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C. S. LEWIS: GOD AND ATHEISM C. S. Lewis went from being a convicted atheist to becoming the foremost apologist for Christianity in modern time. His works have been read and appreciated for decades by millions, and they continue to be a source of inspirations for a great many. "Lewis's interest in fantasy and mythology, seen as contradictory to his professed atheism, especially in relation to the works of George MacDonald, helped to lead him from atheism. In fact MacDonald's position as a Christian fantasy writer was very influential on Lewis. This can be seen particularly well through this passage in 'The Great Divorce,' chapter nine, when the semi-autobiographical main character meets MacDonald in Heaven:
Influenced by arguments with his Oxford colleague and friend J. R. R. Tolkien, and by the book The Everlasting Man by Roman Catholic convert G. K. Chesterton, he slowly rediscovered Christianity. He fought greatly up to the moment of his conversion... After his conversion to theism in 1929, Lewis converted to Christianity in 1931. Following a long discussion and late-night walk with his close friends Tolkien and Hugo Dyson, he records making a specific commitment to Christian belief while on his way to the zoo with his brother." "C. S. Lewis," Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._S._Lewis, Feb. 23, 2007.
"My argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea of just and unjust? A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line. What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust? If the whole show was bad and senseless from A to Z, so to speak, why did I, who was supposed to be part of the show, find myself in such violent reaction against it? A man feels wet when he falls into water, because man is not a water animal: a fish would not feel wet. Of course, I could have given up my idea of justice by saying that it was nothing but a private idea of my own. But if I did that, then my argument against God collapsed too--for the argument depended on saying that the world was really unjust, not simply that it did not happen to please my private fancies. Thus in the very act of trying to prove that God did not exist--in other words, that the whole of reality was senseless--I found I was forced to assume that one part of reality--namely my idea of justice--was full of sense. Consequently atheism turns out to be too simple. If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning: just as, if there were no light in the universe and therefore no creatures with eyes, we should never know it was dark. Dark would be without meaning." C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity. Harper
San Francisco, Zondervan Publishing House, 2001, pp. 38-39. |