Mark Shea’s Take On Michael O’Brien’s Take On the Harry Potter Delusion
In today’s First Things http://www.firstthings.com/onthesquare/?p=844 Catholic writer and apologist Mark Shea counters other writers contention that the Harry Potter books are occult, neo-gnostic or both. Mark specifically mentions Michael O’Brien’s article “Harry Potter and “the Death of God” http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2007/aug/07082003.html wherein Michael makes his case: “We might also consider for a moment the fact that no sane parents would give their children books which portrayed a set of “good” pimps and prostitutes valiantly fighting a set of “bad” pimps and prostitutes, and using the sexual acts of prostitution as the thrilling dynamic of the story. By the same token we should ask ourselves why we continue to imbibe large doses of poison in our cultural consumption, as if this were reasonable and normal living, as if the presence of a few vegetables floating in a bowl of arsenic soup justifies the long-range negative effects of our diet. Leaving aside a wealth of such arguments, let us consider Lev Grossman’s insight.
“The death of God?” many a reader will respond. “Surely he is making too much of the matter! Aren’t we discussing a single phenomenon in a vast sea of cultural phenomena? And aren’t there a lot of positive values in these books and films - even some edifying moments of courage and sacrifice? And isn’t it all about love?” Yes, in a sense it is. But what kind of love? What kind of sacrifice? And for what purpose?
The series is also about the usefulness of hatred and pride, malice toward your real or perceived enemies, seeking and using secret knowledge, lies, cunning, contempt, and sheer good luck in order to defeat whatever threatens you or stands in the path of your desires. It is a cornucopia of other false messages: The end justifies the means. Nothing is as it seems. No one can really be trusted, except those whom you feel comfortable with, who support your aims and make you feel good about yourself. Killing others is justified if you are good and they are bad. Conservative people are bad, anti-magic dogmatists are really bad and deserve whatever punishment they get (hence the delicious retributions against the Dursleys). The ultimate cause of evil is rejection of magic: the arch-villain Voldemort, for example, first went off track when he became a dysfunctional boy abandoned by his anti-magic father.”
Mark vehemently disagrees:
• Charges of Occultism: The simple fact is this: The books are not occultic. Magic is not real, as Rowling repeatedly has had to state to interviewers who ask her if she “believes” in it. The magic of Harry is, as John Granger points out, “incantational,” not “invocational,” exactly like the magic of Gandalf. Born with the talent for magic, Gandalf says the magic words and fire leaps forth from his staff, just as from Harry’s wand. No principalities or powers are invoked in HP. Indeed, if any words are “invocational” they are the prayer to Elbereth and Gilthoniel uttered in Middle Earth. Yet nobody accuses Tolkien of promoting the worship of false gods. That’s because we understand Tolkien’s fictional subcreation and its rootedness in Christian thought. I suggest Christian critics try to extend Rowling the same charity.
• Guilt by Association: Nuff said.
• The Charge of Gnosticism: Michael O’Brien et al have made a career of arguing that Harry is an elaborate anti-Christian gnostic myth teaching that we can become gods without God by the mastery of hidden knowledge.
*************************************************************
Not being an expert on the Harry Potter books, in fact I haven’t even read any of them, I will follow with interest this debate that I find both fascinating and yet very curious in that we have two Catholic writers who are renowned in their particular areas ( Mark Shea as a writer of apologetics and Bible studies and Michael O’Brien as a brilliant novelist and superb artist) in a very fundamental disagreement over something that, one would think, should be either black or white. Perhaps that’s the key to this entire Harry Potter matter; evil very rarely presents itself in simple black but cunningly prefers to attract the prey through the subtle shades of a preternaturally mysterious allure.
