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Guru Corner Disclaimer: Teachers highlighted in the guru corner are not being recommended or promoted for spiritual guidance. They are merely individuals who exemplify certain spiritual qualities that are placed here for us to observe and use in whatever fashion works best for us. "Clive Staples Lewis was born in Belfast, Ireland, as the son of A.J. Lewis, a solicitor, and Flora Augusta (Hamilton). His mother, a promising mathematician, died when he was nine years old. Lewis had been very close to his mother, who taught him to love books and encouraged him to study French and Latin. Lewis and his brother were brought up by their father. During his childhood, Lewis created the imaginary country of Bloxen. He started writing early - in the attic of their house he had a "study" where he composed his stories. After attending schools in Hertfordshire, Northern Ireland and Malvern, he was educated at home from 1914-17. "I am the product of long corridors, empty sunlit rooms, upstairs indoor silences, attics explored in solitude, distant noises of gurgling cisterns and pipes, and the noise of wind under the tiles. Also of endless books," Lewis wrote in his autobiographical book Surprised by Joy (1955). "There were books in the study, books in the drawing-room, books in the cloakroom, books (two deep) in the great bookcase on the landing, books in a bedroom, books piled as high as my shoulder in the cistern attic, books of all kinds reflecting every transient stage of my parents' interests, books readable and unreadable, books suitable for a child and books most empathically not. Nothing was forbidden me. In the seemingly endless rainy afternoons I took volume after volume from the shelves..." Lewis's early favorites were Edith Nesbit's books, among them The Story of the Amulet (1906), which mixed fantasy with reality, and the uncut edition of Gulliver's Travels. Later he read the Norse myths and sagas, and such historical books as Henryk Sienkiewicz's Quo Vadis and Lew Wallace's Ben Hur. Later he also found The Odyssey, Voltaire, Milton and Spenser. Lewis's private tutor taught him to read Greek for pleasure."- Excerpt from http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/cslewis.htm . C.S. Lewis understood the magic in life. He was a devout Christian who realized that being religious often enhanced the magical experience. However, his books did not proselytize directly towards Christianity as they did towards simple fundamental principles of morality and the Divine. His books are loved my children around the world, and I was happily one of them. To learn more about C.S. Lewis, order his biography from Amazon.com entitled: "The Magic Never Ends." Very appropriate, I think.
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Beyond The Dream
The Chronicles of Narnia is about to come out in film. C.S. Lewis was a devout Christian but this did not preclude him from tapping into the magic within. As one reviewer puts it in his article "Exploring The Deeper Magic": In the early 20th century the great German sociologist Max Weber reported that science—and particularly the emerging social sciences in which he was a pioneer—had succeeded in "disenchanting" the universe. In the past, people had tried to explain the unknown by talking about demons, angels, ghosts, and gods. Now the human race had reached a point, he argued, where an adequate understanding of reality could be achieved solely within the framework of a universe governed by natural causes and effects. The magical had finally been banished from the world. A hundred years later, Weber's proclamation does not ring as true as it may have sounded to many of his contemporaries. In many ways we have been experiencing the "re-enchantment" of reality. For those of us who believe that the magic never really departed, the widespread present-day interest in spirituality—including a fascination with the occult—is a vindication of sorts. To be sure, many traditional believers would recoil at my suggestion that we live in a world in which magic has its place. But the repudiation of all things magical can itself play into the schemes of the dis-enchanters. And this is precisely why C.S. Lewis's Narnia stories are so instructive. He portrays an enchanted universe that is held together by what he calls a "Deep Magic." To rebel against magic's laws is to threaten widespread destruction. The witch may be exercising her craft for wicked purposes, but she does have very real universal forces at her command. Aslan, the majestic lion, knows this. He has opposed the witch's magic and he is aware that he must pay the price: his own death. But Aslan also knows of an even more basic truth. The witch may use her deep magic to satisfy her lust for power. But there exists a Deeper Magic, which subverts the laws that govern the "ordinary" magical reality. As the story unfolds, this Deeper Magic raises Aslan from the dead and brings about an ultimate restoration of all things." As a child "The Chronicles of Narnia" and
all of C.S. Lewis' books were definitely favorites. I think
its important
to foster
some sense of magic in our lives and I do think my life would
have been a lot different if I hadn't been allowed the sense
of the magical in my life. Just the way Harry Potter books
and merchandising sells
tell us about our deep need and connection with magic. Clearly, instead of
going more towards science, we are steering away from it into
the intuitive realms
of the mind where more possibilities of creation await us. Do yourself a favor,
if you haven't indulged your magical Self in years, go out and see a Harry
Potter or Narnia film sometime and enjoy your magical Self.
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