Voldemort killed personally?

[Mike]

No: HPFGUIDX 157194

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "justcarol67" wrote:
>
> > Geoff wrote:
> > I am in agreement with you here in that I was trying to make the
> > point that even if Voldemort encouraged/incited/ordered the 
> > Basilisk and  Pettigrew inter alia to commit murder, he did not 
> > actually say the words  and thus, in the case of Cedric, if 
> > anyone's soul got split, it was Wormtail's. <snip>

Mike:
Am I correct to assume that (left unsaid) you do not think a Horcrux 
could have been made from Myrtle's death? It sounds like it.

> 
> Carol responds:
> I agree with you regarding Wormtail. But in the case of the 
> Basilisk, which as I've argued elsewhere, was the instrument, not 
> the agent, of Myrtle's death, just as the wand and poison were in 
> Tom's other murders, the soul that split, if any, would have been 
> Tom's. <snip>

Mike responds:

Aye, but therein lies the rub. As Geoff alluded to above, Tom didn't 
perform the actual magic, he didn't say the spell to kill Myrtle. No 
magical spell was used to kill Myrtle. Granted, Parseltongue does 
appear to be a gift granted only to wizards, and very few of them at 
that, as far as we've been told. So it may require some magical 
ability to speak to snakes in the Potterverse. But, in terms of 
magically splitting one's soul, casting a killing curse is a far cry 
from commanding an animal to kill (if that is what happened), no 
matter what language that command is given in.

> Carol again: 
> 
> In the case of the Basilisk, "Kill him!" or "Kill her!" operates in
> exactly the same way as "Avada Kedavra" does with the wand. It's a
> command for his *instrument* or *weapon* to commit the murder. IMO.

Mike again:

I don't see how you work out that "Kill her!" *operates* exactly the 
same way as "AK". One is a command to another entity, the second is 
spell casting which, we have been told, requires powerful magical 
abilities behind it. Besides, "Kill him!" doesn't ensure the desired 
outcome, whereas a properly cast AK (unless it's cast at Harry) does 
seem to do the trick every time, doesn't it?

Have we not been instructed throughout the series that casting 
spells invites consequences to the spell caster, some consequences 
being more severe depending on the spell that was cast? 

As I have posted elsewhere on this thread, Sluggy said "commit" the 
murder, not *command* the murder. Commit (American Heritage® 
Dictionary: Description of commit,TRANSITIVE VERB: 1. To do, 
perform, or perpetrate: commit a murder.), as in by ones own *hand*, 
is my *figurative* usage clear here?
 
> Carol, who thinks that Tom would agree with me that *he* murdered 
> Myrtle

Mike, who *knows* that Hagrid was originally accused of Myrtles 
death and wasn't even sent to prison for it! What does a guy gotta 
do around here to win an Azkaban vacation?!