DH as Christian Allegory (was Classical & Biblical Quotations)

[Mari]

No: HPFGUIDX 173155

I'd like to weigh in on this topic as it's one I find very
interesting; JKR definitely intended to reference and on some level re
interpret the meaning of the Christian story in this series. Think
also about the two biblical quotations people mentioned previously in
this thread; isn't much of the story in this book about Harry learning
 to practice  the meaning of these passages; the last enemy to be
defeated IS death and Voldemort's heart/soul, unlike most of the
others who die in this book, cannot 'move on' because his treasure is
his horcruxes and his soul is split between and bound within them, and
thus bound to this world, unable to move onto the next.

I know there has been discussion about this particular reference
before, but I'd like to return to it again now that the series is
finished. I'm sure I remember reading on this list or elsewhere that
JKR knows and likes C.S Lewis' work. Keeping that in mind, consider
the quote below, from Lewis, regarding the use, in fantasy fiction, of
Christian symbols and metaphors:

"I thought I saw how stories of this kind could steal past certain
inhibitions which had paralyzed much of my own religion in
childhood. Why did one find it so hard to feel as one was told one
ought to feel about God or about the sufferings of Christ?

I thought the chief reason was that one was told one ought to. An
obligation to feel can freeze feelings. And reverence itself did
harm. The whole subject was associated with lowered voices, almost
as if it were something medical. But supposing that by casting all
these things into an imaginary world, stripping them of their
stained-glass and Sunday school associations, one could make them
for the first time appear in their real potency? Could one not thus
steal past those watchful dragons? I thought one could."

Now turn your minds to the long known translation of the Hogwarts
motto, which is "Never tickle a sleeping dragon". My feeling is that
this can be read as a subtle nod to Lewis, and the sleeping dragon
that JKR warns against tickling can be equated, at least partly, with
the watchful dragons C.S Lewis is using as an image in his discussion.

Since, like the Narnia stories, it is perfectly possible to enjoy the
HP series without bothering about any of this Christian or
mythological imagery on a conscious level I think that JKR, like
Lewis, has succeeded in stealing past the watchful/sleeping  dragons.
The Christian and mythological imagery is recast and reformulated in
the Potterverse, so that the significance, although clear upon re
reading, is not immediately apparent. 

Mari.