The Razor-Blade Between Nature and Spirit - and the Illuminating Metaphors of CS Lewis - by SC Skillman
Though many of us hold within ourselves a conviction of the truth of the Christian story, do we never find that the arguments of the world sometimes intrude, or that what may be called 'belief-feelings' intervene?
Reading this volume, one of CS Lewis's most celebrated books of Christian apologetics, is like sitting in a comfortable room with the great writer in Oxford, both of us in armchairs, possibly with sherries at our elbows and maybe the glow of a friendly fire in the grate, as I ask him burning questions, as he patiently and rationally answers every objection, resolves every doubt with his characteristic humour and his mastery of analogy and metaphor.
I imagine many people feel like this when reading CS Lewis's books. As we follow him through the pages of Miracles, one of his great books of Christian apologetics, he seems to anticipate the very next question that may spring to our minds. This no doubt results from the amount of time he must have spent with all sorts of questioners, many of his young students among them, who would have plied him with every question anyone has ever come up with about the Christian faith: or at least, anyone with our modern sceptical mindset and (supposed) knowledge of our contemporary world, of psychology, science, astrophysics, history and the so-called laws of nature.
I chatted several months ago with a scientist, (who happens to be Christian) and who has a fine, analytical mind. He questioned something I had no answer to: and which CS Lewis perfectly answers in this book. If I had read 'Miracles' before our conversation, I would have been able to say, "CS Lewis demolished that argument in 1947."
This book was indeed first published in 1947 (though it was re-issued in 1960 with a revised chapter on Naturalism, following the famous 1948 debate with Elizabeth Anscombe which caused CS Lewis to re-examine his argument). Nowhere in this book is it possible for the modern reader to say, "Well, this is out of date. People don't think that any more". Instead, I recognise everything he writes about, going on right now.
CS Lewis is so penetrating that he accurately describes my progress, spiritually, in my own life. He encapsulates my thoughts and beliefs about spiritual matters all through my childhood, adolescence and 20's. I can see it clearly now in the thinking and teaching of the people I used to so admire and listen to. This spiritual position may best be known as "Pantheism."
When I believed it, it felt "right." But, says CS Lewis, so far from being the final religious refinement, Pantheism is in fact the permanent natural bent of the human mind... Platoism, Judaism and Christianity have proved the only things capable of resisting it. It is the attitude into which the human mind automatically falls when left to itself. No wonder we find it congenial.
CS Lewis's argument is intellectually rigorous and scrupulous, encouraging us to engage with our powers of reason as opposed to indulging in our emotions - just as I did. "I feel, therefore I know" summed up my position: "It makes me feel good, therefore it must be true and right." How many of us today still fall into that trap, in so many ways?
Lewis's metaphors and his use of figurative language are funny, lucid and illuminating: In advance of experience, in the teeth of many experiences, we are already enlisted on the side of uniformity..... the Christian story relates the various steps of a strategically coherent invasion of Nature - an invasion which intends complete conquest and 'occupation'..... When Nature and Spirit are fully harmonised... in the reality which will then exist, there will be no room to get the finest razor-blade of thought in between Spirit and Nature.
He concludes that: God does not shake miracles into Nature at random as if from a pepper-caster. They come on great occasions: they are found at the great ganglions of history - of spiritual history which cannot be fully known by us.
His final metaphor seems to parallel that great image of Aslan the Lion in Narnia:
These small and perishable bodies we now have were given to us as ponies…. We must learn to manage: not that we may some day be free of horses altogether but that some day we may ride bare-back, confident and rejoicing, those great mounts, those winged, shining and world-shaking horses which perhaps even now expect us with impatience, pawing and snorting in the King's stables.
Reading Lewis is both an intellectual experience and mental challenge (for there are many passages in this book which the average reader may find difficult, and must read carefully and slowly in order to follow all the arguments) but also he draws us with him through the medium of our imagination, understanding that we are body, mind and spirit.
At the end of the book he anticipates a phenomenon which has happened to me many times, when I close a book such as this. He warns that in the days and weeks after we close these pages, there will reappear what he calls "belief-feelings", even though we once were so convinced by powerful rational argument: 'Belief-feelings' do not follow reason except by long training: they follow Nature.
We can only trust that when those 'belief-feelings' reassert ourselves we will remember or return to CS Lewis and his books.
SC Skillman
psychological, suspense, paranormal fiction & non-fiction
My next book Paranormal Warwickshire
will be published by Amberley Publishing on 15th June 2020
and is available to pre-order now online or from the publisher or from your local bookshop.
Reading this volume, one of CS Lewis's most celebrated books of Christian apologetics, is like sitting in a comfortable room with the great writer in Oxford, both of us in armchairs, possibly with sherries at our elbows and maybe the glow of a friendly fire in the grate, as I ask him burning questions, as he patiently and rationally answers every objection, resolves every doubt with his characteristic humour and his mastery of analogy and metaphor.
I imagine many people feel like this when reading CS Lewis's books. As we follow him through the pages of Miracles, one of his great books of Christian apologetics, he seems to anticipate the very next question that may spring to our minds. This no doubt results from the amount of time he must have spent with all sorts of questioners, many of his young students among them, who would have plied him with every question anyone has ever come up with about the Christian faith: or at least, anyone with our modern sceptical mindset and (supposed) knowledge of our contemporary world, of psychology, science, astrophysics, history and the so-called laws of nature.
I chatted several months ago with a scientist, (who happens to be Christian) and who has a fine, analytical mind. He questioned something I had no answer to: and which CS Lewis perfectly answers in this book. If I had read 'Miracles' before our conversation, I would have been able to say, "CS Lewis demolished that argument in 1947."
This book was indeed first published in 1947 (though it was re-issued in 1960 with a revised chapter on Naturalism, following the famous 1948 debate with Elizabeth Anscombe which caused CS Lewis to re-examine his argument). Nowhere in this book is it possible for the modern reader to say, "Well, this is out of date. People don't think that any more". Instead, I recognise everything he writes about, going on right now.
CS Lewis is so penetrating that he accurately describes my progress, spiritually, in my own life. He encapsulates my thoughts and beliefs about spiritual matters all through my childhood, adolescence and 20's. I can see it clearly now in the thinking and teaching of the people I used to so admire and listen to. This spiritual position may best be known as "Pantheism."
When I believed it, it felt "right." But, says CS Lewis, so far from being the final religious refinement, Pantheism is in fact the permanent natural bent of the human mind... Platoism, Judaism and Christianity have proved the only things capable of resisting it. It is the attitude into which the human mind automatically falls when left to itself. No wonder we find it congenial.
CS Lewis's argument is intellectually rigorous and scrupulous, encouraging us to engage with our powers of reason as opposed to indulging in our emotions - just as I did. "I feel, therefore I know" summed up my position: "It makes me feel good, therefore it must be true and right." How many of us today still fall into that trap, in so many ways?
Lewis's metaphors and his use of figurative language are funny, lucid and illuminating: In advance of experience, in the teeth of many experiences, we are already enlisted on the side of uniformity..... the Christian story relates the various steps of a strategically coherent invasion of Nature - an invasion which intends complete conquest and 'occupation'..... When Nature and Spirit are fully harmonised... in the reality which will then exist, there will be no room to get the finest razor-blade of thought in between Spirit and Nature.
He concludes that: God does not shake miracles into Nature at random as if from a pepper-caster. They come on great occasions: they are found at the great ganglions of history - of spiritual history which cannot be fully known by us.
His final metaphor seems to parallel that great image of Aslan the Lion in Narnia:
These small and perishable bodies we now have were given to us as ponies…. We must learn to manage: not that we may some day be free of horses altogether but that some day we may ride bare-back, confident and rejoicing, those great mounts, those winged, shining and world-shaking horses which perhaps even now expect us with impatience, pawing and snorting in the King's stables.
Reading Lewis is both an intellectual experience and mental challenge (for there are many passages in this book which the average reader may find difficult, and must read carefully and slowly in order to follow all the arguments) but also he draws us with him through the medium of our imagination, understanding that we are body, mind and spirit.
At the end of the book he anticipates a phenomenon which has happened to me many times, when I close a book such as this. He warns that in the days and weeks after we close these pages, there will reappear what he calls "belief-feelings", even though we once were so convinced by powerful rational argument: 'Belief-feelings' do not follow reason except by long training: they follow Nature.
We can only trust that when those 'belief-feelings' reassert ourselves we will remember or return to CS Lewis and his books.
SC Skillman
psychological, suspense, paranormal fiction & non-fiction
My next book Paranormal Warwickshire
will be published by Amberley Publishing on 15th June 2020
and is available to pre-order now online or from the publisher or from your local bookshop.
Wow! What a blog. I am going to buy Miracles and read it. I love the way you describe sitting with the great man and the concept of Pantheism. Absolutely fascinating. You've woken up my curious intellectual side this morning.
ReplyDeleteThank you Ruth. I'm glad it had that effect on you! Now I wish I could go back to CS Lewis and ask him some further questions that have sprung up since then. I know he would have the perfect answer
DeleteI really enjoyed this post. I love that point about miracles and how/when they occur - not randomly as from a pepper pot but at great moments in (spiritual) history. I've never read Miracles either. You've whetted my appetite. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteThank you Deborah. However I do feel the blurb on the back of the book is slightly misleading. It says, 'CS Lewis shows us that miracles are happening all around us" which does give a different impression of what he is saying; but it all depends on how you define a miracle. CS Lewis defines it simply as "an interference with Nature by supernatural power", and he addresses the question on a philosophical level. I have also read another book on Miracles which I can recommend, by Eric Metaxas - that is an excellent book, and does provide another way of approaching the subject.
DeleteI didn't really know what pantheism was! Thank you!
ReplyDeleteIt's what Wordsworth does, Fran - mostly!
DeleteIn a nutshell (sorry about that cliche!) Pantheism means identifying God with Nature (Wordsworth was a pantheist and I loved his poems). I suppose Blake must have been too now I think of it ('heaven in a wild flower'). It's a huge subject. I still need several more sessions with CS Lewis by that fire with our glasses of sherry!
ReplyDeleteWith you 100%
ReplyDelete