Milton’s Dantean Raphael

Abstract

While Raphael’s guidance of Adam has provoked much discussion, his origin in the Apocrypha, which Milton in Christian Doctrine derided as “fabulous, low, trifling, and quite foreign to real sagacity and religion,” deserves more attention. This article argues that his origin in Tobit, considered canonical by Catholics, is only the beginning of his Catholic identity. Through the “divine” Raphael, who encourages in Adam an exaggerated confidence in his own nature, Milton critiques another charming, philosophical, Catholic storyteller whose teachings are grounded in the analogia entis, the author of The Divine Comedy. Milton imitates Dante’s practice of making the epic predecessor a character—Raphael guides Adam as Virgil had the Pilgrim—to critique Dante’s poetic presumption and deficient understanding of sin. Michael, the angel from the Protestant Bible whose teaching hews closely to Scripture, with his emphasis on sin and obedience then provides a model for the Protestant poet.