During the 1930s and 1940s, the Inklings met in the rooms of C.S. Lewis each Thursday to read aloud, discuss, and critique each other’s work. The giants of this literary group were C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien. While others emerged as skilled writers and poets like Owen Barfield and Charles Williams, the heartbeat of the group was Lewis and Tolkien. We call it a literary group now, but in practice it was a group of friends that delighted in the crafts of arguing, debating, eating, drinking, laughing, reading, and writing. This group of friends just happened to include some of the most brilliant Christian minds at Oxford at the time. We are here to get to know Jack better, but you can and should read the Professor, J.R.R. Tolkien too.
Thursdays featured greater depths of topic and so we will venture more into the depths of Lewis with this post. Tuesdays at the Bird and Baby for lunch were more lighthearted and posts on Tuesdays will aim to do the same. For now, let’s discuss Lewis just for a moment.
Clive Staples Lewis, C.S. to the public and Jack to his friends, is welcomed and enjoyed by many differing Christian denominations and traditions. To be seen and enjoyed by so many from different Christian traditions is quite a difficult task. How did this brilliant Oxford don find his influence across different traditions, languages, and countries with the everyday man? Yes, his academic work reveals a brilliant mind, An Allegory of Love, A Preface to Paradise Lost, Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Literature. However, it is his popular works (non-academic in nature) that do the heavy lifting in his popularity. That ability to connect with the common person stems from his desire to be a common person.
His desire to be a common man is a key component of his “mere Christianity.” A faithful Anglican, Lewis transcends traditions purposefully. Perhaps nowhere does he do this more plainly than in the preface to Mere Christianity as he describes the Christian faith as a house with many rooms. The hall is in the house but it is not a place to stay, the rooms (traditions) are where one goes upon reflection and conviction.
Lewis—due to multiple reasons—moved on from any explicitly apologetic works after Miracles (no the debate with Elizabeth Anscombe didn’t play as major of a role as some have suggested — we’ll talk about that soon). Narnia’s popularity cemented that decision. No more broadcast talks would be produced. Lewis would not focus on apologetics as he did during the war years, but his legacy loomed large still throughout his life. Mere Christianity did not fade into the past. Its popularity grew. Sales are still strong for it today (I just gave a copy to a friend a few weeks ago). Why does it continue to influence and reach if it’s such a meek book as “merely Christianity?”
Lewis does not use “mere” as a modern audience might understand as meager or the minimal scraps of the Christian faith. He draws on the expression as employed by the Puritan writer, Richard Baxter (there are circles of debate as to whether he truly meant what Baxter meant). However, I think that charity can and should be given that what Lewis seeks to describe is standard Christianity. Christianity that is nothing short or less than that which is ascribed in his broadcast talks. That bold standard of Christianity. What is merely nothing less than the Nicene Creed. Is there more? Sure. The Councils of Ephesus I (431) and Chalcedon I (451) are crucial to the doctrine of the Trinity. Clarity is a beautiful thing, for God is indeed not an author of confusion. The church wrestled further throughout history on many issues after the Nicene Creed, but here we find the essential standard of a proper guard rail for the Scriptures.
I respectfully move that it is fair to state that Lewis and his “mere Christianity” is Nicene Christianity. It is orthodox and held by all major divisions of the church (Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Protestant). That does not mean however, that the book is without error or disagreement. Lewis sought to remove a single tradition as the focus/voice of the book. His attempts for this went as far as sending the broadcast manuscripts to several different pastors of various traditions to avoid any favoritism. While he does succeed in this area in many ways, this does leave his book lacking in places. Let’s come back to Mere Christianity more fully later and leave this as a short introduction.
So what is merely Lewis? He is nothing short of being hard to define. Many groups enjoy him, but he remains elusive to label to this day. As his dear friend Tolkien remarked to one of Lewis’s students, George Sayers, “you’ll never get to the bottom of him.” Indeed we shall not get to the bottom of him.