[Milton-L] Knowledge, free will, etc.

[Margaret Thickstun]

Jeffrey--thank you for the thoughtful post in response to Michael 
Grattan's questions.  In response to yours, below, I think this might 
have been a question Milton was asking--he certainly emends and modifies 
the Genesis story as much as the bare bones of the narrative will 
allow.  But, ultimately, the Genesis story requires both expulsion and 
death, and, in real life, humans do die.  A person who believes the 
Scripture must be true in some way and is explaining reality can not 
completely rewrite the story. 

So your question seems more a question about theodicy than a question 
about Milton.--Margie

Horace Jeffery Hodges wrote:
>
> The question that arises -- for me anyway -- is this: why could God 
> not have created free beings whose choice of disobedience did not cut 
> them off from the source of life, but rather resulted in a lesser 
> punishment, e.g., expulsion from the Garden. On this point, I don't 
> know enough about Milton. Perhaps he thought that a fateful choice was 
> necessary for a truly free individual, namely, that to be radically 
> free, an individual must be able to utterly reject God, damn the 
> consequences.
>  
> What do others think?
>  
> Jeffery Hodges
>
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-- 

Margaret Olofson Thickstun

Elizabeth J. McCormack Professor of English

Hamilton College

198 College Hill Road

Clinton, NY 13323

(315) 859-4466

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