ABSTRACT
In this chapter we explore innocence by considering the notion of ‘childlikeness’ in the work of George MacDonald (1824-1905). It is a ubiquitous theme: one critic lamented that it was something ‘he constantly harps about’, to the detriment of his theology.1 MacDonald places Christ’s command to become ‘as children’ at the heart of his theology; to explore its implications, in his novels he places impossibly saintly children into nineteenth-century grime (albeit somewhat sanitised) to see what happens. It raises a key question: are the often unsatisfactory results (and few would argue otherwise) due to bad dramatisation, bad theology, or both? Or are we missing something?
