Abstract
Excerpt: It is then something of a simplification to see Lewis as a “dinosaur” out of step with his own time. As a modern apologist he managed to retain the framework of the multi-level medieval model, but only with the assistance of credible modern sources that challenge the hegemony of the one-story “developmental” model of evolutionary naturalism. The threetier hierarchy – material, organic, spiritual – that arose out of the turnof- the-century revolt against positivism provided a means of exposing the reductive tendencies of the naturalistic orientation and affirming a traditional conception of the Supernatural that transcends natural order. The idea of higher dimensional space not only offered a way to illustrate this three-tier hierarchy but also to imagine an even more variegated hierarchy of “Natures piled upon Natures.” It also opened the door to the vision of alternative time-tracks and parallel worlds, a multiverse that expands the frontiers of the cosmic order beyond anything conceived by our premodern forebears.
Recommended Citation
Schwartz, Sanford
(2014)
"Recasting the Discarded Image:
C. S. Lewis on the Modern Side,"
Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal: Vol. 7
:
Iss.
1
, Article 5.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.55221/1940-5537.1210
Available at:
https://digitalcommons.georgefox.edu/cslewisjournal/vol7/iss1/5