Letter seven seems to foreshadow an internal battle that the patient will have to face. With regards to the War, he apparently is really confused, and does not know which way to turn. It is interesting to note that he could become anything from an extreme patriot to an extreme pacifist. Even more interesting is screwtape’s advice to his nephew on making sure that the patient chooses one of these extremes, and not something in the middle. It seems that powers in the world often push for one extreme or another to be recognized as the correct answer. Either a country is making war because the cause is the purest and truest in history, or they’re making war because they’re the biggest war-happy nation in history.
Religion comes in here since religious texts are confusing and have tons of stories that can be interpreted to mean about anything. If someone wants to prove that a war is good or bad based on religious scripture, they’re going to have absolutely no problem convincing themselves of it. Yet, the fact that someone else can prove to themselves the complete opposite based on the same texts should give a clue that one’s reasoning has to be deeper than that. What screwtape definitely doesn’t advocate is allowing the patient to take his time figuring out based on values and beliefs he wouldn’t trade for anything, how he feels about the war situation. This would lead to the best decision being made, even if it is a somewhat extreme position. Although screwtape does seem to disagree with my analysis, if the analysis is done correctly, I feel the patient would have the confidence and knowledge that unlike the masses in the extreme position, he would not conform to the crowd that also agrees with him when he decides how he views the war.
2 comments:
I really agree with your comment about the polarization of values or beliefs. It does seem like people are either attracted to one extreme end of the spectrum (whether it be political, social, religious, etc.) or the other. Society seems to frown upon people who take into account both ends of the spectrum and are in the middle, or moderates, as being 'fence-sitters' who can't make up their minds.
I like your idea about extremes and how people choose the polar opposites just to be recognized. Now more than ever there seems no room for middle grounds. We seem to live in a world that is "in or out". The whole idea of him being a patriot or pacifist goes nice with the whole idea of heaven and hell and what screwtape wants.
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