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Liar, Lunatic, or Lord: Reconstructing C.S. Lewis's
Trilemma as a Postmodern Apologetic
by erik barton
Western culture is changing. Perhaps the most dramatic evidence of this is that the modern definitions of what counts as truth are being replaced by radically different, postmodern ones. As individuals who are deeply committed to introducing our culture to knowledge of the One Who is Truth, we must adapt our defense of the faith to reflect the changing context of our audience. And I believe that by reconstructing our apologetics to meet the needs of a postmodern culture, we will also recapture much of biblical Christianity that has been neglected by the modern Church.
Modern Apologetics and C.S. Lewis's Trilemma
Like most Christians, when I think of apologetics I think of intellectual arguments for the existence or character of God, the reliability of scripture, or the deity of Christ. I was introduced to this version of apologetics as a nineteen-year-old biology student in college, as I was struggling to come to terms with the rationality of my Christian faith. Were there legitimate reasons to believe in such supernatural things as an incarnated God, redemptive sacrifice, or bodily resurrection? I was on the verge of concluding that my faith was unreasonable, which would of course make me an irrational person, incapable of defending my faith to anyone who chose to adhere to materialistic rationalism, a philosophy which, for the scientist, is synonymous with Reality.
At this critical point in my faith, I was introduced by a brother in Christ (who, as an artist, was a little less disturbed than I was at the thought that his faith might be irrational) to the classic work of C.S. Lewis's Mere Christianity. Lewis presented an argument that did much to ease my fears of self-delusion. Speaking of Christ's claims to godhead and the ability to forgive sins, Lewis writes:
A man who was merely a man and said the sorts of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic--on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg--or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son or God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God.1
This argument has been expanded by others, and termed the "Trilemma" of Jesus's identity: Christ claimed to be God Himself. Now, either he was right or he was wrong. If he was wrong, then maybe he knew he was wrong (in which case he was a sinisterly evil person and an outright liar). But that doesn't seem to fit, because everything He advocated--love of others, love of God, self-sacrifice, care of the poor and destitute--would seem strangely out of place in the value system of a liar. And why would anyone tell lies that he knew would get him killed? So maybe he was wrong, but didn't know it--a well-meaning nutcase. But could a lunatic teach so wisely and compellingly on so many aspects of human life? No. So, that leaves one clear option: Jesus was who he said he was!
This simple argument helped me through a very difficult period in my faith. With it, I was assured that my faith in Christ was not irrational --it had behind it all the power of a logical deductive syllogism. More importantly, it convinced me that if I studied hard enough and learned all the key evidences for Jesus's life, teaching, miracles, and resurrection, then I could show anyone who would listen that the most reasonable choice in the world was to believe that Jesus was God. For much of the past decade, my spiritual energy has been directed to that learning task. But what I didn't realize until recently was that the world of ideas and knowledge has changed dramatically since Lewis first wrote.
Lewis's Trilemma and his general approach to apologetics reflect modern philosophical assumptions about the nature of truth. Since the birth of science during the Enlightenment, "true" human knowledge has been viewed as knowledge that is individual in ownership, rational in its derivation, certain in its reliability, and material with respect to its content. The modern knower is a coldly dispassionate observer, who gathers facts about a quantifiable, material situation, sorts these facts using the unfailing power of the human mind, and comes to a certain conclusion about the nature of the universe with respect to the question at hand. No appeal to revelation or supernatural forces of any kind is necessary to explain modern reality. Answers obtained in this fashion are said to be certain and absolute; that is to say that beliefs based on these answers correspond directly to external reality and are universally true regardless of the social context of the knower. Accordingly, when Lewis, the modern apologist, wants to convince us that Jesus is God, he presents us with the observed facts: Jesus's claims to godhead, his impeccable life, the wisdom of his teaching, and the circumstances of his death. (Notably, Lewis makes no appeal to supernatural events in Jesus's life as evidence of his Godhead.) Lewis then arranges these facts for us in a straightforward, logical syllogism. The endpoints are unambiguous and mutually exclusive: He was either a liar, a lunatic, or Lord. So why isn't the whole world convinced?
What's Wrong with Modernism?
Now Christians have gotten very comfortable defending the faith within this modern paradigm, despite the fact that it excludes, a priori¸ many paths that we as believers consider valid in the pursuit of Truth (including both revelation and personal experience). We have constructed excellent seminaries to educate our clergy in the rational defense of the faith, and even the lay believer is often well enough versed in the historical/rational evidences to hold his or her own against the modern doubter. However, because modernism fails to consider the many non-intellectual factors of human nature that contribute to what we believe, modern apologetics arguments have always had one fatal flaw: even when they are able to change a person's mind about Christ, they rarely have the power to change a person's heart and life toward Christ. It is for this reason that I believe postmodernism may be the best thing to happen to Christian faith since the Enlightenment, and why I believe we need to reconstruct Lewis's Trilemma, and our apologetics in general, in a manner that makes them relevant and compelling to a postmodern generation.
Towards a Postmodern Apologia
Postmodern thought is incredibly diverse.2 In this essay, however, I primarily refer to postmodern ways of knowing: in contrast to modern truth, postmodern truth is generated within a social context that extends beyond the individual, and hence is seen as supra-rational in its derivation, tentative in its reliability, and supra-material in its content. The postmodernist recognizes that the human as knower always exists within a community, and that social factors color every aspect of what the person knows and believes. In fact, the community even affects what the knower considers as "rational"; each society generates its own intrinsically consistent rationality. Reason is thus dethroned as the universal, transcultural arbiter of all human knowledge, and the rationality of an argument is no longer compelling justification to embrace its conclusion. One implication of this is that postmodern knowledge is not limited to a narrowly defined, materialistic rationality but can extend beyond reason into the realm of the whole person: emotional, intuitional, sensual, and even spiritual knowledge are as valid as rational knowledge. Finally, since the meaning of knowledge attained by human enterprise is, to a great degree, relative to the social context in which it is acquired and transmitted, all such "truth" should be held humbly and tentatively.
It is this last point, the relativity of truth, that Christians most frequently (and negatively) associate with postmodernism. How can the Christian ascribe to the relativity of truth? Jesus is absolutely the Lord of all creation; His reign is universal and judgment by Him is certain for all individuals. True enough. So our motive for apologetics must always be grounded in the concept of absolute Truth. However, I assert that with respect to our methods of apologetics, we can learn a great deal from postmodernism's critique of absolute truth. To say that truth is relative simply means that truth is dependent upon its social context to give it meaning. Accordingly, we must acknowledge that Christian doctrine only acquires a sense of personal truth when it is related to the larger context of a Christian community. To convince someone that the resurrection is historically probable cannot be compared to demonstrating the power of the living, risen Christ in healing a broken marriage. Hence, a purely rational, individualistic apologetics cannot hope to enable the non-believer to come to a deep, transforming knowledge of Christ outside of a community in which the relevance of Christ to daily living is clearly displayed. Presented with Lewis's Trilemma alone, the non-believer of the late nineties is likely to respond: "Seems like a reasonable argument. But so what? Why is it relevant to me?"
So, if the modern approach is inadequate to the task, what would a postmodern Trilemma look like? First and foremost, our apologetics must become community-based.3 The radical individualism that modern, reductionistic social theory has brought to our culture has resulted in a nearly complete loss of community, even within the Church. Postmodernism is a welcome wake-up call, reminding us that truth is born, nurtured, and passed on within communities. Perhaps this is what Christ meant when he said that the world would know we are His disciples by our love for one another 4--not by our ability to recite the historical evidences of the faith. Second, our apologetics must become a supra-rational defense of the faith. We must become proclaimers of how Christ meets the deep spiritual and emotional needs of our souls and our culture, and cease to be simply defenders of Christian doctrine. This is not a proposal to jettison all of the excellent arguments that we have developed to support the rationality of the Christian faith. Instead, it is a call to see these arguments as merely one facet of the apologetic approach--and perhaps a much less important facet than in times past--and to see the non-believer the way Christ would see him: as a whole person, who must have the gospel administered to the whole person, not simply to the intellect.
In summary, we must unlearn the view of apologetics that places all emphasis on the isolated believer debating with the non-believer over the intellectual aspects of Christian doctrine or history, and we must replace it with a different, postmodern model that views the apologetic process as communal and individuals as body, mind, soul, and spirit. In so doing, we will not dilute the Christian faith; we will instead restore it to its proper context and practice: the body of Christ, striving together to know and love our God with all of our hearts, minds, souls, and strength.
So Where Do We Go From Here?
What does such a postmodern Christian apologia demand of us? First and foremost, it demands that we begin to take seriously the supra-rational aspects of our relationship with Christ. We must become practitioners of the whole range of personal spiritual disciplines, from meditation and fasting to solitude and prayer.5 To the postmodern seeker, the believer who has only head faith has no compelling faith at all. We must learn to shed our modern shame of entering into a deep, emotional, spiritual communion with the Creator of the universe. For it is in that deep communion that we will find the grace and power of God to begin to experience transformation in our lives--real transformation that frees us from destructive habits, re-prioritizes our time, and represents the only real hope for our culture. And we must learn to be humbly honest with non-believers about both our spiritual and emotional struggles and the victories God grants us in these areas. We must liberally use the name of God in our daily conversation. Thankfully, the modern deification of science and reason that has forced all spiritual content out of serious public discourse is now past; God is real, and knowledge of Him is as legitimate as that of subatomic physics or socio-economic theory. Second, and of equal importance, we must become members of dynamic communities of believers, each of whom is striving to meet God with his or her whole person. We must allow ourselves to serve and be served--in tangible, meaningful ways--by others within this community. This will require much more than two hours of your time on Sunday morning. As the very real Spirit of God transforms each individual, this community will become a group that is "filled with awe...many wonders and miraculous signs.6" Selfish materialism will give way to people willing to have "everything in common...selling their possessions and goods" to give to others as they have need. When we bring non-believers into this community, and they witness genuinely "glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people," they will be left with but three choices: Is this community a group of liars, attempting to deceive us and each other about the source of power that seems to be transforming their very nature? Or could this be a classic example of mass hysteria, merely group self-delusion? Or perhaps, just maybe, could these people be indwelt with the living God who created us all?
1 C.S. Lewis. Mere Christianity. MacMillan Publishing Company, 1960. pp 40-41.
2. For an excellent introduction to postmodernism from a Christian perspective, see Stanley J. Grenz, A Primer on Postmodernism, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, Grand Rapids MI, 1996.
3. The ideas presented here are largely inspired by the work of S. Grenz in the final chapter of his Primer on Postmodernism, entitled "The Gospel and the Postmodern Context."
4. John 13:35.
5. For a classic introduction to the supra-rational Christian disciplines which the modern church has all but abandoned, I recommend Richard Foster's Celebration of Discipline, Harper Collins Publishing, 1988.
6. Acts 2:42ff