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An Analysis Of John Milton's Theodicy In Paradise Lost

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Why do bad things exist? (An analysis of John Milton’s theodicy in Paradise Lost) In today’s world, the news and social media bombard people with stories of war, disease, and evil. Some people have even stopped watching the news because it is sad and terrifying. Stories of children dying of cancer and innocent civilians being killed are everywhere people turn. In the 1600’s, during the Renaissance and the enlightenment, people were discovering new things everyday, but bad things were still happening. The plague was wiping out thousands of people, and no one could figure out why. At this point in time, England was predominantly religious, but people couldn’t understand how bad things happened when there was an all-loving God. John Milton decided he would write an epic story, that told of the fall of man from God in the garden of Eden that would explain the ways of God to man. Milton named his epic, Paradise Lost, and it is regarded as one of the greatest epic poems ever written. BBC writer, Benjamin Ramm writes, “Its dozen sections are an ambitious attempt to comprehend the loss of paradise,”(Ramm). In Paradise Lost, Milton uses the example of Adam and Eve to explain how man is free to make his own choices even though God is all-powerful, and therefore, sin entered the world. One of Milton’s major arguments of theodicy is that without sin in the world, man would never truly have free choice. If man was never tempted to turn away from God, nothing bad would ever happen. True,

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