I had a sudden thought the other day. When Harry gets hit by the AK in the forest, is he actually master of death, thereby meaning that the place he went to to talk to Dumbledore was created by The Hallows, or was it created because of the soul fragment in him being ripped out?

 

I think it's generally implied that the Horcrux was responsible. Though, you could make it due to the Hallows if it's for a story or something, I suppose.

 

I saw it as a sort of limbo, not created by the hallows, but basically sort of in between dying and death. I always assumed that people always go there, but instead of going back to life and moving on, they have the choice between moving on and becoming a ghost. Not sure if that's canon... Some of the ghosts somewhere do mention something about making the choice to stay back because they were too afraid to move on, and I thought of this as an answer for how they make that choice.

 

Ohhh. That explains a lot. Although, now I have the conundrum in my head on how The Hallows work. Somehow I don't see them being that great if they don't actually stop death from happening. On the ghosts though, does it say anything anywhere on whether they have the ability to move on to the afterlife?

 

JK said that being the Master of Death did not mean you were invincible, but that you did not seek to run from death, and that you accepted your mortality. Doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but she's not all that bright from what I've seen.

 

Not as far as I know, I think that once you make the choice to be a ghost you're a ghost forever. Even the basilisk couldn't kill a ghost, right?

Hmm. If the Veil kills, I wonder what would happen to a ghost going through it?

Also, as Carmine said, the point of being Master of Death is not to avoid death but to accept it.

 

Hmm. Doesn't that defeat the purpose of having the hallows then? Anyone could accept their death, but that wouldn't necessarily mean that they were the Master of Death. I reckon if a ghost went through the veil though, it would just go through. On another note though, wouldn't the ghost itself have to actively decide to move on, therefore making it unable to be 'killed' as it were...

When I say 'go through' I mean that it would just pass through by the way.

 

Master of Death is just a symbolic title. It'a for when a person unites all three Hallows, which are designed to defy death (invincibility, invisibility and resurrection), but still chooses to accept death that they are considered a "Master of Death".

That's my interpretation at least.

 

Gotcha. Doesn't seem like JK planned this out very well though. Seems more to be something to just make everything work.

 

Pretty much.

She's a good writer, but her long-term planning (see romance, mistakes, plot-holes) is fucking terrible.

 

Yeah... Example of this that made me rage an insane amount was in the fourth book when Mrs Weasley shoots sauce out of her wand, and then in the 7th book, it's suddenly impossible...

 

You can conjure something like sauce if you already know where it is. And you can create wine from nothing so it's possible you can do the same for sauce.

 

Right... I was under the impression that conjuring was just making something from nothing, and summoning was when you get something if you know where it is.

 

I meant conjuring in a general way rather than actual Conjuration. Presumably, Mrs Weasley summoned the sauce without it actually having to travel the distance from where it was stored to her.

 

I see. Still, I would have thought that JK would at least try to make these things clear, rather than leave them to speculation...

 

Sigh. You need to lurk more. These things have been covered (and argued, debated, raged about) a dozen times just since I've been coming here. Dumbledore (or rather, Harry's subconscious, in the guise of Dumbledore, IMO) pretty much states outright that the Hallows aren't from an anthropomorphic Death-Personified, but rather the creations of the three very talented but ultimately mortal Peverell brothers, and the power of those items, like all mythical objects of power, has been exaggerated and overblown through centuries of embellished retellings.

 

Right. Any thoughts on the ghosts topic and the like though?

 

The Harry Potter Lexicon is your friend.

 

Oh indeed. Good show old chap.

 

Just thought I'd interject here, but didn't Dumbledore tell Harry things that he didn't already know?