TSL Chapter 10 -- Desirable New Acquaintances

Chapter Summary

That old scoundrel Triptweeze has informed Uncle that Worm's patient has made some new friends. These are fashionably intellectual skeptics who will clearly be good (bad) influence on The Patient -- he will, desiring their approval, become shallow, cynical, and trendily flippant just like they are.

So opposed are these new influences to The Patient's Christian values that Screwtape urges Wormwood to work hard to ensure that The Patient doesn't realize how fundamentally opposed he is to them and that when he does, to make sure he doesn't cut ties immediately. As always, Screwtape has practical advice to offer:

Not so much in how to prevent the patient from realizing the grave disconnect, but to make sure that when the Patient does realize his problem he either doesn't think of it when they're around, or -- and this is better -- to have the guy gleefully understand how out of integrity is when he hangs out with the intelligentsia. Or maybe think he's doing them some good with his presence.

Meanwhile Screwtape suggests that Wormwood inspire the guy to overspend and neglect mom.

Literature & Theology

I found this fascinating: Who are these dreadful people -- people whose sins and values are so anti-Christian that even hanging out with them imperils the soul and even as mild and tentative a Christian as The Patient (who is also a bit of an idiot) cannot help but realize how foul and antithetical these folks are?

Are they criminal? Cruel? Perverse? Are they idolaters who worship at the alter of Marxism or Pacifism? Are they pagans?

None of the above. These Agents of Damnation are

• Rich
• Smart
• Superficially intellectual
• Brightly skeptical (about everything in the world)

And while they may have some ideology, there's no sign that their vague pacifism and "purely fashionable and literary communism" is anything but the same superficiality they bring to their intellectualism.

We learn later that to fit in with their "urbane and mocking" world The Patient he will have to assume a manner with "cynical and skeptical" attitudes which will eventually become sincere.

Oh, and these Sirens of Worldly Culture people are "middle aged" and "married."

What the heck is going on here? Why are these folks so extremely bad and dangerous that not only are they damned but they're in danger of sucking down those around them, like a great ship sinking[1]?

I have to admit, I'm not sure. I will examine two theories:

Theory One: Damned by the Every Day

Theory One is that CSL recognizes that his target audience is more likely to have trendy intellectual friends than criminal perverts. He aims his warnings at the every day, not the dramatic:

For his lecture on Choosing the Right Friends, he's chosen the sorts of people he thinks his readers might have for friends. If he chose extreme examples, his reader would chuckle and shake his head, self-satisfied and secure that he has no friends like that.

This is probably part of the picture, but I don't think it covers all the waterfront. For one thing, CSL doesn't see a need to explain their crimes. They're almost certainly atheists, but the problem isn't their theology -- it's their worldliness and extreme seductivity.

Also, he contrasts them to The Grocer -- a simple, Godly man who kneels beside The Patient in Church. I mean, let's face it: the Grocer is probably just as doomed as The Patient is (which is to say, in peril until he's dead), but here he represents the polar opposite of the Temptations of the World. In an earlier chapter it was the greasy looking Butcher who would cut a faintly ridiculous figure when seen in Church handing out pamphlets his simple mind couldn't quite understand.

I think this is key.

Theory Two: Damn those Skeptics!

What's so bad about these people? Sure they're worldly, but most of The Patient's friends probably are. If they were presented as extremists in some way (Commies), then they'd be obvious idolaters and that would answer the question. 

I think the problem is their skepticism, which is probably expressed as an unconsidered agnosticism or even an explicit atheism (although he doesn't use the term). Firstly, CSL/Screwtape uses invokes skepticism twice, and secondly that's only area where their nature becomes sinful.

Being rich isn't a sin[2]. Being smart can't be bad. Superficial affectations are the polar opposite of idolatry, so their trendy communism and pacifism can't be that damning. That leaves being middle aged and married and the skepticism.

Theory Three: Damn those Intellectuals in the English Department!

One of the joys or writing fiction from a God's Eye PoV, is the opportunity to put your enemies in Hell. This dates back to Dante, and it would be surprising if CSL was completely above it. I bet the English Department in Oxford was full of mocking, laughing, intellectual (well, you know, superficially intellectual) sophisticates with progressive liberal values and a good dose of class-ism who would not have been sympathetic to Lewis's conversion or thought well of the simple working class folk he'd kneel with in Church.

There's no way to prove this, but the chapter feels like a bit of a Take That at the intellectuals who would have been his colleagues.

The Aesop

The moral here is really that you don't sell out your beliefs for the approval of your friends (whoever they are) and that if you have worldly friends (and believe me, you do -- even if you're hanging with the Butcher or the Grocer), you'll probably have to do some selling out to fit in with them.

This is true and it's a good reminder. I recall being uncomfortable when a guy I was with asked me incredulously, point blank, if I believed in the Resurrection in front of a bunch of secular Jewish folks I was hanging out with. I said I did and he dropped it was the sort of thing that could have been quite divisive and unpleasant.

But I wonder what the remedy is. Screwtape and Mom both remind us we should Choose our Friends Wisely, but does that mean that we shouldn't consort with anyone who doesn't match our values? Maybe -- or maybe we should hang out with them but not for friendship, only to convert them. I have a good, observant Jewish friend I used to work with and still see regularly. We spoke today and I'm looking forward to seeing him next week. Have I chosen poorly?

I guess I'll find out one day.

[1] Myth Busted -- according to Justified.

[2] We hope. Since we're all rich by 0 A.D. and by 2013 global standards, by virtue of living in the US, we dearly hope that business about the eye of the needle isn't all that literal, or that it just means you can't buy your way in, or something about that small gate or that rock you have crawl under or whatever.