"I was the lion"

The Horse and His Boy + the God who is in our pain

Light and dark aren’t supposed to mix.

By their very natures, they cancel each other out. So surely—surely—when dark days come, when tragedy hits, when grief stifles all other emotions—surely light is nowhere in the equation.

I’m sure that there’s at least one point in your life that you can think of, as you read this, where the presence of a good and willing-to-save redeemer felt (or feels) completely absent. I know I can.

Yet it’s that very belief—or, rather, the shattering of that belief—that drives Shasta to his knees in chapter eleven of The Horse and His Boy, by C.S. Lewis.

Let’s join him, shall we?

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First, let’s set the stage.

Shasta is about fourteen years old, and, until recently, he’s lived with a harsh fisherman named Arsheesh. But when Arsheesh is ready to sell Shasta into slavery, he runs away.

Now, several weeks later, he’s raced across the desert, been forced to leave his companions (one of them wounded) behind to run with all his might, and now he’s lost in the fog on a strange mountain where enemies lurk nearby.

To top it all off, now there’s a Voice, talking to him, and Shasta has no idea who it is.

At first, he thinks it’s a giant. Then, even worse, a ghost. But then:

Once more he felt the warm breath of the Thing on his hand and face. “There,” it said, “that is not the breath of a ghost. Tell me your sorrows.”

Reassured, Shasta complies. He tells about never knowing his true parents, being brought up by the fisherman, being chased by lions throughout his flight, the night he spent in the tombs with beasts howling in the desert, the exhaustion of their journey, and the lion that just wounded his friend Aravis.

(Being a teenage boy, he also mentions that it’s been a very long time since he’s had something to eat.)

The Voice listens, then, when he’s finished, it says, “I do not call you unfortunate.” When Shasta protests that, at any rate, it was bad luck to meet so many lions, the Voice says,

“There was only one lion. […] I was the lion.” And as Shasta gaped with open mouth and said nothing, the Voice continued. “I was the lion who forced you to join with Aravis. I was the cat who comforted you among the houses of the dead. I was the lion who drove the jackals from you while you slept. I was the lion who gave the Horses the new strength of fear for the last mile so that you should reach King Lune in time. And I was the lion you do not remember who pushed the boat in which you lay, a child near death, so that it might come to shore where a man sat, wakeful at midnight, to receive you.”

I was there.

Hear the words of this lion (and remember, remember, this is still the world of Narnia, even beyond the reaches of Cair Paravel).

He was there, watching Shasta. He was there, interceding in ways that, at the time, seemed strange or even terrifying. He was there, at this moment of pain, at that point of anguish, and he was there, even before Shasta’s memories begin, guarding and protecting his own.

But Shasta, his mind reeling, stumbles over one fact—the lion that clawed at his friend, who now lies wounded miles behind him.

“Then it was you who wounded Aravis?”

“It was I.”

“But what for?”

“Child,” said the Voice, “I am telling you your own story, not hers. I tell no one any story but his own.”

There are things about this lion that we cannot understand. There are things about our God that are higher and greater than ourselves.

But look. Look. Those other mysteries, those other points of shadow—they were flooded with light, in the end. Surely we can abide in that.

Our God may be full of mystery, but there is no hidden malice in his thought. There are no dark secrets to be revealed.

Whatever truly lies behind the curtain, it is just as bright and as glorious as the revelations before us.

“Who are you?” asked Shasta.

“Myself,” said the Voice, very deep and low so that the earth shook; and again “Myself,” loud and clear and gay; and then the third time “Myself,” whispered so softly you could hardly hear it, and yet it seemed to come from all round you as if the leaves rustled with it.

[…] The High King above all kings stooped toward him. Its mane, and some strange and solemn perfume that hung around the mane, was all round him. It touched his forehead with its tongue. He lifted his face and their eyes met. Then instantly the pale brightness of the mist and the fiery brightness of the Lion rolled themselves together into a swirling glory and gathered themselves up and disappeared. He was alone with the horse on a grassy hillside under a blue sky. And there were birds singing.

Knowing Lewis’ faith, the tri-identification here is certainly no accident. Neither is the bending low of the High King above all kings, to embrace the boy who’s just poured out his sorrows.

Notice what information isn’t given in this conversation. The name “Aslan” is never mentioned. “Myself,” echoed three times, is the only introduction he gives to himself. The lion’s kiss, too, is unmarred by words.

All Shasta knows is that this creature, this Voice, this Lion who is himself—that he has been with him.

That even in the moments when he felt utterly alone, when terror and pain were the only markers, he was being watched over.

Shasta doubtless still has questions at the end of this chapter. But some have been answered, and the answers are good. Surely that is enough to have hope that the rest will be the same.

And there are birds, singing.

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There are moments in all of our lives that we cannot explain well. There are days, weeks, years that seem to be so tightly wrapped in pain and darkness that we can’t see anything else.

But one day, I believe we will encounter this Voice.

We will tell our story, and then our own story will be told back to us. Only this time, all the pieces will be filled in, all the questions satisfied, all the darkness suddenly and eternally turned to light. And we will finally see, as we have never seen before—

He was the lion, all along.