Dumbledore's plan

[Dana]

No: HPFGUIDX 177451

Carol responds:
> I used to think something similar, that the soul bits from the
> Horcruxes would go to the afterlife when the Horcrux container was
> destroyed, but that's not the implication I get from Dumbledore's or
> Hermione's words. Clearly, the thing under the bench is not the
> destroyed soul bit (see upthread). And if your interpretation were
> correct, there would be eight flayed babies (one for each piece of
> Voldie's soul, including the one within himself) lying around 
> waiting to be reunited in whatever Voldie's equivalent of King's 
> Cross is. In my view, there's only one baby, the soul that was in 
> Voldie himself,which became Vapor!mort, then was inside Fetal!mort 
> and then, "however maimed, reside[d] in his regenerate body" (DD to 
> Harry, HBP Am. ed.503), and, after his death, will lie forever 
> untouched and beyond comfort or restoration unless he feels 
> remorse, and even then cannot be whole because the Horcrux soul 
> bits have been destroyed because it has been mutilated beyond the 
> realms of what we might call 'usual evil'" (502). 

Dana:
I totally understand your interpretation but what I do not get is 
why? Why would it represent LV's conscious soul, while the only part 
of LV dying in connection to these events is the piece residing in 
Harry himself. A "living" soul would not have been able to be there 
and LV would not been able to get there because the soul bit in 
Nagini would still have prevented his living soul from moving on. 
LV's soul would not have been able to entire this limbo just as he 
couldn't leave after the events in GH. It makes no sense that the 
baby-like creature to represent LV's conscious "living" soul. 
DD's entire plan was to keep LV alive so Harry could return and in 
your scenarion this would have failed because like Harry, LV would 
truly have been death in that moment (which he couldn't because of 
Nagini).   

Just because JKR used the baby symbolism before in GoF doesn't mean 
that the baby-like creature is a reflection of the same thing. The 
only thing that is similar is its helplessness. 

Technically there indeed would at the time of Harry's near-death 
experience be 6 maimed soul pieces existing in limbo. We do not see 
them because this one is Harry's personal experience within his own 
personal limbo but I have no doubt that JKR meant for us to expect 
that LV would indeed witness the implications of the damage he 
brought onto each individual soul piece. 
Ask yourself this question, why would the conscious soul piece be 
part of Harry's personal near-death experience? It wouldn't but the 
soul piece residing in Harry would because it died at the same time 
Harry did and was very much part of Harry's life from the age of 15 
months. 

DD specifically states in the quote you posted above that LV's soul 
could, to some degree, be restored if LV would truly feel remorse for 
the damage (evil) he has done, not only to other people but 
especially to his own soul.  If DD was talking about that specific 
soul piece as if it where LV's conscious soul then this would be a 
moot point because the baby-like creature was incapable of doing 
anything at all. LV's conscious soul is the only one that could do 
anything for the soul piece we see in Harry's vision but only to some 
extent because the damage LV has caused to his own soul is so sever 
that nothing LV could ever do would make it able to be completely 
whole again. Damaging the soul is a universal sin not an earthly sin 
and therefore an earthly way of repenting the soul will never be 
enough to undo what is done. 

I know many people have objected to the imagery used to reflect the 
mutilation LV has put on his soul and many are repulsed by the idea 
that neither Harry nor DD tried to save or comfort it but essentially 
no one but LV himself could do anything for this particular soul 
piece. LV destroyed his own soul and it would mean that he would need 
to consciously make an effort to mend what he has broken to save any 
of his soul pieces. These soul pieces are therefore entirely 
dependent on LV's choice to make aments and he will never be able to 
restore his soul completely because the destruction of each 
individual soul piece has resulted in extra damage brought upon them. 
It is the ultimate evil in JKR's world and the piece we see in 
Harry's vision is just a reflection of the damage LV brought upon his 
soul.  Neither Harry nor DD could do anything for the baby-like 
creature because neither of them can undo the damage LV caused to 
it.  Neither Harry nor DD could comfort or take away its pain because 
it is caused by the absence of the other pieces that made up LV's 
soul in its entirety. 

LV's conscious soul (although this is speculation on my part) will 
probably indeed meet his 7 soul pieces in limbo and he will 
consciously experience their pain and will probably unlike Harry be 
able to disregard any of their murmurings and grovels. This will 
probably be LV's personal hell and he could have completely avoided 
this if he had respected the one holy part of human existence -> his 
own soul. It would not be a punishment for the ultimate crime against 
universal pureness if LV could not consciously experience the pain he 
caused. 

Anyway, everything you have brought forward is still true even if the 
soul piece was not actually LV's conscious soul and it actually makes 
more sense if it wasn't because if it was then LV's conscious soul 
would thus consciously have experienced the events as well and he 
would know what he would become and he would know that Harry had 
chosen to go back but he doesn't. 
Also (and I know logic is not JKR's strong suit) if LV had truly died 
in that event as we are to presume Harry did then Harry would no 
longer have the ability to go back because LV's body (as the blood 
was the binding factor anchoring Harry's soul to the world of the 
living) would have been death. So while LV's soul would still have 
his soul piece residing in Nagini enabling him to come back, Harry 
would have lost that opportunity if LV would have been death in that 
specific moment.  
 
Carol:
> But making the Horcruxes has mutilated Voldie's soul to the extent 
> that it may be damaged beyond repair, and, IMO, cannot be fully 
> restored even by remorse after the soul bits have been destroyed.
> What makes me think they were utterly destroyed and not just waiting
> beyond the Veil or at the Voldie equivalent of King's Cross to 
> rejoin him? 
<big snip>

Dana:
Well I think our difference in interpretation comes from our 
differences in our understanding of the concept "beyond the veil" as 
it is presented in the Potter verse in relation to what we witness in 
Harry's vision. 

I do not perceive Harry's experience as passing beyond the veil. To 
me, Harry would only have gone beyond the veil if he had, so to 
speak, taken the train and moved on. Harry was actually in limbo. 
This is the place where Nearly Headless Nick decided he was to scared 
to find out where the train would be going and where he decided to go 
back to the land of the living but because his body was no longer 
there he remains in this plane as a mere imprint of his previous 
self. 

LV's soul pieces do not have the ability to move on because they have 
no individuality to make such choices or decisions. They are not 
individual souls but just pieces of what was once one complete soul 
and although LV was able to "live" with his soul shattered all over 
the place, he can only move on to the afterlife as one soul and 
because he will never be able to achieve this point completely he 
will remain in limbo for eternity. He will neither be here nor there 
and thus will not be able to enjoy the rewards of the afterlife as 
normal souls would. He will also not be able to go back as a ghost 
because his soul pieces with anchor him to this limbo and neither 
could he move forward for this same reason. 

LV got the ultimate punishment. He split his soul so they would 
anchor him to the world of the living and they will still perform 
this function after his conscious died as they now will anchor him to 
the limbo of his own creation too. 

To answer your last question (in the way I see it of course) then LV 
will not be joined by his soul pieces but LV will be joining them. 

Carol:
> for whom the whole point of the flayed baby is its representation 
> of the Voldie soul's future state, a point that could not be made 
> if the baby were the destroyed soul bit.

Dana:
Why? Wouldn't it be far more impressing if LV would be confronted 
with the damage he caused without really being able to undo that 
damage but eternally trying then to be a creature without real 
awareness or consciousness? A baby is helpless and so are LV's 
individual soul pieces, except the one that has consciousness. 

JMHO

Dana