S3E25 – TWHF (Pt 2 – Ch 4) – “Barefaced”

Orual comes face-to-face with Orual and the god of the Mountain.

S3E25: “Barefaced” (Download)

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Time Stamps

00:49 – Drink-of-the-week
01:40 – Quote-of-the-week
05:20 – Chapter Summary
50:22 – Closing remarks

YouTube Version

After Show Skype Session

This Season, after each episode, Matt and I will be recording a short Skype conversation about one particular topic that was raised during the podcast:

Show Notes

• I was joined by Matt “Barefaced”/”Have you seen my face?!” Bush.

• For the drink-of-the-week, Matt was enjoying a Margarita and I was drinking my Engagement Scotch, Glenmorangie La Santa.

• The quote-of-the-week was:

“I was being unmade. I was no one. But that’s little to say; rather Psyche herself was, in a manner, no one. I loved her as I would once have through it impossible to love, would have died any death for her. And yet, it was not, not now, she that really counted. Or if she counted it was for another’s sake. The earth and stars and sun, all that was or will be, existed for his sake.”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

• I then read my chapter summary:

Orual says her complaint itself was the gods’ answer. She meets the Fox, who blames himself for her mistakes. He takes her away to a vineyard with walls of living pictures. Orual sees one of Psyche considering suicide, one of her sorting out seeds while being helped by ants, another of her gathering golden wool of rams, another of her walking in the desert, and finally of her walking down into the underworld. The Fox leads her to a courtyard where she falls at Psyche’s feet. Psyche takes her to the edge of a large pool in which she sees the reflection of not one, but two Psyches. She hears the voice of the god say “You also are Psyche” and the vision ends. Four days later Orual dies while writing about that vision. Arnom concludes the text, praising his queen and his desire to send the book to Greece.

150-word summary of Chapter 4 from Part II of Till We Have Faces

• We finished the last chapter on a cliff-hanger. Orual was having a vision and was deep inside a mountain, presenting her case against the gods before a judge and a great number of shadowy figures… After she had read her complaint multiple times, the judge stopped her and asked whether she had received her answer… Orual said that she had… So Orual then begins this final chapter with an explanation…

The complaint was the answer. To have heard myself making it was to be answered.

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

• She recalls something that the Fox would say when he was teaching her Greek:

 “Child, to say the very thing you really mean, the whole of it, nothing more or less or other than what you really mean; that’s the whole art and joy of words.”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

She regards this as a glib saying. She says you can’t talk about the “joy of words” when:

“the time comes…at which you will be forced at last to utter the speech which has lain at the center of your soul for years, which you have, all that time, idiot-like, been saying over and over”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

In the courtroom Orual kept repeating her complaint again and again. She now sees that she had been repeating it to herself for years. 

• She had often complained that the gods don’t communicate clearly. Now she says:

I saw well why the gods do not speak to us openly, nor let us answer. Till that word can be dug out of us [i.e. the nonsense we keep repeating to ourselves], why should they hear the babble that we think we mean? How can they meet us face to face till we have faces?

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

• Orual then hears the voice of her father, the King:

“Best leave the girl to me…I’ll lesson her.”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

So it appears that her father wants to be in charge of her punishment…nice! Rather reminded me of the bossy wife in The Great Divorce, wanting to have control of her husband again.

• But then she hears the Fox speak, seemingly addressing the judge, using a variety of names: “…Minos… Rhadamanthus… Persephone”. As expected, Matt didn’t know who these folks were… Persephone was the wife of Hades, god of the Underworld. Minos and Rhadamanthus were judges of the dead. 

• The Fox steps forward to try to take the blame. He says…

I am to blame for most of this, and I should bear the punishment. I taught her, as men teach a parrot, to say, ‘Lies of poets,’ and ‘Ungit’s a false image.’ I made her think that ended the question. I never said, Too true an image of the demon within. And then the other face of Ungit (she has a thousand) . . . something live anyway. And the real gods more alive. Neither they nor Ungit mere thoughts or words. 

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

It’s not quite clear to me exactly what he’s saying, but I think he’s saying that the gods were an image of the worst parts of the human soul? Yet he also seems to speak of other, “real” gods who are even more alive.

• The Fox says that he never told Orual why the Priest or the people got something from the Temple which he himself never got from his pithy philosophy. This takes us back a couple of chapters, when Orual is confused by the consolation that the old peasant woman found in the Ungit stone. He says that he was ignorant of his ignorance. He seems to imply that there’s a mixture of truth and falsehood in the house of Ungit. But the question is, what’s the bit that’s right?

“The Priest knew at least that there must be sacrifices. They will have sacrifice — will have man. Yes, and the very heart, center, ground, roots of a man; dark and strong and costly as blood”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

Once again, I’m not entirely clear what he’s saying, other than the fact that the gods want sacrifice, and that sacrifice seems to be man himself, his entire being, which makes me think of Psalm 51:

The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not spurn.

Psalm 51:17

In Christlike fashion (and quite the opposite of her father), the Fox even asks to take the punishment instead:

“Send me away, Minos, even to Tartarus, if Tartarus can cure glibness”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

Tartarus is the prison of the Titans and the abyss of torment mentioned in 2 Peter 2:4 where the fallen angels are sent.

• The Fox says that, in giving Orual philosophy, he gave her something good, but not everything that she needed.

“I made her think that a prattle of maxims would do, all thin and clear as water. For of course water’s good; and it didn’t cost much, not where I grew up. So I fed her on words.”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

This relates to “thick” and “clear” religions which Lewis talks about in God in the Dock. We’ll have to talk about that with Andrew or in the retrospective.

• In response to all this, and the Fox’s request that he stand in Orual’s place, the judge explains:

“Peace… The woman is a plaintiff, not a prisoner. It is the gods who have been accused. They have answered her. If they in turn accuse her, a greater judge and a more excellent court must try the case. Let her go.” 

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

• Orual throws herself off the rock and the Fox catches her. She’s surprised that his “real and warm”, as Homer said that the dead were only shadows. The Fox replies that he always told her that the poets often got things wrong!

• The Fox then asks for her forgiveness. Orual responds in kind, noting that his excuses to stay with her in Glome were  “only disguises for… love”.

“I lapped up all you gave me like a thirsty animal. Oh, Grandfather, Ansit’s right. I’ve battened [grew strong] on the lives of men”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

The Fox confirms the truth of this, but says he’s glad because that means that he has something to forgive!

• He says that he must now take Orual to the judge, as it is now the gods’ turn to accuse Orual. The exchange is beautiful. She says:

“I cannot hope for mercy.”

“Infinite hopes — and fears — may both be yours. Be sure that, whatever else you get, you will not get justice.”

“Are the gods not just?”

“Oh no, child. What would become of us if they were? But come and see.”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

This reminds me of so many things… Jesus’ invitation to “Come and see” in the Gospels… The murderer and the self-righteous man in The Great Divorce… Scripture… :

“…but if you, O Lord, should mark our guilt, Lord who would survive, but with you is found forgiveness – for this we revere you”

Psalm 130:3-4

• The Fox leads her into a vineyard filled with sunshine. Orual describes it like this:

We were in a cool chamber, walls on three sides of us, but on the fourth side only pillars and arches with a vine growing over them on the outside. Beyond and between the light pillars and the soft leaves I saw level grass and shining water.

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

As they wait, orual notices that the walls are painted with wonderful images…

• In the first image, Orual sees a picture of a woman coming to a river bank. The picture somehow comes alive, like a video. The figure ties her ankles together with her belt, but with horror Orual realizes that it’s not her… it’s Psyche! Terrified by what she is doing, Orual cries out as though the picture could hear her…and amazingly, Psyche unties her ankles and goes away…

• The Fox takes Orual to the next picture and it too comes alive. Psyche is in some kind of dungeon in rags and chains, sorting out seeds into their proper heaps. Orual notes with surprise that she finds no anguish or despair in Psyche’s face. The reason is that the ants are helping her in her task!

• The Fox takes her to the third picture, which is of the pasture of the gods. She sees Psyche wondering how she will obtain the golden wool and almost laughing inwardly at her own bewilderment. Suddenly, the rams charge off towards an intruder at the other end of the meadow and Psyche excitedly gathers the wool from the hedge without obstruction.

• In the fourth image, Orual sees herself and Psyche walking through the desert. Psyche holds an empty bowl and a shadowy Orual holds her complaint against the gods. Although she’s pale, Psyche is merry and singing! When they came to the precipice, Orual disappeared. An eagle takes Psyche’s bowl and returns it filled with the water of death.

• At this point, they’ve viewed two of the three walls and the Fox asks Orual if she’s understood what she’s seen. Orual is confused as to why Psyche was almost happy and the Fox tells her that “Another bore nearly all the anguish.”, and that this was one of the true things he used to tell the girls:

“We’re all limbs and parts of one Whole. Hence, of each other. Men, and gods, flow in and out and mingle.”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

This fills Orual with thanksgiving to the gods.

• The Fox asks her if she would have rather had justice instead. Orual says that, as Queen, she knew that a people’s cry for justice must be heard, but that her cry shouldn’t, comparing her own plea to that of Batta’s muttering or Redival’s whining.

• The Fox now shows her the next wall and the fifth and final image. He says that this is the last of Ungit’s tasks. When Orual is shocked that there is a “real” Ungit, the Fox replies:

“All, even Psyche, are born into the house of Ungit. And all must get free from her. Or say that Ungit in each must bear Ungit’s son and die in childbed — or change.

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

This seems to relate to the god’s earlier statement that one must “die before you die”.

• he Fox then explains Psyche’s task… Psyche is alone, walking on a downwards slope. She must go to the land of the dead and get a casket of beauty from the Queen of the Deadlands, death herself, and bring it back to Ungit so that she may become beautiful. The catch is that Psyche isn’t allowed to speak to anyone. The two of them watch. As Psyche walks to towards the underworld, a great crowd appears:

“Istra! Princess! Ungit!… Stay with us. Be our goddess. Rule us. Speak oracles to us. Receive our sacrifices. Be our goddess.”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

• Next the Fox himself appears in the picture, saying:

“O Psyche, Psyche, what folly is this? …All lies of priests and poets, child…There are no deadlands such as you dream of, and no such gods. …Come to me and I’ll lead you out of all this darkness; back to the grass plot behind the pear trees, where all was clear, hard, limited, and simple.”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

• A final figure appears, a face unknown to Orual, but one which inspired tremendous pity, whose eyes had been wept dry, full of “despair, humiliation, entreaty, endless reproach”. Orual sees the woman’s left arm drips with blood and her voice is filled with passion, wailing:

“Oh Psyche… Oh my own child, my only love. Come back. Come back. Back to the old world where we were happy together. Come back to Maia.”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

Albeit with great difficulty, Psyche continues on, “journeying always further into death”.

• Orual asks the Fox whether they really did those things to Psyche. He replies:

“Yes. All here’s true.”

“And we said we loved her.”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

• The Fox explains that although they did love her…

“She had no more dangerous enemies than us. And in that far distant day when the gods become wholly beautiful, or we at last are shown how beautiful they always were, this will happen more and more. For mortals, as you said, will become more and more jealous. And mother and wife and child and friend will all be in league to keep a soul from being united with the Divine Nature.”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

So he’s saying that mortal love is jealous. Once again I hear the echo of Christ’s words which I mentioned a while ago:

I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law

Matthew 10:33-35

• Orual asks about the beauty of the gods. The Fox says he doesn’t fully understand, but he knows that…

This age of ours will one day be the distant past. And the Divine Nature can change the past. Nothing is yet in its true form.

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

Rather sounds like MacDonald’s comment that Heaven and Hell are retrospective.

• Suddenly many sweet, awesome voices begin crying:

“She comes. Our lady returns to her house; the goddess Psyche, back from the lands of the dead, bringing the casket of beauty from the Queen of Shadows.”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

At this, the Fox leads her out into the sunlight of the grassy court where Orual sees a large pool of crystal-clear water, but swiftly falls on her face and kisses the feet of Psyche. She says:

“Oh Psyche, oh goddess, …Never again will I call you mine; but all there is of me shall be yours. Alas, you know now what it’s worth. I never wished you well, never had one selfless thought of you. I was a craven”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

We’re told that Psyche is both a goddess and yet still the same old Psyche, but somehow even more so. This echoes The Great Divorce and what Lewis says about personality in Mere Christianity. Psyche bends down and lifts her up, telling her that she went on “a long journey to fetch the beauty that will make Ungit beautiful”

• But then something even greater and more awesome seems afoot. The voices say:

“He is coming, …The god is coming into his house. The god comes to judge Orual.”

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

• Psyche takes her to the edge of the pool and a change begins to happen within her…

I was being unmade. I was no one. But that’s little to say; rather, Psyche herself was, in a manner, no one. I loved her as I would once have thought it impossible to love, would have died any death for her. And yet, it was not, not now, she that really counted. Or if she counted (and oh, gloriously she did) it was for another’s sake. The earth and stars and sun, all that was or will be, existed for his sake. And he was coming. The most dreadful, the most beautiful, the only dread and beauty there is, was coming.

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

• I’d suggest that this is what happens to the natural loves when they become infused with divine love. This also points to what Lewis says about the glory of our neighbours in The Weight of Glory,, as well as St. Paul when he wrote to the Corinthians:

Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being changed into his likeness from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.

2 Corinthians 3:17

• As she looks at the pool, Orual sees two reflections – two Psyches, both beautiful, one clothed, the other naked. It is then she hears a great voice say “You also are Psyche”. Orual looks up… and suddenly finds herself back in the palace gardens with her book. The vision has ended.

• The visions have taken their toll on Orual. Four days later she is writing about that last vision. Arnom has confirmed she is near death. Orual wishes that her nephew, Daaran, were there so she could have taught him to love Arnom and her women. Her final paragraph in the book appears thus:

I ended my first book with the words no answer. I know now, Lord, why you utter no answer. You are yourself the answer. Before your face questions die away. What other answer would suffice? Only words, words; to be led out to battle against other words.

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

Consider the Book of Job. He doesn’t get an explanation. He gets to encounter God.

• The final sentence of the “Book of Orual” is:

Long did I hate you, long did I fear you. I might —

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

• Arnom concludes the book, telling us that Orual died mid-sentence and that the book has been placed in the temple.  Arnom praises Orual as “the most wise, just, valiant, fortunate and merciful of all the princes known in our parts of the world”. He says that he thinks she would have liked her book to be taken to Greece. He has charged his successor to make sure this happens. 

• The final sentence is a bit strange as it is given in the form of a question:

(The Priest who comes after me has it in charge to give up the book to any stranger who will take an oath to bring it into Greece?)

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (Part II, Chapter 4)

• I ended with a section of St. Augustine’s Confessions. The final paragraph of Orual’s book put it in mind and it’s a wonderful articulation of the soul’s desire for God:

Late have I loved you, O Beauty ever ancient, ever new, late have I loved you! You were within me, but I was outside, and it was there that I searched for you. In my unloveliness I plunged into the lovely things which you created. You were with me, but I was not with you. Created things kept me from you; yet if they had not been in you they would have not been at all. You called, you shouted, and you broke through my deafness. You flashed, you shone, and you dispelled my blindness. You breathed your fragrance on me; I drew in breath and now I pant for you. I have tasted you, now I hunger and thirst for more. You touched me, and I burned for your peace

St. Augustine, The Confessions

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