Splitting the Soul (was: Voldemort killed personally)

[Mike]

No: HPFGUIDX 157454

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Ken Hutchinson" wrote:
> > Karen F here---
> > 
> > Could it be that when bits of soul are released from their
> > encasement they aren't actually destroyed at all but return
> > back to their original source? Could it be that once all the   
> > bits are back where they came from, the original owner of the 
> > soul bits can then be truly  mortal again? Will we maybe 
> > start to see Voldemort start to return to an aged Tom Riddle
> > in appearance?

Mike:
I'd like to postulate a slight variation. I, too, think that all the 
soul bits are trying to return to the *spiritual* home base, or the 
main/primary soul piece, if you prefer. The variation: by seperating 
the soul bits and forcing them to exist away from home, these bits 
can no longer be reincorporated to form a complete soul. 

I analogize this to cutting up a magnet then trying to put it back 
together. First, you lose something in the cutting. Then, each piece 
becomes it's own magnet with both poles, but much weaker than the 
original and the original is diminished. Finally, the magnet pieces 
are attracted to each other, but they will never be one whole magnet 
again, and will never regain their original strength/capacity.
 
> 
> Ken:
> 
> There is a tradition that humans are three-part (we are created in
> God's image) as is the God of Abraham. People often speak of "body,
> soul, and spirit". The body is the obvious physical container of 
> the other two. The soul is our eternal essence. The spirit? To me 
> it is our conscious self. Voldemort and Slughorn seem to confirm 
> this view in the Horcruxes chapter of HBP (p 497, US HB):
> 
> ******************************************
> <snipping the canon>
> ******************************************
> 
> Notice that body, soul, and spirit are all mentioned above. Later 
> on DD says "Never forget, though, that while his soul may be 
> damaged beyond repair, his brain and his magical powers remain 
> intact" (p 509). DD can't mean his physical brain since that is 
> long gone, he must mean his intellect which along with his magical 
> powers must be part of LV's spirit. I take this all to mean that 
> while his physical body may be destroyed (and regenerated) LV's 
> spirit remains active in the world as long as part of his soul 
> remains in the world.
>
> Notice something else that I only noticed today: Slughorn says 
> that if the body is destroyed *part* of the soul remains undamaged 
> and Earthbound. I think the implication is that the part encased 
> in the horcrux(es) remains, the part that was in the body is sent 
> on. This is enough to keep the bodiless and apparently weakened 
> spirit Earthbound too. This suggests that unless one of his soul 
> fragments is embedded in Harry's scar all of the fragments in LV's 
> body that night at GH have been sent through the veil. It kind of 
> implies that LV's regenerated body has no soul inside it, doesn't 
> it? He appears to be running on the soul bits in his scattered 
> (or not) horcruxes. <snip>

Mike:
Man, I really like this theory. It makes a lot of sense to me!! If I 
could add my analogy from above, the soul is like the magnet that 
binds the spirit to the body. When the AK rebounded onto LV, his 
body was destroyed. To be fair, his soul and spirit could still be 
together, but it plays better if the connection between his soul and 
spirit was severed. Either you believe this soul piece went into 
Harry (like I do) or that soul piece was lost to this world. I have 
my opinion, but all of these work as consequences of the rebounded 
AK and none of them violate canon, IMO.

This magnet has it's own qualities, it is not simply glue for 
holding the spirit and body together. As Lupin told Harry in PoA, 
responding to Harry's question regarding the Dementor's Kiss:

***********************************************************
You can exist without your soul, you know, as long as your brain and 
heart are still working. But you'll have no sense of self anymore, 
no memory, no ... anything. There's no chance of recovery. You'll 
just -- exist. As an empty shell.
***********************************************************

Now Lupin is prone to hyperbole, but if the soul is the magnet, then 
removing it from the body would also disengage the spirit. This 
would leave the body with no intellect, as well as no sense of self 
nor memories. Either the spirit remains attached to the soul or, 
barring any seperated, earthbound soul bits, the spirit departs this 
world.

Horcruxes seem to embody not only a truncated "sense of self" but 
also seems to contain some intellect, some of the spirit. So when LV 
lost his body at GH, he was "less than spirit, less than the meanest 
ghost". It appears that parts of his spirit were also torn away and 
included in the Horcruxes. Notice he was not only less than the 
meanest ghost, he was also less than spirit.


> Ken again:
> 
> unless one of you can explain how LV's new body can have a resident
> soul fragment. I suppose he could have pulled one from a horcrux, 
> that would make Harry's job easier except he would not know that 
> one more was accounted for. Perhaps Hermione will figure that out 
> for him.

Mike again:
Exactly. Why did Voldemort's spirit go to Albania? Granted, there 
probably weren't a lot of aurors there, but there weren't any DEs to 
help him there either. What was in Albania that he needed? How about 
one of his Horcruxes. If he could just get one of his DEs to come to 
rescue him, he could instruct him/her on how to make a rudimentary 
body, but he needed a piece of soul to bind his spirit to that body. 
We all know the rest of that story.

Maybe that particular Horcrux was well hidden, but not protected by 
the kind of defences the ring or the locket had. He knew where and 
wouldn't have a problem retreiving it. Can you imagine Vapormort 
trying to retreive the locket Horcrux from the cave? Or trying to 
get a DE to do it in a way that would still leave him/her functional 
to perform the magic he needed afterward? And DD almost died trying 
to retrieve the ring. What chance did anyone but LV have at 
retrieving either of these two? Besides, hanging around Britain in 
his Vapormort state must not have looked too appealing to him.

> Ken again:
> However we know that DD made one mistake in his 
> Frank/Nagini/horcrux theory: It was LV not Nagini that killed 
> Frank. Here we have a second possible mistake. It is looking more 
> and more like DD was trying to plant some inconsistencies in 
> Harry's mind to give him the clues to figure out that he is a
> horcrux too. Having partially regained Carol's respect by finding 
> a way to confirm her Nagini theory I now put myself beyond the 
> Pale again.

Mike:
I agree with you, but let's leave it here, shall we? Not much sense 
in getting Carol mad at us. <g>