Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7czq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T06:03:39.079Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Beyond Sacrifice: Milton and the Atonement

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 October 2020

Gregory Chaplin
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In Paradise Lost, Milton imagines a cosmos at odds with orthodox theology, making a heretical departure that parallels his reluctance to dwell on the Crucifixion and his Arian Christology. Belief in a plurality of worlds threatens the integrity of the Trinity: it exalts the omnipotence of the creator, while it limits the significance of the redeemer. In effect, it produces a tension best resolved by Milton's position that the Father and the Son are two distinct beings—the former uncreated, infinite, and immutable and the latter created, finite, and changeable. This distinction enables Milton to fashion a theory of salvation that transforms Christ's sacrifice from a singular, traumatic event to an ethical decision that other created beings can emulate. These heterodox views constitute the theological underpinnings of his radical republicanism, which embraces an idea of human dignity and agency antithetical to the tyrannical politics of torture and blood sacrifice.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 125 , Issue 2 , March 2010 , pp. 354 - 369
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Works Cited

Bauman, Michael. “Heresy in Paradise and the Ghost of Readers Past.” College Language Association Journal 30.1 (1986): 59–68. Print.Google Scholar
Bauman, Michael. Milton's Arianism. Frankfurt: Lang, 1987. Print.Google Scholar
The Bible: Authorized King James Version with Apocrypha. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1997. Print.Google Scholar
Campbell, Gordon, et al. Milton and the Manuscript of De doctrina Christiana. New York: Oxford UP, 2007. Print.Google Scholar
Cicero. De senectute, De amicitia, De divinatione. Trans. W. A. Falconer. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1923. Print. Loeb Classical Lib.10.4159/DLCL.marcus_tullius_cicero-de_senectute.1923CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Danielson, Dennis. Milton's Good God: A Study in Literary Theodicy. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1982. Print.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Danielson, Dennis. “Through the Telescope of Typology: What Adam Should Have Done.” Milton Quarterly 23.3 (1989): 121–27. Print.Google Scholar
Dick, Steven J. Plurality of Worlds: The Extraterrestrial Life Debate from Democritus to Kant. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1984. Print.Google Scholar
Elyot, Thomas. The Boke Named the Governour. Ed. Rude, Donald W. New York: Garland, 1992. Print.Google Scholar
Empson, William. Donne and the New Philosophy. Ed. Haffenden, John. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1993. Print. Vol. 1 of Essays on Renaissance Literature.Google Scholar
Empson, William. Milton's God. Rev. ed. London: Chatto, 1965. Print.Google Scholar
Fallon, Stephen M. Milton's Peculiar Grace: Self-Representation and Authority. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 2007. Print.Google Scholar
Fish, Stanley. Surprised by Sin: The Reader in Paradise Lost. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1997. Print.10.1007/978-1-349-26056-0CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fowler, Alastair, ed. Paradise Lost. By John Milton. 2nd ed. London: Longman, 1997. Print.Google Scholar
Gregg, Robert C., and Groh, Dennis E. Early Arianism: A View of Salvation. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1981. Print.Google Scholar
Grotius, Hugo. Defensio fidei Catholicae de satisfactione Christi adversus Faustum Socinum Senensem. Trans. Mulder, Hotze. Ed. Rabbie, Edwin. Assen: Van Gorcum, 1990. Print. Vol. 1 of Opera theologia.Google Scholar
Hanford, J. H. A Milton Handbook. 4th ed. New York: Appleton, 1946. Print.Google Scholar
Hardie, Philip, ed. Aeneid: Book IX. By Vi rgil. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1994. Print.Google Scholar
Herbert, George. The Works of George Herbert. Ed. Hutchinson, F. E. Corrected ed. Oxford: Clarendon, 1945. Print.Google Scholar
Hill, Christopher. Milton and the English Revolution. New York: Viking, 1978. Print.Google Scholar
Hunter, William B. “The Provenance of the Christian Doctrine.” SEL 32.1 (1992): 129–42. Print.Google Scholar
Hunter, William B. Visitation Unimplor'd: Milton and the Authorship of De doctrina Christiana. Pittsburgh: Duquesne UP, 1998. Print.Google Scholar
Huttar, Charles A. “The Passion of Christ in Paradise Regained.” English Language Notes 19.3 (1982): 236–60. Print.Google Scholar
Kelley, Maurice. Introduction. Milton, Complete Prose Works 6:3–10.Google Scholar
Kelley, Maurice. This Great Argument: A Study of Milton's De doctrina Christiana as a Gloss upon Paradise Lost. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1941. Print.Google Scholar
Kerrigan, William. “The Heretical Milton: From Assumption to Mortalism.” English Literary Renaissance 5.1 (1975): 125–66. Print.Google Scholar
Leonard, John. Naming in Paradise: Milton and the Language of Adam and Eve. Oxford: Clarendon, 1990. Print.Google Scholar
Leonard, John, ed. Paradise Lost. New York: Penguin, 2000. Print.Google Scholar
Lewalski, Barbara Kiefer. Paradise Lost and the Rhetoric of Literary Forms. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1985. Print.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewis, C. S. A Preface to Paradise Lost. London: Oxford UP, 1942. Print.Google Scholar
Lieb, Michael. Theological Milton: Deity, Discourse, and Heresy in the Miltonic Canon. Pittsburgh: Duquesne UP, 2006. Print.Google Scholar
Marjara, Harinder Singh. Contemplation of Created Things: Science in Paradise Lost. Toronto: U of Toronto P, 1992. Print.Google Scholar
McColley, Grant. “The Seventeenth-Century Doctrine of a Plurality of Worlds.” Annals of Science 1 (1936): 385–430.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Melanchthon, Philip. Initia doctrinae physicae. 1549. Wittenberg, 1550. Print.Google Scholar
Milton, John. Areopagitica. Milton, Complete Prose Works 2:486–570.Google Scholar
Milton, John. Complete Poems and Major Prose. Ed. Hughes, Merritt Y. New York: Odyssey, 1957. Print.Google Scholar
Milton, John. The Complete Prose Works of John Milton. Ed. Wolfe, Don M. et al. New Haven: Yale UP, 1953–82. Print. 8 vols.Google Scholar
Milton, John. De doctrina Christiana. Milton, Complete Prose Works 6:117–807.Google Scholar
Milton, John. Defensio pro Populo Anglicano. Milton, Complete Prose Works 4:301–537.Google Scholar
Milton, John. The Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce. Milton, Complete Prose Works 2:222–356.Google Scholar
Milton, John. Lycidas. Milton, Complete Poems 120–25.Google Scholar
Milton, John. Mansus. Milton, Complete Poems 127–30.Google Scholar
Milton, John. Of Reformation. Milton, Complete Prose Works 1:519–617.Google Scholar
Milton, John. Of True Religion. Milton, Complete Prose Works 8:417–40.Google Scholar
Milton, John. “On the Morning of Christ's Nativity.” Milton, Complete Poems 43–50.Google Scholar
Milton, John. Paradise Lost. Milton, Complete Poems 211–469.Google Scholar
Milton, John. Paradise Regained. Milton, Complete Poems 483–530.Google Scholar
Milton, John. “The Passion.” Milton, Complete Poems 61–63.Google Scholar
Milton, John. The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates. Milton, Complete Prose Works 3:190–258.Google Scholar
Milton, John. Tetrachordon. Milton, Complete Prose Works 2:578–718.Google Scholar
Paine, Thomas. The Age of Reason, Part I. Political Writings. Ed. Kuklick, Bruce. Rev. ed. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2000. 265–317. Print.Google Scholar
Pico della Mirandola, Giovanni. Oration on the Dignity of Man. Trans. Elizabeth Livermore Forbes. The Renaissance Philosophy of Man. Ed. Cassirer, Ernst, Kristeller, Paul Oskar, and Randall, John Herman Jr. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1948. 223–54. Print.Google Scholar
Rogers, John. The Matter of Revolution: Science, Poetry, and Politics in the Age of Milton. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1996. Print.Google Scholar
Rogers, John. “Milton's Circumcision.” Milton and the Grounds of Contention. Ed. Kelley, Mark R., Lieb, Michael, and Shawcross, John T. Pittsburgh: Duquesne UP, 2003. 188–213. Print.Google Scholar
Rumrich, John P. Matter of Glory: A New Preface to Paradise Lost. Pittsburgh: U of Pittsburgh P, 1987. Print.Google Scholar
Rumrich, John P. “Milton's Arianism: Why It Matters.” Milton and Heresy. Ed. Dobranski, Stephen B. and Rumrich, John P. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1998. 75–92. Print.10.1017/CBO9780511549335.005CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rumrich, John P. “Milton's God and the Matter of Chaos.” PMLA 110.5 (1995): 1035–46. Print.Google Scholar
Schoenfeldt, Michael. “‘That Spectacle of Too Much Weight’: The Poetics of Sacrifice in Donne, Herbert, and Milton.” Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies 31.3 (2001): 561–84. Print.Google Scholar
Shuger, Debora Kuller. The Renaissance Bible: Scholarship, Sacrifice, and Subjectivity. Berkeley: U of California P, 1994. Print.Google Scholar
Strier, Richard. “Milton against Humility.” Religion and Culture in Renaissance England. Ed. McEachern, Claire and Shuger, Debora. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1997. 258–86. Print.Google Scholar
Virgil. Virgil II: Aeneid 7–12, Appendix Vergiliana. Rev. ed. Trans. H. R. Fairclough and G. P. Goold. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 2000. Print. Loeb Classical Lib.Google Scholar