The Screwtape Letters and Theology

[OrthodoxyUSA]

Have you ever read it?
Your thoughts on the Theology embedded?

The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis is a classic masterpiece of religious satire that entertains readers with its sly and ironic portrayal of human life and foibles from the vantage point of Screwtape, a highly placed assistant to "Our Father Below." At once wildly comic, deadly serious, and strikingly original, C.S. Lewis's The Screwtape Letters is the most engaging account of temptation—and triumph over it—ever written.

The Screwtape Letters - Wikipedia
In The Screwtape Letters, C. S. Lewis provides a series of lessons in the importance of taking a deliberate role in Christian faith by portraying a typical human life, with all its temptations and failings, seen from devils' viewpoints. Screwtape holds an administrative post in the bureaucracy ("Lowerarchy") of Hell, and acts as a mentor to his nephew Wormwood, an inexperienced (and incompetent) tempter. In the thirty-one letters which constitute the book, Screwtape gives Wormwood detailed advice on various methods of undermining faith and of promoting sin in "the Patient", interspersed with observations on human nature and on Christian doctrine. In Screwtape's advice, individual benefit and greed are seen as the greatest good, and neither demon can comprehend God's love for man or acknowledge human virtue.

http://www.samizdat.qc.ca/arts/lit/PDFs/ScrewtapeLetters_CSL.pdf

The Screwtape Letters - Download

https://www.amazon.com/Screwtape-Letters-C-S-Lewis-ebook/dp/B002BD2V2Y

Forgive me...

 

[Goatee]

Never read it but would like to one day

 

[brinny]

Never read it but would like to one day

i haven't either...i agree, i'd like to read it one day.

 

[rockytopva]

86 Years Ago J. R. R. Tolkien Convinces C. S. Lewis That Christ Is the True Myth. On September 28, 1931--just nine days after Lewis’s conversation with Tolkien on Christ being the true myth--Lewis took the final step in embracing the divinity of Christ.

JRR Tolkien was a Roman Catholic! I have read and re-read both the Chronicles of Narnia and the Lord of the Rings many times as a kid. The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis ought to be interesting as well.

 

[Tolworth John]

Have you ever read it?
Your thoughts on the Theology embedded?

Have read it many times and the great divorce. Both contain lessons for hose willing to learn.

They are also written in an easier style than his other books like Mere Christianity.

 

[Aimz]

It is one of my favourite books I reread it often and it never gets boring. I recommend it to every believer. I also like his take on Cupid and Psyche in Till We Have Faces.

Have you ever read it?
Your thoughts on the Theology embedded?

The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis is a classic masterpiece of religious satire that entertains readers with its sly and ironic portrayal of human life and foibles from the vantage point of Screwtape, a highly placed assistant to "Our Father Below." At once wildly comic, deadly serious, and strikingly original, C.S. Lewis's The Screwtape Letters is the most engaging account of temptation—and triumph over it—ever written.

The Screwtape Letters - Wikipedia
In The Screwtape Letters, C. S. Lewis provides a series of lessons in the importance of taking a deliberate role in Christian faith by portraying a typical human life, with all its temptations and failings, seen from devils' viewpoints. Screwtape holds an administrative post in the bureaucracy ("Lowerarchy") of Hell, and acts as a mentor to his nephew Wormwood, an inexperienced (and incompetent) tempter. In the thirty-one letters which constitute the book, Screwtape gives Wormwood detailed advice on various methods of undermining faith and of promoting sin in "the Patient", interspersed with observations on human nature and on Christian doctrine. In Screwtape's advice, individual benefit and greed are seen as the greatest good, and neither demon can comprehend God's love for man or acknowledge human virtue.

http://www.samizdat.qc.ca/arts/lit/PDFs/ScrewtapeLetters_CSL.pdf

The Screwtape Letters - Download

https://www.amazon.com/Screwtape-Letters-C-S-Lewis-ebook/dp/B002BD2V2Y

Forgive me...

 

[Radagast]

Have you ever read it?

It's a classic!

 

[OrthodoxyUSA]

Capture

• OrthodoxyUSA
• Sep 29, 2017

Forgive me...

 

[Dave-W]

Have you ever read it?
Your thoughts on the Theology embedded?

I read it in college.

My "thoughts on the theology" is he had some amazing insight. While the idea of only one demon per believer is not accurate, it was an effective literary device to make his point. All believers have this tsuris and spiritual warfare going on around them and most are entirely unaware of it. That book unmasked many of the demonic strategies intended to trip us up.

 

[paul1149]

It's a masterpiece of reverse psychology. I think I read somewhere that Lewis found it exhausting to write.

“Be not deceived, Wormwood, our cause is never more in jeopardy than when a human, no longer desiring but still intending to do our Enemy's will, looks round upon a universe in which every trace of Him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys.”​

 

[OrthodoxyUSA]

It's a masterpiece of reverse psychology. I think I read somewhere that Lewis found it exhausting to write.

“Be not deceived, Wormwood, our cause is never more in jeopardy than when a human, no longer desiring but still intending to do our Enemy's will, looks round upon a universe in which every trace of Him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys.”​

QFT!

Forgive me...

 

[FenderTL5]

Have you ever read it?
Your thoughts on the Theology embedded?

The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis is a classic masterpiece of religious satire that entertains readers with its sly and ironic portrayal of human life and foibles from the vantage point of Screwtape, a highly placed assistant to "Our Father Below." At once wildly comic, deadly serious, and strikingly original, C.S. Lewis's The Screwtape Letters is the most engaging account of temptation—and triumph over it—ever written.

The Screwtape Letters - Wikipedia
In The Screwtape Letters, C. S. Lewis provides a series of lessons in the importance of taking a deliberate role in Christian faith by portraying a typical human life, with all its temptations and failings, seen from devils' viewpoints. Screwtape holds an administrative post in the bureaucracy ("Lowerarchy") of Hell, and acts as a mentor to his nephew Wormwood, an inexperienced (and incompetent) tempter. In the thirty-one letters which constitute the book, Screwtape gives Wormwood detailed advice on various methods of undermining faith and of promoting sin in "the Patient", interspersed with observations on human nature and on Christian doctrine. In Screwtape's advice, individual benefit and greed are seen as the greatest good, and neither demon can comprehend God's love for man or acknowledge human virtue.

http://www.samizdat.qc.ca/arts/lit/PDFs/ScrewtapeLetters_CSL.pdf

The Screwtape Letters - Download

https://www.amazon.com/Screwtape-Letters-C-S-Lewis-ebook/dp/B002BD2V2Y

Forgive me...

I've read a couple times - however, not since becoming Orthodox. I'm sure there would be added insight now.
I enjoyed it.. now do I find my old paperback copy, stowed away somewhere in my house or do I just download and read electronically? uum?? I'll look for the paperback first.

 

[Dave-W]

Lewis must have had some kind of personal experience in spiritual warfare. The opening of the final book of his sci fi space trilogy, That Hideous Strength, Lewis writes the most accurate description of a demonic attack I have ever read.

 

[2PhiloVoid]

Have you ever read it?
Your thoughts on the Theology embedded?

The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis is a classic masterpiece of religious satire that entertains readers with its sly and ironic portrayal of human life and foibles from the vantage point of Screwtape, a highly placed assistant to "Our Father Below." At once wildly comic, deadly serious, and strikingly original, C.S. Lewis's The Screwtape Letters is the most engaging account of temptation—and triumph over it—ever written.

The Screwtape Letters - Wikipedia
In The Screwtape Letters, C. S. Lewis provides a series of lessons in the importance of taking a deliberate role in Christian faith by portraying a typical human life, with all its temptations and failings, seen from devils' viewpoints. Screwtape holds an administrative post in the bureaucracy ("Lowerarchy") of Hell, and acts as a mentor to his nephew Wormwood, an inexperienced (and incompetent) tempter. In the thirty-one letters which constitute the book, Screwtape gives Wormwood detailed advice on various methods of undermining faith and of promoting sin in "the Patient", interspersed with observations on human nature and on Christian doctrine. In Screwtape's advice, individual benefit and greed are seen as the greatest good, and neither demon can comprehend God's love for man or acknowledge human virtue.

http://www.samizdat.qc.ca/arts/lit/PDFs/ScrewtapeLetters_CSL.pdf

The Screwtape Letters - Download

https://www.amazon.com/Screwtape-Letters-C-S-Lewis-ebook/dp/B002BD2V2Y

Forgive me...

Hello OrthodoxyUSA,

Yes, I've read it, more than a couple of times. In fact, if my memory serves me right, it was the third or fourth Christian book I came across several months after I first became a Christian. Reading it basically gave some additional orientation to the way I approach my faith, even now.

I must say, that Wormwood is something else, isn't he? And although I know that Lewis was just using his story line as an analogy, I do see something in the idea that Hell could be run as a kind of bureaucracy; or maybe that there is a bit of hell in each bureaucracy.

Peace,
2PhiloVoid

 

[OrthodoxyUSA]

Hello OrthodoxyUSA,

Yes, I've read it, more than a couple of times. In fact, if my memory serves me right, it was the third or fourth Christian book I came across several months after I first became a Christian. Reading it basically gave some additional orientation to the way I approach my faith, even now.

I must say, that Wormwood is something else, isn't he? And although I know that Lewis was just using his story line as an analogy, I do see something in the idea that Hell could be run as a kind of bureaucracy; or maybe that there is a bit of hell in each bureaucracy.

Peace,
2PhiloVoid

Imagine the paperwork!

Forgive me...

 

[2PhiloVoid]

Imagine the paperwork!

Forgive me...

If that's the case, I guess it'd be true that the devil really is "in the details." Yes, a paperwork hell must be a very hellish place to be, indeed!

 

[2PhiloVoid]

Have you ever read it?
Your thoughts on the Theology embedded?

The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis is a classic masterpiece of religious satire that entertains readers with its sly and ironic portrayal of human life and foibles from the vantage point of Screwtape, a highly placed assistant to "Our Father Below." At once wildly comic, deadly serious, and strikingly original, C.S. Lewis's The Screwtape Letters is the most engaging account of temptation—and triumph over it—ever written.

The Screwtape Letters - Wikipedia
In The Screwtape Letters, C. S. Lewis provides a series of lessons in the importance of taking a deliberate role in Christian faith by portraying a typical human life, with all its temptations and failings, seen from devils' viewpoints. Screwtape holds an administrative post in the bureaucracy ("Lowerarchy") of Hell, and acts as a mentor to his nephew Wormwood, an inexperienced (and incompetent) tempter. In the thirty-one letters which constitute the book, Screwtape gives Wormwood detailed advice on various methods of undermining faith and of promoting sin in "the Patient", interspersed with observations on human nature and on Christian doctrine. In Screwtape's advice, individual benefit and greed are seen as the greatest good, and neither demon can comprehend God's love for man or acknowledge human virtue.

http://www.samizdat.qc.ca/arts/lit/PDFs/ScrewtapeLetters_CSL.pdf

The Screwtape Letters - Download

https://www.amazon.com/Screwtape-Letters-C-S-Lewis-ebook/dp/B002BD2V2Y

Forgive me...

The one thing that really spoke to me in that book wasn't just the theological implications, but also the psychological and familial analysis that was implied.

Specifically in my case, it was Lewis' description through Screwtape about the familial dysfunctions that existed between the Patient and his mother. And it was that one issue alone, described in more than one chapter, that really hit home for me since that story line was much like the one I had with my own mother. I appreciate Lewis' book for just providing that one insight alone. It helped me...

Peace,
2PhiloVoid

 

[Tutorman]

Never read it but would like to one day

A great book as all of his are

 

[Go Braves]

Nope never read it, but that does sound interesting! Nice that you can dl it for free, too.

 

[FredVB]

I have read The Screwtape Letters, when I was younger, possibly a couple of times through. It was interesting and in ways enlightening, and I take seriously the idea that demonic spirit beings are active generally in human affairs. What I find that I would disagree with, though as an imaginative work it is being creative without claim of stating dogmatic truth, is that demonic spirits consume one another for any failures.