Floating Islands - Kevin Crowley

Floating Islands

The most awe-struck moment I found myself reading in Perelandra was toward the end of the book when it occurred to the Green Lady (Tinidril) why she should not stay on the Fixed Island, other than of course for the reason that she was told not to by Maleldil.

“I awoke from sleep, my mind was cleared”, she says, “…How could I wish to live there except because it was Fixed? And why should I desire the Fixed except to make sure—to be able on one day to command where I should be the next and what should happen to me? It was to reject the wave—to draw my hands out of Maleldil’s, to say to him, ‘Not thus, but thus’…That would have been cold love and feeble trust. And out of it how could we ever have climbed back into love and trust again?” (p.179)

This trusting in Maleldil to provide resembles Jesus’ speech on the Sermon of the Mount, “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear…” And the passage goes on. The idea portrayed here in Mathew, chapter 6, and in Perelandra is about trusting in God.

I believe C.S. Lewis uses an excellent analogy with fixed and floating islands. It’s funny because living on a planet in which all landmasses are fixed, we don’t see the idea of living fixed as a type of sin. Ransom says himself that his ancestors were not given such a forbiddance by God (for how could He if all lands are fixed?). But the sin is just the same. There need not be floating islands to recognize the temptation in permanence. Permanence gives rise to us being tempted in owning something. We believe we own this land. We believe we own our day to day lives. We believe we are owners of our own destiny. And as such, we lose our ability of adaptation. When we are fixed it is much harder to adapt to change…which is exactly what life is—a constant change. Any attempt to bring order to our lives is an attempt to enslave ourselves.

However, putting your faith in God…trusting God, some would say is just another form of slavery. Indeed, the New Testament scriptures are full of quotes revering an idea of being “enslaved to God” (Rom 6:15-23 speaks plenty on this). But this language used by Paul was seemingly reluctantly used to get through to the thick-headed people he was addressing. While the word slavery does not give one the best connotation, it is certainly not the same kind of slavery we are use to thinking about. Being enslaved to God/Maleldil is quite simply trusting in his providence. In effect, we are enslaved by our appetite for food, but one would not say this is a bad kind of enslavement, for food provides us with nourishment and life. We are also enslaved by air, the sun, the earth, and other things that without we would die. And the kind of slavery that Paul talks about is exactly the same kind that Jesus spoke of in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 6); being enslaved to the life-giving objects such as food, water, and shelter, is the same as being enslaved to the one who provides such. The choice lies in trusting ourselves to provide ourselves or trusting God. Personally, the idea of self-providence is like an image of a snake eating itself.