I believe I discovered Narnia in Grade 6, and my friends and I made short work of all seven books in C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia. At lunch time we played winged horses (like Fledge in The Magician's Nephew) combining the stereotypical 12-year-old girl's love of horses with our love for the magic of Narnia. I also recall doing a report on lions, and begging for and receiving a plush toy lion family (which I still have). I was smitten with Aslan and I wanted Narnia to be real.
I never went to church as a child so I was oblivious to the Christian element to the stories. Had I encountered the books later I might have been offended by phrases such as "son of Adam" and "daughter of Eve," but at the time I hadn't yet learned to roll my eyes at the slightest hint of Christian dogma. I now wonder if reading and re-reading these books throughout my adolescence played any part in my later accepting Christianity so whole-heartedly.
My very worn boxed set of the Chronicles of Narnia has been resting on my bookshelves for a few years now, but I am proposing to reread the books, for the first time as a Christian. This has come up because in the last two days I have stumbled across three entirely separate references to Narnia, and I'm not one to dismiss these sorts of "coincidences" without some investigation.
First, in my continuing studies of Girardian theory, I read S. Mark Heim's article, "Visible victim: Christ's death to end sacrifice," which explains the revelation of the cross in terms of René Girard's theory of sacred violence. In it he says:
C. S. Lewis, who knew the mythical heritage of the world better than most, saw this aspect of the crucifixion clearly. In his Christian allegory the Chronicles of Narnia, the lion Asian, the Christ figure, allows himself to be killed so that the evil powers will release those they hold hostage. The idea of this exchange is proposed by the evil powers. The sacrificial process is known to all from the earliest times; it is the law that an innocent one may die on behalf of others and so free them. It is called "deep magic from the dawn of time."
The evil powers love this arrangement and, incidentally, have no intention of keeping their side of the bargain after Aslan is dead. The resurrection comes into this story as an unexpected development, from what Aslan calls "deeper magic from before the dawn of time," something about which the evil powers knew nothing. And when Aslan rises, the ancient stone altar on which the sacrifice was offered cracks and crumbles in pieces, never to be used again. The gospel, then, is not ultimately about the exchange of victims, but about ending the bloodshed.
Well, I am intrigued to say the least. But as if I needed more encouragement to revisit Narnia (which I probably did) I stumbled across the Book-A-Minute summaries of the Chronicles, including this somewhat harsh take on The Last Battle:
(EUSTACE and JILL go back to Narnia. INCOMPREHENSIBLE stuff happens, and they learn how MUSLIMS inadvertently worship SATAN. Then everybody DIES.) THE END
Well, the cynicism of the summary aside, I hadn't seen the pretty obvious connection between the scimitar-waving, turban-sporting Calormenes and real live Muslims. I thought the Calormenes' appearance was simply an expression of racial prejudice (like the many criminals-of-colour that populate cop shows) and took them to be nothing more than generic mythical bad guys. But was Lewis really making a statement about Islam? I want to find out.
