Paradise Lost Book 1 Pdf Download Questions and Answers
Q. 1. What are the epic similes Milton uses to describe Satan?
Ans. One important way in which the narrator develops our picture of Satan-and gives us the impression that he is a hero- is through epic similes, lengthy and developed comparisons that tell us how big and powerful Satan is. For example, when Satan is lying on the burning lake, Milton compares him to the titans who waged war upon Jove in Greek mythology. Then, at greater length, he compares him to a Leviathan, or whale, that is so huge that sailors mistake it for an island and fix their anchor to it. In other epics, these sorts of similes are used to establish the great size or strength of characters, and on the surface these similes seem to do the same thing. At the same time, however, the effect of these similes is to unsettle us, making us aware that we really do not know how big Satan is at all. No one knows how big the titans were, because they were defeated before the age of man. The image of the Leviathan does not give us a well-defined sense of his size, because the whole point of the image is that the Leviathan’s size generates deception and confusion.
More than anything, the similes used to describe Satan make us aware of the fact that size is relative, and that we don’t know how big anything in Hell is—the burning lake, the hill, Pandemonium, etc. Milton drives this fact home at the end of Book I with a tautology: while most of the devils shrink in size to enter Pandemonium, the important ones sit “far within / And in their own dimensions like themselves” (1.792–793). In other words, they were however big they were, but we have no way of knowing how big that was. Finally, it is important to note that the first description of Satan’s size is the biggest we will ever see him. From that point on, Satan assumes many shapes and is compared to numerous creatures, but his size and stature steadily diminishes. The uncertainty created by these similes creates a sense of irony-perhaps Satan isn’t so great after all.
The devils in Paradise Lost are introduced to the story here in Book I in almost a parody of how Homer introduces great warriors in the Iliad. The irony of these descriptions lies in the fact that while these devils seem heroic and noteworthy in certain ways, they just lost the war in Heaven. As frightening and vividly presented as these creatures are, they did not succeed in killing a single angel.
In Book I, Milton presents Satan primarily as a military hero, and the council of devils as a council of war. In doing so, he makes Paradise Lost resonate with earlier epics, which all cenier around military heroes and their exploits. At the same time, Milton presents an implicit critique of a literary culture that glorifies war and warriors. Satan displays all of the virtues of a great warrior such as Achilles or Odysseus. He is courageous, undaunted, refusing to yield in the face of impossible odds, and able to stir his followers to follow him in brave and violent exploits. Milton is clearly aware of what he’s doing in making Satan somewhat appealing in the early chapters. By drawing us into sympathizing with and admiring Satan, Milton forces us to question why we admire martial prowess and pride in literary characters. Ultimately he attempts to show that the Christian virtues of obedience, humility, and forbearance are more important.
Q. 2. Briefly describe the scene of Pandemonium in Lost.
Ans. The pandemonium is that creation in hell designed for infernal conclaves which would rival in its splendor the greatest of human creations and perhaps even divine architecture. It is a word formed by the union of two Greek words, pan, all, and daemon, demon, but the compound word did not exist in the Greek vocabulary, and Milton formed it out the analogy of ‘pantheon’, the abode of the gods. The pantheon at Rome was a temple containing statues of all the gods. Milton’s pandemonium is the capital of hell built to receive all the devils. The coinages of Milton have gained currency in the English, the common noun being used to express a place full of tumultuous voice, confusion and discord.
The pandemonium is built in a corner of hell, the place of a horrible dungeon, of ‘darkness visible’ which in its turn had been created by Go as punishment for their rebellion of Satan and the fallen angels in heaven. Immediately after the inspiring words of Satan in his fifth and last speech, ‘a numerous brigade’ hastened to a hill ‘where grisly top/belched fire and rolling smoke’. The brigade is compared to those ‘pioneers’ in the army who advance before the king or commander to make troupe or prepare a camp. The add is provided by mammon who is described as ‘the least erected among all the spirits who fell from heaven. This look is always ‘downward benť, and this was so even in heaven where he admired the trodden gold of which heaven’s pavement was made. Qualitatively this stooping also suggests his moral nature, since it also suggests a grilling or base spirit. [An upright carriage is the sign of lofty thoughts while a downcast look suggests deviousness.[He is denied the ‘vision beatific’ a theological tern for the happiness of seeing God. ‘Mammon’ is a archaic word meaning ‘wealth”, and this name is used both by Matthew and by Spenser in Faerie Queene, though there does not seem to have been any god called Mammon worshiped by the nations bordering on the territory of the Israelite.) But later Milton uses the name of another architect, Mulciber. Muliciber is a surname of Vulcan, the Roman god of fire who was identified with the Greek Hephaestus. Milton describes how he was thrown over the crystal battlements of heaven by an angry Jove, and how he continued to fall for an entire day until he landed on the Aegean isle.] [Milton points out that the Greek and Roman legends about Hephaestus or Vulcan being cast out by Zeus or Jupiter were wrong, and that he was realy a rebel angel cast out by God along with the other angels). Soon the crew, working under Mammon, began to dig the centre of the earth for hidden minerals. They opened up the volcanic hill which was covered with a glossy scurf indicating that the metallic are of sulphur was concealed within They dugout veins of gold, while a second group sluiced liquid fire from the lake of fire to help in the construction. A yet third group used the fire to melt the ‘messy ore’ and separate each kind, taking special care to extract ‘bullion’ on solid gold.
Pandemonium is a miraculously produced marvelous creation:
And here let those Who boast in mortal things, and wondering tell Of Babel, and the work of Memphian kings, Learn how their greatest monument of fame, And strength, and art, are easily out done By spirits reprobate.
If the Egyptian pyramids had taken 3,60,000 men twenty years to construct, they are able to create a greater architectural marvel in an hour. Milton uses an epic simile to describe how the huge fabric ‘Rose like an exhalation’ likes a note being produced by the wind in a musical organ. It was accompanied by ‘dulcet symphonies and voices sweet. It was built like a temple and was decorated with numerous architectural designs: architraves, Doric pillars, cornice, frizz and embossed sculpture. The roof was made of gold, and the building was of a stately height. The structure was so massive as to have huge brass doors which, when opened, revealed a pale space and level pavement. The miracle of rare device was lit by rows of starry lamps and cressets which hung from the arched roof by ‘subtle magic’ since there were no supports, and which were fueled by naphtha and asphaltus. Milton declares that neither Babylon, nor could great Alcaero boast of such wealth and luxury, such splendor and magnificence.
Thus, pandemonium, ‘the high capital of Satan and his peers’ is both itself architectural and the product of a miracle. Yet Milton presents such magnificence as inimical, and does this not merely because it is inhabited by the rebel angels but perhaps also because the puritan in him militated against such vain splendour.
Q. 3. Why does Milton refer to Vellombrosa in Book I “?
Ans. It would seem to be Dante’s use of the image that has a primary influence here on Milton, but, as we might expect, there is a complication in the way that Milton uses this particular image. Vallombrosa is a place in Italy that Milton had actually visited as a young man. He visited Vallombrosa when he was introduced to Galileo in Fiesole. Vallombrosa literally means “shady valley,” and I think it recalls Galileo’s shady place, Valdarno, another valley. As you know, in classical literature the dead are referred to as shades, but here in Milton’s simile “shades” merely means “shade trees.” It refers solely to trees, and Vallombrosa is the place “where th’ Etrurian shades / high overarch’t imbow’r.” If these trees are still supplying shade, embowering the entire valley At once with joy and fear his heart rebounds.
Now, the purpose of this simile is to evince confusion produced by our vision of the fallen angels. We can only imagine the fallen angels with a kind of dim uncertainty just as the belated peasant , the dance of fairy elves by a forest side.
There’s a difference between fairy elves and hideous demons, I submit , and with the phrase “sees or dreams he sees,” Milton’s alluding to Virgil’s Aeneas who descends to the underworld and catches a glimpse of the shade of his dead lover, Dido — or he thinks he catches a glimpse of the shade of his dead lover, Dido. The Virgilian echo gives this passage in Milton an unmistakable pathos and an undeniable beauty. As with the passage on the falling of the leaves there’s a kind of elegiac tone that works to undo, or at least to challenge, our theological certainty. As we’ve noticed, all of these similes have these observer figures and this one does, too. There’s a second figure here standing ab extra, and that’s the moon hovering overhead: “while over-head the Moon / sits Arbitress.” We’re naturally invited to question what force is it that this moon represents. Now you may remember what Geoffrey Hartman had argued that the moon represents the power of divine providence, and there’s a lot of ways in which this reading makes sense. An arbitress is a judge and she would seem to oversee the justice in this world. The question of providential justice is of course of primary significance to Milton’s poem, but Hartman goes on to say that the moon, which reminds us of a calm and perfect sense of Providence, also works to guarantee the principal of free will.
So, this is my question to you: how complete and perfect is the image of Providence that hovers moonlike over the pages of Paradise Lost? I think Milton is encouraging us in these similes to question, really to wrestle with, the theological certainties that the rest of the poem labors to establish. The uncertain status of divine providence here, I think, is made clear by its figuration as a moon. So I’m going to conclude here by reminding you what you already know. We have already seen a moon in Book Onė. The moon was compared to Satan’s shield, and Milton was preparing us then for this radically ambiguous status of this providential moon. It was Galileo’s job, you’ll remember, with his telescope to detect the otherwise undetectable spots and imperfections in this seemingly, but only seemingly, perfect moon. I’m convinced that it’s the reader’s job to apply the same degree of critical scrutiny, a kind of Galilean critical scrutiny, to the image of Providence that will be elaborated, as you will see, at extraordinary length in Book Three of Paradise Lost.
Q. 4. Comment on the similes- Satan’s Shield Compared to the Moon.
Ans. First of all, let’s look at the simile that compares Satan’s shield to the moon. This is Book One, line 283. This should be in the Hughes, page 218. He scarce had ceas’t when the superior Fiend (that’s obviously Satan] Was moving toward the shore; his ponderous shield, Ethereal temper, massy, large and round, Behind him cast; the broad circumference Hung on his shoulders like the Moon, whose Orb Through Optic Glass the Tuscan Artist views At Ev’ning from the top of Fesole, Or in Valdarno, to descry new Lands, Rivers or Mountains in her spotty Globe. The official function of this simile is to give us a sense of the size of Satan’s shield and thereby to give us a sense of the size of Satan himself. Satan’s shield is as big as the moon — this is the most common form of simile, epic or otherwise, and it can be schematized.
Now, this particular simile conjures for us an image of someone trying to get a fix on Satan’s shield, and there’s the suggestion here of an attempt to get a proper perspective on this huge character, Satan. By extension we have our attempt as readers to arrive at apunderstanding of the first two books in general. I think it’s easy to see why Milton would have wanted to do this. There’s no question that it’s Satan who in these first two books completely overwhelms our imagination. He’s without question the most compelling figure, certainly, in the first two books and, I think, arguably in the entire poem. This fact is a continually troubling phenomenon both for Milton and, of course, for Milton’s readers. It only stands to reason, I think, that Milton would want to inscribe within this poem the problem posed by this extraordinarily compelling characterization of Satan. How are we supposed to see Satan? How are we supposed to arrive at some kind of proper moral discernment of Satan’s being? This is the type of question that these similes are continually raising.
But we have further to go with this simile. So initially the ponderous shield is of an “ethereal temper,” we are told. It has been tempered in a celestial fire in ether, and it was the ether of the ethereal heavens that had always been thought — throughout the Renaissance and long before, of course to be the most perfect substance imaginable.
Q. 5. Comment on the Allusion of Galileo.
Ans.Galileo’s important. Milton had written in Areopagitica that he had actually met Galileo on his journey, when Milton was a young man and Galileo was a very old man, through the continent. When Milton met him, Galileo would have been old and blind, not unimportant to the later Milton, and Galileo was under house arrest at his home in Fiesole. He’d been imprisoned for his intellectual daring and affirming the Copernican view that the earth orbited around the sun. He had rebelled against the supreme authority of the Roman Catholic Church, and in this respect, he provides the poem with something like an earthly version of the arch-rebel Satan of course: Satan who rebels against the supreme authority of the heavenly father.
Well, that makes sense, kind of, that Milton had clearly admired the astronomer. In calling him here the Tuscan artist, in some respects we can see him forging an identification between himself as a artist and Galileo as a scientific artist. The rebellious artist Milton and the rebellious astronomer Galileo are continually threatening to lapse into some sort of identity with Satan himself. Suddenly , the distinctions that the simile works so hard to establish are beginning to erode. Not just that, but the moral certainties that may have seemed distinct when we contrasted the ethereal heaven with the spotty and the imperfect nature of Satan and of the moon — those, too begin to seem fairly hazy. The simile sets out to establish the moral polarities between good and evil, but it then works almost systematically to undo that understanding. The perspective is an evening perspective rather than a perspective of total illumination. The similes are continually working to unleash — and they’re really quite unruly in this respect — to unleash the moral and the theological confusion that so much of the rest of the poem seems really quite eager to pin down and to fix. .
The moon, too, was widely believed to be a perfect sphere of fiery ether Like the sun, it was thought to be a perfect heavenly body and, as you probably know, it was Galileo though — the Tuscan artist, the Italian astronomer – who disproved just that assumption in 1610 when he published the Sidereus Nuncius (The Starry Messenger). So with his optic glass, his telescope, Galileo was able to discern spots on the orb of the moon. It turned out to be a spotty globe just like the earth. The moon seemed to contain all of the geological imperfections of earth. Suddenly, looking through the optic glass, one could see valleys, it seemed to have rivers, and there were mountains. It could no longer be said that the moon was perfect. It was no longer a fiery heavenly body. It was no longer, after Galileo, of an ethereal temper.
It’s in this light that the introduction, of Galileo in this simile starts to make a little more sense. If we had been thinking — and some of us may well have been thinking and we were right to think provisionally — that Satan was a character that we could actually identify with, if we had been thinking that Satan was in any way a perfect character with some sort of justifiable claim these thoughts are now being corrected by the means, by the mechanism, of the simile. Like the moon, Satan may look beautiful, but upon a closer scrutiny that beauty begins to yield certain metaphysical flaws.
Q. 6. How do Satan’s own words suggest the futility of his enterprise ?
Ans. Satan’s speeches reveal Pure Miltonic lyricism. His opening speech to Beelzebub is a magnificent set-piece. It reveals the character of Satan – a defiant rebel and a great leader. He encourages and sympathizes with his followers with bold words and sentiments.
Satan first takes pity on the change in his friend. Then he refers to their friendship of the hazardous enterprise in heaven and in their present misery. He is ashamed to admit the might of God. But he will not allow it to change his mind. He has nothing but contempt for God who insulted his merits. It is a sense of injured merit that makes him wage war against the tyrant of Heaven.
As for the battle, it has been an equal match and the issue uncertain. It is not their want of merit but God’s new and secret weapon that won the war. There is an irony through Satan’s speech which continually reduces his stature even when apparently it seems to be building it up. Satan’s historical of “high disdain” and “sense of injured merit” have overtones of the ludicrous. It seems weak and childish.
A single victory does not permanently ensure God’s victory. For the present, they may have lost the field, but that does not mean they have lost everything. What though the field be lost?
All is not lost-the unconquerable will. And study of revenge, immoral hate, And courage never to submit or yield.
And what is else not to be overcome?
He, who failed to conquer these things cannot be said to be victor at all. Defeat is complete only when the spirit and the will too are subjugated. The bow down before God is worse than defeat. So he is determined to wage eternal war by force or guile.
Satan’s question “what though the field be lost?” is “an exposure of himself
and his inability to act in any other way other than what he enumerates.” Though the speech is one of high rhetorics there is barrenness; no suggestion of action at all except to brood on revenge and hate. Revenge will be eternally “studied” and have sustained yet it is so grandly expressed that we are thrilled by the implied suggestion to wage ceaseless war against hopeless odds, this appears as admirable.
Q. 7. How does Satan address the fallen angels in his second speech?
or,
How and why does Satan propose “to pervert that end, / And out of good still to find means of evil”?
Ans. In his second speech, Satan speaks his intention in front of Beelzebub, that their sole duty will be diverting the aim of God. The existential despair makes him wretched, and in his wretchedness, he plots against God and everything that is good. Paradoxically, in the pursuit of overcoming the consequences of fall, he plans for trials more sinful, that makes him fall into the cause of his despair and wretchedness more deeply and ever more permanently. There is irony too in his speech in the sense that he thinks he has the power of diverting good into evil, but does not realize that the power solely lies in the hand of God. He foolishly denies the possibility of their evil works being diverted into good, and so resolves to ever be damned, and chooses to be wretched. He is manipulating and exploiting the fallen miserable condition of the rebel angels, to stand with him so that they may regain Paradise again, but ironically he, rather in his manipulation, is actually welcoming his own and all others’ eternal doom of damnation. In the second speech he says:
“To do aught good never will be our task, But ever to do ill our sole delight,
If then his Providence
Out of our evil seek to bring forth good, Our labour must be to prevent that end, And out of good still to find means of evil;”
And then later in the fifth speech says he:
“For who can yet believe, though after loss,
That all these puissant legions, whose exile Hath emptied Heaven, shall fail to re-ascent, Self-raised, and re-possess their native seat?” Satan is very much crafty in uplifting enthusiasm in his followers, for he knows it so well that despair and doom overwhelms the spirit, and that in trying to overcome it, they may become more violent than they usually are. This serves the purpose of Satan so well, and so he describes the land in crafty language so that it appears gloomy and disastrous. It is evident that disaster either makes spirit dull or enthusiastic, and Satan by his power of language chooses to portray the landscape in a more negative light while aiming at the revival of enthusiasm in his followers. Thus he speaks: “Seest thou you dreary plain, forlorn and wild, The seat of desolation, void of light, Save what the glimmering of these vivid flames
Casts pale and dreadful?” (Second speech)
He indeed is the harbinger of light among his desolate followers, but of such a light that makes them all the more violent, destroying everything that they may consider dark.
Q. 8. To whom does Milton pray for inspiration in Book I and why?
Ans. Milton opens Paradise Lost by formally declaring his poem’s subject: humankind’s first act of disobedience toward God, and the consequences that followed from it. The act Adam and Eve’s eating of the forbidden fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, as told in Genesis, the first book of the Bible. In the first line, Milton refers to the outcome of Adam and Eve’s sin as the “fruit” of the forbidden tree, punning on the actual apple and the figurative fruits of their actions. Milton asserts that this original sin brought death to human beings for the first time, causing us to lose our home in paradise until Jesus comes to restore humankind to its former position of purity.
Milton’s speaker invokes the muse, a mystical source of poetic inspiration, to sing about these subjects through him, but he makes it clear that he refers to a different muse from the muses who traditionally inspired classical poets by specifying that his muse inspired Moses to receive the Ten Commandments and write Genesis. Milton’s muse is the Holy Spirit, which inspired the Christian Bible, not one of the nine classical muses who reside on Mount Helicon, the “Aonian mount” of 1.15. He says that his poem, like his muse, will fly above those of the Classical poets and accomplish things never attempted before, because his source of inspiration is greater than theirs. Then he invokes the Holy Spirit, asking it to fill him with knowledge of the beginning of the world, because the Holy Spirit was the active force in creating the universe.
Milton’s speaker announces that he wants to be inspired with this sacred knowledge because he wants to show his fellow man that the fall of humankind into sin and death was part of God’s greater plan, and that God’s plan is justified.
Q. 9. Give a brife description of Hell after Milton.
Ans. In “Book I” of Paradise Lost Milton gives us some very memorable images of hell; many of them allude to the Bible, and others from his own mind. Here are some of them:
“bottomless perdition” (I. 47)
“fiery gulf” (I. 52)
“A dungeon horrible” (I. 61)
“one great furnace flamed, yet from those flames / No light (I. 62-63) My favorite.
“Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace / And rest can never dwell, hope never comes / That come to all” (I. 65-67)
These are incredible images of Milton’s hell. The first one alone is astonishing. In the two words “bottomless perdition” Milton gives us a sense of the magnitude of the punishment; it is eternal; thisidea is accomplished via the word “bottomless.” How does one escape a bottomless anything let alone a “perdition?” The other that is quite mind-boggling is “flames” that cast “No light.” This paradox certainly further enhances the “bottomless perdition” idea, doesn’t it? The image reveals just how hopeless it is in hell, for light represents hope; Milton confirms this lost of hope when he says Hell is a place where peace ,And rest can never dwell, hope never comes That comes to all (I. 66-67).
Q. 10. Comment on Milton’s treatment of the fallen angels as heathen gods.
Ans. The first Book of John Milton’s magnum opus, Paradise Lost, initiates the story of “Man’s First Disobedience” in niedias res, and one comes across the fallen angel Lucifer, and his vanquished comrades-in-arms, incarcerated on the lake of fire in Hell. Milton provides a catalogue of the most powerful fallen angels in keeping with the epic tradition, and proleptically proclaims them to be the deities of three future pagan religions, namely the Semitic, Egyptian and Greek. Christianity has a long history of the diabolization of the pagan gods, and Milton may have been simply following that very tradition, but his treatment of these apostate angels turned pagan gods whispers of a multitude of sociological, cultural and religious traditions that were venerated for a long time indeed in the pre-Christian days.
Milton’s tone is proleptic as he asserts that the fallen angels would get “new names”, and turn into “Gods ador’d Among the Nations round”. The introductions of these erstwhile “many throned Powers” are coloured with their future reputation. Milton actually describes the Egyptian pantheon as “Names of Old Renown.” The past tense is continually used to speak of the future.
Milton speaks of the pagan gods as “wand’ring” and “roaming to seek their prey on earth”. This vacillating connotation attached with pagan deities appears to differentiate them clearly from the high and immovable seat of Jehovah. Yet, this may have been an unconscious nod to the overlapping identities of all these deities. The word “Baal” could refer to any of the vast multitudes of tribal Semitic gods(10); hence, he is synonymous with Tammuz, who in turn, becomes Adonis in Greek myth . Biblical references speak of Baal-Peor, who might have been identical with Chemos. A Semitic manifestation of Chemos was ChemiosMalik, which forges a relation between Moloch and Chemos . A Byzantine record says that Dagon was Kronos in Phoenicia . Also Astarte or Ishtar was equated with Venus. Isis and Demeter have been regarded as avatars of the same CornMother. The struggle between Osiris and Seth has been interpreted as the one between Jove and Typhon . Hence, all of these pagan gods seem to be united in essence as parts of a singular, colossal faith of nature worship.
Q. 11. What does Milton say about Moloch in Book -1.
Ans. The first Book of John Milton’s magnum opus, Paradise Lost, initiates the story of “Man’s First Disobedience” in medias res, and one comes across the fallen angel Lucifer, and his vanquished comrades-in-arms, incarcerated on. the lake of fire in Hell. Milton provides a catalogue of the most powerful fallen angels in keeping with the epic tradition, and proleptically proclaims them to be the deities of three future pagan religions, namely the Semitic, Egyptian and Greek. Christianity has a long history of the diabolization of the pagan gods, and Milton may have been simply following that very tradition, but his treatment of these apostate angels turned pagan gods whispers of a multitude of sociological, cultural and religious traditions that were venerated for a long time indeed in the pre-Christian days.
Milton’s tone is proleptic as he asserts that the fallen angels would get “new names”, and turn into “Gods ador’d Among the Nations round”. The introductions of these erstwhile “many throned Powers” are coloured with their future reputation. Milton actually describes the Egyptian pantheon as “Names of Old Renown.” The past tense is continually used to speak of the future.
Moloch leads the catalogue; he was an ancient Ammonite god, worshipped w the Canaanites, Phoenicians, and related cultures of the Levant. In the valley of Gehenna adjacent to Jerusalem, apostate Israelites practiced propitiaTory child sacrifice to him, by burning their children alive. Hence, he is “besmeared with the blood of human sacrifice, and parents’ tears.”Milton’s claim, that loud noise of “drums and timbrels” was used to drown the wails of the victims, is corroborated by Plutarch in his De Superstitiones.
Q. 12. What does Milton say about Chemos in Book -1.
Ans. The first Book of John Milton’s magnum opus, Paradise Lost, initiates the story of “Man’s First Disobedience” in medias res, and one comes across the fallen angel Lucifer, and his vanquished comrades-in-arms, incarcerated on the lake of fire in Hell. Milton provides a catalogue of the most powerful fallen angels in keeping with the epic tradition, and proleptically proclaims them to be the deities of three future pagan religions, namely the Semitic, Egyptian and Greek. Christianity has a long history of the diabolization of the pagan gods, and Milton may have been simply following that very tradition, but his treatment of these apostate angels turned pagan gods whispers of a multitude of sociological, cultural and religious traditions that were venerated for a long time indeed in the pre-Christian days.
Milton’s tone is proleptic as he asserts that the fallen angels would get “new names”, and turn into “Gods ador’d Among the Nations round”. The introductions of these erstwhile “many throned Powers” are coloured with their future reputation. Milton actually describes the Egyptian pantheon as “Names of Old Renown.” The past tense is continually used to speak of the future.
Chemos was a god of the Moabites. His presence in the Old Testament world was well known, as his cult was imported to Jerusalem by King Solomon. King Josiah destroyed the Israelite branch of the cult 21. Milton relates the Biblical episode of the Israelites involving in fornications with the women of Moab, after their defeat of the Moabites on the journey to the Promised Land. Hence Chemos, the “obscene dread of Moab’s sons”, becomes an agent of seduction, and the centre of “lustful orgies”.
Q. 13. What does Milton say about Baalim and Ashtaroth in Book -1.
Ans. The first Book of John Milton’s magniin opus, Paradise Lost, initiates the story of “Man’s First Disobedience” in medias res, and one comes across the fallen angel Lucifer, and his vanquished comrades-in-arms, incarcerated on the lake of fire in Hell. Milton provides a catalogue of the most powerful fallen angels in keeping with the epic tradition, and proleptically proclaims them to be the deities of three future pagan religions, namely the Semitic, Egyptian and Greek. Christianity has a long history of the diabolization of the pagan gods, and Milton may have been simply following that very tradition, but his treatment of these apostate angels turned pagan gods whispers of a multitude of sociological, cultural and religious traditions that were venerated for a long time indeed in the pre-Christian days.
Milton’s tone is proleptic as he asserts that the fallen angels would get “new names”, and turn into “Gods ador’d Among the Nations round”. The introductions of these erstwhile “many throned Powers” are coloured with their future reputation. Milton actually describes the Egyptian pantheon as “Names Renown.” The past tense is continually used to speak of the future, Chemos is followed by a multitude of “Baalim and Ashtaroth” – One finds Yin the Tanakh the plural forms ‘Baalim’ or ‘Lords’ and ‘Ashtaroth’ or ‘Astartes’. A theory holds that the people of each territory or in each wandering clan worshipped their own Baal, as the chief deity of each, the god of fertility. Joined with the Baals, there would be corresponding female figures which might be called Astartes, embodiments of Astarte. Post-Exilic allusions to the cult of Baal-Peor suggest that orgies prevailed. Human sacrifice, the burning of incense, violent and ecstatic exercises, and ceremonial acts of bowing and kissing appear among the offences denounced by the post-Exilic prophets; and show that the cult of Baal (and Astarte) included characteristic features of worship which recur in various parts of the Semitic (and non-Semitic) world, although attached to other names.
Q. 14. What does Milton say about Astarte and Thammuz in in Book .
Ans. The first Book of John Milton’s magnum opus, Paradise Lost, initiates the story of “Man’s First Disobedience” in medias res, and one comes across the fallen angel Lucifer, and his vanquished comrades-in-arms, incarcerated on the lake of fire in Hell. Milton provides a catalogue of the most powerful fallen angels in keeping with the epic tradition, and proleptically proclaims them to be the deities of three future pagan religions, namely the Semitic, Egyptian and Greek. Christianity has a long history of the diabolization of the pagan gods, and Milton may have been simply following that very tradition, but his treatment of these apostate angels turned pagan gods whispers of a multitude of sociological, cultural and religious traditions that were venerated for a long time indeed in the pre-Christian days.
Milton’s tone is proleptic as he asserts that the fallen angels would get “new. names”, and turn into “Gods ador’d Among the Nations round”. The introductions of these erstwhile “many throned Powers” are coloured with their future reputation. Milton actually describes the Egyptian pantheon as “Names of Old Renown.” The past tense is continually used to speak of the future.
Milton goes on to speak of Astarte and Thammuz in close succession, who serve as an exemplification of the many “Baalim and Ashtaroth”. Astarte is one of the oldest goddesses in recorded history. She has been known as the ‘Queen of Stars’, ‘Morning Star of Heaven’, and ‘Venus in the Morning’. Astarte has been associated with goddesses such as Artemis, Aphrodite and Inanna, and indeed, these goddesses could represent Astarte under a different name. Her name is also synonymous with the Goddesses Ishtar and Ashart 15). The worship of Adonis was practised by the Semitic peoples of Babylonia and Syria, and the Greeks borrowed it from them as early as the seventh century before of Old -1.
Christ. The true name of the deity was Tammuz: the appellation of Adonis is merely the Semitic Adon, “lord,” a title of honour by which his worshippers addressed him. In the religious literature of Babylonia, Tammuz appears as the youthful spouse or lover of Ishtar, the great mother goddess, the embodiment of the reproductive energies of nature. Every year, Tammuz was believed to die, passing away from the cheerful earth to the gloomy subterranean world, and his divine mistress journeyed in quest of him to the underworld. During her absence, the passion of love ceased to operate: men and beasts alike forgot to reproduce their kinds: all life was threatened with extinction. So intimately bound up with the goddess were the sexual functions of the whole animal kingdom that without her presence they could not be dischargedlo). Every year, the death of Thammuz/Adonis was lamented by “Sion’s daughters”, and Milton’s succinct description is faithful to history. But the “Love tale” is deemed immoral, as it kindled “wanton passions” in their hearts; the rites of Astarte had a licentious character as well, and thus, these divine lovers were deemed insidious by Milton, so to say, Christianity.
Q. 15. What does Milton say about Dagon in Book -1.
Ans. The first Book of John Milton’s magnum opus, Paradise Lost, initiates the story of “Man’s First Disobedience” in medias res, and one comes across the fallen angel Lucifer, and his vanquished comrades-in-arms, incarcerated on the lake of fire in Hell. Milton provides a catalogue of the most powerful fallen angels in keeping with the epic tradition, and proleptically proclaims them to be the deities of three future pagan religions, namely the Semític, Egyptian and Greek. Christianity has a long history of the diabolization of the pagan gods, and Milton may have been simply following that very tradition, but his treatment of these apostate angels turned pagan gods whispers of a multitude of sociological, cultural and religious traditions that were venerated for a long time indeed in the pre-Christian days.
Milton’s tone is proleptic as he asserts that the fallen angels would get “new names”, and turn into “Gods ador’d Among the Nations round”. The introductions of these erstwhile “many throned Powers” are coloured with their future reputation. Milton actually describes the Egyptian pantheon as “Names of Old Renown.” The past tense is continually used to speak of the future.
Dagon was originally an east-Semitic, fertility god who evolved into a major Northwest Semitic god, reportedly of grain (as symbol of fertility) and fish and/or fishing (as symbol of multiplying). He was worshipped by the early Amorites and by the inhabitants of the cities of Ebla and Ugarit. He was also, perhaps, chief of the pantheon of the Philistines. The account in 1 Samuel 5.2–7 relates how the Ark of Covenant, captured to Dagon’s temple in Ashdad, led to the amputation of his image. Milton mentions this episode, and loads the epithet “Sea Monster” on Dagon because of his fish-tail, which is now believed to have been a phallic symbol .
Q. 16. Briefly bring out the humam elements in Satan’s character.
Ans. By fictionalizing a Biblical figure, Milton gives Satan an ethos that, due to Milton?s particular techniques, is sympathetic . Creating a text that fictionalizes Satan, the Son of God, and God waschallenging for Milton because divinity is thought not to be conceived entirely by the humanmind as presented by the Anglican Church and other theological officials and devout followers.Milton’s mission in his epics is heretical and sinful through the eyes of Judeo-Christian believersbecause it attempts to validate evil action. Counteracting the assumption of the Church, Miltontransforms his characters, predominantly that of Satan, into heroic and sympathetic figures thatare at the same time separate from and a part of mankind. As Milton states in the opening of Paradise Lost, his mission is to “justify the ways of God to men” so that the reader of his poems can comprehend morality and Christian duty through two of the most prominent happenings inexistence, specifically the fall of man and the temptations of Jesus.After experiencing the worst punishment by being cast into hell, Satan does not feeldefeated or depressed. On the contrary, he speaks inspirationally and evokes his legion to notgive up their ambition.As Satan states at the onset of Book 1 of Paradise Lost , All is not lost – the unconquerable will, And study of revenge, immortal hate, And courage never to submit or yield: And what is else not to be overcome? (106-109)
Satan’s rebelliousness, his seeking of transcendence, his capacity for action, makes him attractiveand endears him to readers. Milton’s fictionalization of Satan “has freedom without self-discipline, dynamic energy and driving individualism with no recognition of limits” (Hill 367).
Satan is unhindered and not even slightly slowed down by his failure as he continues toencourage others to overcome obstacles and not submit to their feelings of loss anddisappointment. By constructing Satan in this way, Milton highlights the admirable qualities of the character and exaggerates unfavorable qualities by emphasizing different aspects in eachpoem. The Satan of Milton’s Paradise Lost is presented as a tragic hero whom readers can revere and admire.
Q. 17. Describe, after Milton, Satan’s thoughts as he surveys the army of fallen angels.
Ans. Immediately after the prologue, Milton raises the question of how Adam and Eve’s disobedience occurred and explains that their actions were partly due to a serpent’s deception. This serpent is Satan, and the poem joins him and his followers in Hell, where they have just been cast after being defeated by God in Heaven.
Satan lies stunned beside his second-in-command, Beelzebub, in a lake of fire that gives off darkness instead of light. Breaking the awful silence, Satan bemoans their terrible position, but does not repent of his rebellion against God, suggesting that they might gather their forces for another attack. Beelzebub is doubtful; he now believes that God cannot be overpowered. Satan does not fully contradict this assessment, but suggests that they could at least pervert God’s good works to evil purposes. The two devils then rise up and, spreading their wings, fly over to the dry land next to the flaming lake. But they can undertake this action only because God has allowed them to loose their chains. All of the devils were formerly angels who chose to follow Satan in his rebellion, and God still intends to turn their evil deeds toward the good.
Q. 18. Comment on the conversation between Satan and Belzeebub.
Ans. Satan’s defiance and his desire for revenge overcome his pain. At first he seems dismayed as he addresses Beelzebub, once like him among the brightest angels and now “O how fallen!” But as soon as he speaks of God, “He with his thunder,” Satan’s rage overtakes his sympathy. He will not repent or change. “All is not lost” while he has his “unconquerable will / And courage never to submit or yield.” He will continue the war, either by force or by guile. Because we know the story of Adam and Eve and how Satan will corrupt them, “guile” is like a wink at a knowing audience. You may think that Beelzebub takes a more realistic view of the fallen angels’ terrible situation because he thinks further rebellion is futile. He regrets what has happened. The fallen angels may feel their strength undiminished, but perhaps God has left them that strength only so that they can work as slaves in Hell and has allowed them their immortality so that they can feel acutely their eternal punishment.
Satan is a good leader who knows when his subordinates need to be jerked out of what looks like self-pity. “To be weak is miserable” he declares, as he sets out a program of action: everything that God does must be opposed, even if God tries to bring good out of evil:
To do aught good never will be our task, But ever to do ill our sole delight.
Then he draws Beelzebub’s attention to the fact that God has recalled his forces and left the fallen angels to suffer in Hell. Things now seem calm enough for them to leave the lake and hold a meeting of their troops on a “dreary plain,” to plot their revenge strategy.
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