Grierson’s Milton and Wordsworth, in Review of English Studies, XIV (1938) 225–8, writes that Milton ‘means the reader to take this quite literally, since otherwise there can be no drama’. Raleigh writes that Milton ‘flies in the face of the Anasthasian Creed by representing the generation of the Son as an event occurring in time’. 56–6, in keeping with his theory, does not take these legends as authentic Jewish tradition. ![]() Henrietta Szold (Philadelphia, 1913) 162–4. Louis Ginzburg, The Legends of the Jews, trans. The legends are even more ancient and are represented elsewhere in Jewish literature: All these go back, thinks Wells, probably to a Hellenistic Jew who wrote between A.D. Ancient versions of the Vita are found in Armenian, Syriac, Syriac and Arabic, and Ethiopic. Two Middle English versions are given by Carl Horstmann, Sammlung Altenglischer Legenden (Heilbronn, 1878). According to Wells, there are numerous manuscripts of the Vita dating from the Middle Ages (pp. Wells, in Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha, ed. Charles (Oxford, 1913) II 163.ĭenis Saurat, Milton Man and Thinker (New York, 1925) pp. The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament, ed. Gilbert, ‘The Theological Basis of Satan’s Rebellion and the Function of Abdiel in Paradise Lost’, in Modern Philology, XL (1942) 19–42. To Maurice Kelley, This Great Argument (Princeton, 1941).Īnd to Allan H. Throughout this article I am under exceeding obligation to Grant McColley, Paradise Lost (Chicago, 1941), This study attempts to sketch such an inquiry. So much hinges on the motivation of Satan’s rebellion that an organized inquiry should be conducted into the methods by which Milton motivates Satan’s rebellion, the exact meaning of Satan’s actions, the sources on which Milton drew, and the dramatic validity of the account in Paradise Lost of the fall of the angels. Satan’s action initiates the whole sequence of the expulsion of the rebel angels, the creation of man to take their place, the temptation and fall of man, and finally his regeneration by grace. When Satan summons his followers to council in the North, evil enters the cosmos. 1 A proper understanding of the rebellion of Satan is likewise essential to the whole philosophic meaning of the epic. Without Satan’s rebellion, man would possibly not have been created and would certainly not have fallen, and no justification of the ways of God to man would have been necessary or possible. Many readers have argued that Milton deliberately makes Satan seem heroic and appealing early in the poem to draw the readers into sympathizing with him against their will, so that one might see how seductive evil is and learn to be more vigilant in resisting its appeal.T hough, until very recently, critics have paid scant attention to the motivation of Satan’s rebellion, it must be clear that this motivation is of cardinal importance to Paradise Lost. Satan, moreover, strikes a grand and majestic figure, apparently unafraid of being damned eternally, and uncowed by such terrifying figures as Chaos or Death. It would be difficult, perhaps impossible, for Milton to make perfect, infallible characters such as God the Father, God the Son, and the angels as interesting to read about as the flawed characters, such as Satan, Adam, and Eve. ![]() One source of Satan’s fascination is that he is an extremely complex and subtle character. Yet there are many compelling qualities to his character that make him intriguing to readers. Nor does it make sense to celebrate or emulate him, as one might with a true hero. Satan is far from being the story’s object of admiration, as most heroes are. This goal, however, is evil, and Adam and Eve are the moral heroes at the end of the story, as they help to begin humankind’s slow process of redemption and salvation. Some consider Satan to be the hero, or protagonist, of the story, because he struggles to overcome his own doubts and weaknesses and accomplishes his goal of corrupting humankind. To justify the ways of God to Man” was Milton’s grand purpose. Paradise Lost is the only epic of magnifiscence in English Literature.
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