Colin Curtis "Myth Became Fact" Blog 1

In CS Lewis' essay "Myth Became Fact" he makes a brilliant defense against a claim by a man named
Corineus who claimed that Christians today are merely nominal by nature, and have dropped the "barbaric" doctrines that true Christians have held in the past. I appreciated the fact that in his defense of this claim, Lewis chose to analyze the similarities and differences of myths and facts, and how in Christianity, myth became fact when Jesus died on the cross and then rose again, three days later. For this blog post, I selected a few excerpts from the essay, and will offer my analysis on the writing and points being made.

"Obstinacies of this sort are interesting. 'Why not cut the cord?' asks Corineus. 'Everything would be much easier if you would free your thought from this vestigial mythology. To be sure: far easier."

Corineus is not making a revolutionary or original argument here. I believe he's assaulting true Christianity because he doesn't fully understand true Christianity. Biblical Christianity isn't supposed to be easy. Jesus never promised lives of comfort, security, or convenience to the people who decided to follow him. He said that "In this world you will have trouble," (John 16:33) and "If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first." (John 15:18) Therefore, if Corineus is looking for a watered down, prosperity-centered theology, he won't find it in true Christianity. It's just a shame that he wasn't alive to hear a Joel Osteen sermon. They would have gotten along splendidly. 


"Corineus wants us to move with the times. Now, we know where times move. They move away. But in religion we find something that does not move away. It is what Corineus calls the myth, that abides; it is what he calls the modern and living thought that moves away."

I absolutely agree with Lewis on this point, and scripture backs him up. Hebrews 13:8 says that "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever," and having the mindset that Corineus did of wanting the constant ebb and flow of secular culture to shape our worldview and theology is a dangerous one. Even throughout my limited ministry experience, one of the most dangerous things I've seen is when people have their beliefs and then look to particular passages of the Bible to back it up, instead of letting the Bible as a whole define and dictate their beliefs.

 "The myth (to speak his language) has outlived the thoughts of all its defenders and of all its adversaries. It is the myth that gives life"

I just loved this sentence. Christianity has survived and thrived against unspeakable odds in places all over the world, and yet it still remains to be the myth (and fact) that gives so many people "abundant life." (John 10:10)


 "When we translate we get abstraction -- or rather, dozens of abstractions. What flows into you from the myth is not truth but reality (truth is always about something, but reality is that about which truth is), and, therefore, every myth becomes the father of innumerable truths on the abstract level"

I appreciate the fact that Lewis made a distinction between truth and reality here. I don't necessarily agree with this concept, but it certainly made me pause and reflect for awhile. The only way I can seem to grasp it is by realizing that we can't conjure up images of reality. Reality just is; it's all we know. However, we can absolutely focus in on certain unavoidable truths.

 

'By becoming fact it does not cease to be myth: that is the miracle."

This seems to be Lewis' main point, that myth and fact are indeed intertwined. I remember from a class long ago that the common understanding of myth, as humans see it today, is a made up story of sorts, sometimes with a moral lesson involved. But this greater, more accurate definition of myth involves truth and fact, which makes Christianity the greatest myth of all time.

"A man who disbelieved the Christian story as fact but continually fed on it as myth would, perhaps, be more spiritually alive than one who assented and did not think much about it."

This is my only real disagreement with Lewis' essay. I believe that both men in this scenario would be "spiritually dead," simply because there are no levels of spiritual life, at least not in the Biblical sense. You are either alive, and made new in Christ, or dead, and separated from God. There is no middle ground, which seems to be both of these men in this scenario. Overall though, I found this to be a brilliant and interesting essay.