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The “Paradise Lost” and Today’s Society

In Paradise Lost, John Milton centers his discussion on the story of Adam and Eve and also Satan throughout the whole book. The book focuses primarily on the origin of sin as well as its outcome to the human nature. Milton’s story is the same as the one found in the first pages Genesis in the Bible, and he tends to have expanded it into a long, and comprehensive narrative poem. His thorough retelling of Genesis seems to have transformed the old characters present in the Bible into some epic heroes and thereby reviving the Christian tradition for the groups of readers (John, p.25). In the first lines of his work, Milton presents the theme as being “disobedience to God” and the repercussion of sin.

Though this is one of the prevalent themes that the author presents in the book, it is thus imperative for the readers to be open-minded and, also to look at this book with different viewpoints. While many readers may view Paradise Lost as a work regarding sin, the outcome of sin and disobedience to God, the book portrays to readers how it is easy for individuals to fall into sin. It also shows how simple it is to allow evil to take over human beings and the primary teaching being the importance of obedience. Though Milton’s book exists as a narration of how humans’ disobedience led to their expulsion from the Garden of Eden and the origin of sin and evil, there exist several other themes that are still applicable even in the today’s society in various ways.

Human beings are prone to sin, and this belief has lasted for quite some time. They tend to be easily persuaded by small things which typically makes them forget the good things at the end. This is evident From the Paradise Lost whereby disobedience and ignorance seem to be the root cause of conflict between man and God. It is clear that if Adam and Eve had obeyed God, by following his commandment of not consuming the forbidden fruit, the evil acts we experience in the society and the sinful behaviors that are prevalent could never be heard.

In the book, the theme of obedience is substantial such that the author generates two discrete paths that the reader can incline to, and then decide which would fit best. It presents the idea of whether it is better to disobey, or is it right to defy and then wait for the great things to come, just like the way Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit and were waiting to become wise as God (Fowler, p.32). There exist other fundamental themes in Milton’s Paradise Lost that are still evident today and resonates with the current readers even after some three hundred years ago.

These essential themes comprise of revenge, insurgency and also the temptation to doing wrong. All these themes relate to the principle of human nature that typically never changes, and this makes Milton’s articulations to be relevant to readers up to now. From the general perspective, it is clear that every individual has in his or her life at one occasion developed the urge of going against or contradicting with the high authority, for example, God, a parent or even the government. Both Satan, Adam and Eve are an excellent example of explaining this. Satan developed the urge to go against what God had planned by luring Adam and Eve to go against God. The Satan enticed Eve to eat the forbidden fruit by lying to her that the fruit will make her more wise and beautiful. Eve developed the urge and decided to go against the rules by believing in Satan. Another thing is that every individual must have felt angry over something or someone in life and thus developed the need to contemplate revenge against the enemy. This is the same with the case of Satan as in the Paradise Lost who had projected some revenge against God for being dejected. He, therefore, sought some revenge, and he decides to use it to harm the good relationship that existed between God and man.

Satan finally accomplished his revenge by making Adam and Eve sin and thus being thrown out of the Garden (Milton, p.42). The theme of revenge portrayed in “Paradise Lost,” is also evident in today’s society, for example, it can be related to the movie called “Vendetta.” The movie depicts this theme when an individual named “Vendetta” is put under a stressing test. Vendetta’s body is used as a test to fight a severe virus, and in the process, his body form is blemished as a result of a chemical fire in the lab. He, therefore, chooses to have some revenge on the government that was conducting these laboratory tests on individuals. He did this by corrupting the system that the government was using to hide the truth from its citizens. Finally, he accomplishes his revenge by making the citizens overthrow their government. This case is just the same as to what happened in the Garden of Eden.

Also, indeed the feeling of doing what is unlawful has engulfed like every individual in life for example from stealing petty things like cookies in the supermarket or contemplating to steal some considerable amount of money. The language that Milton applies in Paradise Lost may feel onerous and to be outdated to some contemporary readers (Herman, p.23). However, these themes present in the book remain by his excellent work and thus are what makes the book to be such a relevant story for all the generations.

John Milton has tried to provide a clear explanation context in his work in attempting to distinguish between what is right and wrong. The external battle between good and evil as well as to what transpires evil is evident in today’s society as it existed during the author’s time and in the Bible. This can take the form for example of two individuals arguing or as a complicated feud among the Nazis plus the Jews in the Holocaust. The battle seems to be amid God and Satan or directly between good and evil respectively. Therefore the point of right and evil exist as a recurring theme in today’s literature and life. As described above, Milton’s work, Paradise lost is still relevant in today’s society whereby the issues presented, are still applicable in many areas.

Works Cited

Fowler, Alastair. Milton: Paradise Lost. Routledge, 2014.

Herman, Peter. Destabilizing Milton:” Paradise Lost” and the poetics of incertitude. Springer, 2016.

John, Milton. Paradise Lost. Рипол Классик, 2017.

Milton, John. Paradise lost, Book IX. Vol. 20. Retrieved from www. parad iselo st. org/8-Searc h-All. html. Accessed, 2018.