10. Dante: The Divine Comedy
Continuity with the Epic Tradition
As you read the Inferno, the first part of the Divine Comedy, you will notice many similarities to the epics of Homer and Vergil. In fact, Vergil is a main character in the Inferno: he serves as Dante’s guide. As the two travel through the underworld they meet mythical and historical characters from the ancient past. The journey to the underworld was mentioned in Gilgamesh and described in memorable episodes of the Odyssey and the Aeneid. In Dante’s epic, it becomes the whole of the Inferno.
A Christian Epic
Dante uses the theme of the journey through the underworld and imagery from classical poetry to produce a Christian literary classic. The three parts of the Comedy describe the journey through hell, purgatory, and paradise (Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso).
A Comedy
The Divine Comedy[1] has humorous elements, but it is a serious work overall. It is not what we think of as comedy. Why did the poet choose this term? It is a fictional work with a happy ending, so it doesn’t fit into the categories of tragedy or history. Perhaps also the poet sometimes plays with the reader. The Divine Comedy is not exactly an allegory, but it is full of symbolic elements. Further, at least in The Inferno, the travelers are forewarned not to trust everything they hear. Many readers have been misled by the stories some of the characters tell-who would have suspected there would be liars in Hell? As the readers travel through the underworld with the poets, they will have to keep on their toes.
Theology and Politics
The Divine Comedy has a serious purpose. Although the three realms belong to the afterworld, Dante is also concerned about this life. He is concerned both with the individual and with society. How does an individual find meaning and fulfillment in this life and attain to eternal life? How can society and governments be organized so that the citizens enjoy peace, security, and happiness?
Along with mythical and ancient characters, Dante will meet many historical persons who have died within his lifetime; there will be other references to individuals still living.
Aquinas
Two major influences in the Comedy are the theology of Thomas Aquinas and the political turmoil in Dante’s city, Florence. Aquinas lived from 1225-1274, and brought about a major shift in theological thinking. The writings of Aristotle, after having been forgotten in the west for centuries, had recently been translated into Latin. Aquinas believed that Aristotle’s philosophy was a reliable source of knowledge about the natural world, as the teachings of the Bible and the church fathers were the sources of knowledge about the supernatural world.
Aristotle had been a student of Plato in the fourth century BC. Plato had taught in the Republic, in the section known as “The Allegory of the Cave” that physical reality known to the senses was a poor copy of eternal realities known through reason. Plato taught that the physical world is a trap, a prison for the soul, and that the souls ultimate goal was to return to the heavenly realm of pure ideas. Historically, Plato was interested both in politics and the individual soul; but in the early Christian centuries it was his concern for the soul that was central.
Before Aquinas, Augustine was considered the greatest theologian of the church. Augustine had been deeply influenced by his reading of this kind of Platonic philosophy. Thus to some extent, theology took an other-worldly turn with the theology of Augustine.
To understand the difference between Augustine and Aquinas, it is helpful to consider the difference between Plato and Aristotle. Consider the design of a table. It begins with a blueprint and is fashioned by a craftsman. No craftsman produces a perfect copy of the blueprint; the table is an imperfect imitation of the pure idea or form of the table. Now consider an oak tree. Its origin is not in a blueprint but in an acorn.
Plato believed that “real reality” existed “out there” in the world of pure forms or ideas. Aristotle believed that the real oak tree existed in the acorn. The purpose of the acorn is to develop into an oak tree. Plato believed he could reach truth through pure reasoning alone. Aristotle would go to the edge of a pond, get down on his knees, and study tadpoles and frogs.
Theologically, Platonic philosophy as mediated through Augustine, meant a turning away from this world. The real home of the soul is in heaven, this world is just a temporary probation. Augustine’s doctrine of original sin further diminished the value of this fallen, sinful world.
The return to Aristotle’s philosophy meant a return to the biblical doctrine of the goodness of creation and to the value of the world and of scientific knowledge. Aquinas admired Augustine and considered him the greatest authority on matters of theology. But he also had an interest in this world. Aquinas believed that natural philosophy and science can lead to truths that lead to happiness in this life. To attain eternal life, nature (including science and philosophy) must be augmented by grace.
The Value of Classical Literature
Aquinas is the greatest theological authority for Dante. Aquinas makes room for an interest in this world. Earlier Christian writers who had studied the classics had a troubled conscience. Augustine, in the confessions, describes his great love for Vergil. He confessed how he wept over the sorrows of Dido, but was unmoved by his own sins and lost soul. Jerome, the great contemporary of Augustine had also mastered classical Latin literature; he was particularly fond of the eloquence of Cicero. Once in a dream he heard the voice of God complaining, “You are not a Christian but a Ciceronian.”
Through the theology of Aquinas, Dante was able to find room for classical literature. It is true that pagan poets cannot lead one to heaven (they couldn’t find the way themselves), but they can teach virtue, which leads to happiness in this life and can prepare the way for the grace of God.
Poets such as Vergil can teach the four cardinal virtues: justice, wisdom, courage, and moderation. These virtues are necessary for human happiness in an individual and in any society. They can be known by all people and are taught by philosophers and poets. There is no need for a special revelation from God to know the basic virtues that lead to happiness in this life.
The virtues that are needed to reach heaven are called the three theological virtues: faith, hope, and love. They are taught only in the Christian gospel. So Vergil is qualified to be Dante’s teacher and guide through hell and halfway through purgatory; but he will need a higher guide to take him all the way to paradise.
Florence
Dante was deeply involved in the politics of his city, Florence. In the year 1300 the world of Europe was beginning to awaken from the middle ages. The unified “Holy Roman Empire” was breaking up and national identity was beginning to assert itself. Florence was a city-state that was struggling to find its way. The two main political factions in Florence were the Guelphs, who favored independent city states, and Ghibellines, who supported the emperor. The Guelphs had defeated the Ghibellines in 1289 and then divided among themselves. The black Guelphs supported the pope’s authority in politics, while the white Guelphs believed government should be free of papal interference.
Dante was a white Guelph and was exiled by the black Guelphs in 1302. In the Inferno he takes poetic vengeance on some of his enemies and shows sympathy to some of his friends. He was concerned for peace, stability, and prosperity in his native city.
Dante
As a character in his own poem, Dante plays three roles. First of all, Dante Alleghieri was a real historical person. He occasionally refers to incidents in his real life in Florence. Second, he was already famous as a poet when he wrote the Comedy, and there are some references to Dante the poet within the poems. Third, he is a fictional character, a poetic persona. He is a pilgrim on the way to salvation and represents every lost soul struggling to find the right way. As you read, keep in mind Dante the person, the poet, and the pilgrim.
Poet and Citizen
Dante Alleghieri was born about 1265 in Florence. He was exiled in 1302 and never saw his home town again. He began writing the divine comedy about 1307 and completed it shortly before his death in 1321. The dramatic date of the Comedy is Holy Week of the year 1300. The journey through hell begins on Good Friday, Saturday is spent in Purgatory, and the tour of Paradise takes place on Easter Sunday. The fact that it was written several years after the dramatic date allows the poet to include several “prophecies” by the characters he meets.
At the age of nine, the precocious young poet-to-be fell in love with a girl whom he called Beatrice. Both Dante and Beatrice were married to others by arrangement. Beatrice died at the age of 24 in 1290. Dante and his wife Gemma had two children. Dante considered his love for Beatrice a pure spiritual love to which he remained faithful throughout his life. Gemma did not accompany Dante into his exile. He never mentioned her in any of his poems.
Dante’s father died when he was a teenager. The scholar Brunetto Latini became a mentor and father figure to him. Dante wrote lyric love poetry before he began the Comedy. His Vita Nova describes his love for Beatrice. He also wrote philosophical essays on government. His book De Vulgari Eloquentia, written in Latin, was a defense of the common Italian language and a plea to unify the various dialects. He thus played a role in creating modern Italian.
Pilgrim
Dante the poet is also a character in his own poem. The character is on a personal spiritual journey; the goal is ultimately salvation, but it also is a journey toward human freedom. Salvation is not only an other-worldly concern; it involves reaching God’s purpose for one’s life, which is identical with freedom or what we would call self-actualization. Dante’s journey represents the journey of every individual human. The first line of the poem identifies his journey as “our” common journey.
“Midway in the journey of our life,” the character Dante faced a mid-life crisis and had lost his way. Based on the biblical “three score and ten” as the normal human life span, he would have been 35 years old. He is in such desperate spiritual condition that he cannot begin the straight journey up Mount Purgatory toward heaven. He must first understand the true nature of sin before he can be freed of its grip. He is not able to hear the voice of divine revelation, but he has not yet lost the good of intellect and will follow the voice of reason, represented by Vergil. The journey through hell, led by a pagan poet, will prepare him for the journey toward salvation.
In the comments below, I use the term “pilgrim” to refer to the persona of Dante, the character in his own fiction.
The Architecture of the Divine Comedy
Vestigia Trinitas
Augustine believed in the doctrine of the vestigia trinitas, the idea that the signs of the triune God are found throughout the universe. Dante certainly composed the Comedy around the number three.
The three parts of the comedy comprise 100 cantos. Canto 1 of the Inferno is an introduction to the whole comedy. The Inferno has 33 additional cantos (for a total of 34), and the Purgatoria and Paradiso each have 33 cantos.
The rhyme scheme of the entire comedy is called terza rima, or “third rhyme.” The poem is comprised of terzets or units of three lines. The first line of each terzet rhymes with the third line. The middle line of each terzet will rhyme with the first line of the next terzet, thus interlinking all the terzets of each book in an unbroken chain.
As you begin reading the Inferno, take a few minutes to study the first two or three terzets in Italian. Observe how the rhyme scheme works. Listen to one of the readings in Italian (noted below), and follow along in the Italian text.
Divine Time
The journey through the three realms covers the three days of Good Friday through Easter Sunday.
The Organization of Hell
The inferno is located beneath the earth. (Inferno means “the lowest place” in Italian, not fire.) It is shaped like a funnel, spiraling downward, narrower at the bottom. It is divided into nine circles appropriate to categories of sins. There are three rivers separating the various regions. As one descends, the sins and their punishment becomes more severe. The first circle is limbo, for those who die in original sin without Christ but without any personal sin. The next three circles are sins of incontinence (lack of self-control): lust, gluttony, misuse of money (subdivided into greed and waste). Next are sins of violence, and in the lowest realms, sins of treachery.
For a good visual representation of the Inferno, go to Dante Worlds at http://danteworlds.laits.utexas.edu/. You might want to save this link. The notes on each canto will be helpful as you read.
Contrapasso
Dante uses the term contrapasso in Inf. XXVIII.142-144 to describe the punishment of sins in hell. The word means the suffering appropriate to the act, or the just reward for the sin. Each sinner in hell is placed in a circle appropriate for his characteristic sin. The punishment for each sin is simply the true nature of the sin itself. Punishment is not arbitrary. The lost in hell have chosen their sin, the contrapasso is simply allowing them to have for all eternity the choice they have made in life.
The cowardly, who refused in life to choose for God or Satan, for good or evil, are denied a place in either heaven or hell. They never truly lived and never truly die. Those who give in to lust refuse to allow reason to guide their choices. In life they were swept away by their passions, in hell they are carried along by the infernal winds. The suicides flung away their bodies, so their souls are imprisoned in trees.
Those who have died without Christ are not allowed to enter Paradise. Yet those among them who did not sin (infants and virtuous pagans) are not punished in hell. They are in a place without suffering but also without hope or joy.
Dignity and Misery
The condemned in hell still retain some of their humanity and dignity. Some who attained fame in life retain their fame in hell, and it gives them some consolation. Dante no doubt recalled Jesus’ words “they have their reward.” Dante the pilgrim has great sympathy for Francesca and great affection for Brunetto Latini.
The inscription over the gate of hell says “Divine love created me.” How is hell a product of God’s love? First, it allows its residents the dignity of responsible actions in life. They are allowed to make a choice and to have their choice. Human action is meaningful for all eternity. Second, existence-even suffering existence-is better than nonexistence. God does not destroy what he has created. Hell is the painful refuge for those who chose to exist apart from God’s love.
Still, hell is a miserable place. Humans are allowed to have their choices, but sin is a miserable choice. The lower one descends into hell, the greater the suffering. Yet even those in the lightest circle, the circle of lust, still suffer eternal misery. Those in limbo, the philosophers who sought the highest good, sigh eternally knowing that they will never see God.
Dante’s Poetry
Italians, even those who are completely secular, still love the beauty and rhythm of Dante’s poetry. He has had more admirers than converts. Try listening to an Italian reading of the beginning of The Inferno. You might follow along in your text. Go to http://www.ilnarratore.com/show.php?type=author&language=en&aid=24&tpl=/eng/autore.tpl.html and download the file from La Divina Comedia: Inferno 1, read by Moro Silo (MP3 file). The “Dante Worlds” site also has brief audio recordings of selected lines from each canto: http://danteworlds.laits.utexas.edu/.
Medieval Catholic Theology
Dante is committed to the truth of Christianity as taught by the catholic church of his time. He is critical of representatives of the church who abuse their power; he places several popes in hell. He is aware of the need for reform in the church. But he is also committed to what he believes are the essential truths of the faith. Among these is the belief that there is no salvation without faith in Christ or apart from the church. As much as he loves and reveres Vergil, as much as he is moved by the plight of Francesca, and as much as he owes to Brunetto, he cannot rescue them from eternal condemnation in hell.
As a medieval catholic, Dante also believes in purgatory and in the power of the prayers of the saints. Humanity can be divided into those who have a right faith in God and those who don’t. Those who do can be divided into those who are ready for paradise and those who are not. Those who die in faith and in good standing with the church are assured of ultimate salvation. Most still have some sins that need to be purified before they are ready to enter the presence of God, since only the pure in heart can see God. For them, purgatory is an opportunity to finish the task of spiritual and human development that was not finished in their lifetime. They are “happy in the flames.”
Those who finally reach paradise will find a place appropriate to their level of spiritual grace. There are degrees of rewards in heaven as there are in hell.
Intermediate Status
The destiny of those in the inferno, purgatory, and paradise is already sealed for all eternity. However, the resurrection and the final judgment have not yet come. On that day, both the lost in hell and the redeemed in heaven will receive their resurrection bodies and will experience more keenly their reward or punishment. There is also in the Inferno mentions of a past event, one that happened not long after Vergil’s arrival to the realm (remember, the poet Vergil died a few years before the birth of Christ), the “harrowing of hell.” This was when Christ descended into hell between the time of his death and resurrection and released the Old Testament believers who were waiting in hope.
Memorable Characters
Those Who Never Lived
Just outside the gates of hell are the cowardly angels and humans who refused to take a stand. They are denied entrance into either heaven or hell, and their punishment is worse than any within hell itself. I list them under “memorable” characters, although in Dante’s eyes, they are imminently forgettable. They are nameless and faceless; their lives counted for nothing. Their number includes a great multitude.
The Virtuous Pagans
The virtuous pagans lack baptism and right faith. For no other fault, they are denied access to the heavenly realm. They now know of God as the emperor and conqueror, but not as their Lord or Father. Modern readers might wish the poet had assigned them a more generous fate, but we should remember three facts:
Dante is not modern; he is committed to a catholic Christian world view. To allow salvation apart from Christ would undermine that view. Second, the fate of the virtuous pagans is no worse than what they had expected. The ancient poets believed that all who died went to Hades, the realm of the dead. Hades was, however, divided into different realms. The virtuous went to the Elysian Fields, a pleasant, green realm of Hades. No humans expected to go to heaven.
Third, Dante knows he is writing fiction. Dante has serious theological points to teach, but he also calls his work a “comedy.” In reality, God is the one who will dispose of the souls of men and women. Dante knows this, but as a poet, the realms of the comedy are the universe of his creating, and he has the right to dispose of his characters according to the needs of his poetry. The poem requires Vergil to be a guide through hell. Part of what Dante teaches in the Inferno is the need to submit one’s passions to reason. The poet has to overcome his personal love for Vergil to allow him to play the role he needs to play in the Comedy.
Among the virtuous pagans are some whose works Dante the writer had read; others he had only heard of. He knew of the fame of Socrates, Plato, and Homer from Latin authors, but he had not read their works. Later we will see that he places Achilles in the circle of lust rather than wrath. This is not what we would expect from Homer, but Dante had not read Homer. He knew other stories in Latin that spoke of Achilles’ love life.
There had been several hundred years of hostility between Christian Europe and the Muslim east when Dante wrote. It is not surprising, in this context, that he places Mohammed deeply in hell. He does, however, include famous Muslims among the virtuous pagans; including Saladin (the enlightened hero of the recent movie “Kingdom of Heaven”) and Averroes who wrote a commentary on Aristotle.
Francesca and Paolo
Francesca and the handsome Paolo were adulterous lovers who were killed in Dante’s lifetime by her husband, the older (and ugly) brother of Paolo. Francesca predicts that Caїna, the lowest circle of hell, awaits their murder. Caїna is named after Cain, the first murderer, who killed his brother Abel. Francesca and Paolo’s souls cling together for all eternity, but without the beautiful bodies that attracted them to each other, swept along by the wind as they were swept away by passion in life.
Dante the pilgrim is swept away by Francesca’s seductive speech just as surely as Paolo was swept away by her beauty. Dante the poet was perhaps also touched with guilt at his role in writing love poetry. Had others been swept away into an illicit passion by reading his love lyrics? He never again wrote that kind of poetry after beginning the Comedy.
Dante the pilgrim’s reaction to various sinners presents a challenge to the readers. Later, he heaps scorn and punishment on some he meets. Is he learning that one should have no sympathy for those whose choice of life has been confirmed in hell? Another option is that he is affected by the chief sin of each circle. He is seduced in the circle of lust, he becomes angry when surrounded by the sin of anger. He has already learned that Beatrice has compassion in heaven on him while he still lives on the earth. The place for sympathy and compassion is on earth in this life, while it can do some good, not in the next world where the choices made in life have been sealed for eternity.
Beatrice
Beatrice will be a major character in purgatory, where she will replace Vergil as Dante’s guide. She is introduced briefly in the Inferno as the one who sent Vergil to rescue and guide him. The mutual love between Dante and Beatrice is a pure spiritual love, in contrast to the illicit love between Francesca and Paolo. A modern psychoanalytic reading might say that Dante has merely sublimated his lust and given it another name. Perhaps he would not disagree entirely.
He would recognize that love can take two forms: one holy and spiritual and one carnal and destructive; and that temptation can turn something good into a perversion. He would say that the point is to let reason guide the ways in which love is expressed.
On a symbolic level, Vergil represents reason as a guide to happiness in this life. Beatrice represents revelation or theology and grace that leads to eternal happiness.
Brunetto Latini
Brunetto Latini was a scholar of the classics and one of the first to use Italian for poetry. Dante the poet had read and been influenced by his works. It is uncertain whether had had actually been his student; but Dante the pilgrim treats him as a revered teacher and mentor. There are two puzzles in the encounter with Brunetto.
The first question is, if Brunetto was such a great mentor, why does Dante place him in hell? Because his circle is identified with Sodom, it is usually assumed that his sin is homosexual activity. Brunetto’s greeting, “How marvelous!” sounds “gay” even in translation; and other signs (the way the men eye each other up and down, in dark corners) seem to confirm this.
Perhaps motivated by contemporary sensitivities, some scholars have objected to this interpretation. First they note that neither Brunetto nor his companions are known from historical sources to have had this predilection, (though the fact that Dante mentions a great number of clergymen may indicate that a church that demanded a celibate clergy may have had the same scandals 700 years ago that plague the church today.) Second, in the Purgatorio, homosexuals are purged of the sin of lust in the same circle as heterosexual offenders. Brunetto is in a circle that represents crimes of violence against nature and therefore against God the creator. The other sin named in this circle is usury (associated with the Italian city of Cahors) a sin against God’s created way of gaining wealth, which is work.
One possible answer is that Dante recognized different forms of homosexuality. It may be that the form most frequently found among teachers and clergy involved the abuse of children entrusted to their care, a sin of violence more than of lust, a perversion of their role. Dante certainly regarded homosexual behavior among consenting adults as a sin. He also regarded affection and love between humans, whether of the same sex or the opposite sex, as God’s greatest gift. Like any gift it can be perverted or distorted and become destructive. It is not a sin to be tempted, but it is a sin to give way to temptation. The temptation to lust, whether heterosexual or homosexual, can be purged through spiritual discipline and reason in this life, or in purgatory.
The other puzzle about Brunetto involves his desire for fame even in hell. He asks Dante to remember his great work the Tresoro. This either refers to an encyclopedia he wrote in French, or to a collection of Italian poems. These two works had similar names that were sometimes confused. But the main question is, what good does it do him if people on earth continue to read his works? How does it help him in hell?
The answer to that question lies in the paradoxical nature of hell as a place of dignity and misery. Brunetto believes that fame for literary accomplishment is how one gains immortality. In that sense, he “has his reward.” Yet Dante also knows he is profoundly mistaken. Brunetto never mentions God as the way one attains immortality.
Mohammed
A few years ago a Muslim defaced a statue of Dante because of his portrayal of Mohammed. In light of the recent controversy over cartoons, this reaction is understandable. In Dante’s day, Muslims were considered a military and political threat. More than that, Islam was considered a false religion and Mohammed a false prophet. Mohammed is placed in the circle of the schismatics, those who cause divisions among the faithful. Mohammed’s punishment as a cause of division, is to be split down the middle.
His son-in-law Ali walks before him weeping. The split in Islam between Shiah and Sunni goes back to divisions over Ali as the legitimate successor of Mohammed. As Mohammed divided followers of the God of Abraham, his own religion is split down the middle.
We have already seen that Dante included great Muslim leaders in the circle of virtuous pagans. He does not have a hostility to Muslims as such. As a catholic, he can allow no salvation outside the church; but he can recognize the greatness and humanity of Muslim scholars and statesmen in the same way that he recognizes those qualities in famous philosophers and poets of the classical world.
Satan
At the very bottom of Hell is Satan, frozen up to his waist in ice. His head has three faces, and his mouths hold three sinners: Judas who betrayed Christ, and Brutus and Cassius who betrayed Caesar. Tears stream down Satan’s face. His six bat-wings beat the air causing the freezing winds that chill his tears (mingled with the tears of all humanity flowing down into the ice, of which he is the cause) into the ice that imprisons him.
Dante and Vergil climb onto his hairy legs; and then at midpoint Dante is confused when Vergil seems to turn upside down. They have reached the center of the earth and are now climbing up. They will emerge on the other side, ready to ascend Mount Purgatory.
Further Study
We have only required the first part of the Comedy, the Inferno, for this course. If you enjoyed Dante you may wish to read Purgatory and Paradise on your own.
Because of the many historical references, classical allusions, and heavy symbolism, The Divine Comedy required a commentary as soon as it was published. Even contemporaries of Dante who spoke the same language needed help.
There are several excellent web sites devoted to the study of Dante. Some have been listed above, but they will be included again with the others. Some of these sights also include commentaries and helps and lists of books on Dante.
The following is an excerpt from an article written by Mark Alterman:
“Dante on Line” at http://www.danteonline.it/english/home_ita.asp includes a magnificent collection of manuscripts with a user-friendly viewer. The Dartmouth Dante Project provides access to the full text of over fifty major commentaries arranged by date from 1321 to 2003. For some reason, I was unable to access the site directly, but had no problem when using Google. “Dante Worlds” includes interesting graphics as well as useful notes to the Divine Comedy, at http://danteworlds.laits.utexas.edu/. The Princeton Dante Project at http://etcweb.princeton.edu/dante/index.html includes images from art, notes, commentaries, and texts and audio in English and Italian. The audio reading of the entire Comedia in Italian by Lino Pertile (in Real Audio format) is quite good, but I prefer the reading of Moro Silo. MP3 files of the latter reading selected cantos from the inferno and other poetry are available at http://www.ilnarratore.com/collectman/show.php?type=author&language=en&aid=24&tpl=/eng/autore.tpl.html. Silo’s reading of the Inferno is slow, heavy, and somber; while his readings of La Vita Nova are light and enthusiastic.
[1] Dante himself refers to it as “this comedy” and “my comedy” [Inferno XVI.128 and XXI.2], but readers eventually added the adjective Divina.
