Aslan



Aslan the Great Lion is a character in C. S. Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia and the eponymous lion of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Creator and ruler of Narnia, he appears in all seven books of the series. Throughout the series it is often repeated that he is "not a tame lion", since, despite his gentle and loving nature, he is powerful and can be dangerous. He takes the role of a Christ-like figure, though according to Lewis he is not an allegorical portrayal of Christ, but rather a different incarnation of Christ himself:

If Aslan represented the immaterial Deity, he would be an allegorical figure. In reality however he is an invention giving an imaginary answer to the question, 'What might Christ become like if there really were a world like Narnia and He chose to be incarnate and die and rise again in that world as He actually has done in ours?' This is not allegory at all. In the course of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Aslan is put to death in the place of a traitor; he subsequently rises from the dead, and makes appearances in the remaining books in the series. He appears as the creator of Narnia in the prequel The Magician's Nephew.

When Narnia is destroyed in The Last Battle, Aslan judges every creature who has died. It turns out his kingdom is the real Narnia and the one that was destroyed was merely a copy.

Lewis attempts to convey something of the ineffable mystery of the divine by frequently reminding his readers that "Aslan is not a tame lion."

The books also make reference to an Emperor-Over-the-Sea, whose son Aslan is said to be; this further highlights his Christ-like status. The Emperor-over-the-Sea is similar to Eru Ilúvatar of J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth, in His separation from His creation, or considerable equivlent to God.

The words aslan and arslan are Farsi for "lion", with the word later being adopted in Turkish; it was used as a title by a number of rulers, including the notorious Ali Pasha.

Portrayals in film and television
In the 1988 BBC television adaptation of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Aslan was voiced by Ronald Pickup.

In the 2005 film The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, he is voiced by Liam Neeson.