An Introduction
The Screwtape Letters is a novel by C.S Lewis. It is comprised of a one sided correspondence between a senior demon (Screwtape) and his nephew, a junior temptor by the name of Wormwood. Throughout the novel we watch as Screwtape attempts to guide his dear nephew through his very first tempting of a human subject. Along the way we are confronted with our own shortcomings, deficiencies, and our struggle to do what we know is right. Our quest for comfort and acceptance is pointed out to us, just as the cost is illuminated. This heart wrenching exposè of the human condition is a must read, but if you aren’t yet convinced, here are a couple of letters, written in the style of Screwtape by two of your classmates, Eric Linder and Tanner Loe.
Letter One: Written by Tanner Loe
MY DEAR WORMWOOD,
You mentioned in your last letter that your patient has developed an interest in philosophy. Though, I believe you were too hasty in your enthusiasm. Of course, any practice that encourages a reliance wholly on a humans faulty reasoning, is a promising prospect. Though there is a great danger lurking in the light, and that is the practice of critically analyzing one’s own actions. If your patient is to realize his own inadequacy, and subsequently develops a strong sense of humility, that could leave him very vulnerable to the Enemy’s advances. Luckily, all is not yet lost, there are a number of opportunities to divert his path towards Our Father below.
The first thing you may try to do is to keep his interest at a superficial level. Convince him that he and his puny mind have not only the capacity, but an obligation to understand the world. Though, as far as his own life is concerned, there is no need for a deeper dive. After all, what else is there to know? I had a subject, a writer from a few hundred years back, that spent his whole life attempting to discern right from wrong, but when he left his room and ceased his writing, the discernment immediately stopped. He was only in it for notoriety, his quill was his god, his ink his salvation, and as soon as he let it drop, so with it his conscience. If you can keep him in the dark, never admitting to himself that he needs to look deeper within and solidify that self-reflection is a trivial matter, all that should remain is his delicious arrogance.
Though, if you are unable to keep him from searching within himself, the next best thing will be to keep him from realizing his wrong-doing. This, I trust, won’t pose too much of a challenge, as humans often look for any reason to justify their actions. Furthermore, If you are able to convince him that, not just man, but specifically HE is the measure of all things, you will have successfully solidified his ego and he will believe that he can do no wrong. If you are able to keep his scrutiny pointed outwards, and his gaze on the inadequacy of others, this may serve to pit him against the world. He will grow to loathe his surroundings, never noticing his actions that directly contribute to the world he so despises.
If still your patient persists, there is one last opportunity to keep him from the path of humility. If you fail to justify his action, it will have to be excused, to pardon his poor choice in the light of a greater injustice. In other words, you have to get him to blame his own action on someone or something other than himself. “Sure I shouldn’t have spoken to my wife that way, but if she hadn’t made me so mad that never would have happened.” I trust you get the picture. I personally had a patient some years back that I believed to be straying close to the path of humility, but through a series of carefully placed inconveniences which were promptly and expectedly responded to in a less than graceful manner, I was able to get them to not only assign blame, but to assign it to the enemy himself. This has the potential to be a rather satisfying victory. Again, humans find honest evaluation of their actions to be an especially unpleasant activity. So, if you can show them that there are ways to avoid this feeling by assigning blame elsewhere, you have the potential to instill a rather tasty habit in him.
If you are unable to utilize these three pitfalls in his nature we are in great danger of losing his soul. For if he is to reach the point of genuine self-reflection he will assuredly trip up, but will soon correct his footing. It is only when a human disregards their own inadequacy that they have no hope to correct it. Arrogance is one of our greatest weapons in the battle of faith, for if he understands himself to be perfect, what need has he for the Enemy? Remember, the enemy offers unconditional love and forgiveness to all the undeserving vermin, but can only do so if they are to turn away from themselves and towards him. This “love” we can do nothing about, but we can persuade the humans into never choosing to be forgiven. After all, what good is forgiveness to the blameless?
Your affectionate uncle,
SCREWTAPE
Letter Two: Written by Eric Linder
MY DEAR WORMWOOD,
Reading your letter has caused me to question my perception of you and whether my time and effort was all a waste. You wrote that your patient has become vigilant about cutting out alcohol and caffeine, distancing himself from technology, and limiting other forms of overstimulation. I was appalled to read the ways you encouraged this and celebrated his agony. Since being sent into the world, you’ve written countlessly about this patient’s propensity to avoid difficult feelings and circumstances and now you have sloppily mistaken his emotional distress as your victory. Embracing discomfort is a sign of growth, which is why I have been writing that he should be encouraged to seek the opposite. As long as the patient shrinks from his fears and runs from his pain, he will believe that he is unable to live a significant life because he feels he is missing something. This is why I have told you to focus your attention on getting him to try and fill this feeling of lack, never letting him sit and question it for too long. It appears that he has already begun to shed the belief systems we have worked tirelessly on since he was born. By carving out silence in his day-to-day, he exists in a tension between believing in everything he’s ever known and choosing to walk into the unknown. Our plan to make his feelings of insecurity become his emotional home have come to fruition but you have let him run out the front door of this pain cave with his sudden burst of courage. Don’t you see the problem with the dazzling clarity that this man’s eyes are beginning to shine with?
You have forced me to alert Our Father below about this issue, which I have told you again and again about my reluctance to do so, and he has confirmed that you have nearly lost this man to The Enemy. I told him that our goal from the beginning was to fracture the man’s attention and capitalize on his thirst for meaning. After showing him letter after letter that displayed the ways you have gotten him drunk on the lies of instant gratification, self-sufficiency, and material success, he became violent, pouring an eternity of rage on me and leaving my body seared and covered in fleshy boils. He was furious with my inability to see that none of these things matter if the man has begun to realize that the adventure, he has been longing for is not found in escape but in becoming present in his own life. This will enable him to see through falsehoods and cling to truth. I told him about how he has begun clinging to messages like “the magic is in the work you are avoiding” while the luxurious vacation advertisements have begun to fall on deaf ears and he stood over me boiling. I tried to understand the unintelligible gnashing of teeth that followed but only came out with the understanding that if we lose this man, our suffering will be greater than we could ever begin to imagine.
Luckily, there is one last scheme still available to you. Since he remains adamant on distancing himself from methods of escapism and refusing to alter his sober mind, you must begin to manipulate him through his desire for social connection. Whereas before you convinced him to believe that he can make himself happy, it’s important that he is put in a position where the choice to live the Enemy’s way of life comes at an extreme cost. Right now, he feels like he has nothing to lose. Begin bringing people in his life who are a part of the hostile culture we have created where everyone huddles around strategically designed belief systems, clinging to them mindlessly and ostracizing anyone who questions them. These beliefs have been crafted by the most intelligent among us so that they appear to hold substance. It is unlikely that the patient will believe in these ideologies because of his recent revelations but his desire to be loved still burns within him. If you can inflict this unique sensation on this patient, making him feel an intense desire to fit in whilst playing on his preexisting fear of being different, it is possible that he will reject what he knows is true out of his longing to belong. We must create a new emotional home for the man to run and escape into so that he shuts the door to the Enemy’s love forever. I heard Our Father below whisper something to himself about how there is a home with an open door and a large table that all the souls that have been lost eat at, laughing until crying, mocking our work. There is something infectious about these saved vermin… It makes me sick.
Your affectionate uncle,
SCREWTAPE
