On the Slaying of Dragons
The Dragon-Slaying Motif in History
The first dragon story I remember hearing is Sleeping Beauty. I’m sure I heard some before it but they must have gotten lost amidst my other early memories. I don’t know how old I was but I remember where I was. In the basement of a relative’s house, with that dark wood paneling and brownish carpet that was common in the 70s, I sat in front of an old television, the kind with the knob you had to get up to turn. A VHS player sat on top of the TV and, on the screen, the villain in Disney’s 1959 Sleeping Beauty turned into a large, green-fire-breathing dragon. This dragon was gigantic compared with the prince. He didn’t hesitate, though, to immediately ride to fight it.
As I wrote this, I decided to go back and watch that scene. As Prince Phillip is headed for the castle, a forest of thorns grows up in front of him as a result of the witch’s spell. When he successfully cuts through this forest, the witch transforms herself into a dragon, which he fights and kills. This is not exactly the classic dragon-slaying story but it is based on them. One thing the movie got right was Prince Phillip’s determination to get through whatever obstacle was in his way. Although he looks surprised at each new challenge, he immediately jumps in, ready to overcome it.
Myths and legends that involve the slaying of a dragon are common throughout history and persist today, despite the best efforts of some to repaint the dragons as misunderstood. These stories almost always include a voluntary undertaking by a knight or warrior. In the stories that come to mind on this theme, the man could walk away, but doesn’t; he chooses to go fight. Whether it’s for glory, to save a woman, or to save his people, he is always fighting for something that, should he choose to walk away and fail to defend it, he couldn’t rightfully call himself a man. Now, don’t worry, I’m not taking this in a Jungian direction. However, there is something to be said for consistent themes that fascinate people across times, places, and cultures. This dragon-slaying story is one such theme.
The dragons in these stories are often attacking a family or a people and a man or group of men take up arms to fight against them. They are typically brought to the very door of death in the fight. Through some effort or circumstance, they overcome the dragon and deliver their people from its terror. It’s worth noting, as well, that it’s the masculine figure that goes to fight the dragon and defend or save the feminine figure. The only thing the feminists have succeeded in doing by trying to have a woman play the warrior’s role in these types of stories is in making her masculine. She may be female, but she has masculine characteristics and is defending someone with feminine characteristics; even when they make the defended person a male, he’s always feminine. This is one of those inescapable realities.
A good example of this kind of dragon-slaying story is found in Beowulf. Near the end of the epic story, Beowulf is an aged king whose people are being attacked by a dragon. Despite his warriors trying to convince him otherwise, he goes to fight the dragon and rid his people of this scourge. In the battle, all but one of his warriors abandon him at the sight of the dragon’s power and flames. Beowulf is cut and poisoned during this battle and, after his death, the one warrior who stood by his side gives a rebuke to the men who fled.
Now it was not long ere those laggards in battle, who before had not dared to wield their shafts in the great need of their sovereign lord, forsook the wood, ten faint hearts together, breakers of their vows…Then did each man that had forgot his valour with little seeking get a grim rebuke from Wiglaf the young, the son of Wihstan…looking on those men unloved: ‘Lo! this indeed may he say, who wishes the truth to tell, that his liege-lord (who gave you those costly gifts and soldier’s gear, arrayed wherein ye now stand here, in that time when he oft did grant to you, sitting drinking ale upon the benches in his hall, both helm and corslet, even the most splendid of such things as he, a king for his knights, might get for you from far or near) that in the hour when war came upon him all that harness of war he utterly had cast away, ruinously.1
Both sides of the conflict are visible in this story. Beowulf responds to the challenge of the dragon correctly, properly fulfilling his role as a man and king. He steps up to defend and take responsibility for his people by fighting the dragon, despite his age. However, those men who flee exhibit the opposite, the sinful reaction to this sort of calling. Those men posture as if they will fight and go with their leader, but when they feel the heat of the flames and see the gleam of the claws, they run away. This, unfortunately, is what fallen men want to do. We want to look strong and responsible, like we’re worthy of respect, without actually having to risk anything. Like these warriors, we enjoy the benefits of a position but then grow comfortable and are unwilling to risk what we’ve received, even if it’s our duty.
This contrast is also plain in C. S. Lewis’s Perelandra. We see the two types of men we just saw in Beowulf, only this time they’re warring with each other in the main character, Ransom. The planet Venus is a kind of second Eden in this story and Ransom is sent to defend a woman-like creature from the enemy. Lewis shows us the following internal conflict Ransom experiences:
He was no longer making efforts to resist the conviction of what he must do. He had exhausted all his efforts…He was faced with the impossible. This he must do: this he could not do…Terrible follies came into his mind. He would fail to obey the Voice, but it would be all right because he would repent later on, when he was back on Earth. He would lose his nerve as St. Peter had done, and be, like St. Peter, forgiven.2
Ransom knows what he must do, at this point. He must fight the un-man, the serpent in this story. He must try to kill him. However, like many men before him, he’s tempted to abandon the task because there would be grace and forgiveness afterward. The planet would be redeemed if he failed. This leads him to a realization, though.
He had long known that great issues hung on his choice; but as he now realised the true width of the frightful freedom that was being put into his hands—a width to which all merely spatial infinity seemed narrow—he felt like a man brought out under naked heaven, on the edge of a precipice, into the teeth of a wind that came howling from the Pole. He had pictured himself , till now, standing before the Lord, like Peter, But it was worse. He sat before Him like Pilate. It lay with him to save or to spill. His hands had been reddened, as all men’s hands have been, in the slaying before the foundation of the world; now, if he chose, he could dip them again in the same blood. “Mercy,” he groaned; and then, “Lord, why me?” But there was no answer.3
This is Ransom’s Gethsemane. Every man faced with the decision to take responsibility, especially when it’s over something significant, faces this fight. Will I stand up and do what needs to be done and what God has called me to, even though it seems impossible, or will I turn away and ask forgiveness later? God will surely raise up someone from somewhere to meet the challenge, but will I be the one whose failure necessitates that another go to this likely death?
The story of God’s redemption of His people is the final layer, the source, of all similar stories. Christ, the second Adam, slayed the dragon that deceived and abused His bride; this is the ultimate dragon-slaying story. He does what the first Adam failed to do. This is also why the stories are always of the masculine figure saving the feminine figure. Masculinity and its relationship to femininity is a picture of God’s relationship to His people. God is the one who goes to slay the dragon and save His bride.
The relation of God to His people is also why maleness is designed to reflect masculinity. This principle is explained well by another scene from the Ransom Trilogy in the final novel, That Hideous Strength. One of the main characters, Jane, is resistant to the submission to her husband that she can tell Ransom and his group expects of her. She is a feminist, after all. Ransom explains:
There is no escape. If it were a virginal rejection of the male, He would allow it. Such souls can bypass the male and go on to meet something far more masculine, higher up, to which they must make a yet deeper surrender...The male you could have escaped, for it exists only on the biological level. But the masculine none of us can escape. What is above and beyond all things is so masculine that we are all feminine in relation to it. You had better agree with your adversary quickly.4
Ultimately, when men reject their role as the defender and dragon-slayer and women reject their role as the receiver and multiplier, they are rejecting the deeper truth that God came in the flesh, died, was raised again, and killed the serpent attacking His bride. Because they don’t want to submit to Him as their Husband, husbands don’t love and die for their wives and wives don’t submit to their husbands. As Ransom points out above, it’s possible to skip out on the earthly picture of marriage, but everyone has to submit to the ultimate masculine figure: God. It’s inescapable.
So what does all of this mean? This means that we must slay the dragon creeping into our homes, following the example of our Lord. There will be little Gethsemanes every day, where we need to decide whether or not we’re going to obey the Father’s will and lay down our lives for those He’s given us. In each circumstance we face we have to decide which man we will be: Will we be Beowulf, facing the dragon on behalf of those for whom we’re responsible, or the cowards, running away at the first heat of the dragon’s breath?
Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong. Let all that you do be done in love.5
Beowulf. Translated by J. R. R. Tolkien (New York, NY: HarperCollins Publishers, 2014), pp.96-97.
C. S. Lewis, Perelandra (New York, NY: Scribner, 2003), p.124-125.
Ibid, p.126.
C. S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength (New York, NY: Scribner, 2003), pp.312-313.
1 Corinthians 16:13, 14 (NASB95)
❤️ Great post!