The Abolition of Man by C.S. Lewis
A Review: Precise and Prophetic
Introduction:
C.S. Lewis is so classic that almost any review is superfluous, but a review of one of his lesser-known works, and taking the time to highlight Lewis’s remarkable prescience is always worthwhile. It’s a short book, originally delivered as a three-lecture series, making it an easy read. Of course, Lewis’s brilliant writing throughout makes it an enjoyable read and seasons the deep thought he carefully communicates. He breaks up the little book into three main chapters with an interesting appendix, so let’s discuss it accordingly.
Chapter 1: Men Without Chests
The opening chapter provides an extensive critique of an English textbook for elementary school students, which he calls The Green Book and its authors “Gaius and Titus.”[1] He takes issue with their effective erasure of objective standards of ethics and beauty. They basically assert that all such judgements are statements of subjective feeling, and therefore minimally meaningful. Lewis sees the effect of an education where students are taught to rationalize away every innate moral judgement and feeling of awe and beauty. This “atrophy of the chest” Lewis refers to is, in his view, an attempt to turn the head against the heart and all the divinely built-in notions of ethics, beauty, and joy which everyone holds.
Chapter 2: The Tao
He then introduces the idea of “The Tao”, which is a Chinese philosophical-religious term roughly translating to “The Way.” It refers generally to the function of the world, not just narrowly to the ethical “Way.” So Lewis is essentially developing an idea of natural law without using a term that comes with heavy baggage. To combat the “atrophy of the chest,” he doesn’t advocate an atrophy of the head in response; rather, he shows that there is no need for conflict between the two in the first place. After deconstructing common naturalistic methods of accounting for universal human ethics, he develops his idea of “The Tao” as a set of universally held ethics for which the naturalist cannot logically account.
Chapter 3: The Abolition of Man
According to Lewis, viewing ourselves as purely material beings, “natural objects,” is the result of divorcing science from “The Tao.” He also points out that reason will be a casualty of naturalism’s devourings. We’re already seeing this prediction come true: Radical leftists claim that reason is simply a way of enforcing the white, patriarchal hegemony. Thus, reason is no more valid a way of thinking than voodoo superstition. Coming up with naturalistic explanations, the “debunking” Lewis attacks in chapter one, is further refuted in light of the exposition of “The Tao.” He concludes with:
…you cannot go on ‘explaining away’ for ever: you will find that you have explained explanation itself away. You cannot go on ‘seeing through’ things for ever. The whole point of seeing through something is to see something through it…. It is no use trying to ‘see through’ first principles. If you see through everything, then everything is transparent. But a wholly transparent is an invisible world. To ‘see through’ all things is the same as not to see.
This short quotation beautifully encapsulates the flaws behind every unbelieving naturalistic worldview. Ultimately, it voids reality of meaning or coherence and necessarily contradicts itself and does not comport with reality. Take those who explain all religion as an evolutionary development which came about to solidify culture, in/out groups, and tribal loyalties. Why would a denial of religion’s truth claims be anything more than centering a new group around a new belief system? And if its purely natural origins de-legitimize religion, what can be said of the purely natural origins of “science” and “logic”?
Appendix:
In this excellent appendix, Lewis seeks to provide solid factual beams of support to his arguments about “The Tao” as he uses the term. More specifically, he seeks to demonstrate that it actually exists. He cites dozens upon dozens of religious and ethical materials from Chinese and Indian sources, the Bible, and Greco-Roman philosophers, just to name a few. He picks several key moral loci common across all these sources and identifies these key moral loci loosely defined as “The Tao.” While it may seem a little dry to some, you should read through it as he really does a stellar job in proving his point. Lewis, beyond being a downright mesmerizing writer, was also an outstanding literary scholar, as this little presentation shows. Plus, take advantage of his straightforward organization.
The Relevance:
On top of the constant baseline level of relevance Lewis always has, “The Abolition of Man,” though written in 1943, is particularly relevant these days for at least two reasons. First, Lewis reminds us of the importance of a child’s education. Impressionable young minds being shaped by ideologies of unbelief will grow up to be “men without chests.” While precise and rigorous teaching may seem like more effort than it’s worth, Lewis shows what the results will be, and they are terrifying to say the least. Lewis’s “The Chronicles of Narnia” show just how seriously he took the divine mandate of Christian education.
Just reading the headlines confirms much of what Lewis wrote. For example, when atheistic, secular education, which teaches that humans are meaningless bio-accidents, dominates, why does it come as a surprise when depression and suicide rates skyrocket? Children have been taught patchy, distorted history for decades. How is it surprising when they denigrate America’s founding or overlook glaring historical facts surrounding slavery, both in the U.S. and abroad? Why, when math is assumed by many (even math teachers) to be an impractical skill, is it surprising that a massive sector of society was duped by media Covid exaggerations? A widespread basic understanding of statistics would have enervated the media’s fearmongering. The idea of offending people as a moral wrong has been drilled into their heads since a young age. How is it surprising when these children react to being offended the same way a mature person reacts to being literally slapped in the face?
Why are we surprised that churches and denominations are falling prey to the “Christian social justice” movement when, in the vast majority of churches, the Old Testament has been relegated to the status of The Word of God Emeritus?[2] When God’s law is never preached and the pages of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy remain unwrinkled and untouched, how is it surprising that pastors and laymen are giving way to a Marxist definition of justice? We could provide dozens more examples, but these suffice to show Lewis’s insight. We, like Wormwood’s patient in “The Screwtape Letters,” have been accustomed, ever since we were children, to having a dozen incompatible philosophies dancing about together inside our heads.[3] There are practical consequences to embedding this habit in children’s heads via education.
The second timely reminder we see in this short book is Lewis’s warning of the practical consequences of a godless worldview. Considering the technological advancements Lewis likely didn’t foresee, and the concentration of technological power in godless hands, the ominous warning of the abolition of man rings ever truer. The upside to this negativity is twofold: first, clearly identifying the problem of the poor education of Christian young people is one step towards solving it. Second, God has implanted strong, visceral feelings and moral instincts in us; He has made us in His image and written His law on our hearts. Thus, there will always be a part of rebel man that must live in conflict with himself. Whenever we engage unbelievers, whether in evangelism, apologetics, day-to-day life, or in the political sphere, we always have an ally, a secret agent behind enemy lines: the imago Dei and the moral instincts that spring from it. In addition, knowing that God’s law is inextricably linked to God’s world, we can be confident that all attempts to live contrary to God’s law will finally fail in God’s world.
[1] Lewis shields their names because he extends the charitable assessment of good intentions to the authors. However, they have subsequently been identified as “The Control of Language: A Critical Approach to Reading and Writing” by Alex King and Martin Ketley.
[2] Credit to Doug Wilson for this clever phrase.
[3] From “The Screwtape Letters,” Letter No. 1.