Lecture 1 Work vs Toil

Question 1

quote in genesis 2:15 about Man’s role in eden

Answer 1

God took the Man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it

Question 2

quote in genesis 2:5 about tilling

Answer 2

there was not a man to till the ground

Question 3

quote from genesis 1:28 about man’s duty on earth/ eden

Answer 3

replensih the earth, and subdue it

Question 4

what was Andrew Willet’s view in Hexapla in Genesin regarding the nature of work/ labour

Answer 4

• man should not have toiled/ wearied himself with any labour in paradise as this was his punishment
• having said that, he should do SOME labour
• this labour can be recreational
• the purpose of this labour was to acknowledge the beuaty of God’s creation

Question 5

quote about the role of the reader in Paradise lost

Answer 5

‘A reader of milton must be always upon duty, he is surrounded with sense, it rises in every line, every word is to the purpose; there are no lazy intervals

Question 6

cicero quote about labour

Answer 6

all other nations can bear slavery, our state alone cannot… they shun labour and pain to be free

Question 7

how did the rabbinical school of thought justify Eden?

Answer 7

Work was one aspect of Adam and Eves obedience to God, it was a manifestation of
respect and gratitude for Eden

Question 8

how did the patristic school of thought justify Eden?

Answer 8

Tendency to allegorise work- the purpose of work is for Adam and Eve to contemplate
the garden and the beauty of God’s creation

Question 9

what was milton’s view on the rabbinical/ patristic tradition?

Answer 9

• troubled by the gaps
• uses his subjet choice to dramatise the gaps
• dismantles the binary of toil vs labour

Question 10

Which other work of Milton can be used to address this theme

Answer 10

On his blindness- a sonnet about Milton’s anxieties about being able to do his duty to god (his poetic work), even after he turned blind