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The Screwtape Letters By Clive Staples Lewis

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In his epistolary novel “The Screwtape Letters”, Clive Staples Lewis introduces the reader to a world of demons, doubt, and danger; all these facts of life are experienced by a recent convert to Christianity who is referred to as The Patient. The work is “a collection of fictitious epistles from a suave, professional, and insidious devil to a younger, inexperienced, but just as insidious fellow demon” (Watkins 114). While the quote does give a major insight into the conversation, it does not offer a glimpse into the way Lewis humanized Screwtape and his apparent nephew Wormwood. This humanization of the two devilish characters is part of what makes the novel a fascinating read. Lewis’ writing captivates the reader to think about the spiritual …show more content…

Based on his age it can be inferred that Screwtape mentors other demons besides Wormwood. Screwtape's attack strategies on humans are universal. He states that "the safest road to hell is the gradual one" and so we never realize where we going "without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts"(Lewis 19). All of us can fall prey to these attacks. Making them very effective for Screwtape and Wormwood to utilize in the world. This is one of The Screwtape Letters penetrating messages. The Screwtape letters by C. S. Lewis is one of the most enthralling of his works. Screwtape's nefarious ways, divulged by Lewis, offer an unconventional view of the metaphysical world. By humanizing demons, giving them families, offices, and hierarchies. Lewis connects with his readers in a unique way. Roger Chapman states "the initial popularity of The Screwtape Letters was boosted in part by how it portrayed the devil's underworld"(Chapman 12). Edwin E. Aubrey called the book “profound theology in the hilarious mood” (Aubrey 231). Undeniably, both analysises are true. Some of he thoughts that come to mind while reading the book would not manifest if a pastor were speaking on the same subject. Satan and Screwtape’s sole purpose is to push us away from God. Therefore, the work is a must read for all Christians, because it offers new insight into how Satan and his lieutenants exploit and twist God's redemption for us. In other words: our light at the end of the

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“The best way to drive out the devil, if he will not yield to texts of Scripture, is to jeer and flout him, for he cannot bear scorn” -Luther This quote is the backbone of C.S. Lewis' epistolary novel The Screwtape Letters, which chronicles the letters of Screwtape, an experienced demon, to his demon nephew Wormwood, on how to best tempt a human toward unhappiness and moral failure. The story is written from a Christian perspective, but the topics addressed are largely drawn from real aspects of human nature, thus their validity is not demeaned by this presentation; rather The Screwtape Letters provides an accurate testimony on the subject from a universal point of view. Covering a broad spectrum of topics, The Screwtape Letters employs upside down, infernal logic as Screwtape's young nephew Wormwood fails or succeeds in corrupting certain areas of his “patient's” life after Screwtape advises him on how to push an advantage or withdraw from a failed area. Though Wormwood receives a myriad of lessons on the exploitable weaknesses of human nature,

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Prayer is a prevalent aspect in the Screwtape Letters. In Letter Four, Wormwood struggles to attack the prayer life on his patient. His uncle, Screwtape, advises him that it is best if the patient does not pray at all. By being a recent Christian convert, Screwtape suggests that it would be better if Wormwood could take advantage of the patient’s forgetfulness. “Whenever they are attending to the Enemy Himself, we are defeated, but there are ways of preventing them from doing so.”

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Humans have a tendency to conform and often neglect the potential consequences of doing so. In The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, the author introduces those consequences through a respected clergyman and sinner named Arthur Dimmesdale. Dimmesdale struggles with his guilty conscience and cowardice to confess his sin which prompts him to abide by societal rules but question himself in private. Dimmesdale’s conflict between outward conformity and inward questioning contributes to the novel’s message that everybody must confront their sins or they will fall victim to some form of retribution.

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C.S. Lewis is probably one of the greatest Christian writers who ever lived. His variety and depth of works is legendary. But, in this particular book, he does what few authors have done well. No other author has better captured the subtle deceptions of the Devil and helped the Christian (or non-Christian) to understand it in such a clear way. The book brings feelings of disturbance, humor, sadness, and elation.

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While Satan, “Our Father Below,” is a self-loving, deceitful father. When everyone agrees that Lewis’s style of writing is instructive. Some say Lewis wrote the book for people to understand and feel sympathy for Satan and his followers “demons”. Lewis’s style of writing makes one better equip to reorganize Satan’s subtle deceptions in three ways: it helps people recognize distractions in our thoughts, it helps people recognize distractions

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Whether in delicacy or excess, gluttony is the most readily accepted of the seven deadly sins. Guinness argues both that, in the modern world, gluttony of delicacy has replaced the gluttony of excess and the proper response to this vice is courage under suffering. When we think of gluttony, we tend to envision endless tables of food sprawled out before a man who could stand to skip a few meals, however, while this is one way in which gluttony presents itself, it is not the form we find often within the modern Christian’s life. Rather, the most common form of gluttony in the Christian’s life is that of delicacy. In his book, The Screwtape Letters C. S. Lewis utters these words through the pen of his character Screwtape, a demon corresponding with a demon-in-training, “Your patient’s mother… would be astonished… to learn that her whole life is enslaved to this kind of sensuality, which is quite concealed from her by the fact that the quantities involved are small” (Guinness, pg. 4-10).

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As we know Screwtape has a significant amount of experience in the demon world knowing many tips and tricks. One example of this is, “Now it may surprise you to learn that in His efforts to get permanent possession of a soul, He relies on the troughs even more than on the peaks…”(Lewis 38.) In the beginning of the quote Screwtape explains that it will be surprising with the information that he is informing Wormwood about. With this we are able to assume that Screwtape isn’t new to these ideas and is sharing his knowledge with Wormwood. Throughout this chapter Screwtape is able to inform Wormwood about the Enemies power and ability he has over all people.

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Due to Dimmesdale’s perfect reputation, he chooses to hide his sin from people. As a young pastor, God’s words judge Dimmesdale’s soul deeply, and sin in his heart burns his soul wildly. The more people trust him, the more he agonizes internally. Therefore, Dimmesdale starts to torture himself with whip, and even puts a letter “A” on his chest. Hidden sin in his heart break him down gradually.

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Hey Jacob! I concur with you that through the book, C.S. Lewis exposes many different challenges faced by Christians. Many of these I did not even realize that we, as Christians, encounter. I am sure that our ignorance plays into the hands of Satan and benefits his scheme. The points you brought up were very intriguing, but I had trouble figuring out how some of them related to The Screwtape Letters.

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In C. S. Lewis's The Screwtape Letters, Screwtape, a demon, writes a series of replies to letters from his nephew Wormwood, also a demon, on how to tempt a human 'patient' on earth to the Devil's camp. While this is a fictional work, this novel points out many different ways the Devil may tempt humans, specifically Christians, into disobeying God's word. For me, it has helped me identify some of the ways the Devil has tempted me to sin when I had not really realized that what I was doing was a sin, specifically when he speaks about the relationship between the patient and his mother: "...build up between you in that house a good settled habit of mutual annoyance; daily pinpricks"(11). Here Screwtape wants Wormwood to make the patient easily annoyed by small things that his mother does and to hold her to a different standard than himself. I often

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Subjectivism C. S. Lewis “The Screwtape Letters” tells the story of Screwtape, a devil in Hell, writing letters to his nephew, Wormwood, who is trying to guide a patient towards Hell over God and Heaven. Lewis has in other works described his thoughts on subjectivism and an objective truth and how an objective truth is better than subjectivism. However, in “The Screwtape Letters”, Lewis is describing the view of the devil and therefore the descriptions most often become the opposite of Lewis’ beliefs. Yet, in some circumstances an objective truth applies to the devil as well. The elements in the novel describe how Screwtape uses an objective truth and reality as a means of pushing the patient towards Hell compared to Heaven, which in Scretape’s

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The protagonist from “The Turn of the Screw”, is perceived to be despearate as she tries to achieve her dream but her personal pride leads her to an unstable condition. The author depicts the Governess believing that to attain her goal of gaining attentionby her employer, she must be a hero. Therefore, she invents lies about seeing her predessors haunting her pupils. Nonetheless, the more times James makes the Governess mention the ghosts the more she believes they are real and they, “want to get them (the children)” (82). The Governess is blinded by making it appear she sees the ghosts that she looses herself in her own lies leading her to an unstable condition of not knowing what is real or not.

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