"Paradise Lost," VII, 8-12, and the "Zohar" Author(s): Maurice Kelley Source: The Modern Language Review,

Vol. 29, No. 3 (Jul., 1934), pp. 322-324 Published by: Modern Humanities Research Association Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3715490 Accessed: 24/08/2009 22:08
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Miscellaneous Notes

Mr Jackson also informs me of two books in the possession of A. Ehrman, Esq., 38 Lowndes Street, S.W. 1, which once belonged to Richard Harvey, Gabriel's brother. They are 1500 Formulare Instrumentorum,Cologne, 4to (the Barlow-Duff copy), and 1521 Henry VIII Assertio, Pynson, 4to.
G. C. MOORESMITH.
SKifJfrIfLD.

'PARADISE LOST,' VII, 8-12, AND THE 'ZOHAR.' Before the Hills appeerd, or Fountain flow'd Thou with Eternal wisdom didst converse, Wisdom thy Sister, and with her didst play In presence of th' Almightie Father, pleas'd With thy Celestial Song.

The preceding lines, Professor Saurat1 would interpret thus:

There were, therefore, plans to be fulfilled, plans that were shaped before the Creation, by Eternal Wisdom playing before the Supreme. Milton devotes sublime passages to the state of the Deity before Creation. [Saurat then quotes the passage which appear from Paradise Lost, given above, and certain portions of Tetrachordon, below.] ...It was during this divine play that the plans of the world were made.... And from these divine 'recreations' the creation came. Milton ascribes to these acts within the bosom of divinity the sexual character which is so well marked in the in which Zohar; and that is the meaning of that terrible passage in Tetrachordon, Milton invokes God's own example to justify man in his need of woman: 'God himself conceals us not his own recreations before the world was built: "I was," saith the Eternal Wisdom, "daily his delight, playing always before him"...and [Solomon] sings of a thousand raptures between those two lovely ones far on the hither side of carnal enjoyment.' No doubt Milton is quoting sacred texts; but he adds anpther text: 'before the world was built,' and this is a relationship of cause to effect in the Zohar-the world is the outcome, the child, of sex-life within the divinity.

Saurat's conclusions would seem to be these. Milton considered the creation as the result of the sex life of God. His source for such a concept was the Zohar. Paradise Lost does not explicitly state this idea; but the lines under examination have such a connotation, for the passage in Tetrachordon,which is parallel, does express the belief found in the Zohar. Such an interpretation for these lines of the epic seems hardly tenable. The De doctrina, to begin with, does not so much as hint at such an idea; and in this work, moreover, Milton professes ignorance of the employments of God before the creation.
Sed ante mundum conditum quid egerit Deus, insipiens nimis sit qui quaerat; nec qui respondeat multo sapientior...2. 1 Denis Saurat, Milton: Man and Thinker,New York, 1925, pp. 132, 291-2. The
passage from Tetrachordon,quoted by Saurat, may be found in The Prose Works of John

Milton(Bohnedition),in, 331. 2 De doctrina 1825,p. 124. Christiana, Cambridge,

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The passage in Paradise Lost, therefore, more logically refers to the 'less serious employments of the Deity before the creation of the worldl,' for both passages speak of Wisdom playing before the Lord2, and the Tetrachordonrefers to God's 'recreations.' When one considers the importance of creation in the divine plan, may not one doubt that Milton intended this divine play to refer to the planning and production of the universe? The passage from Tetrachordon,moreover, does not mirror the belief of the Zohar. The 'terrible' passage is not terrible at all. It appears so only because Saurat has tampered with Milton's reference. His method of quotation indicates that 'those two lovely ones' refers to God and Wisdom. In reality, the reference is to Christ and the Church. Milton wrote as follows:
Whereof lest we should be too timorous, in the awe that our flat sages would form us and dress us, wisest Solomon among his gravest proverbs countenances a kind of ravishment and erring fondness in the entertainment of wedded leisures; and in the Song of Songs, which is generally believed, even in the jolliest expressions, to figure the spousals of the church with Christ, sings of a thousand raptures between those two lovely ones far on the hither side of carnal enjoyment3.

The context, moreover, does not bear out Saurat's interpretation. Milton is commenting on Genesis ii, 18: 'And the Lord said, It is not 'Alone' is to be interpreted as good that man should be alone....' 'alone from woman'; and to elevate the discussion above things of the body, Milton insists that loneliness is not to be considered only in the sense of 'want of copulation.' All men, says Milton, need relaxation from labour. Even God conceals not from us that he partakes of recreation. Man, therefore, may do likewise. Now the greatest recreation is to be found in the company of man's opposite, woman; and this recreation consists in mental rather than bodily pleasure-in 'a peculiar comfort in the married state beside the genial bed, which no other society affords4.' Throughout the passage, Milton strives to keep the discussion on a plane higher than that on which Saurat would interpret it. Neither does passage or context permit Saurat's interpretation; and the belief of the Zohar, therefore, does not appear in Tetrachordon. Other alleged influences of the Zohar on the invocation to Urania (vii, 1-12) are likewise unconvincing. The De doctrina does not permit
1 So Sumner in his translation of the De doctrina, The Prose Wtorksof John Milton edition), iv, p. 170. (Bohn 2 One should also observe that the lines do not permit Saurat's description of the matter: 'these acts within the bosom of divinity.' The texts merely say playing 'before' or 'in presence of' the Father. 3 Saurat's most recent reproduction of the passage (Milton et le Materialisme Chrgtien en Angleterre,Paris, 1928, p. 88) is even more misleading, for there he indicates no omissions. 4 The Prose Worksof John Milton (Bohn edition), iII, pp. 330-2.

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Notes

Saurat's identification of Wisdom and the 'Creative Son1.' Of the portion of the Bible which lies behind these lines in the epic, Milton writes:
Ad illud autem Proverbiorumcap. viii. quod attinet, crediderim,non Filium Dei, sed sapientiam, more poetico, quasi personam illic induci.. 2.

The equation of Urania with the Third Sephira, Intelligence, therefore, becomes too arbitrary for acceptance. The fact that Saurat's suggestion has not the support of the De doctrina, that the passage in Tetrachordonis not in consonance with the Zohar, and that other influences of the Zoharon the invocation of Book vII have not been proved, forces the rejection of Saurat's interpretation. We know only that Wisdom played in the presence of the Father, and that this play was pleasing and recreative to Him. Beyond this, existing evidence does not permit us to go.
MAURICEKELLEY. U.S.A. PRINCETON, CARLYLEON RAMSAYAND FERGUSSON.

Allan Ramsay and Robert Fergusson are mentioned only once in Carlyle's Essay on Burns, in which the Ayrshire bard is said to have had 'no furtherance but such knowledge as dwells in a poor man's hut, and the rhymes of a Fergusson or Ramsay for his standard of beauty.' The absence of any further reference is probably due to the writer's lack of any serious interest in Burns's poetic predecessors. This virtual indifference is illustrated by the following holograph letter, addressed to a correspondent whose name has been carefully erased, and now published3 from the Watson Collection (the property of the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, on permanent loan to the National Library of Scotland since September, 1930). Separate editions of Allan Ramsay's and of Robert Fergusson's poetry appeared in 1851, but it is unlikely that they had any connexion with the edition which was projected five years earlier and for which Carlyle offered such sound advice 4.
CHELSEA,25 Novr, 1846

Dear Sir, I am much afraid I shall not be able to assist you, by any contribution but that of my good wishes, in your pious Enterprise. I have not read Fergusson at all since the time of my boyhood; neither has Ramsay ever
1 Saurat, op. cit., p. 291. 2 De doctrina, p. 127. 8 By kind permission of the Director, Mr Stanley Cursiter. 4 Was Carlyle's correspondent conceivably the precocious Grosart, who edited Fergusson in 1851, while still a student, and may have formed ambitious plans even at the age of 19, before he entered Edinburgh University? [Ed.]