Thursday, September 2, 2010
Aslan/Christ Comparisons?
During the discussion in class on Wednesday Randy's (Prof Jensen) comment about how The Lion, Witch and the Wardrobe does not particularly portray the humanity of the Christ figure (Aslan) well. That got me thinking and no, I do not think that The Lion, Witch and the Wardrobe necessarily portrays the humanity of the Christ figure in Narnia (Lewis' conjured world with the Christian story in the fantasy world's context) as Christ lived his life on earth. However, I got to thinking and I wonder how well the Bible portrays Christ's humanity. Now I believe Christ was fully human and fully God, but from the stories the bible emphasizes Christ does not seem like a run of the mill human being. At age 12 he was teaching the religious leaders, he turned five loaves and two fish into a meal for five thousand, walked on water and rose from the dead. In my opinion, the average reader of the bible would not see Christ's humanity, they would have to read deeper into the text to see his dual essence. This left me with a few questions, why would God not want Christ's humanity to be more evident in the Gospels? Am I wrong to say that most people when reading the bible could have a hard time grasping Christ's humanity? I know that I do. If so, why would God desire for the bible to be written that way? Finally, how could Lewis best portray his Christ figure in another setting so that his audience would perceive Christ as would pay the Almighty his best respect and honor?
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The creeds teach that Jesus is one person who is fully human and fully God. That is indeed a mystery. Perhaps it's not surprising that theological battles and sometimes real ones have been fought over this doctrine and how to understand it. My own humble opinion is that we will all tend to lean in one direction or the other, either seeing Jesus as God but not *really* human or as a human being who isn't *really* God. We need to resist both these tendencies. I think Scripture helps us to do this. Yes, as you point out, there are passages that show us Jesus is no ordinary human being. But I think there are passages that show he *is* a human being: he gets tired, he gets angry, he sleeps, he weeps, he wants to be alone, and so on. So, at the end of the day, I guess I think his humanity is evident in the Gospels.
ReplyDeleteI do have to confess that the idea of the Incarnation--the astonishing claim that God became one of us, that he spent time living the life of a creature, that he made that kind of sacrifice so that he could know us and save us--is a big part of what makes Christianity attractive to me. Yes, God is magnificently transcendent, but as Philippians 2 reminds us he emptied himself and become one of us.