[Milton-L] Justify God?

[Tony Demarest]

I would like to know what are the degrees of "stereotyped"- seems to me one is either stereotyped or not, not "very," or "somewhat,"- and nomenclature is a reflection of learning as well as preference- the word, "poorly," however is a reflection of the writer- a poor word indeed. 

Tony   
----------------------------------------
> From: rastrier at uchicago.edu
> Subject: Re: [Milton-L] Justify God?
> To: milton-l at lists.richmond.edu
> Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2008 14:29:56 -0500
> 
> I'm afraid that I think that Carol Barton has a very stereotyped and poorly 
> informed (and supersessionist) view of what Christians call the "Old Testament," 
> but should be called the Hebrew bible.
> 
> ---- Original message ----
>>Date: Wed, 08 Oct 2008 09:10:27 -0700
>>From: "Peter C. Herman"   
>>Subject: Re: [Milton-L] Justify God?  
>>To: John Milton Discussion List 
>>
>>   At 07:52 AM 10/8/2008, you wrote:
>>
>>     Jeffery Hodges asks:
>>      
>>     As everyone knows, Milton gives this reason for
>>     composing Paradise Lost:
>>      
>>
>>             That to the highth of this great Argument
>>             I may assert Eternal Providence,
>>             And justifie the wayes of God to men. [PL
>>             1.24-26]
>>              
>>             (Luxon, Thomas H., ed. The Milton Reading
>>             Room, http://www.dartmouth.edu/~milton,
>>             October, 2008.)
>>              
>>
>>     For one reason, Jeffery, because, as Empson would
>>     much later, people then were questioning why a
>>     just and benevolent God would have made Lucifer
>>     and the reprobate angels and Adam and Eve
>>     susceptible of falling in the first place--in
>>     Empson's terminology, why God was in effect
>>     "playing with a stacked deck"? Theological issues
>>     were to the 1640s what politics and the economy
>>     are to today's world--topics of vital importance,
>>     over which people tortured and maimed and burned
>>     one another at the stake.
>>
>>   I have to quibble with Carol Barton's statement
>>   above. Theological issues in the 1640s (and earlier)
>>   were not like politics, they were politics. To
>>   paraphrase Clauswitz, religion was politics by other
>>   means, and politics was religion by other means.
>>   Thus King James VI/I could say,"No bishop, no king,"
>>   and he was right. Attacking church hierarchy was the
>>   same as attacking political hierarchy.
>>
>>   Milton's assertion that he intends to "justifie the
>>   wayes of God to men" also needs to be seen in the
>>   context of the Revolution's collapse, which Milton
>>   and many others previously regarded as enjoying
>>   divine approval.
>>
>>   One further point. Prof. Gardner is of course right
>>   to bring up Dennis Danielson's work, but as Prof.
>>   Hodges (and others on this list) know, there have
>>   been challenges to Danielson's sense that Milton
>>   conducts an entirely successful theodicy in PL. See
>>   for example Michael Bryson's work.
>>
>>   Peter C. Herman
>>
>>     The Yahweh of the Old Testament was a very harsh,
>>     very unforgiving deity, who (like his Greco-Roman
>>     predecessors) often seemed to behave in arbitrary
>>     ways . . . which didn't square at all with the New
>>     Testament's perception of a benevolent and
>>     merciful Logos. Milton could not accept the notion
>>     of God's culpability in human frailty or
>>     sinfulness . . . so on one level, the purpose of
>>     PL is to debunk such concepts.
>>      
>>     Hope that quick, superficial response is helpful.
>>     The full answer is a much deeper one, of course,
>>     and a subject large enough for a full doctoral
>>     dissertation. (Believe me . . . I know!)
>>      
>>     Best to all,
>>      
>>     Carol Barton
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> Richard Strier
> Department of English
> University of Chicago
> 1115 East 58th Street
> Chicago, IL 60637
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