Then some re-adjustment of the mind or some focusing of my eyes took place, and I saw the whole phenomenon the other way round. The men were as they had always been; as all the men I had known had been perhaps. It was the light, the grass, the trees that were different; made of some different substance, so much solider than things in our country that men were ghosts by comparison.
C.S. Lewis, The Great Divorce
In 1793, WIlliam Blake published a book called The Marriage of Heaven and Hell. His thesis was that Heaven and Hell represented differing tendencies, but that life only progresses by holding them together. Hell is, as it were, the energy driving life forward. In an argument reminiscent of the philosopher Hegel, he urged that we needed to unify these opposites rather than dichotomize them.
In 1945, C.S. Lewis published his response to this idea: a dream vision in which the absolute incompatibility of the infernal with the celestial is revealed and discussed, and the difficulty in letting go of the infernal, even as that which tortures and unmakes us, is dramatized. Though coming in at fewer than 150 pages, it is one of the most striking, spiritual, and philosophically challenging works that Lewis ever wrote.
In this course we will dig deep into this book, discussing at length the many issues and images it raises, and the overall vision for the spiritual life it promotes.
Mondays, 6:30 - 8:30 pm CT
November 9 - 23, 2026
$150 / student
included in the Pathways to Wonder membership
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Participating in a course led by Dr. Junius Johnson is a wonderful journey of exploration, seeking hidden gems in unexpected places. It is an opportunity to learn to look deeper than the surface, both in reading and in the mundane of life. A delightful feast for the mind that lasts far beyond the actual banquet.
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I came to the C.S. Lewis’ Cosmic Trilogy class with an expectation of academic rigor, thoughtful teaching, and imagination-opening conversation. Dr. Johnson delivered this and more! He brought these texts alive in a way that I could not have imagined, and he made me think about implications for my life. This class took me far beyond a simple reading of the text, into a world of wonder and a desire for deeper understanding of the great mysteries of our world and the stories that we tell about them.
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Every time I hear Junius Johnson speak, I walk away asking: "Did I forget how exciting and joyful the life of the mind can be?”
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A deep perspective on the human need for wonder, and the essential desire for things powerful and uncontrollable.