Mendoza, Franchezka L.

Faith and Love

As I grew up, I consider faith and love as two of the most significant values in the world.

I believe that these two are both non-material things that keep the person alive. Both of them are

too powerful and can be expressed through different ways. There are several individuals who are

using these two as the center of their works and some of them are Dante Alighieri and Rumi.

Both of them used the beauty of poetry but they derived different opinions regarding the two.

Upon reading the works of Dante Alighieri’s Inferno, Canto V and Rumi’s Granite and

Wineglass, Buoyancy, and Music Master, I comprehended different sides of faith and love.

For Dante Alighieri and Rumi, faith is an important thing that must be taken up seriously.

Both of them acknowledge the essence of believing on something beyond rational reasons and

evidences. Both of them reminded their readers how valuable it is to find divine’s love and

presence. However, since faith is too powerful that cannot be describe wholly and perfectly by

someone, it is expected that Dante Alighieri and Rumi through their writings, explained the

meaning of this word in two different ways. Dante Alighieri through Inferno, Canto V,

enlightened his readers that faith to the divine is the ultimate path of life but because of sins that

each individual commit, people lost their ways. Some lines that can support this idea can be

found in second stanza of Canto V. It says, “There Minos sits, grinning, grotesque, and hale. He

examines each lost soul as it arrives and delivers his verdict with his coiling tail.”. This means

that once you have lost your way, you will be in a place where you will receive the consequences

of the sins that you have committed. Those consequences are not simple. In fact, it is

unrecognizable and cannot be encounter in Earth based on what he had written, “Now I have

come to Hell’s full lamentation, sound beyond sound”, that can be found in the 9th stanza. Indeed,
Dante Alighieri did not use sweet and sugar coated words to explain how important faith is and

how wicked the consequences that we can get once we taken it for granted. He is very vocal and

bold in explaining the consequences that someone can get through sins that is why he reminded

his readers through 7th stanza to be careful and do not be misled. According to his work, “Do not

be misled by the wide and easy passage”. He is pertaining to the fact that it is very easy to

commit a sin and several individuals might enter the gates of hell. On the other hand, Rumi used

lighter way in explaining faith to his readers. Instead of being vocal about how terrific the

situation it can be once you did not acknowledge the divine, Rumi used his works to remind

individuals how joyful it is to be with the presence of the divine. In fact, it is an overflowing joy

that even words cannot explain that is why he put “I had to clap and sing” in 2 nd stanza of

Buoyancy. It is like a form of celebration and declaration of divine’s goodness. Also, Rumi

reminded his readers that the divine is leading them for so long and He will surely guide them

further. For Rumi, God is an ocean and His people are ships that must remove any guilt that they

feel so they can rest in their faith along the way. If Dante Alighieri used bold warnings to remind

his readers how significant it is to have faith to divine, Rumi used his works to remind

individuals the beauty of having faith to God.

Aside from faith, Dante and Rumi explained love in two different ways. Even though

both of them acknowledged that love is a powerful and beautiful thing, they portrayed this word

in different two perspectives. For Dante Alighieri, there is nothing wrong about love. What

makes it evil is when sin comes in. Love is fair but mixing it with desire makes it sinful and

imperfect. Dante Alighieri is reminding his readers to love from a far unlike what Dido and

Sichaeus did. Dante believes that once you pursue or touch someone, it is not love anymore

because it is already lust. In fact, Dante Alighieri considers love with lust or any form of desire
as something that can be the reason why someone will be dammed to hell. On the other hand,

Rumi explained love through sweet words that any couple can appreciate. Rumi reminded his

readers through one of his works, Buoyancy, to sacrifice for the one that you love. He insisted

that you must love without counting even though it is hard because it should be in that way. In

his Music Master, he explained how love keeps the person alive while in his work, Granite and

Wineglass, he acknowledged that love requires patience and gentleness. If Dante Alighieri used

his work to recognized the power of lust to destroy love in order to remind his readers to be

careful, Rumi used light words to remind his readers how to unconditionally show love to

someone through gentle actions and upright attitude.

All in all, Dante Alighieri and Rumi both gave reminders and lessons to their readers

about faith and love. Even though they have different ways of showing and explaining different

things, both of them has one purpose and that is to remind their readers the beauty, essence and

power of these two.