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

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 188962

Lealess:
> If it appeared that Snape killed him, then Snape would have been a sitting duck for a Voldemort determined to find a wand to head off the wand trouble he was having with Potter.  Having observed Snape through six books, I think Snape would have taken steps to address that situation, had he known about it, to place himself out of danger so he could fulfill his mission to tell Potter of the embedded soul piece.

Pippin:

Voldemort's notion of killing the wand's previous owner to make himself its master was irrational and contradicted by facts known to Voldemort.  Therefore it's difficult to see how Snape could have anticipated it no matter how much he knew. 


It's canon that Voldemort acted to conceal his theft. 

"It would not do for Snape, or indeed anyone else, to see where he was going. But there were no lights in the castle windows, and he could conceal himself...and in a second he had cast upon himself a Disillusionment Charm that hid him even from his own eyes." -DH ch 24.

If Snape or Portrait!Dumbledore had known that the wand had been taken, they might have acted to protect Snape. But JKR tells us here that they didn't. There's no canon that Snape ever saw Voldemort with his new wand until those last moments in the Shrieking Shack, so he had no opportunity to recognize it either. 

Lealess: 
> As for the Prophecy, see above.  No matter what Dumbledore said, he put his faith wholly in Prophecy Boy Potter to carry out his plans, making no contingency plans.  

Pippin:
Dumbledore's portrait presumably had all the knowledge Dumbledore had and all the memories that he collected are, AFAWK, still in his office. If Snape failed to transmit Dumbledore's message to Harry, or if Harry and his friends failed, the portrait could find others to carry out those tasks. 

Lealess:
He also put people in danger to protect the secrets of the Prophecy and cried over Harry's prescribed role at the end of OOTP.  Were these the actions of a rational leader who discounted prophecy?

Pippin:
Dumbledore put people in danger to guard the prophecy so that if Voldemort showed up to try to steal it, there would be proof that he had returned. Once it became clear that Voldemort's plan was to entice Harry to steal the prophecy, the guards would  no longer be necessary and it appears they were removed. As DD tells Harry, there was never any need to protect the prophecy, and if he had been honest with Harry he would have told him so. 

Certainly he wept over Harry's role, but what has that got to do with the prophecy prescribing it?

 It may not seem rational that Dumbledore would think that anyone  acting alone or with a few helpers, would be capable of destroying Voldemort without the prophecy to suggest it. But Dumbledore comes from a tradition of duels and single combat, and he himself defeated Grindelwald in just that way.

Lealess: 
> If he was stressing choice in HBP, he may have been allowing Potter to believe he had a choice, at the same time he demanded absolute obedience from Potter.

Pippin:
There's a difference between being coerced into obedience and voluntarily agreeing to obey.

Pippin