Is Satan the Hero of Paradise Lost?



Warning to students tempted to plagiarize: this paper is covered by Turnitin.

Read Paradise Lost lately? Robin is reading it now because of a college paper that her daughter, Stephanie, recently wrote on it. John Milton's brilliant epic poem, first published in 1667, has drawn criticism from the beginning for its portrayal of Satan as a classic epic hero.

But is that a valid criticism? Stef addresses that in her paper, which Robin (in her unbiased judgment) thought worth reading. So may we present:

The Synthesis of Protestant Christianity and Greek Epic Tradition as Devices for Milton's Object in Paradise Lost

To the casual observer, the widely known (and widely parodied) story of the Genesis account in the Bible of the creation and fall of humankind does not make very interesting story fodder. Almost anyone familiar with Western tradition can give at worst this sketchy account: God makes angels, the best angel wants to be God, the angel gets kicked out of Heaven into Hell, goes to the garden of Eden, persuades Eve to eat an apple, and down plunges humanity. So why, then, did Milton choose to use this particular piece of Biblical narrative, first, above his original intention of an Arthurian tale, and second, above any other account in the 66 books of the Old and New Testaments?

Milton answers these questions both simply and enigmatically in the beginning of the poem: "What in me is dark/ Illumine, what is low raise and support;/ That to the heighth of this great Argument/ I may assert Eternal Providence/ And justify the ways of God to men" (Milton 47). The question that humanity begs an answer for, above all, is the reason for the rampant evil in the world. Many people over the last several centuries, and many Christians even, cannot reconcile the existence of unchecked evil alongside a loving, merciful God. Milton would heartily agree that characteristics of God can be found in any situation in the Bible (and so he did draw from these in other works), but within Milton's enlightened seventeenth-century society, the scientific process itself dictated that to discover the meaning of any process, one had to go back to the catalytic moment. In order to answer the most theologically difficult question this side of B.C., Milton had no choice but to go back to the beginning and see, with what mortal reasoning can conceive, the necessity of what God allowed.

The next question that is begged involves the use of poetry: only the lofty language of the epic poem can contain the absurdity of such unimaginable events as war in Heaven or Paradise and still be an aesthetically worthy literary work. In combining traditional Greek epic poetic form with known Christian history and Protestant beliefs, Milton artfully accomplished his object in the justification of characteristically infinite Divine ways to the finite reasoning of mortal man.

Foremost, Paradise Lost is an epic poem after the traditional Greek epic form. Taking that further, Encyclopædia Britannica claims that Paradise Lost "is generally regarded as the greatest epic poem in the English language" ("Milton"). Here, I will examine just a sampling of characteristics that an epic comprises, and the way in which Milton fulfills this quality. To begin with, while Milton was greatly influenced by (and probably knew by heart) Homer's works, he used Virgil's The Aeneid as his primary epic model for Paradise Lost. Milton devotes the first two books to Satan and his languishing legions as we come to know them individually as heathen gods. Similarly, Virgil recounts the Italian chiefs who oppose Aeneas. Moreover, the angel Raphael's account of spiritual histories to Adam mirrors Odysseus' and Aeneas' retellings of their own past events ("Milton"). Upon this foundation of similarity, however, Milton continues to build the epic as we know it, and yet makes it "tauntingly new; the epic becomes the anti-epic" (Ricks xviii).

The next building block of the epic is its epicenter: the hero. Within the Greek epic, the hero has many facets: he must overcome great odds, with great superhuman acts ("Epic"). On first glance, Satan overwhelmingly appears to be the heroic figure of the poem. He persuades and deceives one third of the angels to follow him into embattled rebellion against God. Against all odds, he must overcome the despair of Hell, pass through the locked Gates, and find the new Creation that has been rumored in Heaven for some time. He displays such power that he is second only to God in gifts. And yet, we see Milton turn everything on its head. Satan is not the hero; he is the anti-hero. Christopher Ricks said it best about Milton's poem in the introduction to Paradise Lost: "So delicate in portraying true heroism, so rich in creating the glamour of Satanic heroism, and so lethal in judging it" (Ricks xvii).

I will address the implications of this quote backwards. The emphasis on the last phrase is mine, for we indeed see the seductive "glamour," as it were, that Satan displays like cheap jewelry throughout the entire epic. He is the false hero: he imagines that it is time for God to step down and allow a better (himself) to reign rather than the ordained Son, and later he steps forward to a sort of martyrdom when no one else in Hell will seek the truth of the new Creation or venture past the Gates. Under less evil circumstances, the latter act would be a heroic act, but the fact remains that Satan is attempting to bust out of Hell so that he can drag the entire human race back to Hell with him in order to revenge himself on God. His heroism is false: heroism arises out of noble sacrifice, not out of selfish sacrifice.

Ricks is correct; Milton does not spare Satan within Paradise Lost. He is a doubly humiliated figure, even though he accomplishes the fall of man. First, he is bested by Christ two times: both in Jesus' anointing as King over himself, and when he is driven relentlessly by Jesus from Heaven into the pits of Hell. Second, and less obvious, is God exalting Adam to best Satan. This is the "so delicate in portraying true heroism" part of Ricks' statement. Adam emerges as the real epic hero figure within Paradise Lost. Before and after his fall, Adam displays superhuman characteristics required of the hero in that he communicates with angels—with the Archangels, no less. Additionally, he makes an incredible sacrifice—out of love for Eve, he sins against God so that she may not be alone in punishment and death. Furthermore, Webber requires as part of the epic: "The epic hero is asked to live as a flawed man in a flawed world" (42), which is precisely what happens to Adam as he sins and leaves Eden: he is a fallen man that must live in a fallen world. Finally, and most puzzling of all, is the exaltation of Adam to overcome not just great odds, but all odds, and it is done by God's power and strength. Adam is given the promise that through his sin will come a greater good than the paradise he and Eve left, and not just for himself, but for all humanity.

Concluding this argument of Paradise Lost as a Western epic is the coupling of intended audience and narrative voice. Anne Ferry explains the narrative tone: ". . . the speaker assumes our familiarity with the story, assumes that we can identify 'that Forbidden Tree' and 'one greater Man.' His purpose in these lines is therefore not so much to familiarize us with the events to come as it is to identify for us which story we are to hear, what it means to us, and who is to tell it" (22). It is as I initially suspected: Milton never intended to elaborate on the extensive allusions he makes in his epic poem; he rather uses it as the rich scenery, much as the Homeric audience was definitively familiar with the Greek gods. Continuing in that vein, Milton was writing to a very particular audience. He himself mentioned that first, he was called to minister to Britain in his native tongue just as Homer served the Greeks (Ricks ix-x). Ferry continues to outline for us the particulars of the Paradise Lost audience:

We are human beings, simply, and yet certain assumptions are implied about us as human beings. It is assumed that we loathe sin and love virtue, regret the loss of Eden and long for our restoration; that we can respond to divinely inspired music, that we are interested in the serious treatment of a serious subject, and that we are capable of rational attention to a logical argument. Yet it is simultaneously assumed that as human beings we need divine inspiration because our minds cannot transcend the limits of our creaturely nature, and that as heirs of Adam we are fallen, bereft, miserable, and mortal (23).

Inasmuch, we as a special audience require a very special narrator. The comparison to the Greek epic narrator here is uncanny; Milton himself draws it for us in Book III, lines 32-36: "Nor sometimes forget/ Those other two equall'd with me in Fate,/ So were I equall'd with them in renown,/ Blind Thamyris and blind Maeonides,/ And Tiresias and Phineus Prophets old" (Milton 100). If only Milton knew that he won his wish of immortality in spite of his (or would it be partly because of?) his blindness: his name is often mentioned with Homer (Maeonides) whenever epic poetry is cited. And how he would react, if he could have known: "because he is afflicted with the more than human suffering . . . we feel him to be capable of more than human profundities of experience. Because he can no longer see the colors and surfaces of things, we feel him to have special powers of inner illumination which penetrate the veils dimming our mortal vision" (Ferry 27). With all of these devices, Milton was successfully able to transform the sketchy creation story of Genesis first, into a traditional epic poem, and next, the defense for "God's ways."

Obviously, quantifying the Divine in such a way as to be measurable in our linear finite minds was problematic enough for Milton to illustrate. It is nearly as problematic to prove satisfactorily that Milton accomplished this, but I am going to use some illustrations on sin and Milton's presentation of sin toward this purpose. First, we must cover certain truths about theology that Milton as a Protestant would have held: God is holy and righteous (New American Standard Bible, Isaiah 5:16). Because God is holy, no creature who has sinned (in other words, is unholy) can be in the presence of God, and therefore, in Heaven (Romans 3:23). Add to that one more challenging statement by Jesus: "You have heard that it was said, 'Do not commit adultery.' But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart" (Matthew 5:27-28), and you have a whole new concept of sin. Not only is sin committing a disallowed act, sin is now the corruption of the heart.

Another foundational Protestant complex is that of free will: how much of our lives is predestined, or already determined, and how much control do we personally have over ourselves? The Encyclopædia Britannica maintains that although Milton was raised in the Calvinist camp (who believed in very little free will, and no free will when it pertained to salvation), he ultimately rejected this doctrine and "above all insisted on humanity's rational freedom and responsible power of choice" ("Milton").

Within Paradise Lost and Biblical accounts, Satan is created first as an angel: a perfect being and second only to God in power. Because God loves his creation and desires to be loved freely in return, his creation, including the angels, have free will. When Satan entertained pride enough to desire to be God, he sinned. In Paradise Lost, when he raises a rebellion, he is pursued out of Heaven. Milton does not explicitly state the following, but I believe it to be his train of thought: that when Satan conceived Sin, the entirety of creation was corrupted. In bringing Sin into Paradise, in presenting foreign thoughts to Eve, her heart was corrupted, as was Adam's, before they ever took a bite of the forbidden fruit. Chambers elaborates in his essay that Satan desired to corrupt the order of nature as he corrupted order in Heaven. Eve listened to her subordinate, a serpent, and Adam listened to his subordinate, Eve (Chambers 128-130).

Consequently, God devised a Grace out of his love: that Christ should pay the penalty for sin and in so doing, overcome Satan for all eternity and bring a better good out of Satan's evil intentions, turning Satan into a mere pawn to demonstrate God's love. Paul in Romans sums all of this up with the force of words that is felt even through translation:

Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death . . . . I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us . . . . For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has? . . . And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose . . . . What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all--how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? . . . For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord (8:1-2, 18-21, 24, 28, 31-32, 37-39).

Ferry comments on the parallel between Milton's justification and the narrator himself; that the narrator, being blind, is granted sight more valuable than his human sight; that Adam and Eve, having sinned, are granted a Paradise (albeit delayed) better than the one they were just cast out of. "The tone implies that for the blind bard, for Adam and Eve, and for the reader, the world that is gained is in some sense more precious than what is lost" (38). Adam expresses his understanding of God's vanquishing Satan and how much better the next Paradise will be after Michael relates the events to come in Book XII:

O goodness infinite, goodness immense! That all this good of evil shall produce, And evil turn to good; more wonderful Than that which by creation first brought forth Light out of darkness! full of doubt I stand, Whether I should repent me now of sin By mee done and occasion'd, or rejoice Much more, that much more good thereof shall spring, To God more glory, more good-will to Men From God, and over wrath grace shall abound (469-478).

In one final ironic stab at Satan, Milton barely touches on the finishing irony of God's grace. Satan, being once the highest authority of angel, will be vanquished through the lowest of creation. Adam continues in Book XII as he grasps this concept: "Merciful over all his works, with good/ Still overcoming evil, and by small/ Accomplishing great things, by things deem'd weak/ Subverting worldly strong, and worldly wise/ By simply meek; that suffering for Truth's sake/ Is fortitude to highest victory" (565-570). So, Milton has illustrated his point: that through Satan's corruption, God will use Christ's sacrifice to overcome Death and Satan, cleansing his creation from sin and reuniting them with himself in Heaven: the final subversion of Satan's attempted revenge, and ultimately better than if Satan had not conceived Sin at all.

Works Cited

Chambers, A.B. "The Falls of Adam and Eve in Paradise Lost." New Essays on Paradise Lost. ed. Thomas Kranidas. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1969. 118-130.

"Epic." Encyclopædia Britannica. 2003. Encyclopædia Britannica Premium Service. 30 July 2003 .

Ferry, Anne. Milton's Epic Voice: The Narrator in Paradise Lost. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1963.

"Milton, John." Encyclopædia Britannica. 2003. Encyclopædia Britannica Premium Service. 30 July 2003 .

Milton, John. Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained. New York: Signet Classics, 1968.

New American Standard Bible. 1995. Gospel Communications International. 30 July 2003 .

Ricks, Christopher. Introduction. Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained. By John Milton. New York: Signet Classics, 1968. vii- xxx.

Webber, Joan Malory. Milton and His Epic Tradition. Seattle and London: University of Washington Press, 1979.

Copyright 2003 Stephanie Cole


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