THE PROBLEM OF THE HUMAN HEART

Sin in The Chronicles of Narnia

John Bowen

My father-in-law and I used to disagree about dictionaries. He believed that the

dictionary told you how words should be pronounced-- that it was prescriptive. Thus

he would pronounce the word Trafalgar as Trafalgar because that's the way the

dictionary--his dictionary anyway--said you should pronounce it. I believed (and still

believe) that the dictionary is merely descriptive--it tells you how the majority of

people choose to pronounce a certain word at a point in history. Dictionary compilers

simply listen in on conversations and record what they hear. I have no doubt that, at

one time, many people may have said Trafalgar, but if you are in London today and

want to find the National Gallery, I would not advise you to ask the taxi driver for

Trafalgar Square. You will probably get a very strange look.

In the same way, if you want to know what “sin” means, don't go to the

dictionary in the first place. The dictionary will certainly tell you how the word is used

in conversation in the world in general. Thus the Oxford English Dictionary is typical

in informing me that sin means “transgression of the divine law.” Certainly

“transgressing the divine law” is part of how the word is used in the Christian

community, but it is by no means the whole truth. In fact, singling out this one

dimension of sin can actually distort our understanding of the full reality. The

Pharisees were very conscientious about not transgressing divine law, yet they come in

for the harshest criticism from Jesus! Sin is not just about God’s law and transgressing

it. There is far more to it than that.

1

If we want to know what the word means for Christians, there is no better way

to find out that to listen in on Christian stories. Among the many Christian writings of

C.S.Lewis, The Chronicles of Narnia have perhaps had the most lasting appeal. Out of

the heart of these stories comes an understanding of “sin” (and of other Christian

beliefs) a hundred times more helpful than anything a dictionary could ever offer.

THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE: sin as betrayal

“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with

all your mind and with all your strength.” (Mark 12:30)

There is one fundamental point about sin which The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

makes clear. Sin is not in the first place just a matter of wrong actions, “transgressing

divine law”: sin is primarily an attitude of the heart towards our Creator, an attitude

which says “No” to God.

The four Pevensie children, Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy, are staying for

the summer in an old house owned by an elderly and eccentric professor. There Lucy,

the youngest, discovers that she can enter the magical world of Narnia through an old

wardrobe. Shortly afterwards, her brother Edmund follows her lead, but in Narnia he

meets the White Witch, the illegitimate ruler of Narnia, who ensures that it is “always

winter but never Christmas.”1 The Witch, who is aware of ancient prophecies

foretelling her destruction at the hands of four human children, immediately begins to

seduce Edmund into being her ally with simple temptations such as Turkish Delight:

1 C.S.Lewis, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (London: Geoffrey Bles 1950; London: HarperCollins 1980), 23.

2

The Queen knew . . . though Edmund did not, that this was enchanted Turkish

Delight and that anyone who had tasted it would want more and more of it, and

would even, if they were allowed, go on eating it till they killed themselves. 2

There is little subtlety about her temptations. Having appealed to his greed, she then

appeals quite transparently to his pride:

“I want a nice boy whom I could bring up as a Prince and who would be King

of Narnia when I am gone. While he was Prince he would wear a gold crown

and eat Turkish Delight all day long; and you are much the cleverest and

handsomest young man I've ever met.” 3

Edmund begins to surrender. In a sense it is true to say that he “transgresses divine

law” concerning pride and greed, yet the more important question is that of loyalty:

whose side is Edmund on? The answer is clear when he returns to this world and

Lucy warns him that the White Witch is evil. For Edmund the wonderful memory of

Turkish Delight overrules the danger signals: “[h]e was already more than half on the

side of the Witch.” 4

To be on the side of the Witch, however, is to be on the side of evil and against

good. Shortly afterwards, when all four children have entered Narnia, they hear for the

first time about Aslan, the Christ-figure in the books, “the King of the whole wood and

the son of the great Emperor-beyond-the-Sea . . . the great Lion.”5 What is revealing is

how the mention of Aslan affects each child differently:

2 Ibid. 38.3 Ibid. 39.4 Ibid. 42.5 Ibid. 75.

3

At the name of Aslan each one of them felt something jump in its inside.

Edmund felt a sensation of mysterious horror. Peter suddenly felt brave and

adventurous. Susan felt as if some delicious smell or some delightful strain of

music had just floated up to her. And Lucy got the feeling you have when you

wake up in the morning and realize that it is the beginning of the holidays or

the beginning of summer.6

Each child already has an internal disposition either to be drawn to Aslan or to be

repelled by him: the mention of the name brings to the surface something which was

previously only implicit.7 Edmund is the only one of the four who reacts negatively to

the name. The reason is obvious: he has already turned away from the light and given

his allegiance to the Witch--and it has affected him deeply. As Mr. Beaver observes:

He had the look of one who has been with the Witch and eaten her food. You

can always tell them if you’ve lived long in Narnia; something about their

eyes.8

Who we give our ultimate loyalty to, however, affects every other loyalty and

every other relationship. Edmund’s turning away from Aslan means that his other

relationships are twisted and off-kilter. For instance, he finds himself distanced from

the other children. He imagines that it is they who have changed, but in fact it is he

who has changed. Instead of being involved in the adventure, like the others, he is

more concerned about himself and what the others think of him:

6 Ibid. 65.7 Lewis’ understanding here is similar to that The Gospel of

John, where people are moving either towards the light or away from the light, and those who love the light will welcome Jesus’ coming, e.g. John 3:19-21.

8 Lion 80.

4

He kept on thinking that the others were taking no notice of him and trying to

give him the cold shoulder. They weren’t, but he imagined it.9

This theme of self--what I think of myself and how others perceive me--is one that

will recur throughout these books.

Perhaps the saddest thing about Edmund’s defection, however, is that it fails to

bring him the satisfaction it promised. This, in fact, is a another theme which surfaces

from time to time in the Narnia stories: sin promises joy but fails to deliver it, while

Aslan frequently invites people to hardship, yet they find joy on the other side of trials.

Thus when Edmund goes to tell the Witch that he has brought his siblings into Narnia:

Edmund . . . expected that the witch would start being nice to him . . .But she

said nothing at all. And when at last Edmund plucked up his courage to say,

“Please, your Majesty, could I have some Turkish Delight? You—you—

said--” she answered, “Silence, fool!”10

Sin, in the sense of loyalty to anyone other than the Creator, lets us down and does not

fulfill its promise--any more than the serpent fulfilled its promise to Adam and Eve.11

As with the runaway son in Jesus’ most famous parable12, however, Edmund’s

disillusionment actually brings about the beginning of a change in him:

All the things he had said to make himself believe that she was good and kind

and that her side was really the right side sounded to him silly now. 13

9 Ibid. 82.10 Ibid. 103.11 Genesis 3:5.12 Luke 15:11-24.13 Lion 105.

5

If sin were merely “transgressing the law,” Edmund’s salvation could have

been brought about quite simply by his giving up Turkish Delight. The heart of the

problem, however, is much deeper than that--his betrayal of Aslan--and so his

restoration requires first of all a change in his relationship to Aslan. Thus, when they

meet face to face, Edmund and Aslan have a conversation whose contents we are

never told, although it was “a conversation which Edmund never forgot.”14 A restored

relationship with Aslan then leads to restored relationships with others. Edmund

apologizes to his brother and sisters:

Edmund shook hands with each of the others and said to each of them in turn,

“I’m sorry” and everyone said, “That’s all right.” 15

The change in Edmund, therefore, is not in the first place from being a nasty

person to being a nice person: it is a change in fundamental loyalty, from being the

Witch’s servant to being the Lion’s servant. In a moving cameo, as the Witch begins

to accuse him of his wrongdoing, he does not attempt to defend himself. Instead:

Edmund had got past thinking about himself . . .He just went on looking at

Aslan. It didn’t seem to matter what the Witch said.16

What he thinks of himself, or indeed what others may think of him, is no longer

relevant. That was the mark of someone out of relationship with Aslan. What is

important now is his new allegiance to the king.

In The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, then, there is a distinction between

“sin” and “sins.” “Sins” are those transgressions of divine law which are the focus of

the dictionary definition: Edmund’s lust for Turkish Delight, his desire to be a prince

14 Lion 126.15 Ibid. 126.16 Ibid. 128

6

and to lord it over his siblings. For Lewis, however, these are merely the symptoms of

a much deeper disease, a disease of the heart. This is “sin”—an attitude of life, a

mindset, a heartset if you like--which is opposed to the reign of Aslan in Aslan’s

world. The cure is to become a subject of the true king--but that is very costly, both for

the rebel and for the king. For the rebel, it requires him to lay down his arms. For the

king, it costs him his life. We will return to this later.

THE MAGICIAN'S NEPHEW: making ourselves gods

They exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature

rather than the Creator. (Romans 1:25)

If sin is failing to give Aslan our allegiance, the question then arises, why

should we give our allegiance to Aslan? After all, our society says things like:

“Be your own person.”

“You decide what is true.”

“Believe whatever you like.”

“You choose what is right and wrong for you.”

“Don’t let anyone boss you around.”

The whole concept of obeying a higher authority has been socially unacceptable since

the 1960’s. This theme of “who’s the boss?” is a useful question to bear in mind in

reading The Magician’s Nephew. This story takes us back to the beginning of Narnia

and tells of its creation in a way that deliberately parallels the Bible’s story of the

creation of our world.

7

The only reason that anyone from our world is present to witness the birth of

Narnia is because of Uncle Andrew--uncle, that is, to Digory, one of the central

characters. For years, Uncle Andrew has been involved in a “great experiment”17 in

time travel. As the story opens, Digory and Digory’s friend Polly accidentally discover

what Uncle Andrew is doing. Seizing the opportunity, Andrew tricks Polly into

furthering his experiment: he gives her the gift of an attractive yellow ring, whereupon

she disappears into another world. As Andrew guesses will happen, Digory feels he

has no option but to follow her and try to bring her back.

Uncle Andrew is an interesting creation. C.S. Lewis creates him in such a way

that much of his outlook on life sounds perfectly normal and right to our ears. For

example, he is involved in an important experiment: we understand that experiments

are necessary. He believes he can decide for himself what is right and wrong: many

would agree. He likes to make his own decisions: that is fundamental to western

democracies. He is practical: nobody wants to be accused of being impractical. He is

willing to make sacrifices for greater ends: we admire people like that. All these things

sound perfectly reasonable.

Yet as the story unfolds, it becomes clear that Uncle Andrew's outlook on life

is totally inadequate. His experiment and his desire for power mean that everything

else in his world becomes secondary, whether relationships or beauty, honour or

goodness. His experiment causes him to behave callously towards both people and

animals. His vision of the world, which really centres on himself, means that he cannot

17 C.S.Lewis, The Magician’s Nephew (London: The Bodley Head 1955; Harmondsworth UK: Puffin Books, 1963), 19.

8

acknowledge anything greater than himself. He gives himself away when explaining

to Digory what is involved in being an inventor:

“Men like me, who possess hidden wisdom, are freed from the common rules just

as we are cut off from common pleasures.” 18

He has a sense of belonging to an elite, and of having access to knowledge that no-one

else has. He believes that rules, at least the “common” rules, do not apply to him. And

he makes noble sacrifices for his art, giving up “common pleasures.” He explains that

he learned his art from his fairy godmother, and adds, revealingly:

“She had got to dislike ordinary, ignorant people, you understand. I do

myself.”19

In other words, he has forgotten that he too is an “ordinary”, “common” human being

like other ordinary, common human beings. Nor should we be too impressed by his

giving up of “common pleasures”: that can be just as sinful as to be free of

responsibilities. Both imply pride and independence, and a rejection of God's good

gifts. Digory, however, manages to see through him:

As [Andrew] said this he sighed and looked so grave and noble and mysterious

that for a second Digory really thought he was saying something rather fine. But

then he remembered the ugly look he had seen on his Uncle's face . . . “All it

means,” he said to himself, “is that he thinks he can do anything he likes to get

anything he wants.”20

18 Ibid. 23.19 Ibid. 22.20 Magician, 24-25.

9

Digory is right. Fine words about freedom and sacrifice and a high calling cannot

disguise the fact that, for Andrew, he is still the centre of his own life.21 Though many

of his attitudes may sound “normal”, in fact they are the

expression of an mindset we have already met in The Lion, the Witch and the

Wardrobe, an attitude of independence from the Creator. In a word, Andrew is a

sinner.

The problem with failing to give allegiance to Aslan is that we immediately

come to think that we are more important then we really are--indeed, to think of

ourselves as God in some sense. This, after all, was the essence of the very first

temptation: “you will be like God.”22 Human beings can be very good at being human

beings: they are not created to bear the weight of being God. 23

Not surprisingly, it is the coming of Aslan which shows up the hollowness of

Uncle Andrew. His world has been entirely constructed around himself. So when

Aslan appears, singing into being a new world of colour and beauty and vitality, the

children love it, but Uncle Andrew hates it:

the two children had open mouths and shining eyes; they were drinking in the

sound . . . Uncle Andrew's mouth was open too, but not open with joy. He

looked more as if his chin had simply dropped away from the rest of his face.

21 A similar character is the scientist Weston, in Out of the Silent Planet, who proclaims with similar self-centred motives, “Life is greater than any system of morality.” C.S.Lewis, The Cosmic Trilogy (London: The Bodley Head, 1938; Pan Books 1990), 121.

22 Genesis 3:5.23 Some consciously try. “Each soul is its own God. You must

never worship anyone or anything other than self. For you are God. To love self is to love God.” Shirley Maclaine, Dancing in the Light (Toronto: Bantam Books, 1986), 343.

10

His shoulders were stooped and his knees shook. He was not liking the

Voice.24

The coming of Aslan, after all, challenges the reality of everything Andrew has

built his life on. His view of the newborn Narnia, not surprisingly, is practical25 and

utilitarian: how can he use this world to make himself rich and powerful?

“Something might be made of this country. . . . If only we'd had guns. . . .

Columbus, now, they talk about Columbus. But what was America to this? The

commercial possibilities of this country are unbounded. . . . I shall be a

millionaire. . . . The first thing is to get that brute shot. . . . There's no telling

how long I might live if I lived here.”26

Aslan, on the other hand, has a totally different outlook. His first speech to the

inhabitants of Narnia makes this clear:

“Creatures, I give you yourselves,” said the strong, happy voice of Aslan. “I

give to you forever this land of Narnia. I give you the woods, the fruits, the

rivers. I give you the stars and I give you myself. The Dumb Beasts whom I

have not chosen are yours also. Treat them gently and cherish them but do not

go back to their ways lest you cease to be talking Beasts. For out of them you

were taken and into them you can return. Do not so.”27

24 Magician 94-95.25 To be “practical” in Narnia is not particularly a compliment.

Witches, for example, “are not interested in things or people unless they can use them; they are terribly practical.” Magician 71.

26 Magician 103.27 Ibid. 109.

11

Here is the opposite of sin. Aslan speaks of giving (five times in three lines); Uncle

Andrew thinks only of getting. Aslan speaks of caring for those weaker than oneself;

Uncle Andrew sees the weak as serving the interests of the powerful. Aslan speaks of

cherishing; Uncle Andrew speaks of using. Aslan warns of the danger of becoming

less than one is created to be; Andrew wants to be more than he was created to be.

What is Andrew to do? In order to maintain the self-centred world he has

constructed, and to resist the new spirit of love and self-giving which derives from

Aslan, he is driven to desperate measures. He has to find a way to deny this new

reality Aslan is creating. He needs a way of understanding it and living in it which

allows him to maintain his self-centredness. He finds himself forced to distort the

reality of what he is experiencing:

[T]he longer and more beautifully the Lion sang, the harder Uncle Andrew

tried to make himself believe that he could hear nothing but roaring. Now the

trouble about trying to make yourself stupider than you really are is that you

very often succeed. Uncle Andrew did. He soon did hear nothing but roaring in

Aslan's song. Soon he couldn't have heard anything else even if he had wanted

to.28

As Lewis comments:

what you see and hear depends a good deal on where you are standing: it also

depends on what sort of person you are.29

28 Ibid. 117.29 Ibid. 116.

12

All of us create our own interpretations of the world. God has given us the freedom

and responsibility to do that. Yet, at the same time, we want as far as possible to be

true to the world “out there” as we perceive it, and to be upfront about our limitations

and our biases. This is what Lewis means when he says our view of the world depends

on “where you are standing” and “what sort of person you are.” Andrew is a self-

centred, power-hungry person, and therefore his perception of the world of Narnia is

twisted by that internal bias. Sin always warps our perception of truth.

As a result, Andrew cannot afford to believe what is happening around him. He

finds himself terrified of the newly-created Talking Animals, and becomes a figure of

fun as they try to work out whether he is animal, vegetable or mineral. Polly asks

Aslan to do something to rescue him from the humiliation, but Aslan explains:

“I cannot comfort him . . . he has made himself unable to hear my voice. If I

spoke to him, he would hear only growlings and roarings. Oh Adam's sons,

how cleverly you defend yourself against all that might do you good!”30

Aslan gives him “the only gift he is still able to receive him”--the gift of sleep—and

Andrew returns to our world, chastened:

Uncle Andrew never tried any Magic again as long as he lived. He had learned

his lesson, and in his old age he became a nicer and less selfish old man than

he had ever been before.31

Aslan’s comment, “[H]ow cleverly you defend yourselves against all that might do

you good” is one that is explored more fully in the other Narnia books.32 For the

moment, let us note that Aslan’s purpose for Andrew (as for everyone else) is to give

30 Ibid. 158.31 Ibid. 171.32 E.g. Battle 141.

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joy. The children and other visitors to Narnia find joy, but Andrew defends himself

against such a disturbing gift.

In The Voyage of the Dawntreader, we see more of what sin can do to people,

and more of what it takes to be redeemed and to find that joy.

THE VOYAGE OF THE DAWNTREADER : becoming what we choose

If anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see,

everything has become new. (2 Corinthians 5:17)

The central character, though not exactly the hero, of The Voyage of the

Dawntreader is Eustace Clarence Scrubb. Edmund and Lucy, from the first book in

the series, are his cousins, and have come to stay for the summer. We learn quickly

what kind of person Eustace is:

Eustace Clarence liked animals, especially beetles, if they were dead and

pinned on a card. . . . [D]eep down inside him he liked bossing and

bullying . . . [H]e knew that here are dozens of ways to give people a bad time

if you are in your own home and they are only visitors. He liked books if they

were books of information and had pictures of grain elevators. 33

Like Uncle Andrew, Eustace is clearly of a practical turn of mind. Books are there as

sources of information. Beetles are best when dead and as objects of study. School is

about getting marks: “though he didn't care much about any subject for its own sake,

he cared a great deal about marks.”34

33 C.S.Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawntreader (London: Geoffrey Bles, 1955; London: HarperCollins 1980), 7.

34 Ibid. 27.

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Not only is he selfish and practical, but he also lacks imagination. When he

hears Lucy and Edmund talking about Narnia, he assumes that they are making up

their stories of Narnia because “he was far too stupid to make anything up himself.”35

There is hardly any worse criticism of anyone in Lewis’ world than to say that they

lack imagination. For Lewis, Eustace is clearly ripe to be taught a lesson.

The three children are magically whisked onto the deck of the Dawntreader, a

Narnian ship sailing in search of seven lost lords. Naturally, Eustace hates it. For one

thing, he:

kept on boasting about liners and motor-boats and aeroplanes and

submarines.36

After a severe storm, they arrive at an island where they can find fresh drinking water

and repair the ship. Eustace, wanting to avoid anything resembling hard work, slips off

into the hills by himself for a rest. He comes by chance on the cave of a dragon at the

point of death. He takes shelter from a storm in the dragon’s cave, now vacant, and

finds it filled with treasure. This should not have surprised him, but, of course:

Eustace had read only the wrong books. They had a lot to say about exports

and imports and governments and drains, but they were weak on dragons. 37

When he awakes, he discovers to his horror that he has been transformed into a

dragon:

Sleeping on a dragon's hoard with greedy, dragonish thoughts in his heart, he

had become a dragon himself.38

35 Ibid. 10.36 Ibid. 27.37 Ibid. 71.38 Ibid. 73.

15

For Lewis, our choices make us who we are. If we make selfish choices, we will

become selfish people. If we make generous choices, we become generous people. 39

In the case of Eustace, the self that he has become has taken on a vivid outward

expression, almost a metaphor for the state of his heart—he is a dragon outwardly as

well as inwardly.

The shock of this transformation begins a change in Eustace.40 He discovers

that:

[h]e wanted to be among friends. He wanted to get back among humans and

talk and laugh and share things. He realized he was a monster cut off from the

whole human race. An appalling loneliness came over him. He began to see

that the others had not really been fiends. He began to wonder if he himself

had been such a nice person as he had always supposed. He longed for their

voices.41

The others cannot decide what they will do with Eustace the dragon when they are

ready to set sail. For Eustace, this comes to symbolize what a misfit he had chosen to

be before:

39 Sin “begins with a grumbling mood . . . Ye can repent and come out of it again. But there may come a day when you can do that no longer. Then there will be no you left to criticise the mood, nor even to enjoy it, but just the grumble itself going on forever like a machine.” C.S.Lewis, The Great Divorce (London: Geoffrey Bles, 1946; Harper Collins, 1977), 69.

40 In the same way, the shock of realising that the White Witch did not really care for him was the beginning of Edmund’s transformation in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

41 Voyage 74.

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Poor Eustace realized more and more that since the first day he came on board

he had been an unmitigated nuisance and that he was now a greater nuisance

still.42

This is not the end of Eustace’s lesson, however. It is one thing to realise how

we have sinned, but it is quite another to be able to change. And this Eustace cannot

bring about for himself. Late one night, he meets Aslan, who leads him, still in dragon

form, to a well in a garden on top of a mountain. There Eustace wants to bathe but

“the lion told me I must undress first.” He scratches himself and finds that his dragon

skin comes off. Underneath, however, he finds another dragon skin, and then another

and yet another. When he finally despairs, Aslan tells him: “You will have to let me

undress you.” Aslan tears away the dragon skin completely, tearing so deeply “that I

thought it had gone right into my heart.” As a result, “it hurt worse than anything I've

ever felt.” Aslan then throws Eustace into the water, and he finds to his delight, “I'd

turned into a boy again.” 43

It is a recurring theme of Narnia, that sin reduces our humanity. Frequently, the

wrong-doers in Narnia are called “beasts” or “beastly.” Certainly this was a common

term of reproach in the England of Lewis’ time, yet it takes on a darker significance in

this context. There is something about sin—being out of touch with our Creator--

which has a tendency to make us less human.44 In the case of Eustace, that lack of

humanity takes a particularly dramatic visual form. But the converse is equally

striking, that to be brought out of sin--to be restored to relationship with God--is not to

be made peculiar or superhuman or (worst of all) “religious,” but merely to recover

42 Ibid. 83.43 Ibid. 84-87.44 Ibid. 87 cf. Lion 45, 55; Magician 28-29.

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one's full humanity. If one asks, “why is sin wrong?” in Narnia at least, it is because

sin keeps us from being fully human.

In this life, however, sin is never fully dealt with. The disease—our separation

from God—may be dealt with, but the symptoms continue. This is certainly true of

Eustace. Lewis comments shrewdly:

It would be nice, and fairly true, to say that “from that time forth Eustace was a

different boy.” To be strictly accurate, he began to be a different boy. He had

relapses. There were still many days when he could be very tiresome. But most

of these I shall not notice. The cure had begun.45

PRINCE CASPIAN and THE SILVER CHAIR: sin as disobedience

“Whoever knows what is right for him to do and does not do it, for him

it is sin.” (James 4:17)

If the books considered above deal primarily with those who are not servants

of Aslan, and how they come to be changed, these two—Prince Caspian and The

Silver Chair—focus more on the struggles of those who are already of the Lion’s

company. As Lewis said of Eustace, “the cure had begun” but it had certainly not

ended. In particular, these two books tell stories about following Aslan, both how it is

difficult and how it is rewarding. They also speak about the role of sin in the life of the

Christian.

In Prince Caspian, the four Pevensie children have been magicked from our

world into Narnia once again, this time to come to the aid of Prince Caspian, the

45 Ibid. 89.

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rightful king of Narnia, who is being besieged by the superior army of his uncle, the

usurper King Miraz. First, however, they have to find Caspian.

At one point as they are travel towards Caspian’s camp, they come to the edge

of a deep gorge, at the bottom of which is a river. It is not clear whether they should

turn to right or left, but various factors incline them to think that right, down the hill, is

the more direct. The oldest, Peter, concludes: “Come on, then. Down this side of the

gorge.” But before they can begin:

"Look! Look! Look!" cried Lucy.

"Where? What?" asked everyone.

"The Lion," said Lucy. "Aslan himself. Didn't you see?" Her face had changed

completely and her eyes shone.46

Aslan indicates to Lucy that they should go “up, not down. Just the opposite of the

way you want to go.” Of course, nobody else has seen Aslan at this point (Lucy

always seemed to have the closest bond with him47), and the majority vote to go with

“common sense,” against Lucy's advice, and to move down the gorge. God’s

commands—to love our neighbour as ourselves, to forgive our enemies, to confess our

sins—seldom seem like common sense.

The one exception to the vote against Lucy is Edmund, who says, “speaking

quickly and turning a little red”:

“When we first discovered Narnia . . . it was Lucy who discovered it first and

none of us would believe her. I was the worst of the lot, I know. Yet she was

46 C.S.Lewis, Prince Caspian (London: Geoffrey Bles, 1951; Harmondsworth UK: Puffin Books, 1962 ), 110.

47 Edmund comments elsewhere, “Lucy sees him most often.” Voyage 87.

19

right after all. Wouldn't it be fair to believe her this time? I vote for going

up.”48

But Edmund is in the minority, so they set off, with Lucy the “last of the party, crying

bitterly.”49 Going down the gorge, however, as we might have guessed, only leads

them into an ambush set by Miraz’ troops, and they have to retrace their steps uphill,

hot, tired and thirsty, wasting energy and valuable time. That night, once again, Aslan

appears to Lucy, and once again she has to try to persuade the others to follow her as

she follows Aslan.

“Will the others see you too?” asked Lucy.

“Certainly not at first,” said Aslan. “Later on, it depends.”

“But they won't believe me!” said Lucy.

“It doesn't matter,” said Aslan.50

Not surprisingly, it is Edmund who takes the lead this time in determining to

follow Lucy, and thus it is Edmund who is the first to see that Aslan is indeed ahead of

them on the path.

Halfway down the path Edmund caught up with [Lucy]. “Look!” he said in

great excitement. “Look! What's that great shadow crawling down in front of

us?” “It's his shadow,” said Lucy. “I do believe you're right, Lu,” said Edmund.

“I can't think how I didn't see it before.”

We, however, can easily think why Edmund couldn't see. In the world of faith, it is not

that seeing causes believing, but rather that believing--and following what we

believe--leads to seeing. It is a common mistake to think that “normal” people believe

48 Prince 112.49 Ibid. 113.50 Ibid. 125.

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only what they see, whereas religious people somehow believe without the benefit of

sight. The fact is that nobody believes only what they see. Even the conviction that

“seeing is believing” is itself a statement of faith which could never be proved.

Everybody’s “seeing” is governed by what they believe. Thus if a person decides to be

an atheist (a position of faith), they will see the world in a particular way. A person

who decides to be a Zen Buddhist will see the world in quite a different way. And so

on. For Edmund, his commitment to follow Aslan means that slowly he comes to see

the reality of Aslan. Sight follows believing, not the other way round. For Uncle

Andrew in The Magician’s Nephew, lack of belief meant he could not hear Aslan.51

For Edmund, belief means he can see Aslan. Our senses do not give us absolute truth:

they are often controlled by what we choose to believe or not to believe.

The Silver Chair also explores the idea of following in obedience. Jill Pole and

Eustace Scrub (of Dawntreader fame) have been transported to Narnia to search for

the missing Prince Rilian, heir to the throne. Aslan gives Jill four clues for finding

him, and concludes (with an echo of Moses' words to the children of Israel52):

[R]emember, remember, remember the signs. Say them to yourself when you

wake in the morning and when you lie down at night, and when you wake in

the middle of the night. And whatever strange things happen to you, let nothing

turn your mind from following the signs.53

51 Magician 117.52 e.g. Deuteronomy 6:6-9.53 C.S.Lewis The Silver Chair (London: Geoffrey Bles 1953;

London: Collins 1980), 30-31.

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Together with Puddleglum the Marshwiggle, Jill and Eustace trek through the

wilderness in search of the lost prince, until they meet a beautiful woman on

horseback who tells them they are not far from Harfang, the city of the gentle giants,

where they will be given warm hospitality. As a result:

They could think about nothing but beds and baths and hot meals and how

lovely it would be to get indoors. They never talked about Aslan or even about

the lost prince now. And Jill gave up her habit of repeating the over signs to

herself every night and morning.54

Jesus warned of the danger to those “who hear the word, but the cares of the world,

and the lure of wealth, and the desire for other things come in and choke the word, and

it yields nothing.”55 In Jill and Eustace’s case, it seems to be the lure of soft beds and

hot baths which choke the memory of the word.

It is Puddleglum, the real hero of this story, who remembers the importance of

the clues:

“Are you still sure of those signs, Pole? What's the one we ought to be

after now?”

“Oh, come on! Bother the signs,” said Pole. . . .

Puddleglum's question annoyed her because, deep down inside her, she was

already annoyed with herself for not knowing the Lion's lesson quite so well as

she felt she ought to have known it.56

54 Ibid. 84.55 Mark 4:18-19.56 Ibid. 91.

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As a result, they walk straight past the next clue in their hurry to arrive at Harfang

before the gates close and they are shut out for the night. Having been welcomed by

the giants, they go to bed. During the night, however, Aslan appears to Jill and shows

her from her bedroom window the clue they missed. Eustace learned during the

voyage of the Dawntreader the lesson of dealing with past sins, and is quick to confess

where he went wrong:

“The truth is . . . we were so jolly keen on getting to this place that we weren't

bothering about anything else. . . . We must just own up. We've only four signs

and we've muffed the first three.” 57

The castle, of course, far from being the haven they had expected, turns out to

be a death trap: the giants regard human beings as a delicacy for the forthcoming

Autumn Feast. The luxury the Queen of the Underworld promised meant death; the

hardship that came with obeying Aslan meant life. They manage to escape from the

giants. They cannot put the clock back and undo their disobedience, however: no-one

can know what might have happened, but “anyone can find out what will happen”, as

Aslan tells Lucy on another occasion.58 And what does happen is that they are able to

redeem their mistake and to find Prince Rilian.

The theme of difficult obedience takes a further turn when the three finally find

the prince. While he is under an evil enchantment, the prince tells them that a fit

comes over him at night, so that every night he is bound to a silver chair. He warns

that they might be tempted to untie him, but that whatever he says, however he pleads,

they should not do so. Of course, he says this while enchanted. The truth is that the

57 Ibid. 85-86.58 Prince 125.

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queen wants him to be restrained at night because that is when he is himself, and it is

she who has taught him the opposite. As a result, that night, while he is bound to the

chair and free of the enchantment, he pleads with them to release him . . . in the name

of Aslan. What are they to do? The fourth clue was:

you will know the lost prince . . . by this, that he will be the first person you

have met in your travels who will ask you to do something in my name, in the

name of Aslan.”59

Yet they cannot be sure which persona of the prince is the true one. If the warning the

prince gave them during the day is true, then releasing him from the silver chair will

mean certain death.

“Oh, if only we knew,” said Jill.

“I think we do know,” said Puddleglum.

What he knows is that the choice is not between safety and danger. The real choice is

between obedience and disobedience, and as far as Puddleglum is concerned, that is no

choice at all:

“Do you mean everything will come right if we untie him?” said

Scrubb.

“I don't know about that,” said Puddleglum. “You see, Aslan didn't tell

Pole what would happen. He only told her what to do. That fellow will be the

death of us once he’s up, I shouldn't wonder. But that doesn't let us off

following the sign.” 60

59 Silver 29.60 Ibid. 145.

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Puddleglum understands rightly that obedience to Aslan never guarantees safety or

happiness. But it is the right thing to do, because he is the king.61 In fact, their gamble

pays off: they free Prince Rilian and together the four of them return to Narnia.

Puddleglum’s insight remains valid, however: obedience is right because of who gives

the command, not because the outcome is certain. Anything less is sin.

THE HORSE AND HIS BOY : sin as pride

Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought to think . . . (Romans 12:3)

Pride has the reputation of being the worst of sins.62 Lewis says this:

According to Christian teachers, the essential vice, the utmost evil, is Pride.

Unchastity, anger, greed, drunkenness, and all that, are mere fleabites in

comparison: it was through Pride that the devil became the devil: Pride leads to

every other vice: it is the complete anti-God state of mind.63

Ultimately, pride is the desire of human beings to put themselves in the place of God.

When it is translated into the context of human relationships, pride becomes the desire

to make ourselves more important than we really are, usually at the expense of others.

61 Lewis writes elsewhere about the First Servant in Shakespeare’s King Lear, who does what is right and gets killed for his pains. He only speaks eight lines in the play. Yet, says Lewis, “if it were real life and not a play, that is the part it would be best to have acted.” “The World’s Last Night,” in Fern-seeds and Elephants (London: Fountain Books 1977), 76.

62 “Augustine, Aquinas and Dante all characterized pride as the ultimate sin, while Milton and Goethe dramatized it.” D.H. Tongue, “Pride” in The New Bible Dictionary (London: Inter-Varsity Fellowship, 1962).

63 C.S.Lewis, Mere Christianity (London: Geoffrey Bles 1952; London: Fontana Books 1955), 106.

25

In the Narnia stories, sin has been expressed in various ways. In The Lion, the

Witch and the Wardrobe, it is the betrayal of the rightful King of the Universe. In The

Magician’s Nephew, it is making everything and everyone—human beings, animals,

even reality itself--serve self. In The Voyage of the Dawntreader, it is a self-

centredness that diminishes our humanness. In Prince Caspian and The Silver Chair,

sin is disobedience, making ourselves a wiser and truer authority than God. Now, in

The Horse and his Boy, pride becomes the major expression of sin.

Shasta is the adopted son of a poor fisherman. One day a proud and powerful

knight or Tarkaan stays at his house, and that night Shasta overhears the Tarkaan and

the fisherman haggling over the price for which he might be sold into slavery. He

discovers that the Tarkaan’s horse, Bree, is a talking horse—a thing unknown in the

country of Calormen though common enough in Narnia, the land to the north. They

decide to escape together to Narnia and freedom. On the way, hunting lions force them

to link up with another talking horse, Hwin, and her rider, a young and proud

Tarkheena named Aravis. The book tells of their adventures on the way to Narnia.

Through living in Calormen, “hiding my true nature and pretending to be dumb

and witless like their horses,”64 Bree has become proud. Like most proud people,

however, one result of his pride is that he is worried about how he appears to others,65

and the thought of returning to Narnia, where he will not be familiar with the protocol,

worries him. What about rolling on his back, for example, which he loves?

64 C.S.Lewis, The Horse and his Boy (London: Geoffrey Bles 1954; Harmondsworth: Puffin Books 1965), 18.

65 It was a sign of Edmund’s redemption that he “had got past thinking about himself.” Lion 128.

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“You don’t think, do you,” said Bree, “that it might be a thing talking

horses never do—a silly, clownish trick I’ve learned from the dumb ones? It

would be dreadful to find, when I get back to Narnia, that I’ve picked up a lot

of low, bad habits.”66

When the group have to pass through the city of Tashbaan, the horses have to

be made to look like work horses, not the war horses they really are. Hwin is merely

practical about the matter, but:

“My dear madam,” said Bree. “Have you pictured to yourself how very

disagreeable it would be to arrive in Narnia in that condition?”

“Well,” said Hwin humbly (she was a very sensible mare), “the main

thing is to get there.” 67

This a very revealing exchange. For Bree, to arrive looking bedraggled would be

“disagreeable.” What he really means is that he would give a bad first

impression, whereas he wants to be seen for the fine stallion he believes he is.68 Hwin,

on the other hand, speaks “humbly” because she is “sensible”: this is a hint of what

Lewis will later explain as his understanding of humility.

The denouement of the story comes as they approach Narnia, just ahead of an

attacking Calormene army headed by Prince Rabadash. A lion pursues them and leaps

at Aravis. Shasta jumps from Bree’s back to help in whatever way he can, but Bree

continues to gallop for safety. The lion:

66 Horse 26.67 Ibid. 46.68 Elsewhere Lewis comments that this is not the worst kind of

pride. “It shows that you are not yet completely contented with your own admiration. You value other people enough to want them to look at you. You are, in fact, still human.” Mere Christianity 110.

27

jabbed at Aravis with its right paw. Shasta could see all the terrible claws

extended. Aravis screamed and reeled in the saddle. The lion was tearing her

shoulders.69

Shasta manages to drive the lion back and they all reach safety. But the experience has

been a revelation (literally: it has revealed things they did not know before) for each of

them, particularly for Aravis and Bree. Bree, in particular, realises that he is not the

brave war horse he has believed himself to be up to this point:

“I who called myself a war-horse and boasted of a hundred fights, to be beaten

by a little human boy—a child, a mere foal, who had never held a sword nor

had any good nurture or example in his life!”70

In fact, he is so embarrassed by his failure to defend Hwin and Aravis that he feels he

is no longer worthy of Narnia and wants to return to Calormen to live as a slave.

Aravis, showing spiritual insight, says:

“I think it would be better to stay and say we're sorry than to go back to

Calormen.”71

In some ways, Aravis’ proposal is the more costly one. Bree could stay in Calormen as

a slave and nobody would ever have to know of his humiliation except himself.

“I’ve lost everything,” wails Bree in self-pity. The Hermit of the Southern

March, with whom they find refuge, knows the truth that Bree needs to hear:

My good horse, you’ve lost nothing but your self-conceit. . . . If you are really

as humbled as you sounded a minute ago, you must learn to listen to sense.

You're not quite the great Horse you had come to think, from living among

69 Horse 123.70 Ibid. 128.71 Ibid. 128.

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poor dumb horses. . . . It doesn't follow that you'll be anyone very special in

Narnia. But as long as you know you're nobody very special, you'll be a very

decent sort of Horse.72

Here again is the connection between humility and good sense. Humility for Lewis is

seeing oneself as one really is—that is, as God sees one. Aslan knows that Bree is not

the great horse he thinks he is, but Aslan knows also that Bree is a “very decent sort of

Horse” and that is all Bree is called to be.

Unlike Bree, Hwin has a natural humility. It is not an artificial, exaggerated,

self-effacing kind of humility (which itself can be a form of pride, or at least of a

prideful self-consciousness) but an acknowledgement of the way things really are—

including her own character and appearance and abilities. Thus, when Aslan finally

appears, Hwin is the one who is spiritually prepared:

“Please . . . you're so beautiful. You may eat me if you like. I'd sooner

be eaten by you than fed by anyone else.”

“Dearest daughter,” said Aslan . . . “I knew you would not be long in

coming to me. Joy shall be yours.”73

For Bree, the encounter with Aslan is not one of instant joy. For Bree, not surprisingly,

it has a different flavour. At the moment of Aslan’s appearing, Bree happens to be

explaining to the others why the term “Lion” for Aslan is merely metaphorical and

should not be taken literally.74 Aslan’s response is humorous rather than angry:

72 Ibid. 129.73 Ibid. 169.74 This reference probably reflects Lewis’ disapproval of the

liberal theology of his day. See Perry C. Bramlett, “Theology” in The C.S.Lewis Readers’ Encyclopedia, ed. Jeffrey D. Schultz and John G. Wrest Jr. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan 1998).

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“Now, Bree . . . you poor, proud, frightened creature, draw near.

Nearer still, my son. Do not dare not to dare. Touch me. . . . I am a true Beast.”

“Aslan,” said Bree in a shaken voice. “I'm afraid I must be rather a

fool.”

“Happy the Horse who knows that while he is still young. Or the

Human either.”75

In the face of Aslan, Bree finally admits it: his pride has made him foolish. Aslan does

not respond by telling him he has a poor self-image or that he is exaggerating. Aslan

simply tells him it is good that he knows his foolishness. To acknowledge the truth

about oneself—that is, to be humble--is crucial in one's relationship with Aslan.76

Bree, like Eustace before him, is not entirely cured, however. Before they

finally arrive in Narnia, he is still worried:

“Do Talking Horses roll? Supposing they don't? I can't bear to give it

up. What do you think, Hwin?”

“I'm going to roll anyway,” said Hwin. “I don't suppose any of them

will care two lumps of sugar whether you roll or not.” 77

Aravis too acknowledges the truth that she has been proud. When Shasta returns,

having discovered that in truth he is not Shasta but Prince Cor, the lost son of King

Lune of Archenland, she tells him:

75 Horse 169.76 Similar “confession” scenes occur in Lion with Peter (118),

with Lucy in Prince (124-125) and in Silver with Jill (28).77 Horse 176.

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“There's something I've got to say at once. I'm sorry I've been such a pig.78 But

I did change before I knew you were a prince.” 79

With her too, Lewis is concerned to make clear that this turning point in her life does

not make her perfect. But she has learned some lessons about reconciliation which

stand her in good stead:

Aravis . . . had many quarrels . . . with Cor, but they always made it up again: so that,

years later, when they were grown up, they were so used to quarrelling and making it

up again that they got married so as to go on doing it more conveniently.80

THE LAST BATTLE : the limit of sin

Then comes the end, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father, after he has

destroyed every ruler and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has

put all his enemies under his feet. (1 Corinthians 15:24-25)

Lewis has traveled a long way in his thinking since The Lion, the Witch and

the Wardrobe. Here, in The Last Battle, his thinking on a number of subjects,

including sin, comes together to give “the big picture.” Here, for example, we see that

sin is not just something played out on the human stage, but something which involves

cosmic forces beyond our comprehension. We learn as a corollary that sin has

consequences which extend beyond this life. Yet the fundamental lesson of The Lion,

the Witch and the Wardrobe, that the most important thing about a person is whether

they are servants of Aslan, still undergirds everything else.

78 Here is another metaphor suggesting that sin makes us something less than human.

79 Horse 172.80 Ibid. 188.

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Two new animal characters meet us in the opening pages of The Last Battle.

Shift the ape is evil. From the very first page, he is portrayed as self-centred,

manipulative, thinking only of his own ease and comfort. Although he pretends to

friendship with Puzzle the donkey, Puzzle is in fact virtually his slave. Shift’s

“friend,” Puzzle, also sheds a new light on sin. He is certainly innocent and naive, but

by the middle of the book his seeming innocence is no longer so attractive or pitiable.

There is something quite sinister in the picture of the gentle donkey dressed up in the

bedraggled skin of a lion, silhouetted by a flickering campfire. In fact, it is seen to be

culpable: he did not need to let himself be used to the extent that he was.

Yet there is more here than simply new kinds of sinful character. As the story

unfolds, we become aware of the reality of huge cosmic powers lurking behind the

appearance of human good and evil. The conflict between good and evil is no longer

one that can be resolved by sincere apology and asking Aslan’s forgiveness. This book

describes war. Nor does this story have a happy ending—in Narnia, at least. (In

another sense, it has the ultimate happy ending.) King Tirian is consistently referred to

as the last king of Narnia, and in the final battle, nearly all of those on the side of

Narnia are killed. The stakes in the conflict of good and evil are very high indeed.

The story opens with Shift and Puzzle discovering the skin of a dead lion. Shift

proposes that Puzzle should wear the skin and pretend to be Aslan, in order to put right

all the wrongs with which Narnia is afflicted. When thunder from heaven warns them

against such a strategy, Puzzle understands it correctly (“I knew we were doing

something dreadfully wicked”), but Shift is quick to reinterpret it as a sign of Aslan’s

32

affirmation (“No, no. It’s a sign the other way”81 ). The “blasphemy against the Holy

Spirit,” against which Jesus warned, was to say that good is evil and evil good.82 This

is precisely what Shift does.

With the supposed authority of Aslan now behind him, he makes an agreement

with the neighbouring country of Calormen for them to fell and remove Narnian trees

(“holy trees” 83), to use Narnian talking animals for slave labour, and to transport the

dwarves of Narnia to work in the mines of Calormen. Shift keeps the pliable Puzzle in

a small, dark stable, and only brings him out at night, by the uncertain light of a

bonfire, to add the supposed authority of Aslan to his commands.

In Narnia, it has always been important that every person and animal know

who or what it is, and to fulfill the function to which Aslan has called it. It is thus a

sign of the Ape’s sinfulness that he wants to be something other than himself. He says

to the other animals:

“I hear some of you saying I’m an ape. Well, I’m not. I’m a man. If I look like

an Ape, that’s because I’m so old: hundreds and hundreds of years old.”84

If people in Narnia go wrong when they begin to behave like “beasts,”85 animals in

Narnia go wrong when they begin to pretend to be human. Mr. Beaver had warned the

children in the first book:

81 C.S.Lewis, The Last Battle (London: The Bodley Head 1956; London: Collins 1980), 17.

82 Mark 3:28-30.83 Battle 24. It had been a sign of Narnia’s health centuries

earlier when the four kings and queens “made good laws and kept the peace and saved good trees from being unnecessarily cut down.” Lion 166.

84 Ibid. 31.85 Cf. Lion 45, 46, 55, 139.

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“[T]ake my advice, when you meet anything that’s going to be human, and

isn’t yet, or used to be human once and isn’t now, or ought to be human and

isn’t, you keep your eyes on it and feel for your hatchet.”86

There is a worse way in which the reality Aslan has put into Narnia is

challenged and distorted. The line between good and evil becomes blurred. The

religions of Narnia and Calormen are now said to be the same:

“Tash is only another name for Aslan. . . . The Calormenes use different words

but we all mean the same thing.”87

The loving creator god who is Aslan is incorporated into the cruel and destructive god

Tash. Of course, once good and evil, truth and falsehood, are obliterated, even in the

name of tolerance, all that is actually left is unprincipled power--and that the ape is

determined to wield.

However, it is a principle of all Lewis’ theology that “All find what they truly

seek.”88 Those who claim to be servants of Tash will find him. Those who seek Aslan,

though it may be by a different name, will also find their heart’s desire. Thus, at the

end of the story, Tash comes to claim his own:

“[T]his fool of an Ape, who didn’t believe in Tash, will get more than he

bargained for! He called for Tash: Tash has come.”89

The evil Tash devours both Shift and Rishdah Tarkaan, leader of the Calormene

forces. The fear of Tash also turns Ginger the scheming cat back into a dumb animal:

86 Ibid., 77. Mr. Beaver is speaking of the White Witch, who wants to be human but is not.

87 Battle 35.88 Ibid. 156.89 Ibid. 80.

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[E]very one of them had been taught . . . how Aslan at the beginning of the

world had turned the Beasts of Narnia into Talking Beasts and warned them

that if they weren’t good they might one day be turned back again and be like

the poor witless animals one meets in other countries.90

Ginger may have chosen the side of Tash, but even in his encounter with Tash, Tash

has no real power: all that happens is that the words of Aslan, spoken thousands of

years before, are fulfilled.

Then all of Narnia comes to an end at Aslan’s bidding, and, in the

Narnian version of the final judgement, all the creatures of Narnia have to

come before Aslan:

[A]s they came right up to Aslan one or other of two things happened to each

of them. They all looked in his face; I don’t think they had any choice about

that. And when some looked, the expression of their faces changed terribly—it

was fear and hatred. . . . And all the creatures who looked at Aslan in that way

swerved to their right, his left, and disappeared into his huge black shadow . . .

But the others looked into the face of Aslan and loved him, though some of

them were very frightened at the same time. And all these came in at the Door,

on Aslan’s right.91

The judgement, in other words, is what the animals have chosen for themselves. When

they are confronted with Aslan, the ultimate symbol of good and of God, the reality

that has grown and been nurtured in their hearts over their lifetime becomes visible on

their faces. Some know, as they look on Aslan, that this is what they have been

90 Ibid. 105.91 Ibid. 146.

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searching for all of their lives. Others realise that this is what they have been seeking

to avoid and hide from all of their lives. None who truly want to enter Aslan’s new

world are turned away. None who hate Aslan and what he stands for are forced to

enter.

As a result, there are some surprises. One is that the children discover a

Calormen soldier in Aslan’s country. Surely he should not be there? After all, he

fought on the side of evil against Aslan. But Aslan is interested in a person’s deepest

allegiance, not in outward appearances:

[Tash] and I are of such different kinds that no service which is vile can be

done to me, and none which is not vile can be done to him. Therefore, if any

man swear by Tash and keep his oath for the oath’s sake, it is by me that he has

truly sworn, though he know it not, and it is I who reward him. And if any man

do a cruelty in my name, then, though he says the name Aslan, it is Tash whom

he serves and by

Tash his deed is accepted.92

The soldier, Emeth (the name means “truth” in Hebrew), has actually been seeking

Aslan all of his life, though he did not know the true nature of Aslan. Thus it is to

Emeth that Aslan says the crucial words, “All find what they truly seek.” Sin is to seek

something less than Aslan. Sin is to choose against the Creator.

This truth is underlined by the fate of the dwarves. They too find themselves in

Aslan’s country, but they behave as though they are still in the dark, smelly stable.

Lucy feels sorry for them, and begs Aslan to help them, but he replies: “Dearest,” said

92 Ibid. 156.

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Aslan, “I will show you what I can, and what I cannot, do.” Even his best efforts

cannot shake them out of their illusion, and he concludes:

“They will not let us help them. They have chosen cunning rather than belief.

Their prison is only in their own minds, yet they are in that prison; and so

afraid of being taken in that they cannot be taken out.”93

The dwarves, like Emeth, have chosen, but they have chosen to be shut in on

themselves, and Aslan will not force them to do otherwise. Like Uncle Andrew, who

chose only to hear the animals making animal noises, so the dwarves can only

experience the world in the way they have chosen to experience it. Choice and faith

are closely related in Aslan’s world, so it is equally true to say that the dwarves have

chosen a reality without Aslan and to say they have refused to believe in Aslan (they

will not be taken in).

But what becomes of Puzzle, the false Aslan? He says he is sorry, but, unlike

proper apologies in Narnia, he makes excuses for himself:

“I’m sure I’m very sorry if I’ve done wrong. The Ape said Aslan wanted me to

dress up like that. And I thought he’d know. I’m not clever like him. I only did

what I was told.”94

His excuse (“I only did what I was told”) sounds innocent enough--until one realises

that the same words were used by Nazis to excuse the atrocities they performed in

Word War II concentration camps.95 It is Eustace who tries to confront Puzzle:

93 Ibid. 140-141.94 Ibid. 66.95 The second World War ended in 1945. The Last Battle was

written in 1956, when the memory of that war was still fresh, and war trials were still continuing. The verbal echo is almost certainly deliberate.

37

“If you’d spent less time saying you weren’t clever and more time trying to be

as clever as you could--”96

Ultimately, however, Puzzle, like everyone else, has to meet Aslan face to face:

the Lion bowed down his head and whispered something to Puzzle at which his

long ears went down; but then he said something else at which his ears perked

up again. The humans couldn’t hear what he had said either time. 97

It may be presumptuous for humans to guess what was said by Aslan in private

conversation, but presumably the words which caused Puzzle’s ears to droop were

words about his sin and guilt, and the words which caused him to perk up were words

of forgiveness and reassurance: bad news preceding good news. For us too, there is

bad news about sin and there is good news about forgiveness, and the more we

understand sin, the more we shall appreciate forgiveness.

ON FAIRY STORIES

C.S.Lewis’ friend, Tolkien, wrote an essay called On Fairy Stories, where he

suggested that the Christian account of the world “embraces all the essence of fairy

stories.” The Bible’s story is the greatest story of all—the story of our world from

beginning to end—and yet the Christian story does not make other stories redundant.

No, says Tolkien, “in God’s kingdom the presence of the greatest does not depress the

small”. He suggests that other stories actually resonate for us to the extent that they

96 Battle 81.97 Ibid. 172.

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remind us of the Big Story, and thus they contribute to the “the multiple enrichment of

creation.”98

This is certainly true of the Narnia stories. Lewis claims that he did not set out

to write stories which secretly conveyed Christian ideas to an unsuspecting reader, as

if he “drew up a list of basic Christian truths and hammered out allegories to embody

them.” Rather, he recalls, “[e]verything began with images; a faun carrying an

umbrella, a queen on a sledge, a magnificent lion.”99 Yet he became increasingly

conscious that he was communicating basic Christian ideas through his stories. The

stories do resonate with the Big Story, and Lewis the teacher saw the advantage of

this:

I thought I saw how stories of this kind could steal past a certain inhibition

which had paralyzed much of my own religion in childhood. . . . [S]upposing

that by casting all these things into an imaginary world, stripping them of their

stained-glass and Sunday school associations, one could make them for the

first time appear in their real potency? Could one not thus steal past those

watchful dragons? I thought one could.100

Thus the ultimate test of Narnia’s success is not only how good the stories are.

Lewis himself invites us to measure them by a second criterion. The real test is

whether the stories manage to steal past the watchful dragons. Do they send the reader

back to the Big Story of which the Narnia stories are only an echo—the Bible’s story

98 J.R.R.Tolkien, “On Fairy Stories”, in Tree and Leaf (London: George Allen and Unwin Ltd. 1964), 62-63.

99 C.S.Lewis “Sometimes Fairy Stories May Say Best What’s to be Said”, in Of This and Other Worlds (London: Collins Fount Paperbacks, 1984), 72.

100 Ibid. 74.

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of creation, of human rebellion and alienation, the story of God’s great renewal

program, with its climax in the story of Jesus, his life, his death for sin and his

resurrection—and bring that story to life in a fresh way? Do they, in this context, slay

the dragons which insist that sin is interesting and creative and life-giving, and make

us see and feel and taste that sin is self-destructive? Only the reader can decide.

Tolkien suggests that it is in The Big Story that “legend and history have met

and fused”, where “story has entered History.”101 And this, in a sense, is the point of

Narnia. At the conclusion of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, the children are

surprised to learn that Aslan exists in their world, as well as in Narnia.

“Are—are you there too, Sir?”

“I am,” said Aslan. “But there I have another name. You must learn to know

me by that name. This was the very reason why you were brought to Narnia,

that by knowing me here for a little, you may know me better there.” 102

The watchful dragons have to give way before the energy of a renewed spiritual

imagination.

101 Tolkien 72.102 Dawn Treader, 209.

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