[Propertalk] Epiphany 1

[Ann Fontaine]

For the Baptism of Christ I am thinking of the scene in The Dawn  
Treader where Aslan and Eustace rid Eustace of the dragon skin Dawn  
Treader is out in the theaters now.

http://www.victorianweb.org/courses/fiction/65/lewis/miller3.html
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, third book in the Narnian series (or  
fifth, depending on the publisher) begins much like the first: the  
Pevensie children visit a strange house and are suddenly transported  
to another world. Whereas the first book, The Lion, the Witch and the  
Wardrobe, has many parallels to the Bible, this book is more of an  
adventure book, with moral instruction to be gleaned from the various  
adventures. However, the book contains some blatantly religious  
imagery as well. One example is the scene in which Aslan Himself  
baptizes Eustace. Aslan tells Eustace that he must undress himself  
before bathing in the well, and Eustace understands that he must shed  
his dragon skin. He rips off the first three layers of dragon skin  
himself, but keeps finding more layers underneath.

"I looked up and saw the very last thing I expected: a huge lion  
coming slowly toward me. And one queer thing was that there was no  
moon last night, but there was moonlight where the lion was. So it  
came nearer and nearer. I was terribly afraid of it. You may think  
that, being a dragon, I could have knocked any lion out easily enough.  
But it wasn't that kind of fear. I wasn't afraid of it eating me, I  
was just afraid of it -- if you can understand. Well, it came close up  
to me and looked straight into my eyes. And I shut my eyes tight. But  
that wasn't any good because it told me to follow it."

"You mean it spoke?"

"I don't know. Now that you mention it, I don't think it did. But it  
told me all the same. And I knew I'd have to do what it told me, so I  
got up and followed it. And it led me a long way into the mountains.  
And there was always this moonlight over and round the lion wherever  
we went. So at last when we came to the top of a mountain I'd never  
seen before and on the top of this mountain there was a garden - trees  
and fruit and everything. In the middle of it there was a well. . . .

"Then the lion said -- but I don't know if it spoke -- 'You will have  
to let me undress you.' I was afraid of his claws, I can tell you, but  
I was pretty nearly desperate now. So I just lay flat down on my back  
to let him do it.

"The very first tear he made was so deep that I thought it had gone  
right into my heart. And when he began pulling the skin off, it hurt  
worse than anything I've ever felt. The only thing that made me able  
to bear it was just the pleasure of feeling the stuff peel off. You  
know -- if you've ever picked the scab off a sore place. It hurts like  
billy -- oh but it is such fun to see it coming away."

"I know exactly what you mean," said Edmund.

"Well, he peeled the beastly stuff right off -- just as I thought I'd  
done it myself the other three times, only they hadn't hurt -- and  
there it was lying on the grass: only ever so much thicker, and  
darker, and more knobly-looking than the others had been. And there  
was I as smooth and soft as a peeled switch and smaller than I had  
been. Then he caught hold of me -- I didn't like that much for I was  
very tender underneath now that I'd no skin on -- and threw me into  
the water. It smarted like anything but only for a moment. After that  
it became perfectly delicious and as soon as I started swimming and  
splashing I found that all the pain had gone from my arm. And then I  
saw why. I'd turned into a boy again." [115-116]




The Rev. Ann K Fontaine
Wyoming