Do you know that magic moment where an idea you’ve encountered in one spot converges with a similar concept you’ve just seen somewhere else? I feel like this happens to me constantly. Sometimes the experience is fantastic, especially when it opens up a whole plot point in a story. Other times it can be overwhelming as if a flood has crashed over me and has left me gasping and trying to pull together a raft from the bits carried with it.
This happened recently with three sources: The Everlasting Man, by G. K. Chesterton which I’m reading through very slowly with two friends, an overview of Hinduism for my world religions class that I teach for our homeschool coop, and The Silver Chair, by C. S. Lewis, that I’ve just reread for a Habit writing class.
I’ll start with Chesterton. In chapter 5, “Man and Mythologies,” Chesterton tackles the reason why cultures have myths and idols or various images. He digs into the idea that these myths and images are metaphors—they are concrete pictures of a concept or a reality that can’t be put into words. Humans will always worship something, and Chesterton points out that the act of worship is much more natural and real than any image that is worshipped. This is because the image is only a representation of a bigger reality that is unseen, whether beautiful or terrible.
Reading this reminded me of Hinduism. Every time I teach this religion my East Texan students raised in Christian homes, find these images ridiculous, if not horrible. Why is Vishnu always blue? Why does Shiva have multiple arms and Brahma have more than one head? Who would ever bow down to something like that? I admit it’s hard for me to wrap my mind around the idea, and that’s not even considering the reality I do hold to—that there are entities behind these images and they are not good or life-giving. But the Hindu who honors Shiva is not thinking, “This god has a lot of arms.” Rather, the arms represent the activities and strengths of Shiva. Vishnu is blue, the color of infinity. Brahma has four heads because he sees in four directions at once. There is no physical way to show these gods without using symbols.
So how do these concepts connect to The Silver Chair? In chapter 12, the evil queen of the Underland pairs music and scented smoke with words intended to confuse and blind Prince Rilian, Eustace, Jill, and Puddleglum the Marshwiggle. The four tell the Witch of the sun above her underground kingdom and she says they have seen a lamp and imagined something bigger. They speak of Aslan, the Great Lion. She asks, “What is a lion?” When Eustace tries to explain that a lion is a little like a cat, “like a huge cat—with a mane…and it’s yellow. And terrifically strong,” he is using a simile to represent something much bigger that he doesn’t have words for. The Witch tells them they are playing make-believe and taking all the things in the “real world,” her underground kingdom, and imagining bigger things. All seems lost for the four, until Puddleglum does the only thing that can be done. He walks to the fire of scented smoke and stomps it out. The spell breaks, the Witch is infuriated, and Puddleglum rouses them all with true words:
“Suppose this black pit of a kingdom is the only world. Well it strikes me as a pretty poor one. And that’s a funny thing, when you come to think of it. We’re just babies making up a game, if you’re right. But four babies playing a game can make a play-world which licks your real world hollow.”
The truth is, the image is only a picture of the Real. It’s not the other way around. The Witch tries to convince the four that the smaller things are the only real thing, not things created by someone beyond and above them. If the four accept her reality she will control them. In the same way, we often bow literally and figuratively to small things, forgetting that there are real things, bigger things, behind them. As a result, we deceive ourselves, either placing God, the one who is Truth, in a box, or putting ourselves in the power of evil things who are bent on our destruction. Both paths are dangerous. The only way a myth or image is acceptable is if we see it for the representation it is, and don’t confuse the creation for the Creator.
I’ve been stumbling around, working with these broken words to convey a thought that is bigger than any metaphor, hoping I don’t stumble into heresy. It struck me this morning that there has been one case where the image was the the being behind it, and that’s the incarnate Jesus Christ. He pulled it all together, flesh and spirit, and gave us the promise that in him, we have the hope of resurrection, when faith will become sight. It seems to me that this is what all people long for: to truly see what they believe in.
Check out Daughter of Arden at Bandersnatchbooks.com, along with other great titles.
You can find links to more of my writing at A Shaft of Sun Through the Rain and my old blog, Willing, Wanting, Waiting.
I love this. You’ve explained the meaning of Colossians 1:15 perfectly! ”He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.“