Martin Henry
WALT DISNEY has taken C.S. Lewis' children's novel The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and converted it into a blockbuster movie. Lewis, the classical scholar and atheist-turned Christian had a far more serious purpose in writing for children the seven-book Chronicles of Narnia between 1950 and 1956. "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" was the first.
Clive Staples Lewis lost the Christian faith of his childhood and became a confirmed atheist. He was converted to Christianity at age 31 while a young Oxford don. In his autobiographical book, Surprised by Joy, he records, "in the Trinity term of 1929 I gave in, and admitted that God was God, and knelt and prayed: perhaps, that night, the most dejected and reluctant convert in all England."
As Lewis, a substantial philosopher, reasoned about Jesus and His claim to deity, he came to the conclusion that he wrote down later in Mere Christianity: "A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher ... Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else he was a mad man or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon; or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that option open to us. He did not intend to."
C.S. Lewis became one of the most powerful Christian apologists of the 20th century. He published book after book and did a series of BBC radio broadcasts during the Second World War presenting and defending 'mere Christianity', while being a professor of Literature at Oxford and later Cambridge.
THE GREAT CONTROVERSY
The Chronicles of Narnia explores the Great Controversy, the battle between Good and Evil, for children in fictional form. Lewis was steeped in classical mythology, of which in his youth he regarded Christianity as just another variety. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is filled with mythical characters like fauns, centaurs and unicorns alongside talking animals. Many Christians would not be particularly happy with this syncretism.
The Pevensie children - Lucy, Edmund, Susan and Peter - sent out of war time London to stay with an old eccentric professor in the country for safety from German bombing, stumble upon Narnia through a magical wardrobe they discover in the professor's rambling old house.
Narnia is in perpetual winter under the despotic rule of the white witch who has usurped the rightful rule of Aslan, the Lion King. The Children, sons of Adam, daughters of Eve, whose coming had been prophesied, help Aslan and his forces defeat the witch with the aid of magical gifts from Father Christmas.
Spring, then summer replace the long winter of the witch's rule. But in the struggle, the humans have to overcome their doubts and fears and squabbles. Edmund, who for the promises of more Turkish delight [appetite] and to have his troublesome siblings serve him [power] collaborated with the Witch Queen, has to be redeemed by the sacrifice of Aslan who voluntarily takes Edmund's place as the witch's victim. There is a glorious resurrection of the slain Aslan, the Innocent. Narnia is saved, but not without a fierce battle between the forces of Good and Evil. The children are made queens and kings.
The Chronicles have already sold more than 100 million copies in multiple languages. The Disney movie of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, is running to rave reviews and massive box office returns over the Christmas season. The acting is superb, the animation great, sound and colour excellent. Fantastic movie-making. Great entertainment for young and old alike. But more. C.S. Lewis would not have wanted his life and death story line of the Great Controversy between Good and Evil, in which every child of Adam and Eve is involved like the Pevensie children, to be lost as merely cool entertainment.
Martin Henry is a communication specialist.
