The Abdication of Queen Susan (Part 1)

 "My sister Susan," answered Peter shortly and gravely, "is no longer a friend of Narnia."

Perhaps one of the saddest parts of the Chronicles is the loss of Queen Susan from the Narnian afterlife. Much has been written (some not very complimentary to Lewis) concerning what caused Susan the Gentle to abandon her youthful beliefs, whether a reader could we have predicted from earlier actions or events that she would not hold out her fidelity to Narnian, and whether she can or will come eventually be redeemed. 

For our initial discussion let's see what can be derived from the text itself.  

The first statement regarding the transformation of Susan arises after King Tirian enters the stable and formally meets the seven "friends of Narnia" (the name comes from Tirian's vision earlier in the story when he sees the seven). After King Peter introduces him to the seven, Tirian realizes that one of the four ancient kings and queens, Susan, is missing. Tirian's question is answered by the above statement of Peter. While the present seven are friends are Narnia, Susan is no longer a friend. 

Lewis could have stopped there. After all, earlier Lewis told us that one of the dwarfs who shot the Talking Horses was allowed into the Narnian nirvana, but Lewis (in the mouth of Eustace) told us that it was not our business to know how the dwarf merited this ultimate reward. Lewis could have similarly kept quiet about Susan, but he does not end the discussion there. Instead, we have the following from King Edmund. 

"Yes," said Eustace, "and whenever you've tried to get her to come and talk about Narnia or do anything about Narnia, she says, `What wonderful memories you have! Fancy your still thinking about all those funny games we used to play when we were children.'"

In other words, Susan does not deny that as children they all spoke about Narnia. She rather believes that they were simply playing games. Now as a grownup she realizes that those games were not real. From Susan's grownup point of view, Narnia is no different than the pretend friends and lively stuffed animals that populate the childhood of so many. Those were fine for children, but what value do they have once someone has (colloquially) matured?  

But let's reflect on this for a moment. We should ask ourselves the following question. Does it matter? What if Narnia was not real, if the whole of the Chronicles that were in the minds of the seven friends never actually took place. Should that matter? Does is matter that Hobbes is just a toy tiger in the eyes of Calvin's parents and teacher? Does is matter that Snuffleupagus could only be seen by Big Bird? 

On the one hand the answer is, of course! Truth matters! It matters that the Exodus happened, it matters that God revealed the Torah on Mount Sinai, so much of our religious life is based on these events how can one suggest that things of this sort don't matter? Well, that makes sense, but we've already seen Lewis express the opposite perspective when Puddleglum insisted he would live like a Narnian even without Narnia. 

And, in some ways, we're all like Puddleglum. If you're reading this, you probably value at least some aspect of Narnia. Maybe the Narnian Chronicles have taught you bravery, faith, and loyalty. Or maybe you were inspired to live your life closer to God. But Narnia is NOT real! There's nothing wrong with that. We can learn valuable lessons of morality and ethics from made up stories. We can think Narnia is important despite the fact that it was just the figment of the imagination of someone who lived decades ago in a country across an ocean (at least for me in the United States). We think Narnia is important even though it's not real. But not Susan... 

To Susan, Narnia should have been real. However, Susan's fault may be not that she stopped believing in the actuality of Narnia, but that she stopped believing the importance of Narnia. 

We will have to follow up on this in our next. 

A Hebraic Inkling: Chapter 1

In Chapter 1 of "A Hebraic Inkling" Brazier reviews Lewis' spiritual biography until the time of his conversion. Lewis biography is well known and I will not repeat it here. However, unlike other biographies of Lewis (of which there are many), Brazier tells Lewis' story in the context of the antisemitism Brazier asserts is inherent to the British Empire. Having conquered the world, the British had, in their mind, become the Chosen People, and thus Jews and Judaism had no place in Britain. Lewis himself, when a self-described atheist, was especially dismissive of the Jews calling them "class A primitives," and wondering aloud why one would waste their time reading the Hebrew Bible. 

However, God had other plans for Lewis. From the time he was a child Lewis had experienced sehnsucht, stabs of longing and beauty, what Lewis himself would later call Joy. Brazier states that these are times when the Holy Spirit (the divine presence) touch Lewis, though Lewis himself did not understand their cause. At the point Lewis came to understand, thanks to reading George MacDonald's Phantastes, that these experiences were not an end to themselves, but a mean reach their source, he found God. Lewis thus becomes a theist. 

This is not yet a full conversion to Brazier's Judeo-Christian God, that would wait until after his famed conversation with J.R.R. Tolkien and Hugo Dyson. However, later in life, Lewis would be thankful he was "permitted for several months, perhaps a year, to know God and to attempt obedience without even raising that question [that of future life]. My training was like that of the Jews to whom He revealed Himself centuries before there was a whisper of anything better (or worse) beyond the grave than shadowy and featureless Sheol" (Surprised by Joy page 179). 

Traditional Jews may disagree as to when the concept of life after death entered Judaism, but what is important for us at the moment is that Lewis accepted theism before Christianity and claimed (at least in one respect) that his conversion process followed that of God's revelation to the Jews, His chosen people. 

Brazier will further expand on this theme in the next chapter.