The Christ Figure: Harry Potter and Hamlet

The story of Jesus from the bible is well known. He is born as God's child. He has no faults and so for that matter, he is perfect in every way. He teaches the ways of God throughout his life and collects a good deal of disciples that wish to follow in his footsteps as a good Christian. According to the bible, Jesus was sent originally to basically rid the world of its sins against God. For that matter, Jesus is considered to be the world's savior. When Jesus is presumably much older, he is ordered to be killed. God watches as his only son is pinned on the cross for the world to see. Jesus tells God to please forgive the people because they do not understand what they are doing. When Jesus dies he is taken to heaven, body, soul, and all. This is how the world knew that Jesus was really God's child. The Christ figure shows up quite often in literature. Often it shows as a person that dies or is sacrificed in some way for someone else. For example, in the Harry Potter series, Harry is a very obvious and typical Christ figure. He is faultless and he has a group of people following him. This shows up the most with the introduction of Dumbledore's army. He has a prediction made about him that says that he shall either die or get rid of the evil wizard Voldemort. At the end of the series Harry does die but then he is resurrected similar to Jesus and Harry lives on similar to how Jesus according to the bible, lives within everyone. I have recently discovered that Hamlet will become a Christ figure in Shakespeare's play Hamlet. My first impression of Prince Hamlet was that he had been wronged by a King that probably dislikes him. This is similar to how the King did not like Jesus. Hamlet does seem to have some faults, one of which is being overly sarcastic. I'm sure that more faults will arise as the play continues. However, one has to consider how the tragic element plays into the Christ figure plot. To intertwine these means that Hamlet could possibly have some Jesus-like traits but also some other traits that lead him to be sinful. It will be interesting to see how Shakespeare inevitable proves his skill at combining the Christ figure and the tragedy.