A Case of Conscience

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A Case of Conscience
LC Class
PS3503.L64 C37 2000
Followed byDoctor Mirabilis
Black Easter
The Day After Judgment 

A Case of Conscience is a

Jesuit who investigates an alien race that has no religion yet has a perfect, innate sense of morality, a situation which conflicts with Catholic teaching. The story was originally published as a novella in 1953, and later extended to novel-length, of which the first part is the original novella. The novel is the first part of Blish's thematic After Such Knowledge trilogy and was followed by Doctor Mirabilis and both Black Easter and The Day After Judgment
(two novellas that Blish viewed as together forming the third volume of the trilogy).

Few science fiction stories of the time attempted religious themes, and still fewer did this with Catholicism.

Plot

Part 1

In 2049, Father Ramon Ruiz-Sanchez of

Jesuit, he has religious concerns as well. The planet is inhabited by a race of intelligent bipedal reptile
-like creatures, the Lithians. Ruiz-Sanchez has learned to speak their language to learn about them.

While on a walking survey of the land, Cleaver, a physicist, is poisoned by a plant, despite a protective suit, and he suffers badly. Ruiz-Sanchez treats him and leaves to send a message to the others: Michelis, a chemist, and Agronski, a geologist. He is helped by Chtexa, a Lithian whom he has befriended, who then invites him to his house. This is an opportunity which Ruiz-Sanchez cannot decline; no member of the team has been invited into Lithian living places before. The Lithians seem to have an ideal society, a utopia without crime, conflict, ignorance or want. Ruiz-Sanchez is awed.

When the team is reassembled, they compare their observations of the Lithians. Soon they will have to officially pronounce their verdict. Michelis is open-minded and sympathetic to the Lithians. He has learned their language and some of their customs. Agronski is more insular in his outlook, but he sees no reason to consider the planet dangerous. When Cleaver revives, he reveals that he wants the place exploited, regardless of the Lithians' wishes. He has found enough

open trade
. Agronski is indifferent.

Ruiz-Sanchez makes a major declaration: he wants maximum

Catholic
teaching. Michelis is mystified, but does point out that all the Lithian science he has learned, while perfectly logical, rests on highly questionable assumptions. It is as if it just came from nowhere.

The team can come to no agreement. Ruiz-Sanchez concludes that Cleaver's intentions will probably prevail and Lithian society will be exterminated. Despite his conclusions about the planet, he has a deep affection for the Lithians.

As the humans board their ship to leave, Chtexa gives Ruiz-Sanchez a gift—a sealed jar containing an egg. It is a son of Chtexa, to be raised on Earth and learn the ways of humans. At this point, the Jesuit solves a riddle which he has been pondering for some time, from Book III of Finnegans Wake by James Joyce (pp. 572–3), which proposes a complex case of marital morals, ending with the question "Has he hegemony and shall she submit?" To the Church, neither "Yes" nor "No" is a morally satisfactory answer. Ruiz-Sanchez sees that it is two questions, despite the omission of a comma between the two, so that the answer can be "Yes and No".

Part 2

The egg hatches and grows into the individual Egtverchi. Like all Lithians, he inherits knowledge from his father through his DNA. Earth society is based on the nuclear shelters of the 20th century, with most people living underground. Egtverchi is the proverbial firecracker in an anthill; he upends society and precipitates violence.

Ruiz-Sanchez has to go to

Norwegian, points out two things Ruiz-Sanchez missed. First, Lithia could have been a deception, not a creation. And second, Ruiz-Sanchez could have done something about it, namely, perform an exorcism
on the whole planet. The priest bows his head in shame that he has overlooked an obvious solution to his own case of conscience while he was absorbed in "a book [Finnegans Wake] which to all intents and purposes might have been dictated by the Adversary himself ... 628 pages of compulsive demoniac chatter." The Pope dismisses Ruiz-Sanchez to purge his own soul and to return to the Church if and when he can.

A violent mass riot breaks out, fomented by Egtverchi and made possible by the

space-time, as well as travel around it"[1] so that the instrument presents a view of Lithia in real time, bypassing the delay caused by the speed of light. Cleaver is on Lithia, setting up his reactors, but the physicist who invented the telescope technology believes he has found a fault in Cleaver's reasoning. There is a chance that the work will set off a chain reaction
in the planet's rocks and destroy it.

As they watch on the screen, Ruiz-Sanchez pronounces an exorcism. The planet explodes, eliminating Cleaver and Egtverchi, but also Chtexa and all the things Ruiz-Sanchez admired. It is left ambiguous whether the extinction of the Lithians is a result of Ruiz-Sanchez's prayer or Cleaver's error.

Reception

While faulting the novel for "extreme unevenness", Galaxy reviewer Floyd C. Gale concluded that A Case of Conscience was "a provocative, serious, commendable work" and characterized it as "trailblaz[ing]".[2] Anthony Boucher found Blish's protagonist "a credible and moving figure" and praised the opening segment; however he faulted the later material for "los[ing] focus and impact" and "wander[ing]" to an ending that seems "merely chaotic."[3] In his "Books" column for The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Damon Knight selected Blish's novel as one of the ten best science fiction books of the 1950s.[4] He reviewed the novel as "resonat[ing] with a note of its own. . . . it is complete and perfect."[5]

On the other hand, Br.

S.J., the director of the Vatican Observatory, suggested that this novel was written without much knowledge of Jesuits, saying that "[its] theology isn't only bad theology, it's not Jesuit theology."[6]
In a foreword, Blish mentions that he had heard objections to the theology, but countered that the theology was that of a future Church rather than the present one, and that in any case he set out to write about "not a body of faith, but a man". He also received, and quoted, the official Church policy on contact with extraterrestrial intelligent life forms. The policy described such life forms as being possibly without immortal souls, or having immortal souls and being "fallen", or having souls and existing in a state of Grace, listing the approach to be taken in each case.

In 2012 the novel was included in the Library of America two-volume boxed set American Science Fiction: Nine Classic Novels of the 1950s, edited by Gary K. Wolfe.[7]

Awards and nominations

The novel won a

Retrospective Hugo Award
in 2004.

See also

References

  1. ^ Blish 1999, p. 135
  2. Galaxy Magazine
    , February 1959, pp. 139–140.
  3. ^ "Recommended Reading", F&SF, August 1958, p. 105.
  4. F&SF
    , April 1960, p. 99.
  5. ^ Knight, Damon. "In the Balance", If, December 1958, pp. 108–09.
  6. ^ Cleary, Grayson (November 10, 2015). "Why Sci-Fi Has So Many Catholics". The Atlantic. Retrieved June 25, 2017.
  7. ^ Itzkoff, Dave (July 13, 2012). "Classic Sci-Fi Novels Get Futuristic Enhancements from Library of America". The New York Times. Retrieved January 9, 2013.

Sources

External links
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