here was Narnia ending and Paradise coming, and only seven people got to come?
Huh? A huge number of Narnians got to come -- the ones who came up to the Door, looked Aslan in the face and loved Him. We're told that this included not only the ones alive when Tirian & Co. were thrown into the stable but all the Narnians throughout history who loved Aslan -- and some surprising additions too, including a bunch of Calormenes. They all went running past the Friends of Narnia and disappeared, going "farther up and farther in", but they were definitely there.
As far as the "only seven" is concerned I'm guessing you mean that only seven people from our world got to come to Paradise -- but that's not true either, because the Pevensies saw "our people" -- meaning their father and mother, and other dead family members and loved ones -- waving to them from a distance when they got deeper into Narnia. But note, it was the end of Narnia we were witnessing, not the end of all the worlds and not the end of our own world either. There were seven people from our world there because they were all on the train heading to Bristol that smashed up and killed them all, not because the whole of Planet Earth had been destroyed and only seven people were Found Worthy. Planet Earth was still carrying on just fine, and that's where Susan (who was not on the train) remains.
It just seemed to be to be incredibly killjoy and Puritan of Lewis to exclude her on such minor grounds as vanity. If that's all it took to be denied Heaven, what was the chance of the rest of us getting in?
Peter, Edmund, Lucy and the others didn't get into Paradise because they were perfect (we're shown their faults, and even their serious sins -- remember Edmund was a traitor? -- in other books of the series) but because they loved Aslan and believed in Him. Susan's vanity didn't keep her from being worthy of Heaven, because none of us are worthy and we don't get to Heaven on the basis of our own goodness in the first place. Susan's vanity simply distracted her, at this point in time, from being interested in Aslan and Narnia any more: thus she wasn't with the Friends of Narnia when they died on the train. But as another poster to this thread pointed out (http://www.livejournal.com/users/synaesthete7/176635.html?thread=1630459#t1630459), Lewis wasn't writing her off at all.
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Date: 2005-08-31 12:46 pm (UTC)Huh? A huge number of Narnians got to come -- the ones who came up to the Door, looked Aslan in the face and loved Him. We're told that this included not only the ones alive when Tirian & Co. were thrown into the stable but all the Narnians throughout history who loved Aslan -- and some surprising additions too, including a bunch of Calormenes. They all went running past the Friends of Narnia and disappeared, going "farther up and farther in", but they were definitely there.
As far as the "only seven" is concerned I'm guessing you mean that only seven people from our world got to come to Paradise -- but that's not true either, because the Pevensies saw "our people" -- meaning their father and mother, and other dead family members and loved ones -- waving to them from a distance when they got deeper into Narnia. But note, it was the end of Narnia we were witnessing, not the end of all the worlds and not the end of our own world either. There were seven people from our world there because they were all on the train heading to Bristol that smashed up and killed them all, not because the whole of Planet Earth had been destroyed and only seven people were Found Worthy. Planet Earth was still carrying on just fine, and that's where Susan (who was not on the train) remains.
It just seemed to be to be incredibly killjoy and Puritan of Lewis to exclude her on such minor grounds as vanity. If that's all it took to be denied Heaven, what was the chance of the rest of us getting in?
Peter, Edmund, Lucy and the others didn't get into Paradise because they were perfect (we're shown their faults, and even their serious sins -- remember Edmund was a traitor? -- in other books of the series) but because they loved Aslan and believed in Him. Susan's vanity didn't keep her from being worthy of Heaven, because none of us are worthy and we don't get to Heaven on the basis of our own goodness in the first place. Susan's vanity simply distracted her, at this point in time, from being interested in Aslan and Narnia any more: thus she wasn't with the Friends of Narnia when they died on the train. But as another poster to this thread pointed out (http://www.livejournal.com/users/synaesthete7/176635.html?thread=1630459#t1630459), Lewis wasn't writing her off at all.