Monday, January 25, 2021

The best essay I've read on 'That Hideous Strength' ...

 ... is this one by Mihai Marinescu on the Kali Tribune website - www.kalitribune.com. It was written in September 2017 but it's so relevant to the world of January 2021 that it could have been written this morning. I'm thinking here about what it says about the demonic intelligences ('Macrobes' as Lewis calls them) who dictate so much of the agenda in That Hideous Strength. I don't really need to emphasise the extent to which these dark powers are active in today's world. But the Devil plays all sides, and the writer is also astute in his (her?) exposure of the limitations of 'conspiratorial' thinking, as well as the lies purveyed by the mainstream media, of course. 

There's a better way to be taken, and that is the path chosen by Ransom and the Company he gathers around him at St. Anne's-on-the-Hill. We don't know the how and the why behind the facade of surface phenomena. We can guess and surmise but our points of view are always partial and we'll never be able to 'join the dots' in the coherent, comprehensive manner we often crave. Tuning into the Divine Will is what it's all about and then making ourselves receptacles for that Will to act in the world. When it comes to current events, we need to move beyond our obsession with facts - 'What are the facts behind the smokescreen presented to us? What's really going on? - and look for the archetype which is expressing itself through the event. Only then do we start to look the right way through the lens and begin to get a sense of where God is in all this and what He might be asking us to do.


4 comments:

  1. That is an excellent and 'timely' essay, thank you for linking it, and I agree with your commentary it as well -
    - though, I would be interested to read more as to what 'you' believe "the archetype...expressing itself through" current world events is.
    And as well, where do you think "God is in all this"? What do you believe "He might be asking us to do"?

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  2. Thanks Carol. I've alluded to this before, but to put it plainly the archetype expressing itself right now, in my view, is that described by CS Lewis in Chapters 13 and 14 of The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe - 'Deep Magic from the Dawn of Time'/'The Triumph of the Witch'. This is exactly what's playing out now - the ritual staying of God by a cadre of Satanists (let's be truthful here) who have taken control of the commanding heights of politics and culture. More and more people are jumping on the bandwagon and we're increasingly seeing a kind of revelling in evil, a lionisation and glorification of it. This mirrors exactly the orgiastic frenzy of those creatures gathered around the Stone Table to watch and participate in the murder of Aslan.

    Unfortunately, I don't think we've reached anywhere near the peak of this frenzy yet. That's why it's really important to keep the next chapter of the book always in mind - 'Deeper Magic From Before the Dawn of Time.' Evil, in its madness and complacency, kids itself that God is dead and gone. But these people have no idea how deep the Mystery is. Like Wither and Frost in THS, their cleverness has made them blind and stupid and they no longer have any conception of what spiritual reality actually is. The writing's on the wall for them already - counted, weighed, measured, etc.

    I've got a new post due up later today or tomorrow God willing which will also attempt to answer this question, albeit in a more oblique fashion.

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  3. I meant 'ritual slaying' not 'ritual staying'!

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  4. Thank you! I thought your response might be something along those lines but wasn't sure, so I really appreciate your expressing it in such certain terms - and I absolutely agree with you!

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