C.S. Lewis: The Ethical Theory of C.S. Lewis

This school year I have been working on an undergrad research project in partnership with my advisor Dr. Phillips and Dr. Rourke. We met about every 2 weeks this year and discussed a C.S. Lewis book that we read. Through the readings and the discussion I have come up with a preliminary abstract that summarizes what I believe Lewis is saying about Ethics.

C.S. Lewis has had a dramatic influence on western culture through his famous children’s fantasy series, The Chronicles of Narnia. On an academic level he has contributed a plethora of works in the areas of theology, philosophy, literature, and literary criticism during his time as a professor at Oxford University and then Cambridge University. Informed by his Christian faith, Lewis’ works contribute to the philosophical discussions surrounding a consistent normative ethics. The purpose of this research was to discover and extract what his normative ethics is from his prolific works. Lewis believes that the natural law informs all societies at all times in history about what is right and wrong. The natural law points toward God as the objective standard of morality and is guided by God’s love, which is charity. According to Lewis, the purpose of every thought and action of humans is to become more charitable. Referencing human history, Lewis shows how all humans are inherently evil by nature. We all have free will to choose to do good or evil. Left solely to our own power, we would choose evil and habituate ourselves to do evil with a continually smaller chance of choosing a good action the next time. Lewis here introduces the idea of God’s Grace, which is the only power that can turn a human towards charity and continually seek it. In essence, Lewis’s normative ethics is focused on habituating charitable thoughts and actions that are powered by God’s Grace and motivated by God’s character.

Those of you who have read a lot of Lewis's writings feel free to point out anything that you think is incorrect in my assessment of his writings.

DISCIPLESHIP: The Authority of Scripture

My mind has recently been captured by God's Word and how I have been so wrong in the past about my interpretation of His Word. Several friends have commented on how much I have changed in my interpretations of what I believe Scripture says about certain issues from when I started at Clarion. Some people view this as evidence of me growing and maturing in my faith and others view this as a negative thing of me having been corrupted. These comments have caused me to reflect on a deeper level these changes in myself. Why have I changed?

I think the answer to the question has 2 parts. First is that I have really learned to engage in healthy discussion with people who have differing Biblical interpretations. I used to make fun of the conclusions of a person's argument whom I disagreed without every actually listening to their reasoning to see if they had a valid point. Since I have begun to do this over the last 2 years I have seen that others have very good points that I ignored before without critically thinking about them. Second is that I have learned that really believing in the authority of Scripture means constantly going back and re-examining it. This means being open to correction by the Holy Spirit as I uncover new pieces of Scripture or read something I have never read before.

A crucial distinction must be made when talking about the authority of Scripture. Being faithful to an specific interpretation of a particular Biblical passage is NOT being faithful to the Scriptures. As I have wrestled with the Holy Spirit on Scripture issues that I have struggled with, He constantly brought me back to the fact that I need to be humble in the process and realize that just because God got it right doesn't mean I will interpret it right. Bible scholars have already shown that there have been errors in the translation of the King James Version of the Bible. Some of you may immediately have red flags going up and feel that I have degraded Scripture. The belief that Scripture is inerrant is about the collection of original manuscripts not the modern day English translations.

I have been learning that humility is absolutely key in the process. A humble approach to interpreting Scripture is evidenced by a constant willingness to evaluate differing interpretations and go back to the original text over and over again seeking to understand it better and better. This is why I have have changed many of my Biblical interpretations on certain issues. And I am willing to discuss those issues with anyone who wants to. Even now and for the rest of my life I am willing to constantly re-evaluate my interpretation of Scripture because when I get to Heaven it is likely that I will be right on some things and wrong on others. Humility is absolutely necessary if we profess a belief in the authority of Scripture.