As I mentioned in a recent post, I am reading C. S. Lewis's The Abolition Of Man this month, and I just finished the third and final chapter of this short book. I have to get a few thoughts out. This book really is very deep and impactful, and I recommend everyone read it.
As I explained in my previous post, Lewis starts the book by explaining this idea which he labels for convenience the "tao", the idea that there is an inherent worth to things, which we recognize when our affections are rightly ordered. The value of those things (or actions) doesn't come from our affections but is inherent, and we have to recognize their value through our right affections in order to be in "alignment" with this greater meaning which underlies creation. I believe that this greater meaning and purpose is given by the true and living God, the Creator of everything - if He doesn't give things their meaning, there is no meaning, and that's the problem that Lewis starts to dip into in the third chapter.
To sum up the third chapter, Lewis is arguing that man's quest to "conquer" nature is dangerous when we stifle, or try to explain away (which amounts to the same thing), the inherent value and morality that underlies the universe. There has to be a point when we stop and recognize that there is something deeper at work in the created world, that the universe and human beings themselves are more than just the sum of their parts - and if we won't stop there, we don't truly conquer nature at all, but we become a slave to nature without God. And that is a terrifying place to be.
"It is the magician's bargain: give up our soul, get power in return. But once our souls, that is, ourselves, have been given up, the power thus conferred will not belong to us. We shall in fact be the slaves and puppets of that to which we have given our souls. It is in Man's power to treat himself as a mere "natural object" and his own judgements of value as raw material for scientific manipulation to alter at will...The real objection is that if man chooses to treat himself as raw material, raw material he will be."
-C. S. Lewis, The Abolition Of Man
Without a deeper meaning to the universe, all that is left is our arbitrary desires, motivated by untethered emotional impulses, and not even our own impulses, but whatever we have been educated to think about our impulses by those who have more earthly power than ourselves.
When we start to reduce everything in nature to some "scientific" explanation, and even reduce our own selves to mere molecules with no significant purpose, except perhaps "the survival of the fittest" - but even the survival of the fittest means nothing if our species is of no more value than anything else - well, we haven't risen over nature at all. We've merely destroyed ourselves - we've rejected the underlying thing that makes us human. We've scorned the value of being made in the image of God, we've thrown it away by treating the universe and worse, ourselves as parts with no divine Hand holding us together. We've abolished man in it's truest sense.
"'White!' he sneered. 'It serves as a beginning. 'White cloth may be dyed. The white page can be overwritten, and the white light can be broken.'
'In which case it is no longer white,' said I, 'And he that breaks a thing to find out what it is has left the path of wisdom.'"
-Conversation between Saruman and Gandalf, The Fellowship Of The Ring
This third chapter was somewhat horrifying to read, because I can see these philosophies at work in society today. Scientists all over the world have, in the words of Malcolm in Jurassic Park, been so busy wondering if they can, that they've neglected the very important question of whether they should. They've scoffed at and rejected the true purpose of all mankind, which is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever, and instead they have sought to wield their own power over nature, to their own ends. As the sinful, fallen creatures as we are, this whole thing turns dystopian pretty quick.
So how can we stop this frightening progression? I don't truly know. It may be that only Christ Himself will stop it when He returns in judgement. But I think we, as Christians who care about the image of God in man and the glory of God in His creation - we slow it down by teaching our kids that there is more to this world than what meets the eye. That they themselves have inherent value because of the meaning and purpose that God Himself put into every molecule of their being - the same God who that at this very moment holds up all of the universe by the word of His power (Hebrews 1:3). Man may remove all meaning and morality in his own mind, but he cannot do it in reality. Someday every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord (Philippians 2:1-11). There will be no explaining away then.
"But you cannot go on "explaining away" forever: you will find that you have explained explanation itself away. You cannot go on "seeing through" things forever. The whole point of seeing through something is to see something through it. It is good that the window should be transparent, because the street or garden beyond it is opaque. How if you saw through the garden too? It is no use trying to "see through" first principles. If you see through everything, then everything is transparent. But a wholly transparent world is an invisible world. To "see through" all things is the same as not to see."
C. S. Lewis, The Abolition Of Man
As always, Lewis says it better, these are just my thoughts on the chapter! I highly recommend the book, it gives so much food for thought.
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