The Dresden Files > DF Spoilers
The Nine Billion Names of Harry Dresden
Logistics515:
The TLDR version of this is that Harry Dresden is the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. This is beyond a tinfoil hat theory - I'm now wearing a tinfoil suit, with my office located in a tin mine somewhere. But the evidence seems to keep piling up to me, so read on if you find the speculation interesting.
We learned in Peace Talks that a Starborn is a cycle that occurs every 666 years.
It's the first connection we've had linking Biblical lore to the Starborn status. It made me wonder if Jesus qualified as "Starborn". The Bible certainly has the whole Born under a Star / 3 Magi bit in it. If you run the math, the timeframe is off by +/- 15 years, which cratered my speculation at that point.
But...I keep running into narrative clues.
For instance this little tidbit from Storm Front:
--- Quote ---The world is getting weirder. Darker every single day. Things are spinning around faster and faster, and threatening to go completely awry. Falcons and falconers. The center cannot hold.
But in my corner of the country, I’m trying to nail things down. I don’t want to live in Victor’s jungle, even if it did eventually devour him. I don’t want to live in a world where the strong rule and the weak cower. I’d rather make a place where things are a little quieter. Where trolls stay the hell under their bridges and where elves don’t come swooping out to snatch children from their cradles. Where vampires respect the limits, and where the faeries mind their p’sand q’s.
My name is Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden. Conjure by it at your own risk. When things get strange, when what goes bump in the night flicks on the lights, when no one else can help you, give me a call. I’m in the book.
--- End quote ---
Falcons and Falconers. The Center cannot hold. Both of those are references to a poem by William Butler Yeats. The name of the poem?
The Second Coming
That little warning at the end of Storm Front? The book that he's referring to? It's not the phone book...it's the Bible. The warning about conjuring by his name....you don't conjure by a name of God idly.
Here's some more textual foreshadowing, if you interpret it in a certain light:
Fool Moon
--- Quote ---Denton stared at me as the soul gaze broke and we were released. He wasn’t reacting well to whatever it was he had seen inside of me. His face had gone white, and his hand was trembling, the barrel of the gun wavering every which way. He lifted his other hand to mop beads of cold sweat away from his face.“No,” Denton said, white showing all around the grey irises of his eyes.“No, wizard.” He raised his gun. “I don’t believe in hell. I won’t let you.”
--- End quote ---
Summer Knight
--- Quote ---“Harry Dresden,” he said dryly, “Meet Martha Liberty.” She shot him a look and said pointedly, “He’s arrogant, Ebenezar. Dangerous.”I snorted. “That’s every wizard ever.” Martha continued as if I hadn’t spoken. “Bitter. Angry. Obsessive.” Ebenezar frowned. “Seems to me he has good reason to be. You and the rest of the Senior Council saw to that.”Martha shook her head. “You know what he was meant to be. He’s too great a risk.”
--- End quote ---
Changes
--- Quote ---I exhaled wearily, and stopped even trying to hold the spell. “I don’t understand.” Uriel nodded. “That’s the difficult part of being mortal. Of having choice. Much is hidden from you.” He sighed. Love your child, Dresden. Everything else flows from there. A wise man said that,” Uriel said.
--- End quote ---
Cold Days
--- Quote ---“And on a similar note, do not underestimate yourself. You haven’t been given the power and the knowledge and the allies and the resources you possess for no reason, Harry. Nothing I have to say can possibly make this task any easier for you. The only way to do it is to do it. He lifted his chin. You don’t need help, Warden. You are the help.”
--- End quote ---
Peace Talks
--- Quote ---Their thoughts, or whatever madness it was that passed for them, began to devour mine. I felt like my mind was being chewed apart by a swarm of ants. And then for just an instant, the alien thought patterns made sense, and I saw an image from their point of view – a being made of coherent light, a column of glowing energy centers, and pure dread, standing like an obelisk before the cornerhounds, a bolt of terrible lightning gathered around its upraised fists, head, and shoulders, like a miniature storm front.
I saw what they saw when they looked at me.
And I felt their fear.
--- End quote ---
Finally, we have the titles of the last 3 books in the series, the apocalyptic trilogy; Stars and Stones, Hell's Bells, and Empty Night.
I submit that Empty Night is a reference to a famous short story by Arthur C. Clarke. In the story the stars start winking out, one by one. The name of the story? The Nine Billion Names of God.
I'm starting to strongly suspect that "Starborn" is something akin to Jesus, an avatar of the White God. But he's all about Choice - so Harry gets to choose to be good or evil, the same as any normal mortal human...but the consequences of that choice could be a great deal bigger then a normal life. Hence how everyone in the series who is in the know are so darned nervous about him. Why more then a few keep testing his morality. It's not on account of him being a Wizard, as he's always thought. Morgan mentions in his microfiction about something called a Destroyer....that sounds a bit like an Antichrist to me.
Conspiracy Theorist:
Harry is the ultimate expression of free will designed to defeat any sort of predestination, he has shrugged off prophecies, entropy curses, death curses and the choosing of Valkyries. Harry dislikes and disrespects authority of most kinds. Harry is an outlier even among wizards.
This makes him the polar opposite of Uriel, who cannot do anything unless a Fallen has intervened. His boss is probably even more circumscribed. So creating an avatar who is the walking embodiment of free will, is literally the only way the White God can intervene.
The point is Harry is raw potential, but that potential can crystallise into either a Saviour, or a Destroyer depending upon the choices he makes. I suppose the vast majority of Dresdens in the multi-verse are neither, they are the meh Dresdens, but most people don’t have that range of potential.
In Mirror, Mirror, we may not see an Destroyer Harry, we may just see a meh Dresden, an ordinary Harry making some bad decisions. A Harry who is mediocre.
spiritofair:
I like both of these posts! Nothing to add, just really like both of them! Explains a lot of what Uriel has been doing.
ClintACK:
It's a plausible theory....
but from a Doylist perspective, it's a minefield of sensitive topics...
Logistics515:
That is true.
Though Butcher gave himself a clever out with the idea of Mantles, cosmic hats, and the Jesus angle just being a reflection of some greater truth, all religions equally valid and all that.
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