''Paradise Regained'' is an

epic poem In poetry, an epic is a lengthy narrative poem typically about the extraordinary deeds of extraordinary characters who, in dealings with gods or other superhuman forces, gave shape to the mortal universe for their descendants. With regard to ...

by English poet

John Milton John Milton (9 December 1608 – 8 November 1674) was an English poet, polemicist, and civil servant. His 1667 epic poem ''Paradise Lost'' was written in blank verse and included 12 books, written in a time of immense religious flux and politic ...

, first published in 1671. The volume in which it appeared also contained the poet's

closet drama A closet drama is a play (theatre), play that is not intended to be performed onstage, but read by a solitary reader. The earliest use of the term recorded by the Oxford English Dictionary is in 1813. The literary historian Henry Augustin Beers, H ...

'' Samson Agonistes''. ''Paradise Regained'' is connected by name to his earlier and more famous

Paradise Lost ''Paradise Lost'' is an Epic poetry, epic poem in blank verse by the English poet John Milton (1608–1674). The poem concerns the Bible, biblical story of the fall of man: the temptation of Adam and Eve by the fallen angel Satan and their ex ...

'', with which it shares similar

theological Theology is the study of religious belief from a religious perspective, with a focus on the nature of divinity. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of an ...

themes; indeed, its title, its use of

blank verse Blank verse is poetry written with regular metre (poetry), metrical but rhyme, unrhymed lines, usually in iambic pentameter. It has been described as "probably the most common and influential form that English poetry has taken since the 16th cen ...

, and its progression through Christian history recall the earlier work. However, this effort deals primarily with the temptation of Christ as recounted in the

Gospel of Luke The Gospel of Luke is the third of the New Testament's four canonical Gospels. It tells of the origins, Nativity of Jesus, birth, Ministry of Jesus, ministry, Crucifixion of Jesus, death, Resurrection of Jesus, resurrection, and Ascension of ...

. Milton composed ''Paradise Regained'' at his cottage in

Chalfont St Giles Chalfont St Giles is a village and civil parish in southeast Buckinghamshire, England. It is in a group of villages called The Chalfonts, which also includes Chalfont St Peter and Little Chalfont. It lies on the edge of the Chiltern Hills, we ...

Buckinghamshire Buckinghamshire (, abbreviated ''Bucks'') is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England and one of the home counties. It is bordered by Northamptonshire to the north, Bedfordshire to the north-east, Hertfordshir ...

. ''Paradise Regained'' is four books long and comprises 2,065 lines; in contrast, ''Paradise Lost'' is twelve books long and comprises 10,565 lines. As such, Barbara K. Lewalski has labelled the work a "brief epic".

Plot

Book 1

Jesus Jesus (AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, and many Names and titles of Jesus in the New Testament, other names and titles, was a 1st-century Jewish preacher and religious leader. He is the Jesus in Chris ...

is baptized by

John the Baptist John the Baptist ( – ) was a Jewish preacher active in the area of the Jordan River in the early first century AD. He is also known as Saint John the Forerunner in Eastern Orthodoxy and Oriental Orthodoxy, John the Immerser in some Baptist ...

Satan Satan, also known as the Devil, is a devilish entity in Abrahamic religions who seduces humans into sin (or falsehood). In Judaism, Satan is seen as an agent subservient to God, typically regarded as a metaphor for the '' yetzer hara'', or ' ...

schemes with the demons against Jesus after witnessing the baptism. In

Heaven Heaven, or the Heavens, is a common Religious cosmology, religious cosmological or supernatural place where beings such as deity, deities, angels, souls, saints, or Veneration of the dead, venerated ancestors are said to originate, be throne, ...

God In monotheistic belief systems, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator, and principal object of faith. In polytheistic belief systems, a god is "a spirit or being believed to have created, or for controlling some part of the un ...

tells the angels of Satan's arrogance, and He is praised. Jesus then fasts in the

wilderness Wilderness or wildlands (usually in the plurale tantum, plural) are Earth, Earth's natural environments that have not been significantly modified by human impact on the environment, human activity, or any urbanization, nonurbanized land not u ...

for 40 days. Satan tempts Jesus with bread but is rebuked. Jesus allows Satan to linger with limitations, staying vigilant.

Night Night, or nighttime, is the period of darkness when the Sun is below the horizon. Sunlight illuminates one side of the Earth, leaving the other in darkness. The opposite of nighttime is daytime. Earth's rotation causes the appearance of ...

falls.

Book 2

Simon the Zealot and

Andrew the Apostle Andrew the Apostle ( ; ; ; ) was an apostle of Jesus. According to the New Testament, he was a fisherman and one of the Apostles in the New Testament, Twelve Apostles chosen by Jesus. The title First-Called () used by the Eastern Orthodox Chu ...

witness Jesus' baptism, recognizing Him as the

Messiah In Abrahamic religions, a messiah or messias (; , ; , ; ) is a saviour or liberator of a group of people. The concepts of '' mashiach'', messianism, and of a Messianic Age originated in Judaism, and in the Hebrew Bible, in which a ''mashiach ...

. They lose sight of Him, prompting a frantic search. Jesus' mother, Mother Mary, shares their concern, recalling a time when she lost Jesus at 12 years old. Satan tells his demons of the challenging temptation ahead, dismissing Belial's honey trapping suggestion due to his belief in

pride Pride is a human Emotion, secondary emotion characterized by a sense of satisfaction with one's Identity (philosophy), identity, performance, or accomplishments. It is often considered the opposite of shame or of humility and, depending on conte ...

's strength. Jesus dreams of

Elijah Elijah ( ) or Elias was a prophet and miracle worker who lived in the northern kingdom of Israel during the reign of King Ahab (9th century BC), according to the Books of Kings in the Hebrew Bible. In 1 Kings 18, Elijah defended the worsh ...

fed by ravens, then resists temptations of Satan: a

banquet A banquet (; ) is a formal large meal where a number of people consume food together. Banquets are traditionally held to enhance the prestige of a host, or reinforce social bonds among joint contributors. Modern examples of these purposes inc ...

is offered and rejected; He is tempted with money, and reminds Satan of King David's humble beginnings.

Book 3

Satan flatters Christ's wisdom but taunts his lack of achievement compared to

Alexander the Great Alexander III of Macedon (; 20/21 July 356 BC – 10/11 June 323 BC), most commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the Ancient Greece, ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia (ancient kingdom), Macedon. He succeeded his father Philip ...

at 30. Jesus rejects

violence Violence is characterized as the use of physical force by humans to cause harm to other living beings, or property, such as pain, injury, disablement, death, damage and destruction. The World Health Organization (WHO) defines violence a ...

, seeing suffering as his path. Satan suggests alliances and freeing the Ten Tribes, but Christ chooses

divine providence In theology, divine providence, or simply providence, is God's intervention in the universe. The term ''Divine Providence'' (usually capitalized) is also used as a names of God, title of God. A distinction is usually made between "general prov ...

Book 4

Satan tempts Christ with

Ancient Rome In modern historiography, ancient Rome is the Roman people, Roman civilisation from the founding of Rome, founding of the Italian city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the Fall of the Western Roman Empire, collapse of the Western Roman Em ...

, offering all kingdoms in exchange for His allegiance. Christ declines, rebuking Satan by referencing the

Book of Exodus The Book of Exodus (from ; ''Šəmōṯ'', 'Names'; ) is the second book of the Bible. It is the first part of the narrative of the Exodus, the origin myth of the Israelites, in which they leave slavery in Biblical Egypt through the strength of ...

. Satan tries to tempt Christ with

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

wisdom, but Jesus prefers the

Psalms The Book of Psalms ( , ; ; ; ; , in Islam also called Zabur, ), also known as the Psalter, is the first book of the third section of the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible) called ('Writings'), and a book of the Old Testament. The book is an anthology of B ...

. Satan then subjects Christ to a perilous night before attempting to lure Him to

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

's temple. Jesus resists, quoting Scripture. Satan fails, and angels aid Christ and return Him to Mary, celebrating His triumph.

Analysis

Whereas ''Paradise Lost'' is ornate in style and decorative in its verse, ''Paradise Regained'' is carried out in a fairly plain style. Specifically, Milton reduces his use of simile and deploys a simpler syntax in ''Paradise Regained'' than he does in ''Paradise Lost'', and this is consistent with Biblical descriptions of Jesus's plainness in his life and teachings (in the epic, he prefers Hebrew Psalms to Greek poetry). Modern editors believe the simpler style of ''Paradise Regained'' evinces Milton's poetic maturity. This is not to say that the poem bears no affinities with Milton's earlier work, but scholars continue to agree with Northrop Frye's suggestion that ''Paradise Regained'' is "practically ''sui generis''" in its poetic execution. One major concept emphasized throughout ''Paradise Regained'' is the idea of reversals. As implied by its title, Milton sets out to reverse the "loss" of Paradise. Thus,

antonym In lexical semantics, opposites are words lying in an inherently incompatible binary relationship. For example, something that is ''even'' entails that it is not ''odd''. It is referred to as a 'binary' relationship because there are two members i ...

s are often found next to each other, reinforcing the idea that everything that was lost in the first epic will be regained by the end of this "brief epic". Additionally, the work focuses on the idea of "hunger", both in a literal and in a spiritual sense. After wandering in the wilderness for forty days,

is starving for food.

, too blind to see any non-literal meanings of the term, offers Christ food and various other temptations, but Jesus continually denies him. Although Milton's Jesus is remarkably human, an exclusive focus on this dimension of his character obscures the divine stakes of Jesus's confrontation with Satan; Jesus emerges victorious, and Satan falls, amazed. An anecdote recounted by a Quaker named Thomas Ellwood provides some insight into ''Paradise Regained''s development. After studying Latin with Milton and reading the poet's epic ''Paradise Lost'', Ellwood remarked, "Thou hast said much here of Paradise lost, but what hast thou to say of Paradise found?" Hearing this, Milton at first "sat some time in a muse" before changing the subject; however, sometime thereafter he showed to Ellwood a new manuscript entitled ''Paradise Regained.'' Some maintain that although he seemed to express gratitude to Ellwood in a letter, Milton in truth "passed on a friendly if impish fabrication" that made Ellwood feel like the inspiration for the poem."Introduction to ''Paradise Regained'', in ''Complete Poetry, 631.

Notes

References

* Northrop Frye, ''The Return to Eden: Five Essays on Milton's Epics'' (Toronto: Toronto UP, 1965). * Introduction to ''Paradise Regained'', in ''The Complete Poetry and Essential Prose of John Milton'', ed. William Kerrigan, John Rumrich, and Stephen M. Fallon (New York: Modern Library, 2007). * Barbara Lewalski, ''Milton's Brief Epic: The Genre, Meaning, and Art of Paradise Regained'' (Providence: Brown UP, 1966). * Susanne Woods, introduction to ''Paradise Lost & Paradise Regained'', published by Signet Classics.

External links

*
E-text from the John Milton Reading Room
*

by Gilbert McInnis {{Authority control 1671 poetry books 1671 poems 1671 in England Christian poetry Epic poems in English Poetry by John Milton Fiction about the Devil Depictions of Jesus in literature Temptation of Christ Works based on the New Testament Cultural depictions of John the Baptist Cultural depictions of Mary, mother of Jesus Cultural depictions of Elijah Cultural depictions of David Cultural depictions of Alexander the Great