[HPforGrownups] Re: Baptism/Christianity in HP: was Looking for God in Harry Potter

[Magpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 153680

Gerry:
> ?????? Only if you believe that Christians, and in this case Christian
> mums have the monopoly on sacrificing themselves for others. Which is
> arrogant to say the least. Lily's sacrifice is a sacrifice of love and
> love is something universal. I'm sorry, but I find this statement
> offensive.


Magpie:
Sorry, it wasn't meant to be--I feel the same way as you do about it.  What 
I meant was that if one (presumably a Christian) describes any good act as 
"Christ-like" then one would describe any mother sacrificing herself as 
Christ-like whether or not that mother was Christian herself.   Christ-like 
is being used there just as a synonym for good behavior, and Lily would not 
need to be Christian to do it.  As you said and I agree, Christian mothers 
have no monopoly on motherly instincts or any sort of good behavior. Did I 
make that more clear?  I do completely understand the annoyance with the 
term, but was saying that if one describes Lily's action as Christ-like it's 
not because of Lily herself being Christian or not.  Lily being Jewish or 
Hindu would not have changed her actions at all. (Heh--this reminds me of 
someone once telling me she helped an old woman across the sreet and the 
woman said she was a good Christian.  She informed her she was Jewish and 
the woman said she was a good Christian anyway.  Err...gee, thanks.)

> Leslie41:
> Most if not all of Rowling's names have a secondary meaning, from
> Remus Lupin to Dolores Umbridge to Lucius Malfoy to Voldemort.
>
> All of them, *all* of them, have secondary meanings.
>
> Arthur means "noble and courageous"
> Remus Lupin is a double play on the wolf motif.
> Dolores Umbridge means "deceitful shadow" (plus other
> interpretations)
> Lucius Malfoy is a play on Lucifer and the French "bad faith".
> Voldemort means "flee from death"
>
> I would go on, but it would take too long.
>

Magpie:
It would take too long and it would really not always have any value.  All 
names have meanings, period.  If the names have an extra meaning the text 
makes clear it's fun to see it, but the author's also populating a  world in 
Great Britain in the 90s where everyone has to be named something.

Leslie:
> Arthur means "noble and courageous"

Magpie:
And so could be applied to lots of characters in the HP verse.  She's got 
eight regular boy names to find for the Weasley family.  I think she's going 
more for the types of names they'd have.  They all have nice, solid, guy 
names, with the nerdy one having the nerdiest name.  Charlie works with 
dragons so might seem to fit a dragon-ish name, but Charlie (meaning man, 
also naming English kings) fits him more than Draco.

Leslie:
> Remus Lupin is a double play on the wolf motif.

Magpie:
Yes, and that's confirmed by Remus being a wolf in canon.  Same with Fenrir 
Greyback.  No stretching required.

Leslie:
> Dolores Umbridge means "deceitful shadow" (plus other
> interpretations)

Magpie:
The other interpretations are more correct.  Umbridge/Umbrage is far more 
connected to the meaning "offense" rather than "shadow."  As in "to take 
umbrage at her rudeness."  Umbridge causes other people to take umbrage.  It 
also means shadow/to afford shade, but canon supports the first meaning. 
It's funny.

Dolores means sorrows and comes from one of the titles of the Virgin Mary. 
Do you think she's supposed to be the Virgin Mary?  Because I think JKR just 
thought Dolores was the right kind of name for her because it's kind a 
girlie feel to it.

Leslie:
Lucius Malfoy is a play on Lucifer and the French "bad faith".

Magpie:
Lucius is also a name in itself which means light, with other Luciuses 
appearing in history and in the world today.  But let's look at the 
connection to Lucifer--how far does it work?  Certainly Lucius Malfoy is 
bad, so a devilish name fits him.  But associating him literally with 
Lucifer himself is a little problematic given the mess he seems to have made 
of his life by HBP, and his ties to his family.  He seems quite human by 
now, perhaps more echoing one of the Roman Luciuses more than Lucifer. 
Voldemort as the bigger bad and Lucius' leader is more in the role of the 
devil if there is one.

Malfoy is definitely bad faith, a meaning which became more clear when Draco 
Malfoy's story in HBP actually illustrated the meaning of the term as Sartre 
used it.  Apparently people had suggested the Sartre meaning before, but 
people didn't think much of the theory because until then it didn't show 
much about canon.  Now it does, so people see it more.  Before that it 
seemed like it probably just meant they had faith in a bad set of ideas. 
Both meanings work--it's a great name.  However, had Draco stuck with his 
original name I don't think it would have had any meaning beyond "Spungen" 
being an ugly name.

Leslie:
> Voldemort means "flee from death"

Magpie:
Yes, it does.  And Tom means "twin" and was also the name of an 
apostle...so?  Tom Riddle doesn't like it because, as he says, there are 
lots of Toms.  Sometimes names are important because of their meaning, 
sometimes, imo, they are chosen because they just fit the character.  I 
think sometimes you're blurring the two.  Merope's name is more obviously 
chosen for its meaning because it's both unusual in the modern 
English-speaking world and her story contains connections to the name.  Mark 
Evans name turned out to be equally unremarkable.


Leslie:
So, when Voldemort (flee from death) attacks James (apostle
associated with good deeds) and Lily (the symbol of the risen
Christ), and is foiled by Harry (power, destruction), right on the
place on his body where he was baptized (symbol of being welcomed
into the Kingdom of Christ), yeah, I think there's an underlying
meaning there.

Magpie:
And I agree with a_svirn--what is that meaning, exactly?  Because it's seems 
to add up to gobbledy gook.  Voldemort's name is chosen by himself "flight 
from death" because he is seeking immortality.  He attacks James, who shares 
his name with two apostles, one of whom was apparently known for good works 
though James Potter was not particularly that we've seen (does this make 
Seamus James the Lesser?).  James has also been one of the most popular 
names in the English speaking world since James I.  I think the name 
actually comes from Jacob, meaning "to take by the heel/one who trips up 
another/supplanter."

James is married to Lily, a flower which is often used in Christian art to 
represent purity.  A particularly lily is called the Easter lily (a holiday 
never celebrated in canon; our Lily dies on Halloween).  Their son's name is 
Harry, which I have always heard means "home ruler" or "army ruler," has 
also been shared by English kings and is a very popular English name.  I 
believe it's the author's favorite.  You have found a definition about power 
and destruction, and say this means Harry is about power and 
destruction--not.

Harry gets a lightning bolt on his forehead (a symbol with its own rich 
history, some of which includes other gods) where everyone can see it, and 
in a place that's got meanings in other cultures as well.

I'm not seeing any coherent meaning there.  Of all the Christian things 
you've thrown in the ones that could possibly resonate for me are a) 
Lily=purity in a general way and b) Harry's getting his scar could be seen 
as a type of baptism by fire/death because it's a general marking.

Leslie:
What's *there* is what matters, not what the author
> *intended* to be there.  Authors are notoriously bad readers of
> their own work.

Magpie:
But it seems very few readers agree that a lot of this stuff is there 
either.

Leslie:
Just can't help it, considering all the evidence.  Is Harry's
baptism some sort of protection for him?  Not really.  But I think
the place of his scar is supposed to remind us of his baptism and
remind us that it is only through Christ's principles that he will
vanquish Voldemort.  Not through power or destructive raids.  But
through love.

Magpie:
And to me if the scar has a connection to baptism at all it's that, as I 
said above, Voldemort's marking him could remind me of a sort of perverted 
baptism.  He's marking Harry as his own.

Leslie:
Your milage may vary, of course, but I think I've shown that there
is AMPLE evidence in canon to at least CONSIDER a deeply Christian
interpretation.

Magpie:
But having considered it I've got no reason to accept it because you haven't 
shown ample evidence.  Nothing adds up in a way makes me see more meaning in 
the story.

Leslie:
See it or don't.  It doesn't mean it's not there.

Magpie:
Or that it is there.

Tonks:
I know that we as a group argue over this issue every time it comes
up. I think what the problem is here is that some of us see symbols
that we recognize as explicitly Christian. Now that can occur as a
coincidence in a work of this size, but when it occurs over and over
one has to stop and ask "why?, What is the author doing?" And I
don't think any of us has an answer to that. But we see *something*
going on beneath the surface.  Like any other clue we try to report
it here. I agree with Leslie that it doesn't seem to be taken well
when we do. I tend to think that this is because people don't want
to think that JKR is pulling something over on them in some
subliminal way. But that is JMO.

Magpie:
And I think that since neither of you have been able to come with anything 
coherent yourselves it's unfair to imply that people are just not taking it 
well due to their personal biases against the idea.  Your friend's knowing 
that Lupin meant wolf is backed up in the text so that everyone can see 
it--he's even got a double wolfy name, as does Fenrir Greyback.  It's there 
within the story.    The connection to Sirius being the dog star is also 
there in canon--he's a dog.  (Btw, Sirius is the brightest star in the night 
sky,  not the morning star.  Venus is the morning star.  Jesus has been 
called the morning star, but so has Lucifer--Lucifer literally was the 
morning star in Roman astronomy.  Personally, of those two, I've always 
heard Lucifer associated with the term far more than Jesus.)  The framework 
of a house actually is detectable in the house itself.  This stuff seems 
more like seeing faces in the molding.

Tonks:
> Drop: In an interview JKR says that DD is not Jesus. Hum.. why use
> those words? She could have said "he is not Merlin, he is not ____.
> why "not Jesus"  if she did not mean for us to think about the
> connection?  She did not say "he is not Christ".

Gerry
Because lots of fans hope he is not really dead. And actually, I think
that Merlin is quite a good comparison.

Magpie:
Actually, if I remember the context of that interview wasn't JKR being asked 
about Christian themes?  It seems like when she said "Dumbledore is not 
Jesus" she also meant "He is not Christ" (and also, I think, that he wasn't 
coming back from the dead).

-m