Milton’s masterwork, Paradise Lost, was the Star Wars and the Lord of the Rings of its time, a widescreen, 3-D, apocalyptic blockbuster that pulled out all the stops and captured the imagination of readers all across Europe.
Milton drew on the idea of the War of the Angels — hardly more than a few lines in the Book of Revelation — and created a saga that was meant to convey the very mind of God to the reader, to tell the story of Creation and the Fall, to open up the inner mind to imagery and drama not seen in the Western world for hundreds, if not thousands, of years.
But the epic was written during very dark days for the English poet, and indeed for England itself. Its motivation and inspiration was less religious ecstasy than death, desperation and paranoia.
It may be why Satan — or Lucifer, as he's come to be known in the popular imagination — is by far the most compelling character in the story. Some have even called him its hero, if you can believe that.
Milton scholar John Leonard notes, "John Milton was nearly sixty when he published Paradise Lost in 1667. [The writer] John Aubrey (1626–97) tells us that the poem was begun in about 1658 and finished in about 1663.
Leonard also notes that Milton "did not at first plan to write a biblical epic."... Milton originally envisioned his epic to be based on a legendary Saxon or British king like the legend of King Arthur.
Having gone totally blind in 1652, Milton wrote Paradise Lost entirely through dictation with the help of amanuenses and friends. He also wrote the epic poem while he was often ill, suffering from gout, and despite the fact that he was suffering emotionally after the early death of his second wife, Katherine Woodcock, in 1658, and the death of their infant daughter (though Milton remarried soon after in 1663).
Not a happy time, by any measure. But there's a major plot point in Paradise Lost that tends to get overlooked, and that is the association of pagan — and specifically Phoenician/Canaanite — gods with fallen angels.
Remember that the Book of Enoch was still lost to Europeans during Milton’s time, and we're just now beginning to discover the connection of the Watchers to lost Phoenician deities.
In Milton's estimation, the Fallen Angels, banned from Heaven and written out of the Book of Life, chose to descend to Earth and present themselves as gods to humankind. (Note: I've translated some of the archaic English here to clarify the text)
Godlike shapes and forms excelling human, princely dignities,
And powers that art in Heaven sat on thrones;
Though of their names in heavenly records now
be no memorial Blotted out and erasedBy their rebellion from the Books of Life.
Got them new Names...wandering over the Earth...
Of Mankind they corrupted to forsake
With gay religions full of pomp and gold,And devils to adore for deities:
Then were they known to men by various names,
And various idols through the heathen world.
Anu, progenitor of the angel archetype
Milton — who really knew his mythology — spends a lot of time cataloging the ancient gods.
First among these imposters are Baalim (Ba'al Hadad) and Ashtaroth, noting that the angels — apparently all male — could change genders at will:
From Syrian ground, had general names
of Baalim and Ashtaroth,
Those male, these feminine.
For spirits when they please
Can either sex assume, or both
That sounds all too familiar these days.
