October Debate: The Mystery Surrounding Dumbledores Death

Originally posted by Borbarad
Nice how many theories are posted here. Let me just add my personal theory.

First we have to take a look at the unbreakable vow. What did Snape swear ?

a) Watch over Malfoy when he's trying to carry out Voldemorts plans.
b) Protect Malfoy against all kinds of dangers / threats.
c) Kill DD himself if Draco is about to fail.

Now we know that breaking the unbreakable vow will result in the death of the person that is under it's influence meaning if Snape acts against one of the points he will die.
Now let's just think about the points b and c. The only real danger or threat to Draco is Voldemort himself and the only protection against this threat is Dumbledore. Now killing Dumbledore might result in breaking the second unbreakable vow but as we have seen Snape was still alive after doing that.
And the third unbreakable vow ? Where was Draco about to fail ? He had Dumbledore disarmed and there were 4 Death-eaters in the room for backup then you have Snape coming in and immediatly cursing Dumbledore without even waiting for Draco doing something.

But let's go back to the actual scene and have a look at it.
We have Harry and Dumbledore arriving with the magic brooms. Then DD freezes Harry and get's disarmed before talking to Draco but think about it.

- in OotP Dumbledore alone took out Fudge, Percy Weasley, Kingsley, Umbridge and Dawlish at once and he mentioned that he would easily be able to escape from Askaban. Draco would have had [b]no chance to disarm him if Dumbledore didn't want to get disarmed.
- the hint that he will be able to escape from Askaban as well as the scene when he saves Harry in PoA have shown that Dumbledore is able to use spells without having his wand at hand (wandless magic). It's hinted again in the scene when Dumbledore tells Draco that now everything is up to his mercy.

And now think about the possibilities Dumbledore had in the scene even when the Deatheaters arrived. He had the two magic brooms up there that he could have used to escape from the tower. He had Harry hidden under his magic cape and I'm pretty sure that Harry could have taken out all the people in the room from his hidden position if Dumbledore lowered his spell. And we know that Dumbledore is able to lower Hogwarts protections to give people the ability to use Apparition within the school building meaing he could have used Disapparition to get away from the tower.

But he didn't do anything like that but instead waited for Snape coming. And DD didn't beg for mercy and he didn't beg for getting killed by Snape. Why should he ? If Snape had shown mercy then he wouldn't be able to spy on Voldemort and the Deatheaters any longer and as we have seen all the Deatheaters wanted Dumbledore dead.
The only thing that he could have begged for was that Snape should have continued his spy works for the Order of the Phoenix.

My personal theory:
I think Snape told Dumbledore about everything Malfoy was doing and he told Dumbledore about the unbreakable vow. Dumbledore knew that Malfoy won't be able to kill him and he knew that Snape will come which he utilized to fake his own death.

Now point one: The Avada Kedavra
Bellatrix Lestrange's own words in OotP:
"Never used an Unforgivable Curse before, have you, boy? You need to mean them, Potter! You need to really cause pain--to enjoy it-- righteous anger won't hurt me for long..."

That means that Snape must have wanted to kill Dumbledore and he must have enjoyed killing him. We know that Snape started spying on Voldemort before Voldemort's fall and his hand twitched before giving the third unbreakable vow. I don't think he would hesitated a second if he enjoyed the idea having to kill Dumbledore or if he really wanted to do it.
Therefore we can say that the Avada Kedavra Snape used against Dumbledore didn't kill Dumbledore.

Next observation: Dumbledore flying backwards being hit by the curse and it seems like he was "standing in the air" before he actually fell down from the tower.

I think Snape used some nonverbal spell to get Dumbledore out of sight either a banishing charm (Flitwick was thrown across the room when Neville accidentially used it on him in GoF) or the Levitation charm just to cover that he didn't really kill Dumbledore.

Next observation: Dumbledore bleeding when he's found at the side of the tower.

As it was already pointed out: Dead people don't bleed. That means Dumbledore was still alive when he was lying there although he was injured by the fall. And here we have a perfect recycling of the scene when Harry fell down from his broomstick during the Quidditch-match against Hufflepuff in PoA. Dumbledore used wandless spell casting to stop Harry from falling down and although he managed to slower down Harry's fall, Harry was still injured through it. I think the same thing was happening here...Dumbledore slowed down his own fall but still the impact did hurt him enough to bleed and maybe break some bones - then Fawkes moved in and cried to heal him.

Next observations all from the funeral scene:
- we never see Dumbledore's body
- Harry sees a Phoenix flying away

I think Dumbledore used the flames as a cover up and then Fawkes carried him away. We have seen in OotP that Fawkes can simply disappear from Dumbledore's office although Hogwarts has anti-Appartion magic installed and Fawkes wasn't present at the funeral which seemed very odd to me since all creatures did show their respect for Dumbledore but Fawkes was missing.

Conclusion: I think Dumbledore faked his death to make Voldemort reveal himself and provoke Voldemort to make mistakes. The entire search for the Horcrux was senseless and I bet that Dumbledore knew there was no real Horcrux in that cave (R.A.B who removed / destroyed the Horcrux seems to be Sirius brother Regulus Black) and just wanted to show Harry what awaits him when trying to find the other Horcruxs. I don't think that Jo Rowling would kill Dumbledore in such a useless way (having himself weakened through the search for a Horcrux which wasn't even at the place, having Draco disarm him and then Snape killing him). [/B]

only thing i diss agree with is that RAB, it said on the locket that RAB is the one who discoverd the truth... about the horicuxs... i jus dont know it doesent sound right... and also "if" DD is alive then why would he have let any one take the real locket that he and harry had worked so hard to retrieve.... thats the only things i question..

in other words we will just have to wait till the 7th book comes out to find out what the true story is....... and stop racking our brains to come up with somthing that may or may not be true....

THIS IS SO FRUSTRATING!!!! i just think its fishy the way that JK like showed us since the beginning Snapes "true self"....usually she just waits to the last moment or in a really tense moment to show us...for example...
in POA we all hated Sirius until i dont know when we found out that all was wrong and that in fact he was good...
Mad Eye Moody after all the things with the cemetery and that, we dont find out IMMEDIATELY he was barty crouch jr we found out a little later...

so see where im going? just that JK always comes up with something that is completely wrong(she misleads us) and just in the last moment she shows us the true colors of it. So maybe at the beginning with the unforgivable curses and all that maybe she was trying to mislead us making us thing that snape was a voldy spy...and if you ask me that i know that none of you did she sort of like wheeled us around with that one really hard...cause all of the sudden we see hes bad?!!? AAAA!!! TOO MUCH to take but o well lets see! 😎

He is not dead. I refuse to believe it. NO NO NO NO NO schmoll

Originally posted by Borbarad
Next observation: Dumbledore bleeding when he's found at the side of the tower.

As it was already pointed out: Dead people don't bleed.

i think the fact that fawkes did not save him is big evidence.
first-(ootp pg.815)
["look out!" harry yelled
but even as he shouted, one more jet of green light had flown at dumbledore from voldemort's wand an the snake had struck-
fawkes swooped down in front of dumbledore, opened his beak wide, and swallowed the jet of green light whole. he burst into flame and fell to the floor, small, wrinkled, and flightless.]

i think fawkes would have saved him again. and the fact that he didnt is very suspicious.

my next theory-
(hbp pg 645)
[then several people screamed. bright, white flames had erupted around dumbledore's body and the table upon which it lay: higher and higher they rose, obscuring the body. white smoke spiraled into the air and made strange shapes: harry thought, for one heart-stopping moment, that he saw a phoenix fly joyfully into the blue, but next second the fire had vanished. in its place was a white marble tomb, encasing dumbledore's body and the table on which he had rested.]

we are not really sure what dumbledore's animagus is but it could be a phoenix and the phoenix harry saw could be him flying away.

(ootp pg 622)
[fawkes circled the office and swooped low over him. dumbledore released harry, raised his wand, and grasped the phoenix's long golden tail. there was a flash of fire and the pair of them had gone.]

dumbledore could have also escaped throught the fire on his tomb.

Yeah, in the 6th book Harry was told by Hagrid that DD and Snape were arguing and that DD told him he had to do it, (kill DD? or fake it?) But why did Snape accuse DD of taking too much for granted?

hmm i dont know. but i think there was definitely some kind of plan going on between them.

I agree that the unbreakable vow was made to Narcissa to make the illusion that Snape was gonna help draco to the end. But Malfoy never followed through and Albus made the vow with Snape so he would kill him. But Dumbledor wasn't begging for his life he was begging for his death So that the plans could go through in the Order.

And truely i think that this former Death eater has a good heart. His history is dark and evil that would make anyone sour and bitter. He was trapped with the group of servers to the darkest wizard ever.

Snape couldn't possibly do it when it came down to it just like Draco. Trust me AD isn't gone JK Rowling has something in store for us all. I have yet to re-read the book but i strongly am against his death it was all strange. Esp his journey with Harry in the end.

Check out my post "Dumbledores Death is Staged"

Lots of evidence of JK's tricks

Originally posted by DarkC
Not unless they are freshly dead, and Harry couldn't have taken more than an hour to arrive back at where Dumbledore's body lay.

The question is where did the blood came from and how did it come to DD's face ?

We know that he wasn't bleeding before getting hit by the Avada Kedavra. We know that the Avada Kedavra instantly kills people without doing visible damage to them.

Thus being said the blood can only come from wounds that DD suffered from the fall from the tower (maybe inner wounds). But how did it get to DD's face ? He was lying on his back and if the Avada Kedavra killed him there is no possibility that he was breathing any longer and therefore there is no way that blood from his mouth or nose had come to his face (blood can't defy gravity and DD was lying on his back). And since he couldn't have moved there is no possibility that blood from other parts of his body got on his face.
And that means that DD was still alive after having hit the ground.

@seanjones:

only thing i diss agree with is that RAB, it said on the locket that RAB is the one who discoverd the truth... about the horicuxs... i jus dont know it doesent sound right... and also "if" DD is alive then why would he have let any one take the real locket that he and harry had worked so hard to retrieve.... thats the only things i question..

JKR has basically admitted that "RAB" was Sirius brother Regulus Black. If that's the truth then the Horcrux must have been stolen before Voldemort's fall (about 16 years before HBP). If that's the truth I guess Regulus would have told DD, Sirius or somebody else about it. How else would DD know anything about the Horcruxs ?

And thinking about that point: Why did DD weaken himself ? In the cave he used his own blood instead of letting Harry spend some which I don't understand because he can instantly heal wounds. Then he is drinking the magic potion although he exactly knew what it will do before they even entered the cave (He told Harry before).

I think DD has been to that cave before and just wanted to teach Harry about the things Voldemort will use to protect the Horcruxes so that Harry would be able to deal with that tests alone and that's why he explained everything they found to Harry.

About "Snape and Dumbledore arguing":
I still think that Dumbledore wanted Snape to go and spy on Voldemort himself. As far as we knew Snape only spied on the Deatheaters and not on the Dark Lord himself. And that's what Dumbledore begged for when Snape arrived at the Tower. As I said...it doesn't make sense if he begged for getting killed or not getting killed.

And now...even if all that things can be explained there is still no explanation for the following questions:
- Why wasn't Fawkes present at DD's funeral ?
- Where did the flames surrounding DD's body came from ?
- Where did the tomb come from ?
- Why did Harry see a Phoenix flying away ?

Beside of that I think there is a reason why DD is always associated with the Phoenix (his pet is a phoenix, his patronus has the shape of a phoenix, he called the organisation of Wizards against Voldemort the Order of the Phoenix). If he really was killed (which I still doubt) I think he will return.

Borbarad has made some excellent points and made them very well. I am in total agreement with him/her.

Dumbledore is not dead. JKR would not have even left the slightest possibility that he was alive, let alone so many.

A lot of people have made reference to the point of JKR saying that 'once a character is dead, it's dead' and 'i'm killing someone off in HBP' but come on, think about it. She's hardly going to say 'Oh, you never know, he could be alive' because that would totally blow secrecy and it would be obvious he was alive. I mean, if you were worth more than the queen and you had a load of losers like us racking our brains and spending time thinking about this you are hardly going to blow your cover. No one would discuss the book, it would be less popular!

This is just added to Borbarad's theory. Read the one on page 6 that he/she wrote, it is very good.

Guys, I don't know what to believe. Of course, I want Dumbledore to be alive. It was a poor way he died (if he really did). But still, I don't know, after reading the Order of the Phoenix, I honestly believed Sirius would come back. (He didn't, though he has one more chance (or book) to show up.)
And again, JKR put me in denial. I don't believe Snape's evil. I don't think he is. I guess he would come back in the 7th book and explain everything and maybe sacrifice himself in some kind of fight and this way, he finally manages to prove that he's on the right side.
It's really simple: Harry and Ron can't be right about Snape if Dumbledore, Lupin and Hermione think he's a good guy. 🙂
I think there are two choices: either Snape's evil, or they faked Dumbledore's death. Otherwise, how could Snape explain why he killed Dumbledore and who would believe him? Let me know if I'm wrong or right.

Hold on a sec, i have read arguements on both sides, apparently there seems to be decent evidence and respectable arguements for both, but....the arguement of dumbledore being alive appears to be stronger. If I may?

Dumbledore is dead:

1)He was old anyway, and JK figured it was time for Harry, Ron, Hermoine, and Neville to grow up journey together.
2)Dumbledore knew some of Voldemort's weaknesses just as Voldemort knew some of Dumbledore's weaknesses. Trust.
3)Dumbledore said himself that Voldemort put an enchantment on Defense Against the Dark Arts (D.A.D.D.) which is why a teacher of that subject in Hogwarts never lasted more than a year. It just so happens that Snape became a teacher of the subject meaning it is possible that he chose the evil side instead.

Dumbledore is alive:

1)Dumbledore said over and over again that he trusted Snape and never mention why.
2)Dumbledore purposley kept harry frozen even when it appeared that he, Dumbledore, was pleading to Snape not to kill him because "all of a sudden" it seemed like Dumbledore was afraid of Snape. And after all that talk of trust? dont think so.
3)And yeah, we've all heard about the avada kedavra curse incident. The curse does not send you flying in the air and then stop and fall. It kills you instantly, maybe knocking you slighly off your feet. Snape must've done something that no one else noticed.

Originally posted by Auror_Elite
Hold on a sec, i have read arguements on both sides, apparently there seems to be decent evidence and respectable arguements for both, but....the arguement of dumbledore being alive appears to be stronger. If I may?

Dumbledore is dead:

1)He was old anyway, and JK figured it was time for Harry, Ron, Hermoine, and Neville to grow up journey together.
2)Dumbledore knew some of Voldemort's weaknesses just as Voldemort knew some of Dumbledore's weaknesses. Trust.
3)Dumbledore said himself that Voldemort put an enchantment on Defense Against the Dark Arts (D.A.D.D.) which is why a teacher of that subject in Hogwarts never lasted more than a year. It just so happens that Snape became a teacher of the subject meaning it is possible that he chose the evil side instead.

Dumbledore is alive:

1)Dumbledore said over and over again that he trusted Snape and never mention why.
2)Dumbledore purposley kept harry frozen even when it appeared that he, Dumbledore, was pleading to Snape not to kill him because "all of a sudden" it seemed like Dumbledore was afraid of Snape. And after all that talk of trust? dont think so.
3)And yeah, we've all heard about the avada kedavra curse incident. The curse does not send you flying in the air and then stop and fall. It kills you instantly, maybe knocking you slighly off your feet. Snape must've done something that no one else noticed.

Agreed. Although one other argument for Dumbledore is Dead part is that it did say he copped it. But meh. He's gotta be alive.

Ok Voldemort-best wizard of all times-EVIL
Dumbledor-best wizard of all times-GOOD

Both are extremely great wizards,even though one in each side. If Voldemort didnt ever try to do something while Dumbledore lived (he didnt even tried to kill him) why did Snape,one of his teachers, one of his member of the order of the phoenix, one which he gave so much trust...killed him just like puf, its done, over...dont get it

And why in the last book DD is so wrong so many times?!!?!??! he was so wise in all the other books he never was wrong and in the last book...suddenly gets so old and weary, finally gives Snape DADA and gets killed and many more...i just sensed DD in this book so weird!!

it's still frustrating to me...but might as well wait until the final book comes out(hope its 8942893 pages long cause shes got a lot of explaining to do)

im not sure i almost fell over hearing that dd died i meean seriously

I think danagrint is right because if you watch the Goblet Of Fire Mad-Eye moody did avada kevadra in the dark arts class the spider didn't fly backwards.

dont base your theories on what happened in the movies.

as it is stated in the books, whenever the killing curse is performed the person just drops down dead.

Yeah the movies are defenatly wrong, In Goblet of Fire, Cedric gets blown backward, which obviouslly makes the MOVIE WAY WRONG!!!