# The biblical reversal inside the gravity joke

Commentary on Orthodoxy by G. K. Chesterton.

On [CH07.P033](https://glosses.org/orthodoxy/pg16769-r1/CH07.P033/#char=2362,2397): "Satan fell by the force of gravity."

The last sentence compresses two kinds of falling. Luke 10:18 has Christ say, in the King James Version, ‘I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven.’ Luke 14:11 gives the moral reversal: self-exaltation ends in abasement, while humility is exalted. The Magnificat similarly joins the scattering of the proud with the lowering of rulers and raising of the lowly (Luke 1:51–53). These are scriptural parallels, not evidence that Chesterton is quoting one verse verbatim. [Luke, KJV](https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10).

The joke's further premise is traditional rather than stated in Luke's lightning image. Aquinas argues that an angel's first sin must be pride: a refusal of the subjection owed to a superior (*Summa theologiae* I, question 63, article 2). The inspected English witness is the Dominican Fathers' second revised edition of 1920, reproduced by New Advent; the medieval *Summa* was composed in the thirteenth century. [Aquinas, I.63.2](https://www.newadvent.org/summa/1063.htm#article2).

Chesterton turns moral gravity—self-importance—into physical gravity. His paradox therefore does more than decorate an argument about cheerfulness: the apparently ascending ambition of pride becomes a downward movement. The powerful can fall precisely through their sense of their own elevation, continuing the chapter's argument that high position provides no exemption from corruption.

## Sources

- [The King James Bible, Project Gutenberg eBook 10](https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10), Luke 10:18; 14:11; 1:51–53; KJV tradition first published 1611
- [Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I, question 63](https://www.newadvent.org/summa/1063.htm#article2), Article 2, response; Fathers of the English Dominican Province, second revised edition, 1920, New Advent transcription

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