I was just reviewing a story about complaints that libraries get re the Harry Potter series. I haven’t read them all, so I’m not sure what the Harry Potter universe’s take is on belief in higher powers.
In a universe where the supernatural is natural, how would the nature of a theist ontology manifest itself?
I’m pretty sure the HP books are very very vague on the subject, although of course they do celebrate Christmas.
As for whether the existence of the supernatural would make belief in God more or less likely, well, I think that comes down to what you call “supernatural”. In the HP universe, magic works, but it’s not quite clear whether the wizards view magic as being “supernatural”. To them, is it just like another force, so you have gravity, magnetism, strong nuclear, weak nuclear, and magic? Or do they view it as something, for want of a better word, “magical”?
The intellectual foundation of my agnosticism is the belief that everything in the universe can be (even if it hasn’t yet been) explained by application of the simple and consistent underlying nature of the universe. If I didn’t have that, because there was magic, it would be a lot harder for me to justify agnosticism/atheism. But that might just be me. (It’s a teeny bit more complicated than that, actually, but is outside the scope of this thread.)
Also, it’s entirely possible (in fact somewhat likely) that the various muggles would hold traditional religous beliefs. I think it’d be interesting to contrast the religious views of a Muggle, a first-generation Wizard, and a Wizard from a Wizarding family.
I can see how some first or second generation wizards might look at magic as being proof of a Higher Being™, specifically because it can’t be explained by science. Presumably they’d consider their magic abilities to be gifts in a similar fashion that many religious people do today with skills like athletic or artistic abilities. As for someone from a long-line of wizards, that might be different, but as with all things, likely depends on which wizard you ask
The cultural trappings of the wizarding world are obviously Christian, even if the culture itself seems to be mostly secular (but so are most modern-day western European cultures, even without magic). Wizards celebrate Christmas and Easter, have christenings and godparents, and name their hospitals after saints. One of the castle ghosts is a friar, and we’re told that only wizards can become ghosts; the suits of armor are charmed to sing “O Come All Ye Faithful” at Christmas; etc., etc. My guess is that Rowling didn’t intend to portray the religious beliefs of wizards as any different from those of Muggles.
On the other hand, the existence of the soul and some sort of consciousness after death seem to be indisputable facts in the wizarding world, rather than beliefs held only by the faithful, which rather throws a wrinkle into things. (Perhaps a more interesting question would be whether atheism of any kind can exist in the Harry Potter universe; I haven’t the foggiest idea what the answer would be.)
Well, there are hints. They celebrate Christmas, Harry has a godfather, and the chief (only?) wizarding hospital is named after a saint. Which suggests that even if religion isn’t a big deal to wizards, their society at least developed out of one which was somewhat religious. Which, so I’ve heard, is much the case in most of Muggle English society, as well.
Was the simulpost good for you, too, Porpentine?
[sub]except you had more detail, and still squeezed in before me, grumble, grumble[/sub]
We won’t know until the final book, but I believe that Rowling holds true to the theme of good triumphing over evil. I suppose one could claim this as secular humanism at its best, but usually it’s considered a Judeo-Christian or Western world view. (I see no reason for it not to be an Islamic worldview, but I am woefully ignorant re Islam and literature or even popular kid fiction).
Harry has some definite similiarities to Arthur and his legend-another literary figure not without Christ imagery.
I am in the process of rereading the series, and am finding her references to soul splitting etc fascinating.
I’m with the others. I haven’t read anything to suggest that the Wizarding world’s religious beliefs are much different than the Muggle world’s.
On a related note, it seems to me that Rowling is deliberately avoiding anything that might suggest paganism or occultism. Notice that they don’t use pentagrams to cast spells, and unless I’ve forgotten something they don’t use animal bones, blood, or other items that are normally associated with voodoo and the occult.
You’re kidding, right?
If there’s one critique of Rowlings work that the crazy fundamentalists have actually UNDERPLAYED, it’s that she’s obviously got a good working knowledge about the history of the occult. Many of the wizards referred to are (or were) real occultists or occult figures - Nicholas Flamel being the most obvious. Many of the text and library book titles are plays on actual occult book titles or grimoires, and her spell names are obvious ridicuLatin.
True, she’s not writing about modern day neopaganism or Wicca, but the chick knows more than your average bear about English and European Renaissance esoterisicm and occultism. There are many more than that Wikipedia page covers, but I don’t have my books handy right now to go through them all. Suffice it to say that I have only a few years training in such things, and I’m giggling to myself every few chapters because she’s stuck another reference in there that’s flying over the heads of the religious “right”.
They certainly seem to have copied the trappings of Muggle society, but I see no real evidence of theism. They celebrate Christmas about the way my family does, with food and presents, and absolutely no religious symbolism. If Harry or anyone has ever gone to chapel, or if a chapel exists at Hogwarts, I don’t remember it.
I’d suspect a ceremony making someone a godfather would be magical and not religious. I suspect again that they picked up the Muggle term, from before it was secularized to guardian.
I love this, but was not aware of it. I am glad to see it, and now will read more (ok, will read Wikipedia more) about this. I like almost anything that cocks a snoot at fundamentalist “christian” anything, though… I did notice that Nikolas Flamel was 665 years old and had enough elixir to last one more year.
If you can bear to read through the moralizing, some more of the actual occult stuff is outlined in this Christian essay. I’ve only skimmed it, and only the bits about “references to actual occult practices”, but the author has picked up on some of the more obvious ones. Just be prepared to shove your eyeballs back in your head after they’re rolled out and gone to hide under the sofa. :rolleyes:
There are some published pro-Harry sources on this debate. I’ll see if I can dig a few up.
From that anti-Potter Christian essay:
Ha ha, you lose, crazy essay-writing fundie lady! Godwin smackdown!
Of course, Voldemort worships Cthulhu.
Okay, here’s a start. More tomorrow when I have my reference books about me. People who have dealt with questions such as Is Harry Potter Christian? Is Harry Potter Anti-Christian? Is Harry Potter Theistic?:
“Harry Potter and the End of Religion”, Marguerite Krause
“It’s All About God”, Elisabeth DeVos
Both in Mapping the World of Harry Potter, Ed. Mercedes Lackey
“Heaven, Hell, and Harry Potter”, Jerry L. Walls (more about morality than theism)
“A Skewed Reflection: The Nature of Evil”, David and Catherine Deavel
Both in Harry Potter and Philosophy: If Aristotle Ran Hogwarts, Ed. David Baggett and Shawn E. Klein
There are a number of books of critical essays on Harry Potter
The Wisdom of Harry Potter: What Our Favorite Hero Teaches Us About Moral Choices by Edmund M. Kern
The Ivory Tower And Harry Potter: Perspectives On A Literary Phenomenon, Ed. Lana A. Whited
Looking for God in Harry Potter by John Granger
The Gospel According to Harry Potter: Spirituality in the Stories of the World’s Most Famous Seeker by Connie Neal
What’s a Christian to Do with Harry Potter? by Connie Neal
Harry Potter’s World: Multidisciplinary Critical Perspectives, Ed Elizabeth E. Heilman
BenBella Press has a forthcoming collection, The
Let’s try again. For some reason my laptop is sending rather than toggling browsers.
Okay, here’s a start. More tomorrow when I have my reference books about me. People who have dealt with questions such as Is Harry Potter Christian? Is Harry Potter Anti-Christian? Is Harry Potter Theistic?:
“Harry Potter and the End of Religion”, Marguerite Krause
“It’s All About God”, Elisabeth DeVos
Both in Mapping the World of Harry Potter, Ed. Mercedes Lackey
“Heaven, Hell, and Harry Potter”, Jerry L. Walls (more about morality than theism)
“A Skewed Reflection: The Nature of Evil”, David and Catherine Deavel
Both in Harry Potter and Philosophy: If Aristotle Ran Hogwarts, Ed. David Baggett and Shawn E. Klein
There are a number of books of critical essays on Harry Potter:
Looking for God in Harry Potter, John Granger
**The Gospel According to Harry Potter: Spirituality in the Stories of the World’s Most Famous Seeker, ** Connie Neal
**What’s a Christian to Do with Harry Potter?, **Connie Neal
The Wisdom of Harry Potter: What Our Favorite Hero Teaches Us About Moral Choices, Edmund M. Kern
The Ivory Tower And Harry Potter: Perspectives on a Literary Phenomenon, Ed. Lana A. Whited
Harry Potter’s World: Multidisciplinary Critical Perspectives, Ed. Elizabeth E. Heilman
Reading Harry Potter: Critical Essays, Ed. Giselle Liza Anatole
**Selected Papers from Nimbus-2003 Compendium: We Solemnly Swear These Papers Were Worth the Wait (The Harry Potter Conference Papers), ** Ed. The Nimbus-2003 Programming Team
BenBella Press has a forthcoming anthology, **The Psychology of Harry Potter: An Unauthorized Examination of the Boy Who Lived, ** Ed. Neil Mulholland
I’ve never read the books ( but have heard/read a fair bit about them ), so I’m just addressing the question in your post. The answer is : yes. The proven-in-Potterverse existence of souls and ghosts doesn’t prove or disprove the existence of a God, or gods plural, for that matter. Even some real world belief systems beive in souls but no gods. Now if a reliable witness actually met God after death and returned to tell about it, that would be different; the mere existence of souls proves nothing.
For that matter, given that most Muggles have no knowledge of any of the Wizarding World, there could be plenty of Muggle atheists no matter how much proof the wizards have.
I would say that the potion work done in Harry Potter does indeed resemble my naïve understanding of some religious practices - indeed, blood and various animal parts are used. The pseudolatin used for spell work doesn’t strike me as occultish at all; it resembles magic words as spoken by magicians, and those could probably be argued to stem from words spoken in magic rituals, but the use of such words in Harry Potter seems pretty much in keeping with our general image of magic in general. Nothing about that strikes me as particularly occultish - there’s little sign that they’re invoking spirits or anything like that in their work, except perhaps with the patronus spell.
I couldn’t contest the point about references to actual spell books, but there haven’t been many actual historical figures mentioned at all in the books as far as I know, besides Nicholas Flamel. And to my knowledge, he wasn’t an occultist by my standards. Alchemy was a science, more or less. Granted, the division between science and magic wasn’t as clear in that time, but I’ve never heard any references to alchemy being treated as witchcraft or anything of the sort during the somewhat more demon-obsessed middle ages. I don’t think alchemy was particularly linked with anything religious or occult, even if it dealt in arcana.
I’d certainly be curious about other specifics, but I’m not particularly convinced so far.
I find it facinating that it is commonly held in the Wizarding world that to have your soul sucked out of you is worse than death. I also note that Nearly Headless Nick implies that it was his reluctance to go on that made him a ghost. Which to me begs the question-death as choice?
The Dementors suck out your soul-leaving you alive with no spirit. Are you then a zombie? what happens when old age catches up to you and your heart stops?
Voldy has taken things in a slightly different direction, splitting his soul into bits. If HP is successful in destroying those bits, does V then completely die? Can he become a ghost, like Sir Nick? For that matter, does Sir Nick have any magic powers at all, except for the obvious one?
I take the point re souls and still maybe no god. I am not sure with HP if there is a god or just the powers of Good and Evil. That would make HP a spiritually themed book, but not a theistic one. Fine by me.
I think the St Mungo stuff is just Rowling playing with known archetypes in our world, no? Certainly that is not true for all references, but that one strikes me as gloss. If it’s not, it raises a thousand questions: how does a member of the wizarding world become a saint? What governing body deliberates and allocates such a honorarium? Is there a pantheon? Do they have feast days etc.
I am sure many of these queries could be answered by reading any of the resources provided. Sadly, I am too busy with grad school to do any more reading. I’ll make a note of them, but does anyone have any “on the ground” info re my questions? Thanks.