C. S. Lewis, The Discarded Image: An Introduction to Medieval and Renaissance Literature

Cambridge Publishing, 1964, 231 pgs.

Summary: Lewis gave a series of lectures at Oxford on the cosmological model or the understanding of reality as it was generally understood in the Medieval and Renaissance period. The textual source of the model was the Bible and classical sources synthesized into a single mostly non-contradictory system. Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, and the others all participated in building the model through the writings of men like Pseudo-Dionysius (c. 500) and Boethius (c. 480-524). Lewis defends the later two as Christian writers.

It must be stressed that the model is not anthropocentric or even Terra centric if correctly understood. Instead the model was “anthropoperipheral.” “Earth is in fact the ‘offsourings of creation’, the cosmic dust-bin” (63). The weighty and the gross, the dross, descends to the center: in the intelligible universe, “the Earth is the rim, the outside edge where being falls on the border of nonentity (116). The earth was widely understood as round and insignificant “as a mathematical point—puncti habere rationem” (83) through the work of Boethius.

It is of particular concern to Lewis that the reader understand not only the model of the medieval period but of modernity. Lewis believes that the modern model is a spoilt model in the sense of arrogance and ignorance of the past. It provides a hermeneutic which keeps the reader from enjoying the full richness of the Medieval and Renaissance works. Throughout The Discarded Image he offers an illustrations of the two models:  “In modern, that is, in evolutionary, thought Man stands at the top of stair whose foot is lost in obscurity; in this, he stands at the bottom of a stair whose top  is invisible with light” (74-75).

The difference is something like this: the modern man is in the process of becoming something better, but the medieval person was journeying towards someone better. The modern man looks into the heavens as if the universe were infinite; medieval man’s universe was “unimaginably large, was also unambiguously finite. And one unexpected result of this is to make the smallness of the Earth more vividly felt” (99). The modern man feels the angst of potential chaos and meaninglessness, but the medieval man found a well-ordered and stable model. In the older model the “human imagination has seldom had before it an object so sublimely ordered as the medieval cosmos” (121).

A further difference is in the issue of the human past; modernity, and to a lesser degree post-modernity, turns on what Lewis calls “Historicism: the belief that by studying the past we can learn not only historical but metahistorical or transcendental truth” (174-175). The modern turns to history to discover the process by which we are becoming. He judges the past as muted and lesser. The medieval man turned to history to see himself actualized to his full potential:

Medieval and nineteenth century man agreed that their present was no very admirable age; not to be compared (said one) with the glory that was, not to be compared (said the other) with the glory that is still to come. The odd thing is that the first view seems to have bred on the whole a more cheerful temper” (184-185).

Lewis closes with a brief consideration as to why the medieval model passed away; and his answer is extremely important for Christians to grasp:

There is no question here of the old Model’s being shattered by an inrush of new phenomena. The truth would seem to be the reverse; that when changes in the human mind produce a sufficient disrelish of the old Model and a sufficient hankering for some new one, phenomena to support the new one will obediently turn up. . .The new Model will not be set up without evidence, but the evidence will turn up when the inner need for it becomes sufficiently great. It will be true evidence. But nature gives most of her evidence in answers to questions we ask her. (221-223).

The basic and most fundamental change between the modern model and the older model was an issue of axiomatic truth. (The difficultly with axioms is that they are considered self-evident truths from which we infer other truths. They are defendable, but rarely provable.) When the axiom moved from “‘all perfect things precede all imperfect things’ to one in which it is axiomatic that ‘the starting point (Entwicklungsgrund) is always lower than what is developed’. . .” (220) then the old was replaced with the new.

Lewis’ cosmological plea concludes with this: “I am only suggesting considerations that may induce us to regard all Models in the right way, respecting each and idolising none. . . We can no longer dismiss the change of Models as a simple progress from error to truth. No Model is a catalogue of ultimate realities, and none is mere fantasy” (222).

Benefits: Any reader attempting to understand the contributions of Medieval and Renaissance literature (art, science, theology, and philosophy) will find this a helpful guide in defining the model behind the inferences.

As an example of assisting in reading the primary source documents, some of the Renaissance theologians will strike out against Epicureanism by saying that man is a microcosm or world in and of himself. This bizarre statement to modern minds is explained on two cosmological issues: the first is that humans have all three forms of being according to Gregory the Great (540-604),“because man has existence (esse) in common with stones, life with trees, and understanding (discernere) with angels, he is rightly called by the name of the world” (153). The second is that the human beings includes the “four contraries” which “combine to form the elements—fire, air, water, earth” (169). Humans are a microcosm of the world, because we have all the possible elements of being within ourselves.

I believe that it is extremely important that Christians begin to address modern cosmology as a possible description of reality and the hermeneutical outcomes (textual and scientific). Further, we must pound away at the false narrative of the march of truth created by the Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment propaganda.

Detriments: Lewis is a subtle thinker and some of his comments about history, story, and myth seem to work out in his other works as undermining the inspiration of Scripture. I don’t believe this is a necessary element of his wider teaching on cosmology. I am still trying to grasp if Lewis is using his understanding of story/history/true myth as an apologetic device to speak to the “prevalent psychology of [our] age” (222) or a personal conviction on his part. Regardless, I think his view is a dangerous misstep.

On the issue of cosmology, the Christian thinker must have some privileged elements within whatever cosmology with which he conceptualizes the universe to remain Christian. These elements must include the existence of God and the bare fundamentals of the faith, including the veracity of Scripture. The privileged elements or revealed elements require that a cosmology which fundamentally denies the Christian faith must be repulsed.

The axiom “the starting point (Entwicklungsgrund) is always lower than what is developed” excludes the possibility of Christianity. It requires either that God is evolving with the universe or that there is no God. While many of the descriptive elements of modern cosmology may be accepted by Christians, the axiomatic foundation and its corrosive effects must be guarded against. Due respect of modern cosmology ought to include an appreciation of the destructive nature against the faith and its technological advancements.

I love Lewis dearly, yet too often I find in his handling of Scripture the hermeneutic “the starting point is always lower than what is developed.” There are occasional flashes against this sort of thing—his heart likely believes better than what he understands, but let the reader enjoy and learn from Lewis with an appropriate degree of caution.