Do you agree? (Harry as Horcrux)

[Geoff Bannister]

No: HPFGUIDX 164017

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, Scarah <scarah at ...> wrote:
>
> > Geoff:
> > Just to clarify things, Slughorn does use the word "encase"....
> >
> > "Well," said Slughorn uncomfortably, "you must understand that the soul is supposed 
to
> > remain intact and whole. Splitting it is an act of violation, it is against nature."
> > "But how do you do it?"
> > "By an act of evil - the supreme act of evil. By committing murder. Killing rips the soul 
apart.
> > The wizard intent upon creating a Horcrux would use the damage to his own 
advantage" he
> > would encase the torn portion -"
> > "Encase? but how -?"'
> > (HBP "Horcruxes" p.465 UK edition)
> 
> Sarah:
> Yes, you're right.  I usually look it up first and this time I failed
> to, so, conceded, he said "Encased."
> 
> However.  I don't believe that the use of the word "Encased"
> automatically equals "Magic done after the fact."
> 
> You snipped the rest of my post.  There is so much magic in the
> Potterverse that involves preparing an object first and having that
> object react later, that I can't even quote it all.  Can you respond
> to any of that?

Geoff:
The reason I snipped the post is that I merely wanted to point out 
that Slughorn obviously did know things about Horcruxes and what 
their function was.

Moving on, to be quite frank I find myself unable to really draw 
conclusions about the dratted things except that I hold to my view 
that Harry is a Non-crux - a view which I shall maintain until since 
time as it might possibly be disproved. i.e. the launch of Book 7.

Ever since I read HBP and the long drawn-out threads began to analyse, 
dissect and theorise over these objects, I have increasingly found them 
annoying. We have talked recently about the wizard soul and, in message 
163780, I posed the rhetorical questions "However, if a person is made 
into a Horcrux, where does the soul piece reside? Indeed, what form 
does a soul fragment take? Where does our own soul reside for that 
matter? Can we see it, touch it?"

As a Christian, I ponder over where my soul is. I suppose that many of 
us think of it as being inside our heads, like thoughts and feelings etc. 
But the fact is that I, along with other believers like myself, consider that,
although it is an intangible, it covers more than our thoughts and  
feelings. It is the essential 'me' which I believe will go into the afterlife.

The fact that JKR is manipulating something which is intangible rather 
like a specific object is what both puzzles and annoys me. Someone has 
likened a Horcrux to a cake tin with the soul inside able to be sliced like  
a swiss roll or equivalent. But I postulated recently that maybe when a 
person loses a soul fragment that it is like removing air from a balloon. 
and that the remaining soul fragments expand to fill the remaining space. 
But how do you capture an intangible piece of soul and contain it? Is it 
like a container of say, a rare gas, where it is kept in an airtight container 
- i.e. the wizard's body somewhere and then transferred to another 
airtight container, namely the Horcrux.

>From which, one asks, how can an intangible soul fragment be held in 
stasis in a ring or a diary or a locket. We cannot pinpoint where our soul 
resides in us and cannot visualise a situation where it is elsewhere. Jesus 
talked about a person losing their soul but did not go further into 
specifics; perhaps the warning was enough.

The other thoughts about Horcruxes which come to me are why JKR 
introduced them so late in the plot. By Book 6, we were begining to try 
to crystallise our thinking about the possible end games to the battle and 
suddenly we have these mysterious new objects littering the countryside 
and Harry apparently having to occupy himself in frantically trying to find 
them and deal with in a way that satisfies the story and ties up umpteen 
loose ends in the space of a reasonably-sized Book 7.

Another member emailed me today off-group to agree with my comment 
about threatening to form an I-Hate-Horcruxes-Club because she had 
disliked them form the word 'go'. I suspect that opinion will be divided 
on their function and usefulness but I hope that Book 7 will provide a few 
more tangible answers to an irritatingly intangible creation....