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The prophecy: an analysis
'Voldemort tried to kill you when you were a child because of a prophecy made shortly before your birth. He knew the prophecy had been made, though he did not know its full contents. He set out to kill you when you were still a baby, believing he was fulfilling the terms of the prophecy. He discovered, to his cost, that he was mistaken, when the curse intended to kill you backfired. And so, since his return to his body, and particularly since your extraordinary escape from him last year, he has been determined to hear that prophecy in its entirety. [OotP ch. 37; p. 740]
''The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches ... born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies ... and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not ... and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives ... the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies ...' [OotP ch. 37; p. 741]
Voldemort's information about the prophecy was incomplete. The Hog's Head inn, which Sybill chose for its cheapness, has long attracted, shall we say, a more interesting clientele than the Three Broomsticks. As you and your friends found out to your cost, and I to mine that night, it is a place where it is never safe to assume you are not being overheard. Of course, I had not dreamed, when I set out to meet Sybill Trelawney, that I would hear anything worth overhearing. My -- our -- one stroke of good fortune was that the eavesdropper was detected only a short way into the prophecy and thrown from the building.' 'So he only heard --?' 'He heard only the beginning, the part foretelling the birth of a boy in July to parents who had thrice defied Voldemort. Consequently, he could not warn his master that to attack you would be to risk transferring power to you, and marking you as his equal. So Voldemort never knew that there might be danger in attacking you, that it might be wise to wait, to learn more. He did not know that you would have power the Dark Lord knows not --' [OotP ch. 37; p. 743]
So, we know what the full prophecy said. We know that Snape only heard part of it, and didn't get as far as "mark him as his equal". It's implied, although not definite, that he didn't hear "mark him", especially as Dumbledore says that he heard "only a short way into the prophecy" and "only the beginning". Indeed, if he had heard and relayed "and the Dark Lord will mark him", you'd expect Voldemort to assume that "the one" was one of his own Death Eaters. At the same time, he heard far enough past "seventh month dies" for Voldemort to know that there was more he hadn't heard.
So, this is what we know for sure that Snape heard:
but it's just possible, though unlikely, that he heard as far as:
There is nothing there to say whether the word is "born" (given birth to) or "borne" (conveyed). That's true even in the unlikely event that he heard as far as "mark him", since people can be conveyed. If he did hear "mark him" he at least knows that "the one" is a person or a creature, and male, but not how old or what species. If he did not hear "mark him" then "the one" could equally well be a weapon of some kind, being carried.
Rowling said that Dumbledore saw Snape as "the man who had sent Voldemort after an innocent child in the knowledge that Voldemort would kill him", which suggests that Dumbledore is perhaps autistic in a way that includes lacking Theory of Mind, and not understanding that other people are working from different information from him (or, of course, that the author herself lacks Theory of Mind). Yes, Dumbledore himself knew that the prophecy referred to an unborn boy (although still not that it was necessarily a human boy), because he had heard the entire prophecy, including "mark him" and "will be born". But there was nothing in what Snape heard strongly to suggest that the birth or conveying was in the future, and if he did not hear as far as "mark him", nothing to suggest that "the one" was a person and not a weapon.
OK, the fragment Snape heard said "as the seventh month dies", not "... died". But he was being interrupted by Aberforth at that point and probably couldn't be sure of what he heard; "dies" is actually present tense, not future; and prophetic language is often a bit woolly. Six years earlier, the popular British singer-songwriter Al Stewart, with whom Muggle-raised Snape may very well have been familiar, had produced a song called Nostradamus which set to music some of the seer's prophecies which appeared to relate to the 20thC. It includes the following:
So in one brief passage, which referred to the future from Nostradamus's point of view and to the past from Al Stewart's, that's future tense, present tense, future tense again – shall, does, shall. So there was no strong reason why Snape should assume that the use of the present tense "dies" meant the birth or conveying was in the future, and wasn't just there because it sounded cool.
There's nothing in what he heard to say whether the birth or conveying is a thousand years in the future and relates to a completely different future Dark Lord, or decades in the past. There's nothing to say whether the "those" to whom the one is being born or conveyed are the one's parents, or general family, or a group such as the Order, and nothing to say whether the thrice defying happened before or after the birth or conveying: only that it had probably already happened before the prophecy was made. What Snape heard could perfectly well refer to a warrior-centaur (female, if he didn't hear "mark him"), born thirty years ago to a herd who defied Voldemort last week.
Then there's that word "approaches". I'm approaching seventy, myself, and I've lived in Britain all my life, and in all that time I have never, ever heard anybody other than Rowling say that an unborn baby "approaches" (and Lily had only been pregnant for about six weeks, so the embryo that would become Harry was the size of a baked bean). You say that a birth approaches, but never the baby, so if it even occurred to Snape that "the one" might be a baby then that word "approaches" would kill that thought stone dead. It emphatically sounds like an adult champion, physically travelling.
Then there's the "seventh month". Which seventh month? July; September (which, owing to a shift of the New Year from 25th March to 1st January in 1752, actually means "seven-month"); the seventh month of the Jewish calendar; the seventh month of the Chinese calendar; the seventh month from when the prophecy was made (which, OK, would be mid to late July the following year anyway); seven months of gestation?
For reasons explained here we know the prophecy was almost certainly made in December 1979, and we know for certain that Snape defected around early December 1980, give or take a couple of weeks, after Voldemort decided the prophecy might refer to Harry. Voldemort finally moved against the Potters in October 1981. Presumably the reason it took Voldemort a whole year to pick a target was that he was waiting to see if an adult champion would show up, and then when one didn't he started looking at who had defied him three times.
Of course, although by later in the war Voldemort knows that Dumbledore thinks that Snape is his spy, Voldemort believes that Dumbledore is wrong and that Snape is just fooling him. He will not expect, therefore, that Snape will have told Dumbledore that he, Voldemort, thinks that the prophecy might relate to Harry. When Voldemort sees the Potters go into hiding, therefore, he will assume that the second part of the prophecy, the part which Dumbledore heard and he didn't, strongly pointed to Harry, and that therefore he was correct to make Harry his target.
The prophecy is self-fulfilling and circular in all ways. The fact that Voldemort thinks the prophecy might refer to the Potters causes Dumbledore and the Potters to behave in a way which just confirms Voldemort's belief that it refers to the Potters, and so he attacks Harry, who would never have been a threat to him if he hadn't attacked him.
There has long been a theory in the fandom that perhaps the prophecy didn't really refer to Harry at all, but to Snape. It makes a certain amount of sense. He was physically approaching as Trelawney said "The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches". He might have been born at seven months of gestation, or seven months after his parents' marriage. We don't know whether his family ever defied Voldemort, but "borne to those who have thrice defied him" could refer to the fact that he was moving towards joining the Order.
For reasons explained here we don't know whether Snape had the Dark Mark before he defected, or not. If indeed he was Marked after his defection, then Voldemort Marked him "as his equal", at a point where Snape was successfully using Occlumency to fool him.
Finally, the final chapter of the series, before the epilogue, is called The Flaw in the Plan and it's made pretty explicit that the plan is Voldemort's, and the flaw in it is that he didn't know about or understand Snape's love for Lily. So it was Snape who had the power of love. Harry is not actually portrayed as particularly loving, in the normal sense, but rather as being remarkably lacking in self-interest. Both Snape's love and Harry's lack of self-interest were powers Voldemort knew not.
[My own pet theory is that the prophecy refers to all three of them in collaboration: Harry, Neville and Snape. To some extent this is true in the books. Snape gives his life to Nagini in order to send Voldemort into battle not knowing that his wand won't strike at Harry because Harry is its master. Neville then kills Nagini, rendering Voldemort mortal. And Harry doesn't actively strike Voldemort but, Aslan-like, takes him down because he is a willing sacrifice and allows Voldemort to strike at him: and because Snape died to conceal from Voldemort the fact that the Elder Wand won't strike Harry, it first kills the Horcrux in Harry, and then rebounds from Harry and kills Voldemort.]
