The Jealousy of Venus: Renewal (Part 2)

He cannot ravish; He can only woo

(The Screwtape Letters, 8)

By God's own rules He cannot reveal His true self to His humanity. Doing so would immediately thwart their free will forcing them to be robots and automatons, not the sons He wants us to become. Hence, Venus, goddess of love and beauty, and stand-in for God in Till We Have Faces, cannot ramp up her own beauty to outshine Psyche. She must woo Glome into loving her.

Accomplishing this task is the punishment of Psyche as well as Orual. But for Glome to truly recognize Ungit/Venus more beautifully than in their pagan ways, more than Venus has to change. Glome has to change as well. That change we've discussed earlier. Glome's governance, economy, and mode of worship are enlightened by Orual so that Glome can now accept a God more beautiful than that of the pagans. 

But that final step, ushering God into an enlightened world, needs to be done by someone who loves God. Someone who does not love God would simply enjoy the economic prosperity and order and reject that its purpose is to comprehend God more fully, not less. This is Psyche's final test. Bringing beauty from the underworld. However, the question remains why beauty from the underworld would make Venus more beautiful in the eyes of the people?

Persephone, the daughter of Zeus and Demeter (the goddess of agriculture), was kidnapped by Hades and made queen of the underworld. In her distress over her daughter, Demeter causes a draught until Zeus is forced to allow Persephone to return home. However, because Persephone ate of the good of the underworld she must return there every year. When she does, during the winter, Demeter neglects to cultivate the earth until Spring when Persephone, the goddess of Spring, once again emerges from the underworld.   

In Till We Have Faces, Psyche becomes Persephone, as Orual hears the details from the old priest:

But, Stranger, the sacred story is about the sacred things — the things we do in the temple. In spring, and all summer, she is a goddess. Then when harvest comes, we bring a lamp into the temple in the night and the god flies away. Then we veil her. And all winter she is wandering and suffering; weeping, always weeping...

All winter Psyche suffers from having been abandoned by husband, but she emerges every Spring as the goddess of renewal.  

With this we can understand why Psyche must retrieve beauty from the queen of the underworld. It is there where Persephone is found and it is she that enables the renewal of people. Of course, Venus does not need renewal, but she needs the people to experience renewal, the reconnection with and rededication to the gods that is possible and present. 

Psyche, as an ardent follower of the gods herself becomes the tool the renewal for Glome to return to Venus. 

With this we have seen two levels of the story. The Greek story of Psyche in which the jealousy of Venus is paramount, and Lewis' story of Psyche in which the people must renew their love for Venus. In our next post we must address the true story, the love between God and Israel as told in Song of Songs.