Creation

Miracles 4.15 "I do not maintain that God's creation of Nature can be proved as rigorously as God's existence, but it seems to me overwhelmingly probable, so probable that no one who approaches the question with an open mind would very seriously entertain any other hypothesis."

No philosophical theory which I have yet come across is a radical improvement on the words of Genesis, that 'In the beginning God made Heaven and Earth'. //Miracles//, Chapter 3, last paragraph

Creation seems to be delegation through and through. He will do nothing simply of Himself which can be done by creatures. I suppose this is because He is a giver. And He has nothing to give but Himself. And to give Himself is to do His deeds--in a sense, and on varying levels to be Himself--through the things He has made. //Letters to Malcolm//, chapter 13, 3rd paragraph from the end

It is not easy to understand this doctrine, but we may note that it does not fall into the heresy against which the doctrine of 'creation out of nothing' was intended to guard. That doctrine was directed against dualism--against the idea that God was not the sole origin of things, but found Himself from the beginning faced with something other than Himself. This Milton does not believe: if he has erred he has erred by flying too far from it, and believing that God made the world 'out of Himself'. And this view must in a certain sense be accepted by all Theists: in the sense that the world was modelled on an idea existing in God's mind, that God invented matter, that (salva reverentia) He 'thought of' matter as Dickens 'thought of' Mr. Pickwick. From that point of view it could be said that God 'contained' matter as Shakespeare 'contained' Hamlet. In fact, if Milton had been content to say that God 'virtually contains' matter, as the poet the poem or the feet swiftness, he would (I believe) have been orthodox. When he goes on to add 'essentially' he probably means something heretical (though I do not clearly understand what) and this something presumably appears in Paradise Lost, v, 403 and following--a fugitive colour on the poem which we detect only by the aid of external evidence from the De Doctrina.

Perhaps it will be useful to mention here--though it would concern me more closely if my subject were Paradise Regained--what Professor Saurat believes about Milton's presentation of the Redemption. Professor Saurat says (p. 177) that the Crucifixion plays 'no noticeable part' in the poet's theology and that 'vicarious atonement is no Miltonic conception' (p. 178). But it is precisely the scheme of vicarious atonement in its strictest Anselmic form which the Father propounds in P. L. III (210 et seq.) and which the Son accepts--'On Mee let thine Anger fall... account me Man' (III, 137). Michael explains the whole matter to Adam in forensic terms. Christ will save Man 'by suffering Death, The penaltie to thy transgression due' (XII, 398): 'Thy punishment Hee shall endure' (ibid. 404). His 'imputed' merits will save human beings (409). He will 'nail' our enemies 'to the cross' (415) and pay our 'ransom' (424). What could Milton have done, which he has not done, to forestall Professor Saurat's criticism? Even in Paradise Regained it is only Eden-not Heaven--that Christ raises in the wilderness (Regained, 1, 7). The perfect manhood which Adam lost is there matured in conflict with Satan; in that sense Eden, or Paradise, the state of perfection, is 'regained'. But all the vicarious atonement is still to be carried out: that is why we hear so little of it in the poem. The temptation is merely 'exercise' (I, 156) and 'rudiments' (1,157) preparatory to the work of redemption, and different from it in kind, because in the wilderness Christ merely conquers Satan's 'sollicitations' (1,152) Whereas in the crucifixion He conquers 'all his vast force' (I, 153). Hence at the end of the poem the Angelic chorus bid Christ 'now enter' on His true task and 'begin' to save Mankind (IV, 634). Satan's 'moral defeat' has been achieved, his actual defeat is still to come. If the analogy is allowable, Milton has described the enfances and knighting of the Hero, and has really made it quite clear that the dragon-slaying is not part of his subject. It may, of course, be asked why Milton did not write a poem on the Crucifixion. For my own part, I think the answer is that he had more sense. But why should such a question be raised? A man is not under a contract to write every poem we happen to think suitable for him. //A Preface to Paradise Lost//, Chapter 12, paragraph 13

All our language about such things, that of the theologian as well as that of the child, is crude. The real point is that the myths, even in their own terms, do not reach the idea of Creation in our sense at all. Things "come up out of" something or "are formed in" something. If the stories could, for the moment, be supposed true, they would still be stories about very early events in a process of development, a world-history, which was already going on. When the curtain rises in these myths there are always some "properties" already on the stage and some sort of drama is proceeding. You may say they answer the question "How did the play begin?" But that is an ambiguous question. Asked by the man who arrived ten minutes late it would be properly answered, say, with the words, "Oh, first three witches came in, and then there was a scene between an old king and a wounded soldier." That is the sort of question the myths are in fact answering. But the very different question: "How does a play originate? Does it write itself? Do the actors make it up as they go along? Or is there someone--not on the stage, not like the people on the stage--someone we don't see who invented it all and caused it to be?" This is rarely asked or answered.

We do of course find in Plato a clear Theology of Creation in the Judaic and Christian sense; the whole universe--the very conditions of time and space under which it exists--are produced by the will of a perfect, timeless, unconditioned God who is above and outside all that He makes. But this is an amazing leap (though not made without the help of Him who is the Father of lights) by an overwhelming theological genius; it is not ordinary Pagan religion.

Now we all understand of course the importance of this peculiarity in Judaic thought from a strictly and obviously religious point of view. But its total consequences, the ways in which it changes a man's whole mind and imagination, might escape us.

To say that God created Nature, while it brings God and Nature into relation, also separates them. What makes and what is made must be two, not one. Thus the doctrine of Creation in one sense empties Nature of divinity. How very hard this was to do and, still more, to keep on doing, we do not now easily realise. A passage from //Job// (not without its own wild poetry in it) may help us: "if I beheld the sun when it shined, or the moon walking in brightness; and my heart hath been secretly enticed, or my mouth kissed my hand; this also would be an iniquity" (31, 26-28). There is here no question of turning, in a time of desperate need, to devilish gods. The speaker is obviously referring to an utterly spontaneous impulse, a thing you might find yourself acting upon almost unawares. To pay some reverence to the sun or moon is apparently so natural; so apparently innocent. Perhaps in certain times and places it was really innocent. I would gladly believe that the gesture of homage offered to the moon was sometimes accepted by her Maker; in those times of ignorance which God "winked at" (Acts 17, 30). The author of Job, however, was not in that ignorance. If he had kissed his hand to the Moon it would have been iniquity. The impulse was a temptation; one which no European has felt for the last thousand years.

But in another sense the same doctrine which empties Nature of her divinity also makes her an index, a symbol, a manifestation, of the Divine. I must recall two passages quoted in an earlier chapter. One is that from Psalm 19 where the searching and cleansing sun becomes an image of the searching and cleansing Law. The other is from 36: "Thy mercy, O Lord, reacheth unto the heavens, and thy faithfulness unto the clouds. Thy righteousness standeth like the strong mountains, thy judgements are like the great deep" (5, 6). It is surely just because the natural objects are no longer taken to be themselves Divine that they can now be magnificent symbols of Divinity. There is little point in comparing a Sun-god with the Sun or Neptune with the great deep; there is much in comparing the Law with the Sun or saying that God's judgements are an abyss and a mystery like the sea.

//Reflections on the Psalms//, Chapter 8, paragraphs 5 –9

But the most surprising result of all is still to be mentioned. I said that the Jews, like nearly all the ancients, were agricultural and approached Nature with a gardener's and a farmer's interest, concerned with rain, with grass "for the service of man", wine to cheer man up and olive-oil to make his face shine--to make it look, as Homer says somewhere, like a peeled onion (104, 14, 15). But we find them led on beyond this. Their gusto, or even gratitude, embraces things that are no use to man. In the great Psalm especially devoted to Nature, from which I have just quoted (104), we have not only the useful cattle, the cheering vine, and the nourishing corn, we have springs where the wild asses quench their thirst (11), fir trees for the storks (17), hill country for the wild goats and "conies" (perhaps marmots, 18), finally even the lions (21); and even with a glance far out to sea, where no Jew willingly went, the great whales playing, enjoying themselves (26). //Reflections on the Psalms//, Chapter 8, paragraph 13

The Lion, whose eyes never blinked, stared at the animals as hard as if he was going to burn them up with his mere stare. And gradually a change came over them. The smaller ones--the rabbits, moles and such-like--grew a good deal larger. The very big ones--you noticed it most with the elephants--grew a little smaller. Many animals sat up on their hind legs. Most put their heads on one side as if they were trying very hard to understand. The Lion opened his mouth, but no sound came from it; he was breathing out, a long, warm breath; it seemed to sway all the beasts as the wind sways a line of trees. Far overhead from beyond the veil of blue sky which hid them the stars sang again: a pure, cold, difficult music. Then there came a swift flash like fire (but it burnt nobody) either from the sky or from the Lion itself, and every drop of blood tingled in the children's bodies, and the deepest, wildest voice they had ever heard was saying:

"Narnia, Narnia, Narnia, awake. Love. Think. Speak. Be walking trees. Be talking beasts. Be divine waters."

//The Magician’s Nephew//, chapter 11, last 2 paragraphs