Did C.S. Lewis say this?

Sunnygal41

I was watching Naomi Judd's morning program, and she recited a quote and attributed it to C.S. Lewis...........I love it and wish to share it with you all:

"God is the love that loves all loving"

JamesThomas

"...and will kill you if you don't believe it".

The second part of the sentence doesn't get quoted all that much.

j

Hi Sunny,
Feel free to ignore the jerk who commented first. C.S. Lewis is such a fine author. He is well hated by those who try to insist that a Christian cannot also be an intellectual. In fact, Christianity is the MOST intellectual of all faiths. Lewis was one of the great thinkers and poets who ever graced this earth!
Rex

JamesThomas

Rex, what kind of "intelligence" is it, do you think, that is offended at the little things I say, but not offended by the vengeful and cruel slaughter and mayhem of the killing-deity found within the pages of the Bible?

j

Shining One

Hi James,
Your first erroneous assumption: you have concluded that I take all scripture totally literal. Your second error is to assume that God needs me to defend His judgements. Your most grievous error though, is to assume that you have some right to judge the Creator's actions. By His very nature God sets the days of our lives in this physical realm: He is the arbiter and has all providence and assumes full responsibility. Read the last couple of chapters of Job, you might get the sense of what I am saying.
Rex

bebu

"...and will kill you if you don't believe it".

But we also read...

Matt. 12:31 And so I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. 32 Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.

Sounds to me like there is a bit of grace to cover circumstances beyond our control, or our natural misunderstandings.

Teri,

I am not familiar with that quote, but it sounds like Lewis to me. Here is an interesting excerpt from "The World's Last Night" by Lewis.

Our ancestors had a habit of using the word 'Judgment'... as if it meant simply 'punishment': hence the popular expression, 'It's judgement on him'. I believe we can sometimes render the thing more vivid to ourselves by taking a judgement in a stricter sense: not as the sentence or award, but as the Verdict. Some day... an absolutely correct verdict--if you like, a perfect critique--will be passed on what each of us is.

It will be infallible judgement. If it is favourable we shall have no fear, if unfavourable, no hope, that it is wrong. We shall not only believe, we shall know, know beyond doubt in every fibre of our appalled or delighted being, that as the Judge has said, so we are: neither more nor less nor other. We shall perhaps even realize that in some dim fashion we could have known it all along. We shall know and all creation will know too: our ancestors, our parents, our wives or husbands, our children. The unanswerable and (by then) self-evident truth about each will be known to all.

Lewis was a tremendous writer!

bebu

drew sagan

I've found this argument against the Christian religion as a whole to a quite interetsing one, even a puzzling one untill a few days ago when I came across in a book I was reading discussion of this very topic.
A controversial Bible text as regards the judgement of God is Romans 2:12 which reads:
2:12 For as many as have sinned without law will also perish without the law. As many as have sinned under the law will be judged by the law
The commentary I read was quite basic, but very revealing. The author stated that about ever year he is asked this same question at least 3 or 4 four times. The question is "what about those who never heard or where able to put faith in God, will they have the chance to be saved?". First he commented that it is quite a strange thing that a person takes such a stand in the first place (which I agree). How can your own personal faith be tied to people and places you know little about (and more than likely don't care much about unless your making your case not to believe in Christianity.) But the more important point was this. He stated, if (actually 10 if's where in the book) when I myself enter into the kingdom of god and find the Native American, Chinese, or anybody else that did not hear the good news about God I myself would marvel at the Glory of God and his ability to deliever such ones into his presense. But the best part he added afterwards. If (10 more if's) I was to enter into the kingdom of God and find that these ones where NOT there, who am I to evaluate the judgements of God?
The grander point of all of this is that the Christian believes that he is sinful and corrupt. It is at this point the Christian realizes that he can base his faith or beliefs upon his own sense of right and wrong, or what he personally feels to be just. That is for God to descide. Each Christian puts faith in their creator for he is the ultimate source of justice. That is the Christian faith.
If you believe Christianity or not it's really dosn't make any differance to me. But I do wish to say that those who make the cry that God is cruel and treats his creatures badly I think make an unfair observation of the bigger picture. Christians believe such things as part of their FAITH. It is their FAITH IN THINGS UNSEEN that makes them what they are. Likewise to say that the things unseen are unjust shows the same amount of faith in my opinion. Faith that the unseen does not exisit and instead the individual that is seen (ourselves) are somewhat above it is the bigger picture. We all choose what we want to put our faith into based upon our own decisions.

MissBehave

"...and will kill you if you don't believe it".
The second part of the sentence doesn't get quoted all that much.

JamesThomas, I think I love you a little bit.

Elsewhere

God exists in the ever shrinking cracks of science. -- Elsewhere

JamesThomas

Your first erroneous assumption: you have concluded that I take all scripture totally literal.

So, none of the murder and destruction attributed to god in the Bible is meant to be taken as real? How then do we know what is bs and what isn't?

Your second error is to assume that God needs me to defend His judgements.

Sorry, I thought you were one of his champions.

Your most grievous error though, is to assume that you have some right to judge the Creator's actions. By His very nature God sets the days of our lives in this physical realm: He is the arbiter and has all providence and assumes full responsibility.

I'm simply judging the actions of the vile little Bible god. Your grievous error is unquestionably accepting this tribal-man-god-of-war out of a story book, as our true and real source.

j

Did C.S. Lewis say this?

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