Mere Christianity 9

1 February 2012 Leave a Comment

In the last post, we said that there are two views of the universe, the materialist and the religious (or spiritual) views. And we added that one of the great gifts to humankind, scientific study and knowledge is able to discover a staggering amount of knowledge about the universe itself, but is limited to the universe and therefore unable to speak to the existence of Something Behind the universe.

So if there is “Something Behind” the universe, we can’t discover it through science, therefore it would have to make itself known to us some other way.

Lewis claims that since we have “inside information” about one part of our universe that we don’t have about anything else, namely ourselves, human beings. “We do not merely observe [humans], we are [humans]” (emphasis his). This is the key. To put it a little differently, there is one case in which we have more than just the observable external/behavioral facts. Our case.

To quote Lewis:

Since that power, if it exists, would be not one of the observed facts but a reality which makes them, no mere observation of the facts can find it. There is only one case in which we can know whether there is anything more, namely our own case. And in that one case we find there is. Or put it the other way round. If there was a controlling power outside the universe, it could not show itself to us as one of the facts inside the universe—no more than the architect of a house could actually be a wall or staircase or fireplace in that house. The only way in which we could expect it to show itself would be inside ourselves as an influence or command trying to get us to behave in a certain way. And that is just what we do find inside ourselves. Surely this ought to arouse our suspicions?

Having presented this argument, Lewis reminds the reader:

Do not think I am going faster than I really am. I am not yet with a hundred miles of the God of Christian theology. All I have got to is a Something which is directing the universe, and which appears in me as a law urging me to do right and making me feel responsible and uncomfortable when I do wrong.

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Mere Christianity 8

30 January 2012 2 Comments

It’s been a little while since that last post, but let’s get back to CS Lewis’s classic Mere Christianity. We pick up in book 1, chapter 4.

Lewis is now exploring what the existence of the Moral Law (“a real law, which none of us made, but which we find pressing on us”) tells us about what lies behind the Law itself.

First, we are directed to notice that there have always been two basic views of the universe: the materialist view and the religious view. (For an excellent comparison of these two views and their significance, see The Question of God: CS Lewis and Sigmund Freud Debate God, Love, Sex, and the Meaning of Life, by Dr. Armand Nicholi. The book is based on a graduate course he taught for 25 years at Harvard. It’s a moderately challenging and a very rewarding read.)

The materialist view says that nothing exists beyond the universe, that the universe (or some material antecedent) has always existed, and that while we know an amazing amount of information about when and how, we do not know why. In fact, we hope to know why, but “why” only in the sense of what caused what to occur, which led to the part that we know at present. But as for the “meaning and significance” sense of the term “why,” the materialist view has nothing to offer. Why the universe gave rise to persons with intelligence is another mystery.

The religious view (we might say, “spiritual view” today) contends that something does lie behind the universe after all, and that something is more like a mind with intelligence than anything else we know.

Here’s another fact. If there is an intelligence behind the universe, then science would not be able to verify or falsify either view because science works with the universe itself and therefore lacks the tools to examine anything that lies behind the universe. This is not an anti-science statement (though, yes, some Christians have unfortunately dubious views and relationships with science). Science has yielded an absolutely staggering amount of knowledge about the universe. But science has limits. It is limited to the universe itself.

So… “If there is ‘Something Behind,’ then either it will have to remain altogether unknown to [us] or else make itself known in some different way.”

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Mere Christianity 7

1 December 2011 Leave a Comment

We began book 1, chapter 3 in the previous post.

Assigning a moral value of good or bad to someone’s actions is what the word “ought” means. Lewis points out that the physical Law of Nature is about what the natural world does. Gravity is his prime example. If you let go of a rock in mid-air, the rock falls. The Law of Nature describes what happens.

But the Law of Human Nature (what Lewis has called The Moral Law), is about the word “ought” in a moral value sense.

But what if, Lewis asks, someone questions his use of an “ought” moral value and claims that what he is saying someone ought to do describes not a moral principle but a preference that relates to his own convenience: “we might try to make out that when you say a man ought not to act as he does, you only mean the same as when you say that a stone is the wrong shape; namely, that what he is doing happens to be inconvenient to you.”

So, is all this “ought to” really about behavior that isn’t morally bad, but is simply inconveniencing me? Lewis says no and gives four lines of argument to support his claim.

  1. Intentionality: “A man occupying the corner seat in the train because he got there first, and a man who slipped into it while my back was turned and removed my bag, are both equally inconvenient. But I blame the second man and do not blame the first.” In other words, there is an “ought to” attached to the second man’s actions that is not attached to the first man’s actions.
  2. Motive: “I am not angry…with a man who trips me up by accident; I am angry with a man who tries to trip me up even if he does not succeed. Yet the first has hurt me and the second has not.”
  3. Universal Standard: “In war, each side may find a traitor on the other side very useful. But though they use him and pay him they regard him” poorly. Their actions may be more convenient to us, but that alone does not determine how we assess their character.
  4. True Inconvenience: Obeying the Moral Law is itself the inconvenient thing much of the time–honesty instead of cheating/lying, honor and respect instead of gratification, bravery instead of safety, truthfulness “even when it makes you look a fool.”

So, the Moral Law, or the Law of Human Nature/Behavior, is not a matter of preferences that convenience us. Rather, it is a hard edge. Something that holds us to a standard even when it would seem more convenient to be free of its demands. And since it is not a statement of how we’d like others to behave for the sake of our own convenience, the Moral Law “must somehow or other be a real thing–a thing that is really there, not made up by ourselves.”

It begins to look as if we shall have to admit that there is more than one kind of reality; that, in this particular case, there is something above and beyond the ordinary facts of men’s behavior, and yet quite definitely real–a real law, which none of us made, but which we find pressing on us.

 

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Mere Christianity 6

29 November 2011 Leave a Comment

In this post, we’ll begin looking at chapter 3 in book 1 of Mere Christianity.

Having dealt with some potential objections in chapter 2, Lewis now gets back to advancing his argument for the existence of the Moral Law. To do that, he picks back up where he left off at the end of chapter 1: Humanity has a sense of a Moral Law, and humanity fails to follow it.

Here’s an interesting difference between the Moral Law, which we might call the Law of Human Nature, and the Laws of Nature that we find in the physical universe. The Law/s of Nature are not laws for nature to obey, but rather a description of how nature actually behaves: “what Nature, in fact, does.”

But contrast that with the Moral Law, or the Law of Human Nature. It does not refer to “what human beings, in fact, do” because many do not obey it and no one obeys it completely.

“The law of gravity tells you what stones do if you drop them; but the Law of Human Nature tells you what human beings ought to do and do not. In other words, when you are dealing with humans, something else comes in above and beyond the actual facts. You have the facts (how men do behave) and you also have something else (how they ought to behave). In the rest of the universe there need not be anything but the facts.”

 

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Mere Christianity 5

14 November 2011 Leave a Comment

I’d like to follow up on something in the last post, which was a summary of Lewis’ presentation in chapter two of book one in Mere Christianity.

In one of his answers to potential objections, he offers the following illustration to prove their is something in our minds in addition to our instincts toward certain kinds of actions.

He writes: “If two instincts are in conflict, and there is nothing in a creature’s mind except those two instincts, obviously the stronger of the two must win. But at those moments when we are most conscious of the Moral Law, it usually seems to be telling us to side with the weaker of the two impulses.”

A paragraph earlier, Lewis gave the example of hearing a cry for help. When we quickly survey the scene, it turns out that the man is drowning. Lewis says that we feel two instincts–one to help him and another for self-preservation. Those instincts are both good instincts. Whether they are right or wrong to follow depends on the situation. Something must judge which should win out in the particulars of that situation. Which ought to be elevated, strengthened, and acted upon? Which should be suppressed and denied?

Lewis continues: “But you will find inside you, in addition to these two impulses, a third thing which tells you that you ought to follow the impulse to help, and suppress the impulse to run away.”

Perhaps in that moment the stronger impulse is the one to help. Perhaps it is the one to run away. If we’re truthful, I think we would find that we have had both experiences ourselves.

We know the experience of having known the good we ought to have done. But we found that the impulse we ought to follow in that moment of decision was the weaker one. And it needed an extra voice advocating for it when we were tempted to ignore it and go with the other.

Lewis contends that the Moral Law is not an impulse because it is the judge between our impulses at times of situational application. It is the advocate for the impulse in that moment that represents the right, but finds itself weaker than the other impulse.

In Lewis’ example, when we act with sacrificial courage and give help, we feel good in the end that we “rose to the occasion” and acted with courage and conviction (does this common phrase not indicate the struggle of the weaker impulse to exercise itself?). But if we succumb to allowing the stronger of the two impulses, self-preservation in our example, we are filled with regret and feelings of guilt that we didn’t do what we should/could have. We’re even tempted to hide our inaction and keep it a secret because we feel shame.

There’s more that the Christian gospel has to say about this latter situation, but Lewis delays speaking to that and so will I. The point here is to underscore the reality and toughness of the Moral Law. It only mediates and tells you which impulse you should follow, and reminds you of it if you fail to do so. If we are to understand the Christian gospel fully, we must reckon with this aspect of the Moral Law.

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Mere Christianity 4

9 November 2011 Leave a Comment

In the first chapter, Lewis begins his argument for God from morality by establishing two summary points:

  • “First, that human beings, all over the earth, have this curious idea that they ought to behave in a certain way, and cannot really get rid of it.”
  • “Secondly, that they do not in fact behave that way.”
He adds that if we are to think clearly about our true state of affairs, these two facts are the bedrock.
In chapter two, Lewis is ready to deal with two potential objections and his responses to each before he is ready to advance his argument further. I’d like to offer in bullet-point form here what Lewis offers in paragraph form in the book. As usual, read Lewis for yourself on this–his explanation of it all is really rich. But I hope this is a helpful way of making this part easier to see the progression of his counter-arguments to the objections he raises on behalf of those who may disagree with him.

Objection 1: Isn’t the Moral Law just a “herd instinct” we’ve developed like all the others? By “herd instinct,” Lewis is referring to what comes to us through evolutionary biology as a species.

  • Answer 1: What is the thing that judges between our instincts when they come into conflict with one another? (ex: help instinct vs. self-preservation instinct)
  • Answer 2: If there are only instincts and a situation draws up a conflict between 2 instincts (opposing in their behaviors), logic says the stronger instinct will win. But there is something that works on behalf of the weaker (more morally demanding) instinct to make it stronger, in that moment, than it is.
  • Answer 3: We have no instinct within that may be labeled “always good.” Our impulses are neither good nor bad, strictly speaking. They may produce goodness or evil depending on the situation and their use. So something else must be deciding/judging their proper use and the proper timing of their use.

Objection 2: Isn’t the Moral Law just a social convention, instilled by education?

  • Answer 1: Learning something in our education hardly makes it a social convention (ex: mathematics, multiplication table). Some are conventions (like which side of the road to drive on); some are objective facts, “real truths.”
  • Answer 2: Lewis offers 2 reasons why the Moral Law belongs in the same category of “real truths” like mathematics.

First, Despite differences in the particulars, there is a common thread of moral teaching that is present in all cultures. Second, We believe that some moralities are better than others, which assumes an objective standard capable of judging between the two.

In the next chapter, Lewis will pick up where he left off at the end of chapter one and continue making his case, so we’ll meet him there in the next post.

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Mere Christianity 3

27 October 2011 Leave a Comment

Mere Christianity is divided into four books. The first one consists of five chapters and is a logical argument from morality for the existence of God. We’ll begin with chapter one today.

Remember two bits of background. First, that each chapter began as a short talk on BBC radio. Second, that Lewis himself made the journey to Christian faith from the position of being a committed atheist. He first convert to theism (belief in god), then a little later to Christianity, which was in his early 30s. These talks are given in the early to mid 1940s when Lewis is himself in his early 40s. So he has made this precise faith journey only ten years or so removed from contending for the faith in the radio talks that would become the classic book.

This is just to say that Lewis knows what it means not to believe from experience, and relatively recent experience at that, at the time of these talks. So he takes nothing for granted and assumes he must start at belief’s ground floor.

In chapter 1, Lewis is making two points to begin advancing his case, which he summarizes at the end of the chapter:

  1. “First, human beings, all over the earth, have this curious idea that they ought to behave in a certain way”
  2. “Secondly, that they do not in fact behave that way”

The first point claims that a standard for human behavior exists, what Lewis calls “the Moral Law.”

This is demonstrated when persons argue. We argue based on the premise that we are nearer to, or aligned with, the True Standard than the other person. We assume that someone or something is acting as the judge between the two of us as to what the right really is. We do not assume that “might makes right,” that is, if I can whip you physically or intellectually or emotionally, that I get to create the Standard (popularly stated, “the one with the gold makes the rules”).

And he buttresses that claim by pointing out that some persons claims to disagree that there is a universal Moral Law, disbelieving in a “real Right and Wrong.” But try lying to him, or treating him unfairly. You’ll soon see what he really believes about a real right and wrong.

The second point claims that the Moral Law, though universally acknowledged, is not universally followed.

The Moral Law may be just as universal as the Law of Gravity, but is a description of what we know we ought to do, not a description of what we do.

A stone doesn’t have to think about and then obey the Law of Gravity. The “Law” of Gravity simply describes what a stone does when you hold it in the air and let go. But the “Moral Law,” which Lewis also calls the “Law of Decent Behavior,” makes claims on our behavior that we choose to obey or not.

And we find that none of us obeys perfectly. Even looking only at my standards for myself, I don’t measure up.

Lewis states: “These two facts are the foundation of all clear thinking about ourselves and the universe we live in.”

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Why Read/Study Something Like Mere Christianity?

26 October 2011 Leave a Comment

Before we go further with Mere Christianity, I should offer an analogy about what engaging in this sort of reading is like within the Christian life.

I played basketball in school. During the season, we practiced offensive plays, defensive strategies, shooting, plays for throwing the ball in-bounds, etc. Those had an immediate application to the games we would play that week. Some curricula, books, bible studies or Christian lessons are like that—clearly applicable to the game of life, and relatively soon after learning the lesson. But both during the off-season and during the season, our coach had us lifting in the weight room to build muscle strength and stamina.

Work in the weight room did not have an immediate application to executing the game we were playing, but it had tremendous implications for our ability to play the game well.

In other words, some of our Christian formation is like practicing shooting the ball, and drawing up and practicing the execution of plays—getting clear on what, how, when, and why we do what we do in order to be faithful Christians. Other parts of our Christian formation resemble lifting in the weight room—building the strength and stamina to live the Christian life faithfully.

Knowing specific offensive plays does little good if we lack the mental strength and discernment to read defenses and make adjustments that will allow us to score in the face of difficult opposition. Knowing our own defensive strategies does little good if we lack the strength and stamina to hold up against our opponents’ offensive advance.

The point is this. We need practice on the court to teach us the what, how, when, why so that we can know and run the Christian plays. And we need workouts in the weight room to sharpen our minds and strengthen our hearts—our emotional maturity and our courage—so that we have the fortitude to run the Christian plays in the face of confusion and/or opposition (even from within ourselves!).

Christian formation includes both of these dimensions—practicing on the court and lifting in the weight room. Some of our curricula, books, etc focus primarily on moving clearly from lesson to application, that is, practicing on the court. Others tilt primarily in the direction of lifting in the weight room, that is, strengthening us in mind, heart, and soul, so that we can apply Christian teaching with intelligence, courage, and endurance.

While I think you will find a good deal of “take-away” application in Mere Christianity (and in the Bible, and in the Christian classics) than you might think at first, I also think it important to point out that this is more like building muscle in the weight room than it is like learning the plays at practice. Both are absolutely vital. Both play their part.

One last thing. I want to point out that in the illustration I’ve been using, the assumption is that Christianity is a team sport. That is the biblical view. I don’t say that to shame, but rather to invite you (and challenge you, if that’s the proper motivator for you) to do the Christian life the way God designed it to be done—as a team.

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Mere Christianity 2

25 October 2011 Leave a Comment

Continuing in the preface to Mere Christianity…

As I said last time, the preface establishes a few helpful details at the outset.

  1. The background
  2. He aims to contend only for “mere” Christianity
  3. How he will use the term “Christian,” especially in reference to Book Three, on Christian Morality

Use of the Term “Christian” 

After telling us that he is trying to take a similar “mere” sort of approach to morality or ethics, and that he does not write on areas that he has little experience with or pastoral authority (and therefore obligation)  to address, he discusses his use of the term “Christian.” He writes: “Far deeper objections may be felt—and have been expressed—against my use of the word Christian to mean one who accepts the common doctrines of Christianity. People ask: ‘Who are you, to lay down who is, and who is not a Christian?”

Lewis acknowledges that he understands the reason for the objection on the one hand. But on the other hand, he denies the usefulness of loosening up the definition of the word “Christian” to include people who act “in the spirit of Jesus” even if they don’t believe the Christian doctrines about him. But, Lewis objects, “We simply cannot, without disaster, use language as these objectors want us to use it.”

He explains the problem with the example of the term “gentleman.” Originally, the term “gentleman” meant something concrete and observable—a man with “a coat of arms and some landed property.” You were neither complimenting a man by calling him a gentlemen, nor were you insulting him by saying he was not. You were only describing him (coat of arms? landed property?). It was a description of fact. Once it was transitioned into the realm of designating a subjective value or quality, it became just one more word that showed one person’s approval for another.

Lewis points out that using the word “Christian” as a way of making judgments about who is living nearer in the spirit of Christ may smack of arrogance. And using it as a way to describe someone as “good,” robs the term of its particular meaning. We would do better to say someone is not a very good Christian, or quite a good Christian, rather than claim they are not a Christian at all.

Next up: Book One, “Right and Wrong as a Clue to the Meaning of the Universe” 

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Mere Christianity 1

24 October 2011 Leave a Comment

I’m finally getting to a project I’ve long talked about, namely blogging through CS Lewis’ classic book Mere Christianity. I plan to go more-or-less straight through, chapter by chapter. But I will also vary the pace and take an extra post here and there to expand on something in the book from time to time, so the numbers on the post titles will not correlate with the chapters themselves. So I’ll make note of where I am at the top of each post.

If you’re wanting to read along, now is a good time to pick up a copy wherever fine books are sold, either at a store or online. If you’ve never read Mere Christianity, I think you’re in for a treat.

For my part, I’m certainly no expert. I have read Mere Christianity many times and once had the immense blessing of teaching through it weekly—just about chapter by chapter—with a great small group of guys, which took us about eight months to do. But I’ve not reached the point of having read through, much less studied well the whole Lewis canon. Still, I think I can be helpful for those who’ve got a little less time with it than I, so I offer these posts for that purpose.

Preface

The preface establishes a few helpful details at the outset.

  1. The background
  2. He aims to contend only for “mere” Christianity
  3. How he will use the term “Christian,” especially in reference to Book Three, on Christian Morality
The Background

These are the collection of what where originally radio addresses on BBC radio. They had been previously collected into three books, and are here collected into one, with some editing to help the transition from spoken language to written language.

“Mere” Christianity 

Lewis aims not to weigh in on a doctrinal distinctive of a particular denomination, though he says of himself, “There is no mystery about my own position. I am a very ordinary layman of the Church of England, not especially ‘high,’ nor especially ‘low,’ nor especially anything else.”

He helpfully reminds us that not only is it true that the finer points of doctrine that separate one branch of Christianity from another are fewer and less weighty than those points of agreement that bind the whole faith together. In my own context, this is clearly seen around the beliefs and practices associated with baptism. Baptism is certainly an important thing, and our theology of baptism is far from insignificant. But it is also not so great a point as to overshadow the centrality of Jesus Christ as Divine Son of God, Savior of the world, and Lord of all creation, for example. That is far greater a thing to have in common, that particular theologies about and practices for baptism that differ, important as those may be.

And Lewis points out that conversations, even arguments, about doctrinal distinctives are conversations for the already converted: “I think we must admit that the discussion of these disputed points has no tendency at all to bring an outsider into the Christian fold.” Let’s stick to the stuff at the absolute center, the core.

Here’s the best definition of “mere Christianity”: “Ever since I became a Christian, I have though that the best, perhaps the only, service I could do for my unbelieving neighbors was to explain and defend the belief that has been common to nearly all Christians at all times” (emphasis mine).

I’ll get to the use of the term “Christian” in my next post.

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