Prevenient Grace and Conversion in Paradise Lost

Abstract

The Conversion SceneAccording to Sir Walter Raleigh, the entire plot of Paradise Lost "radiates" from a single point: the moment when Eve plucks and eats the forbidden fruit. 1 Referring to this moment, Raleigh remarks that "there is not an incident, hardly a line of the poem, but leads backwards or forwards to those central lines in the Ninth Book" (81-82).In this influential reading, subsequently adopted by James Holly Hanford (213) and, initially, by E. M. W. Tillyard (Milton 245-49), the moment of the Fall tends to eclipse other significant themes in the epic, such as obedience, restoration, and grace.Accepting Raleigh's claim that the epic action centers on the single episode of the Fall, A. J. A. Waldock argues that this episode ultimately fails (25-64).His devastating critique of the entire poem prompted substantial defection from Raleigh's theory.In "The Crisis of Paradise Lost," still one of the most important studies of the poem's portrayal of conversion, Tillyard repudiates his earlier position in favor of an "adjustment of balance" (Studies 51) in which "the centre of importance should be shifted to [Adam's and Eve's] regenerate action after the Fall" (45).By thus raising the conversion scene to a place of eminence within the epic narrative, Tillyard also attempts to compensate for the comparative neglect of this part of the poem, and several scholars have followed him in recognizing the crucial significance of this scene in Paradise Lost.G. A. Wilkes, for example, identifies its importance within the context of the poem's theodicy, arguing that the conversion of Adam and Eve exhibits "the operation of Providence in bringing forth good from evil" (35-36).C. A. Patrides suggests that the conversion of Adam and Eve is "one of the most important though least understood incidents in Paradise Lost" (210), and Robert Crosman speaks of the closing lines of Book 10, where Eve and Adam water the ground with penitent tears, as "perhaps the greatest moment of Milton's poem" (204).The theological significance of the conversion scene, however, remains often overlooked, especially by readers who view this scene as no more than a depiction of the reconciliation between two estranged

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