Midway in the journey of our life I found myself in a dark wood, for the straight way
was lost. Ah, how hard it is to tell what that would was, wild, rugged, harsh;
the very thought of it renews the fear!
I cannot rightly say how I entered it, I was so full of sleep at the moment
I left the true way ....
Canto I
Through me you enter the woeful city,
through me you enter eternal grief,
through me you enter among the Lost ....
Abandon every hope, you who enter.
Canto III
I will have you know that they did not sin ...
that without hope they live in longing.
Canto VI
Consume yourself inwardly with your own rage
Canto VII
... the circle of Judas. That is the lowest place, and the
darkest, and farthest from the heaven that encircles all.
Canto X
All the first circle is for the violent: but because violence is done to three persons,
it is divided and constructed in three rings.
To God, to oneself, and to one's neighbor.
Canto XI
Behold the beast with the pointed tail, that infects all the world!
Canto XVII
Rise, therefore; conquer your panting with the soul that wins every battle ..
Canto XXIV
Consider you origin; you were not made to live as brutes,
but o pursue virtue and knowledge.
Canto XXVI
Commentary Notes
Philosophy calls those who are immoderate, pigs;
the fraudulent, foxes;
the garrulous dogs;
the truculent, lions;
the irascible, boars;
the rapacious, wolves;
the torpid asses.
All of them dwell amidst the things of this world.
Metaphors
The lake of the heart ... a concavity or ventricle in which the blood gathered.
... this lake was identified as the location of fear in the human body.
The savage way of Hell corresponds to the dark wood of the sinful life.
The journey beyond always remains potentially our journey here.
---------
For Dante, the Roman Empire is directly ordained by God as part of His providential plan
for man's redemption and was established in order to prepare the way for the Adven
of the Saviour and the foundation of His Church on earth.
Saint Lucy of Syracuse, the third-century virgin martyr ... patron saint of those who suffer
from eye ailments, the symbol of illuminating grace.
To be deprived of action is to be deprived of love.
By God's mercy man is saved; by Hils justice, man is condemned.
Limbo is reckoned as teh first of the nine circles of Hell, even though in another sense it lies outside of Hell proper.
Hell is funnel-shaped, each successive circle in the descent is smaller in circumfernce than the one above it.
mal nata .. applied repeatedly to the damned in Hell, suggest that "it would be better for them not to have been born." (Matthew 26:24)
bene nato ... addressed to those assured of salvation.
The entrance of Hell is very wide indeed (Matthew 7:13)
In Hell the name of the God is avoided or is uttered only in blasphemy.
The condition most longed for by these souls eternally tossed on the infernal winds is that which, in punishment, is eternally denied them ... longing for peace.
Here in upper Hell, the souls of the guttons are "empty" and insubstantial; they have only the appearance of bodies.
He who exceeds in giving is said to be prodigal, while he who is deficient in giving is said to be covetous.
Tight-fisted ... Cropped hair as a symbol of wasting one's substance.
This world is a swindle, and everyone in it squabbles.
The muddy people are the wrathful ... in this second death of Hell they continue to act the part as they assail and rend each other in their furious anger.
The souls who are entirely submerged int eh mire constitute a special problem. by their own declaration, they were sullen in life and harbored a sluggish smoke within themselves. Moreover, ... they can only gurgle their words and are unable to utter them with unbroken speech.
Torpor is sowrrow depriving of speech.
The Philospher (Aristotle) calls some angry persons choleric, because they are easily angered; some he calls bitter, because they retain their anger for a long time; and some he calls ill-tempered, because they never rest until they have retaliated. These then are the three classes of the wrathful.
... a sullen person has an abiding anger on account of an abinding displeasure, which he hold locked in his breast, where as the vindictive harbor wrath because of their intense desire for vengeance.
Continue ...
No comments:
Post a Comment