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              Buddhist Parallels in John Milton's Paradise Lost

Milton intended his Paradise Lost to be a tale of Christian values. He tried to present it as a story of the fall of humankind in a way which would be entertaining as well as thought provoking. Being the Christian tale that it was, Milton drew upon many ideas from Christianity to simplify his ideas and give it an entertaining and wider appeal. He uses his own ideas of “predestination” and “free will” while also touching upon many issues such as the “original sin” and “divine punishment.” In his quest to deliberate on these ideas, Milton drew inspiration from many sources such as the ancient mythology of the Greeks and the Romans his biggest source being the Bible. As much Christian as Paradise Lost is, it does however have many ideas and themes which run parallel with Buddhism. Although Milton might not have been inspired by Buddhism it is interesting to note that the some of the arguments he makes have similarities with the Buddhist approach to some of the pertinent issues in his work. Milton uses his work to glorify the ways of God and in a wider sense paints a glorious picture of Christianity but from a Buddhist stand point, he makes lots of arguments and discussions which even a Buddhist would agree with.

The Christian belief of God creating world is well documented in Paradise Lost by Milton. God created the world because he wanted a kingdom that would be obedient and a loyal subject. After the war with Satan and his rebellious angels, God decided that if they can try to go against him, he will prove that he is the ultimate power. By creating the world, he can create a race of men who will always obey his commands and wishes while proving to be diligent and productive. Keeping the objectives with which God created the world, it can be observed that the world is just a realm created where divinity is the ultimate power. In this realm people can be nearer to God and find peace. In Buddhism, the ultimate state of enlightenment that a man can achieve is “Nirvana”. It is the realm that a person gets into when he has enlightened and gained knowledge of the world and how it works. In other words it is the “exhaustion or the ultimate precipitation or resolution into the primal essence” (G. M. Tagore, On Buddhism, pg. 184) which forms the substratum of true knowledge in Buddhist philosophy. As much as they differ in terms of origins and nature, both religions has “in common the fact that both are world transcending salvations” says Otto (Rudolf Otto, Buddhism and Christianity: Compared and Contrasted, pg. 90) In Paradise Lost God creates the world as his resolution to the problems and grief caused by Satan and his followers. The creation of men is in fact a reversion of the creation idea because a divine power has now created a race which is inferior to the celestial beings; a race which embodies the primal essence because of it being lower in the hierarchy. Furthermore God creates men with complete “freedom of will and with an intuitive sense of right and wrong called right reason” (Maurice Kelley, Paradise Lost and Christian Theory of History, pg. 4) which places men above brute animals but below the angels and God himself. The free will that man has been endowed with can be used to follow right reason and continue to obey  God’s commands leading a righteous life or he can yield to his desires and “forfeit his freedom by become a slave to his appetites.” (Kelley, pg. 4) 

Salvation is a key issue in both Christianity and Buddhism. Rudolf Otto in his essay Buddhism and Christianity describes that in both religions “it is not a matter of finding knowledge of realizing practical ends nor of simply cultivating an exalted morality but seeking salvation and nothing but salvation.” (Otto, pg. 89)The Christian idea that everyone can atone for their sin and be redeemed in the eyes of God is well represented by Adam in Paradise Lost. After his and Eve’s fall from grace, Michael shows Adam what the future is for mankind in Book XI and Book XII of Paradise Lost. Adam is happy and assured that there is a way for him to be redeemed through incarnation, death, resurrection and ascension of mankind of which he is going to be the ancestor. Through men’s effort of obeying God’s commands and fulfilling God’s wishes, he can get nearer to the divine one thus redeeming himself from the fall due to the origin sin. In Buddhism, man is considered the humblest member in the hierarchy. This humble member “is sustained by the assurance that by the practice of virtue and endurance he may attain equality with superior intelligences” (Tagore, pg. 184) proving that there is a way for him to rise up and get nearer to nirvana. As the process of ascension in Buddhism continues, it is further possible that “by gradation peculiar to its metempsychosis, man might actually attain identification with the Supreme Intelligence” (Tagore, pg. 184) In Paradise Lost Adam rejoices with the knowledge that there is an opportunity for him to be accepted and get nearer to his creator. In Christianity God has given free will to all men “to the degree that each man has the power to believe or not to believe, and if he believes and continues in the faith, he will attain everlasting salvation.” (Kelley, pg. 5)   In parallel to this belief of Christian salvation, runs the Buddhist idea of getting nearer to the Supreme Intelligence through practice of virtues and good deeds. As much as they differ in terms of origins and nature, both religions has “in common the fact that both are world transcending salvations” says Otto (Rudolf Otto, pg. 90)

Satan’s fall from grace brings to life another significant creation called hell. In Book I, Satan and his rebellious angles are thrown out of the heavens into hell for going against God and his power. They had resisted God’s words and decided to rebel against him thinking that they could overthrow him and take control of heaven but they fail thus their fall into hell. As going against is a sin, it can be rightly said that Satan’s hell is created because of the effects of the evil and malicious intents he had which later morphed into his sin. The Buddhist’s also believe in the existence of a hell with devils and demons in which “the wicked undergo a sort of purgatorial imprisonment” (Tagore, pg. 185) as in the case of Satan. In this hell, “those who have been guilty of such deadly sins as those of parricide, sacrilege and denial of faith and apostasy” (Tagore, pg. 185) are doomed to be punished which was exactly Satan’s punishment for his rebellion against God by committing the above mentioned evil.

Fate is as much an important issue in Paradise Lost as it is both Christianity and Buddhism. The question of predestination emerges as an issue most difficult to deal with in this regard because it has come under debate and discussion for a long time. Fundamentalist Christians believing that everyone is doomed and that there will be an apocalypse whereby the non believers will be annihilated and the believers liberated is one such example of predestination in Christianity. In Paradise Lost, the predestination is played out once again on Adam and Eve when Adam is shown the fate of mankind for the sins he and Eve had committed. They were, from the initial stages of their creation, destined to be the keeper of God’s words and with the passage of time they become the missionaries of God when they have become the ancestors of mankind. The fate of the world that they have come to know about after the original sin makes them predestined to still carry on God’s message even when he has driven them out of paradise. In Buddhism this predestination r fate is given the name of “karma” or the merit/demerit that one has achieved in his previous and present life. The idea in Buddhism is “that man under no circumstances escape the consequences of his acts” (Tagore, pg. 186) meaning that morals are in themselves the productive or unproductive causes depending on the virtue of the act. According to Buddhism, “the sufferings and enjoyments in this life are in some respects the consequence of merit or demerit in a pervious stage of existence” (Tagore, pg. 186) turning karma into a form of predestination; if you had bad karma you were bound to suffer and if you had bad karma you were bound to lead a peaceful and happy life. Adam and Eve’s demerit or karma of the original sin sets the tone for the good and the bad that is going to happen in the future of mankind.

The origin of sin in both religions comes from the individual and this stands true in the case of Paradise Lost. Satan is the source of evil in the sense that he is the father of Sin. Sin describes her birth to occur sometime after the war in heaven had begun. Satan as an individual with free will gives birth to Sin while Eve also as an individual with free will commits the first sin; the original sin. Satan’s fall is “completely and freely self-determined” (Vincent DiBenedetto, Milton and the Origin of Evil, pg. 813) because he chooses to use his reason and judgement to think that he is right and rebels against God. In truth it is his Satan’s choice to go to hell. Just like Satan’s choice Adam’s sin is of his own choice because he has decided to risk the consequences due to his love for Eve. “Adam’s approval of “evil cannot be said to be influenced by any external determining forces other than those that he has chosen to create for himself.” (DiBenedetto, pg. 813) It is constantly debated and argued that Satan is the originator or responsible for the fall on men yet it must be kept in mind that every act carried out by Satan, Eve and Adam were all of free accord and will. As much as Satan is blamed for Eve’s sin, the latter is blamed for Adam’s sin yet it is noteworthy that Adam had given Eve the choice to leave his side and go although he knows it is dangerous. Satan succeeds in seducing Eve whereby her actions fail the future of mankind. Therefore “Milton makes it amply clear that since the burden rests on Adam to prevent the fall, their undoing is Adam’s fault, freely committed.” (DiBenedetto, pg. 814) In fact DiBenedetto goes to the extent of mentioning that “Adam creates the very web of temptation in which he chooses to enmesh himself and Eve.” (DiBenedetto, pg. 814) As in Buddhism, sin and evil is all a creation of the self’s own desires and passions. Nothing is to be blamed for the influences of a decision other than the individual. The desire of an individual gives rise to passion, passion causes grief and grief causes pain, jealousy and anger which are all the sources of evil and sin. An individual has the choice to lead a virtuous life or to squander it away by indulging himself in activities which are of no benefit to him, his community or to the world.

Christianity and Buddhism differs in their historical origins and the way they act out in a follower’s life but it is easy to see that they share many common elements in the way they get their message across to their followers. Although Milton might not have borrowed any of his ideas for Paradise Lost from Buddhism, it can be assumed that many of his themes and ideas run parallel to Buddhist philosophies. Buddhism can never be regarded as a source for Paradise Lost like the mythologies of the ancient European civilization or the Holy Bible yet it becomes an interesting read if a person hold’s knowledge about Buddhism and its philosophies.

                                              Works Cited

DiBenedetto, Vincent. Milton and the Origin of Evil. PMLA, Vol. 103, NO. 5.

(Oct.,1988), pp. 813-815.

Kelley, Maurice. “Paradise Lost” and the Christian Theory of History. South Atlantic

Bulletin, Vol. 37, No. 1. (Jan., 1972), pp. 3-11.

Milton, John. Paradise Lost. “John Milton; The Major Works. Eds. Stephen Orgel and

Jonathan Goldberg. Great Britain: Oxford University Press, 2003.

Otto, Rudolf. Buddhism and Christianity: Compared and Contrasted. Buddhist-Christian

Studies, Vol. 4. (1984), pp. 87-101.

Tagore, G. M. “On Buddhism”. Transactions of the Ethnological Society of London, Vol.

2. (1863), pp. 182-201.

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