It's Weird that a Christian Wrote Aslan
Modern Christians have an odd habit of forming theological views by exegeting C.S. Lewis. Many people take their understanding of demons from The Screwtape Letters. A popular view of Hell is wholly derived from The Great Divorce. I know of one bishop who justified patriarchy by reference to Lewis's bizarre science fiction novel, Perelandra.1
I've had this thought before. But, it only occurred to me now because I heard someone quoting Aslan as though he were Jesus. That made no sense to me. Aslan is not Jesus. Aslan is a fictional character from a series of mid-century children's stories.
But, Lewis obviously intends Aslan to be a stand - in for Jesus. And this is a bizarre decision for a Christian author to make. There's a long tradition of creative retellings of Bible stories, but none of the Narnia books are just creative retellings of Bible stories. Aslan does plenty and says loads of stuff that Christ never did. And this forces the author the ventriloquize God. I am probably less devout than C.S. Lewis was, I have much less reverence for the church and Bible than most of his fans do. But I would feel very uncomfortable writing a story where I was forced to speak for Jesus. If I became an atheist tomorrow, my vestigial piety would keep me from doing so. But C.S. Lewis apparently did not feel this way, and most people seemingly don't either.
To be clear, "bizarre" is not an insult. Perelandra is quite nice (though not scripture). Out of the Silent Planet is not bad either. We speak not of That Hideous Third Volume.↩