The Sword of Gryffindor

[jkoney65]

No: HPFGUIDX 182595

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Carol" <justcarol67 at ...> wrote:
> Carol responds:
> 
> I agree with you that the Hat itself is not responding to the plea 
for
> help (surely, it's the Sword of Gryffindor that's responding, coming
> out of the Hat only after Harry calls for help, with the hat having
> been brought by Fawkes, not coming to Harry on its own).
> 
> Also, I agree that Dumbledore, himself a Gryffindor, arranged those
> particular protections for Gryffindor Harry: his own
> Gryffindor-colored Phoenix, Fawkes, and the Sword of Gryffindor--
with
> the Hat as not so much a conduit as a container that Fawkes can 
easily
> grasp in his claws. That the Sword also comes out of the Sorting Hat
> for Neville in DH (after LV has Summoned the Hat--it doesn't come on
> its own) suggests that this particular arrangement was placed on it
> either by Dumbledore bdfore Harry's encounter with Slytherin's
> monster, or, more likely, by the original owner of the Sorting Hat,
> Godric Gryffindor. And, with or without Dumbledore, the Sword 
responds
> to Gryffindors under conditions of "need and valor." (I don't think 
it
> would have come to a Gryffindor outside the school or the grounds 
had
> it not been for Snape, however, and he, of course, was acting on
> Portrait!DD's orders. It certainly didn't magically appear to Harry 
in
> the graveyard in GoF or when he faced Nagini in DH, to give just two
> examples. If the Sword appeared to him whenever he needed it, with 
or
> without the Sorting Hat, his life would be much easier!)

Geoff:
Dumbledore's actual words are:
'"You will also find that help will always be given at Hogwarts to
those who ask for it."'
(COS "Cornelius Fudge" p. 195 UK edition)

Note two things. Help will be given "at Hogwarts" and also, not to
"those who need" but to those "who ask". Which is a very different
scenario.


Jack-A-Roe responds:

I think Geoff's quote answers alot of Carol's arguments. Help will be 
given at Hogwart's if you ask for it. The Chamber is part of Hogwarts 
and Harry did ask. By doing so he received the sword.

I don't think Dumbledore did any preparation work. What he did was 
give us clue as to how Harry ended up with the sword. 

Fawkes was summoned by Harry's devotion to Dumbledore. As to why 
Fawkes grabbed the hat, I can only say that perhaps Fawkes is more 
intelligent then people give him credit for. Perhaps he knew that 
Harry could draw the sword out of the hat.



Carol:
> 
> As I said earlier, I think that DD knew that Harry would be facing a
> Basilisk in the Chamber of Secrets and arranged his protections
> accordingly. But *he* did not hear Harry's cry for help; he had been
> evicted from the school by the Board of Governors under threat from
> Lucius Malfoy. If it were the HoH who heard the plea, it would have
> been McGonagall, not Dumbledore, who sent them, but it's clear from
> both Diary!Tom's words about "Dumbledore's defender" (Harry) and 
DD's
> own words in Hagrid's Hut that it's DD who arranged the protections 
to
> be sent when the need arose. (The "songbird" and "old hat" appear 
when
>  Harry expresses loyalty to DD, and Fawkes blinds the Basilisk 
before
> it can attack Harry, also crying to heal his wounds with Phoenix 
tears
> just as he's about to expire from the venom; the sword appears only
> when he cries for help, showing "need." he has already shown "valor"
> by standing up to Memory!Tom--or Horcrux!Tom as I suppose we should
> not call him.)

Jack-A-Roe:
If Dumbledore was really manipulating things would he have let Harry 
face a Basilisk alone. Fawkes didn't get there until after Harry 
would have had a chance to look at it. If he had looked into it's 
eyes than he would have died. That is not much of a plan.




Carol: 
> Does "help will always come at Hogwarts to those who need it" really
> apply? We see Snape saving Draco (and he also saves Montague from 
the
> toilet after he finds a way out of the Vanishing Cabinet), and until
> the Battle of Hogwarts, no one (except Quirrell, who has forfeited 
any
> right to the school's protection) actually dies in the school or on
> its grounds. 


Jack-A-Roe:
What about Myrtle?

Carol:
If the school were as protected as Snape and DD believe it
> is, DEs could not have gotten into the school in HBP. Neither, for
> that matter, could Fake!Moody in GoF, Umbridge in OoP, and the 
Carrows
> in DH.


Jack-A-Roe:
The DE's got in in HBP because they used the cabinet which 
circumvented all of the protections. No one other than Draco had 
thought of that idea. In DH, Snape was running the school and would 
have let them in. Umbridge didn't start out with attempting to hurt 
the students and that could be why she got through the wards.

I thought the Sword only got covered in Basilisk blood. When did it 
get the venom on it?