I've seen points of views concerning this topic spread all over the forums, and most of them are different from each other, so I thought it would be good idea to discuss it separately:

why exactly did harry survive in the forest?

- was it because he was the true master of the elder wand, so the wand refused to harm him?
- or because he was the owner of the three Hallows and was "master of death"?
- or because of Lily's protection? (DD mentioned that at King's Cross, but I didn't understand why the fact that LV had Harry's blood and consequently part of Lily's protection afected his attempt to kill Harry)
- or because of the fact that he turned himself in and embraced death? (DD mentioned that too but didn't explain)

please, someone clear this up for me!

This was something I was wondering too. It wasn't explained that clearly in the novel, but I think it was a combination of things. But if someone has a better explanation of this, I would love to hear it.

that was a good summary of the theories.

1. harry was the master of the elder wand but LV said that the wand still worked ok for him. i think LV's magical power should have been enough to avada kedavra anyone with any wand. but then again we see later on that his charms and curses wore off much quicker than usual. i think if the wand truly refused to not work for anyone but it's master it wouldn't have produced the curse in the first place. and besides... the curse killed the horcrux.

2. possible. entirely possible. i however don't believe that the hallows were truly acquired by supernatural means. and therefor don't truly make you the "master of death". i think it's more in the metaphorical sense. and besides, he never actually "united" the hallows.

3. i don't see how lily's protection could do that again. i thought that was all dealt with in GoF.

4. that is possible also, but a little too reminiscent of the lion the witch and the wardrobe. and besides, selflessness didn't help lily did it.

i have another theory however. i think that when harry was hit by the avada kedavra curse the horcrux within harry took the blow instead. that would explain the gross dying baby thing in kings cross "you can't help it now harry". and it's how things worked with all the other horcruxes. destroying the horcrux didn't necessarily completely destroy the object.

this is what I assumed, Im not sure why althoug i think it was from something DD said (i wish i had my book nearby to check). Because harry was a horcrux the bit of soul died, because it was weaker that harry's complete soul. I think its because the avada kedavra curse doesnt actually destroy the body taht harry wasnt actually harmed. But it would be interesting to know whether he would have survived being stabbed or something... or if avada kedavra was the only way to only attack that bit of soul and not kill him.

I think Harry survived because...
the Avada Kedavra curse is meant to kill 1 person/soul and at the moment that Voldemort threw the curse at Harry, Harry's body contained 2 souls. His own and a piece of Voldemort's. It was a very risky thing for Harry to let Voldemort cast the Avada Kedavra curse because you couldn't really know which soul would survive. Remember, Avada Kedavra destroys the soul, not the body.
However when you read the full story, you know that a soul in 1 piece is far stronger than a soul that has been mutilated and split in 7, which reduced the risk of Harry dying to non-excistant.
Well, practically non-excistant actually. If I remember correctly, in the Chapter King's Cross, Harry asked Dumbledore if he was dead. Dumbledore replied that he didn't think so, and what Dumbledore thinks turns out right most of the times
But still, Harry had a choice. The way I understand it, the conversation he has with Dumbledore takes place somewhere between life and death. Harry knew that Voldemort survived, that his own soul and his body survived too. He now had 2 choises - let his soul "move on" and leave his body soulless (what muggles would take as 'dead') or let his soul return to his body and try and finish of Voldemort.

Well,
I can't wait to hear your thoughts on this

bye bye

I think Harry survived because Voldemort had Lily's blood too. Voldemort couldn't kill Harry's soul because it was protected by Lily's love. And because Lily's blood with that protection was flowing through Voldemorts veins as well, the protection was intact even if he tried to kill Harry because there was still a living person - Voldemort himself - with that protection in his blood.

Hope that makes sense, don't know if i'm right.

I believe Harry survived in the forest because of several reasons:

1. At that point (through no fault of his own) he owned all 3 Hallows and was the true master of death, albeit by accident.
2. Voldemort's new body had his blood and Lily's protection.
3. It was a great plot point and JKR willed it to be (the best reason).

i don't quite understand... i may be completely off the mark with what your thinking but remember that the horcrux inside harry was created BEFORE LV had lily's blood protection.

another thing is when LV attacked harry the first time, lily's blood protection rebounded the curse and it hit LV instead and destroyed half the house. if the blood protection was still in working order then the same thing should have happened. but it didn't. and that is due to the events at the end of GoF.

Yes yes, that's right!

If you're too logic, you won't enjoy HP

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Very well explained for such a hard-to-explain-thing! I think that's the reason as well.

Its definatley got something to do with Lily's blood anyway. Because since Harry's blood was in Voldemort's viens, when he tried to kill Harry it affected him to. But because that living bit of Lily's protection was still alive it gave Harry the choice whether he wanted to die or not ( if he had gotten the train and went 'on' he would have died). Dying of course, would have been the easy way out for Harry, but he chose to go back and try to finish off Voldemort.

This is so hard to explain! I was trying to explain to my mum ( who doesn't read the books but just lets me tell her what happens) and I got all confused and muddled up, though I think she was even more confused!

ok hang on... are we saying that because harry's blood (i.e. lily's blood protection) was in LV's new resurrected body, it worked kinda like a horcrux and let harry survive?? that doesn't make sense to me. that blood protection is a physical thing. if i cut off my hand it dies, it doesn't continue living because i keep living. a horcrux lets the physical body die (i.e. what happened to LV first time round) but the soul continues, seperate from the body. harry's body was still in one piece because avada kedavra doesn't destroy the body, it should have destroyed the soul.

It destroyed the Horcrux inside harry didn't it? So essentially Voldermort had killed himself? Well that's how i took it but then again.. as always.. I could be wrong

I'll TRY to explain it better

In the forest LV tried to kill Harry. Instead, he killed a part of his soul that was inside Harry. Harry and LV both had Harry's blood, because LV took Harry's blood when he returned in GoF. So they both have Lily's protection. So LV couldn't kill Harry's soul because he had Harry's blood too, so he had Lily's protection FOR HARRY too. Thats why LV's Horcrux inside Harry didn't survive, and Harry's soul did.

I think that's why DD had 'a gleam of something like triomph' in his eyes in GoF when they talked about LV taking his blood in the graveyard, because he realised then that Harry had a double protection, inside LV and inside himself.

Another proof of my Harry-survived-because-LV-has-Lily's-protection-too is what DD says in DH:

'But if Voldemort used the Killing Curse,' Harry started again, 'and nobody died for me this time - how can I be alive?'
'I think you know,' said Dumbledore. 'Think back. Remember what he did, in his ignorance, in his greed and his cruelty.'
'He took my blood,' said Harry.
'Precisely!' said Dumbledore. 'He took your blood and rebuilt his living body with it! Your blood in his veins, Harry, Lily's protection inside both of you! He tethered you to life while he lives!'

"He tethered you to life while he lives" I think that's the proof Harry survived because LV has Harry's blood! Don't know for sure but DD is answering Harrys question why he was still alive and they're talking about Harry's blood so I think this is the best explanation.

An add-on to this is that Harry shouts to Voldemort that not only will Voldemort fail to kill Harry but also to harm any of the people at Hogwarts. At first I didn't completely get why they were all protected. But suddenly the lightbulb kicked on.

What Harry did was exactly like what Lily did. I kept seeing it from the perspective that it was inevitable, so that it wasn't Harry's choice. But it was. He did have a choice. At any point he could have run, could have avoided the "final" battle. Instead, Harry chose to walk calmly into the forest and allow Voldemort to kill him.

Harry had the same subtle choice that Lily did. James didn't because Voldemort came after him. Lily had a choice because Voldemort gave her one. Harry had a choice because he could have remained hidden but instead walked out into the open and welcomed death.

So all of those people on Hogwarts grounds were forever safe from an attack by Voldemort - presuming that he survived.

I realize that probably everyone in the world got this without thinking about it, but, well, I didn't.

You explain ahead ADF...I didn't get this until just now.

Sometimes you need to have things written down by someone else for the meaning to truly sink in so I am glad that you 'spelled' it out for me! Thanks

Thats actually a pretty solid argument DaH. i guess i just want to know a bit more of the specifics on how exactly lily's protection on harry works. hopefully JKR could shed some light on the subject in her encyclopedia.

i guess that he was the master of the death beacause he was the master of all the hallows the cloak always worked for him well and not as well as it worked for dumbledore and the snitch opened for him so he became master of it and the wand belonged to malfoy and he defeated him so he was master of the three and i don't think it was because he faced death a lot of brave people faced death and weren't afraid of it like sirius his parents lupin mad eye and a lot of people

I was just wondering whether the fact that Harry thought about Ginny before LV used the Avada Kedavra curse can be important. I can be wrong, of course, but I reckon his love and his complete soul strenghtened the protection that Lily gave him. Dumblerdore couldn't tell him ( in King's Cross) if his feeling was important for survival because he simply didn't know about Harry's last thought. What do you think? Was it just the unimportant thing in this plot?

Lily's protection inside Voldemort worked akin to a horcrux for Harry. Harry couldn't die because he still had his mother's protection for him alive in someone else. Voldemort was selfish and thought that the protection would protect himself, but instead it only extended Harry's protection. Therefore, the killing curse killed the only other living thing inside Harry that wasn't Harry, the part of Voldemort's soul. Later, when they fight again, Voldemort's spell deflects back to him because Harry was the master of the Elder Wand, but even if he wasn't, Harry would still survive the curse, as while Voldemort lived, Harry couldn't be killed(It's funny how the prophecy took so many turns like that). About the 'Master of Death' title helping Harry, it couldn't because it was explained that the Master of Death was not one who was immortal, it was one who accepted the fact that he would die. So, in a great deal of different ways, Voldemort was defeated before he began.

Are you wondering why when Voldemort attacked him when the Avada hit him and he met up with Dumbledore? Because in the fourth book, Wormtail used Blood of the enemy, forcefully taken from Harry, so Voldemort's blood is also circulating with Harry's, thus he cannot be killed by himself, and his killing curse hit the fragment of soul inside Harry instead of Harry himself. Also, Lily's protection has already expired so it won't do any good, from the 4th book on.

Since when did Harry have Voldemort's blood flowing through him? Regardless, it wouldn't matter as there is nothing special about his blood. The reason Voldemort can't kill Harry has nothing to do with a connection between them, it is because Harry cannot die while Lily's protection lives. Presumably if Harry was killed before Voldemort regained his body by someone other than Voldemort, then he would in fact be dead, but the protection was extended to Voldemort, which meant that Voldemort beat the barrier between them, but he didn't beat the protection itself, he just made it stronger. Harry could have killed Voldemort, he just didn't need to. Voldemort doomed himself, as after GOF the only way for Voldemort to kill Harry(or anyone else to kill him), Voldemort would have to die, which he obviously would never do.

I don't think Lily's protection was over after GOF. Yes LV could touch him now however doesn't mean he could kill him while that protection against death still lives in both Harry and LV's blood.

Lily's protection definately had something to do with it as we see from the book:

'But if Voldemort used the Killing Curse,' Harry started again, 'and nobody died for me this time - how can I be alive?'
'I think you know,' said Dumbledore. 'Think back. Remember what he did, in his ignorance, in his greed and his cruelty.'
'He took my blood,' said Harry.
'Precisely!' said Dumbledore. 'He took your blood and rebuilt his living body with it! Your blood in his veins, Harry, Lily's protection inside both of you! He tethered you to life while he lives!'

Vincent - you summed it up the best way- i was a bit confused over why harry survived - you definately made it all come together in my head for me!

ok this is why the prophesy never made sense to me. "one cannot live while the other survives". if the fact they share the same blood ties their lives together then it should be "one cannot DIE while the other survives". and how come harry could kill voldemort? shouldn't it work both ways?

But Harry's blood has protection in it, Voldemort's does not. Harry doesn't have Voldemort's blood regardless, but it wouldn't matter. Like I said before, Harry COULD kill Voldemort. Nothing was stopping him. He just didn't need to as he was the master of the Elder Wand, which made Voldemort kill himself. Their lives weren't really tied together equally; Harry would live as long as Voldemort lived, true, but there was nothing to keep Harry from killing Voldemort. As for the prophecy, Dumbledore summed it up the best. It was only important because Voldemort made it important. He just saw that there could be a threat to his power and as such went to whatever lengths he had to to end the threat. As a result, he fulfilled it himself by giving Harry the powers he needed to win.

He didn't kill Voldemort. He suicided. The curse rebounded because of the Elder Wand being in Harry's possession.

Hey guys I've just discovered this forum and I am now eternally gratefull...reading the debate on why Harry survived gave me chills all over. Man I Love DH for how the story became resolved and every plot became clear...

As for why Harry survived I agree...that Lily's blood in LV did help him survive. Harry Lives while LV lives and not so much neither can survive while the other lives. Lily protected Harry in the forest and I agree with Deathly-and-Hallow's and Arabella Doreen Figg completly pretty much word for word so I wont repeat her but the part that struck me was Arabella Doreen Figg phrase:





Ugh I can just see the whole scene again in my head...from him walking out of Snape's office knowing what he knew; knowing he had to die! And courageously walking to the forest...''I am about to die'' His CHOICE made all the difference in my opinion!

I didn't think that Harry was the owner of the Elder Wand until the end. I assumed that it was Lily's lingering protection on both of them, combining just to kill the horcrux in Harry, and not entirely killing him.

As for the Elder Wand, I thought that, as Harry explained, Draco Malfoy was the owner of the Elder Wand, not Harry, so I assumed that wasn't it. Am I just missing something, or was that true?

In goblet of fire, Voldemort took Harry's blood. In doing so, as long as he lived, the protection his mother gave Harry was alive. Pretty much, whoever attacked and killed first dies. Voldemort killed himself the moment he killed Harry. Like Dumbledore said, Voldemort made his own worst enemy.

I think Harry survived because of the fragment of LV's soul inside him. I believe the curse hit Harry but it hit the part of the soul that wasn't his.

This destroyed the fragment and also caused great damage to Harry too, seeing as he was given the option to die.

I was a little bit confused too why Harry can be still alive.. You know?? I read part which Harry and AD have a conversation at King Cross, for many times..

I conclude that when LV took Harry's blood, he could touch Harry b'cause both of them have the same blood.. But as you know, Lily's protection just work with LV so when he took the blood, the protection still alive ..

" ...His body keeps her sacrifice alive, and while the enchanment survives, so do you and so does Voldemort's one last hope for himself..."

When he cursed Harry with Avada Kedavra, he just kill his soul in Harry b'cause Harry still have the protection..And LV become a little alive,b'cause he have a little of that enchanment..

"...You blood in his veins, Harry, Lily's protection inside both of you! He thetered you to life while he lives!"

So that is my argument.. hope you have the same thought with me..hehehe

Why Did Harry Survive?
For the happy ending

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I agree with the idea that it was because Lily's blood was in Lord Voldemort too, I don't understand it completely really but I agree with what everyone in this topic has been saying about it. Why else would Dumbledore have the gleam of triumph at the end of Goblet of Fire when Harry told him that Voldemort took his blood. (Assuming of course he knew about the horcruxes by now because he knew Harry would have to be killed for Voldemort to finally be destroyed). He probably knew and that's why LV had to be the one who "killed" Harry because of something with Lily's blood, if anyone else killed Harry he probably would not have lived.

I also believe it's got to do with the blood protection living on inside Voldemort; the 'sparkle' in Dumbledore's eye in the end of Goblet of Fire makes that quite clear. I don't believe Harry's survival has any direct link with the Deathly Hallows (yes, he is their master, and yes he's embraced death - but I don't see the point) but oh well that's another discussion.
My question: why did Dumbledore never tell Harry that Voldemort couldn't kill him because of this blood protection living on inside Voldemort?
It would have made Harry's life a lot easier. Okay, he wouldn't have walked into the forest, ready to die, and Dumbledore said that 'that will have made all the difference'...but I don't see how it did. The fact that Voldemort shot the killing curse at him made the difference because it killed the Horcrux inside him - but if that had happened without Harry calmly walking towards death, if for example Voldemort had shot the killing curse at him while Harry was fleeing, the outcome would have been the same.

...wouldn't it?

I think he couldn't tell him because Harry had to willingly sacrifice himself and if he knew he wasn't going to die then he wouldn't have really been sacrificing himself, by thinking he was going to die he made a decision to give up his life in order to protect others because it seemed it was essential to the destruction of Voldemort. Dumbledore also said the true master of death accepts he must die and realizes there are worse things so I think that may be why. I know that wasn't really clear, I'm sorry but I think it's somewhere along those lines.

I think it could be one of two things:

The part of Voldermorts soul in Harry took the blow and died instead.

Or it was that fact that Voldemort used Harry's blood. Dumbledore says something like that because he used Harry's blood Voldemort connected his life to his, or something meaning that.

In that case, then when Voldemort used Harry's blood he made Harry invincible as long as Voldemort was alive.

I also think that Dumbledore, when he speaks to Harry (in what I think is Limbo, or something between life and death), gives evidence to support ALL the theories people have suggested. I think JK did this intentionally as well.

Ok. This is how my friend explained it to me.....

When Snape killed Dumbledore he basically gave Draco the Elder Wand.
Harry took Draco's wand.
Voldemort took the Elder Wand from Dumbledore but it wasn't Dumbledore's at the time. It went to Draco and Harry took Draco's wand which was the Elder Wand.
Voldemort killed Snape hoping to get the Elder Wand. He didn't.
When the Killing Curse hit Harry it didn't kill him because the Elder Wand won't kill it's master.
It killed Voldemort because it wasn't truly his!!

Hope this makes since.

~Leja~

I'd like to think of it this way:

Only the one who makes a Horcrux is capable of destroying it without needing a very special magical object or incantation, let's say, like the sword of Gryffindor covered in basilisk blood, or a basilisk fang, or the lethal fire that Goyle conjured (Fiendfire, was it?) because they are the owner of the piece of soul made into a Horcrux.

That way, Voldemort was able to use the AK curse against the Horcrux that was saved inside Harry's body, instead of using the curse against Harry himself. (Am I making any sense here?)

So, what I believe is that the piece of Vodemort's soul that was inside of Harry actually saved his life from Voldemort when he was attacked in the forest by the AK curse, taking the curse in and allowing its destruction instead of killing the body that held it. (Hope I didn't confuse anyone here....)