Four shades of love (and lack thereof)

[raisin_gal]

 My mind has been focusing lately on the things I disliked about DH (and man oh man were there many) so I thought I'd shift gears for a bit and reflect on what I liked about the conclusion to the series.

Comments

[raisin_gal]

Thanks:)

[spamwarrior]

I love charts. Thanks. That was a neat comparison.

[raisin_gal]

Thank you! I love charts too. It's a dangerous addiction to have. *g*

[tree_and_leaf]

Nice essay, and you're right about Dumbledore's shortcomings (though I think he hoped Harry would survive: he just couldn't hint at it to Harry, because then Harry's sacrifice wouldn't be genuine - but it takes either very strong nerves or a great ability to block out your own feelings to set the poor kid up to think that he was going to survive).

here I'd at least like to point out that Harry's Jesus is unique for filling the dual roles of the Christian God and Jesus at the same time

I'm not entirely sure I understand this sentence, though. Christians believe that Jesus is God; that's the whole point. I assume you mean 'God the Father' (as opposed to God the Son) here with God, but I'm not sure how Harry's like him.

Anyway, I like the model you set up, and I'm glad you got your squee back, even with reservations... :)

[raisin_gal]

Ahh, I should have known I was going to screw that up. Sorry, and thanks for the clarification!

you mean 'God the Father' (as opposed to God the Son) here with God

Yes, that's what I tried to mean. My grasp on Christianity (or anything to do with Western-based culture really) is woefully lacking, but the way I understood the sacrifice of Christ was: God loves all human beings (agape) who all are sinners and thus in need of saving, and to do so he sacrifices his own son, for whom his direct love is unquestionable because it's his son. That's the point, it's the Father's sacrifice as much as it's the Son's. In contrast, Dumbledore loves all human beings but that's the only love he's capable of; he doesn't really have a son or any similar son-figure whose sufferings he feels as his own -- even in Harry, or so I tried to make the case here. So him giving up Harry for humanitarian salvation is really no act of "giving up" his flesh-and-blood loved one for the sake of something he has (somewhat) less reason to care about; it's more of a

[tree_and_leaf]

Ah, I see what you mean now

[raisin_gal]

Oh, not too long at all! I admit I'm probably only getting about half of what you're saying, but the themes relating to Christianity (and not just the sacrifice/resurrection bit either) are undoubtedly one of the key issues in HP, so I always appreciate hearing someone who knows and cares about it tackling that particular mountain. I myself am way out of my depths there.

[ciraarana]

Insteresting essay. Especially the Dumbledore part. It also explains his plans of Muggle-domination; after all, he thought it would be for their own good, protect those poor creatures from themselves, etc. (Makes me wonder about his reaction to WW I and II

[raisin_gal]

Oh yes! Totally. You have an excellent point. So it's Snape who saved the world from day one, isn't it? Maybe even before he got to influencing Lily's fate, when you think about the fact that had he not heard the prophecy, and furthermore, happened to hear just the part of it that he did hear, then rushed back to Voldemort and deliver the information (despite the enemy's powerful leader having seen him spying for this bit of intelligence), the whole thing wouldn't have been set in motion to begin with and the side of the Light wouldn't have had their Final Weapon. He's the one who influences the history for the better the most often, and he's the one who personally suffers the most because of those changes he causes. How unfair is that! And how heroic that he keeps on going. Oh, Severus.

And I think you and mary_j_59 are right about Harry, too... We never see anywhere in the text any description of the kind of growth I claim is happening, do we? I kind of had to triangulate Harry's section from what has to be the point of the narrative

[woman_ironing]

I'd say that one way Harry's growth in love is shown is through Draco, who has always been Harry's enemy but who Harry saves, along with Goyle. Harry witnessed Draco's suffering in the intolerable position Voldemort put him in, and his anguish over the threat to his parents. He saw Draco's reluctance to kill Dumbledore, and (in Malfoy Manor) his unwillingness to identify Harry to Lucius. He also saw Draco supporting the unconscious Goyle in the burning room. To me, it's clear that Harry comes to recognise the humanity of Draco, his enemy - in other words, your wide-scope love.

[raisin_gal]

Yeah, that was a huge part of Harry's growing-up plot wasn't it? I tend to forget about the Draco storyline altogether... Thanks for your thoughts!

[ms_arithmancer]

I like the table. :D A very nice way to categorize these four major figures from the series

[raisin_gal]

Wow, great insight on the growths of Snape and Dumbledore. On Snape I completely agree from the get go. You're right, more or less every single thing he does in DH can only be explained if he has gained some capacity for wider-scope love than he used to -- up to and including the fact that he even delivers Dumbledore's order to Harry in the shack. I mean, that's narrow love and wide love coming in direct conflict right there. Snape chooses to tell Harry how to save the world by dying. He doesn't obliviate him and plant false memories in him, so that he has a sudden burning urge to fly away to Australia

[ms_arithmancer]

I would not say Snape finds his wider-scope love because of Harry, no. I'd say he finds it because of Lily. You seemed to suggest the same in your essay - going from the step of experiencing pain because Lily is dead, to some sense that everyone is someone's Lily. The examples we see in which Snape seems unambiguously to act out of a wider love are involving people Harry knows and mught care about, and Lily might therefore care about for reasons of narrow love, but I do not believe Snape's reasoning ran in such a track. For one thing, there is the mater of the Malfoys, though I suppose that could be traced to Snape's personal ties. I myself, however, felt that, for example, it was not easy for Snape to watch the murder of Charity Burbage, a person Harry did not know (as he did not take the Muggle Studies elective) and Lily likely also did not know. (We have no idea when Charity started teaching, and Lily, like Harry, would have no need of her class anyway owing to her Muggle upbringing.) The text does not make this clear, but it is a

[raisin_gal]

Hmm... I think you've convinced me.

My original thought was "Snape can only ever reach wide love through a succession of narrow love," and so I was thinking every single wide-love instance must have a person-to-person route that Snape is instantly running through, even when it's an extremely long route: Burbage <-- at least somebody taking her class must be Harry's friend <-- Harry <-- Lily, Draco <-- Lucius <-- himself from his Death Eater days, etc.

But you do have a great point, he could be choosing a kind of love that it's not in his given nature to feel, because of Lily's tragedy waking up in him an awareness of what his lack of humanitarian love can do, and that's plenty heroic... much more heroic, even, than if he just had that kind of love to begin with.

Now that I think on it, I think the crucial test on this matter is to think about when Snape's change started happening. Obviously, if he's always circumnavigating through the Harry-Lily route, it would have to have begun when Harry came into his life, i.e. seven years ago