Table of Contents
-Preface
-The Books and the Author
-View on Religion
-In Comparison to Lewis and Tolkien
-Responses to the Books
-Conclusion
-Works Cited

Religion plays a vital role in the His Dark Materials trilogy. However, while the books are based on Paradise Lost, which is itself merely a retelling of the Genesis story, His Dark Materials takes quite a different approach. Religion is presented in His Dark Materials in a very negative light, but behind the views presented in the books are those of Philip Pullman himself, and finally the theory that he presents in the place of religion.

Overwhelmingly, religion is portrayed as evil and barbaric. The Church in Lyra’s world is Catholic, but without ever having gone through a reformation. The papacy was dissolved and replaced with the ‘Magisterium’, a collection of powerful Church bodies that are constantly struggling to be the most powerful. There is a perpetual state of Inquisition– anyone who contradicts the Church or who studies science without Magisterium approval is deemed a heretic and killed.

The story of His Dark Materials circles around the concept of Dust, which is an elementary particle that is attracted to human beings, especially adults. The Church in Lyra’s world believes Dust to be the physical incarnation of Original Sin, which sets in when a human being reaches maturity. The word ‘Dust’ comes from the Bible, which said that God created man from Dust, and to Dust he shall return. To prevent children from attracting Dust (and hence avoiding falling into sin), a branch of the Magisterium known as the General Oblation Board (oblation is a term meaning to offer or sacrifice something to a god) is cutting children away from their dæmons.

The Church that is portrayed in His Dark Materials is one almost entirely made up of cruel and corrupt human beings whose sole purpose is depriving others of happiness and freedom. While one or two good priests exist in the trilogy (such as the chaplain of Jordan College), priests are overwhelming evil. Father Gomez, for example, resembles a member of Al-Qaida more than a priest of the Catholic Church: he is given “pre-emptive absolution” so that he may kill Lyra without being punished. The Church receives word that Lyra is set to replace Eve in a second Temptation (and Fall), and they are intent on making sure that she does not fall, even if it means killing her. When Will is traveling through the Himalayas, he meets a priest named Father Borisovitch who is a drunk, and attempts to make Will drink a glass of vodka as well.

Mary Malone is a scientist from Will’s world (our world) studying the same elementary particles that in Lyra’s world are known as Dust, only we know them as Dark Matter. She is instructed via a computer by angels that she is to play the Serpent for Lyra, meaning that she must somehow tempt her. Malone is one of Pullman’s most interesting characters, since she was a former nun who came to believe that God and physics couldn’t both be right. When talking to Lyra in The Amber Spyglass she says, “The Christian religion is a very powerful and convincing mistake, that’s all” (Pullman, 441). Lord Asriel, Lyra’s father, takes the place of Satan in rebellion against God, or in this case, merely a creature known as the Authority who claims to be God. The Authority was just the first angel to condense out of Dust, and has told all who came afterwards that he created them. He is ancient beyond reckoning, senile, and without possession of his senses. Much of his power has been delegated to the angel Metatron, who was once the biblical hero Enoch.

In place of heaven (or hell, for that matter) the Authority has set up a land of the dead, populated by harpies, where the dead exist in eternal nothingness, neither paradise nor torture. Lyra and Will use the subtle knife to enter this world and open a way out. The dead follow them out, preferring to dissolve and become a part of Dust (strangely similar to the concept of becoming 'One with the Force', from Star Wars) than stay in the prison camp atmosphere of the land of the dead for the rest of eternity.

Behind this presentation of brave rebel angels, a senile God, and a corrupt Church are the beliefs of Philip Pullman himself. Pullman grew up in the Anglican church, much of his youth spent in the company of his grandfather, a clergyman in the local parish. Religion was a major part of his life. He enjoyed singing hymns and participating in the group, and still thinks that there's nothing wrong with those parts of religion. During his teenage years however, Pullman began to sense that much of what the Church preached was very different from what it actually did, and this is the source of his dislike for organized religion. "[My dislike of Religion] comes from History. It comes from records of the Inquisition, persecuting heretics and torturing Jews and all that sort of stuff; and it comes from the other side too, from the Protestants burning the Catholics. It comes from the insensate pursuit of innocent and crazy old women, and from the Puritans burning and hanging the witches-- It comes not only from the Christian Church, but also from the Taliban. Every single religion with a monotheistic god ends up persecuting other people" (Pullman qtd. in Spanner, 1-2).

In addition to this feeling that the power involved with religion had corrupted it, Pullman lost his boyhood faith in general. He feels that in his experiences, there hasn't been any truly convincing evidence for the existence of God. However, Pullman isn't certain that there isn't a God: he thinks that maybe somewhere there has been firm evidence for God's existence, but he hasn't found it yet.

His dislike of organized religion arises not from a disbelief in God, or necessarily a dislike of what is contained in the Bible, but instead the way that human beings have used religion to give themselves power over others is the problem. Corruption is the problem, not whether or not one believes in God. The corruptness of the religious bodies in His Dark Materials reflects this, as well as the corruptness of The Authority and his servants themselves. Pullman feels that despite the negative aspects of religion, there are morals and values that must still be practiced, whether a person believes in God or not, and because of this, he has come up with a theory to maintain the good aspects of religion while not requiring the presence of an all powerful being. As a mix between an atheist and an agnostic, Philip Pullman doesn't really believe that Heaven (or Hell) exists, or that when your life is over you will be judged by an omnipotent being. However, Pullman still believes that everything good that the idea of Heaven stood for still has a great importance in human life. He thinks that if there is no heaven and God is dead, why should that mean that human beings stop living good lives?

In his books, Pullman replaces the traditional view of a Kingdom of Heaven with a 'Republic of Heaven'. Lord Asriel, Lyra's father, attempts to overthrow the Authority's kingdom, and to literally replace it with a Republic, a world where everyone upholds the values and morals that religions have all endorsed, such as loving your neighbor as yourself and being good and kind. However, the nature of the parallel universes in His Dark Materials prevents this from happening: a person can only live outside the world that they were born in for so long, before their dæmon grows sick and they die. In the end, Asriel's literal republic cannot work.

This does not mean the idea of a Republic of Heaven has been defeated. Lyra concludes The Amber Spyglass with the following lines: "'We have to be all those difficult things, like cheerful and kind and curious and patient, and we've got to study and think and work hard, all of us, in all our different worlds, and then we'll build… The Republic of Heaven.'" (Pullman, 518)

The idea of a Republic of Heaven does not revolve around there being a life after death, but instead, the responsibility of human beings (as free citizens) to live their lives in the here and the now and live them in a good and virtuous manner. When Will and Lyra escape from the land of the dead, it is after bargaining with the harpies that in exchange for guiding the dead out, the harpies are entitled to hear a true story about that person's life. The Republic of Heaven requires a person to go out and live their life so that when they die, they will have stories to tell to the harpies, since their life was not lived locked up in a monastery, but out in the world, being a part of everything.

This idea is meant to give meaning to a person's life, whether they believe in God and an afterlife or not. Pullman is seeking to keep the values of Heaven, without keeping God. But is this a logical idea? David Couchman, the founder of Facing The Challenge, a Christian web site that takes a look at the His Dark Materials trilogy, disagrees. "What Pullman is trying to say is that we should all be nice to each other… but let's leave God out of the equation. Then no one has to ask the question 'Why?' If there is no God, no judgement, no afterlife, why on earth should I care whether I hurt, damage, destroy other people? […] My point is that if there is no God, there is no reason for me to try to make earth like heaven. If there is no king, why should I live like one of his subjects?" (Couchman 2) Mr. Couchman believes that the source of the goodness and virtues that Pullman has placed at the center of The Republic idea comes from God, and that trying to have just the parts you like is a foolish idea. Pullman on the other hand believes that these things come from basic human morality, not God, and that if God doesn't exist, then these good things should still hold a very important place in a person's life.

Pullman's point in creating a Republic of Heaven is that those who don't believe in a God should still have the same responsibility to do good as those who do believe in God. Whether or not a person believes in God does not matter, what matters is that they still seek to uphold these basic principles of morality and goodness.

Philip Pullman's personal views have, of course, shaped how religion has been presented in the His Dark Materials books. Some critics have complained that his views have entered the books at the expense of the story, and that an otherwise entertaining and well written tale is bogged down by Pullman seeking to clearly state what he believes. Others have found the view of religion presented in the books as refreshing, or at the very least that they fit in well. The target of Pullman's portrayal of The Authority is the corruption of the Church, and by creating the idea of a Republic of Heaven, Pullman seeks to uphold the values of the traditional religions while doing away with that corruption, along with the feeling that goodness cannot exist without a God to judge it. Table of Contents
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