“You said once before that people today view Christianity as just another religion, and you were right,” said Corwin. “Anyone who studies pre-Christian faiths will find the same old stories recycled in the Bible. There are Hindu gods like Krishna who had virgin births, Roman gods like Hercules who were part man and part divine, and Egyptian gods like Osiris who died and rose again. Would you call it mere coincidence that Jesus shares so much in common with his pagan ancestors?”
“Certainly not,” Ransom replied. “It’s actually quite astonishing. Just think of it! Even without the Father’s revelation, the mystics of the ancient world had some inkling of understanding, some foresight into how the Redeemer would come!”
Corwin slapped his forehead, his palm sliding down his face like a wet rag down a window.
“You would say that! It’s just like you to twist honest criticism into some far-fetched point in your favor!”
“What can I say? I’m a relentless optimist.”
“But I’m not! I’m a realist!”
“Oh, come off it!” huffed Ransom. “Were you to play angel’s advocate, you could come up with plenty of arguments for the uniqueness of Christianity, not the least of which stems from common sense. If the Good News of the Redeemer were simply the Same Old News that everyone had heard before, Christianity would have registered as no more than a blip on history’s radar.”
“I never claimed that there was nothing unique about Christianity,” Corwin clarified. “It’s just that I don’t see any vital difference so striking as to convince me that your scriptures are true while everyone else’s are false.”
“Then let me offer you one.”
Grabbing a leather-bound Bible, Ransom cradled it in one hand. Like a wizard’s spell book, it opened, the pages flipping in rapid succession.
“Forget what the Bible says about God and consider for a moment what it says about man. Almost every major philosophy or religion takes one of two stances: either man is noble and destined for greatness, or man is pitiable, an absurd dreamer whose only destiny is to return to the dust from whence he came.
“The first stance leads to pride, but also to depression when the life you’ve been told is so special doesn’t work out quite the way that you’d hoped. The result of the second stance is despair.”
He snapped shut the book and tossed it backwards, into the arms of Corwin, whose clumsy hands juggled it before finding a grip.
“Now, which of these two stances does Christianity take?”
Corwin pried open the Bible and again its pages began to turn, but not at random. As verses sprang from his memory, the pages flipped to the relevant chapters, their words illuminated in a golden glow. “Sinners” decried the Lord, but did he not also say that he came not for the just, but for sinners such as these? Did he not claim that these lowly sinners were to inherit his kingdom?
“I would have to say . . . both,” concluded Corwin.
Ransom awarded him with a slow clap.
“You spoke much of paradoxes, but it seems that you forgot one. Let us call it the Paradox of Man. On the one hand, you are made in the Father’s own image and likeness. But on the other hand, you are fallen. On the one hand, you are wretched sinners, undeserving of love. But on the other hand, you are loved—loved with a passionate, infinite love! In Christianity alone you find this wonderful paradox. And so you find both humility and hope; an answer that denies neither the hardships nor the aspirations of life.”
Corwin was reminded of the old saying “It’s so crazy, it must be true!” Christianity had an uncanny propensity for unbelievable claims that yet seemed to get so much right about human nature.
“You sometimes have a way of saying things that makes even me want to believe,” he told the angel. “So why does the ‘divinely inspired word of god’ do such an inferior job? Your holy book has more contradictions than I can count! There are contradictory teachings, contradicting accounts of Jesus’ birth, his death, his genealogy! The Bible is anything but consistent.”
“A contradiction means more than just a difference in accounts,” said Ransom. “To be contradictory, it must be impossible for both accounts to be true. You will find no meaningful points of difference in the Bible.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure about that. And if I’m misinterpreting your scriptures, you have only the holy spirit to blame! Why inspire the biblical authors to write a text so absurdly cryptic?”
“You exaggerate, but yes, the Bible can be rather mystifying. Thankfully, the Redeemer didn’t send forth a simple collection of writings. He sent forth the apostles. Christian thinkers throughout the centuries have left you plenty of insight into those cryptic passages. Why ignore them?”
“Maybe because they can’t seem to agree.”
Voices arose from a nearby nook of the library, and Corwin peered through the right-hand bookcase. The row of Bibles was haphazardly arranged on the shelf, some stacked and some leaning, loose pages sticking out at odd angles. On the other side, he spied a brightly lit table set against the wall. Wax dribbled from a dozen candles, spilling like milky icicles over the table’s edge. Upon it rested various scriptures and documents, and seated across from each other were two men in priestly attire. One had sharp, hawkish eyes, his beard trimmed close. The other fellow was clean shaven with curls of gray hair shooting out from under his foppish black cap.
“The text is clear, Luther,” declared the first man. “The Lord says: ‘Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I shall build my church.’”
“What Christ meant, Ignatius, is ‘thou art a pebble, but upon this rock I shall build my church.’ The rock he was speaking of was himself, not Peter. In the Greek: petra, not petros.”
“Consider the surrounding verses,” insisted Ignatius. “You would have Jesus say: ‘Blessed are you Simon bar-Jona . . . you are an insignificant pebble . . . here are the keys to the kingdom of Heaven!’ Would the greatest of all teachers really have spoken in such a disjointed manner?”
The heated debate continued, but Corwin had already lost interest. He turned away, leaving Luther and Ignatius to the unenvious task of working out their differences.
“Do you see what I mean?”
Ransom was crouched in the aisle, petting the black cat that had crossed their path earlier. It meowed, swished its tail and slinked away into the shelves.
“For all their disagreements, you’ll still find more wisdom in the words of men such as these than in the shallow interpretations of those with no faith at all.”
“But which theologians are correct? Which translation of the Bible is the proper one? I wouldn’t even know where to start.”
“That never stopped you before. In the church of atheism, there are many denominations. The relativists disagree with the humanists, who disagree with the determinists, who disagree with the existentialists, who disagree with the nihilists, who–”
“Okay, okay!” interjected Corwin. “Atheists may not always agree, but at least they don’t waste their time arguing over events that, in all likelihood, never even happened. Real historians will tell you that much of the Bible is pure fabrication. Passages were tweaked and verses added over time, not by some spark of divine insight, but because of the very human desire to make the stories more appealing.”
“Interesting.” Ransom knuckled his chin. “Tell me of these ‘real’ historians. Are they the sort of men who suppose that all records of supernatural events must have natural explanations?”
“That’s called being objective,” stated Corwin.
“It’s called being an atheist.”
“What then? Should historians blindly presume that all the old myths are true? Should they give serious consideration to whether we once lived on the back of a giant celestial tortoise, or to the possibility that our ancestors discovered fire thanks to Prometheus stealing away with some embers from Mount Olympus?”
“Historians ought to presume as little as possible. If supernatural events have in fact occurred, then a
view of history which denies them, denies reality.”
“But there’s no firm evidence that they ever have!”
“Could there have been any account, any collection of relics from 2,000 years ago that would have convinced you that a man rose from the dead?”
“Probably not,” conceded Corwin. “Unless perhaps there were prophesies in plain, precise language that foretold events unfolding in the modern age.”
“No, even that wouldn’t have swayed you,” said Ransom. “You would simply have deemed such prophesies to be self-fulfilling.”
“Couldn’t god have seen fit to impart some actually useful information? Why not tell his followers about disease pathogens or electrical conduction?”
“Would that have saved their souls? If the Father had told Moses all about magnetic polarity, would skeptics in your age have renounced atheism, concluding that the origin of such knowledge could only be divine?”
“That’s doubtful, but . . .” Corwin’s voice trailed off. He had thought to say that supernatural events demanded supernatural evidence, but what kind of evidence would that be? Would God leave behind some speaking stone or everlasting rainbow? And if he were to go that far, why not just reveal himself openly? No, leaving a signpost like that would undermine the role of faith. It would reduce belief to a simple question of practicality.
“The truth of Bible is hidden for the same reason that God is hidden,” Ransom said, as if reading Corwin’s mind. “The Father does not force himself on those who don’t wish to see, nor does he force his Word on those who don’t wish to hear. With faith and reason, the truth comes to light. Reason alone will only take you halfway.”
24
The Risk of Redemption
The lights had been turned off, the hallway deserted, but Corwin knew this place. He knew the white walls and yellow doors and checkered tiles, the picture frames in which newborn babies cuddled with teddy bears and doctors smiled respectably, the sterile scent and the dull gleam of the freshly mopped floor.
But something wasn’t right. Hospitals never slept, yet this place did. It was as quiet as a crypt, and the only light was that which shone meekly through the wired glass windows of the double doors that stood at the far end of the hallway—the doors of the operating room.
“I liked the library better,” mumbled Corwin.
He wondered vaguely whether his real-life body was right now in a hospital like this one, his life signs fading as surgeons frantically tried to patch him up. What kind of shape would he be in? A frightful thought occurred to Corwin, the thought that he might not want to go back. What if he was horribly crippled or had severe brain damage? Did he have the strength to endure life as a paraplegic? He wasn’t so sure.
“An operation is underway, and the patient is in critical condition,” said Ransom.
“Who’s dying?”
“Mankind.”
A hazy shadow stirred within the lighted room.
“You have a hole in your heart—a God-shaped hole—and you will never be happy so long as you try to fill it with anything less. Atheism’s solution is to unmake man by reducing him to just another beast, to kill the disease by killing the patient.”
“Then the patient is going to die either way,” said Corwin. “Anyone who looks at the world today will see that it’s religion that’s liable to bring civilization to a bloody end. You even admitted as much!”
“I admitted that religion wasn’t safe,” replied Ransom. “Love always carries a risk.”
“Let’s say that you’re right and that atheism is contrary to human nature. That doesn’t make it untrue. And happiness has nothing to do with it! We’ve come all this way on a simple maxim: that the only good reason to believe something is if it’s true. You can’t have it both ways! You can’t stand there and tell me that ‘because it makes me happy’ is a valid reason for belief! That’s never a valid reason! Truth can be hard. Truth can hurt. But I’d rather believe in the truth than in a kind lie!”
Ransom spontaneously punched his client in the shoulder.
“Ouch!” yelped Corwin, rubbing the sore spot.
“That’s what I like about you, Corwin! You’re uncompromising about the right things! Yet I wonder . . . truth, love, beauty . . . have you never thought that these virtues belonged together?”
“So say the poets, but I’ve always preferred the prose of scientists.”
“You’re right that truth is the only valid reason for belief, but how do you know when you’ve found the truth?”
“Through observation and testing and–”
“Empirical knowledge isn’t the only knowledge,” interjected Ransom. “How do you know when you’ve found the other kind? How do you know whether to kill yourself or have a cup of coffee?”
Corwin’s heart knew the answer, yet his mind drew a blank. He didn’t doubt that truth was bigger than science, not anymore. Ransom had been right when he’d said that Corwin didn’t have it in him to choose the razor blade apple. Some decisions were better than others. But what was the measure? Did goodness truly point to something real, to a meaning woven into the fabric of the universe?
“Happiness is no reason to believe a lie,” said Ransom. “But when you find life’s highest truths, you’ll know it, because truth isn’t just true. It’s beautiful. To discover it is to know happiness, and I mean not some ‘fuzzy feeling.’ I mean a deep and abiding joy. Your chest will tighten, your heart will sing, and your soul will finally be at ease, for no longer will you be a man divided. Your mind will grasp what your heart knew all along: that you were made to be loved by your Father.”
“And if your Christ doesn’t bring me happiness?” Corwin asked fearfully. “What then, if all he brings is guilt and false hopes? My heart has scars enough already, and it’s too late for me to take that wager.”
“You hedged your bets. That’s why you’re here. But you still don’t understand the nature of the gamble.”
Ransom pushed open the swinging doors at the hallway’s end and stepped inside. A medical lamp cast a tent of white light over the operating table. Upon it, a patient lay sedated, bare feet sticking out from beneath the bottom of his gown. Bent over him was a bald doctor in a surgical mask and lab coat. His back blocked their view of the operation, but the bloody instruments on the tray beside him were already more than Corwin wanted to see.
“Christianity is like open heart surgery,” spoke the angel over the steady beep, beep, beep of the heart rate monitor. “It’s a risky undertaking, one that you might not survive. There’s a chance that your doctor will make a mistake. Maybe he’s a hypocrite who doesn’t take his own advice. Maybe he failed to interpret his texts properly while in medical school. But you need the surgery. You’re dying inside, and to live without taking that risk wouldn’t really be living at all.”
The patient shook with a violent convulsion and his heart rate spiked. Dropping a scalpel in the tray, the doctor clasped a pair of forceps, working feverishly at the unseen cavity in the man’s chest. Another gyration rattled his body, and then his heart flatlined. A bleak, high-pitched tone blared through the monitor. The doctor rose to his full height and switched it off with a somber shake of his head.
“What a shame!” he declared, his voice dry and callous. “It seems that the operation was a failure!”
Turning, he pulled off his mask, the front of his lab coat spattered crimson.
Ransom thrust an arm out in front of Corwin.
“Get behind me!”
“You won’t be slipping away this time,” said Isley as all warmth and color drained from the world, enfolding the hospital in a field of closed space. “And I hope you don’t mind, Ransom, but I’ve brought along a friend. Maybe you remember him? I’m told the two of you are old acquaintances.”
A hulking figure darkened the side doorway. He wore a black suit and tie, his broad chest threatening to burst his shirt at the seams, but while the cut of his clothes was modern, the thick braids that fell from his beard
hadn’t changed.
“Strega,” Ransom hissed. “I see you’ve moved down in the world.”
The arch demon flexed his hands eagerly at his sides. Seeing the angel, a tingling burn awoke in his old wound—the scar where Ransom’s soulrender had blinded him eight hundred years ago.
“Centuries have I waited, longing for this day!”
As he took a stride towards them, Ransom moved instantly, kicking a rolling tray table into the demon’s knees.
“Corwin, run!”
It took a moment for the words to register in Corwin’s head. Strega buckled forward and snarled, smashing the tray table to pieces with a swipe of his hand.
“I said run!”
Ransom’s shove nearly knocked Corwin off his feet. He caught himself and crashed through the swinging doors, and his legs didn’t stop. The portraits in the shady hallway flew by. No time to look back. No time to worry. His boots pounded the checkered tiles and Isley’s bitter laughter rang in his ears.
“Too easy,” gloated Strega. His fingers stroked the groove of his scar. “I could end you here and now, stop this wound from burning.”
On his hands and knees, Ransom coughed fiery blood, yet he gazed back at Strega with the same invincible grin.
“I really think two glass eyes is a good look for you. You’re like the poster child for grizzled warriors . . . or for running with scissors. I haven’t decided which.”
His ribs cracked and the halogen lights shattered as Strega’s kick launched him into the ceiling. He landed with a thud, flakes of plaster raining from the crater overhead.
“Patience, Strega,” urged Isley. “His client will be joining us soon.”
Surely, Ransom would be alright. Any moment now, he would reappear by his side and whisk them off to some safe, secluded corner of an alternate universe, far from the clutches of any demonic legal teams. Or so Corwin told himself, but the hallway was only growing darker, the shadows shifting with a will of their own.
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