Screwtape Chapter 1 Summary

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 one such part, Screwtape writes to his nephew that he should keep the patient in the church. He records that, “One of our great allies at present is the church itself.” (5). Ironic because the church contains the truth about God which would ruin Wormwood’s patient. If the patient stays in the church, he will eventually hear the truth. Screwtape also warns his nephew about the use of science and logic. Addressing his nephew, Screwtape composes, “Above all, do not attempt to use science (I mean, the real sciences) as a defense against Christianity. They will positively encourage him to think about realities he can’t touch and see.” (4). Ironically, if Screwtape really, truly believed his own beliefs, he would encourage his nephew to employ logic to uncover the truth. However, Screwtape knows his beliefs stand untruthful and logic and science would find the lies in Wormwood’s arguments. Furthermore, Jesus could also destroy Wormwood’s flimsy arguments. Warned by Screwtape that, “He (Jesus) has to be a ‘great man’ in the modern sense of the word,” (125) Wormwood endeavored to fulfill this demand. This statement displays the irony written by Screwtape. Screwtape doesn’t demand Wormwood convince the patient that Jesus exists; he simply tells him to convince the patient that Jesus is a great man. One would think the smart thing to do would be to convince the patient that Jesus does not exist whatsoever. Clearly, C.S Lewis uses irony

1. Instillation of Hope - faith that the treatment mode can and will be effective. All the members felt that with God’s strength they can overcome the impossible.

“The long, dull, monotonous years of middle-aged prosperity or middle-aged diversity are excellent campaigning weather.” Screwtape wished to drag out the Christian’s life and turn it into a purposeless, repeating roll-play. He wanted to slowly and despairingly tear the Christian from God and so tear him from the only true hope and life and joy there is in this world. Do not be alarmed, though, because God is stronger that the demons and He, “having oddly destined these mere animals to life in His own eternal world, has guarded them pretty effectively from the danger of feeling at home anywhere else.” Screwtape admits that God insures his children a place in his forever home and an everlasting joy. Additionally, Screwtape refers to humans as “mere animals.” God created us in His image, which sets us apart from the animals. Screwtape therefore was trying to degrade humankind, to lower us, and how can any of us, humans, feel sympathy for one who so hates us

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 Letters, it talked a lot about how the devil can distract a Christian. A devil can shift a person’s focus on God with random thoughts and actions. In the book, Wormwood is told by Screwtape to distract his patient from converting to Christianity. Even along the patient's journey of getting into church and being a better follower of God, Wormwood found any little way to make his mind wander. Even today the devil can shift a Christians focus to mundane thoughts. So as we go through Screwtape letters looking at the distractions used by Screwtape lets also think about what mundane things the devil can do to us today.

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.

In The Screwtape Letters, the topic of love appears continuously throughout the text. In different ways, it is seen that the theme of love is used. Love is commonly understood as a deep feeling for another but C.S describes God’s love as so much more. God’s love is unchanging and no matter what wrong is committed, he will continue to love. Whether it is seen in the patients love of Christ, his love of his mother, or his love for his romantic partner, they all point to one prominent thing, God. Screwtape and Wormwood continuously fight throughout the book to strip the patient of the things that he loves in his life to ultimately lead him away from the true source of love, which they call the enemy, Christ.

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:

In Reclaiming the Body: Christians and the Faithful Use of Modern Medicine, Joel Shuman and Brian Volk “attempt to reframe that relationship, to ask if theology as lived in the church has something to offer anyone who has had or will have an encounter with the medical establishment” (Shuman and Volk 8). They talk about how to reimagine the relationship between Christians and medicine (9). In chapter one, Joel Shuman and Brian Volk reinforce the thesis by stating that Christians need to involve and invite God, the church, and the right characters into their story (19). The chapter starts off with discussing how God is sometimes pictured as a guy in the sky that is there for us to go to when we are worried medicine is not enough and nothing

“The patient” is first a man distracted from God by life. Screwtape first tells Wormwood to use the patients’s weakenesses against him to keep him away from God. We see this continue to go on throughout the plot. The patient is converted to christianity on more than one occasion, meets the woman of his life, has conflict with his mother, and experiences the troubles of a war.

healing process. Compassion allows the patient to feel at ease to communicate with the nurse

Henry James's The Turn of the Screw paints a landscape that is ripe for psychoanalytic analysis. He has chosen language and syntax that symbolize his main character's psychological fragmentation and her futile attempt to mend herself. Many of Lacan's theories emerge as the Governess reveals her motivations through her recollective narrative.

The Turn of the Screw is one of the most controversial works in literature and the text has provoked a variety of critical interpretations from its publication in 1898. In this novel, the governess tells her experience with two apparitions that no one but she could see. And the governess accuses the ghosts of servants for corrupting the children, Miles and Flora. Critics concerning about the truth of the story are divided two basic camps based on their acceptance or rejection of the governess's credibility as a storyteller. Some critics believe that the ghosts are real and the governess is a rational and credible narrator, while the others believe that the ghosts are hallucinations of the governess and regard the governess as an incredible and mentally abnormal narrator. Also, we could speculate the author’s intention on the basis of his life experience and other works of Henry James. This essay will examine the reliability of the governess on the basis of the text and interpret Henry James’s intention on the basis of other sources.

This has been established for us before where recognition of trial and error of what medical methods work in sustaining health have been passed on in narration. This long history of continuous narration has now made medicine a tradition that we humans live by, spanning across