Comments on: The Firebolt

By: May

May — Sat, 08 Oct 2011 11:00:26 +0000

Among the trio, only Hermione was thinking logically in this chapter. I mean on my first read of the book, I immediately jumped to the conclusion that Black sent that Firebolt to kill Harry off. I mean topnotch and expensive broom, unknown benefactor, Christmas gift… it’s got to be Black! And it indeed was, though for reasons far from what I initially thought. But still, it’s lucky the boys got Hermione to keep them grounded and of course, save their lives. :)

By: Pam

Pam — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 11:54:32 +0000

Grace, why do you say that Bill & Fleur’s wedding was completely secular? I always thought of the presiding official as a minister (priest?), due to his officiating at the funeral and now at a wedding.

Do ministers officiate at weddings held outside of a church in Britain? They do in the US. You can have a religiously valid marriage service and not be in a church, at least for most religions.

By: Grace has Victory

Grace has Victory — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 11:04:23 +0000

Actually, Lewis, it seems that Dumbledore does believe in some kind of afterlife. He refers to death as “the next great adventure”. Very few wizards become ghosts; most of them go on to the “adventure”.

Why would some wizards fear death enough to become ghosts? Perhaps they are not certain of their stakes in the afterlife. A wizard who thought he was going to Hell might well prefer the ghost option. (Peter Pettigrew, anyone?)

It seems that James and Lily Potter had some kind of religious belief because Harry was christened and has a godfather. If James and Lily hadn’t had at least a loose religious affiliation, they would surely have used a secular naming ceremony and not bothered giving Sirius any role beyond legal guardian.

Bill and Fleur have a completely secular wedding, but all that tells me is that the Weasley family is completely agnostic. And we sort of had that impression anyway.

As for JKR minimising the references to religion… She has said that this was so that readers wouldn’t guess the ending of the story. You can’t really write a story about a Christ-figure hero and then also have Christianity as a real force in the lives of some of the characters. It would be distracting to mention it even as a historical or social force.

By: Pam

Pam — Fri, 01 Jul 2011 02:41:13 +0000

My understanding is that JKR (she said this somewhere, I think) deliberately left religion out of the books so they would a) appeal to more people and b) so she was not seen advocating any particular religion. I remember reading her talking about her own beliefs somewhere but can’t remember where.

My personal feeling is that, as religion, like politics are discussions fraught with emotion, and are better left off the table, so to speak.

Some of us do hold strong beliefs, but I am also an adamant believer in freedom of religion and hate censorship.

By: Lewis

Lewis — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 23:56:34 +0000

Yeah, I guess it’s a tricky one. We’ll never realy know I guess because it doesn’t have anything in canon. All we can do is interpret the facts the way we see fit.

What sways me however, is the fact there that we do not hear of an afterlife at Dumbledore’s funeral, or anything about Holy Matrimony at Bill and Fleur’s wedding, though of course Harry zoned out at both of them.

I think this shows these two groups of people didn’t find religion too important but whether this holds true for all…???

By: Casey

Casey — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 10:14:57 +0000

This is true, Lewis. I’m an agnostic, yet I still celebrate Christmas with my family more than because of habit than anything else. I still find it hard to believe that every single witch and wizard has this mindset, though. Just because not every single man, woman, and child worships Christmas and Christian holidays out of habit. There are a number of them that actually believe in it. I would hazard a guess that this is also true for witches and wizards.

By: Lewis

Lewis — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 23:55:52 +0000

Casey, may I point out that most religions don’t have Christmas as part of their religious calender, but they still “celebrate” it. Same goes for wizards.

By: Casey

Casey — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 08:36:45 +0000

Lewis, if wizards didn’t believe in religion, then there’d be no point in celebrating Christian holidays such as Christmas or (even more relevant to your idea of death) Easter. And Harry has his temporary death because of his connection to Voldemort. However, I suppose that because of Nick’s explanation to Harry at the end of OotP, wizards are given a choice to return and become spirits (usually when they feel they have unfinished business) and end up inhabiting the areas they’ve left their imprint on, or passing on. This would be similar to Harry’s death, except instead of the choice of coming back alive, they would still be dead.

By: Lewis

Lewis — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 08:26:29 +0000

I don’t actually believe wizards believe in Muggle religion. What I believe is the case in the Potterverse there are spirits that hang around (such as death in the Tale of the 3 brothers) but apart from that they dont have knowledge of any sort of afterlife.

This is supported by the ghosts: indeed, if there were an afterlife to look forward to, why be afraid of death and leave an imprint of yourself behind. Of course this is just as easily disproved by Harry’s temporary death in King’s Cross, where it seems to be an overlap between life and death.

In addition, I theorise that these same spirits act on Muggles, who, with no magical knowledge to guide them, come up with their own theories which have formulated themselves into Muggle religion

By: rtozier

rtozier — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 11:25:59 +0000

@Josiah: religion is a deeply complicated phenomenon, so the idea that going to a school of magic precludes it doesn’t ring true. Magic is a part of everyday wizarding world life, so there is no reason that it would tend to produce an anti-religious environment per se. And Casey, I personally find it very difficult to contemplate that you would cite “the Church” as inferrable magicophobes (although I know there have been some religious people who have said what you say they’ve said). Magicophobia shouldn’t be automatically assigned to a religious institution, as being a church or equivalent attendee doesn’t automatically make you a bigot.