So, picking up where chapter one leaves off, Lewis begins chapter two saying that, yes, Atheism is too simple, but so is what he calls Christianity-and-water: the view that says "there is a good God in Heaven and everything is all right - leaving out all the difficult and terrible doctrines about sin and hell and the devil, and the redemption." According to him, these are both children's philosophies. And yet, this childish version of Christianity is not only what many people hold but also what many of the opponents attack. When you try to explain the real doctrines of Christianity to these individuals, they "complain that you are making their heads turn round and that it is all too complicated and that if there really were a God they are sure He would have made 'religion' simple, because simplicity is so beautiful, etc."
But Reality is not simple. It is not neat, not obvious, and not what you expect. Reality is complicated and odd and surprising. In fact, this is one of the reasons Lewis says he believes Christianity because it actually is not neat and simple and not what you would expect or what anyone would have made up. When you really look at it and really examine what Christianity says about the world, about humanity, about the God over it all, "it has just that queer twist about it that real things have."
So he says to put away these children's philosophies and over-simplified answers to the questions we are asking. Neither the problem nor the answer are simple.
But Reality is not simple. It is not neat, not obvious, and not what you expect. Reality is complicated and odd and surprising. In fact, this is one of the reasons Lewis says he believes Christianity because it actually is not neat and simple and not what you would expect or what anyone would have made up. When you really look at it and really examine what Christianity says about the world, about humanity, about the God over it all, "it has just that queer twist about it that real things have."
So he says to put away these children's philosophies and over-simplified answers to the questions we are asking. Neither the problem nor the answer are simple.
The Problem: We have a universe that "contains much that is obviously bad and apparently meaningless" but which also contains "creatures like ourselves who know that it is bad and meaningless."
Lewis says that there are only two possible views that face all the facts of the Problem and provide a consistent and rational answer:
Lewis says the Dualism view cannot actually be the answer to the problem because Good and Evil cannot be on equal footing. It cannot merely be a preference of one over the other because then we ought to "give up talking about good and evil at all. For good means what you ought to prefer quite regardless of what you happen to like at any given moment." If it is not simply a matter of preference or choosing which side you like at a particular moment, then it must mean that one of the powers is Right and the other is Wrong, which takes us back to the Moral Law, the standard by which the two powers are judged, and means that whoever created the Moral Law would actually be the ultimate authority over Good and Evil.
"The same point can be made in a different way. If Dualism is true, then the bad Power must be a being who likes badness for its own sake. But in reality we have no experience of anyone liking badness just because it is bad. The nearest we can get to it is in cruelty. But in real life people are cruel for one of two reasons- either because they are sadists, that is, because they have a sexual perversion which makes cruelty a cause of sensual pleasure to them, or else for the sake of something they are going to get out of it - money, or power, or safety. But pleasure, money, power, and safety are all, as far as they go, good things. The badness consists in pursuing them by the wrong method, or in the wrong way, or too much. I do not mean, of course, that the people who do this are not desperately wicked. I do mean that wickedness, when you examine it, turns out to be the pursuit of some good in the wrong way. You can be good for the mere sake of goodness: you cannot be bad for the mere sake of badness. You can do a kind action when you are not feeling kind and when it gives you no pleasure, simply because kindness is right; but no one ever did a cruel action simply because cruelty is wrong - only because cruelty was pleasant or useful to him. In other words badness cannot succeed even in being bad in the same way in which goodness is good. Goodness is, so to speak, itself: badness is only spoiled goodness. And there must be something good first before it can be spoiled."
These are the reasons Dualism cannot provide the answer. Which leaves us with Christianity. And Lewis admits that Christianity comes very close to Dualism in that there is a battle between Good and Evil. It is just that Christianity is not a war between two independent powers, but rather a civil war, where Evil has rebelled against the Good and now occupies the territory that is the world we live in. Christianity is the story of how the Rightful King entered that Enemy-occupied territory and is calling us all to take part in the battle to restore the Good.
Why is Christianity-and-water such an appealing view?
How has that view helped the cause of Atheism and damaged the reputation of Christianity?
How has that view helped the cause of Atheism and damaged the reputation of Christianity?
*This post is part of a 31 day series on C.S. Lewis' book Mere Christianity. If this is your first stop along the way, I am so glad you’re here! I would love to interact with you in the comments, or you can email me by clicking on the "Contact Me" tab at the top right of the page. All of the blog posts in this series will be linked together on the intro page if you are interested in reading more. Click here to be taken to the introduction post, and if you want to follow along with the whole series, enter your email address in the box toward the top right corner to subscribe to the blog. Thanks for reading!
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