Do you recall that significant moment when, in the Peter Jackson finale of
J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, Frodo fails to throw the Ring of Power
into the lava flows of Mount Doom, and instead takes it for himself?
Viewers seemed to linger almost torturously on that precipitous ledge
inside the volcanic peak— hoping that Sam would be able convince Frodo
of the madness of his pending decision. Reason proved useless, of
course. Even the humblest of the races of Middle Earth proved incapable of
assuming humility when faced with the monstrous temptations of the Dark
Lord’s ring.
Now, juxtapose this prolonged and tortured failure with the immediate,
almost glib manner in which Harry Potter is able to dispatch the Elder Wand
— with all its potential to grant invincibility to its user— into the nearest
abyss outside Hogwart’s School. While it is possible that J.K. Rowling is
speculating about differences in spiritual resolve arising in the aftermath of
Valdemort’s existence, as opposed to Sauron’s ongoing existence during
Frodo’s epic failure, it is also equally possible that Rowling and Tolkien
measure the power of power (as a temptation) differently.
Yet which, do we suppose, is more representative of Biblical truth?
I must defer, in this case, to Tolkien’s analysis. If we take by faith the idea
that the fundamental Biblical sin is the human attempt to displace God— to,
ourselves, become “as gods”— then a realistic Harry Potter could never
have broken and then discarded the Elder Wand as though it were
meaningless jetsam among all the other wreckage of Hogwarts. Power is
more seductive— and far more addictive— than we realize. And, quite
arguably, the greater the power the greater the seduction and addiction.
As a modern case-in-point, consider the difficulty the U.S. is presently
undergoing in walking back from the abortion abyss. American social
commentator, Bill Maher, claims he knows that abortion is murder. He also
indicates that he doesn’t care that it is. Obviously, the overturning of Roe
may have eliminated one federal argument for the entrenchment of the
practice, but the Biden administration clearly doesn’t care about this judicial
setback. It considers what Maher calls “murder” to be a fundamental right.
Read this again: the right to murder.
Legally, women in Canada have been similarly granted the equivalent of a
license to kill— in all nine months of any pregnancy. Canadians have no
law saying otherwise. Now, given Tolkien’s reflections, do you suppose that
this level of power, once established, easily gives up its foothold on the
human psyche? Given the precedent of Genesis, do you suppose that
Eve’s contemporary lethal authority is easily returned to its Maker for safer
keeping? Given the species, do you suppose that any license to kill, once
granted, is easily surrendered? After all, it’s rather “handy” in a pinch.
Could any “Wanda” ever toss such a wand?
In many moral and ethical crises, the problem is not just the issue involved,
but the political hubris created alongside the issue. Only the humble tend to
repent, and these are days of significant ego.
And this is the reason why Christian faith must begin to inform the average
Canadian citizen again. Power creates monsters. It doesn’t cultivate the
inner child, but rather encourages mere mortals to believe themselves
legitimate Divine rivals. In such a cult of petty “divinity”, people stretch out
to grasp various “rings” and “wands”— to lay hold of the power of life and
death— hence abortion, hence euthanasia.
We were never meant for such things, and only the Biblical witness can
remind us of this truth. Moreover, only the miraculous allows us to resist
power’s near-ceaseless temptations.
Thankfully, God is in the process of designing such a miracle. He has come
in Christ Jesus— one who interestingly ran from a crowd who wanted to
crown Him king (John 5:16), and who walked willingly toward a lonely hill
that he would die upon in utter humiliation (Luke 13:32-33). Ironically,
Christ’s miraculous authority arises out of His denial of mere power.
Inherently, the strength to accomplish a similar miracle is not within any of
us— any more than such strength was inherently within Eve, Adam, or the
literary Frodo.
As literary figures go, Harry is a true anomaly.
The reason Canadians need to go back to Church is because the Biblical
witness is the primary— in fact, functionally, the only— source of this
counter-cultural teaching. Only the Biblical testimony can speak to the
problem of human hubris that would consume us all, given time and
opportunity.
Meanwhile, Christ is Adam, as Adam should have been. And only the love
of God can keep a child childlike— and recreate Eve in God’s own image,
complete with all her lost progeny.
Given the real risks of the seduction of power, therefore, I commend
Church— and Biblical faith— to you all!
[Images: from Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003), and
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2 (2011).