Reading C.S.: Mere Narnia
August 30th, 2007 | by Scott |I was going to do an indepth take on The Chronicles of Narnia and I still might at some point but here are my grades for each of the books:
The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe–A
Prince Caspian–B+
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader–B
The Silver Chair–A
The Horse And His Boy–A
The Magician’s Nephew–A-
The Last Battle–A
The Silver Chair was my favorite and Dawn Treader was my least favorite. There is no greater allegorical picture of Christ in contemporary literature that comes close to the beauty, majesty and splendor of Aslan. The greatness of Lewis’ Narnia series is that there is an indelible and beautiful picture of Christ that will make you fall in love with Him in new ways.
In my chronological reading I also tackled Mere Christianity again. Next time just give me the quotable parts. Lewis is a master of false dichotomies with his most famous example being the Liar, Lunatic or Lord conclusion in this book. Grade: B-
I was supposed to read English Literature in the 16th Century, Excluding Drama by Lewis in the midst of Narnia as well. However, my commitment to this process has its limits. 700 pages on poetry and prose written during the 1500s greatly exceeds my capacity for caring for Lewis’ writing. So, I skipped it.
At this point I take a break from Lewis and come back to his works in a bit.
10 Responses to “Reading C.S.: Mere Narnia”
By Mike the Eyeguy on Aug 30, 2007 | Reply
“Lewis is a master of false dichotomies with his most famous example being the Liar, Lunatic or Lord conclusion in this book.”
That’s a strong statement. I would be interested in hearing a little more explanation as to why you think so.
By Scott on Aug 30, 2007 | Reply
Ahh, someone is reading this stuff after all. While reading Lewis I get a picture of an excessively intelligent man who is given to dismissing other points of view a priori. One of his techniques in writing off other avenues of thought is to produce tremendously quotable nuggets of thought that are just close enough to being true that people ignore other possibilities. I’ve always love the Liar, Lunatic quote but are those the only possibilities. Lewis drops those ideas like a bomb (and I’m thinking primarily of Miracles and Abolition of Man)and then moves on without any more thought.
By Jonathan on Aug 30, 2007 | Reply
I started reading The Lion… to the kids. We made it through 10 or so chapters before stalling during a weeklong vacation and haven’t gotten moving again.
The Liar, Lunatic, or Lord argument was one of the things that caught my attention when the Professor used it in relation to the possibility that Lucy was lying about the wardrobe.
By George Cooper on Aug 30, 2007 | Reply
Your take on Lewis and false dichotomies is accurate (in my opinion). But what’s wrong with being excessively intelligent–unless you mean he is too cognitive and is one of those “mean without chests” he complained about.
Blessings
By Scott on Aug 30, 2007 | Reply
Jonathan, there is much of carry over between Lewis’ books. I’ll be interested to hear your take as you read through.
Goerge, I don’t think there is anything wrong with being excessively intelligent. I aspire to be so. However, I think Lewis often overlooks nuance in the arguments he has already dismissed.
By LukeD on Aug 30, 2007 | Reply
“I’ve always love the Liar, Lunatic quote but are those the only possibilities.”
Wasn’t it Josh McDowell that added the “Legend” option? The idea that Jesus’ followers exaggerated His claims later on?
Beyond that, I can’t think of other possibilities, but did you have something else in mind?
By Greg Brooks on Aug 30, 2007 | Reply
Bear in mind that these were primarily speeches. Speeches lend themselves to dramatic and quotable nuggets without further explanation. Sermons often don’t bear up very well to print–see Max Lucado, for example. Pap.
As for the liar-lunatic-legend thing, I can’t think of any other angles either. Either he didn’t say it, or he believed what he said, or he didn’t believe it. If it’s true and he didn’t believe it, he’s a nut. If it’s not true and he didn’t believe it, he’s a liar. If it’s not true and he did believe it, he’s a nut again.
Maybe he believed part of it? Or like in Life of Brian (or the Vietnam conflict), things just got a bit out of hand though it seemed like a good idea at the time?
Seriously. It’s all well and good to dismiss someone’s pith as piffle, but what alternatives are there?
By Scott on Aug 31, 2007 | Reply
Just to keep an objective take there are several different options. And my quibble here is that if you are to be a credible apologist then you must not be dismissive of other option but treat them equally with logical inquiry.
Now let me preface this with the understanding that Lewis and I both come to the same conclusion: That Jesus is Lord. But I don’t get there the same way.
Legend is a big one that has several different tacks. That this was embellished after the fact. The he never existed. That what he said has been lost, manipulated or altered through the years. That we misunderstand what he was saying.
The great teacher still hold weight as well. He would not have to be deluded to believe what He was saying.
Then there is a historical take on it as well which N.T. Wright can make far better than me:
“Famously, as in his well-known slogan, “Liar, Lunatic or Lord,” he argued that Jesus must have been bad or mad or God. This argument has worn well in some circles and extremely badly in others, and the others were not merely being cynical.
What Lewis totally failed to see—as have, of course, many scholars in the field—was that Judaism already had a strong incarnational principle, namely the Temple, and that the language used of Shekinah, Torah, Wisdom, Word, and Spirit in the Old Testament—the language, in other words, upon which the earliest Christians drew when they were exploring and expounding what we have called Christology—was a language designed, long before Jesus’ day, to explain how the one true God could be both transcendent over the world and living and active within it, particularly within Israel.
Lewis, at best, drastically short-circuits the argument. When Jesus says, “Your sins are forgiven,” he is not claiming straightforwardly to be God, but to give people, out on the street, what they would normally get by going to the Temple.”
By Greg Brooks on Sep 15, 2007 | Reply
Did Lewis state that he was assuming the Bible account was accurate? I mean, did he reject the Legend theory or just pass over it as belonging to another discussion–one about text criticism? I’m going to pass over it myself. If the text is corrupt we’re all screwed. Here I’m going to assume it is accurate, inerrant.
As for the great teacher argument, I just disagree with you. What water does it hold if Jesus said everything the gospels say he did? He made claims that go beyond being human.
And because of that, I’m afraid I’m not following Wright very well (I know that quote is just a snippet; I should read the whole book maybe?). What I understand him to say is that laying aside liar and lunatic, there are other possibilities besides Lord even if Jesus was honest and sane. But according to the gospels Jesus did straightforwardly claim to be God, in John 10:30 for instance; and the Son of God, in Luke 10:22; and the Messiah, in John 4:26; and so on. Jesus said many things in parables and other not-straightforward ways, but he was also very clear some times.
In addition, saying “Your sins are forgiven” is most certainly not what a Jewish believer would receive by “Going to the temple”. For one thing, they would get that only by offering sacrifice, which Jesus shortcuts altogether. And they wouldn’t get their illness healed in the bargain. And besides that the reaction of his hearers points out that his claim was astonishing; this was no run-of-the-mill comment and it didn’t jibe with an already established Incarnational principle (Luke 5:17-26). God had never incarnated before–He had never been “in flesh”. God was not the Temple, he was at the temple. To become Immanuel was a discrete event, outside the stream of the way things had always been (albeit prophesied of and in many ways a natural extension of the preexisting order).
I haven’t read Wright, but I have to think he’s assuming a corrupt text when he wrote that.
Others had claimed to be the Messiah; they are all dismissed as liars or lunatics. I suppose we can take it as read that those are two options for Jesus too. But is Lord the only third option?
I think it is. It may be a bone-marrow thinking, but if the text is inerrant, what more was Jesus than a deceiver; or honest but himself deceived; or honest and also correct?
By Scott on Sep 15, 2007 | Reply
I understand what you are saying. And I don’t disagree with Lewis’ conclusion. My point is that as a theologian and/or apologist you must give equal weight to each possibility.
That he does not do. And you would be well served to read Wright. He’s not supposing a corrupt text but is placing the Christ story within the broader realm of Jewish history.