Why the Chronicles of Narnia Are Not Allegorical

I am in the process of rereading The Chronicles of Narnia and will blog about each of the seven books. I will focus on a single theme from each book and discuss it in light of Christianity. It is important to note, however, that Lewis never wanted The Chronicles of Narnia to be read as an allegory. Rather, Lewis wondered what would happen if instead of God becoming incarnate in our world, He had been the Lord of an imaginary place called Narnia. While the distinction between allegorical fantasy and what Lewis calls a “supposition” may seem insignificant, Lewis has an important reason for placing emphasis on that distinction. To understand further what he means, we need to be introduced to another famous work by C.S. Lewis. The Screwtape Letters are a series of letters written by a senior devil named Screwtape to his nephew Wormwood. Wormwood is in charge of destroying the faith of a newly baptized Christian whom the devils call the Patient. Why is it that Lewis chooses to write from the devils’ perspective and not from God’s? The answer can be found in the preface to his book:

 “Readers are advised to remember that the devil is a liar. Not everything that Screwtape says should be assumed to be true even from his own angle.”

To write definitively about God when it comes to matters of salvation is always a dangerous endeavor. After all, Lewis is not a prophet. From the scriptures and from his own personal experiences, Lewis has ideas about how a person is ultimately saved or why a person suffers, but as neither of us living know fully the details of God’s workings in the world (for God works in mysterious ways), neither of us can definitively know why people are put to the test (whether or not they always are) or what we will experience on the other side of the grave. This is not to say that Truth is relative because it is not. But some things have not been revealed to us.

When an author like Hal Lindsey or a man like Harold Camping write and speak definitively about the end times or about how God works in people’s lives for their ultimate salvation, they speak with false authority. At best, they simplify others’ sufferings. At worst, their failed promises discredit Christianity in the eyes of non-believers. The Chronicles of Narnia and The Screwtape Letters speak of suffering, salvation, temptation, and the end-times – issues that we do not fully understand. When Lewis writes The Screwtape Letters from the devils’ perspective he acknowledges the fact that he may not be fully correct, and that is alright since the devil is “a liar and the father of lies” (John 8:44). To write about Aslan’s workings in an imaginary place called Narnia as a thought experiment rather than as an allegory liberates Lewis to write as a fictional author who happens to be Christian rather than as a prophet.

Sometimes false prophets don’t even know that they are speaking falsely. For example, most of us have probably seen billboard signs with quotes like ”Don’t make me come down there – God” as if this is how God feels about the world, as if we don’t wait in joyful hope for the coming of our Savior, Jesus Christ (Roman Missal). As I write posts on the seven books of The Chronicles of Narnia keep in mind that the books are a supposition and not an allegory. In many places, Aslan seems to quote Jesus and circumstances in Narnia may seem to echo passages in the Bible, but C.S. Lewis’ fictional books never replace the Bible or claim to no more about God than has been revealed to us. This is what impresses me the most about Lewis. Let us not be afraid to question the author. Let us not confuse Aslan with Jesus Christ.

Søren Kierkegaard: What Does it Mean to be Christian?

I have not posted anything in almost a month it seems, but I will try to post a lot more in the next few weeks. Come back February 14 because I will have a post on Christian love.

A few posts ago, I wrote a reflection on Søren Kierkegaard's book Fear and Trembling, written under his pseudonym Johannes de Silentio. This book really changed the way that I had previously viewed Abraham. I highly recommend others to read this book as well. If nothing else, it will make you to read the story of Abraham and Isaac with fresh eyes. Is faith always reasonable? We would like to think so, but Scripture does not reflect this claim. What is reasonable about Abraham being called to sacrifice his son (an act that would have been in direct opposition to the standards of the Ethical), Hosea marrying a prostitute, God coming into the world as a human, Jesus resurrecting from the dead, Moses leading a whole group of people from Egypt into the desert where they have to wander for 40 years with only their faith to guide them...? Kierkegaard argues, that faith and reason are different spheres and that when reason is overemphasized, faith is sucked out of Christianity. In other words, when we make reason a prerequisite to having faith, we do not have faith. Intellectual gymnastics is not faith. Once again, 1 Corinthians 1:18-25 comes to mind. 

"For Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are called, Jews and Greeks alike, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength" (v.25).

Kierkegaard lived in Denmark at a time when the Hegelian System was highly regarded. Kierkegaard noticed that the so-called Christians of the Danish National Church felt that they belonged to a sort of Christian ethnicity: Christendom. They felt that going to church, getting baptized and confirmed, and being "good" made someone a Christian. But they did not have true faith. They thought that because they followed the "Universal" (the Natural Law, whatever that may be), they were Christians. They never really thought about their individual relationships with God. They failed to realize that once they died, they would stand alone before God and it would be to Him alone that they would have to render an account of their lives. Sound familiar? We fall for this daily.

What does it truly mean to follow Christ? Kierkegaard argued that true faith requires one to surrender oneself totally to God no matter the consequences. He wanted to reintroduce Christianity into Christendom. The Hegelians made faith something that immature people cling to, and that mature people go beyond (outgrow faith and cling instead to a reasonable form of Christianity at best). Kierkegaard was strongly against this. As he wrote in Fear and Trembling, "Faith is the highest passion in a human being. Many in every generation may not come that far, but none comes further." Kierkegaard's works are very thought-provoking not because he necessarily says anything new but because he brings us face-to-face with the Truth.

What I Have Come to Realize About Faith

There are times when reading the Bible is like staring into a mirror. It doesn't necessary tell you anything new but shows you the Truth about yourself, a truth that you have somehow always known although you have never really acknowledged it before. A few weeks ago, it seems, I fully acknowledged a truth about Christianity (which incidently has everything to do with the Truth about me) for the very first time. And here it is, beautifully voiced by St. Paul in 1 Corinthians 1:18-31:

 The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written: "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the learning of the learned I will set aside." Where is the wise one? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made the wisdom of the world foolish? For since in the wisdom of God the world did not come to know God through wisdom, it was the will of God through the foolishness of the proclamation to save those who have faith. For Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are called, Jews and Greeks alike, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.

Consider your own calling, brothers. Not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. Rather, God chose the foolish of the world to shame the wise, and God chose the weak of the world to shame the strong, and God chose the lowly and despised of the world, those who count for nothing, to reduce to nothing those who are something, so that no human being might boast before God. It is due to him that you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, as well as righteousness, sanctification, and redemption, so that, as it is written, "Whoever boasts, should boast in the Lord."

I finally understood why I had struggled with the cross for so long. From a secular perspective, the cross is a symbol of death, defeat, and humiliation. Without any knowledge of God, it is impossible to understand the cross, to understand that the cross is not a symbol of death but a symbol of life - a symbol not of defeat but of victory. Now as a Christian, there is something else that I have learned, namely that knowledge does not create faith. This is a strange realization for me since I love reading books on theology. And although these books can certainly be beneficial, they do not create faith. Reason alone can never lead you to faith because reason's limits is this world and faith has to do with the "other" world, what is beyond human knowledge. The most knowledgeable people are not necessarily the ones who have faith while on the contrary the least educated are not the ones most lacking in faith. Often, the opposite is true. Maybe this is the case becuase faith is required before anything we read on God makes any sense. Everything precedes from faith. Maybe having faith is not as difficult to acquire as we may think. Sometimes I find that reading theology, instead of helping my faith, actually makes Christianity merely into an interesting philosophy. We all want proof, but religion is not science. We cannot prove the existence of God. We know that Jesus is God because He said so. This is what Jesus meant in his parable of Lazarus and the rich man when Abraham said, "If they will not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded if someone should rise from the dead" (Luke 16: 31). Miracles are only miracles when seen through the eyes of faith. For Christians, Jesus has risen from the dead. For everyone else, Jesus is still dead. So, I love theology. I love the challenge of reading books written by well-known theologians, but I am starting to realize that the best way to learn about God is to personally ask Him. There is no better way.

Ezekiel Part 1: God's Relationship With Israel

Alright, I promised you all a reflection on the book of Ezekiel. Here goes. This was a really challenging book for me, probably the toughest book I’ve ever read in the Bible (even harder than Revelation…and that’s saying something). It is hard to follow what God tells Ezekiel. One moment, He seems to condemn the Israelites and tell them that they will be destroyed forever, and the next moment, He says, “You will live in the land I gave your forefathers; you will be my people, and I will be your God” (Ezekiel 36:28). I am going to post two reflections on this book. Today I’ll attempt to explain God’s intentions for the Israelites.




Ezekiel - Sistine Chapel



God wants to punish the Israelites. However He has a reason for this. It can be summed up in one verse that appears slightly differently in numerous places in the book of Ezekiel. “You will suffer the penalty for your lewdness and bear the consequences of your sins of idolatry. Then you will know that I am the Sovereign LORD” (23:49). Thus, God, once again, wants to wake the Israelites up to the Truth. Unfortunately, it is not in the good times that people remember the Lord but in the bad ones. By punishing the Israelites through captivity by the Babylonians and Egyptians, God reminds the Jews that He cares about His people, that He desires a relationship with His people and is angered when He is forgotten and even insulted. Ezekiel’s message to Judah is shocking. Yes. But God has plans for the Jewish people and even the Gentiles. God’s anger does not last forever. “For I am God, and not man – the Holy One among you” (Hosea 11:9b). God wants to unite all people. “I will place over them one shepherd, my servant David; he will tend them and be their shepherd. I the LORD will be their God, and my servant David will be prince among them. I the LORD have spoken” (Ezekiel 34:23-24). And we all know who this new David is. Jesus Christ. In Ezekiel, God compares himself to a shepherd who is in charge of a flock of sheep. “I myself will tend my sheep and have them lie down, declares the Sovereign LORD. I will search for the lost and bring back the strays. I will bind up the injured and strengthen the weak, but the sleek and the strong I will destroy. I will shepherd the flock with justice” (34:15-16). Elsewhere God proclaims to the “wicked prince of Israel,” “Take off the turban, remove the crown. It will not be as it was: The lowly will be exalted and the exalted will be brought low (21:26). This proclamation is echoed in many places in the scriptures. Hannah sings, “[The LORD] raises the poor from the dust and lifts the needy from the ash heap; he seats them with princes and has them inherit a throne of honor” (1 Samuel 2:8). Mary echoes Hannah in her Magnificat: “He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty” (Luke 1:52-53). God wants to show the Israelites the Truth. He wants them to see that life is a gift, a sacred gift. He is the Father, the One who gives the gifts, but He wants respect. Will we love God as He loves us? Or will we only recognize Him when it is too late?

The Task of a Theologian

I would like to start this post with a parable from Matthew chapter 13:

            “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field” (v.44).

I noticed recently that in this parable and the one in the next verse, the treasure and the fine pearls were actually found.

An old, tattered dictionary I have at my bedside (a copy of Webster’s New World Dictionary) defines the word discern as follows: “to perceive or recognize clearly.” The way the term discernment is used in our society adds a bit more to this definition, namely to perceive or recognize clearly what can be perceived or recognized clearly. From my observations, the term is almost always used to explain the state of looking for or perceiving something in the knowledge that that the object of discernment can be found and recognized. You cannot truly discern if a) you do not know what you are looking for, or b) you can never possibly find the answer. This seems to be common sense. But is it?

The parable above is enlightening. What I take from this passage from Matthew’s Gospel is that God’s Truth can be found. St. Anselm defined theology as “fides quaerens intellectum” (faith seeking understanding). Theology’s greatest aim is to understand God and His relationship with the world. Christian theology is a discerning process because we are seeking what we know we can find. As the beginning of John’s Gospel and his first epistle boldly proclaim, God has revealed His Word (the logos) to us. This Word has manifested itself through the life of Jesus of Nazareth, who because of his incarnation has made God known to us. Because Christ is the logos, he is the Truth and this Truth is available for the discerning, so to speak. “Seek and you will find” (Matthew 7:7b). The treasure and the pearls can be found, and this must be the primary aim of a theologian: to discover and proclaim the Truth. Of course we can never know everything about God, or we would be God. But what has been revealed to us can be discerned because the Truth is available. We can in fact understand God because of His Son. 

Theology is different from philosophy. Philosophers attempt to create their own theories about life--- to replace Truth with mere propositions. While theology knows that Truth stands objectively and cannot be manipulated by human thought, philosophy claims that the Truth that created everything including man comes from man himself, and thus can be altered and discarded at will. This is preposterous! Philosophy may help theologians understand the Truth once it has been found, but it can never replace the Truth. We know the Truth exists because of the Gospel, so our searching must be to find and better understand the Truth. Philosophers do not discern because they do not know what they are looking for, but we know what we are looking for.