Arthur Conan Doyle's "The Adventure of the Speckled Band"

Back in September last year, I read Arthur Conan Doyle's "The Adventure of the Speckled Band," and Sherlock Holmes' comment that "Violence does, in truth, recoil upon the violent, and the schemer falls into the pit which he digs for another" caught my attention.  It seemed to have Biblical precedent, and a few months later, I ran across a very similar passage in Psalm 7 in the NKJV:  "15 He made a pit and dug it out, and has fallen into the ditch which he made.  16 His trouble shall return upon his own head, and his violent dealing shall come down on his own crown."  The pit imagery is the same as that in Holmes' comment, but "His trouble shall return upon his own head, and his violent dealing shall come down on his own crown" has a more literal analogue in the story, even more than Holmes' "Violence does, in truth, recoil upon the violent."

Near the end, Holmes deduces that Dr. Grimesby Roylott has been letting a snake into his step-daughter's room in an effort to kill her and prevent her upcoming marriage, which would have a devastating financial effect on him.  When Holmes attacks the snake with a cane, it retreats to Roylott's room and kills him instead.  Holmes and Watson enter his room to find that "Round his brow he had a peculiar yellow band, with brownish speckles, which seemed to be bound tightly round his head."  Roylott's "violent dealing" has literally "return[ed] upon his own head" in the form of the snake.

While there's definitely a similarity between the Psalm and the end of Holmes' adventure, I don't know whether this is just a coincidence or whether Conan Doyle created this situation in such a way that Holmes can draw this Biblical parallel.*

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*A couple of Holmes' comments that I stumbled upon indicate that he does believe in God, which in turn suggests a familiarity with the Bible:  at the end of "The Boscombe Valley Mystery," he says, "God help us!  ...  Why does fate play such tricks with poor helpless worms?  I never hear of such a case as this that I do not think of Baxter's words and say, 'There, but for the grace of God, goes Sherlock Holmes'" and in "The Adventure of the Empty House," he says, "Halfway down I slipped, but by the blessing of God I landed, torn and bleeding, upon the path."  

Edward Johnson's "Poem for Thomas Hooker"

Near the end of last year, I started reading the Heath Anthology of American Literature again, after having set it aside for four years.  Recently, I've been reading a section titled "A Selection of Seventeenth-Century Poetry."  One of the poems is "Poem for Thomas Hooker" by Edward Johnson.  I noticed a slew of Biblical allusions (appropriate since Hooker was a "Puritan preacher and theologian"), and since the anthology doesn't cite any of them, I thought I'd note them here.

Here's the poem:

Come, Hooker, come forth of thy native soile:

    Christ, I will run, sayes Hooker, thou hast set

My feet at large, here spend thy last dayes toile;

    Thy Rhetorick shall peoples affections whet.

Thy Golden Tongue, and Pen Christ caus'd to be

    The blazing of his golden truths profound,

Thou sorry worme its Christ wrought this in thee;

    What Christ hath wrought must needs be very sound.

Then looke on Hookers workes, they follow him

    To Grave, this worthy resteth there a while:

Die shall he not that hath Christs warrier bin;

    Much lesse Christ Truth, cleer'd by his peoples toile.

Thou Angell bright, by Christ for light now made,

    Throughout the World as seasoning salt to be,

Although in dust thy body mouldering fade;

    Thy Head's in Heaven, and hath a crown for thee.

"Christ, I will run, sayes Hooker, thou hast set / My feet at large" seems to be a reference to Isaiah 52:7:  "How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation, who says to Zion, 'Your God reigns.'"  The same idea also appears in Romans 10:15:  "And how are they to preach unless they are sent?  As it is written, 'How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!"  The poem may also incorporate Hebrews 12:1 ("let us run with endurance the race that is set before us").

"Thou sorry worme" bears some resemblance to Psalm 22:6:  "But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by mankind and despised by the people."

"Thou Angell bright, by Christ for light now made, / Throughout the World as seasoning salt to be" contains two elements from the Sermon on the Mount.  In successive verses (13 and 14) in Matthew 5, Jesus says, "You are the salt of the earth" and "You are the light of the world."

The lines "Although in dust thy body mouldering fade; / Thy Head's in Heaven, and hath a crown for thee" include multiple allusions.  "Although in dust thy body mouldering fade" could refer either to "for you are dust, and to dust you shall return" in Genesis 3:19 or the similar "All are from the dust, and to dust all return" in Ecclesiastes 3:20.  As in the poem ("Thy Head's in Heaven"), Christ is called "the head" in 1 Corinthians 11:3 and Ephesians 5:23.  The "crown for thee" could refer either to Revelation 2:10 ("Be faithful unto death, and I will give you the crown of life") or James 1:12 ("Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him").

The Song of Roland

My reading has been progressing at a glacial pace lately (hence the lack of any updates here), but a couple weeks ago I finished reading The Song of Roland for the first time.  I found two Biblical allusions that my edition failed to note, although it comes extremely close to citing one of them.

In laisse 179, Charlemagne prays "to make the sun stand still for him in heaven, / hold back the night, let the day linger on" (lines 2450-2451).  My edition has a footnote here referring the reader to a book that talks about "the story of Joshua as the model for this episode," yet it fails to identify "the model for this episode."  It's Joshua 10:12-13:  "At that time Joshua spoke to the LORD in the day when the LORD gave the Amorites over to the sons of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, 'Sun, stand still at Gibeon, and moon, in the Valley of Aijalon.'  And the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, until the nation took vengeance on their enemies."  In the Bible and in the poem, the sun stands still so that an army can continue its battle.

The other Biblical reference I found is in laisse 203.  The day after the battle for which the sun stood still, the French army prepares to return to Rencesvals.  "Then they mount up and ride with all their strength / on these long ways and on these great wide roads" (lines 2851-2852).  That first line bears some resemblance to Isaiah 40:31:  "They who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint."  These are English translations, but both have "mount up," although one refers to mounting a horse and the other seems to refer to flying.  Both also refer to strength.  Isaiah says that "they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength," and this is exactly what the French army does.  Despite the exhausting battle the previous day (after which the army didn't even set a watch when they went to sleep), they can now "ride with all their strength" because of their faith in God.

Anne Bradstreet's "Upon the Burning of Our House July 10th, 1666"

In The Heath Anthology of American Literature I'm still reading selections from Anne Bradstreet's work.  Last week, I read "Upon the Burning of Our House July 10th, 1666," and I was surprised that the anthology didn't provide footnotes for the Biblical references Bradstreet put in the poem.  While I don't really have anything very literary to write about the poem itself, I thought I could at least catalogue her Biblical references.

Bradstreet's "I blest His name that gave and took" (line 14) echoes Job's "The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD" (Job 1:21).  Despite their losses, both Job and Bradstreet bless God.

"Adieu, Adieu, all's vanity" (line 36) is a quote from Ecclesiastes.  "Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities!  All is vanity" (Ecclesiastes 1:2).  The next verse in Ecclesiastes reflects on the transience of life:  "What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun?"  From this, Bradstreet shifts her focus to Heaven, which she calls "an house on high erect, / Framed by that mighty Architect" (lines 43-44).  She asks herself, "And did thy wealth on earth abide? / Didst fix thy hope on mold'ring dust?" (lines 37-38)  Her self-examination seems to be spurred by Matthew 6:19-21:  "Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal.  For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."  Along with the similarity in these views, there's some resemblance between Bradstreet's "mold'ring dust" and the Biblical "moth and rust destroy" (initial M and D, and the -ust of dust and rust).  At the end of the poem, she expresses the same view presented in Matthew: "The world no longer let me love, / My hope and treasure lies above" (lines 53-54).

Anne Bradstreet's "In Reference to Her Children, 23 June 1659"

As part of my Anthology Odyssey project, I've been reading some Anne Bradstreet poems in The Heath Anthology of American Literature.  I recently read and noticed something about "In Reference to Her Children, 23 June 1659."

In the poem, Bradstreet portrays herself as a mother bird worried about her young.  She writes:

If birds could weep, then would my tears
Let others know what are my fears
Lest this my brood some harm should catch,
And be surpris'd for want of watch,
Whilst pecking corn, and void of care
They fall un'wares in fowler's snare (lines 41-46)

This anthology includes a footnote for "fowler," explaining only that "fowler is a term for bird-catcher."  When I saw the superscript number that indicated a footnote, a mere definition of the term was not what I expected to find because I think this specific image in Bradstreet's metaphor is a Biblical allusion.

I've been reading the Bible since July 2014 (and plan to continue to cycle through it, just re-starting when I've finished), and earlier this year, I found this same image of the fowler's snare twice in the Psalms:  "For he [God] will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence.  He will cover you with his pinions, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness is a shield and buckler" (Psalm 91:3-4) and "Blessed be the LORD, who has not given us as prey to their teeth!  We have escaped like a bird from the snare of the fowlers; the snare is broken, and we have escaped!" (Psalm 124: 6-7).  The bird imagery in Psalm 91's "he will cover you with his pinions, and under his wings you will find refuge" is also echoed in Bradstreet's "Long did I keep you soft and warm, / And with my wings kept off all harm" (lines 57-58).

Some of the other Bradstreet poems in this anthology, like "Contemplations" and "The Flesh and the Spirit" have very obvious Biblical references that evidence Bradstreet's familiarity with the Bible so it seems very likely that she would also have been familiar with the fowler image in the Psalms and used it in "In Reference to Her Children."

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Final Battle

When I started writing about The Chronicles of Narnia after re-reading it, I hadn't really intended it to turn into a series of posts, but nevertheless it has.  Here's the last one, on The Final Battle.

In the first chapter, an ape and a donkey find a lion's skin.  The ape, Shift, creates a coat for the donkey, Puzzle, out of the skin, and then Shift has the idea to tell people that Puzzle is Aslan.  There's a similar premise in one of Aesop's Fables, "The Ass in the Lion's Skin":

An ass found a lion's skin, and dressed himself up in it.  Then he went about frightening everyone he met, for they all took him to be a lion, men and beasts alike, and took to their heels when they saw him coming.  Elated by the success of his trick, he loudly brayed in triumph.  The fox heard him, and recognized him at once for the ass he was, and said to him, "Oho, my friend, it's you, is it?  I, too, should have been afraid if I hadn't heard your voice."

There's a difference in motivation (in The Final Battle, the donkey is coaxed into the lion's skin where the donkey in Aesop's fable does it of his own volition), but the two are similar.  Lewis seems to have used fairy tales in The Chronicles (I wrote about a Grimm fairy tale he seems to use in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader a few weeks ago), so it's likely that he knew and used this element from Aesop too.

In Chapter Seven, Tirian frees a company of dwarfs from some Calormene soldiers.  However, they don't join his side and don't even thank him for their freedom.  Tirian and his friends walk away, but then one dwarf - Poggin - comes back to join them.  "Everyone crowded round him and welcomed him and praised him and slapped him on the back.  Of course one single Dwarf could not make a very great difference, but it was somehow very cheering to have even one.  The whole party brightened up."  I think there are two Biblical references here.  The first is Jesus' healing of ten lepers.  "When he saw them he said to them, 'Go and show yourselves to the priests.'  And as they went they were cleansed.  Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice..." (Luke 17:14-15).  Jesus heals all ten lepers, but only one returns to thank Him; Tirian frees the whole company of dwarfs, but only one returns to join him.  Both also have their faith in common.  To the one leper who returned, Jesus says, "Your faith has made you well" (verse 19), and Poggin the Dwarf tells Tirian, "I'm on your side, Sire; and on Aslan's."  Since Aslan is the Christ-like figure in The Chronicles of Narnia, the faith of both the one returning leper and the one returning dwarf is the same.

The second Biblical story I think this event references is The Parable of the Lost Sheep.  Jesus tells a group of people about a man who has one hundred sheep, and after he loses one, he leaves the ninety-nine to look for the one.  "And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing.  And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.'  Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance" (Luke 15:5-7).  The like one sheep that was found, there's Poggin, the one dwarf to return.  Similar to the "rejoicing" and "joy" in the parable, Poggin's return is "very cheering" and the party "brighten[s] up."

The rest of the things I noticed are all Biblical references and are all in Chapter Fourteen (Night Falls on Narnia).  First, Father Time rises up and blows a horn, ushering in the end of Narnia.  In Revelation chapters 8 and 9, the end of the world is also ushered in with trumpets.

Next, the Narnian creatures come up to Aslan and turn either to his left (those who look at him with "fear and hatred") or his right (those who "looked in the face of Aslan and loved him").  There's the same left-or-right separation - the same final judgement - in Matthew 25:  "And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left" (Matthew 25:33).  One of those who go to Aslan's right is "one of those very Dwarfs who had helped to shoot the Horses."  Earlier, Eustace was indignant about this, but now "he had not time to wonder about that sort of thing... for a great joy put everything else out of his head."  This, even more so than the return of Poggin the Dwarf, is the "joy in heaven over one sinner who repents."

Finally, there's the comparison between blood and the sun and the moon:

[The sun] was three times - twenty times - as big as it out to be, and very dark red.  ...  in the reflection of that sun the whole waste of shoreless waters looked like blood.
     Then the Moon came up, quite in her wrong position, very close to the sun, and she also looked red.

Similar descriptions are in Revelation 6, at the end of the world:  "the sun became black as sackcloth, the full moon became like blood, and the stars of the sky fell to the earth as the fig tree sheds its winter fruit when shaken by a gale" (Revelation 6:12).  After Father Time blows his horn in Narnia, there's a shower of falling stars:  "these were dozens, and then scores, and then hundreds, till it was like silver rain: and it went on and on."

Clearly, the end of Narnia was inspired by the end of the world as described in the Bible.

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Silver Chair

This post contains spoilers.

In re-reading The Silver Chair I found only a few things to write about (I did find an-other, but I have to do some more research on that, so I'll come back to it later).

First, there's Prince Rilian's fight with the Lady of the Green Kirtle in Underland in Chapter Twelve.  She turns herself into a serpent and wraps herself around his legs, but "the Prince caught the creature's neck in his left hand, trying to squeeze it till it choked."  With his other hand, he strikes the serpent with his sword, and with some help from Puddleglum and Eustace, "they hacked off its head."  The narrator then mentions that "the floor, as you may imagine, was a nasty mess."

Although it's been years since I've read it, I recognized the similarities between this event and Redcrosse Knight's battle with Error in Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene.  Redcrosse Knight descends into a hole and "he saw the ugly monster plaine, / Half like a serpent horribly displaide, / But th'other half did womans shape retaine" (canto 1, stanza 14)  Like Spenser's Error, Lewis' Lady of the Green Kirtle is half woman and half serpent (although she's either/or rather than a mix).  Redcrosse Knight attempts to strike her with his sword, but he misses his mark.  She then "lept fierce upon his shield, and her huge traine / All suddenly about his body wound" (canto 1, stanza 18), just like the Lady does to Prince Rilian.  Next, "Knitting all his force, [he] got one hand free, / Wherewith he grypt her gorge with so great paine, / That soone to loose her wicked bands did her constraine" (canto 1, stanza 19).  Redcrosse Knight is able to free himself merely by choking Error where Prince Rilian still has to use his sword before he's freed, but the situation is still quite similar.  In the end, just as Rilian beheads his serpent, Redcrosse Knight "strooke at her with more than manly force, / That from her body full of filthie sin / He raft her hatefull head without remorse" (canto 1, stanza 24).  Finally, Error's "scattred brood... flockéd all about her bleeding wound, / And suckéd up their dying mothers blood" (canto 1, stanza 25).  Spenser's description is more graphic than Lewis', but the large amount of blood is common to both.

Second, there's the temptation with which the Lady of the Green Kirtle seduced Rilian.  At the end of Chapter Fifteen, Rilian recounts "the whole adventure with the older and wiser Beasts and Dwarfs" of Narnia, and "they saw how she had dug right under Narnia and was going to break out and rule it through Rilian; and how he had never dreamed that the country of which she would make him king (king in name, but really her slave) was his own country."  The situation is different, but there's some resemblance between this and the devil's temptation of Jesus in Luke 4.  "And the devil took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, and said to him, 'To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will.  If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours'" (Luke 4:5-7).  The devil tries to tempt Jesus with power over the world, but Jesus already had that power, just like Rilian already had (or would have) power over Narnia.

There's also the comparison between the Lady of the Green Kirtle and the White Witch from The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.  Rilian and "the older and wiser Beasts and Dwarfs... all saw what it meant; how a wicked Witch (doubtless the same kind as that White Witch who had brought the Great Winter on Narnia long ago) had contrived the whole thing."  In The Magician's Nephew, when the White Witch is still known as Jadis, she tries to tempt Digory with the fruit of the tree, just as the serpent tempts Eve in the Garden of Eden.  So the comparison that Rilian and the Narnians make is more than just a comparison of devious plots; both the Lady of the Green Kirtle (literally) and the White Witch (allusively) have the guise of a serpent.

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

This post contains spoilers.

When I re-read The Voyage of the Dawn Treader recently, one of the things I noticed is the magician's table in Chapter Eleven.  The narrator says that "The table was bare when they entered, but it was of course a magic table, and at a word from the old man the tablecloth, silver, plates, glasses and food appeared."  It reminded me of a similar table in "The Table, the Ass, and the Stick" in the Grimm Brothers' fairy tales.  The eldest of three sons, after he becomes an apprentice to a joiner, received a table

which had certainly a very ordinary appearance, and was made of common wood; but it had one excellent quality: - If its owner placed it before him, and said, "Table, cover thyself," the good table was at once covered with a fine cloth, and plates, and knives and forks, and dishes of roast and baked meat took their places on it, and a great glass filled with red wine, which gladdened one's heart.

I'm not sure if the table in the Grimms' fairy tale inspired Lewis' table, but I think there's pretty strong evidence for it.  There's a famous Lewis quote advocating the reading of fairy tales (of which the Grimms' are among the most well-known), and the descriptions of the two tables are quite similar.  It's not specifically given, but the "word from the old man" might very well be "Table, cover thyself," and the specific items that are spread on each table are the same (table cloth, cutlery, plates, food, and glasses) and are listed in a very similar order.

Next, I noticed the birds in Chapter Fourteen (The Beginning of the End of the World).  An old man comes out to meet the travellers, and a flock of birds flies to him.  Lucy sees "one bird fly to the Old Man with something in its beak that looked like a little fruit, unless it was a little live coal, which it might have been, for it was too bright to look at.  And the bird laid it in the Old Man's mouth."  Shortly there-after, the old man introduces himself as Ramandu and explains that "every morning a bird brings me a fire-berry from the valleys in the sun, and each fire-berry takes away a little of my age.  And when I have become as young as the child that was born yesterday, then I shall take my rising again" as a star.

The "live coal" to the man's mouth is the same description that's given in Isaiah 6:  "Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the altar.  And he touched my mouth and said: 'Behold, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for'" (Isaiah 6:6-7).  While the "live coal" in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader isn't actually a coal and doesn't serve the same function as the coal in Isaiah, its description as such seems to indicate the source of Lewis' image.

The other two things I noticed are in the last chapter and are also Biblical images.  First, there's the lamb that Edmund, Lucy, and Eustace meet.  After they have breakfast, the lamb's "snowy white flushed into a tawny gold and his size changed and he was Aslan himself, towering above them and scattering light from his mane."  Throughout the series, there's an overtone of Aslan as Christ, and this is an-other example of that.  In John 1, John the Baptist calls Jesus "the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!" (John 1:29).  In The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Aslan (as a Christ-like figure) is now literally a lamb.  His "scattering light from his mane" might also be a subtle reference to the Transfiguration, when Christ "was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light" - Matthew 17:2.  There's a similar description of Aslan in The Horse and His Boy.

Second, as the children are transported back to their own world, there's "a rending of the blue wall (like a curtain being torn)."  I don't think a deeper similarity is intended, but just as a description, this also seems to be Biblical.  After Jesus is crucified, "the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom" (Matthew 27:51).  There's a literal curtain tearing and a simile involving one, and both circumstances involve a sort of transition.

The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian

Originally, I wasn't going to write about Prince Caspian because I didn't find a whole lot to write about in it, but then I finished The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (about which I did find a fair amount to write), and I figured I had to continue in the order I started.  So, while I didn't find much, here's what I found in Prince Caspian.

In Chapter Fourteen (How All Were Very Busy), Bacchus drops a pitcher into an old woman's well, and when he draws it out, "it now was not water but the richest wine, red as redcurrant jelly, smooth as oil, strong as beef, warming as tea, cool as dew."  The water-to-wine part of this was easy enough to place: Jesus does the same thing at the wedding at Cana (John 2:1-12).  What I couldn't figure out at first was: if Aslan is the Christ-like figure, why is Bacchus the one changing water into wine?  (My confusion over this is an-other reason why I initially wasn't going to write about Prince Caspian.)

Eventually, though, I think I figured it out.  First, this isn't Bacchus acting by himself.  Before Bacchus draws the water from the well, Aslan heals the old woman.  "As he [Aslan] spoke, like the flush creeping along the underside of a cloud at sunrise, the colour came back to her white face and her eyes grew bright and she sat up and said, 'Why, I do declare I feel that better.'"  The healing of the old woman is itself the miracle.  Aslan effects that, and Bacchus' changing the water into wine, which - as the old woman notes - "makes a nice change," is only an-other aspect of that healing.  Bacchus is acting under Aslan's power.  As Susan notes in Chapter Eleven, "'I wouldn't have felt safe with Bacchus and all his wild girls if we'd met them without Aslan.'"

Second, Bacchus' working under Aslan is an example of how Lewis combined various elements to create his own world.  Primarily, there are the Christian elements, but here he also includes mythology.  In other places, there are elements from fairy tales and animal stories.  Having Bacchus work under Aslan provides a hierarchy into which the disparate elements are organized.

The other thing I found is a phrase in Chapter Eleven (The Lion Roars).  At first, I recognized just that the phrase "she [Lucy] fixed her eyes on Aslan" is similar to a Biblical verse, but once I looked up that verse, I found a deeper connection.  The surrounding situation is significant.  Lucy is the only one who can see Aslan, and he's told her to wake up the rest of the party and follow him.  The others are annoyed at being woken up, especially because they can't see Aslan for themselves.  "Susan was the worst," so when Lucy eventually starts leading them through the woods, she's "biting her lip and trying not to say all the things she thought of saying to Susan.  But she forgot them when she fixed her eyes on Aslan."

It's a similar situation in Hebrews 12:1-2:  "Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God."  Some translations (and I believe also some liturgies) have it as "let us fix our eyes on Jesus" - the same phrase that's in Prince Caspian.  Once Lucy "fix[es]" her eyes on Aslan, she forgets the not-very-nice things she was going to say to Susan, similar to how the "sin which clings so closely" is "[laid] aside" when "looking to Jesus."

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Horse and His Boy

About two weeks ago, I finished re-reading The Chronicles of Narnia: The Horse and His Boy.  As I've been re-reading The Chronicles of Narnia books this time, I've been looking for more instances of Aslan-as-Christ, which I've talked about in some other posts.  I found two in The Horse and His Boy, one of which I felt absolutely foolish for not having noticed the last time I read it.

The first (and the one I felt foolish for not having noticed before) is near the end of Chapter Eleven (The Unwelcome Fellow Traveller).  As Shasta is travelling through the woods, he becomes aware that "someone or somebody was walking beside him" and that "he had really no idea how long it had been there."  At first, Shasta can't see who it is because it's so dark, but eventually, it's revealed that the "someone or somebody" is Aslan.  After Shasta talks with him for awhile, "the pale brightness of the mist and the fiery brightness of the Lion rolled themselves together into a swirling glory and gathered themselves up and disappeared."

There are more than a few similarities between Shasta's encounter with Aslan and the two disciples going to Emmaus in Luke 24.  While the disciples are travelling they meet someone they don't know at first ("But their eyes were kept from recognizing him." - Luke 24:16).  They talk with him for awhile, but it isn't until he takes bread, blesses it, and gives it to them that they recognize him as Jesus, at which point He vanishes.

Within Shasta's conversation with Aslan, there are a few other elements that hint at Aslan-as-Christ.  When Shasta asks the lion who he is, he replies:  "'Myself,' said the voice, very deep and low so that the earth shook: and again, 'Myself', loud and clear and gay: and then the third time 'Myself', whispered so softly you could hardly hear it, and yet it seemed to come from all round you as if the leaves rustled with it."  First, there's the Trinity in the three "Myself"s, and second, "Myself" seems to have some relation with God's "I AM WHO I AM" in Exodus 3.

There's also the light.  "Now, the whiteness around him [Shasta] became a shining whiteness; his eyes began to blink.  ...  He could see the mane and ears and head of his horse quite easily now.  A golden light fell on them from the left.  He thought it was the sun.  ...  It was from the Lion that the light came."  There's a similarity between this and Christ's Transfiguration:  "And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light" - Matthew 17:2.  Both descriptions involve the same elements:  the sun, whiteness, and a shining light.

The narrator then describes Aslan as - among other things - "the High King above all kings in Narnia," which seems to be a reference to Revelation 19:16: "On his robe and on his thigh he has a name written, King of kings and Lord of lords."  Both are kings, but each is a higher king than all other kings.

The second instance of Aslan-as-Christ (which I actually found last time I read the book) is in Chapter Fourteen (How Bree Became a Wiser Horse).  Aslan jumps over the wall into the Hermit's courtyard and then talks with Aravis, Bree, and Hwin.  Aslan says to Bree, "You poor, proud frightened Horse, draw near.  Nearer still, my son.  Do not dare not to dare.  Touch me.  Smell me.  Here are my paws, here is my tail, these are my whiskers.  I am a true Beast."  It's a similar situation to Christ's appearing to His disciples after the resurrection.  "And he said to them, 'Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts?  See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself.  Touch me, and see.  For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.'" - Luke 24:38.  "Then he said to Thomas, 'Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side.  Do not disbelieve, but believe.'" - John 20:27.  Where Christ offered His hands and feet and the scars in His hands and side, Aslan offers his paws, tail, and whiskers.  While it's not as close a resemblance, there's also a similarity between Aslan's jumping over the wall and Christ's appearing "although the doors were locked" (John 20:26).  Both arrive despite that which is meant to keep people out.

"The Lilies of the Field" in Fahrenheit 451

This is just a small point about Fahrenheit 451, but I didn't feel that it went with my other post about smell, so I'm making a separate post for it.

When Montag reads the Bible on the subway, the text includes the phrase "the lilies of the field."  This is from the Sermon on the Mount.  It's a phrase that doesn't seem particularly relevant to the novel, but later it (in its original context) acquires a sort of retrograde importance.

A few pages after Montag rides the subway, he arrives at Faber's house, and they talk about how religion has changed to conform to the "families" in the parlor wall-screens.  Faber says

Christ is one of the "family" now.  I often wonder if God recognizes His own son the way we've dressed him up, or is it dressed him down?  He's a regular peppermint stick now, all sugar-crystal and saccharine when he isn't making veiled references to certain commercial products that every worshiper absolutely needs.

What Faber says can stand on its own, but - in their original context - "the lilies of the field" that Montag read about while in the subway emphasize it:

Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on.  Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?  ...  And why are you anxious about clothing?  Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow:  they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.  (Matthew 6:25, 28-29)

In that section of the Sermon of the Mount, Christ says to not worry about clothing (and by extension seems to say to not worry about having particular possessions at all), but now - via the perversion of the television parlors - He's made to say the opposite:  that there are "products that every worshiper absolutely needs."

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

This post contains spoilers.

A week or two ago, I finished re-reading The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.  I think this was only the third time I've read it, and I found a lot of things that I'd missed the other two times.

The first thing I noticed was Edmund's comment about fauns.  At the end of Chapter Four, after Edmund's met the White Witch, Lucy tells him that while she (the Witch) calls herself the queen of Narnia, she really isn't.  When Edmund asks her where she learned this, she says, "Mr. Tumnus, the Faun," and Edmund replies, "You can't always believe what Fauns say... Everyone knows it."  The narrator explains that Edmund is "trying to sound as if he knew far more about them than Lucy."

What I found interesting here is that Edmund's comment about Fauns is similar to the Witch's comment from (in my edition) the previous page:  "Fauns will say anything, you know."  Not only is Edmund refuting Mr. Tumnus' opinion about the Witch, but he's doing it in a way that's like the Witch herself.  It demonstrates the power that she has over him since he ate the Turkish Delight.  In Chapter Eight when Mr. Beaver says that Edmund looks like "one who has been with the Witch and eaten her food," eating the food seems more metaphorical than literal, and at the beginning of the next chapter, the narrator seems to confirm this, saying that "there's nothing that spoils the taste of good ordinary food half so much as the memory of bad magic food."

---&---

Last time I read the book (which was last year), I thought I found a reference to Luke 1.  This time I was able to pay more attention to it.  In Chapter Seven when they first hear the name of Aslan:

each one of the children felt something jump in its inside.  Edmund felt a sensation of mysterious horror.  Peter felt suddenly brave and adventurous.  Susan felt as if some delicious smell or some delightful strain of music had just floated by her.  And Lucy got the feeling you have when you wake up in the morning and realize that it is the beginning of the holidays or the beginning of summer.

Throughout the book, there's an overtone of Aslan as Christ, particularly in his sacrifice for Edmund and his returning from the dead.  The reactions that the children have to his name are similar to Elizabeth's reaction in Luke 1:

And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the baby leaped in her womb.  And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit, and she exclaimed with a loud cry, "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb!  And why is this granted to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me?  For behold, when the sound of your greeting came to my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy.' - Luke 1:41-44

In the next chapter, when Mr. Beaver talks about Aslan again, the children have "once again that strange feeling - like the first signs of spring, like good news."  The "good news" in particular hints at that Aslan-as-Christ overtone, since the word Gospel comes from words that mean "good news" or "good tale."

Edmund's reaction to the name of Aslan is different from the others' though.  At the beginning of Chapter Nine, the narrator says that "the mention of Aslan gave him a mysterious and horrible feeling just as it gave the others a mysterious and lovely feeling."  He doesn't have the same reaction as the others because he's still under the Witch's influence.  After he's been with her for a while, he begins to see that he's allied himself with the wrong side.  When spring comes (since Aslan is drawing nearer) in Chapter Eleven, "his heart gave a great leap (though he hardly knew why) when he realized that the frost was over."  He finally catches up to the others in his reaction to Aslan.

---&---

At the beginning of Chapter Twelve, as the beavers and the children (without Edmund) are just about to meet Aslan at the Stone Table, the narrator describes the setting:

They walked on in silence drinking it all in, passing through patches of warm sunlight into cool, green thickets and out again into wide mossy glades where tall elms raised the leafy roof far overhead, and then into dense masses of flowering currant and among hawthorn bushes where the sweet smell was almost overpowering.

The "cool, green thickets" here caught my attention.  It's the same description that the narrator gives in Chapter Nine (The Founding of Narnia) in The Magician's Nephew:  "They stood on cool, green grass, sprinkled with daisies and buttercups."  Not only is Narnia returning to spring after the years-long winter, but it's returning to the Narnia it was at its founding.

I think the "cool, green" description might also be a subtle reference to Psalm 23:2 - "He makes me lie down in green pastures.  He leads me beside still waters."  There's a connection of character descriptions here:  Aslan as Christ and Christ as the Good Shepherd.

In the next chapter, which returns to Edmund in the Witch's captivity, there are more descriptions that seem to be taken from Psalm 23.  The Witch "halted in a dark valley all overshadowed with fir trees and yew trees," and "it was so dark in this valley under the dark trees."  Lewis even repeats the "dark" in that second description.  Both of them are like Psalm 23:4 - "Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me."

---&---

In Chapter Sixteen, Aslan revives the statues that the Witch has made her enemies into, starting with a lion:

He had bounded up to the stone lion and breathed on him.  ...  Then a tiny streak of gold began to run along his white marble back - then it spread - then the colour seemed to lick all over him as the flame licks all over a bit of paper - then, while his hindquarters were still obviously stone, the lion shook his mane and all the heavy, stone folds rippled into living hair.

This bears some resemblance to God's creation of man in Genesis (and therefore also connects to the similarities between the Founding Narnia in The Magician's Nephew and the Genesis Creation account).  Specifically, both have the breath of life in common.  "Then the LORD God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature." - Genesis 2:7.

---&---

An-other subtle characterization of Aslan-as-Christ is in the final chapter, Chapter Seventeen.  After the battle against the White Witch, "they slept where they were.  How Aslan provided food for them all I don't know; but somehow or other they found themselves all sitting down on the grass to a fine high tea at about eight o'clock."  This is a similar situation to the Feeding of the 5,000 (Matthew 4:13-21), in which Christ feeds 5,000 men, along with women and children, from only five loaves and two fish.  Both Aslan and Christ feed a large group of people through miraculous means.

Hans Christian Andersen's "The Gardener and the Noble Family"

Since March, I've been reading The Complete Hans Christian Andersen Fairy Tales.  About two weeks ago, I read "The Gardener and the Noble Family," and a particular phrase stood out.  The narrator describes Larsen, the titular gardener:  "He was goodhearted and a good and faithful worker."

Because it was originally written in Danish and this is an English translation, I'm hesitant to assert anything too strongly, but the "good and faithful worker" seems like a phrase taken directly from the Bible, specifically the Parable of the Talents (Matthew 25:14-30).  To the servants who increased the money that was entrusted to them, the master - once he returns - tells each, "Well done, good and faithful servant."  Of course, the New Testament was written in Greek, so there are translation problems there too.  Arguing for the resemblance between a Danish phrase and a Greek phrase using only English translations is a precarious position, but the lessons for both texts are the same too.

In the Parable of the Talents, the third servant - who buried the money he was entrusted with instead of investing it - is rebuked upon the master's return.  He's told that he should have done something with the money, which is what the other servants did.

Larsen, the gardener in Andersen's tale, is like the two "good and faithful" servants; he's a good steward.  The noble family is impressed with fruit, melons, and flowers that other families have, but the produce - unbeknownst to them - came from their own garden under Larsen's care.  At the end of the story, they reflect on Larsen's value:

     "Anything that Larsen does," said the noble family, "they beat the drum for.  He is a lucky man.  We should almost be proud to have him!"
     But they were not a bit proud of it; they knew they were the masters of the manor, and they could dismiss Larsen, but that they wouldn't do.  They were good people, and there are many good people of their kind in the world - and that is fortunate for all the Larsens.

To some degree, this is like a verse near the end of The Parable of the Talents: "For to everyone who has will more be given, and he will have an abundance.  But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away" - Matthew 25:29.  Larsen is a good steward, so he's able to retain his job as gardener.  It might not be "abundance" exactly, but it is a result of his good management.

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Magician's Nephew

I just wrote a short post about The Chronicles of Narnia: The Magician's Nephew, but - as it usually happens - after I posted it, I found something else I could have added.

Last July I started reading the whole Bible.  I'm only in Job so far, but I recently read something about Creation that seems to be an-other one of the Biblical parallels in the founding of Narnia that I wrote about last year.  God asks Job where he (Job) was when the earth was created:

"Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?  Tell me, if you have understanding.  Who determined its measurements - surely you know!  Or who stretched the line upon it?  On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone, when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy?"  (Job 38:4-7)

Because I'd just read The Magician's Nephew, "the morning stars [singing] together" sounded really familiar.  In Chapter Eight, the whole company of characters are standing in darkness when they start to hear singing.

Then two wonders happened at the same moment.  One was that the voice was suddenly joined by the other voices; more voices than you could possibly count.  They were in harmony with it, but far higher up the scale:  cold, tingling, silvery voices.  The second wonder was that the blackness overhead, all at once, was blazing with stars.  ...  The new stars and the new voices began at exactly the same time.  If you had seen and heard it, as Digory did, you would have felt quite certain that it was the stars themselves which were singing, and that it was the First Voice, the deep one, which had made them appear and made them sing.

I'm not sure if the stars' singing is meant to be a reference to that passage in Job, but since the founding of Narnia has connections to the Creation account in Genesis and since that Job passage also deals with Creation, I think there's something to it.

Les Misérables (Part I, Book Seven, Chapter 11)

This post contains spoilers.

In reading Les Misérables, I recently got to the courtroom scene where Monsieur Madeleine reveals his true identity as Jean Valjean.  He does this to protect Champmathieu, who was thought to be Jean Valjean and who was going to be sent to the galleys for life.  In the preceding chapters, it was explained that Champmathieu allegedly stole a branch of apples.  The particular object of his alleged theft got me thinking about religious parallels here, and in Chapter 11 ("Champmathieu More and More Astonished"), I found many of them.

First, from the previous chapters, Champmathieu's alleged theft of apples is a parallel to Adam and Eve's taking the forbidden fruit from the tree in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3:6).  Jean Valjean intercedes for him, and in doing so, I found a lot of parallels between Valjean and Christ.  By correcting the misplacement of the identity, Valjean obviates the punishment that Champmathieu would have been faced with.  Similarly, Christ takes on humanity's punishment in the crucifixion.  To some degree, 1 Corinthians 15:22 demonstrates this parallelism and Christ as a second Adam:  "For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive."

Chapter 11 itself starts with a description of Monsieur Madeleine (not yet revealed as Jean Valjean).  It's specifically noted that "his hair, already grey when he came to Arras, was now perfectly white."  There's a footnote in my edition that explains that "To have hair turn white overnight from an emotional shock is a common melodramatic device in nineteenth-century fiction."  I suppose "emotional shock" is a valid reading, but if Valjean is Christ-like in his intercession, that whiteness demonstrates purity and even the Transfiguration.  Later in the chapter, the narrator says, "Nobody said to himself that he there beheld the effulgence of a great light, yet all felt dazzled at heart."  The revelation of Valjean's identity is also called a "luminous fact."  This isn't too different from "And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light" (Matthew 17:2).  Valjean reveals his identity before Brevet, Chenildieu, and Cochepaille, three of his former galley-mates, and Christ's identity as true God at His Transfiguration is revealed before Peter, James, and John, three of his disciples.  After Valjean provides some details about some suspenders that Brevet owned in the galley, Brevet is "struck with surprise" and "gazed wildly at him" - a reaction that isn't too dissimilar from the disciples:  "When the disciples heard this ["This is my beloved Son"], they fell on their faces and were terrified" (Matthew 17:6).

Immediately after Valjean reveals his identity, "That species of religious awe was felt in the hall," and as he leaves the courtroom, "there was at this moment an indescribable divinity within him."  Like the Transfiguration, there are features that indicate a deity.

When an attorney calls for a doctor, thinking Monsieur Madeleine has gone mad, Valjean interrupts him "with a tone full of gentleness and authority" - more Christ-like attributes.  Valjean also says, "I tell you the truth," which Christ frequently says in the Gospels.

Finally, while Valjean's intercession for Champmathieu could be read as Christ's intercession for Adam (and for humanity as a whole), there are also parallels to Christ's trial before His crucifixion.  There's the obvious similarity that both are trials, but more specifically there's the crowd's choice to release Barabbas instead Christ where here Valjean acts to release Champmathieu and offers himself instead.  There are slight differences, since Christ didn't act to release Barabbas and Valjean is actually guilty, but the decisions of each that lead to the courtroom scenes are similar.  Before being turned over in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus prays, "If it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will" (Matthew 26:39).  Valjean goes through his own version of this, asking himself what is the right thing to do and pondering over it for multiple chapters.  But he too does as God wills (or as he thinks God wills) and gives himself up.

At the end of the chapter, Champmathieu is released from all accusations, because even though Valjean thinks Champmathieu is guilty (in his lengthy considerations in Book Seven, Chapter 2, he tells himself, "He has stolen!  it is useless for me to say he has not stolen, he has stolen!"), he still interceded for him.

---

After writing the original draft of this post, I found in later chapters some parallels that are more crucifixion-centered.  At the beginning of Chapter 5 in Book Eight, the narrator describes the reaction that the citizens of M--- sur M--- have after Monsieur Madeleine is revealed to have been Jean Valjean the galley slave.  "We are sorry not to be able to disguise the fact that, on this single sentence, he was a galley slave, almost everybody abandoned him.  ...  Three or four persons alone in the whole city remained faithful to his memory."  This is similar to Christ's disciples' falling away after His arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane:  "Then all the disciples left him and fled" (Matthew 26:56).

About a page later, Valjean escapes from prison and returns home.  The narrator explains that

It has never been known how he had succeeded in gaining entrance into the court-yard without opening the carriage port.  He had, and always carried about him, a pass-key which opened a little side door, but he must have been searched, and this taken from him.  This point is not yet cleared up.

This seems to have some connection to Christ's appearing to His disciples (after the resurrection) even though they were within a locked room.  "On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, 'Peace be with you'" - John 20:19.

I'm not sure if the Valjean-as-Christ parallels continue throughout the book (I guess I'll find out), but they do seem particularly strong in these chapters.

Les Misérables (Part I, Book Three, Chapter 9)

This post contains a minor spoiler.

The day after I posted about finding a reference to 1 Corinthians 13 in Les Misérables, I found an-other important Biblical reference.

Part I, Book Three is about Fantine, her three friends, and their lovers, rather than Jean Valjean.  Chapter 2 starts with "In this year, 1817, four young Parisians played 'a good joke.'"  The joke itself doesn't come until chapter 9.  Throughout Book Three, these four students have been telling their lovers that they have a surprise for them.  In chapter 9, after eating at a restaurant, they get up (ostensibly to go and get the surprise) and just leave the girls.  After a hour, the waiter gives them a letter (on which is written "THIS IS THE SURPRISE") that the students left for them.  It starts:

Oh, our lovers!
     Know that we have parents.  Parents - you scarcely know the meaning of the word, they are what are called fathers and mothers in the civil code, simple but honest.  Now these parents bemoan us, these old men claim us, these good men and women call us prodigal sons, desire our return and offer to kill for us the fatted calf.  We obey them, being virtuous.

The students want to portray themselves as honorable men who do what their parents want, and - in doing so - they compare themselves to (or say that their parents compare them to) the prodigal son.  But, instead, their comparison illustrates their complete ignorance of the prodigal son.

In the Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32), a son asks his father for his share of the inheritance, goes off travelling, and "squander[s] his property in reckless living" (15:13).  A famine comes, leaving him even more desperate, so he gets a job feeding pigs (and finds himself envying even their food).  Then he realizes that his father's servants are treated better, so he goes back to his father's house, intending only to ask to be a servant and say "I am no longer worthy to be called your son" (15:19).  But, instead, his father welcomes him joyfully and commands his servants to "bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet.  And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate.  For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found" (15:22-23).

The key difference between the actual prodigal son and the four students is that the prodigal son demonstrates penitence ("I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you'" [15:18]) where the students pride themselves because they think themselves "virtuous."

There's also a difference in the incentive to return home.  The prodigal son returns merely so that he can find work and lodging, but the students' letter explains that the fatted calf is a reward that the parents are offering in exchange for their sons' homecoming.  The prodigal son wasn't expecting a feast upon his return, but the students seem almost weary of the prospect, as if it's an ordeal they have to go through.  If anything, they're like the prodigal son at the beginning of the parable, when he wants his share of the inheritance and is interested in "reckless living."

What struck me about the prodigal son comparison is its irony.  The students want to appear as if they're good sons and do what their parents want, but the actual prodigal son attained a much better understanding of his filial relationship.

Les Misérables (Part I, Book Two, Chapter 13)

About a month ago, I started re-reading Les Misérables (this is the second time I've read it).  I recently finished Book Two, and at the very end (in Chapter 13 - "Petit Gervais"), I think I found a reference to 1 Corinthians 13.

The narrator writes that Jean Valjean "beheld himself then, so to speak, face to face, and at the same time, through that hallucination, he saw, at a mysterious distance, a sort of light which he took at first to be a torch.  Examining more attentively this light which dawned upon his conscience, he recognised that it had a human form, and that this torch was the bishop."

The "face to face" part in particular is what reminded me of 1 Corinthians 13:12:  "For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face.  Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known."  The study notes in my Bible gloss this passage, explaining that it's talking about the personal knowledge of God that the believer will have, but in Les Misérables, it seems to apply more to Jean Valjean's self-examination and his later certainty in what he has to do.  Shortly before his seeing himself face to face, the narrator asks:

Did a voice whisper in his ear that he had just passed through the decisive hour of his destiny, that there was no longer a middle course for him, that if, thereafter, he should not be the best of men, he would be the worst, that he must now, so to speak, mount higher than the bishop, or fall lower that the galley slave; that, if he would become good, he must become an angel; that, if he would remain wicked, he must become a monster?

These two passages are linked by the expression "so to speak."*  Of the two options presented, Valjean chooses to "mount higher than the bishop."  The chapter (and Book Two) ends with him "in the attitude of prayer, kneeling upon the pavement in the shadow, before the door of Monseigneur Bienvenu."

That higher path is characterized by the bishop bearing illumination, which is a similar description to what 1 Corinthians 13:12 has.  Things are no longer seen dimly, but with illumination ("The light grew brighter and brighter in [Valjean's] mind...").  The preceding verse seems to have some relation to Valjean's choice too:  "When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child.  When I became a man, I gave up childish ways" (1 Corinthians 13:11).  Valjean also seems to acquire a new perspective (he now "know[s] fully"):

His past life, his first offence, his long expiation, his brutal exterior, his hardened interior, his release made glad by so many schemes of vengeance, what had happened to him at the bishop's, his last action, this theft of forty sous from a child, a crime meaner and the more monstrous that it came after the bishop's pardon, all this returned and appeared to him, clearly, but in a light that he had never seen before.  He beheld his life, and it seemed to him horrible; his soul, and it seemed to him frightful.

At the end of the previous chapter (chapter 12 - "The Bishop at Work"), the bishop tells Jean Valjean that "It is your soul that I am buying for you.  I am withdrawing it from dark thoughts and from the spirit of perdition, and I am giving it to God!"  This dedication to God is an important part of the book, so it's fitting that Hugo's narrator uses Biblical descriptions like these from 1 Corinthians 13 to describe Valjean.

---
*Usually, I'd be hesitant to assert something about a translated work based on a particular phrase, but I checked an-other translation I have, and it too uses "so to speak" in both passages.

Creation Parallels in The Chronicles of Narnia: The Magician's Nephew

Last month, I started reading The Chronicles of Narnia (I have an edition where all seven books are printed in one volume).  While reading The Magician's Nephew, I found multiple parallels between the founding of Narnia and Creation.

Chapter Nine (titled The Founding of Narnia) starts with "The Lion was pacing to and fro about that empty land and singing his new song.  ...  And as he walked and sang, the valley grew green with grass."  Polly notices that there's a "connection between the music and the things that were happening" and that "when you listened to his song you heard the things he was making up: when you looked around you, you saw them."  The Lion's singing is similar to God's speaking at Creation.  The first six days of Creation start with "And God said," followed by the existence of whatever God called into being.

A few chapters later (in Chapter Twelve), Aslan (The Lion) gives a horse wings.  He then asks the horse whether it's good, to which the horse replies, "It is very good."  It's not as similar as the parallel between God's speaking and Aslan's singing to call their respective worlds into existence, but it does bear some resemblance to the repeated "And God saw that it was good" throughout the account of Creation.

In Chapter Eleven, after the creation of Narnia, Aslan tells the Cabby and his wife that "You shall rule and name all these creatures, and do justice among them, and protect them from their enemies when enemies arise."  Aslan gives them dominion over Narnia in the same way that God gave dominion over the Earth to man:  "Now out of the ground the Lord God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them.  And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name" (Genesis 2:19).  Chapter Nine details how Aslan also brought forth creatures from the Earth:  "The humps moved and swelled till they burst, and the crumbled earth poured out of them, and from each hump there came out an animal," which is similar to God's forming the animals from "out of the ground."

Both accounts (Creation and the founding of Narnia) also contain the entrance of evil into the world.  In Chapter Eleven of The Magician's Nephew, Aslan declares that "before the new, clean world I gave you is seven hours old, a force of evil has already entered it; waked and brought hither by this son of Adam."  This parallels with the serpent's deception of Eve, which results in man's "knowing good and evil" (Genesis 3:22).  Aslan's calling Digory a "son of Adam" strengthens the Biblical connection.

Both entrances of evil are linked with a tree, although not in the same way.  In the Bible, the tree is what evil uses in order to enter the world; in The Magician's Nephew, the tree will provide the seed for an-other tree that Aslan will plant in Narnia so that it will be protected from the Witch, the representation of evil.  The trees function differently, but both are accompanied by temptation.  The serpent tells Eve that if she eats of the tree in the Garden of Eden, "your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil" (Genesis 3:5).  In Chapter Thirteen of The Magician's Nephew, the Witch tells Digory that if he eats the fruit of the tree within the gates, "you and I will both live for ever and be king and queen of this whole world."  This tree within the gates actually bears some resemblance to the second tree in the Garden of Eden - the tree of life, which would grant man life forever if he ate of it (Genesis 3:22).

I've only just started to really get into C.S. Lewis' works, so while I've recognized a lot of the Biblical parallels he includes in The Chronicles of Narnia, I don't really know why he includes so many.

Biblical Allusions in The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers

In May, I started re-reading The Lord of the Rings.  The last and only other time I read it was for a class (for which I had to rush through the book in about three weeks), so it's been interesting being able to read it slowly and actually pay attention to things.

A few days ago, I finished The Two Towers, and in two different chapters I'd found that Tolkien employs extended Biblical allusions.  The first is in Book Three, Chapter 10 "The Voice of Saruman."  Gandalf leads a party to Orthanc to talk to Saruman, and he warns them to beware of his (Saruman's) voice.  The narration describes that "all that it said seemed wise and reasonable, and desire awoke in them by swift agreement to seem wise themselves."  This is similar to the serpent's temptation in Genesis 3:  "But the serpent said to the woman, 'You will not surely die.  For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.'" (Genesis 3:4)  Both the serpent and Saruman appeal to the desire of knowledge; the serpent to "knowing good and evil," and Saruman to "seem[ing] wise."  When Éomer tries to dissuade Théoden from listening to what Saruman suggests, Saruman himself makes the connection between deceptive talk and snakes:  "'If we speak of poisoned tongues what shall we say of yours, young serpent?' said Saruman."

After Gandalf reveals that he is no longer Gandalf the Grey, but Gandalf the White, Saruman's staff breaks.  "There was a crack, and the staff split asunder in Saruman's hand, and the head of it fell down at Gandalf's feet."  The significance here, with regard to the Biblical allusions, is the head and the feet.  After the serpent's deception, God curses him, saying, "'I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel'" (Genesis 3:15).  (I think some translations of the Bible have it as "he shall crush your head," with which Tolkien's "split[ting] asunder" fits more closely, image-wise.)  Here, with Saruman as the serpent, that head bruising is fulfilled in the splitting of the staff and the head's falling down to Gandalf's feet.  There's no bruising of the heel though, and I think that's because this is Gandalf the White.  In the same way that man could not overcome sin until after God is incarnate in Christ, Gandalf could not overcome Saruman until after he's become Gandalf the White.  At least, that's if my grasp of theology and The Lord of the Rings is correct.  So, in a way, through the Biblical allusions, Tolkien connects sin and the power of Sauron, who is working through Saruman.

The second set of allusions I discovered is in Book Four, Chapter 8 "The Stairs of Cirith Ungol."  The setting is described as a "valley of shadow and cold deathly light," which is a fairly blatant reference to Psalm 23, specifically "the valley of the shadow of death" in verse 4.  Tolkien just changed "death" from a noun into an adjective.  In the same way that Tolkien uses the Biblical allusions to Genesis 3 to strengthen his own setting and characters in Book Three, Chapter 10, he uses the pastoral imagery of Psalm 23 to strengthen the contrast between Mordor and Galadriel in Book Four, Chapter 8.  The Ring Wraiths come close to where Frodo and Sam are hiding, but instead of clutching the Ring, Frodo holds on to the phial of Galadriel.  A little later Frodo "took his staff in one hand the phial in his other."  This is a mirror of the later half of Psalm 23:4 - "your rod and your staff, they comfort me."  The staff that Faramir gave Frodo and the phial of Galadriel help Frodo on his way to Mordor in a similar manner that the shepherd's rod and staff comfort the sheep in the pastoral language of Psalm 23.  Near the end of the chapter in The Two Towers, there's also a reference to the "green pastures" and "still waters" of Psalm 23:2.  "'Sleep!' said Frodo and sighed, as if out of a desert he had seen a mirage of cool green."

In both of these instances, the allusions that Tolkien uses strengthen his descriptions and characterizations.

Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre

About two weeks ago, I finished reading Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre.  Here are some thoughts/observations about it.  There aren't any outright spoilers, but I do mention some significant plot points.

I thought the sort of reversal of life and death when Jane is talking to her aunt in Chapter XXI was interesting.  Mrs. Reed's son John recently died, and Jane goes to visit her, yet Mrs. Reed speaks as if John were still alive and if Jane were dead.  She said that she "wish[es] she [Jane] had died!" and talks to Jane as if Jane were someone else.  That is, Mrs. Reed mentions Jane only in third person even though she's who Mrs. Reed is talking to.  And when she talks about John, she uses present tense verbs: "John is like me and like my brothers, he is quite a Gibson... John gambles dreadfully... John is sunk and degraded, his look is frightful."  Even though John is dead, she talks of him as if he were still alive.

I can't help thinking that there's some further meaning to the names of the two sisters (Diana and Mary) whom Jane meets after she runs away from Thornfield.  In Chapter XXX, Jane describes Diana as "a superior and a leader" and "vigorous."  She also says that "in her animal spirits there was an affluence of life and certainty of flow."  To me, this seems to align her with the mythical figure Diana, goddess of the hunt and the moon.  The hunting aspects are covered with Jane's description of her as "a superior and a leader" and "vigorous" and in the mention of her "animal spirits."  The "certainty of flow" seems to be a connection between Diana and the moon, by way of the tides.

And if Diana is meant to resemble the mythical figure, I can't help but feel that Mary is meant to resemble the Biblical figure.  Yet I couldn't find any textual evidence to support this.  Similarly, their brother St. John might have some connections to the Biblical figure, but I couldn't really find anything to further that either.

While I couldn't find any Biblical connections to support my thoughts about those characters' names, there are many Biblical connections and references in the novel, especially in the later part of the book.  A lot of these are just similarities in phrasing, but I did notice two larger connections.

In Chapter XXXIV, St. John asks Jane to go with him on a missionary trip to India.  He wants her to go with him as his wife, but she would consent to go only if she remains his "adopted sister."  He explains, "I cannot introduce you as such; to attempt it would be to fasten injurious suspicions on us both."  This is almost the opposite of Abram and Sarai in Genesis 12.  "When he was about to enter Egypt, he said to Sarai his wife, 'I know that you are a woman beautiful in appearance, and when the Egyptians see you, they will say, "This is his wife." Then they will kill me, but they will let you live. Say you are my sister, that it may go well with me because of you, and that my life may be spared for your sake'" (Genesis 12:11-13).  I'm not exactly sure what the meaning of this connection is, but the situations are so similar (albeit oppositely) that there has to be something.  Along with the wife/sister complications, there's the similarities of going into a foreign land and the importance of physical appearance.  Sarai is beautiful, and Jane Eyre mentions more than once that she is rather plain-looking.

I also found some Biblical connections in the different ways that St. John and Jane pray in Chapter XXXV.  Jane describes that when St. John prays, "all his energy gathered" and "all his stern zeal woke."  In the same chapter, when Jane prays, she says, "I mounted to my chamber, locked myself in, fell on my knees, and prayed in my way - a different way to St. John's."  She herself makes a distinction between the two.  I think they're meant to reference Jesus' words from the Sermon on the Mount:  "And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites.  For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by others.  Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward.  But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret.  And your Father who sees in secret will reward you" (Matthew 6:5-6).  It seems to imply that St. John is a hypocrite.  This might explain why he's in an opposite position compared to Abram in regard to the wife/sister distinction, but I still don't really understand it.