"In the Trinity Term of 1929 I gave in, and admitted that God was God, and knelt and prayed: perhaps, that night, the most dejected and reluctant convert in all England." So writes C. S. Lewis, who later became one of the twentieth-century's leading Christian apologists. An author of brilliance, clarity, humor, and charm, Lewis wrote successfully for scholars, theologians, the man in the street, and perhaps, most surprisingly, for children. None of his works is more beloved by them than The Chronicles of Narnia. This seven-book series begins with The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, a symbolic re-telling of the Christ story. The much-anticipated movie, which bears the same name as this first book, will open in theaters in the United States on
December 9.

Lewis's admirers are hoping the film will accurately reflect his Christian sensibility and not fall prey to the "dumbing down" and emptying out that often accompany the secularization of spiritual classics. The fact that Douglas Gresham, Lewis's stepson, is deeply involved in the movie's production gives cause to hope that the film will be true to the spirit of its remarkable creator.

Clive Staples Lewis, who as a child re-named himself "Jacksie"–later "Jack"—was one of the best-known and most influential writers of the previous century. Translated into at least thirty languages, his works have sold more than two hundred million copies worldwide—with the Narnia stories accounting for half that number. Nearly all of Lewis's thirty-eight books are still in print, and for decades they have sold more than a million copies a year around the globe.

Born in 1898 in Belfast to a middle-class, Protestant (Church of Ireland) family, he fought briefly in World War I, graduated with a brilliant record from Oxford, and then taught English Literature there for nearly thirty years.

A man of great erudition, sterling prose, terrific humor, and heroic kindness, this intellectual giant was not only an expert in Medieval and Renaissance Literature, but also, as his great friend, J. R. R. Tolkien, put it, "a scholar, a poet, a philosopher" and "after a long pilgrimage," a "lover…of Our Lord."

Lewis's evolution into a one-man army in defense of orthodoxy—was neither quick nor easy. Although raised as a Christian, Lewis had, by his teens, become a "convinced atheist," considering Christianity on the same level as Norse mythology—and preferring the latter.

Through reading G. K. Chesterton and discussions with believers, Lewis became a Theist in his late twenties, but it took an amazing late-night conversation with J. R. R. Tolkien, to convince Lewis of the divinity of Christ. This was all the more remarkable because Lewis had been raised "never to trust a Papist" or a philologist—and Tolkien was both. On September 19, 1931, Lewis finally accepted Christ when Tolkien convinced him that Christianity was not —as he had thought—only a myth, but a story that had actually happened. From then on, Lewis believed that the "myth" had indeed become fact, and as the Gospel of John so beautifully puts it, "the Word was made Flesh."

A couple of years later, Lewis, Tolkien, and some other friends formed the Inklings, a group that met several times a week—in Lewis's rooms and at a local pub, "The Eagle and Child"--to read their unpublished work aloud and to discuss matters of the moment. Many of Lewis's books and much of Tolkien's now-famous Lord of the Rings were first read to and discussed by this highly literate group.

During this time, Lewis, a committed Anglican, began to distinguish himself as a defender or orthodox Christianity with The Screwtape Letters, Mere Christianity, Miracles, and The Weight of Glory. He also wrote a space trilogy, "smuggling in," as he put it, quite a bit of theology.

But how did a childless bachelor immersed in scholarship come to write classics for children? Perhaps listening to Tolkien's Ring Trilogy encouraged Lewis to try his hand at a fairy tale. Indeed, both of them had agreed that since no one wrote the kind of stories they liked to read, they would have to write some themselves! Even as a child, Lewis had loved and written stories about animals performing gallant deeds. A further impetus may have been the arrival of four children who came to stay with him after being evacuated from London during World War II. Amazed at how few stories they knew, Lewis began to write a tale about children who had gone to stay with an old professor who lived alone in the country.

Later he picked up that thread, impelled by images of "a faun carrying an umbrella, a queen in a sledge, and a magnificent lion" that kept coming to his mind. On a conscious level, Lewis also said he wanted to answer the question, "What might Christ be like if there really were a world like Narnia and he chose to be incarnate and die and rise again in that world as he actually has done in ours?"

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, published in 1950, answers that question by telling the tale of four children who accidentally enter Narnia through a magic wardrobe. With their help, the great lion Aslan (a Christ figure) redeems Narnia by breaking the power of the evil White Witch who has made it "always winter,…but…never Christmas."

Through Lewis's faith, imagination, and humor, his books have won a following worldwide. They continue to win hearts for Christ and have built a bridge of understanding among Christians, especially between Evangelicals and Catholics. In fact, the late Pope paid the author of The Chronicles of Narnia the ultimate compliment when John Paul II said, Lewis "knew what his apostolate was. And he did it!"

That is a tribute that Lewis, whose life and work flowed from recognition that "the Word was made Flesh,” would certainly have been quick to appreciate.

Dr. Nicholi's book and PBS series juxtaposed two giant intellects of the last century who personify conflicting worldviews

Whether we realize it or not, all of us possess a worldview. A few years after birth, we all gradually formulate our philosophy of life. We make one of two basic assumptions: we view the universe as a result of random events and life on this planet a matter of chance; or we assume an Intelligence beyond the universe who gives the universe order, and life meaning. So each one of us embraces some form of either Freud's secular worldview or Lewis's spiritual worldview.

Our worldview informs our personal, social, and political lives. It influences how we perceive ourselves, how we relate to others, how we adjust to adversity, and what we understand to be our purpose. Our worldview helps determine our values, our ethics, and our capacity for happiness. It helps us understand where we come from, our heritage; who we are, our identity; why we exist on this planet, our purpose; what drives us, our motivation; and where we are going, our destiny.

Dr. Nicholi gets to the core of these opposing worldviews.

Freud argues against the existence of God. He points to the problem of suffering and he develops the psychological argument that the whole concept is nothing but a projection of a childish wish for parental protection from the vicissitudes and sufferings of human existence. He also argues against the objection of those holding the spiritual worldview that faith "is of divine origin and was given us as a revelation by a Spirit which the human spirit cannot comprehend." Freud says this "is a clear case of begging the question" and adds this comment: "The actual question raised is whether there is a divine spirit and a revelation by it, and the matter is certainly not decided by saying this question cannot be asked."

Lewis agrees with Freud that this is indeed the most important question. He writes: "Here is a door behind which, according to some people, the secret of the universe is waiting for you. Either that's true or it isn't. If it isn't, then what the door really conceals is simply the greatest fraud...on record." Because so many people embrace Lewis's answer, Lewis is right: if not true, then the spiritual worldview is not only a fraud but also the cruelest hoax ever perpetrated on the human race. And the only alternative is to follow Freud's advice to grow up and face the harsh reality that we are alone in the universe. He says we may find less consolation, but the truth, harsh as it is, will ultimately set us free from false hopes and unrealistic expectations. But if the spiritual worldview is true, then all other truth fades in significance. Nothing has more profound and more far-reaching implications for our lives.

The Chronicles of Narnia has sold 100 million copies worldwide. The newest release includes all 7 volumes in one book, and has held the #1 spot on the New York Times Children's Paperback Book list for the last 23 weeks.

C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien: Companions and Combatants

Their personalities could hardly have been less alike. Tolkien was a quiet and somewhat diffident man. Only among his family and closest friends did Tolkien become animated and raffish. He once entered a contest by swimming on his back, while wearing a bowler hat and holding a pipe in his mouth. On another carnival occasion, he impersonated a polar bear; on still another, he chased a frightened neighbor with an axe while dressed as an Anglo-Saxon warrior. To hear him read Beowulf, declared W. H. Auden, was to listen to the voice of Gandalf. Another student declared that Tolkien “could turn a lecture room into a mead hall in which he was the bard and we were the feasting, listening guests.” Yet, unlike Lewis, Tolkien was ill at ease when he had to appear in his own persona. He muttered when he lectured, fled from all publicity (especially after he became a worldrenowned author), and did not relish the intellectual bravado that other members of the Inklings displayed in their beer-animated arguments at the Eagle and Child.

Lewis, by contrast, was a hale and bluff argufier. He engaged his students at Magdalen College with an intellectual fierceness that many of them found forbidding, and he delighted in confronting his debating opponents with rationalist rigor at the Oxford Socratic Club. Lewis’s Oxonian enemies—and they were many; in fact, they twice kept him from receiving a much-deserved professorship at Oxford—labeled him “Heavy” Lewis, as if he were more boxer than scholar. Even if we acknowledge this allegation to be a canard, Lewis was (as Tolkien was not) a public intellectual, giving popular lectures and making radio talks, as well as carrying on a huge correspondence. Yet even Lewis finally drew the line on publicity, declining ever to visit the United States, despite repeated invitations from his many admirers there.

by Ralph Wood

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