Truth from the mouth of the enemy

I have a half dozen posts rattling around in my head, most of them musing about the nature of academia, the state of education in our country and the place of Catholics in the academy.  Unfortunately, the very situation which I am trying to think through makes it impossible to find the the time to do so.  At some point I will get these thoughts down on paper in an attempt to sort through them, for by then the things to which I am responding will be quite dated.  In the meantime here is a quote which resonates strongly with my state of mind.

"Only the learned read old books and we have now so dealt with the learned that they are of all men the least likely to acquire wisdom by doing so. We have done this by inculcating The Historical Point of View. The Historical Point of View, put briefly, means that when a learned man is presented with any statement in an ancient author, the one question he never asks is whether it is true. He asks who influenced the ancient writer, and how far the statement is consistent with what he said in other books, and what phase in the writer's development, or in the general history of thought, it illustrates, and how it affected later writers, and how often it has been misunderstood (specially by the learned man's own colleagues) and what the general course of criticism on it has been for the last ten years, and what is the "present state of the question". To regard the ancient writer as a possible source of knowledge—to anticipate that what he said could possibly modify your thoughts or your behaviour—this would be rejected as unutterably simple-minded. And since we cannot deceive the whole human race all the time, it is most important thus to cut every generation off from all others; for where learning makes a free commerce between the ages there is always the danger that the characteristic errors of one may be corrected by the characteristic truths of another. But thanks be to our Father and the Historical Point of View, great scholars are now as little nourished by the past as the most ignorant mechanic who holds that "history is bunk."

                 C. S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

  

Still small voice

The moment you wake up each morning, all your wishes and hopes for the day rush at you like wild animals. And the first job each morning consists in shoving it all back; in listening to that other voice, taking that other point of view, letting that other, larger, stronger, quieter life coming flowing in.

C. S. Lewis

The Paradox of Humanity

“You come of the Lord Adam and the Lady Eve…and that is both honor enough to erect the head of the poorest beggar, and shame enough to bow the shoulders of the greatest emperor on earth.” —C.S. Lewis, Prince Caspian

Once a King or Queen of Narnia, Always a King or Queen of Narnia

The preview for the latest of the Chronicles of Narina movies was recently released.  I know it is unfair to judge a movie by its preview, and I for one am still hoping that despite his limited appearance in the preview they have not reduced Eustace's role in the movie.  However, the lack of attention given to the arch of Eustace's conversion and repentance allows the preview to make another point.  The Pevensie's question  why they were summoned to Narina, for they believe that they are only called to fight its wars and so are confused as to their mission now.  In response, they are told they are all about to be tested.  Lucy is presented with the a vision of her deepest desires coming true and Edmund is confronted with the specter of the White Witch.

The later recalls one of the best and worst scenes from Prince Caspian--when Peter and Caspian almost bring back the White Witch and are saved at the last moment by Edmund.  This scene is the culmination of a lot of angst on the part of Peter, who had been petulant through the duration of the movie believing that he somehow was owed something by his previous kinghood.  He fights with people, Caspian and others, trying to reassert his authority.  This is a serious misunderstanding of Lewis's conception of kingship.  It is not an administrative office, especially for those filling the four thrones at Cair Paravel--it is sacramental.  Throughout the books the Peter lives this, he is always described as gracious and magnanimous, the archetype of a true king.  

The one virtue of this scene is in how it depicts Edmund.  He does not succumb to the pettiness of the others and is the only one to react immediately and decisively against temptation--he smashes the ice wall through which the White Witch is communicating with and seducing Caspian and Peter.  Just as the White Witch says he is marked as a traitor in the first book, once Aslan has bought his freedom he is marked as one redeemed and does not renege on his redemption.  

Conversion, grace and redemption are the central themes of each of the Chronicles of Narnia.  And while Lewis's work is not so simplistic that once a character undergoes these changes they are perfect- Lucy is tempted to read the book in the professors library in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, her sin is not a renouncement of the good and a decision to join the side of evil-- a conscious choice to join Aslan never wavers.  While this make be simplistic in the real world, within Narnia once a person makes a decision to join Aslan, a real conversion, they stand strong against the White Witch.

It is precisely this grace which Hollywood does not understand--what Aslan means when he says "Once a king or queen of Narina, always a king or queen of Narnia." 

Together as one

“Friendship is born as that moment when one person says to another, "what! You too? I thought I was the only one."- C. S. Lewis”

The shadows of the Past

"We read to know that we are not alone."
— C.S. Lewis

The Well Lived Life

"Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art.... It has no survival value; rather it is one of those things that give value to survival. " — C.S. Lewis

The Greatest Story Ever Told

I was surprised when reading a review of a new book has come out entitled The Magician's Book: A Skeptical Visit to Narnia, to note the bitterness with which the author, Laura Miller, recalls her realization as a teen of "what is instantly obvious to any adult reader: that the Chronicles of Narnia are filled with Christian symbolism."

C. S. Lewis is so forthwith about the Christianity in his works that her sense of betrayal is surprising. More surprising, however, is her claim that reading the Chronicles of Narnia as religious allegory is a willful misinterpretation and that she mean to reclaim them. "The Chronicles are unified," she writes, "not by anything resembling the exhaustive cultural stuff that Tolkien invented for Middle-earth . . . not even, really, by a cogent religious vision, but by readerly desire. Lewis poured into his imaginary world everything that he had adored in the books he read as a child and in the handful of children's books he'd enjoyed as an adult. And there is more, too: treasures collected from Dante, from Spenser, from Malory, from Austen, from old romances and ballads and fairy tales and pagan epics. . . The Chronicles," Miller concludes, "are a portal to other worlds, literary worlds."

Now, I have not read her book, but all of the reviews said generally the same thing. Which left me wondering how stories, other worlds and Christianity are mutually exclusive?

Myths and religion form the backbone of most fantasy. Sometimes their presence is overt-in The Iliad the gods are active participants in the plot. Other stories mask religion's presence but it is there; the injunction to follow a rule that is seemingly incompressible, to not open a box, eat an apple or to return home from the ball by midnight, points to the mystery of faith. The quest for some unattainable end, epic last stands, reliance on something besides oneself, these are all tropes that mirror and point to a Christian life.

Not only do most stories owe something to Christianity but the story of salvation history is itself thrilling. I know a professor who claims that you know the Bible was divinely inspired because of how perfect a work of literature it is, no person could have written it. It contains paradigms of tragedy and comedy, soul stirring pieces of poetry, the story of Jonah is even a perfect example of a ring cycle.

This is the point which seems to have eluded Ms. Miller, you cannot dismiss the religion and focus on the fact the C. S. Lewis wrote a smashingly good story because it is in large part the religion that makes it a smashingly good story. Grace, temptation, salvation these are what drives the plot of the Chronicles of Narinia. Incidentally, the same is true for many of the other books which Miller claims inspired Lewis as opposed to Christianity (Dante, have Christian undertones? No! He hid it so well also).

Sorry for the very heavy C. S. Lewis theme of late, I am going to leave off before start ranting about what was done to Peter's character in the Prince Caspian movie.

Will you have some tea?

"You can never get a cup of tea large enough or a book long enough to suit me" -- C. S. Lewis