Another Reality

Mere Christianity p30

Published on June 1, 2004 By Shulamite In Philosophy

So far, I’ve paraphrased the first three chapters of CS Lewis’s book Mere Christianity in hopes to make it more accessible – a kind of cliffs notes. Admittedly, I can spend quite a while digesting this book, extracting the meat out of every sentence. Lewis has brought us thus far to the acknowledgement of the Moral Law. This is the last page in chapter three.

We can say a person ought to be unselfish. If we try to say why, we invariably come up with the reason: “because it is good for society.” Society means other people, so we are simply saying because we ought to be unselfish. Saying one ought to be unselfish because one ought to be unselfish leaves us where we begin.

Noticeably, we cannot circumvent the fact of the Moral Law. LinkDecent behavior is decent behavior and that’s really all there is to it. Lewis also points out that decent behavior (Moral Law) isn’t always what is most convenient to us. Sometimes it is the opposite. I remain justifiably angry with the person who trips me on purpose even if he doesn’t hurt me while I cannot remain justifiably angry with a person who accidentally trips me even if he hurts me. I am not angry with the man sitting in “my” regular seat on the bus or booth in a restaurant if he is there first. I am angry with the person who moves my things while my back is turned. Convenience doesn’t define Morality.

Even those who help us we may abhor. No one admires a traitor. One side may pay a traitor, treat him/her well, and use all the information s/he provides, but still view him/her as human vermin. We face the fact that Moral Law is real and we didn’t make it up. To quote Lewis, because I cannot say it with more eloquence: “It begins to look as if we shall have to admit that there is more than one kind of reality; that, in this particular case, there is something above and beyond the ordinary facts of men’s behavior, and yet quite definitely real – a real law, which none of us made, but which we find pressing on us.”

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