Samuel Swenson-Reinhold: Perelandra, Sin and Experience

 I had one main issue with Perelandra: how can someone know sin without having committed a sin themself? When the Green Lady and the King are both saved from the fall in their being taught about evil by Maleldil, this supposedly saves them from becoming "bent" like humans are. Lewis challenged my own understanding of knowing in relation to experience here; personally, I don't think you can really understand and know the abstract as the concrete until you have the added experience. 

But Lewis might have an out in this situation. Maleldil is a God figure, so it could follow that Lewis is making a statement about the power wielded by Maleldil as God. Christ is able to help his followers understand things about the world and God that they have no business understanding, so Lewis' use of Maleldil as a teacher could be a reflection of his own understanding of Christ. But it doesn't completely solve the issue for me. 

I suppose that the role of myth in human relationships and culture could also support Lewis' claim that sin/evil is a concept that can be taught. Myth allows for us, as creative and imaginative beings, to step into a narrative outside of our own. But I do believe that myth still harkens back to a shared human experience, a truth that we fundamentally understand to be rooted in the reality of our situation. What shared experience could Maleldil be getting at...?

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