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Milton's Dichotomy of “Judaism” and “Hebraism”

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 December 2020

Samuel S. Stollman
Samuel S. Stollman*
Affiliation:
University of Windsor, Windsor, Ontario, Canada
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Abstract

Milton scholars have long been aware of inconsistencies in Milton's views regarding the Old Testament and the Jews. He shows, concurrently, “powerful judaistic motifs” and “anti-judaistic motifs.” He advocated liberty of conscience but was silent during the debate on the Readmission of the Jews. Milton's views may have evolved or changed but he was doctrinally consistent. He dichotomized the Old Testament constellation of personae and concepts into “Judaic” motifs which he rejected and “Hebraic” motifs which he adopted. He took Paul's antithesis of the Law (the Flesh) and the Gospel (the Spirit) and applied it within the Hebrew Bible itself. The “Judaic” complex is that which is human, relevant to the Jews as a people inclined to servitude, and the “external” aspect of the Mosaic Law, also a form of bondage. The “Hebraic” complex is divine, universal, and the “internal” Scripture, equated with freedom and. ultimately, Christian Liberty. The “Hebraic” motif supplies a continuity for the Scriptures. The dichotomy accords with Milton's philosophy (Plato's and Aristotle's dualisms) and with his methodology of structural and imagistic contrasts. The dichotomy explains the presence of “judaistic” and “anti-judaistic” motifs as well as his “reluctance” to grant the Jews freedom of worship.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 89 , Issue 1 , January 1974 , pp. 105 - 112
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1974

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References

Note 1 in page 112 Heroic Knowledge (Minneapolis: Univ. of Minnesota Press, 1957), pp. 227–28, ii. 2.

Note 2 in page 112 Jerusalem and Albion (New York: Schocken, 1964), pp. 160–62, 167.

Note 3 in page 112 “Limits of Miltonic Toleration,” JEGP, 60 (1961), 846.

Note 4 in page 112 The Works of John Milton, ed. Frank A. Patterson et al. (New York: Columbia Univ. Press, 1931–42), xv, 405; hereafter cited as Qolumbia] E[dition].

Note 5 in page 112 All citations from the poetry are to John Milton: Complete Poetry and Major Prose, ed. Merritt Y. Hughes (New York: Odyssey, 1957).

Note 6 in page 112 An Apology, in Prose Works of John Milton, ed. Don M. Wolfe et al. (New Haven, Conn.: Yale Univ. Press, 1953-), i, 878; hereafter cited as Y[ale] E[dition].

Note 7 in page 112 Tetrachordon, YE, II, 652–53.

Note 8 in page 112 An Apology, YE, i, 933; Animadversions, YE, i, 690; Tetrachordon, YE, II, 664.

Note 9 in page 112 Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce, YE, ii, 315; Christian Doctrine, CE, xiv, 153; xv, 169; A Defence of the People of England, YE, iv, Pt. 1, 343.

Note 10 in page 112 Colasterion, YE, II, 745; Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce, YE, ii, 233, 283, 301, 307, 317; Tetrachordon, YE, ii, 639, 640, 668.

Note 11 in page 112 Of Prelatical Episcopacy, YE, i, 651; Animadversions, YE, i, 704; Reason of Church-Government, YE, i, 844, 861; Areopagitica, YE, ii, 553–55.

Note 12 in page 112 Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce, YE, II, 290.

Note 13 in page 112 Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce, YE, ii, 289. Wolfe regards Milton's silence as a disavowal of the traditional accusations of usury and deicide—“Miltonic Toleration,” p.842.

Note 14 in page 112 Observations on the Articles of Peace, YE, iii, 326.

Note 15 in page 112 See “Article vii,” in E. J. Bicknell, A Theological Introduction to the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England, ed. H. J. Carpenter, 3rd ed. rev. (London : Longmans, Green, 1955), p. 127.

Note 16 in page 112 Of Reformation, YE, I, 520; Reason of Church-Government, YE, i, 766.

Note 17 in page 112 Reason of Church-Government, YE, I, 829.

Note 18 in page 112 Reason of Church-Government, YE, I, 843; An Apology, YE, i, 932.

Note 19 in page 112 Means to Remove Hirelings, CE, vi, 63, 65.

Note 20 in page 112 Reason of Church-Government, YE, i, 770–71.

Note 21 in page 112 Christian Doctrine, CE, xvi, 133–37; 103–05; 113; Reason of Church-Government, YE, i, 763.

Note 22 in page 112 Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce, YE, ii, 332.

Note 23 in page 112 Reason of Church-Government, YE, i, 764; Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce, YE, ii, 332; Tetrachordon, YE, ii, 642, 651.

Note 24 in page 112 Milton and the Puritan Dilemma (Toronto: Univ. of Toronto Press, 1942), p. 169. See Milton's equation of the “moral law,” “the law of nature,” “the law of nations,” and “right reason,” in Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce, YE, ii, 292, 306.

Note 25 in page 112 Reason of Church-Government, YE, i, 764.

Note 26 in page 112 Reason of Church-Government, YE, i, 816.

Note 27 in page 112 O. Scheel, Luthers Stellung zur Heiligen Schrift (1902), p. 43; cited by Emil G. Kraeling, The Old Testament since the Reformation (London: Lutterworth Press, 1955), p. 16.

Note 28 in page 112 Tetrachordon, YE, ii, 587–88.

Note 29 in page 112 There are more than 200 references to “Jew,” “Jewish,” “Judaical,” etc. in Milton's prose. See the Index to the Columbia Edition. The “Hebrew” references are few: Tetrachordon, YE, ii, 671 ; Christian Doctrine, CE, xiv, 121, 335; xv, 313.

Note 30 in page 112 “Article vi,” Bicknell, p. 125.

Note 31 in page 112 Civil Power, CE, vi, 25; Tetrachordon, YE, ii, 587–88; Reason of Church-Government, YE, i, 766.

Note 32 in page 112 Christian Doctrine, CE, xvi, 273, 275; Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce, YE, ii, 340. The Jews do not acknowledge the Holy Spirit as “personality and divinity.” Christian Doctrine, CE, xiv, 389.

Note 33 in page 112 Civil Power, CE, vi, 25.

Note 34 in page 112 SP, 69 (July 1972), 334–47.

Note 35 in page 112 A paraphrase of Christian Doctrine, CE, xvi, 39.

Note 36 in page 112 See above, n. 9; also Commonplace Book, YE, I, 440; Tetrachordon, YE, ii, 642.

Note 37 in page 112 Perry Miller points out that both the Presbyterians and Independents indulged in “typological flights in establishing institutional continuity” with the Church of England while at the same time reforming it. “By the same token they stoutly adhered to Calvin's hostility to this dangerously subjective form of Biblical exegesis, typology”—The Complete Writings of Roger Williams (New York: Russell and Russell, 1963), vii, 14.

Note 38 in page 112 See Fisch's discussion of Milton's Covenant of Works in Jerusalem and Albion, pp. 93–114. See also my article, “Analogues and Sources for Milton's ‘Great TaskMaster,‘ ” Milton Quarterly, 6 (May 1972), 27–32.

Note 39 in page 112 “Introduction,” Milton (New York: Dell, 1964), pp. 10, 23.

Note 40 in page 112 Images and Themes in Five Poems by Milton (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ. Press, 1957), p. 6.

Note 41 in page 112 A. S. P. Woodhouse, “Introduction,” Puritanism and Liberty (London: J. M. Dent, 1938), p. 93.

Note 42 in page 112 Jerusalem and Albion, p. 111.

Note 43 in page 112 Reason of Church-Government, YE, I, 757.