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During the Middle Ages, theology was referred to as the Queen of the Sciences." But more lately it has been in a steady freefall. Just what has been lost? According ot C. S. Lewis, we have lost our map. And that spells trouble.
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God's Map - Theology
September 28, 2008
C. S. Lewis, on the value of theology....
I remember once when I had been giving a talk to the RAF, an old hard-bitten officer got up and said, 'I've no use for all that stuff ! But, mind you, I'm a religious man too. I know there's a God, I've felt him: out alone in the desert at night: the tremendous mystery. And that's just why I don't believe all your neat little dogmas and formulas about Him.
To anyone who's met the real thing, they all seem so petty and pedantic and unreal ! ' "Now in a sense, I quite agreed with that man. I think he had probably had a real experience of God in the desert. And when he turned from that experience to the Christian creeds, I think he really was turning from something real to something less real.
In the same way, if a man has once looked at the Atlantic from the beach, and then goes and looks at a map of the Atlantic, he also will be turning from something real to something less real... But here comes the point. The map is admittedly only colored paper, but there are two things you have to remember about it. In the first place, it is based on what hundreds and thousands of people have found out by sailing the real Atlantic. In that way, it has behind it masses of experience just as real as the one you could have from the beach; only while yours would be a single isolated glimpse, the map fits all those different experiences together.
In the second place, if you want to go anywhere, the map is absolutely necessary. As long as you are content with walks along the beach, your own glimpses are far more fun that looking at a map. But the map is going to be of far more use than walks on the beach if you want to get to America.
Now Theology is like a map. Merely learning and thinking about Christian doctrines, if you stop there, is less real and less exciting than the sort of thing my friend got in the desert. Doctrines are not God: they are only a kind of map. But that map is based on hundreds of people who really were in touch with God - experiences compared with which any thrills or pious feelings you and I are likely to get on our own are very elementary and very confused.
And secondly, if you want to get any further, you must use the map. ...In fact, that is just why a vague religion - all about feeling God in nature, and so on - is so attractive. It is all thrills and no work: like watching the waves from the beach. But you will not get to Newfoundland by studying the Atlantic that way, and you will not get eternal life by simply feeling the presence of God in flowers or music. Neither will you get anywhere by looking at maps without going to sea, nor will you be very safe if you go to sea without a map. C.S. Lewis MERE CHRISTIANITY
I remember once when I had been giving a talk to the RAF, an old hard-bitten officer got up and said, 'I've no use for all that stuff ! But, mind you, I'm a religious man too. I know there's a God, I've felt him: out alone in the desert at night: the tremendous mystery. And that's just why I don't believe all your neat little dogmas and formulas about Him.
To anyone who's met the real thing, they all seem so petty and pedantic and unreal ! ' "Now in a sense, I quite agreed with that man. I think he had probably had a real experience of God in the desert. And when he turned from that experience to the Christian creeds, I think he really was turning from something real to something less real.
In the same way, if a man has once looked at the Atlantic from the beach, and then goes and looks at a map of the Atlantic, he also will be turning from something real to something less real... But here comes the point. The map is admittedly only colored paper, but there are two things you have to remember about it. In the first place, it is based on what hundreds and thousands of people have found out by sailing the real Atlantic. In that way, it has behind it masses of experience just as real as the one you could have from the beach; only while yours would be a single isolated glimpse, the map fits all those different experiences together.
In the second place, if you want to go anywhere, the map is absolutely necessary. As long as you are content with walks along the beach, your own glimpses are far more fun that looking at a map. But the map is going to be of far more use than walks on the beach if you want to get to America.
Now Theology is like a map. Merely learning and thinking about Christian doctrines, if you stop there, is less real and less exciting than the sort of thing my friend got in the desert. Doctrines are not God: they are only a kind of map. But that map is based on hundreds of people who really were in touch with God - experiences compared with which any thrills or pious feelings you and I are likely to get on our own are very elementary and very confused.
And secondly, if you want to get any further, you must use the map. ...In fact, that is just why a vague religion - all about feeling God in nature, and so on - is so attractive. It is all thrills and no work: like watching the waves from the beach. But you will not get to Newfoundland by studying the Atlantic that way, and you will not get eternal life by simply feeling the presence of God in flowers or music. Neither will you get anywhere by looking at maps without going to sea, nor will you be very safe if you go to sea without a map. C.S. Lewis MERE CHRISTIANITY
