A Spiritual Education

Like millions of other children, the Harry Potter series captured my imagination at an early age. Restless with ordinary life, I was fascinated by the idea of being whisked away to another country, to learn a "science" of doing fantastical things in a captivating new world running parallel to our own. Like many other children, I too waited for my letter for Hogwarts but to no avail. There is a picture that the promise of a spiritual education paints, gilded in the awe of magic that has been sculpted through generations. In that sense, the Harry Potter series is much like a Peter Pan story---at first.

Unlike Peter Pan, the world of Harry Potter is not frozen in a forever-young perspective. The story of Harry's spiritual education is about growth, and a coming of age. Almost like a second childhood, the Wizarding World provokes amazement and curiosity. Entering that world forever changes the individual, the Muggle world becomes boring and vaguely safe. We are at first amazed, then trauma breaks our built up ideal, and then we grow. From my own experience, my education has been the lifting open of a window to the world. If elementary school was grabbing the bottom rail, high school and college were a series of manic pulls, sliding it open inch by inch. With every event, we all just learn as we go, and change with each new experience.

One of the most profound (and conflicting) concepts the series offered was that mental and emotional aging of the main character. The feelings of wonder, decaying into anger, a sense of duty, and everything between takes the reader for a rollercoaster, akin to the ups and downs of any struggling teen. Holistically, magic takes a backseat to the larger picture of Harry's determination of good from evil. At the series' finish, this ultimately culminates with the answer that there IS no black and white. Good and evil is no longer as simple as it was a the start of the series. Nothing broadcasts this more clearly than Severus Snape's character, and the reveal of his involvement with Harry's past.

With the acknowledgement of these grey areas, J.K. Rowling adds a level of believability to an otherwise straightforward character arc. While there is a definitive evil force, many of the underlying characters are humanized as cowards, or victims to fear. Also, there is all a manner of post-Hogwarts wizards who mirror the typical graduates we'd expect today. Hagrid, the man who, years later, never left school after being expelled. Tom Riddle, the seemingly good student gone bad who was never right in the head to begin with. Quidditch players who become famous athletes professionally. All a manner of alumni are mentioned, and the archetypes are not unheard of in everyday life. And much like graduation will be for us, Harry leaves school with a plan with it's fair share of risks and danger for the next stage of his life.

With that, I leave you with a quote, from the great Albus Dumbledore himself.

"It is important to fight, and fight again, and keep fighting, for only then can evil be kept at bay, though never quite eradicated." --Albus Dumbledore