Harry Potter: Different Definitions of Good

I have a confession to make:

I am a fan of Harry Potter.

Whew. There; I've said it. Now I'll wait for the axe of the modern evangelical christian community to fall.

That was joke. Well, sort of. See, I grew up thinking the Harry Potter books/movies were bad because they blurred the lines between good and evil, thereby presenting a false Gospel. Naturally, I refused to condone such a pagan story, as did the rest of the Christian subculture.

Ten years later ... my college roommates convinced me to watch the first movie. All around, it was pretty good. What do I mean by good? I mean it was well-done, entertaining, and intriguing. Moreover, the story was good. By that I mean it rang true ... as long as one understood the definition of good being used in the story.

The definition of good is really the crux of the issue.

In the movie, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Harry has a poignant discusion with his mentor Sirius Black, concerning his own goodness. He asks if it's possible that he, Harry, is becoming bad. But Black assures Harry that he is a good person. Black then tells Harry that people aren't either good or bad. Instead, Black says, everyone has good and bad in them, and it is their choices which define a person as good or bad.

At the risk of being called a heretic (though a more accurate label might be existentialist), I'd like to say that I think this is true. I know a lot Christians, including the pre-Harry Potter me, would have objected that this is false because no one is good; all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). In other words, no one is righteous before God.

To most evangelicals, "good" means righteous.

However, that's not what Black means when he says Harry Potter is good.

Within the Harry Potter world, "good" means brave, noble, and just, though imperfect.

In other words, Black is utilizing another definition of the word "good." Accordingly, Black can accurately call Harry good, because Harry is indeed brave, noble, and just, though imperfect.

Ok, ok, so his pronouncement of Harry as "good" [aka brave, noble, and just, though imperfect] is accurate. But doesn't that teach that people can be good by acting virtuously? Isn't that heretical? Isn't that denying the reality of the sin nature? Isn't that denying man's need for salvation to achieve eternal goodness?

Actually, I think it is precisely because the story utilizes a different definition of good that it's not heretical. First off, traces of the doctrine of sinful nature can be found in the story. Remember the Harry Potter definition of "good"? Brave, noble, and just, though imperfect.

Note that the Harry Potter definition of "good" does not totally
ignore the concept of sin, but instead acknowledges it.

To be fair, the Harry Potter world has another definition of sin, one which doesn't include offending a holy God. Nevertheless, the story does retain the concept of doing wrong, offending a holy, universal law. Harry Potter dodges Bullet #1!

Moreover, the story simply does not address eternal goodness, or righteousness before God, so it avoids that type of heresy too. Now, if the story had taught that one could be "good" [aka righteous before God] by acting viruously, then it would be heretical. However, it merely teaches that a person can be good [aka brave, noble, and just, though imperfect] by choosing to act virtuously, which is true and God-honoring. Harry Potter dodges Bullet #2!

I'll admit that the Harry Potter story is not perfect. But it is not heretical. Or at least, that's my conclusion as of right now.