Day 19: Simony, or I'll sell you an indulge today for a sin tomorrow

Simony is one of those medieval sins that has lost favor in modernity, even though anyone who has turned on the 700 club late at night could bear witness to exactly the sort of religious swindling and snake oil salesmen Dante castigates in this circle.  The term derives from Simon of Magus, who not so coincidently is introduced in the first lines of Canto 19.  Simon was mentioned in Acts as the man who approached the disciples Peter and John and offered them money in exchange for giving him the power to impart the Holy Spirit in anyone he touched.  In medieval times, this process was practiced in the infamous practice of indulgences (i.e. corrupt clergymen offering to erase sins from the soul for a not so modest fee).  You see examples of this in the never ending slew of religious informercials promising a vial of "blessed" water from the river jordan or a jar of earth from Jerusalem to help purge the sinner of his transgressions, all for the low low price of what$v$r.  In fact, most of the shtick that the televanglists perform could be contrued as an act of simony. 
Dante, in all his poetic irony, has crafted a devious punishment for Simon and his like minded crew.  He and Virgil come across a series of small pools, made to look like baptismal basins popular in San Giovanni at the time.  The sinners, though, are immersed upside down.  Their feet are afire, and they are writhing in agony so much that "they would have severed withes and ropes of grass".  The sinner writhing with the most vigor is Pope NIcholas III, whom Dante obviously believed to be guilty of simony, but who in actuality wasn't the worst guy, having settled a division between more moderate and extreme branches of the Franciscan order and worked tirelessly to help the poor.  When Dante approaches him Nicholas actually mistakes him for the contemporary pope of Dante's time, Boniface.  He says something interesting, proclaiming that the book has lied to him by several years, revealing that at least some of these sinners have been privvy to the fates of those not passed on to the afterlife yet.  It is safe to assume that Dante believes Boniface is headed towards this particular circle of Inferno.  But it does lead to an interesting rumination.  By this reading, Dante believes that people's fates are fixed.  There is no free will.  But if that were true, why exactly is he going on the journey.  He is lost, he knows he needs to transform his desire.  But if its already been written in "the book". isn't it a pointless endeavor (unless, of course, the fates have already preordained his transformation of desire, placing him in whatever circle of inferno purgatorio or paradiso he is destined for and this journey is part of him fulfilling his destiny.) 
So where does Dante land in the afterlife.  There's a whole doctoral thesis for you, one that cannot really be answered (as if most of them can be).
All of this talk of simony reminds me of the pardoner's tale from Chaucer's Cantebury Tales.  Chaucer was a huge Dante fan and there are certainly echoes of his masterpiece in Chaucer's own masterpiece.  It is such a saucy read, especially in the prologue, where the pardoner boasts repeatedly of swindling poor souls he believes are undeserving of salvation, and thus his stealing money from them is quite justified.  He repeatedly makes use of the biblical phrase "money is the root of all evil", al the while continuing to amass more and more money from these unfortunate and gullible souls.  He is devilish in his doings, and yet he is a fairly interesting and complex character, knowing full well the dastardly nature of his trade.  If you haven't read the Cantebury Tales, i would highly recommend it, especially if you have digested the Divine Comedy and are yearning for more.  It is also extremley funny at times, which is a welcome break from Dante's unrelenting seriousness.     

Day 18: we venture away from the text

There are plenty of things to say about Canto 18. It's been nicknamed the Maleboge, which deliciously translates as "Evil Pouches".  Dante describes the architecture of this circle as concentric circles that naked sinners are marching, and it harkens to moats of castles. The sinners march is in direct response to the jubilee that Dante witnessed wherein Pope Boniface VIII introduced that oh so heretical trend from medieval times called "indulgences" (i.e. the church enabling sinners to purchase an indulgence, which would remove a sin from their soul). Jason, from the famed Jason and the Argonauts fable, is present.  Yes there are some wonderfully interesting things here.  But I wanted to veer from my own proverbial rut to examine a painting of ruts.
The picture above was created by the renaissance master, Sandro Botticelli.  He is best known for his masterpiece "Venus in a Clamshell", but his illustrations for the divine comedy are a remarkable achievement.  What strikes me, and I am no art critic, is the use of color in the composition.  There is a striking dispersement of vibrant reds and blues amongst the flat pallatte of browns and yellows which represent the sinners and their prison.  The demons harassing the sinners in the trench are terrifying in their uniqueness.  They range from a minotaur, to a kind of reverse centaur with the head of a horse on the winged body of a man, to the most detailed of the demons looking very much like I would imagine the harpies from the suicide forest.  We the viewers are looking at a static painting that Boticelli clearly wanted to portray a moving image.  The figures of Dante and Virgil are represented in 6 distinct locations.  Most interestly of these representations is the one closest to the vantage point.  It is the only place in the painting where there is noticable space separating Dante and his guide.  Dante looks transfixed on the horrors below him, while virgil appears to be pensively praying, perhaps futiley hoping for the end of the eternal torment on display below him.  It is also the only representation of Dante where he doesn't seem to visibly recoil.  His expression is one of fascination, not fear.  And what to make of the ghostly apperation in the top left corner.  It looks like a manticore, or some variation on another mythical beast.  The figure has certainly spooked Dante, whose stance is clearly one of terror.
This painting has a glorious depth and motion to it.  There is a gripping sense of fear, perpetual agony, and a vibrant separation between those receiving, inflicting and observing torture.  Boticelli has captured the essence of Inferno like few others, regardless of the medium, have.

Day 17: At the halfway point of Inferno, Dante unleashes a torrent of similes and turns right

Not to get too grammatically geeky, but one could spend a lifetime scouring, analyzing a debating the metaphors that are omnipresent in the Divine Comedy.  In each circle, terrace or sphere, Dante is confronted with the metaphoric representation of a particular virtue or vice.  The whole epic could be described as a metaphor for the transformation of desire.  It is quite interesting, then, that as we are in the center of the first book, Dante unleashing a string of similes, perhaps totally all the similes we have seen so far.  That, and the quite uncharacteristically melodramatic episode that overwhelms Dante at the end of the canto, make this a memorable, unique read. 
We begin right where we left off with the cliffhanger from last canto.  Virgil and Dante are confronted with a beast that emerges from the fiery river.  And here come the similes.  The creature had a face of a man, but his trunk was as a serpent.  His arms were hairy as a wolf or bear.  And his flanks were adorned with knots and circles as elaborate as any turkish tapestry or any web Arachne wove.  The beast arose from the liquid as a boat half submerged.  The beast positioned himself with his tail, which was as a scorpion's, like a beaver defending it's damn.  Dante is descrbing the mythical three faced Geryon, but it has also been speculated that this beast is the fabled Manticore. But what a string of similes! 
There is also another interesting tidbit to do with the trajectory of Dante's quest.  Up until this moment, Dante and Virgil have descended only by turning left.  But here in Canto 17, they turn right.  Virgil even makes a point to say "now we'd better bend our path a little, till we reach as far as that malicious beast which crouches over there."  I have a little theory about this, and am probably way off base.  Their journey is one of descension through hell towards righteousness.  But at this moment, they need the aid of a damned soul in order to traverse the fiery river.  So consequently, in a very brief sidestep, they divert from their path to utilize this damned beast.  It is a moment of using evil for the purpose of good. 
But look at the consequences for this action.  We are privy to Dante the poet unleashing a brief melodramatic exposition, as he observes from the back of the Geryon the scene further down in Inferno.  Dante is overwhelmed by fear and dread, "There i was more afraid of falling off, for i saw fires and I heard laments at which I tremble, crouching and hold fast."  He describes his fear as Icarus making his fateful voyage, as well as Phaethron losing control of the chariot which guides the son on its orbit (again with the similes).  But it is curious, because Dante has been in hell for while now, and seem some pretty horific stuff up to this point.  Does this moment when fear immobilizes him have something to do with the clear departure from their movement left?  It certainly seems to be connected somehow. 
The canto ends with finally another simile.  While Dante was so dsitracted by fear, the Geryon has set him and virgil down, like a falcoln who's flight was unseen by its falconer, returns to his arm.  Once again, Dante and Virgil continue their journey downward to the left.  The paralysis is gone and the similes become metaphors. 

Day 16: Meeting the three as one

Ok, this canto starts off pretty weird.  Dante and Virgil, still in the circle of sodomites, hear "a murmur, like a beehive's hum,"and are confronted by three characters.  They see the clothing style of Dante and recognize that he is from teh same land that they are; Florence.  Dante see the burn marks throughout their bodies and is racked with guilt, which is meant to convey to the reader that these unfortunate souls were on the losing end of the guelph ghebbiline struggle and were burnt alive like so many victims.  While Dante wishes to skirt past them as quickly as possible, Virgil insists that they be given a respectful audience.  The three figures then begin to perform what seems to me like a bizarre acrobatic feat.  In Dante's (translated) words, "They formed a wheel, all three of them together. As champions, naked oiled, will always do, each studying the grip that serves them best, beofre the blows and winds begin to fall, while wheeling so, each one made sure his face was turned to me, so that their necks opposed their feet in one uniterrupted flow." So basically, this apepars to me to be some kind of three man cartwheel, facing dante with all three heads.  The three are named, Guido Guerra, Tegghaio Aldobrandi and Jacopo Rusticucci.  Guerra and Aldobrandi advised the Florentine Guelphs against engaging in battle against the Sienese Ghibellines. They were also responsible for exiling the Ghibellines out of Florence.  Rusticucci, the lesser known of the three explains that it was his "shrewdish wife" which drove him to homosexuality and, consequently, the circle of sodomy.  Dante feels a certain sense of comradery with these "fine souls", as folks fighting on the same side as he was (obviously sodomy notwithstanding.  They are in inferno after all).  The souls are gratfeul for Dante's kind words and are curious about their shared hometown.  Dante laments that the newcomers have brought greed and sin to their Florence.  They sigh, but have a request for Dante.  They yearn for him to tell the living of the good deeds of them.  They only wish to have their name spoken in a positive light, and to be remembered.  This is certainly a request most people would want.  With these words, the three who had become one, broke back into three.  So what do we make of this very deliberate image.  After all, their dialog and request could have been done without the gymnastics. Was it supposed to be some sort of trinity image.  Numerology has significance throughout the Divine Comedy, and the number three has importance amongst mathmeticians (the triangle), masons, christians, etc.  And what to make of the fact that immediately after this encounter, Dante and Virgil descend down into a ravine using a rope that Dante assures is strong enough to catch a leopard.  They reach the bottom of the ravine and come to a sea, out of which a strange figure emerges like the creature formteh black lagoon.  And after hanging on a cliff, we are left on this literary cliffhanger.  I admit I am baffled by this canto.  There are some provocative lines and the image of the three as one is captivating.  I just don't get at what Mr. Alighieri is trying to accomplish with such vivid imagery.  We leave that to the "scholars."  

Day 15: Dante and Brunetto

There is a telling stanza in this canto that brings the reader back to the beginning.  Dante exclaims while walking through the realm of sodomites that he is quite removed from the forest of the suicides.  It was translated as "by now we were so distant from the wood that I should not have made it out where it was-not even if i turned around to look" This may just be Dante situating the reader geographically, but i think there may be more.  The language in Italian, while obviously different, still carries familiar echoes.  It also doesn't seem like much of a coincidence that this line is spoken at almost the exact center of Inferno.  So halfway through the 1st leg of a journey that he begins halfway through his life, Dante stops to inform his reader just how far he has come.  The obscurity of the dark forest of suicides stands merely as a metaphor for the larger distance both Dante and the readers have taken.  We are very, very far from Kansas at this point.  Maybe many less invested and adventurous readers have abandoned the journey.  But those of us who stuck around are given pause to possibly reflect before resuming the descent.
The picture above.  Well, it's one of the famous Dore illustrations he did for the longfellow translation of the Divine Comedy.  It shows the pivotal meeting between Dante and his guardian/teacher/mentor Brunetto Latini.  Despite his damnation, Dante speaks of him with great affection, praising him for his "kind paternital image" and speaks of his eternal gratitude to Latini for teaching him to be a better poet and man.  There is such tenderness in Dante's words that commentators have asked the obvious modern question of whether the relationship between Dante and Latini was deeper than a chaste mentor/protege relationship.  I am not one to speculate on these matters, although it does change the readers perception if one entertains this (and not just for this canto, but the epic in general, especially given the specificity of the dark forest motiff reoccurance in this specific canto).  But it is, regardless of the larger implications, a very sweet moment between teacher and student, and considering how deep into the torments of Inferno we are, I'll take it.

Day 14: The defiant ones

Well, as is evident, my frequency in updating this blog has lessened as of late.  This is an all too common occurance for me.  I begin with great gusto, only to peter out into obsolescence (i usually give up when I forget my password to access it). But I am trying to right the ship.  I choose to be defiant over my own waning creative impulses. 
This canto is another demonstration of Dante's masterful command of creating a terrifying visual enactment of sin.  We are still among the violent sinners.  We are, technically at the boundary between the second and third rings in the violent sphere.  The scenery is typically frightening.  Dante the poet surveys a land on the edge of the suicide forest, divided by the fiery river of blood.  Dante and Virgil descend into an open field.  The ground is composed of sand, populated by countless souls in a variety of poses of dispair.  They are a mishmash, some wallowing flat on the ground, others hunched in fetal positions.  Some were static, while others seemed to possessed to be in constant motion.  Interestingly, the largest group, the walkers, were silent, while those who stand or sit stationary chatter incessantly.  Oh, and by the way, is raining scorching embers, and these souls are unable to quench the burning.  This has to be one of the more striking visual representations of what modern day fundamentalist christians imagine when speaking of the hellfire of the eternally damned.  Dante, noticeably shaken by the wretched scene, sees one soul, a giant among men, defiant against the constant torment of the burning embers.  It is Capaneus, the giant wrrior king who was one of the Seven Against Thebes.  According to legend, Capaneus stood before the wall of Thebes and proclaimed that not even Zeus could stop him from ascending the wall.  Of course, as he is climbing the wall, Zeus strikes him dead with a thunderbolt. (on a side note, defiance was a trait in his household, as his wife Evadne threw herself on his funeral pyre, to demonstrate her love, rather than to live on without him)
Capaneus noticed that Dante had inquired about him to Virgil and spoke up, delviering a pretty badass little speech.  He haughtily proclaimed "That which I was in life, I am in death. Though Jove wear out the smith form whom he took, in wrath...and casts his shafts at me with all his force, not even then would he have happy vengeance."  This is one tough hombre.  He stands here, for all eternity, egging Lucifer and God on.  'Give me your best shot.  I can take it.'  While Virgil tries half heartedly to chastise Capaneus that because of this defiance he is punished all the more, there is almost a tone of respect about him.  Virgil says to Dante that Capaneus wears his defiance over God like a ornaments on his chest.
From here our guides carry on, seeing other characters throughout history that have committed violence against God.  But this image of Capanaeus strikes me as a poignant moment, much like one we will witness with Cato in Purgatory.  For Dante the former warrior, there is a hint of sympathy for people like Capaneus.  Even though he is in Inferno, he deals with his torment on his own terms.  Capaneus, like Dante, is defiant.   

Day 13: Harpies and Forests

So we are still amongst those who have sinned violently, but these are the sinners who defile themselves through suicide.  Dante and Virgil, with Nessus guiding them away from the blood river find themselves among a dark forest.  Sounds familiar doesn't it.  I was reading the notes from Hollander's Inferno translation, which has some very insightful analysis.  I'm not sure why it never occurred to me to connect the dark forest from Canto 1, with this dark forest.  Sometimes we need someone with much more knowlege than ourselves to see the forest through the trees (sorry, the bad joke was just screaming out).  Is Dante trying to tell us something about how bad his state of mind was when he began this journey?  Before we jump to that, let me explain a little about this particular dark forest. 
Perched throughout these trees are the harpies.  The harpies play a fairly memorable role in Virgil's Aenid. Aeneas and his crew land on the small island of Strophades.  Once landed they proceed to begin slaughtering the abundant livestock on the island, and prepare them for a feast.  These animals, however, have protectors on the island in the form of the harpies.  Virgil descibes them as having heads of women and bodies of birds, and twice while Aeneas and his crew are trying to eat do they swarm in and attack them and, in a move any city dwellar dealing with pigeons can relate to, defectate all over the feast.  The harpies in Canto 13 feed upon the leaves of the trees in the grove.  What is horrific, and what Dante finds out by accident when he breaks off a thorn of a tree, is that these trees actually entomb the souls of suicides. When the thorn breaks off, a rivulet of blood trickles down and Dante is forced into a conversation with the soul inhabitting that tree.  So then the harpies are actually consuming parts of the soul trees, which echoes the animalistic nature consuming the the human nature in Canto 12.
But back to Dante and the dark woods.  The question that Hollander poses is a fascinating one.  Is Dante suicidal when he is having his mid-life crises?  It would be hard to imagine that it is an act that he would pursue beyond having the impulse.  In fact, i'd argue it was pretty amazing that Dante would even admidt to having such thoughts.  In medieval Europe, suicide was considered one of the gravest sins.  Now this wasn't always the case.  In ancient greece and during Caesar's time in Rome, the act of defiant suicide was a form of heroism.  One would rather end one's life than be subserviant to a ruler or cause, and this would be a form of honor.  Dante knows this and holds Cato, the most famous of the Roman suicides, with respect and gives him an honored place in the afterlife (he acts as the guide to souls entering purgatorio.  kind of like Charon in Inferno).  But clearly during Dante's time, suicide is a one way ticket to hell, with no chance of escape.  Also interesting in his commentary, Hollander posits that trees hold a special place in the sacrificial imagery of Christianity.  After all, a cross is nothing but a tree.  So would Dante consider his own martyrdom the ultimate act of sacrifice?  It is a bit nebulous as far as what exactly Dante the poet's role is compared to Dante the protagonist.  It sure does seem to me that Dante's use of forests both in the beginning and here is not coincidence.