPFGUIDX 151090

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, Kemper <iam.kemper at ...> wrote:
>
> Tonks wrote:
> As you know I see many symbols in the series that point toward
> a Christian theme. What is confusing is the way in which JKR 
> stirs these symbols and causes them to come out in rather 
> unexpected way, sometimes in very disguised ways and sometimes 
> hidden in plain site. Everything from the names of each book to
> the mark on Harry forehead are symbols of something more. And so
> I think are the deaths of both Sirius and DD.
> 
> ...edited...
> 


> Kemper now:
> I can think of no other non-DE character less like Jesus than
> Sirius.
> 
> Sirius is arrogant, angry, self-righteous, self-pitying, and
> unforgiving.  He's like an anti-Jesus, if not an anti-Christ. 
> Jesus was crucified and died willingly.  Sirius was shoved 
> unwillingly by Bella, tumbling beyond the veil... with a look
> of surprise, IIRC.
> 
> ...edited...
> 
> 
> Maybe Harry will be the Christ figure, dying knowingly and 
> willing for Ron, Neville, Luna, the Wizarding World.. for all 
> of us Muggles.  That would be a good death and maybe a good 
> ending.
> 
> -Kemper

bboyminn:

I was going to respond to Tonks but Kemper has created a better
opening for my comments. But before I start, let me say that I am
running off on a tangent (as usual), and mean no disrespect to either
Tonk or Kemper, both of whom I think are very clever and insightful.
In a sense, I am responding to the concept in general rather than to
any one specific person, so keep that in mind; it's nothing personal.

First on the Sirius/Jesus/Christ comparison, which I admit is even
more tangental than the real point I'm going to make. Kemper says that
Sirius was arrogant and Jesus was not. Well, of course, we don't see
our greatest religious Hero as arrogant, but let's ask the Jewish
scholars and rabbis at the time what THEY thought of Jesus. 

Jesus flouted every convention. He milled grain on Sunday. He threw
money lenders out of the temple. He defined conventional thinking and
the accumulated wisdom of countless generations of religious thinkers.
He essentially told them all that they were wrong, and that they could
not possible be qualified to speak for God, yet he, himself, seemed to
think he was more than qualified to speak for God. In his day and age,
he must have seemed the most arrogant man who ever lived from a
religious perspective. 

You say Jesus was forgiving, but while he easily forgave the
miserable, poor, and wretched of society, he would not suffer fools
easily. He did not easily forgive the religious scholars and their
self-proclaimed piousness, or there absolute condemation of anyone who
dared defy them. 

Jesus was a rebel, and that's enough said on a really tangental
tangent that is barely on topic.

Now to the real topic which again is very much of a side note.

When ever the subject of religion comes up in HP discussions, everyone
invariably tries to make HP a symbolic retelling of Jesus's story.
Admittedly, I'm stretching the concept a bit, but that's roughly what
it amounts to. We try to decide who the Jesus character is, we try to
find symbolic crucifixions and redemption themes. Yet, is that really
necessary? 

Why does every 'good' and 'moral' story  have to be a symbolic
retelling of the Christ story? Why can't this simply be a good moral
tale of good vs evil that is founded in a person's sense of right and
wrong that, since they are a Christian, also founded in Christianity.
Certainly with that as a foundation, we are likely to find Christian
symbols, but do they have to be such direct and obvious symbols? 

Maybe there is no character that represents Christ in this story, but
rather represents the courage and sense of self-sacrifice we see in
all true heroes who make the hero's journey. Hero's Journeys in the
ancient epic tales that predate the dominance of Christianity are
still founded on that same sense of synbolic death and rebirth, that
same sense of courage and self-sacrifice, that same sense that some
things are inherently evil and some people, despite their flaws, are
inherently good.

In the sense of symbolic rebirth, Harry has died and been reborn many
times; at least once in each book. This occurs in the way explained by
Joseph Campbell in his explanation of the hero's journey. At the end
of each book, Harry is a new person. His old sense of self has been
reformed by his heroic experience, just as the heroes of epic tales
are reborn by their trials. 

Yet other characters are also reborn from their experiences. Hermione
was reborn after the confrontation with the troll in the first book.
The old fussy absolute-adherence-to-the-rules Hermione died, and a new
Hermione, with a far more accurate and more morally sound sense of
when and when not to break the rules was formed. 

One could say that Ron has died and been reborn. At least twice, Ron
has symbolically stood in front of Harry and was willing to sacrifice
himself for Harry. That is very Christ-like. Further, Ron has
certainly grown and changed in the series. The Ron we see today, is
not the Ron of "The Philosopher's/Sorcerer's Stone". 

And we can likely find similar symbolic death and rebirth for other
characters. So, does that make them all the Christ figure in the book?
Well, in a way, Yes, but in a way, No. In some ways, I think the story
of Jesus is not unique when view from the perspective of a Hero's
Journey. Jesus was symbolically acting out the story of heroes back to
the beginning of time, or at least to the beginning of epic hero's
journeys.

And that brings me to the key point. Harry Potter's story is symbolic
of Christ only in the sense that Christ is symbolic of the universal
hero's journey. Ask yourself, why do Buddhist, Shinto, Hindu, Muslim,
and atheists all relate to this story so strongly? I say it is because
these books draw on some universal ancient epic sense of heroism that
transends all cultures, a sense of right and wrong, a universal sense
of justice, and on the heroic sense of self-sacrifice for the greater
good. On the sense that there is something greater in the universe
than the individual, but that greater sense is, oddly, symbolicly
represented by the everyman individual who goes against all odd and
against all wisdom, who defies appearent logic, morals, and rule of
law, and transends the mundane, and acts with a sense of higher
virtue. A sense of virtue that is itself universal. 

Any character who plays out the universal themes of epic hero is
Christ-like because Christ himself was merely an epic hero playing out
those same themes. I think that is the real message of the books, that
universal timeless cross-cultural themes of loyalty, courage, true
morality, and virtue are found in everyday heroes as well as
exceptional heroes. 

Maybe in seeing the heroism in the flawed struggling everyman of Harry
Potter and his friends, we can find a greater sense of virtue and
heroism in our own lives, and in that sense, in finding a greater
shelf within our selves. In that sense, this is a very Christ-like story. 

So there you have it. Hummm... Did I actually say anything?

Steve/bboyminn