This book brings together Lewis's legendary radio broadcast talks in which he set out simply "to explain and defend the belief that has been common to nearly all Christians at all times". Mere Christianity. By Brandon Toropov. Beyond Mere Christianity - C. Lewis in fresh ways for a new The basictruths of the Christian faith cannot be separated from the wholeness of the Church.
Skip to content. Lewis's modern spiritual classic Mere Christianity, C. Lewis's eloquent and winsome defense of the Christian faith, originated as a series of BBC radio talks broadcast during the dark days of World War Two.
George Marsden describes how Lewis gradually went from being an atheist to a committed Anglican—famously converting to Christianity in after conversing into the night with his friends J. Tolkien and Hugh Dyson—and how Lewis delivered his wartime talks to a traumatized British nation in the midst of an all-out war for survival.
Marsden recounts how versions of those talks were collected together in under the title Mere Christianity, and how the book went on to become one of the most widely read presentations of essential Christianity ever published, particularly among American evangelicals. He examines its role in the conversion experiences of such figures as Charles Colson, who read the book while facing arrest for his role in the Watergate scandal.
Marsden explores its relationship with Lewis's Narnia books and other writings, and explains why Lewis's plainspoken case for Christianity continues to have its critics and ardent admirers to this day. With uncommon clarity and grace, Marsden provides invaluable new insights into this modern spiritual classic. Lewis's Mere Christianity is a perfect example of one of the most effective aspects of critical thinking skills: the use of reasoning to build a strong, logical argument.
Lewis originally wrote the book as a series of radio talks given from , at the height of World War II. The talks were designed to lay out the most basic tenets of Christianity for listeners, and to use these to make a logical argument for Christian belief and Christian ethics. While Lewis was not an academically-trained theologian or philosopher specializing instead in literature , his own experience of converting from atheism to Christianity, along with his wide reading and incisive questioning, power a charming but persuasive argument for his own beliefs.
Whether or not one agrees with Lewis's arguments or shares his faith, Mere Christianity exemplifies one of the most useful aspects of good reasoning: accessibility. When using reasoning to construct a convincing argument, it is crucial that your audience follow you, and Lewis was a master at constructing well-organised arguments that are immediately understandable to readers.
The beautifully written Mere Christianity is a masterclass in cogently walking an audience through an elegant and well thought-through piece of reasoning. Sample Key Takeaways: 1 People quarrel over many things, but quarrels always involve one party trying to prove the other wrong.
They almost always appeal to a set of inherent rules that everyone implicitly knows about human behavior. These rules make up the Law of Human Nature. However, unlike gravity, humans do not need to obey this law. Rejecting the boundaries that divide Christianity's many denominations, "Mere Christianity" is Lewis's term for the essential Christian message--the theological core on which diverse Christian traditions can stand together.
Lewis influential work. The second reason. In The Abolition of Man2, C. Lewis basically exposes the theory about the subjectivism of value of judgments. It contains three books based on a story from an English textbook where the authors create allusion from reality and personal emotions. Content In the first part of his book, C. Lewis covers the area of Human nature when it comes to right and wrong.
Moral Law, he says, is not a herd instinct He also disagrees that it is not a social or human convention. It is rather what convinces us to do what we should instead of our desire to do or not to do something. In the third part, he establishes the reality of the law. In fact, he contrasts the law of 1 C. The fourth part of the first book presents two views when it comes to the universe. The first one pretends that the universe would be the result of a hazardous event.
It is the materialist view. This view is based the predominance of matter and space and is more scientifically explanative. Because some people would think that man is the result of the purposiveness of a Life-Force, Lewis questions if that should be something with a mind or not. If it has a mind, he calls it a God. Finally, he attempts to explain morality as related to religion, especially Christianity with components such as unselfishness, courage, good faith, honesty… In the second book, he covers the Christian beliefs.
He first approaches the different views about whether there is a God or not and admits that Christians join with the majority that believe God does exists. Further, he establishes a subdivision about the conceptions of God.
Pantheists think the whole universe is actually God. On the other hand, Christians believe that God indeed created the universe and is maintaining it. Lewis argues that having a sense of injustice is a means that justice is possible. In chapter two of the second book, he points the reality of good and bad in the world.
He defends that Christianity believes that we are living in a world that has gone bad, but we know that it ought to have been going in a good manner. And, the Dualism view, believes that the world is the battlefield of two equal powers, good and bad, fighting endlessly Christianity agrees with Dualism that this universe is at war Because man had free will, they could choose from good and bad even though God told them what they should not do.
Then God would leave them conscience, the sense of right and wrong, then sent human race to what Lewis calls good dreams giving new life to men from death , and finally choose a people to rescue mankind. Jesus is the final alternative. The fourth part reflects on the deity of Jesus. He continues to suggest that the good from Christians is different to other religions and other people who are trying to be good in the sense that when they are well behaving it basically comes from the Christ-life inside them.
It is a set of twelve chapters. Morality seems to be concerned with harmony between individuals, harmonizing things inside each individual and the general purpose of human life. All civilized people recognize them. Chapter four, Lewis compares Christian morality to psychoanalysis. Psychoanalysis, on the other hand, is medical theories and technique, and the general philosophical view of the world which Freud and others have gone on to add to his He relates the perversion of the sex instinct and advices others to be willing to be cured from such disease.
He cites three misunderstandings about sex: the warped natures is coercing that the desires are natural and reasonable, that chastity is impossible, that repressing sex is dangerous which is not suppressing sexual feelings. In chapter six, he tends to address the morality issue in a more positive angle: Christian marriage.
Marriage is therefore for life even though other churches admit divorce. Lewis sees marriage in the light of justice because he argues that it includes the keeping of promises. He explains that loving enemies does not mean that they are nice people. Although he might love an enemy, Lewis does not have any problem to let an enemy purge a punishment for justice. He is fine with army killing or a Christian judge sentence a man to death. The author states that pride is essentially competitive; yet, it can be only by accident.
Pride also means enmity between man and man, and to God. He says that pride is a spiritual cancer and can avoid love and contentment. In chapter nine to twelve, he completes the first four major virtues Cardinal virtues he spoke about in chapter two.
The three theological virtues are Faith, Hope and Charity Lewis criticizes this process because he thinks the authors did it because literary criticism is difficult, and that bad treatment of some basic human emotion is bad literature and therefore literacy criticism is a very hard thing to do3.
Secondly, maybe the authors truly misunderstood the pressing educational need of the moment, and thirdly, they might be ready to admit that a good education should build some sentiments while destroying others. Many thinkers shared the tendency of the Chinese concept of Tao that is the reality beyond all predicates. This approach is based on the presupposition that certain attitudes are really true and others false. This is called doctrine of objective value Such doctrine makes of man the realm of all values.
Lewis agrees that the problem of evil the Dark Power is a result of man created with free will. Free will has been a tough topic when it comes to understanding that God had a foreknowledge of the Dark Power as eventual part of universe at certain part.
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