Also known as Lucifer, Satan was a fallen angel who was banished to Hell. This decision is known as ‘the fall’ because it is the moment when the couple – and all their descendants – fell from God’s grace.Īs well as telling the story of Adam and Eve and the Fall, the poem also narrates the story of Satan. The poem illustrates how He considered Adam and Eve to have within themselves the capacity to withstand temptation, but that they chose not to. This is key because, as the poem states, Milton wanted to use the events to demonstrate the ‘ways of God’ to people. The couple had the power to rule over everything on Earth with the only caveat that this particular fruit was out of bounds, and God expected this rule to be kept on trust as a sign of their obedience to Him. While Eve was seduced by the serpent, she still chose to eat the fruit, as did Adam in turn. Instead, it shows that the couple exercised their free will.

Many people assume that that fruit was an apple, and like other writers before him, Milton calls the ‘fatal fruit’ in Book 9 an apple, but the Bible itself doesn’t name the type of fruit.Ī key aspect of Paradise Lost is that Milton does not portray the couple’s decision to eat the fruit as inevitable. This episode is so well-known that the phrase ‘forbidden fruit’ is widely used in society to refer to something tempting which is often morally dubious. Eve then tells Adam what she has done and he too tastes the forbidden fruit. The ‘first disobedience’ comes about when the devil, in the form of a serpent, tempts Eve to take and eat some fruit from the Tree of Knowledge.

'Of Man’s First Disobedience, and the Fruit Of that Forbidden Tree, whose mortal taste Brought Death into the World, and all our woe.'Īnd in doing so it briefs the reader about the whole plot of the epic tale it is about to relate.

Paradise lost book 5