Rose-Fire
[1]
I base this claim on MacDonald’s sermon, “Justice,” published in his Unspoken Sermons, vol. 1, 2, and 3. I read from this Project Gutenberg edition.
I don’t agree with him about that. But he did have some other ideas that are useful.
He was a bit eccentric. According to one scholar, MacDonald esteemed roses so highly that he “seemed to think it unbecoming to speak of them as growing on bushes.”
[2]
Timothy Larsen, George MacDonald in the Age of Miracles (Grand Rapids: MI, Intervarsity Press), 2018. Read for free from HooplaDigital.
He’s got one fantastic scene in The Princess and Curdie in which a boy enters a room to find that “on a huge hearth a great fire was burning, and the fire was a huge heap of roses, and yet it was fire. The smell of the roses filled the air, and the heat of the flames of them glowed upon his face.”
[3]
All the quotes from The Princess and Curdie are from this Project Gutenberg edition.
A wise woman is in the room, MacDonald’s picture of the Holy Spirit. She has a conversation with the boy, Curdie.
“Curdie,” she said, “you have stood more than one trial already, and have stood them well: now I am going to put you to a harder. Do you think you are prepared for it?”
“How can I tell, ma’am,” he returned, “seeing I do not know what it is, or what preparation it needs? Judge me yourself, ma’am.”
“It needs only trust and obedience,” answered the lady.
“I dare not say anything, ma'am. If you think me fit, command me.”
“It will hurt you terribly, Curdie, but that will be all; no real hurt but much good will come to you from it.”
Curdie made no answer but stood gazing with parted lips in the lady's face.
“Go and thrust both your hands into that fire,” she said quickly, almost hurriedly.
Curdie dared not stop to think. It was much too terrible to think about. He rushed to the fire, and thrust both of his hands right into the middle of the heap of flaming roses, and his arms halfway up to the elbows. And it did hurt! But he did not draw them back. He held the pain as if it were a thing that would kill him if he let it go—as indeed it would have done. He was in terrible fear lest it should conquer him.
But when it had risen to the pitch that he thought he could bear it no longer, it began to fall again, and went on growing less and less until by contrast with its former severity it had become rather pleasant. At last it ceased altogether, and Curdie thought his hands must be burned to cinders if not ashes, for he did not feel them at all. The princess told him to take them out and look at them. He did so, and found that all that was gone of them was the rough, hard skin; they were white and smooth like the princess's.
“Curdie,” she said, “you have stood more than one trial already, and have stood them well: now I am going to put you to a harder. Do you think you are prepared for it?”
“How can I tell, ma’am,” he returned, “seeing I do not know what it is, or what preparation it needs? Judge me yourself, ma’am.”
“It needs only trust and obedience,” answered the lady.
“I dare not say anything, ma'am. If you think me fit, command me.”
“It will hurt you terribly, Curdie, but that will be all; no real hurt but much good will come to you from it.”
Curdie made no answer but stood gazing with parted lips in the lady's face.
“Go and thrust both your hands into that fire,” she said quickly, almost hurriedly.
Curdie dared not stop to think. It was much too terrible to think about. He rushed to the fire, and thrust both of his hands right into the middle of the heap of flaming roses, and his arms halfway up to the elbows. And it did hurt! But he did not draw them back. He held the pain as if it were a thing that would kill him if he let it go—as indeed it would have done. He was in terrible fear lest it should conquer him.
But when it had risen to the pitch that he thought he could bear it no longer, it began to fall again, and went on growing less and less until by contrast with its former severity it had become rather pleasant. At last it ceased altogether, and Curdie thought his hands must be burned to cinders if not ashes, for he did not feel them at all. The princess told him to take them out and look at them. He did so, and found that all that was gone of them was the rough, hard skin; they were white and smooth like the princess's.
This is MacDonald’s picture of how God sanctifies us—suffering is part of how He heals our character to make us like Him. The fire of sanctification is a fire of that most holy of flowers, the rose.
In the story, Curdie learns that his hands don’t just look clean now—they are a different sort of hands, capable of discerning whether someone is evil when he shakes their hand. In MacDonald’s fairy tale, evil people become more and more beasts as they become less and less humane. Because the hands are the tools that accomplish evil, the hands are the first part to turn beastly, and Curdie could now sense the paw or hoof of the beast that was being born in a man.
Curdie is given this healing gift of the rose-fire so that he will be equipped to help the princess of the kingdom foil an evil plot to overthrow the king.
The rose-fire hurts terribly, but it takes away the hardened exterior. The rose-fire fits us to serve others.
It doesn’t just do that, though. Beasts can become human again. MacDonald believed that the suffering evil people go through because of their evil actions can bring them to repentance, to a new, human life. Early in the story, Curdie is given one of these repentant beasts as a helper. Her name is Lina, and she looks like a horrible cross between a dog, elephant, polar bear and snake. And when Curdie takes her hand, he feels the hand of a child.
This is about you and me, people enslaved to the law of death. We can be made new, monsters turned into humans. I think MacDonald is right about this—one of the reasons God allows suffering as a result of evil is to bring evil people to repentance. And repentant evil people can be transformed.
By the close of the story, the rose-fire has its way with Lina, too.
Before the hearth stood the princess, an old grey-haired woman, with Lina a little behind her, slowly wagging her tail, and looking like a beast of prey that can hardly so long restrain itself from springing as to be sure of its victim.
The queen was casting roses, more and more roses, upon the fire. At last she turned and said, 'Now Lina!'—and Lina dashed burrowing into the fire. There went up a black smoke and a dust, and Lina was never more seen in the palace.
I read this story first when I was ten or eleven. Its image has never left me—the terrible fire of the roses.
MacDonald believed that every bit of suffering we encounter was sent by God because we needed it. I don’t agree with him.
However, like MacDonald, I do believe that every bit of suffering I encounter has the potential to be redeemed, to lead to good in my life no matter how evil its intent and perpetrator. The Spirit is near during terrific pain. He may not have sent the fire, but He can hallow it. Every fire can be a rose-fire.
We can be remade.
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