Examples Of Spiritual Warfare In C. S. Lewis The Screwtape Letters

The demons that lurk around each and every one of us, in the darkness and shadows, can use things like reality or bad influences and many other ways to get in their “patient’s” head. The demons can’t even use the same things that God uses, to get to us; the demons just use it in an evil way. In The Screwtape letters, all of these pains plus many more pains are used to lure “Patients” towards the darkness. In the Gospel of Matthew, we are warned about demons and other false teachings, “beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they ravening wolves” (Matthew 7:15).

In chapter four of the book, Problem of Pain, C.S. Lewis posits that to bring the doctrine of Christianity into the minds of modern men one must present the wickedness of man. To help argue this Lewis gives many points on the ignorance of man, such as the causes for the need of the explanation of human wickedness, the problem of denial, and lies about sin. The purpose of this is to show how society has changed its view from sin being a disease man suffers from to it just being a normal evil that is excusable. There are two majors reasons for this that Lewis gets into. The first is the fact that society has focused on the virtue of kindness, which is also considered mercy, to overlook all other virtues. This has gotten people into the mindset that showing “kindness” is the best way to represent good and cruelty being the best to represent the bad. The problem with this is that there is an extreme ease to attribute kindness upon ourselves on inadequate grounds. Everyone tends to feel benign when nothing tends to be causing them to be uneasy or annoyed. Due to this men and women alike will comfort themselves from all of their own personal convictions if they believe their own intentions, otherwise known as their heart, is in a good place.

Lewis refers to God, Satan and Hell many different ways. When mentioning God, he uses the term “The Enemy” which in our minds, would normally be in reference to Satan. He also refers to him as “The Father Above,” and to Satan as “Our Father Below” and “High Command.” Hell is referred to as “Our Father’s House.” “Screwtape Letters” is written with this context because it is from the point of view of a demon who goes by the name of Screwtape. This is satirical, it is the opposite of the way we would normally think. In our minds, we think of God as “High Command,” and as Our Father, not as “The

In the Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis proposes a dialog between an experienced devil and a young inexperienced devil. We only get to read letters from the senior, Screwtape, to the junior, Wormwood. In these letters we overhear how Wormwood’s first assignment is going, what tempting strategies he should try, and what might happen to him if he fails. Screwtape comes across cordial in all his letters, but just beneath his tone he seems to dislike his young mentee. In every letter, Screwtape belittles Wormwood in some way or another, and by the end we hear Screwtape’s outright anger and outrage at Wormwood’s failure when his patient dies a Christian. Lewis’ style of writing equips me to better recognise Satin’s subtle deceptions, and does not make

Could anyone feel sympathy for a groveling, sly demon? The demons did have a hard job, but it was a despicable job of choice. In The Screwtape Letters, by C.S. Lewis, Screwtape busily instructs his nephew, Wormwood, who scrambles to trip up his “patient,” and bring the man to hell. Throughout the book, everyone should plainly realize that neither Screwtape nor Wormwood deserved pity or sympathy in the least. The first reason for this is that the demons’ malevolence revealed itself plainly in the book. Secondly the demons’ hate for all that is good and innocent reared its ugly head, snarling in the reader’s face. Finally, the pitiable, vile, cruel plans of the demons wiped out any lingering sympathetic feelings in the reader. The demons were purely cruelty.

He perpetrates this act of sin and permits the guilt of his deed to haunt him every day of his life. He tries to justify the hiding of his sin by thinking of the damage it could do to his congregation. He believes that he needs to demonstrate a virtuous disposition for his church members. However, despite his attempts at justification, he still suffers tremendously for his sin. Instead of repenting his misdeed, he buries it deep inside of his heart, causing it to slowly deteriorate. In his heart “there was, and there had long been, the gnawing and poisonous tooth of bodily pain” caused by his remorse (Hawthorne 135). Rather than admitting his sin, he inflicts in private actions of self-harm including fasting and scourging himself. Hawthorne emphasizes the daily torture that concealed sin can cause through Dimmesdale’s internal

The patient in The Screwtape Letters is an interesting character. He is a struggle for Wormwood who is trying to keep him close to the Devil. I see him as a writer who has been put into the army to do defence work. I see him as a writer who was a professor so his knowledge is very extensive in many things in life.

In the Screwtape Letter, by C.S. Lewis, Srewtape insists that all pleasures are created by the Enemy, meaning God, and that demons have not figured out how to create them. It’s an idea commonly seen in Christian theology. God brought all things into this world to be good, and those things can and have been corrupted by demons and the lot. What Screwtape is saying is that, God wants people to experience pleasure, and that it is a demon’s job to corrupt a person’s sense of that pleasure.

The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis is a set of letters written by the demon Screwtape to his nephew, Wormwood. Wormwood is relatively new at being a demon and throughout the letters, Screwtape both responds to the letters that Wormwood sends him and provides Wormwood with advice about how best to tempt the man Wormwood is in charge of away from the Enemy, God. Although Lewis only gives the reader one side of this correspondence between uncle and nephew, Screwtape’s response at the beginning of each letter is usually enough to understand what Wormwood’s letter contained. It appears as if Wormwood had only recently become a Tempter as opposed to his uncle, Screwtape, who had surpassed the role of Tempter and now occupied an administrative role.

According to an article by Larry D. Harwood , “Lewis’s Screwtape Letters: the Ascetic Devil and Aesthetic God”, he states The Screwtape Letters portrays Lewis’s evil character and the principles of the “realism, dignity, and austerity of Hell” (2004). “In The Screwtape Letters Lewis portrays God as a lavish materialist affirming delight in a sensual as a part of being human. Lewis depicts the pleasures of sense...To Screwtape it appears that God took a gamble that not only makes little sense, but also appears to have come with costs to himself.” (Harwood, 2004). According to the article “Lewis's Screwtape Letters: the Ascetic Devil and the Aesthetic God” the mood of The Screwtape Letters is dusty, gritty as Lewis depicts Hell, due to the tone

Love is a very impactful thing. The fact that the Patient has great love for his mother stands out as a problem for Wormwood and Screwtape. These two accomplices believe that if they strip the patient of all sources of love that he will turn away from God. Wormwood is provided with a list filled with details on how he can turn the patient’s love into anger and annoyance towards his mother. One way that they attempt to do this is by distorting the patient’s prayers into prayers

In "The Screwtape Letters", another book by C.S. Lewis consisting of correspondence between a senior demon and his assistant who is trying to control the soul of a mortal. In it, the senior demon Screwtape writes:

Letters 1-4 Wormwood is related to Screwtape as Nephew and Uncle. Screwtape refers to a man of God as a patient, to describe that wormwood is trying to take a man away from

a) Screwtape opposes argument since ignorance is much more important to tempters. If a patient thinks of doctrines as worn out and old-fashioned, there would be no need to argue with them to change their mind. b) Several times during the novel, Screwtape advises Wormwood to use jargon and convince the patient that materialism is strong, as opposed to using argument.

The Screwtape letters is another great work of Lewis where he uses imagination to explain the truth upside down through letters between two devils. It is like reverse psychology in a way for example if something is good in Screwtape then it is bad in reality or if something is a setback it is actually a victory in struggles against evil ( Brown 177). Lewis then talked about his idea of the 'devil'; he does not believe the devil is the opposite force against God, rather he says it is angels that have become bad. He goes on to explain that these demonic representations are just symbolic and these symbols of concrete reality are used in the Screwtape letters (Brown 178). The first letter is basically saying that Wormwood (the younger devil) cannot use reading and