Paradise lost is largely pulled from Zoroastrianism influence on Christianity, not the bible. The Bible is largely devoid of depictions of satan or hell, traditionally describing evil as an absence of God. Zoroastrianism’s influence on Christianity introduced a lot of the dualistic themes of evil vs good and heaven vs hell that is so prominent in evangelical Christianity that we know today.
The post is about good and evil, which is why I brought up paradise lost, because of the themes revolving around good and evil. I wasn’t suggesting it because I believed it was influenced by the bible. At the start of the poem Satan is trying to reclaim heaven. He’s the underdog, which sort of makes him the hero. It sort of flips the script on good and evil by making Satan the underdog. When Satan gets to earth and decides to fuck with god’s creation, (man,) god is like, “OK chat, what are we going to do about this?” God’s only son is like, “I’ll sacrifice myself to save man, it’s ok though, because I’m just going to end up back in heaven anyway.” When I read those lines, my though process was like, is it even really a sacrifice if he just goes back to heaven anyway and knows that will be the outcome? If the only son wasn’t really sacrificing anything, was he really the good guy? Is holding back knowledge from your “children,” really a benign act?
I thought you were responding to the person who asked if there was a good literary deconstruction of the Bible?
My point was that Paradise lost is a good literary deconstruction of how people interpret the duality of good and evil, but that duality is largely not found in the actual Bible.
TranscendentalEmpire@lemmy.today 1 week ago
Paradise lost is largely pulled from Zoroastrianism influence on Christianity, not the bible. The Bible is largely devoid of depictions of satan or hell, traditionally describing evil as an absence of God. Zoroastrianism’s influence on Christianity introduced a lot of the dualistic themes of evil vs good and heaven vs hell that is so prominent in evangelical Christianity that we know today.
Washedupcynic@lemmy.ca 1 week ago
The post is about good and evil, which is why I brought up paradise lost, because of the themes revolving around good and evil. I wasn’t suggesting it because I believed it was influenced by the bible. At the start of the poem Satan is trying to reclaim heaven. He’s the underdog, which sort of makes him the hero. It sort of flips the script on good and evil by making Satan the underdog. When Satan gets to earth and decides to fuck with god’s creation, (man,) god is like, “OK chat, what are we going to do about this?” God’s only son is like, “I’ll sacrifice myself to save man, it’s ok though, because I’m just going to end up back in heaven anyway.” When I read those lines, my though process was like, is it even really a sacrifice if he just goes back to heaven anyway and knows that will be the outcome? If the only son wasn’t really sacrificing anything, was he really the good guy? Is holding back knowledge from your “children,” really a benign act?
TranscendentalEmpire@lemmy.today 1 week ago
I thought you were responding to the person who asked if there was a good literary deconstruction of the Bible?
My point was that Paradise lost is a good literary deconstruction of how people interpret the duality of good and evil, but that duality is largely not found in the actual Bible.