"Let There be Peace": Eve as Redemptive Peacemaker in Paradise Lost, Book X

It is an irony that one of the most distinctively Christian virtues, peacemaking, has probably been neglected or ignored as much within the Christian tradition as out of it. Milton, as we know, voiced an objection that until his time “Wars” had been “the only Argument / Heroic deemed,” while “the better fortitude / Of Patience and Heroic Martyrdom” remained “Unsung” (PL, 9.28–33). In Paradise Lost he did something to right the imbalance, taking as hero not the military commander Satan but the Prince of Peace, the Son of God, as well as the pastoral Eve and Adam. The poem contains more than the attack on war described in James Freeman’s Milton and the Martial Muse. In Surprised by Sin Stanley Fish insight fully celebrates “standing only” as Christian heroism, but there is an initiating element of peacemak ing—active reconciliation, more than mere loyalty and an attitude of obedience—that characterizes the heroism of the Son and of Eve. ¹ In fact, Milton pic tures such reconciling as a notable aspect of redemption.

Joseph Summers calls attention to the important turning point at which Eve, in Book X, initiates the reconciliation with Adam; and both he and Broadbent remark how the language (especially the repetition of the long e vowel) likens Eve to the Son, at the point in Book III where he offers himself to save mankind. Broadbent suggests that she (like Adam elsewhere in the poem) is drawing on the Son’s “spring of self-sacrifice.” ² Georgia B. Christopher has challenged such readings, correctly asserting that it is divine grace that restores Adam and Eve after the Fall, but failing to grant that such grace could work more than incidentally by means of Eve’s initiative. ³ In dealing with the same passage Cheryl H. Fresch stresses Eve’s penitence, not heroism, by likening her to the sinner of Luke 7 washing Jesus’ feet with her tears. While making good points, both Christopher and Fresch needlessly undercut Eve’s achievement. ⁴ And Diane McColley in what is otherwise a most splendid treatment of Eve seems swayed by Christopher in saying, “Eve’s part as the first to repent and seek reconciliation is the one act for which she is generally given her due, if not more” [emphasis added]. ⁵

A key passage in Ephesians describes Christ’s self-sacrifice as making peace by effecting reconciliation to God and breaking down barriers between people:

now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, who hath made both [Jews and Gentiles] one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us; Having abolished in his flesh the enmity...; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace; And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby; And came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh.

(2:13–17, emphasis mine)

Christ is here presented as a heroic mediator and reconciler; and thus the one who pronounced a blessing on peacemakers (Matt. 5:9) is himself shown to be the supreme example. Although the Ephesians passage speaks of the ending of conflict or “enmity,” it must be understood that in the Scriptures peace is not a merely negative word to indicate lack of conflict. Instead, the Hebrew “shalom” and its Greek equivalent “eirene” denote concord, well-being, wholeness—really, aspects of salvation. And in Para dise Lost, Book X, too, Eve’s action helps initiate not just the end of strife, but the restoration of wholesome relationships between humans and with God.

In this paper I am claiming that Milton’s Eve is in deed a heroic peacemaker in somewhat the way that Christ is in the Scriptures. And although Milton’s assertion that the better fortitude has remained unsung is generally true, I will also cite some patterns of peacemaking that the poet could draw on: the biblical characters...