Doing it for Lily? was Re: Snape and Harry and expulsion LONG

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 188940




--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "lealess" <lealess at ...> wrote:

> I agree that the plan changed over the years as more information became available to Dumbledore, but based on the Prophecy, which stated "either must die at the hand of the other," I think Dumbledore always believed that Potter would have to kill Voldemort.  He was training him up and laying challenges in his path to prepare him for this task.

Pippin:

I agree that Dumbledore's plan evolved over time. 

But I don't think he chose Harry because of the prophecy. *Voldemort* chose Harry because of the prophecy, and Dumbledore took advantage of that. 

The problem with killing Voldemort, as Harry says at one point, was that no one knew how to track him down. But Dumbledore realized that Voldemort would come after whoever he believed to be its subject as long as that person remained alive. That person might  be trained and equipped to face Voldemort, provided he had the power and the ability -- but Lily showed there was another way. 


 Thinking of Lily as an Order member has altered my whole perspective on what she did. Her countercurse didn't only protect her son, it turned him into a booby trap. I don't know if she realized that when the curse struck Harry it would rebound on his attacker-- but if she didn't, she still ought to get the credit for sheer dumb luck. Only she didn't, because Dumbledore (and JKR) led  everyone to think it was something about *Harry* that had turned the curse. 

 Voldemort eventually realized that his curse had rebounded because of the power of Lily's love. He took Harry's blood into his body so that wouldn't happen again, but he didn't consider that *Harry* could place the same protection on other people that Lily had. Dumbledore, however, did think of that. That's why it was so important that Harry "go to meet his death" instead of dying in combat. 

Anything that killed Harry would destroy the soul bit. But only if Harry died willingly  and by choice at Voldemort's hands could Harry invoke the same protection, and set up the same trap, that Lily had used to save him. Harry could save others from Voldemort -- and give anyone, even someone with no more magical prowess than a baby, the power to turn Voldemort's curse back on him. Provided the horcruxes were gone, Voldemort would die, as he should have died at Godric's Hollow. 

I think it was finally realizing all of what Lily had done (and never been recognized for) that sent a flood of tears cascading down Snape's face and finally reconciled him to Dumbledore's plan and to telling Harry the truth. The worthless brat should know what sort of woman had died for him -- and he should know, too, what he must do if he truly wished that her death not be in vain.

In the event, Harry had the chance  to come back, secure the Elder Wand, and finish Voldemort as he had always intended. But if he hadn't, then anyone whom Harry had protected could have sent Voldemort's AK flying back at him. This is so obvious I can't believe I never saw it before. I guess I was so bewitched by the picture of Lily the sacrificing mother and martyr that I never realized what she'd done. It was only when I started to think of Lily the soldier that it dawned on me. 

We know DD always expected Voldemort to come back, which means he believed there was at least one horcrux from the beginning. He guessed when he saw the cut on Harry's forehead  that a soul fragment had become lodged in Harry and would give Harry some of Voldemort's powers. 

Now, Dumbledore knew that the horcrux would be hidden with all of Voldemort's powers and cunning, and with a special regard to keeping Dumbledore, who was his most dangerous enemy, from finding it. So Dumbledore had the idea of training Harry, who would have some of Voldemort's own powers, and a set of strengths and weaknesses very different from Dumbledore's,  to find and destroy the horcrux for him. He knew that to make an end of Voldemort, Harry might have to die, but the gleam of triumph shows that DD had some hope this wouldn't be necessary. That was plan A.

However, in OOP, Dumbledore began to have second thoughts. He realized that he loved Harry, and wished that he could have a normal life. He hoped that Harry could protect himself from the encroachments of the soul bit with occlumency and tried to keep him out of the war. Plan B. But it was too late. Harry was already determined to fight Voldemort, and if Dumbledore wouldn't help him, he would do it on his own.

Dumbledore could have fought Voldemort himself, and did, at the Ministry. But he knew it would be no use to try to kill Voldemort until the horcruxes were destroyed. At most he could destroy Voldemort's current body -- but if he did, then Harry would lose the best protection he had. So Dumbledore went back to plan A, with one modification.

Realizing that Voldemort had made more than one horcrux and they might not be as carefully guarded as he thought, Dumbledore undertook to  find and destroy one himself. He succeeded, but at the cost of a incurring a deadly curse. It seemed that only Harry, who had already proved that he could seek to find a treasure and not use it, could safely be trusted to destroy  the incredibly rare and precious magical objects that Voldemort had used. 

Meanwhile, there was the problem of the Hallows. Harry  already had the cloak, and Dumbledore wanted him eventually to realize what it was. He wanted Harry to use the stone, but not too soon. And he didn't want the wand to be used at all by anyone. 

Dumbledore had a plan to disable the wand, but he doesn't seem to have had a lot of confidence in it. A lot could go wrong, and in the event, something did. So he laid his plot to make Hermione think the hallows were fictional, just in case. 

He is ashamed, eventually, that he didn't trust Harry with the truth about these objects from the outset. But Harry himself isn't so sure that Dumbledore did the wrong thing. He *was* tempted by the wand. 

The thing that bugged Harry  most was the thought that Dumbledore had never believed he had a chance to survive, and had betrayed him into a situation where he had no honorable choice but to walk to his death. But that turned out not to be the case.   

Pippin