10 - Theologies Compared

Summary

THE EXAMPLES EXAMINED in Chapter 9 occasion some misgiving about Milton's theology. General misgiving was expressed long ago by C. A. Patrides. Patrides claimed that Milton's theology in Paradise Lost surpassed the overt and explicit theology of De Doctrina, because in the former it was “open,” but in the latter it was “closed.” He did not elaborate. I have begun doing so, and hope now to understand the “closed” quality in De Doctrina better by sampling its opposite in the poem. For certainly contrast is felt when we move from De Filio into the invocation of Book 3, “Hail, holy light […]”

Hail, Holy Light […]

“Open” theology appears with the poem's narrative of heaven, its glimpses of the life imagined there for the three aspects (or agents, or images, and so on) of Milton's godhead. We meet the three in turn. First, we hear of Holy Light then Father and Son converse.

Let us try, despite the besetting controversies, to absorb the poem's theology from passages:

Hail [,] holy light, offspring of heaven first-born,

Or of the eternal co-eternal beam

May I express thee unblamed? Since God is light,

And never but in unapproachèd light

Dwelt from eternity, dwelt then in thee,

Bright effluence of bright essence increate.

Or hearst thou rather pure ethereal stream,

Whose fountain who shall tell?

The Holy Light is “offspring of heaven first-born,” that is, the first-born offspring of heaven. The words bring to view Genesis 1:1– 3. “In the beginning, God […] said Let there be light.” God comes first, in every sense. Then, however, the poet's next word is “or.” Whatever nuance of “or” this may be, the fact of the alternative itself allows for difference and for choice for the reader of how to think. Even exclusive alternatives still allow choice. But this “or” is not either/ or, what with two more to come. Are they “or rather”? Or “or as well”? The second option now offered might incur “blame,” but the invocation goes ahead with it. Syntax, and the question form (“May I express thee unblamed”), are leaving at least the matter of expression open. “May I?” Maybe, maybe not; but he does, he is doing it.