Buy on Amazon
View on Biblioguides
Did you ever wonder why God created animals? I have heard a lot of reasons given but I don’t think that those cover all of this mystery. In any event, animals have been used throughout known history as characters in stories and as ways to illustrate human traits. Think of sayings such as “crafty as a fox,” “dumb as an ox,” “fleet as a deer,” and “wise as an owl.” It would be fun at home or school to think of as many as possible. Of course, there are even more from outside the Western tradition. For example, there are many African animal sayings – Paul White in his brilliant Jungle Doctor series has illustrated some of these.
God’s famous reply in the book of Job in the Bible used His created animals to make devastating points to Job. Animal illustrations are in fact all throughout the Bible, especially in the Old Testament but not exclusively. Aesop’s Fables, which are at least 2000 years old, go one step further in teaching through animals by giving them personalities and speech. We have built on this tradition in our literature – just think of all your favorite classic books with talking animals: Wind in the Willows, Winnie-the-Pooh, Paddington Bear, and Watership Down.
Now we have a wonderful modern (as of 1971) science-fiction novel that uses this old literary device of talking animals: The Rats of NIMH (National Institute of Mental Health). The animated movie that was made of this book, while faithful in some ways, brought in mystical elements that were not in the original book, which I like a lot better than the movie. The rats, and a few mice, have been genetically altered in a NIMH research laboratory to become much longer-lived and as intelligent as humans. They escape and set up an underground civilization of their own while still being hunted by the NIMH scientists. Mrs. Frisby is a mouse that needs their help. She married one of the escaped super-intelligent mice and one of her children inherited his father’s gifts. The story of the rats and mice who escaped from NIMH is told as the rats help Mrs. Frisby. The book ends with the realization of the rats that even with their intelligence, they are still living off human civilization, being takers and not makers. They decide to go off into the wilderness and build a new independent life of their own.