Wednesday, January 7, 2009

Meditation in a Toolshed

When I read “Meditation in a Toolshed,” I was surprised at how deep CS Lewis went.  He described how in order to truly know what something is we must see it from both the perspective of the insider and the perspective of the observer.  Lewis used a number of different examples.  One of these examples was love.  A person who has never loved another will not quite be able to understand why one person may love another.  He may be able to see two people and say that they are in love, but how can he really know if he has never experienced love himself.

CS Lewis can really make you think about how you view others that have not grown up the same way as you; whether it be religion or just the your cultural life that you have grown up in.  After being raised a Christian I see Christianity as the obvious truth.  My beliefs do not seem strange to me, but they may seem strange to others, just as I may see their faith as strange or ridiculous.  What we must all understand about one another is that we were all brought up differently, that is why it is so hard to change a belief that someone has adopted from birth.

I think that CS Lewis does a great job of explaining to us that we cannot just observe or experience something to truly understand what that something is.  We must do both to attain full understand, at least as far as a human mind can understand anything.

 

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