Exploring Dante's Inferno: A Journey Through Hell and Beyond
Dive into the vivid world of Dante's Inferno, where the poet himself embarks on a perilous journey through Hell and beyond. Encounter various circles of Hell, meet intriguing souls, and witness punishments that reflect the sins committed. Discover the intricate layers of the afterlife as Dante navigates through vivid imagery, encounters mythical figures, and grapples with themes of love, sin, and redemption in this captivating literary masterpiece.
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Dante is lost in the woods. He tries to climb the sunny mountain but is blocked by 3 beasts---a leopard, a lion, and a she-wolf. The ghost of Virgil (author of the Aeneid ), comes to show him how to get to the top of the mountain (Heaven) where Dante s true love, Beatrice, waits for him.
Anti-Inferno (just before the entrance to Hell) reside the souls of the uncommitted: people who lived their lives without making conscious choices between good and evil.
Contains the souls Contains the souls of the virtuous, of the virtuous, but who were but who were born before the born before the advent of advent of Christianity or Christianity or were never were never baptized baptized (therefore could (therefore could not properly not properly honor God) honor God) Admitted to Heaven --Noah, Moses, etc. Not admitted --Virgil, Homer, Horace, Aristotle, Socrates, etc.
Dante feels sympathy because they are essentially damned by love. (Helen, Cleopatra ) Sins of the flesh Francesca tells her story This is the most This is the most natural sin and the natural sin and the one associated one associated with love, so it s with love, so it s punishment is punishment is lightest. lightest. They are whirled They are whirled around by a around by a gigantic gale, gigantic gale, symbolic of their symbolic of their earthly passion. earthly passion.
The gluttonous must lie on the ground while the sewage and filth rain down upon them.
Plutus Plutus: In Greek : In Greek Mythology, Mythology, Plutus was the god of was the god of wealth. wealth. They lacked all They lacked all regulation in regulation in moderating moderating their expenses their expenses and gave up and gave up their souls in their souls in the pursuit of the pursuit of wealth. wealth. Plutus
Last station of Last station of Upper hell Upper hell Souls attacking Souls attacking one another in one another in putrid slime putrid slime The Sullen: Refuse The Sullen: Refuse to accept Divine to accept Divine Illumination and Illumination and are forever are forever doomed to lie in doomed to lie in the stinking mud the stinking mud beneath the river beneath the river Styx. Styx.
City of City of Dis of Hell of Hell Rebellious Angels; Rebellious Angels; Creatures of ultimate Creatures of ultimate evil evil Refuse to let the poets Refuse to let the poets pass pass Incapable of human Incapable of human reason reason Dis: The Capital : The Capital Phlegyas Phlegyas: The Boatman : The Boatman of Styx of Styx In a fit of rage, Phlegyas set fire to the temple of Apollo because the god had raped his daughter. Apollo promptly slew him. Phlegyas, whose own father was Mars , appears in Virgil's underworld as an admonition against showing contempt for the gods.
The Descent into The Descent into Lower Hell Lower Hell Marked by a Marked by a boiling river of boiling river of blood blood Great Great Warmakers Warmakers, , tyrants, tyrants, highwaymen, and highwaymen, and all who waged all who waged violence against violence against their fellow man. their fellow man. As they shed blood in their lifetime, so must they wallow in the boiling river of blood for all eternity.
Round Two: The Violent Against Themselves (The Suicides) The Souls are encased in trees whose leaves are eaten by the Harpies (overseers of the damned). Thus, they who destroyed themselves are denied a human form. Round Three: The Violent Against God, Nature, and Art. (The Blasphemers, the Sodomites, and the Usurers) Plain of burning sand and an eternal rain of fire. Symbolism is sterility and wrath. All three are unnatural actions.
Malebolge (The Evil Ditches) The upper half of the Hell of the Fraudulent and the Malicious Malebolge is a great amphitheatre within are 10 circles, each containing sinners of Simple Fraud
Driven on an endless walk by horned demons to represent the way they goaded others on in life to serve their own purposes.
Sunk in excrement, the true equivalent of their false flatteries on earth.
People who have tried to buy/sell ecclesiastical favors or offices They are doomed to remain upside down in a mockery of the baptismal font they are baptised by fire. Simon Magus: Simon the Samarian magician (Acts VIII; 9-24) Upon his conversion to Christianity he offered to buy the power to administer the Holy Ghost and was rebuked by Peter.
The souls of all those who attempted by forbidden arts to look into the future. Tiresias: the ancient Greek prophet Doomed to forever walk backwards their heads are turned around and their eyes are blinded by tears.
Unscrupulous use of one's position to derive profit or advantages; extortion. Money or an advantage gained or yielded by unscrupulous means. The Grafters are stuck in boiling pitch which represents the sticky fingers they used in their life. It also serves to keep them out of sight the way their unscrupulous deeds were kept out of site.
The Hypocrites are weighed down by leaden robes as they eternally walk around a circle. The robes are brilliantly guilded on the outside, but serve to hide the terrible weight of their deceit in life.
A pit full of monstrous reptiles who curl themselves around the thieves, binding their hands which had done so much evil in their lifetime.
Their crime was to abuse the gifts given to them by the Almighty. Ulysses (Odysseus) and Diomedes Ulysses narrates a tale of his last voyage and death. Ulysses crimes were: The Trojan Horse Persuading Achillles to sail to Troy wherein his lover died of grief at his departure. The theft of the sacred statue of Pallas, which was believed to protect Troy, thus resulting in Troy s downfall.
Just as their sin was to rend asunder what God had meant to be united, so they are hacked and torn through all eternity by a great demon with a bloody sword. After each mutilation, the souls drag their bodies around the pit and return to the demon, only to be hacked again.
Class I: The Alchemists They are punished by afflictions of every sense: darkness, stench, thirst, filth, loathsome diseases, and a shrieking din. Classes II-V: Evil Impersonators, Counterfeiters, False Witnesses They represent what society would be if all falsifiers succeeded a place where the senses are an affliction, rather than a guide.
The giants They are symbols of the earth-trace that every devout man must clear from his soul (base human natures) ; the unchecked passions of the beast.
Caina: Named for Cain Here lie those who were treacherous against blood ties. Antenor: named for Antenor, the Trojan who was believed to have betrayed his city to the Greeks.
Ptolomeaus of Maccabees, who murdered his father-in- law at a banquet. Count Ugolino and Archbishop Ruggieri, who are in Antenora for treason. In life, they had plotted together. Then Ruggieribetrayed Ugolino and caused his death by starvation, along with Ugolino s four sons.
Judecca: Judas Iscariot The treacherous to their masters They lie completely sealed in ice, twisted and distorted into every conceivable posture. It is impossible to speak to them. Satan: Fixed into the ice at the center to which flow all the rivers of guilt; and as he beats his great wings as if to escape, their icy wind only freezes him more surely into the polluted ice. He has three faces and in each mouth he clamps a sinner whom he rips eternally with his teeth.
The poets now climb through the center, grappling hand over hand down the hairy flank of Satan himself---a supremely symbolic action--- and at last reach the next level---Purgatorio
