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Astrological and Other Images of Divinity in the Fantasies of CS Lewis

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Astrological and Other Images of Divinity in the Fantasies of CS Lewis Volume 7 Number 3 Article 10 10-15-1980 The Host of Heaven: Astrological and Other Images of Divinity in the Fantasies of C.S. Lewis (Part 1) Nancy-Lou Patterson Follow this and additional works at: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore Part of the Children's and Young Adult Literature Commons Recommended Citation Patterson, Nancy-Lou (1980) "The Host of Heaven: Astrological and Other Images of Divinity in the Fantasies of C.S. Lewis (Part 1)," Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature: Vol. 7 : No. 3 , Article 10. Available at: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore/vol7/iss3/10 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Mythopoeic Society at SWOSU Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature by an authorized editor of SWOSU Digital Commons. An ADA compliant document is available upon request. For more information, please contact [email protected]. To join the Mythopoeic Society go to: http://www.mythsoc.org/join.htm Mythcon 51: A VIRTUAL “HALFLING” MYTHCON July 31 - August 1, 2021 (Saturday and Sunday) http://www.mythsoc.org/mythcon/mythcon-51.htm Mythcon 52: The Mythic, the Fantastic, and the Alien Albuquerque, New Mexico; July 29 - August 1, 2022 http://www.mythsoc.org/mythcon/mythcon-52.htm Abstract Study of the astrological symbolism present in Lewis’s fantasies. Part 1 covers the Space Trilogy. Additional Keywords Lewis, C.S. Space Trilogy—Astrological symbolism; Lewis, C.S. Space Trilogy—Symbolism of divinity; Nancy-Lou Patterson This article is available in Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore/vol7/iss3/10 THE HOST OF HEAVENASTROLOGICAL AND OTHER IMAGESOF DIVINITY IN THE FANTASIESOF C.S. LEWISPART I NANCY-LOU PATTERSON "I wouldn't have felt very safe with is a huge ball of flaming g a s ." Bacchus and all his wild girls if we'd met "Even in your world, my son, that is them without Aslan." not what a star is but what it is made of."2 "I should think not," said Lucy. In the Medieval world there were only five plan­ C.S. Lewis, Prince Caspian ets, as we define planets, but with the sun and moon they made seven: Moon-Mercury-Venus-Sun-Mars- The sources from which C.S. Lewis took the Jupiter-Satum . Each rolled m ajestically about m otifs of his fantasies included Mesopotamian, the central Earth on transparent globes revolving Greek, Roman, and Norse mythology, as they are one within the other. Outside of these was the filtered through Medieval Christian culture. He Stellatum3 where the fixed stars dwelt, and out­ has thus used the Western past as a deep well side of that was the Primum Mobile. Of the exact from which to draw m otifs as he needs them, position of earth in this model, Lewis says, "the dipping from level to level as he chooses. earth is really the centre, really the lowest place; movement to it from whatever direction is The fantasies of C.S. Lewis can be divided a downward movement.:4 In his pithiest expres­ into three parts. First is the interplanetary sion of this model he says, "The Medieval Model trilogy: Out of the Silent Planet (1938), w h ic h is vertiginous."5 takes place on Mars; Perelandra (1943), w h ic h takes place on Venus; and That Hideous Strength. The life attributed to the stars by Med­ (1945) which takes place on Earth. Second are ieval thinkers came from their origins: "planets the Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, . had, after all, been the hardiest of the and the Wardrobe (1950); Prince Caspian (195lT; pagan gods," as Lewis says,6 but "They were The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (1952); The planets as well as gods."7 As planets, they exer­ Silver Chair (1953); The Horse and His Boy (1954); cised an effect, called technically an "influ-' The M agician's Nephew (1955); and The Last ence," upon the earth and its inhabitants. This Battle (1956). Third and last is the novel, Till effect is precisely the subject matter of astro­ We Have Faces (1956), which takes place in the logy. Lewis explains, "Astrology is not speci­ kingdom of Glome. Narnia is an alternative fically medieval. The Middle Ages inherited it world to Earth, but Earth is part of its story; from 'antiquity and bequeathed it to the Renais­ Glome is a barbaric, kingdom not too distant from sance."8 Its basic principle was not in doubt. ancient Greece. "Orthodox theologians could accept the theory that the planets had an effect on events and on I have not included The Screwtape Letters psychology, and, much more, on plants and ani­ and The Great Divorce, . which deal with infernal mals."9 The problem lay elsewhere: what the and supernal themes, because they are not quite church fought against was: 1) the "practice of of the same genre, though they do contain a nar­ astrologically grounded predictions;" 2)"astro­ rative element. The eleven works listed above logical determinism. The doctrine of influences are clearly stories, and all of them draw upon carried so far as to exclude free w ill;"10 and 3) the wellsprings of Western mythology. They do "the'w orship of planets."11 this, as I have said, in the Medieval manner, fitting the pre-Christian mythologies of northern The origin of these proscriptions is of. and southern Europe and the Near East into the course the Bible, where again and again God's rand structure of Christianity as sculptural people were called to account for having "wor­ getails are fitted into a Gothic cathedral. shipped all the host of heaven." (II Kings 17:16 and 21:3) Jeremiah had complained of his people: I. The Fields of Arbol "they have burned incense unto all the host of heaven, and have poured out drink offerings unto "Medieval thinkers," Lewis wrote in The Dis­ other gods." (Jeremiah 19:13) in Deuteronomy God carded Image (1964), "attributed life and even explains His ways to Moses: "Ye saw no manner of intelligence to one privileged class of objects sim ilitude on the day that the LORD spake unto (the stars) which we hold to be inorganic."1 This you in Horeb out of the midst of the fire.” (Deut­ attitude may be contrasted with the one most in eronomy 4:15) He has not shown Himself in v isi­ favour today, expressed in the following conversa­ ble form, God says, "lest thou lift thine eyes tion from The Voyage of the Dawn Treader: unto heaven, and when thou seest the sun, and the moon, and the stars, even a ll the host of heaven, "In our world," said Eustace, "a star shouldst be driven to worship them, and serve them." (Deuteronomy 4:19) 19 lonians to pass from "empirical observations, VENUS intended chiefly to indicate omens"17 to some- thing more nearly'approaching " scientifijgastron- omy." They knew "seven principal stars"18 of which five were distinguished by them as planets: the Moon, the Sun, Jupiter, Venus, Saturn, Mer­ cury, Mars (the sarte group recognized by Medieval writers). This list has an heirarchical rather that an astronomical order: "Jupiter, or Marduk, is put at the head of the five planets, because Marduk is the principal god. of Babylon."19 It is, as Cumont puts it, "the peculiar distinction of the Chaldeans that they made religion profit by these new conceptions."20 Paleolithic people had been able to keep accurate records of lunar phases by carving tally marks in bone;21 the builders of Stonehenge had constructed an observatory capable of pre­ dicting both lunar and solar movements, some authorities believe.22 With their long history of astronomical observations and their lunisolar calendar, the Chaldeans could predict a wide range of celestial phenomena, and since these elegant patterns traced on the pristine sky were to them the doings of high divinities, it became possible to predict the ways of the gods to men. Jupiter was the foremost god, Marduk. Venus was Ishtar, that lady whose very name means "Star." Saturn was Ninib, Mercury was Nebo, and Mars was Nergal, the god of war. "This astral relig­ ion," as Cumont calls it, had become established in the sixth century BC during the second Baby­ lonian Empire , and one of its primary features The. most attractive members of the heavenly was the concept of Necessity, for the divine host besides the Sun and Moon were those whose stars demonstrably repeated themselves in an graceful dance assumed so elaborate a patterns endless and fixated dance. The god An (Anu) the planets. Franz Cumont in his classic work whose name means "Above" was represented picto- Astrology and Religion Among the Greeks and graphically by a star.23 Upon this basis, the Romans (1912) gives the history of planetary names of all divinities came to include in the association most succinctly by saying that "the cuneiform versions an element derived from this names of the planets which we employ to-day, are star sign. Phyllis Ackerman derives the god An an English translation of a Latin translation of himself from the Polar Star. a Greek translation of a Babylonian nomenclature." Lewis added to this sequence, their names in Old This "sidereal cult" as Cumont calls it, was Solar: I am referring to his wonderful inventions foreign to Greeks and to Romans: Aristophanes re­ in the interplanetary trilogy, especially as they marked that the barbarians sacrificed to Sun and make th eir appearance in That Hideous Strength: Moon while Greeks addressed personal divini-' V iritrilb ia (Mercury); Perelandra (Venus); Mala- ties.24 Nevertheless, "the common people" regard­ candra (Mars); Thulcandra (Earth); Glund (Saturn); ed the stars as living beings.
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