Utopia Lost
“Abashed the devil stood and felt how awful goodness is and saw Virtue in her shape how lovely: and pined his loss.” - Paradise Lost, 1667. In the epic poem, Paradise Lost, John Milton reexamines the Genesis story of Adam and Eve along with an in-depth interpretation into Satan and his motive as the biblical events play out. What I find interesting is that, having grown up a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, we are taught that the fall of Adam was God's plan all along, and that it was necessary for humans to fall in order to "Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth"; but in this version, as well as most mainstream Christian belief, the Fall of Man is considered a great tragedy that could have been avoided if our primordial ancestors would have only listened to God's commandment not to partake of the fruit of knowledge of good and evil. In the latter interpretation, I find it strange that God seems to be so ...