Daeus Lamb

For those who read the comments and are interested in studying novels that reportedly do well at organically and artistically presenting the gospel, I was going to mention Ben-Hur and Deborah Alcock’s novels, except that I’d read them so long ago my memory was fuzzy so I couldn’t speak about them as concretely or confidently as I could The Death of Ivan Ilych.

This article is very well-thought out and brings up some interesting questions. Thank you for writing it! This may have been mentioned already, but I think the Chronicles of Narnia is a fantastic example of an artistic story that illustrates the gospel through allegory.

A small providence: I literally just finished ‘The Death of Ivan Illych’ the afternoon before reading this article. 😉

Really like how you articulated this issue, Daeus.

In retrospect, I should have covered allegory in my article.

Allegory has several definitions, depending on who you ask. I define allegory as a form of speculative fiction which imitates /specific/ events like Jesus’ Passion (The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe), Joseph’s life story from slave to head of Egypt (Seasons of Gray), or the rise of Communism (Animal Farm). Alternately, allegory can also be a story where the characters all represent ideas such as in Pilgrim’s Progress.

Some people (I’m not necessarily one of them) maintain that Aragorn in The Lord of the Rings represents Jesus. Whether or not that was Tolkien’s intention (I don’t know), it doesn’t fit my definition of allegory, because Aragorn would be representing a person, not an idea, and his story does not clearly map on to the life of Jesus except in small bits and pieces here and there. Therefore, if Aragorn represents Jesus, it is /symbolically/, not allegorically.

This type of symbolism (used in Christian fiction) normally falls under the category I mentioned in my article of teaching themes essential to the gospel without covering the entire gospel.

With allegory, the closer it resembles the gospel, the better grip you’d better have on your theology. I.e. if your Jesus figure is literally dying for others’ sins, then the rest of your allegory will be taken very seriously as well and you’d better not mess up. 😛 The less strict your allegory and the more it drifts toward symbolism, the less you have to worry about the fine details, but then, at the same time, the less concrete your message.

Maybe I’m getting off topic.

Basically, there are some great allegories out there. However, when you’re literally copying another story, it takes a ton of skill to sound original and creative and make your readers feel like they’re having a novel experience (all why maintaining orthodoxy). If you’re going to tell such a powerful story, you want to do it artistically! If you can do it though, go for it.

The Story Embers podcast has an episode on allegory. You’ll probably glean more from that than this rambling comment. 😛

Very good post; I’ve wondered about this and how to effectively SHOW the gospel, not preach it in books. I, as a Christian, can’t stand preachy books, because to be painfully honest, they are dull and hard to enjoy reading.

I read the comment in which you talked about allegory and symbolism, and I think I prefer symbolism because it still feels like its own story, but with a tasteful amount of The Great Story thrown in. Such as Aragorn and Gandalf; I think at different times it feels like they represent Jesus, which I love, but the whole story is its own and not a retelling of The Great one. But that’s just my take. I do love The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, though; it is a lovely allegory that gives me chills.

Great post, thank you!

I love this article! It’s something I struggle with in my own writing, and I think I tend to fall on the side of not sharing the gospel explicitly. Though I appreciate books that try to do so.

Nonfiction is definitely a better format for that than fiction (I love Chesterton’s Orthodoxy), but some fiction works succeed: I like the House of Living Stones series by Katie Schuermann and the Grace Alone series by Ruth Meyer because both tell stories of real people who are changed by the gospel. (They’re contemporary/romance novels.)

Not sure that I’ve read a fantasy book that clearly and fully explains the gospel (those that try often fail), but since fantasy is my favorite genre, I’d love to hear some suggestions (:

This was a very good article! Thanks for writing!

I personally just write fun, lighthearted stories. Stories of friendship, adventure (and occasionally friendly dragons) 😊