I just bought and finished my first Harry Potter book, Deathly Hallows, recently. I was surprised by the readability of the book and how the plot has captivated me to finish it within a week. This of course was helped by the language used compared to that of the Lord of the Rings, where I think, generally, I will be turning the pages of a dictionary to look up meanings of words used for almost every page that I read.
What interest me was how Rowling conceptualized the destruction of the Dark Lord, Voldermort. Basically, the story tells that a part of Voldermort's soul is encapsulated in Harry Potter, thus ensuring the survival of one as long as the other is alive. This also means the destruction of one will lead to the end of either one.
This is quite remarkably close to the concept of sin residing in our human flesh that makes us vulnerable to all kinds of evil doing, just as Harry was becoming more and more like Voldermort if left unresisted. The destruction of sin requires the death of Jesus on the cross which nails sin to the death of his earthly body. Yet, death could not hold on to Jesus because he did not yield to sin in his body in the first place. Thus, death is defeated and the resurrection of Jesus into a new heavenly body free from sin is secured.
This is quite aptly depicted in the final chapters of Deathly Hallows although Harry did not attain an immortal heavenly body literally. Voldermort thought he won by killing Harry without knowing that by murdering him, he was actually assisting Harry in destroying him eventually. Harry's willingness to trust and obey Dumbledore, no doubt with great difficulties and struggling of the soul and mind, and offer his life as a means to save the rest of his friends is quite symbolically akin to that of Jesus. The kind of selflessness and trust despite struggling to understand it all is reflected in the Gethsemane scenes.
This can be seen in Frodor's struggle as well as if this theme of salvation by the putting to death of sin and self is reverberating strongly at the culmination of all the three books. I have my disagreements with Rowling on areas of withcraft and wizardry, but I think her final chapters of the Harry Potter series present a truth that is very compatible with that of the Christian faith.
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