Use Of Temptations In C. S. Lewis The Screwtape Letters

C.S. Lewis, a Christian writer from England, penned a manuscript in 1942 called The Screwtape Letters that examined the temptations presented to man by Satan. “Lewis's Screwtape Letters was certainly one of his most popular works, and by his own admission it was a work that he found easy to write” (Harwood 24). By being a Christian himself, Lewis could sympathize and identify with fellow Christians undergoing the onslaught of spiritual attacks. Christians struggle daily with the temptations of Satan similar to those that Screwtape directs his nephew, Wormwood, to employ towards the Patient. In The Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis uses the character, Patient, to symbolize everyman and his struggles with overcoming temptations by showing how Screwtape attempts to conjure a plan for Wormwood to lure the Patient to the Devil’s camp with Satan’s insipid temptations of vanity,

Lewis’s The Screwtape Letters explores the struggles of temptations that mankind goes through before and after they become Christians. By taking advantage of vanity, pride, and pleasures, Wormwood attempts to lure the patient into Satan’s camp with the guidance of Screwtape. The Law of Undulation is where a person goes through a series of troughs and peaks and is presented with the options of growing closer to God or falling into temptation. During and after World War II, people began questioning religion and the role it played in their lives. This was a great valley in which many were presented with conflicting views. What once was considered scandalous was now a normal activity. “C.S. Lewis was signally aware of spiritual warfare. He explored this in many of his writings, but it was especially The Screwtape Letters that fired the imagination of personal spiritual warfare” (Potgieter). How can mankind fight against the devil and his temptations? He cannot do it alone. Pray to God for the strength as Matthew 6:13 states “[a]nd lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil