Narnia

[Johnv]

Originally posted by paidagogos:
I have not condemned reading myth or fantasy. I’ve read a fair share myself.

I'm in agreement with you here, and actually, I'm gleefully glad to see you posted this.

It is one thing to read myth as literature and quite another to read it for theological content.

I concur when the literature is held up as a replacement for, substitute for, or the same level as scripture. But aside from that, just about every story written, be it in the genre discussed, or any other genre, is going to, to some extent, have moral content, often parallelling biblical themes. Does that make them automatically inappropriate for the Christian? I deem no. But, if someone believes this is a stumbling block to them, they are welcome to refrain.

IMHO, it’s a pride thing. Some Christians are so struck on being intellectual, literate, sophisticated, suave, cool, and worldly (i.e. worldly wise and accepted) that they trip all over themselves falling for any foolishness.

Again, I would concur only when a story is upheld to the level of, or as a replacement for, scripture. Where I take issue is when people presume that every Christian who doesn't eschew the Chronicles of Narnia is doing so. I myself have certainly been accused of doing so, when in fact, I don't remotely do so.

 

[Boanerges]

What was some of the favorite reading of the Harry Potter author J.K. ROWLING?

11.What were the most memorable books you read as a child?
My favorite book when I was younger was "The Little White Horse" by Elizabeth Goudge. My mother gave me a copy when I was 8; it had been one of her childhood favorites. I also loved "Manxmouse" by Paul Gallico and, of course, C.S. Lewis' Narnia books.

http://www.salon.com/mwt/feature/1999/03/cov_31featureb.html

I guess she missed the allegory....

 

[Frogman]

Originally posted by bapmom:
I thought CS Lewis was one of those who at first was an avowed atheist and actually tried to disprove the Bible. So to find something he wrote that fit that profile wouldnt be all that surprising.

Or am I thinking of someone else? But I thought I remembered reading that he became a professing Christian later in life, and after he had been an author for awhile.

Try B.H. Carroll, who as a teen was 'convinced' by well meaning church goers, that if he believed what was taught in his sunday school classroom and answered the following questions, then he is/was saved:

Do you believe the Bible is the word of God?

Carroll: Yes, the sunday school class says it is.

Do you believe Jesus died for all sins?

Carroll: Yes, the sunday school class says he did.

Do you believe Jesus died for your sins?

Carroll: yes, the sunday school class says he did.

He was taken to the front of the church against his wishes and contrary to his protests.

His questioners told 'his experience' and the church received him. He knew there was no power, no Spirit, and tried in vain to tell them.

Even unable to convince his dad, a Baptist preacher, of the truth.

He fell away and spent the next seven years reading worldly philosophies and trying to disprove the Bible. At the age of 22 God visited him and gave to him the effectual call.

What if he had died under such false leadership and faith?

Bro. Dallas

 

[rsr]

Originally posted by eloidalmanutha:
There is an old song that goes - garbage in, garbage out - which refers to one's spirituality.[

I suppose it may be a song somewhere, but it's really computer lingo. If you put bad data into a calculation, don't expect to get good numbers at the other end. Given the proof-texting of Lewis' works here, I cannot doubt that a good deal of garbage has gone into the equation.

I believe that Jesus was right when He said that a corrupt/evil tree can only bring forth corrupt/evil fruit - and as someone once said - God is not in the fruit mixing business.

Whoever that someone is was obviously creating a nonbiblical allegory.

If you continue to entertain yourself with mythology, fables, allegory, witchcraft, magic, etc and see these kinds of things as "just for fun" or to find some kind of Godly allegory/imagery you are playing with fire. God is a jealous God. He does not want us sharing our minds and thoughts with things that are an abomination to Him because it rapes our spirits, our minds, and our souls and contaminates His Godliness within each believer.

How true. And shame on Paul for quoting a Stoic poet to the men of Athens. What was he thinking?

And maybe you should have a word with God about the whole bronze serpent incident. Why did God set up a serpent, of all things, the prime reference to which previously was as the tempter of mankind?

And why did Israel keep this serpent — in direct opposition to a literal reading of the Second Commandment — until the time of David, at which time it was no longer a symbol of God's grace but a false god? There's a lesson there; symbols are not harmful, perhaps, until they are perverted into the Real Thing? Nah, couldn't be.

A word to the "wise". God said that when you play with, take part in, enjoy what He considers evil, you will have no part in the Kingdom of God. His Words, not mine. Gal 5.

And you have yet to prove the existence of this evil.

 

[Frogman]

Dear rsr,
Excellent post.

Bro. Dallas

 

[Boanerges]

quote:

All that is needed for evil to triumph is that good men do nothing.

additonal thoughts:

......or send people to see it, or defend it, or actively promote it, or give it money, or herald it, or make excuses for it, or.....

 

[Boanerges]

I wonder if Lewis is spinning in his grave?


The Kilns,
Headington Quarry,
Oxford
18 Dec. 1959

Dear Sieveking

(Why do you "Dr" me? Had we not dropped the honorifics?) As things worked out, I wasn’t free to hear a single instalment of our serial [The Magician’s Nephew] except the first. What I did hear, I approved. I shd. be glad for the series to be given abroad. But I am absolutely opposed – adamant isn’t in it! – to a TV version. Anthropomorphic animals, when taken out of narrative into actual visibility, always turn into buffoonery or nightmare. At least, with photography. Cartoons (if only Disney did not combine so much vulgarity with his genius!) wld. be another matter. A human, pantomime, Aslan wld. be to me blasphemy.

All the best,
yours
C. S. Lewis

http://nthposition.com/blasphemyinnarnia.php

 

[Boanerges]

Author CS Lewis opposed screen version of "Narnia"

Tue Nov 29, 4:31 AM ET

LONDON (Reuters) - C.S. Lewis, author of the classic children's "Narnia" books which are about to make their big screen debut, was "absolutely opposed" to a live action version of his stories, a newly published letter shows.


Walt Disney's "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe" is expected to be a big box office hit this Christmas season, thanks to its blend of magical fantasy themes and a strong Christian slant.

But a letter from Lewis, posted on the literary Web site Nthposition.com, revealed that he had strong feelings about how his book should be used.

"I am absolutely opposed -- adamant isn't in it! -- to a TV version," he wrote to BBC producer Lance Sieveking, who had created a radio version of his book which had met Lewis' approval.

The story tells of four children who travel through a magic wardrobe into the land of Narnia, home to talking animals, a wicked witch and the god-like lion, Aslan.

Disney hopes that the movie, which has its world premiere in London on December 7, will be as big a hit with children as the "
Harry Potter" series, thanks in part to the support of Christian church leaders.

Although Lewis, who died in 1963, said he would have considered a cartoon version, his letter suggests he is unlikely to have approved of Disney's interpretation, particularly its computer-generated Aslan.

"Anthropomorphic animals, when taken out of narrative into actual visibility, always turn into buffoonery or nightmare -- at least with photography," he wrote.

"Cartoons (if only Disney did not combine so much vulgarity with his genius!) would be another matter. A human, pantomime, Aslan would be, to me, blasphemy."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051129/film_nm/arts_narnia_dc

 

[rsr]

To many of those who read Lewis, his great charm is that he does not pretend to Know It All or Understand It All.

Now you are asking us to reject the movie on the basis that this man, who has been widely castigated here, didn't want a movie made?

Besides, "Anthropomorphic animals, when taken out of narrative into actual visibility, always turn into buffoonery or nightmare — at least with photography," doesn't apply. The type of live-action animation available today doesn't compare with what Lewis had any knowledge of.

Aslan is a real lion, not a cartoon lion, and certainly (as C.S. Lewis said) not a tame lion.

 

[Boanerges]

Merchant preachers on the march:

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/10139395/from/RL.3/

 

[Boanerges]

quote:

At the hair-raising moment when the White Witch puts Aslan on the Stone Table for his execution, Lewis lists "creatures whom I won't describe because if I did the grown-ups would probably not let you read this book -- Cruels and Hags and Incubuses, Wraiths, Horrors, Efreets,


http://www.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/movies/bal-ae.adamson04dec04,1,4607334.
story?coll=bal-artslife-movies&ctrack=1&cset=true

Isn't an Incubus a demon that rapes people in their sleep? Sounds like healthy Christian childrens reading to me. Lets get an official definition:

SYLLABICATION: in·cu·bus
PRONUNCIATION: nky-bs, ng-
NOUN: Inflected forms: pl. in·cu·bus·es or in·cu·bi (-b)

1. An evil spirit supposed to descend upon and have sexual intercourse with women as they sleep. 2. A nightmare. 3. An oppressive or nightmarish burden.
ETYMOLOGY: Middle English, from Late Latin, alteration of Latin incub, from incubre, to lie down on. See incubate.


The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Copyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by the Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

 

[Boanerges]

Yep... great “Christian” entertainment for the whole family...


from the same article above about the Narnia movie:

The triumph of Adamson's Narnia is that it vividly depicts all those creatures -- and Lewis' "Ogres with monstrous teeth, and wolves, and bull-headed men" -- without allowing them to swamp his themes of forgiveness and sacrifice.


Bull headed men....hmmmm. sounds like the mythical minotaur. From another website. (warning!!! if you click on the link, there is subject matter that may be offensive):


We recall, too, a goodly number of other instances of bestial intercourse related by the historians and mythologists: Among them,
the mating of Aristo Ephesius with a she-ass, Semiramis, legendary foundress of Babylon, with a stallion, and Fulvius with a mare. From the union of Pasiphae and the bull was born the Minotaur, and the mythologists credited other bestial unions with bringing them into the
world. Satyrs, centaur's, and other strange and monstrous creatures. {5} Robert Burton (*Anatomy of Melancholy*) adds to the list Sphynxes, saying that "not only men go with goats, swine and horse's, but women are inflamed with mad passions for beasts, whence Minotaurs, centaur's, Silvanuses, Sphynxes, etc. . . ." (Of both mythological bestiality and the resulting monstrous issues I will have considerably more to say in another place.)


After consideration, I think that I will not post the link. It must have taken a whole lot of "Turkish delight" to come up with this stuff. I wonder what the Christian community is smoking that is promoting this.

Let's go to the dictionary once again:

The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition. 2002.

Minotaur


(MIN-uh-tawr) In classical mythology, a monster, half man and half bull. The Minotaur was born to the queen of Crete, Pasiphaë, after she mated with a sacred bull. The king Minos, to hide his shame, had Daedalus construct the Labyrinth in which to hide the monster. Minos then forced the Athenians to send as tribute fourteen of their young people, seven men and seven women, to be locked in the Labyrinth for the Minotaur to eat. To stop the slaughter, the hero Theseus volunteered to enter the Labyrinth and fight the Minotaur. On the instructions of the king’s daughter, Theseus brought in a ball of thread, which he unwound as he went through. He found the Minotaur, killed it, and then used the thread to find his way out of the maze. 1


The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition. Edited by E.D. Hirsch, Jr., Joseph F. Kett, and James Trefil. Copyright © 2002 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

 

[rsr]

Do you have any arguments that don't deal with guilt by association or reference?

I guess unicorns would be OK ...

 

[Boanerges]

Originally posted by rsr:
Do you have any arguments that don't deal with guilt by association or reference?

I guess unicorns would be OK ...

And what's with the faunus thing?

quote from the article link about the movie:

Mr. Tumnus (Jerome McAvoy) may still be a magical faun in a red muffler who meets Lucy by the lamppost in the Narnia snow and takes her home for tea."


The mystics and the satanists know who faunus is aka Pan. Maybe Baptists should spend more time reading their sites, since the pastors are obviously uninformed in this area:

quote:
Pan is the phallic god of animal nature, known to the Romans as Faunus and the Vedas as Pusan. He is half man and half goat, or what we may call a satyr."

http://www.arcadiaesoterica.it/131.html

 

[natters]

Ya, those troublesome satyrs. Even infiltrated the KJV, if I remember correctly.

 

[Boanerges]

A little more on the subject:

See The Mother Goddess and the Horned God, in Craig Hawkins' "The Modern World of Witchcraft."

The Goddess's consort, the male Horned God, is associated with the sun. According to most witches, he dies and is reborn every year. He too is called and invoked by many names, including Adonis, Ammon-Ra, Apollo, Baphomet, Cernunnos, Dionysius, Eros, Faunus, Hades, Horus, Nuit, Lucifer, Odin, Osiris, Pan, Thor, and Woden.

Different witchcraft traditions and solitary practitioners diverge in the importance they attach to the Mother Goddess and the Horned God. Some emphasize the Goddess, some the Horned God, while many seek a balance between the two.
Craig Hawkins, The Modern World of Witchcraft, part 1, glossary. Christian Research Journal, Winter/Spring 1990

 

[Boanerges]

After the minor amount of research I have done on this book/movie, in my opinion, it is worse than the Passion movie (filled with mysticism also)because it is targeting kids.

 

[Boanerges]

Originally posted by natters:
Ya, those troublesome satyrs. Even infiltrated the KJV, if I remember correctly.

I wouldn't know about that. All I know, is what I have seen with my own eyes.Your gripe isn't with me. It is with the historical facts about mythical creatures in the movie.

 

[natters]

Originally posted by Boanerges:
Your gripe isn't with me. It is with the historical facts about mythical creatures in the movie.

I have a gripe? Is that like a gremlin?

 

[rsr]

Don't let it get your goat, natters.