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Thank you Zippy - you've put into words what I was trying to get a grip of. When does allegory change from being a means of communicating a truth to becoming 'a truth'? And at that point can it still be considered to allegory?...I can't help but wonder if the cleavage really centers on allegory (and in part I am thinking of Tolkien's objections). You yourself called allegory a presentation, and Lewis says it "consists in giving an imagined body..." But for Catholics it often isn't merely imagined or a presentation, it is the reality itself. This may well cause Catholicism to be more allegorical, but the precise relation of allegory to ontology seems important.
Perhaps we are all just untangling the rich tapestry of Christianity into our own little patch, but how to re-weave it, I don't know.
Thank you Zippy - you've put into words what I was trying to get a grip of. When does allegory change from being a means of communicating a truth to becoming 'a truth'? And at that point can it still be considered to allegory?
Go well
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I respectfully disagree. Tolkien once wrote of Lewis that if a Lutheran was put in jail, he is up in arms, but if catholic priests are slaughtered, he initially disbelieves it. Lewis had a strong love of Norse Saga, and had extensive interest in things Scandinavian. The idea that he wasn't familiar with Lutheranism is patent hogwash, especially as a lot of his thinking was in fact mirrored thereby. I have read many articles linking people like Boenhoeffer's thinking to Lewis'.I think that's his voice as an idiosyncratic Anglican... I don't think he was familiar with Lutheranism, which I think defies those categories, as we are both evangelical and sacramental.
Which is what Lewis said, and connected Protestantism with such symbolical representation and Plato, and Catholicism with Aristotle and Allegory. You must be careful with your wording though, as I am having difficulty understanding what you mean. The Material cause is one of the Four Causes of Aristotle, but I assume you mean a more integrative Scholastic or Realist approach?Seeing the world as symbols infused with meaning is actually more in accord with Plato and other ancient philosophers than Aristotle, who was more interested in material causes.
I respectfully disagree. Tolkien once wrote of Lewis that if a Lutheran was put in jail, he is up in arms, but if catholic priests are slaughtered, he initially disbelieves it. Lewis had a strong love of Norse Saga, and had extensive interest in things Scandinavian. The idea that he wasn't familiar with Lutheranism is patent hogwash, especially as a lot of his thinking was in fact mirrored thereby. I have read many articles linking people like Boenhoeffer's thinking to Lewis'.
The problem with Bonhoeffer is that he spent much of his time persecuted with the Confessing Church, so his theology was never systematically written down. A lot here is people reading things in that I think he did not intend (as with much of the Death of God stuff). I have not read him extensively though. With CS Lewis he shares a number of ideas:I'd be curious to see more about that. My impression of Bonhoeffer, from my studies of him, is that he was in many ways a modernist- especially his later works. He's very influential in mainline Protestantism, as a result. Though Lewis was hardly a Protestant fundamentalist himself, I think he liked to fancy himself so.
Something is only a via media if it can pass between two extremes. In this case, Lutheranism started symbolically representing Communion, which the "Second Reformation" took to its conclusion. From the context of the discussion in this thread, it is not a via media at all, but the first impulse against the allegoric. This is why I think this division of Lewis so useful, as it cuts across the similarities that on occasion confuse and points to the actual divisions that exists between Catholicism and Protestantism.The Sacramental Union is a perfect example of a via media, though. Unlike most Protestants, we really do believe the sacrament has some kind of objectivity to it.
I dunno. This may be one of those rare occasions when I disagree with Lewis. Maybe it's because as I read that (long) paragraph, I see Lutherans walking the middle road between the two states he's describing. Like his characterization of the Catholics, we believe Christianity involves a physical interaction with God - not the "spiritual" or symbolic stuff that seems just empty words. But also like his characterization of Protestants, we don't believe a human institution can take control of that interaction to make it "bricks and mortar" - not the pretending that one man sitting in a specific chair has divine powers yet somehow isn't divine.
"I see Lutherans walking the middle road between the two states he's describing.",
but wasn't CSL the archetypal, middle of the road Anglican and isn't Anglicanism the middle of the road between Catholicism and Protestantism?
When Catholicism goes bad it becomes the world-old, world-wide religio of amulets and holy places and priestcraft; Protestantism, in its corresponding decay, becomes a vague mist of ethical platitudes. Catholicism is accused of being much too like all the other religions; Protestantism of being insufficiently like a religion at all.
You don't seem to understand what allegory means. An allegory is to present a concept or abstraction in material terms - think of the Pixar movie Inside Out for allegorical emotions. This is not the same as a metaphor necessarily.
Symbolism is actually the opposite impulse of allegory. This is where a symbol or reality is imbued with characteristics of an abstraction. Think of the rains coming in the Lion King signifying rightful rule, or Scar's Nazi symbolism.
To consider communion the actual body of Christ is allegoric to Catholics, as it is embodying the spiritual truth in a physical material, which becomes that Truth, becomes Christ. Communing with God is made tangible, thus linking this world with the spiritual truth of God. To Protestants, the bread is symbolic of Christ, whether Real Presence or not, but it is not the actuality of being Christ as such. It represents something that occurs 'behind or beyond our reality' as it were. Communion is Allegoric to Catholics, Symbolic to Protestants. The former calls the divine into the mundane world as a miracle, the latter that the mundane signifies and points toward a greater reality beyond it. Either way we are blurring the division between the physical and spiritual reality, but the mechanism is different.
I only now came across this thread (and what a wonderfully thoughtful discussion!). I wanted to thank you for this particular quote from Lewis, which I hadn't encountered before. It sums up a lot of my intuition about high-church Anglicanism as contrasted with the Baptist/nondenominational church of my childhood. I particularly remember, at an Easter Vigil, with the fire and the chanting, thinking "Are we allowed to be this religious?"
You are still caught up in the inexact popular usage of 'symbol'. Remember, this comes from an academic text.How does Lewis' notion fit with Lutheranism, since we do not believe the Lord's Supper is merely a symbol, but an actual means of grace, even to those who do not believe it?
No, he means that a Christian views and acts radically different than a non-Christian and submits to God. That he follows obediently what God commands. However Catholics embody this in the Church and Tradition, in eclessiastical authority, while Protestants distrust human instititions.C.S. totally lost me with that one, but my what a way with words. I'm not following what this 'wall' is supposed to be. Is it their ecclesiastical authority withoutbwhich we may not approach God, I don't know but that's all I can figure.
You are still caught up in the inexact popular usage of 'symbol'. Remember, this comes from an academic text.
Lutheranism believes in a Sacramental Union. This implies a differentiation between the material and spiritual plains, the acts of which are in union during the Eucharist.
The Presence is 'In, around, etc.' which intimates a different level of reality.
Catholicism makes no such differentiation, with the very essence and substance of the Eucharist being indivisible from its spiritual action.
Lutheranism is thus an example of Symbolic representation here, as opposed to the allegoric of Transsubstantiation and Catholic ideas and such. The Catholic was fully allegorical, and Lutheranism made a differentiation here that perhaps did not conceptually exist before. This is the original Protestant act, severing the Mediaeval unity of the Eucharist into material and spiritual aspects, which Reformed Churches made complete in Idealising the Eucharist fully. That it retains a Real Presence or presumed efficacy is immaterial to whether it is Symbolic representation or not.
Ok, stiil lost. How is the distinction between a real and allegorical wall related to tradition?No, he means that a Christian views and acts radically different than a non-Christian and submits to God. That he follows obediently what God commands. However Catholics embody this in the Church and Tradition, in eclessiastical authority, while Protestants distrust human instititions.
"The truth is not that allegory is Catholic, but that Catholicism is allegorical. Allegory consists in giving an imagined body to the immaterial ; but if, in each case, Catholicism claims already to have given it a material body, then the allegorist’s symbol will naturally resemble that material body. The whip of Penaunce is an excellent example. No Christian ever doubted that repentance involved 'penaunce’ and 'whips’ on the spiritual plane: it is when you come to material whips — to Tartuffe’s discipline in his closet — that the controversy begins. It is the same with the ‘House’ of Holinesse. No Christian doubts that those who have offered themselves to God are cut off as if by a wall from the World, are placed under a 'regula vitae' and ‘laid in easy bed’ by ‘meek Obedience’ ; but when the wall becomes one of real bricks and mortar, and the Rule one in real ink, superintended by disciplinary officials and reinforced (at times) by the power of the State, then we have reached that sort of actuality which Catholics aim at and Protestants deliberately avoid. Indeed, this difference is the root out of which all other differences between the two religions grow. The one suspects that all spiritual gifts are falsely claimed if they cannot be embodied in bricks and mortar, or official positions, or institutions: the other, that nothing retains its spirituality if incarnation is pushed to that degree and in that way. The difference about Papal infallibility is simply a form of this. The proper corruptions of each Church tell the same tale. When Catholicism goes bad it becomes the world-old, world-wide religio of amulets and holy places and priestcraft; Protestantism, in its corresponding decay, becomes a vague mist of ethical platitudes. Catholicism is accused of being much too like all the other religions; Protestantism of being insufficiently like a religion at all. Hence Plato, with his transcendent Forms, is the doctor of Protestants; Aristotle, with his immanent Forms, the doctor of Catholics. Now allegory exists, so to speak, in that region of the mind where the bifurcation has not yet occurred; for it occurs only when we reach the material world. In the world of matter. Catholics and Protestants disagree as to the kind and degree of incarnation or embodiment which we can safely try to give to the spiritual; but in the world of imagination, where allegory exists, unlimited embodiment is equally approved by both. Imagined buildings and institutions which have a strong resemblance to the actual buildings and institutions of the Church of Rome, will therefore appear, and ought to appear, in any Protestant allegory." - CS Lewis, in The Allegory of Love.
I dunno. This may be one of those rare occasions when I disagree with Lewis. Maybe it's because as I read that (long) paragraph, I see Lutherans walking the middle road between the two states he's describing. Like his characterization of the Catholics, we believe Christianity involves a physical interaction with God - not the "spiritual" or symbolic stuff that seems just empty words. But also like his characterization of Protestants, we don't believe a human institution can take control of that interaction to make it "bricks and mortar" - not the pretending that one man sitting in a specific chair has divine powers yet somehow isn't divine.
No, he means that a Christian views and acts radically different than a non-Christian and submits to God. That he follows obediently what God commands. However Catholics embody this in the Church and Tradition, in eclessiastical authority, while Protestants distrust human instititions.
My experience of Reformed churches is not really relevant here. This is purely about the conceptual structure of Protestantism - which in this instance clearly includes Lutheranism and Anglicanism - vis a vis Catholicism. Again, Real Presence has no bearing on whether it is conceived in an allegorical fashion or symbolically of a greater reality.Ok, I think I understand where you are coming from now. It might appears that way from the Reformed perspective, I suppose. We believe we are putting the actual, resurrected body of Christ into our hands and mouths. That's the real difference between the Lutheran and Reformed perspectives. The physical act of eating and drinking the Sacrament is what we emphasize. But you are correct there is still a certain distinction of the sacramental sign from what they signify - we just don't regard that in a nominalist sort of sense, I suppose, where the sign and the thing they signify are radically separated. That's one reason among many, for instance, why we don't really reject the veneration of icons and holy symbols (we had an adoration of the Cross on Good Friday, in fact).
If what you suggest is true, though, it would make Christ's resurrected body "spiritual" in nature as well (in contradistinction to somebody like the Rev. N.T. Wright, who seems to balk at such a notion). Perhaps there is some merit to this notion, though, at least in terms of fitting our notions into modern idiom. The Anglican 39 Articles are perhaps vague enough to accommodate both the Lutheran and Reformed perspectives, perhaps (some say that was intentional).
It also would imply that resurrected bodies are more like what C.S. Lewis said they were, and one of the reasons he disagreed so much with Tolkein about cremation. Indeed, at Marburg in 1529, Luther seemed to have gone in that direction himself, when he protested to Zwingli that Christ's resurrected body was supernatural and not limited in the usual sense we understand bodies to be.
Yes, I think you are correct, here. It would seem to be consistent with the fact that many historians have said that Luther was a Neo-Platonist of sorts, in contradistinction to the prevailing views of Aristotle. This sounds strange to many modern Evangelicals of course, but that's only because they aren't aware of Luther's worldview being so different from their own.
As Protopresbyter Alexander Schmemann said in his book, For the Life of the World, it really does abolish the notion of sacrament altogether, and has serious implications for Catholic spirituality. Life as such, cannot participate in divinity without first being changed into something else. But I think the Orthodox and Lutheran emphasis is that life is in some sense already divine and merely awaits us to awaken to that in Christ (and here we could echo some of the mysticism of Paul about the Cosmic Christ that fills all things with himself).
Maybe your experience of the Reformed tradition is different but I found American Reformed Protestants, influenced so much by Princeton theologians, to be presenting something more like "This is a commemoration of Christ's death, this is merely bread and wine, and you are suppossed to remember he died for you". There's nothing really all that "Numinous" about it (what Rudolf Otto was talking about in his The Idea of the Holy), it's strictly a mental exercise of commemoration, "the Real Absence" would be a better description, honestly.
My pastor has talked about an experience of something like what Otto was describing, presiding at the altar. That idea seems completely foreign to most American evangelicals. They happily take the leftover bread and wine and sweep it into a dustbin, and it means nothing to them. There's no sense of the mysterium tremendum that made Luther feel real fear at his first mass, the same thing my own pastor experienced.
Lewis was pointing out that the manner both traditions 'go wrong' is in keeping with the way they approach the Spiritual. It says nothing about his Anglicanism, as he was anyway unequivocal that Anglicanism is a form of Protestantism - this seeing it as via media stuff is a far more modern phenomenon, and not really helpful or meaningful in a real sense, I think. I think the post WWII liberal German theologians largely proves Lewis' point regarding Protestantism, as things like the Ilaga proves the Catholic side. In like manner, Anglicanism that 'goes wrong' is tending toward moral platitudes as well.BTW, it seems that Lewis here is being critical of both Protestantism and Catholicism. My guess is he's being typically Anglican, and wanting to be comprehensive of both without definitively accepting either one.
I suspect Lewis himself was closer to Lutheranism than he realized in that respect, in not being completely satisfied with either choice.
Here again I think Lutherans, much like Anglicans, are a mediating position. LCMS Lutherans in particular, in the US, have a relatively high view of the Church, as far as Protestants go. The ELCA (my church) is somewhat lower, but it's still higher than the typical Protestant religion.
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