Please allow me to begin by sharing two quotes with you.

The moon is surely somewhere in the sky;
So surely is your whiteness to be found
Through all the dark facts.

~ Elizabeth Barrett Browning

He looked Lupin straight in the eye.
‘-do you honestly like Snape?’

~ Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, p. 312

According to the Oxford English dictionary, “ambiguous” has its source in latin words that translate as “doubtful,” “waver” and “both ways.” I would like to argue that Professor Snape is not ambiguous, and by this I mean that imperfection cannot be equated with betrayal.

From the very first book, it is clear where Snape’s loyalties lie. While Harry believes that Snape is intent on obtaining the Philosopher’s Stone for Voldemort, Professor Quirrell ultimately desabuses him of this notion by saying, “No, no, no. I tried to kill you... Another few seconds and I’d have got you off that broom. I’d have managed it before then if Snape hadn’t been muttering a countercurse, trying to save you.” However, throughout the series Harry persists in his belief that Snape’s motivations are questionable at best and evil at worst. At the end of Half-Blood Prince, at last the facts seem to confirm his views. Or do they?

Sentences that include both the words “trust” and “Snape” are everywhere in Half-Blood Prince. The matter of his trustworthiness is constantly brought to light -it is of vital importance. Hardly anyone, it seems, can be fully convinced that he is worthy of trust. Those on the side of good and those on the side of evil wonder if Dumbledore really does trust him, and if so, why.

At the beginning of Half-Blood Prince, Snape asks Bellatrix Lestrange whether she believes he has “somehow hoodwinked... fooled the Dark Lord.” He asks, “You think he is mistaken?” Indeed, he is asking everyone this question. “Who have I fooled? Dumbledore, or Voldemort?” Has he fooled Love, or Hatred? Is Trust mistaken, or Distrust? Can Love be fooled?

That Snape can be perceived as ambiguous depends entirely upon what values we believe will finally prevail. While Dumbledore is willing to believe the best of people, he certainly does not lack discernment. When Harry asks him how he felt about the possibility of Voldemort teaching at Hogwarts, the headmaster replies, “Deeply uneasy.” He “did not take it for granted” that Tom Riddle was trustworthy. Can Dumbledore be accused of trusting “people in spite of overwhelming evidence that they did not deserve it” -in other words, can he be trusted? Can we have faith in him? Is Voldemort more trustworthy than Dumbledore because he sees Snape for what he is, an agent of darkness? Does Voldemort, who has “never had a friend, nor... ever wanted one,” speak the truth? Can he stand for the Truth? Dumbledore taught Harry that “only love” would defeat Voldemort. Shall we choose to believe the headmaster, then, when he categorically affirms that he trusts Snape completely, though he does not reveal the exact reasons why?

Harry’s determination to expose Snape’s duplicity despite the repeated affirmations of his mentor should not cause the reader to view Snape as ambiguous. When Hermione tried to point out the possibility that the Half-Blood Prince’s influence might be harmful, citing numerous instances where all seemed to indicate this was true, Harry was quick to tell her, “Always jump to the worst conclusions, don’t you?” Even the Sectumsempra curse cannot sway Harry. He snaps at Hermione and says, “The Prince only copied it out! It’s not like he was advising anyone to use it! For all we know, he was making a note of something that had been used against him!” He goes on to say, “You can’t blame the Prince!” In other words, Snape is ambiguous... when he is Snape. Not when he is the Half-Blood Prince.

We should not be discussing whether or not Snape is ambiguous. It is more a question of whether or not he is likable. “-do you honestly like him?” is what Harry asked Lupin; i.e. “He is not likable therefore he cannot be trusted.” Snape is a deeply flawed man and has a shadowy past. His people skills are not particularly well-developed, and he is consumed by bitterness. And yet, it is easy to overstate his weaknesses. When Christ spoke of the widow who only put two coins in the offering box, he declared that she had given more than all the others, because she “out of her poverty put in all she had to live on.” Snape’s acts of goodness may seem few and far between, but they are costlier to him because he has greater difficulty overcoming his natural defects. Harry was prepared to excuse the Half-Blood Prince for including deadly curses in his potions manual, and still doubts Snape’s motives, even though Snape heals one person after the other in the sixth book. In one case, we even know that when he performed the countercurse, which he did three times, it sounded “almost like a song,” a very tender image. He actually tells Draco, “There may be a certain amount of scarring, but if you take dittany immediately, we might avoid even that... come...” Since when is a cruel Death Eater worried about scarring?

The Potions Master is not perfect; that is quite clear. But that does not mean he is ambiguous. The question of his loyalty really boils down to who and what we are ready to believe. What we are willing to see, and how we choose to interpret it. If we are merciful, we are willing to believe the best of someone, even when their behavior makes little sense to us, or even appears to be wrong. I am reminded of a story. A monk saw another monk in the distance who was lying next to a woman. The scandalized monk made his way towards them, already rehearsing how he would accuse and correct his fellow brother. However, the woman in fact turned out to be a log.

Professor Snape is not any more ambiguous than our young Gryffindor hero, who with remarkable ease could think of Dumbledore as an old fool whose trust was “inexcusable.” Harry saw Snape’s not being upset by Mundungus Fletcher’s arrest as further proof that the Potions Master was not on their side; yet he himself was quite eager to rip Fletcher’s head off for the exact same reasons Snape had condemned the man. Why are we all sitting here discussing Snape’s ambiguousness? I am not judging Harry; what I am saying is, if we look hard enough, perhaps we, like the Death Eaters, would end up believing the Boy Who Lived might have potential as a Dark Wizard. Of course, we do not do so, because we love him. We will not conclude that his anger at Dumbledore implies that he is secretly plotting his demise.

Harry will defeat Voldermort with the power that the Dark Lord knows not. But love requires trust. As long as Harry cannot bring himself to trust the one his mentor has always trusted, he does not completely possess that power stronger than fear and death. Snape’s role in the books is to teach Harry about the nature of trust. The moment Harry begins to consider the possibility that Snape may in fact be good, when the one thing he has always been sure of suddenly becomes doubtful, when he experiences metanoia, “changes his mind and turns around,” then he will be ready to trust Dumbledore... Trust Snape, despite his flaws... And not be surprised that “only love” will destroy Voldemort, who cannot trust anyone. Trust is the key to the power of Love. Hence Snape is the key to Voldemort’s defeat.