Payne as an interpreter of the spirituality of C.S. Lewis

books:

	• Real Presence: The Christian Worldview of C. S. Lewis As Incarnational Reality Leanne Payne Crossway Books, 1988 - 198 pages average customer review:based on 6 reviews
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highly recommended

great buy

I received the book in great condition and find it to be very inspiring.

A superb study of CS Lewis's worldview.

This book is a excellent study of the worldview of CS Lewis - one of the most influencial christian writers of the twentieth century. It is aimed at those who have either read or are contemplating reading Lewis's work. Unlike some books which deal with worldviews this is very readable, and far from being dry and abstract. The author demonstrates throughout her book a profound understanding of Lewis's writings and communicates this in a lucid and readable style - showing how Lewis's whole system of thought is centred in what she terms "Incarnational Reality" - the reality of God, present in and through His creation.

Later chapters in the book look at how Lewis understood the role of an artist, the nature of imaginative experience, and Good and evil (the author contrasts Lewis's views on this with those of the psychologist CG Jung and fellow writer Charles Williams).

Well worth reading for anyone even slighty interested in Lewis.

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Payne as an interpreter of the spirituality of C.S. Lewis

In the REAL PRESENCE, Leanne Payne explains the spirituality of C.S.Lewis as revealed in his fiction and nonfiction writings. Payne is in part an interpreter of C.S. Lewis; in part a Christian apologist to the philosophical community; in part a spiritual director (telling us how to 'grow our own spiritual life'). She is also a minister in her own right - she has an international ministry of spiritual (emotional) healing. She has a somewhat arcane writing style which takes just a little bit to decipher. But her understanding of Lewis is great. His spirituality was foundational to the development of her own, and she articulates it very well. She explains it in light of classic, historic Christian doctrine, especially that of the early church. This book is very helpful in understanding her own subsequent books, all of which I highly reccommend, esp HEALING PRESENCE, RESTORING THE CHRISTIAN SOUL and LISTENING PRAYER. She has a tremendous understanding of (as she terms it) 'Incarnational Reality', the essential Christian assertion that, through the Holy Spirit, God comes to live right inside the believer. It is in listening to and collaborating with the Holy Spirit, who indwells us, that we are healed and caused to grow. Lewis wrote much about this concept (in large part symbolically, in his fiction); and it is from him that much of Payne's own understanding comes. It is to this concept that she refers in the title of this book - THE REAL PRESENCE. The book is a tremendous help in understanding the complexity of Lewis' writing, especially his fiction. Without understanding his underlying spirituality, it is hard to appreciate any but the most superficial aspects of meaning in the imagery and characterizations in his fiction; it also informs much of his nonfiction. Payne does an excellent job of explaining that spirituality and does so with frequent quotes from and references to Lewis' writings. (Perhaps you thought that the Narnia Chronicles and his outer space trilogy - PERELANDRA,OUT OF THE SILENT PLANET,THAT HIDEOUS STRENGTH - were simple children's books. They are, in fact, profound works, if one only knows what is meant through the imagery.) Payne taught at Trinity Seminary in Deerfield IL USA, and had access to a large body of Lewis' unpublished writings and correspondence. She has taught, there and elsewhere, on an undergraduate and graduate level, the writings of Lewis, Tolkein, Charles Williams and others. I give this book five stars (" ... and two thumbs up - way up!")

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