TSL Chapter 5

War!

War has broken out in Europe. Nephew Wormwood is apparently ecstatic, which is to say, drunk and incoherent on human fear and suffering. Uncle Screwtape, ever the model of temperance councils moderation, reasonable expectations, and goal-oriented, big-picture behavior.

He acknowledges that war is full of delightful suffering and bad behavior but feels it is, in large, not a net-win for the forces Hell. He enumerates his thinking:

• In times of tribulation, people may flock to God
• Even if they don't, they may find themselves drawn to their better natures
• Men killed in warfare are prepared and may have been given last rites
• While some people may lose faith in suffering, faith that can be lost through suffering isn't real faith at all
• While someone might, in a moment of terror or pain, renounce God, they also might go the other way

The Literature

What a chapter! Firstly, after four chapters of edifying lectures on what not to do, this chapter steps away from the personal to look at the big picture and, as such, brings in a good deal of CSL's world and moral thinking. As such its a fascinating chapter.

A brim-full living chalice of despair and horror and astonishment -- forever

Screwtape's chilling description of a human suffering eternally in hell. Demons enjoy human agony (mental or physical) as fine spirits or a delicious meal. And this isn't just an aesthetic appreciation or pleasure at getting revenge on God by tormenting his creations: it actually impairs them the way strong drink does.

While I have no evidence this explanation is biblical, it works well here, both by being terrifying and by answering questions about motive: why do Demons do it? In part, because they enjoy it. I find myself wondering if human emotional states would have this effect on angels, or is the ability to take pleasure in pain something Demons only acquire after they've fallen? No answers here, but interesting stuff to think about.

I also like that Lewis has included "astonishment" -- this is particularly chilling because one might suppose that after a few centuries of diabolic torment, your typical human would be an incoherent wreck. Not so -- they are perpetually astonished. I also think it implies that humans are -- for eternity -- surprised to find themselves in the clutches of demons -- astonished at the horrible, but never-for-a-second-in-question outcome of it all.

I wonder how many of us are selected for this particularly kind of eternal astonishment.

Temperance and Strategic Thought

I keep calling out the admirable traits of Demons. It's clear that Lewis finds the idea of a demon acting affectionately and nurturingly toward his relative amusing: these letters are in some ways satire on the sorts of instructive letters an earthly uncle might write to his mortal nephew, but then bent rather extremely by their diabolical nature.

In the sense of being funny, the joke isn't overplayed enough to get old but it ceases to be surprising. What I find remains interesting, though, is the implication that there's a functional demonic bureaucracy which would rely on just such values to function. While Lewis is a deep enough thinker to imagine demons that are profoundly alien in thought processes and aspect, I think he also imagines that extensive coordinated action would probably require values and structures not too dissimilar from humans.

The Theology

Chapter 5 steps back to look at some broad, moral concerns through the eyes of a narrator who can see Objective Morality. Fascinating. Inevitably, this raises questions about Lewis's perspective and invites comparisons to biblical guidelines. Let's look at where this goes:

Extreme Patriot v. Ardent Pacifist

Evidently both are good (meaning bad)! Uncle Screwtape doesn't explain, and while it's easy to see how "extreme" patriotism (what I would probably call nationalism) could serve the "Father Below," it's not as clear that ardent pacifism is damming.

Certainly ardent pacifists are annoying, and it's amusing to imagine Hell filled with them -- maybe next pit over from the vegans and the PETA people -- but Lewis has already warned us against assuming someone is damned because they're irritating. Screwtape doesn't really get into why, so there's not much to go on here, but it is interesting, and somewhat (to me) counter-intuitive:

Nationalism would almost certainly be a kind of idol. It's hard to imagine a sincere nationalist who didn't treat his country that way. Pacifism, on the other hand, could be driven by any number of motivations including Christian ones. Certainly some flavors of pacifism would be sinful, but I can imagine, say, Quakers who founded their pacifism in a Christian framework. I don't know anything about Quakers except that they invented prisons and oatmeal, so maybe they're all hell-bound heretics, but that seems like a bit of a jump.

Monstrous Sophistry

A bit more theologically challenging is the assertion that God gives humans credit for championing causes that he disapproves of because humans "thought them good" and were following "the best they knew."

I find this strange and fascinating and I'd love to know how CSL arrives at that conclusion. He's already mocked humanity for justifying their own behavior and surely he's aware that the most ardent Nazi's thought they were doing good and dying for a just cause. It's hard to imagine him assuming God gives people credit for that.

Also, Screwtape's ambiguous wording suggests that salvation (God 'making prizes' of humans) can be granted because God in some way approved of the dying human's morality. I get that Anglicans appear to be focused on deeds than 'by faith alone,' but I wonder how far CSL would take this.

Faith that fails under trial isn't really faith

This is the same conclusion Calvinists reach -- if you lose your faith, you weren't actually ever faithful (or saved) to begin with (nuance alert: can't see human heart, maybe still had faith, don't imagine grandpa burning in hell, it'll keep you up at night, etc.)

It's necessary for all versions of Christianity, of course -- but it raises the dismal specter of a lack of assurance in one's own salvation. It's also depressing: I read a book by a psychologist who had interviewed torture victims, and discovered that many of them had lost their faith after being tortured. He said that most people walk around with a basic belief that God "won't let anything really bad happen to them," and for torture victims, that obviously turned out not to be true.

Clearly those folks didn't have the True Faith -- a sophisticated understanding that the promises in scripture are not necessarily for our corruptible, mortal lives -- and if they really did "lose faith," then they really weren't saved to begin with. Still, it's sad to think that for those poor people, the worst hours of their lives, while they were being tormented into despair, were happier and more pleasant than the eternity they're in store for.

Catching a man at the moment of death

Screwtape concludes that it might be possible to catch a man in a moment of terror and pain, presumably as he's dying or when someone close to him is dying -- but that he also might break the other way. This sort of terrifying coin-flip (along with theologies that need last rites) is a pretty grim look at the conclusions one comes to if you need to be saved by your current belief.

The Calvinist idea that you're saved from the moment of (true) conversion and from then on its all okay at least doesn't leave you wondering how you'll do when you're bleeding out on the floor.

My reaction

I liked this chapter -- it was, as I said, a break from the high-nutrient diet of spiritual self-improvement. It provided a view of a broader spiritual (demonic) world, and a look at over-arching ethics. Interesting stuff.

I also like Screwtape as a character. I like that he's a bit of a wet-blanket on his Nephew's ecstasy and contrarian about the war.

I suspect that despite his warnings and dour nature, WWII proved to be a bonanza for the Devil, at least in terms of the accounting approach TSL implies.