C.S. Lewis, Rob Bell, & The Great Divorce
Despite the staying power of Mere Christianity, I agree with those who believe Lewis’ best work was his fiction. Perelandra (book 2 of the Space Trilogy) and The Great Divorce are probably my two favorites (with a shout-out to the non-fiction The Weight of Glory, probably the single most influential sermon I’ve ever read).
Amidst all the controversy over Rob Bell, universalism, and Hell, I’ve seen The Great Divorce cited as a defense of the positions Bell may (or may not) be taking. I haven’t read Bell’s book yet, but plan on doing that soon. I’ve read more reviews than I care to remember. I’ll comment more in-depth on Bell after doing some more reading and reflection.
In the meantime, Lewis’ words in the preface to The Great Divorce are as timely as ever. They seem to address the questions Bell and others are asking, but not in the affirmative:
Blake wrote the Marriage of Heaven and Hell. If I have written of their Divorce, this is not because I think myself a fit antagonist for so great a genius, nor even because I feel at all sure that I know what he meant. But in some sense or other the attempt to make that marriage is perennial. The attempt is based on the belief that reality never presents with an absolutely unavoidable ‘either-or’; that, granted skill and patience and (above all) time enough, some way of embracing both alternatives can always be found; that mere development or adjustment or refinement will somehow turn evil into good without our being called on for a final and total rejection of anything we should like to retain. This belief I take to be a disastrous error. You cannot take all luggage with you on all journeys; on one journey even your right hand and your right eye may be among the things you have to leave behind. We are not living in a world where all roads are radii of a circle and where all, if followed long enough, will therefore draw gradually nearer and finally meet at the centre: rather in a world where every road, after a few miles, forks into two, and each of those into two again, and at each fork you must make a decision.
As Bell is honest enough to admit, his questions are not new. This marriage has been attempted before. But as Lewis so ably demonstrates, it’s not a “marriage” intended to last. “Let no one join together what God has separated”, we might say.
(HT: Chris Brady at Targuman)
I read the Screwtape Letters as an adult and found it compelling in a way I would not have appreciated in youth. His fiction is genious.
Its hard to decide whether his fiction is better or his non-fiction. I do know for sure that no other Christian author has written so much great stuff. Reading the Great Divorce now. Good stuff. I’m actually reading Love Wins by Rob Bell at the same time and seeing some major influence there. I am in the same boat with you on the the Weight of Glory. That is Lewis at his best. Mere Christianity, however, never fails to speak to me. It’s something I could read once a year and not get tired of. It’s simplicity is always powerful.
My Lewis appreciation is much as yours, although very near the top of the list for me would be “Till We Have Faces.”
In preparing for a discussion of Mr. Bell’s book, I decided to re read TGD, and found that, even in their sometimes similarity, the differences are very great. You note the primary one from CSLs introduction. We must leave such things (of hell) behind. For Bell, God will somehow and somewhen work it all out. Lewis’ Spirits will blow “until the whole pile is ablaze” if there is a spark of a real soul left, but will not “keep forever blowing the ashes in our own eyes.” At some point “they must be swept up”
Bell does challenge some ideas about God.
Lewis challenges my ideas about me. If I had to choose only one “take away” point from TGD, it would probably be our seemingly endless capacity for self-delusion.