HBP chapters 24-26 Post DH look

[Carol]

No: HPFGUIDX 184458

Pippin:
>Carol earlier:
> What, DD would think, is "the power that the Dark Lord knows not"?
> Obviously, love. Ergo, Love Magic would be Harry's best protection. 
> 
> Pippin:
> Dumbledore may well have been  a student of Greek myth, but if he
was, he wouldn't need a prophecy to tell him he should look for
Voldemort's Achilles heel.  JKR shows us that Dumbledore already knew
that Voldemort's disdain for the power of love was his great weakness.

Carol again:
Possibly. But the Prophecy states that *Harry* will have "the power
that the Dark Lord knows not" (which DD would deduce is Love), and he
would think about why that might be true (Lily must have sacrificed
her life to save him) and how that power could be used to protect Baby
Harry so that he, in turn, could use it later to defeat Voldemort.
*Unless* Harry has the power to vanquish the Dark Lord, as the
Prophecy indictes, he, as a soul-bit carrier, is more dangerous alive
than dead. As a Horcrux, he has to die at some point to destroy the
soul bit (or so DD would think at that time). But as the Prophecy Boy,
he has to live long enough to vanquish Voldemort, and, as both DD's
knowledge of Voldemort and his awareness of the Prophecy indicate, the
best protection he can have is Love Magic.
 
 Pippin: 
> Dumbledore couldn't use love magic directly to protect  people
besides Harry because other people hadn't been the object of a
sacrifice like Lily's. But Harry, having been given that power,
*could* use it to protect others, once he grew strong enough.  That,
not the prophecy itself, gave Harry strategic value. 

Carol:
How would Dumbledore know that the boy with the soul bit in his head
could use Love magic to help others if it weren't for the Prophecy?
Assuming, that is, that DD even knew about the soul bit. 

Pippin:
> That Harry turned out to have some of Voldemort's powers as well was
an added bonus, but not, IMO, the main reason that Dumbledore chose
Harry as his secret weapon. 

Carol:
Shrug. We can't know what DD thought. We can only look at his actions
and what we know of his character traits and draw inferences from
there. Dumbledore is not one to throw away helpful information,
especially after he sees aspects of the Prophecy actually fulfilled.
Voldemort *has* marked Harry (who was born as the seventh month dies)
as his equal, which seems to mean that Harry will have powers unique
to him (and LV). If that part is true, the parts about Harry being
"the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord" and his having "the
power that the Dark Lord knows not" (Love magic) must also be true.
How and why would he have the power of Love? Because Lily died to save
him. How to preserve that power, which can only come into play via
Harry if his life is protected? Protect him until he's old enough
using that same magic, which can only be done throug the blood he
shared with Lily, which can only mean Petunia.
> 
Pippin: 
> I am not sure why you conclude that Dumbledore was giving
extraordinary protection to the Potters, protection that other people
would not get if Dumbledore knew for certain that they were being
hunted by Voldemort himself.   There is no reason to think that the
Order's headquarters in VWI wasn't protected by the secret-keeper
spell along with other safe houses just as in VW2. Probably an Auror
was assigned to shadow the Muggle Prime Minister, too. 

Carol:
I disagree. Only the Potters were protected by a Fidelius Charm, which
DD suggested to them alone because of Snape's request. He would have
been the Secret Keeper himself if they had allowed it. That the others
were not similarly protected (except perhaps at Order HQ) is indicated
by the large numbers of Order members who died in VW1, systematically
wiped out by DEs and in some cases by Voldemort himself. The whole
McKinnon family, the Prewett brothers, Benjy Fenwick ("We only ever
found bits of him"), Edgar Bones, and I can't remember who else died
simply because Voldemort was targeting Order members (no doubt on
information supplied to him by Wormtail).

Pippin: 
> Of course Order members died, just as the Potters did, because
Dumbledore's protection is not an impenetrable shield. 

Carol responds:
As far as I can see, the other Order members didn't receive
Dumbledore's protection at all, given all the large number who were
murdered or died fighting. And if a Fidelius Charm had been placed on
the original Order HQ, the Order could have continued to use it when
they re-formed between GoF and OoP, instead of needing new HQ at 12
GP. If Dumbledore himself had placed the Fidelius Charm on the cottage
(and perhaps the yard) at Godric's Hollow, the shield *would* have
been impenetrable because LV, even if he knew where they were hiding,
would not have been able to see or hear them, and in any case, no one
would have told him where they were. That the Fidelius Charm was
broken was no fault of Dumbledore's or the charm itself; it was the
fault of a Secret Keeper who broke the faith that had been placed in him.

Pippin:
> People may be drawn out of hiding as Harry was in OOP, or they may
prefer to rely on their own resources, like Karkaroff and Slughorn, or
they may consider that Dumbledore was exaggerating the danger as James
and Lily did in dismissing the idea that one of their friends was a
traitor, or they may be killed in action like Sirius. I assume the
latter is how most of the Order members killed in VWI met their end,
just as in VW2. 

Carol:
I'm not sure what your point is. Surely, all those Order members
weren't drawn out of the safety of homes protected by the Fidelius
Charm. The Potters, so far as we know, are the only people who
actually went into hiding, the only ones on whose home or hiding place
a Fidelius charm was placed. Sure, restless James could have ventured
out without his Invisibility Cloak once DD brilliantly took it away,
perhaps trusting to his ability to transform into a stag to protect
him (not that he wouldn't be conspicuous wandering around Godric's
Hollow in that form! Then, again, he could Apparate to a forest where
he could safely run around, assuming that he didn't encounter any
humters, and get rid of his pent-up enerby). But while he, Lily, and
Harry were actually inside  the cottage (and perhaps the grounds),
they were perfectly safe from everything but treachery. It's not DD's
fault that they chose the wrong Secret Keeper, nor is it the fault of
the Fidelius Charm itself, which was locked inside the SK until he
chose to reveal it. If the SK had been Dumbledore, they would have
been safe. (Just how LV would have been defeated in that case, there
being no Prophecy Boy with a soul bit in his forehead and "the power
that the Dark Lord knows not" because his mother had died to save
him.) Would Dumbledore have found all the Horcruxes by himself?
Apparently not. He'd have died from the cursed ring, with no Severus
Snape to save him, because Snape would have remained a loyal Death
Eater if not for the Prophecy. And if not for the Prophecy, and LV
acting to thwart it, there would have been no thirteen-year-respite
when the AK fired at the Prophecy backfired and vaporized Voldemort.
Events like those in DH (minus Headmaster Snape and HRH) would have
taken place much sooner. LV would have taken over the entire British
WW, followed by the European WW, and who knows where from there. The
Order members were the almost only people fighting him, and they were
being picked off one by one. Scrimgeour, Mr. Crouch, and Madam Bones
would have been killed sooner. We saw how the WW at large opposed LV.
They didn't. The idea that a Prophecy existed did, however, give them
hope that *Harry* would save them, and the few who fought at the end
did so because of Harry. 

Pippin: 
> It was obvious that Harry was still in danger after Voldemort's fall
since the DE's might try to take revenge on him, but why should
Dumbledore suppose that the DE's would  attack the Longbottoms? It
still isn't clear why Bella thought they would know where Voldemort was. 

Carol:
True, unless we consider that any at-large DEs would want to attack
and kill any remaining Order members (and Aurors) out of revenge or to
avoid arrest. But I'm not talking about protection *after* Voldemort's
fall (except as it regards the Prophecy Boy). I'm talking about
*before* Voldemort's fall. It was only the Potters, Order members
both, who were told to go into hiding because LV was specifically
targeting them, and only the Potters who were (belatedly) told to use
a Fidelius Charm, which DD himself offered to perform. Why would that
be the case unless Dumbledore *believed* that Harry was or would by
some means become the Prophecy Boy, "the one with the power to
vanquish Voldemort"? He could not foretell that the Fidelius Charm
would be broken or that LV would break his own promise to Snape to
spare Lily, setting up the Love magic resulting from her self-sacrifice.

It seems to me that, at first, Dumbledore ignored the Prophecy, doing
nothing beyond taking Trelawney under his protection. Then, told by
Snape how LV interpreted the Prophecy and prompted by Snape's
desperate pleas (and his promise to do "anything") to take action to
protect the Potters, DD sent them into hiding. He may at that point
have started to take the Prophecy seriously. Sure, Harry was in
danger, but so were many other people, including innocent children.
But *what if* the Prophecy was valid? What if Harry Potter really was
"the one with the power"? Best to take extraordinary measures to
protect him. Hence, the Fidelius Charm suggestion. And when that
failed, DD would see parts of the Prophecy (other than "born as the
seventh month dies") coming true. And he would study the Prophecy in
all its implications, deciding that Harry must be protected rather
than kidnapped and killed by his supposed DE godfather, and how best
to go about it using the very magic suggested by the Prophecy, Love
magic. As for what powers Harry would share with LV that made him LV's
"equal," powers that must reside in the place where he was "marked,"
only time would tell.

IMO, Dumbledore, like LV, believed that Harry was or might be "the one
with the power." Consequently, he not only protected him (rather than
letting the soul bit be destroyed at the first opportunity) but tested
and trained him, as he would not have done if he had no faith in the
Prophecy, part of which had already been fulfilled at Godric's Hollow.
Had he never heard the Prophecy, of course, events would have been
entirely different (as they would have been if another DE had
overheard the Prophecy and relayed it to LV without remorse). Whether
DD actually believed the Prophecy or only thought that it might come
true after LV acted on it and "mark[ed Harry] as his equal," he acted
*as if* he believed it, which, ultimately, is all that matters.

The very existence of the Prophecy (which, of course, is fulfilled in
the end) shapes the story. If there had been no Prophecy, the Potters
would not have gone into hiding. They would have been targeted like
any other Order members and probably would not have survived. Harry
might have been killed like the McKinnon children. If he survived,
orphaned or not, and attended Hogwarts, it would have been a Hogwarts
run by LV, with only one House, Slytherin. He would have had no
special powers, only those he inherited from his parents. DD, perhaps
the lone survivor among those who had opposed Voldemort, would have
died from the ring curse, not even having the opportunity to find the
fake locket and be killed alone in the cave.

Or DD could have heard the Prophecy, which was overheard and reported
to LV by a DE other than Snape, but not believed it at that point.
Without Snape to tell him that LV was specifically targeting the
Potters, he would not have sent them into hiding and suggested the
Fidelius Charm. The Potters, including Harry, would have been killed
because LV had made no promise to Snape to protect Lily. Oops. No
story, or at least no story of Harry Potter. There would be no Chosen
One, no boy with a soul bit in his scar that gave him powers like
Voldemort's, as well as the special protection granted by his mother's
self-sacrifice, which differed from the sacrifices of other mothers
because she had a chance to live. (No other Prophecy-reporting DE
would have made the request that Snape made of LV.)

The Prophecy is absolutely central to the story as written. LV's
actions, Snape's actions, DD's actions, and Harry's actions are all
shaped and partly determined by it, as are the fates of Harry and LV.
It's not that they must die because the Prophecy says so, but that
knowing all or part of the Prophecy shapes their actions, as do the
parts of the Prophecy that come true early on ("born as the seventh
month dies," "the power that the Dark Lord knows not," "mark him as
his equal"). The scar, tied in with the Prophecy, also shapes the
action as the means by which Harry comes to understand Voldemort and
the reason why Harry himself must be sacrificed. Love magic again
comes into play without that sacrifice.

Take qway the Prophecy, and you don't have a book, or, at least, it's
a very different book.

Carol, not much interested in reading about DE!Snape, ordinary young
Wizard!Harry, and master of the WW!Voldemort