In our last post we noted the lack of practical clarity attached to two of the three commands Aslan gives in his inaugural speech to the Narnians. While cherishing the Dumb Beasts and treating them kindly are surely fine moral imperatives, we were not able to identify practical ramifications of those laws in the Chronicles of Narnia.
The third command of Aslan, however, provides us with a bit more evidence as to its practical ramifications especially as it comes with a punishment, “Do not go back to their [the Dumb Beast’s] ways lest you cease to be Talking Beasts.” What is included in the ways of the Dumb Beasts? Well, we’re never really told, but if a Talking Beast suffers the prescribed punishment, we can perhaps assume that said Beast violated Aslan’s command.
However, before we look at which Talking Beasts did cease to be Talking Beasts, there is one Talking Beast who is explicitly highly concerned with returning to the ways of the Dumb Beasts.
That character is Bree, and Lewis doesn’t seem to very much value his concern.
The Horse and His Boy tells the story of Bree and Shasta and their great escape from Calormen to Narnia. Bree is a Talking Horse who was kidnapped from Narnia as a young foal and has spent years posing as a Dumb War Horse of a great Tarkaan (Calormen Lord). Shasta is a young boy who knows nothing of Narnia and is simply trying to escape from being sold as a slave by his adopted father.
During their long journey Bree’s method of relaxation is to roll on the ground. Shasta finds this habit quite and amusing and laughs at how funny Bree looks on his back, Bree immediately becomes self-conscious:
“You don't think, do you," said Bree, "that it might be a thing talking horses never do - a silly, clownish trick I've learned from the dumb ones? It would be dreadful to find, when I get back to Narnia, that I've picked up a lot of low, bad habits…”
Shasta, of course, doesn’t think that Bree should bother with such thoughts, and their soon to be found compatriots, Hwin, another Talking Horse, and Aravis, a young Tarkheena, both think Bree is being vain. Nonetheless, Bree becomes more and more anxious the closer they get to Narnia.
Is Bree really just being vain? The response of the other characters suggests that Lewis wants us to think so. Yet maybe Bree is onto something? Aslan explicitly commanded that Talking Beasts should not return to the ways of the Dumb Beasts and who’s to say that, for horses, rolling is not one of those forbidden ways? Or, if not an explicitly forbidden return to the ways of the Dumb Beasts, perhaps its a part of a downward slope that will eventually lead him to returning to their ways?
No doubt Lewis would turn to principle over practice. Who cares about horses rolling? These surface level similarities in action are irrelevant. We would not prohibit eating because Dumb Beasts eat! And, likely, such an argument is, in this case, correct. Especially as Bree’s stated concern is more picking up bad habits that other Talking Horses would find offensive, rather than worrying about the command of Aslan and becoming a Dumb Beast. So, it seems reasonable that allowing Talking Horses to roll is unlikely to transform them into evil or mindless creatures. But where is the line drawn, or is there a line at all?
What determines whether a given action is following the ways of the Dumb Beasts?
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