Luiseach

Greetings, citizens of Biblical Criticism & History:

I have a question about the Bible (the Old Testament, the New Testament and the Apocrypha) on the one hand, and C.S. Lewis and The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe on the other.

Now, it has often been argued that LWW is a Christian allegory, and that Aslan is meant to represent Christ.

Lewis himself saw Aslan as more complex than this: 'In reality however he is an invention giving an imaginary answer to the question, 'What might Christ become like, if there really were a world like Narnia and He chose to be incarnate and die and rise again in that world as He actually done in ours?' (C.S. Lewis, 'Letter to a Lady,' December 29th, 1958).

Given Lewis's suggestion that Aslan the Lion is what Christ might be like, and considering the construction of his character as being based perhaps on the Bible (OT, NT, Apocrypha), then, my question is this: given that there are different kinds of lions throughout the biblical text(s) (both 'good' and 'evil'), how should we interpret Aslan? Which of the biblical lion(s) could Lewis have been thinking about when he invented his lion?

I have been looking at the lion in the Apocryphal Book of 2 Esdras 12, which refers to an apocalyptic messiah lion of sorts. I was looking for some input on the subject from folks who are familiar with the biblical texts. At the moment, I think the lion in Esdras is the most likely candidate for drawing a parellel with Aslan; however, if someone else thinks otherwise, I would appreciate thoughts on this. Thank you very much in advance for your time.

The following is the relevant section of Esdras:

"And it came to pass, whiles the lion spake these words unto the eagle, I saw,

And, behold, the head that remained and the four wings appeared no more, and the two went unto it and set themselves up to reign, and their kingdom was small, and fill of uproar.

And I saw, and, behold, they appeared no more, and the whole body of the eagle was burnt so that the earth was in great fear: then awaked I out of the trouble and trance of my mind, and from great fear, and said unto my spirit,

Lo, this hast thou done unto me, in that thou searchest out the ways of the Highest.

Lo, yet am I weary in my mind, and very weak in my spirit; and little strength is there in me, for the great fear wherewith I was afflicted this night.

Therefore will I now beseech the Highest, that he will comfort me unto the end.

And I said, Lord that bearest rule, if I have found grace before thy sight, and if I am justified with thee before many others, and if my prayer indeed be come up before thy face;

Comfort me then, and shew me thy servant the interpretation and plain difference of this fearful vision, that thou mayest perfectly comfort my soul.

For thou hast judged me worthy to shew me the last times.

And he said unto me, This is the interpretation of the vision:

(.....)

That after the time of that kingdom there shall arise great strivings, and it shall stand in peril of failing: nevertheless it shall not then fall, but shall be restored again to his beginning.

(.....)

And whereas thou sawest three heads resting, this is the interpretation:

In his last days shall the most High raise up three kingdoms, and renew many things therein, and they shall have the dominion of the earth,

(.....)

And the lion, whom thou sawest rising up out of the wood, and roaring, and speaking to the eagle, and rebuking her for her unrighteousness with all the words which thou hast heard;

This is the anointed, which the Highest hath kept for them and for their wickedness unto the end: he shall reprove them, and shall upbraid them with their cruelty.

For he shall set them before him alive in judgment, and shall rebuke them, and correct them.

For the rest of my people shall he deliver with mercy, those that have been pressed upon my borders, and he shall make them joyful until the coming of the day of judgment, whereof I have spoken unto thee from the the beginning.

This is the dream that thou sawest, and these are the interpretations.

Thou only hast been meet to know this secret of the Highest.

Therefore write all these things that thou hast seen in a book, and hide them:

And teach them to the wise of the people, whose hearts thou knowest may comprehend and keep these secrets.

But wait thou here thyself yet seven days more, that it may be shewed thee, whatsoever it pleaseth the Highest to declare unto thee. And with that he went his way."

KJV Bible, 2 Esdras 12

Celsus

I think that the simplest answer to which the Lion would refer to is the Lion of Judah as per Revelations 5:5, a direct reference to Christ. Most of the Biblical references to lions are in the OT as metaphors, and I doubt C.S. Lewis did an exhaustive search through the references. C.S. Lewis' salvation was also not particularly orthodox, as you can see from the Calormen whose name I forget in The Last Battle.

Joel

DamagedGoods

Emeth? Yeah, I'm sure Lewis upset a lot of orthodox Christian readers by having Aslan judge people by the intentions with which they served other gods: "Child, all the service thou hast done to Tash, I account as service done to me," and "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." They probably would much rather have preferred a rigid "you didn't worship me so go to hell" standard.

My impression was that Lewis just based his Narnia stories loosely on the themes from the bible. I haven't done any deliberate research to verify this, but I did read the entire Narnia series both before and after I was a literal Christian fundamentalist (that lasted about 10 years, spent a lot of time reading the bible during that time), and I don't recall there being a very strong correlation in many areas.

Weltall

Semi off topic, but I read the whole Narnia series way before I either cared enough about religion to call myself a Christian or learned enough about religion to become an atheist; I think I was about ten. What exactly did Lewis write that related to religion aside from the obvious rising from the dead bit. I don't have any of the books anymore (or for that matter the time to pore through them). Thanks.

Luiseach

Thanks, Celsus.

Luiseach

In The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Lewis used quite a lot of Christian symbolism, although he married this symbolism to images which aren't particularly 'Christian', and tended to undermine the symbolism in such a way as to throw into question its direct, or undiluted parallel with biblical sources.

For example, in a letter dated 24 December 1959 , Lewis wrote

"When I started The Lion, Witch and Wardrobe I don't think I foresaw what Aslan was going to do and suffer. I think He just insisted on behaving in His own way. This of course I did understand and the whole series became Christian.

But it is not, as some people think, an allegory. That is, I don't say 'Let us represent Christ as Aslan.' I say, 'Supposing there was a world like Narnia, and supposing, like ours, it needed redemption, let us imagine what sort of Incarnation and Passion and Resurrection Christ would have there.' See?"

Of course, it's still tempting to see Aslan as one of the most obvious Christian allusions in the book.

Then there's the habit of the Narnians in addressing the human children as 'Sons of Adam' and 'Daughters of Eve,' which draws direct attention to Genesis, of course.

The Stone Table is seen as representing the tablets on which the Ten Commandments were engraved, although the symbolism is not unproblematic. I think the Table could also be seen much more obviously as an altar, and not necessarily a Christian altar for that matter.

The White Witch is said to represent Satan; at the same time, I think that again the symbolism is not purely Christian. For one thing, she's female; for another, she's a witch, which hearkens back to fairy tales in general rather than Christian mythology in particular. She also turns people into stone, which suggests a hint of the Medusa about her, which again is from a non-Christian source.

These are some of the symbols/images/characters throughout LWW which could be seen as deriving from Christian sources, although as Lewis pointed out himself, the story is much more than just a Christian allegory.

The link I provided contains quite a bit of information about Lewis and the Chronicles of Narnia.

Weltall

Thanks! It's been a while since I looked at this stuff but since I've been seeing Lewis' name pop up in threads I guess I need a refresher.

Celsus

Also, remember that at the end of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Aslan appears as a Lamb [capitalised L], offering them fish to eat, an allusion to the same Lamb in Revelations. A further parallel is found in John 21 in which Jesus shows them how to catch fish, and the disciples [like the kids & Reepicheep] did not recognise him at first. I think it's rather overt, despite C.S. Lewis' protestations (perhaps he felt envious of Tolkien?).

Joel

Luiseach

I agree that Lewis definitely tended to protest a bit too much about the question of whether or not LWW was a Christian allegory. I think he may have had a very strict idea of what an allegory was, and the strictness of this literary definition led him to hesitate to call his own story an allegory.

Funny thing is, I was under the impression that Tolkien was a bit envious of Lewis's ability to produce more fictional texts than he could. I'll need to double-check this...

Amos

One must also keep in mind that the story is somewhat native to mankind and it could very well be that LWW was just his account of how he perceived this to be. All Romantics did this and their unique presentations is sometimes as clever as the story itself.

BTW, I can't find the book of Esdras in my bible. I have the NAB and tried to find it but couldn't. Is that just me or what?