[chc]

I agree that Aslan is obviously an allegory for Jesus, but I don't think that's true in the same way for the parallels in Tolkien's stories. The key feature that distinguishes allegory from other sorts of parallels is that allegory is meant to reveal or teach something about the thing it parallels. Lewis's allegories are bald-faced Christian teaching, but Tolkien's parallels seem to just be remixes of narrative elements, without any sort of commentary intended. Gandalf obviously has a death and resurrection and goes on to save everyone, but is Tolkien saying something about Jesus with it, or is he just riffing on the Christ-figure archetype that appears in many mythologies? It seems more like the latter to me.

[CodeMage]

Exactly. That's exactly what disappointed me about Narnia: I felt like Lewis is ramming his Christianity down my throat, whereas I never felt that way with Tolkien's work. Whenever I compare Narnia and Middle Earth and people tell me "but Tolkien's work is also allegorical", my reply is "If the word allegory can be applied to both, then we need to split it up into two different words, to distinguish two things that are obviously different."

[olavk]

Maybe the word you are looking for is "subtle". Lewis is downright preachy a times and sometimes even goes beyond allegory and just lets Aslan be a mouthpiece for his own theology and morals. Tolkien is never preachy, so he could even become a cult hit among counterculture hippies which probably didn't share many of his values. (Probably to his own dismay I suspect)

[el_cid]

1. CS Lewis is my all-time, favorite author. 2. I am a Christian who believes in Christ. 3. I love the Narnia series.

But I really dislike how Lewis uses allegory in his Narnian series. The Space Trilogy is much better in that respect and I highly recommend it.