Harry Potter Series Review

I just finished Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, which means I have now read every Harry Potter book. Thus, it is time for me to share my thoughts upon the subject. And if you do not want the content of book 7 or any of the books revealed to you, this is your only warning to read no further.

First, let me just gloat. I correctly predicted the ending of the book. Snape dies a hero, check. Voldermort killed by Harry, check. Neville plays a big role in final book, check. Obi Wan Kenobi like appearance by Dumbledore, check. Harry will not die, check. For those desperately trying to make the series more Christian and claming that Harry did die and come back from the dead here is a quote from Dumbledore on the question of whether or not Harry is dead: "That is the question, isn’t it? On the whole, dear boy, I think not"(707). He latter also says, "Of course this is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?" (723). Face facts, I predicted this book correctly.

I believe that I am somewhere in the middle of the road with regards to Harry Potter, by J.K. Rowling. Many hold that Harry Potter is evil because it makes witchcraft seem fun or good, and still others believe that Harry Potter is actually trying to teach kids to be witches and or Satanists. I think that opinion is wrong. Harry Potter is a fantasy book for kids. Magic has long been a way to gain kids attention and appeal to their imagination. Tolkien and Lewis both do the same thing, and if one is to reject Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings and Narnia should also be rejected. However, the main reason that opinion is wrong is because the witchcraft of Harry Potter is fake. Any kid will figure this out the minute he picks up a stick and tries to get it to unlock doors or cast spells. A twig is a twig in the real world. The witchcraft the bible warns us about is not flying on brooms and trying to cast spells because that is fake. The witchcraft the bible warns us about is trying to communicate with demons and having a familiar spirit. That stuff is no where to be found in Harry Potter. On the other hand, some think that Harry Potter is full of Christian images. Others want to argue that the books have always meant to follow a Christian path. I think these are also wrong. Despite two Bible verses being quoted in book 7, I see no reason to think that Rowling was trying to teach a gospel message. Like most books Christian truths can be found within. Rowling does teach us that evil must be opposed and doing nothing in the face of evil is wrong. She does make a great deal about self-sacrifice, and has a theme about free-will, choice, and belief that make it more than just a meaningless Tom Clancey novel. But I do not think the Potter series is explicitly (there is no reference to God at all), nor implicitly Christian.

Stylistic: J.R. Rowling is a good author. She does a good job of getting you interested and has a good sense of pacing. For a book that is almost 700 pages long she knows that the pace cannot always be frantic. However, for a child, this book would have tedious parts as background information is revealed. Harry Potter: the Deathly Hallows has a nice style when considered by itself, but as a concluding book to a long series, it falls short. It would have been better if the idea of the three Deathly Hallows or Hallowed Objects made by Death would have been introduced in one of the prior six books. At least introduce the fairy tale or the symbol of the Hallows or something. That way less time would have to be spent explaining. Plus, by introducing this new idea of a Supreme Wand, a Resurrection Stone, and a Supreme Invisible Cloak it makes it seem as if Mrs. Rowling had no idea how the series was going to end when she began it. This book also suffers from not having any school time. In my opinion this was a large part of what attracted kids to the books. Here was a school that was cool, and the kids did school things that could easily be related and understood. None of that exists in this last book.

I do think Rowling leaves several things dangling and unfinished. For example, she introduced the idea of freedom for house elves, who were slaves, as far back as book two. She returns to that in book seven. Yet, all we see is that Ron has changed his mind. In the epilogue of what happens when they are all grown up, we see no reference to the elves or their plight. The same is said for the goblin and wizard relationship, which is brought out in book seven. They are exposed and then dropped. Did this epic battle between good and evil expose faults in the society in which the wizards live? Yes, it did. Did this epic battle cause the society to change for the better? The reader has no idea. The conclusion also leaves us to wonder at exactly what does Harry Potter do now that he is all grown up? Did he ever go back and finish school? Just a sampling of the many questions that are just left hanging.

Logical: I believe the concluding book only emphasizes the consistency problems Rowlilng has in her make-believe world, again pointing to the idea that she did not have an end in mind when she began writing. There are many minor details that make the overly sensitive such as myself prickle. However, I will concentrate on a few. First is about an idea running through the entire series. According to the books, the sacrifice of Lilly Potter (Harry’s mother) protected Harry because of her love. Thus, when Voldermort tried to kill Harry, the curse backfired. Yet, James Potter (Harry’s father) did the same thing for Lilly. Yet, she died. Lots of people died protecting others throughout this series. Rowling ends the book with the idea that Harry had been willing to die to protect all of his friends who were fighting for him. Supposedly that weakened the spells Voldermort cast during this final battle, but it did not stop them. However, the book makes clear all of those people were fighting to protect Harry while he finished up his mission. Why did their deaths not work? Was it because a true sacrifice had to not be fighting death, but accepting it? I can see that explanation in the book, but that does not answer the problem of James Potter, who died without a wand in hand.
Second, and more troubling for the resolution of this book is the Deathly Hallows themselves. According to their origin the wand was "a wand more powerful than any in existence: a wand that must always win duels" (pg. 407). We find out that the "possessor of the wand must capture it from its previous owner, if he is to be truly master of it" (412). This often meant murder or theft. Yet we learn that Dumbledore possessed the wand after winning a duel against its previous owner. This brings up the obvious question of how did Dumbledore beat an unbeatable wand in a duel? No answer is given. We know from the end of book 6 that Malfoy disarmed Dumbledore, but did not take his wand. Snape then kills Dumbledore. According to the book this means Malfoy is the rightful owner and new master of the wand, which is buried with Dumbledore. How Malfoy is the master without being the possessor is not explained. Then during the course of the book Harry Potter defeats Malfoy, who is not using the Hallowed Wand, and somehow that makes Potter the master of the wand. How the wand knew that fact or how that fits in with being a possessor of the wand is unclear. The Hallowed Wand is then used by Voldermort, but it kills him because it will not kill its master, Mr. Potter. Just in case that was too clear, Rowling muddies the water more when Potter reburies the wand with Dumbledore and claims that if dies a natural death, the wand will lose all of its power. How that fact fits with the previously mentioned fact of Malfoy losing his mastership of the wand without ever possessing it is also unclear. According to the Malfoy scenario, anyone who ever disarms Harry in the future should be the new master of the wand.
The wand is not the only Hallow with problems. The third Hallow of the Hallowed Cloak is also inconsistent with the rest of the series. You may have already guessed that Harry’s cloak given to him in book one turns out to be the Hallowed Cloak. Supposedly the Cloak "renders the wearer completely invisible, and endure eternally, giving constant and impenetrable concealment, no matter what spells are cast against it" (411). Yet, in this very book Harry has to Confound to magic detectors because supposedly they would have seen the cloak. I seem also to remember that Harry Potter the Goblet of Fire, the magic of Mad Eye Moody sees through the cloak to Potter stuck in a hole in the stairs. I think the Marauder’s Map of Hogworts also shows Harry while he is under the cloak. So much for impenetrable concealment.

Theological: I do think there are some good theological themes in the Potter series. There is a theme about will and freedom that I would need to ponder on a bit longer with the other books in front of me. There is an excellent theme about pride. Whether it shows up in silly spats between teenagers or in the fact that Voldermort almost always loses because he fails to examine things he thinks are beneath him such as sacrificial love, children’s fairytales about the Deathly Hallows, or the power of elves being different than wizards, it is always consistent: Pride leads to a fall unless one changes. This is clearly her best theme and it is woven into the stories well. It would be interesting to see how many people in the books die while laughing and bragging. Sirius Black does in an earlier book. Bellatrix dies the same way in this one. The idea that evil most be fought is also apparent in this series and all are laudable themes. There is another theme about faith and belief, but I would have to examine it closer to see exactly what it is saying.

That said, I think there are several very bad themes in these books. Contempt for authority is one. Harry Potter is a snot nosed brat to his Aunt and Uncle who took him in when he was orphaned. They are bad to him, but the Bible does not allow for children to be so disrespectful of those placed in authority over you. Fifth commandment violations abound. Compound the poor treatment of his guardians with his blatant disregard for rules at Hogworts, for which he is often rewarded. Not to mention the disrespect for the authority of the state, the Ministry of Magic, and there is a slight note of kids know best that runs throughout the novels. Not exactly a good theological theme, but clearly part of its appeal to children.
A more disturbing theological problem is the idea that evil is fought with evil. Now I believe this is purely slopping thinking on Rowlings’ part, but it is something that comes across. Rowling introduced the idea of three unforgivable and forbidden curses in the fourth book. One curse puts another under your control. A second tortures another with extreme pain. A third outright kills your opponent. These are Dark Magic, and not to be done. Voldermort and his minions use these spells. However, when Sirius Black dies we see Harry Potter try them in book four. He is told by an enemy that you have to really mean it for the spell to work right. This seems to be Rowling’s answer for why Harry is not arrest for using the Dark spell. Yet, in book 7 we see all the good guys using the Dark Arts and the Forbidden Spells. Harry uses the spell that puts people under your control multiple times. Leaders of the good guys admonish him to kill his opponents rather than disarm them. He also uses the torture curse several time and even remarks that "I see what Bellatrix meant you need to really meant it" (593). Clearly now no defense is possible for Harry the user of the evil Dark Arts. No attempt to explain this or even frown upon such things is made in any of the books. This raises a series theological problem: what is evil for J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter. Why is he fighting evil with evil? This idea alone sabotages any idea that the Potter series is in some way Christian.

All in all the Potter books are okay, but not great. They are not for younger kids in my opinion because of the massive amount of death, the lack of clarity about evil and how it is fought, the authority problem, and the later books will simply not hold their imagination. In the end, this series is Star Wars set on a magical earth rather than far, far, away, and it is not done as well. I do open up the floor now for discussion.