Allegory #1 - The Love of Harry's Mother
Submitted by J on December 12 2001 04:16:34
In reply to Re: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone submitted by F.O.D. on December 10 2001 08:39:56
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Dear F.O.D. Thanks for your comments and feedback. Personally I find it most enjoyable to watch a movie first, then read its original book or novelization to fill in the details. I totally agree with you that the author of the Harry Potter books (J.K. Rowling) is not a Christian or that any Christian allegory was intended in their composition (which makes their presence all the more interesting). As I am unfamiliar with the other three stories, I can only comment on the first, but I can indeed see signs of what you call “a kind of brutality to Harry”. For example (from the movie), when Harry, Ron and Hermione are receiving detention from McGonagall for being out at night in Hagrid’s hut, they find out that Malfoy will be serving one too and Harry cracks a smile indicating he was glad that his ‘enemy’ got in trouble as well. Along the same lines of your example (Ron’s sacrifice in the chess game), if I may share one Christian allegory that jumped out at me while watching the movie. During Harry’s encounter with Quirrell and Voldemort, his ‘weapon’ was love, which he found out from Dumbledore while recuperating in the school hospital. Dumbledore’s explanation of where this love of Harry’s came from is most intriguing (footnotes to relevant Scripture included): ’Your mother died to save you [1]. If there is one thing Voldemort cannot understand, it is love [2]. He didn’t realise that love as powerful as your mother’s for you leaves its own mark. Not a scar, no visible sign… [3] to have been loved so deeply, even though the person who loved us is gone, will give us some protection forever [4]. It is in your very skin. Quirrell, full of hatred, greed and ambition, sharing his soul with Voldemort, could not touch you for this reason [5]. It was agony to touch a person marked by something so good.’ [6] pg. 216 [1] For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. John 3:16-17 [2] The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it. John 1:5 [3] No, a man is a Jew if he is one inwardly, and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the written code… Romans 2:29 [4] And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age. Matthew 28:20 [5] This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. John 3:19-20 [6] This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins… We love because he first loved us. 1 John 4:9-10, 19 Comments, feedback, more allegories most welcome. Take care and God bless, J |
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