Christian and Pagan Influence in Paradise Lost and Beowulf Essay

Christian and Pagan Influence in heaven Lost and Beowulf In enlightenment Lost, Milton is adept at drawing from both(prenominal) Christian and pagan sources and integrating them in such a counseling that they reinforce one an opposite (Abrams 1075). Of course it is a commonplace for critics to call up that Milton valued his Christian sources more highly than the pagan ones (Martindale 20) this is most plausibly due to the fact that he regarded the Christian sources as vessels of the truth. His classical allusions, on the other hand, served as references for things fallen or damned. Thus, as seen in the conjuring trick to Book 7 (Descend from heavn Urania, by that name / If rightly thou art called 7.1-2) wherein Milton places his muse Urania, the Greek muse of astronomy, in enlightenment and distinguishes her as Christian, Milton works to integrate the Christian and pagan throughout paradise Lost. Although a detailed account of the reasoning behind his form is beyond the sco pe of this essay, because a strict Classicist might envy the infringement of the scriptural models, and a strict Puritan might equally resent the degradation of the Word of God to the status of a source of precedents for literary composition (Lewis 5), perhaps Miltons choice of form was a political as well as a stylistic one. On the other hand, the reason could be as simple as Milton himself states in the trick to Book 1 Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme (1.16). In this one line, Milton borrows directly from Ariostos Orlando Furioso, thus acknowledging the epic tradition, yet similarly challenging that very tradition by promising his readers greatness and originality (Abrams 1476). promised land Lost, however, is not the first epic to integrate both Christian and tradi... ...ilik, J. T., ed. The Books of Enoch. Oxford Claredon, 1976. Milton, illusion. Paradise Lost. Elledge 3-304. Mollenkott, Virginia R. The Influence of the Apocrypha in Miltons Thought and Art. Mil ton and the Art of dedicated Song. Patrick and Sundell 23-43. Niles, John D. Pagan Survivals and Popular Belief. The Cambridge Companion to Old English Literature. Ed. Malcolm Godden and Michael Lapidge. Cambridge Cambridge UP, 1991. 126-41. Patrick, J. Max, and Roger H. Sundell, eds. Milton and the Art of Sacred Song. Madison U of Wisconsin P, 1979. Sandner, David. The Uncanny in Beowulf. Exploration 40.2 (1999) 162-70. Shawcross, John T. The mill of Paradise Lost One More Time. Patrick and Sundell 137-47. Steadman, John M. Miltons Biblical and Classical Imagery. Pittsburgh Duquesne UP, 1984.