The Divine Comedy

Dante Alighieri

In this three-part epic poem, Dante Alighieri takes his readers on a pilgrimage to
Heaven via journeys first through Hell and Purgatory. It is a spiritual journey
expounding the evils of sin through the first-person narration of the aptly named main
character, Dante the Pilgrim. The title, The Divine Comedy, is not an implication that
the poem is humorous in nature. Rather, the poem is a “comedy” in that it is of the
classical style that existed in partnership with tragedy. Traditional tragedies had
plotlines that began with an optimistic, or positive, event but ended in sadness, death,
or a downtrodden existence. Comedy, considered a base genre, flowed in the
opposite direction with tragedy, or at least unhappiness, reaching a happy or optimistic
culmination.

Pilgrim’s journey through the realms of the dead lasts from the eve of Good Friday to
the Wednesday following Easter in the year 1300. The Roman poet Virgil is Pilgrim’s
guide through Hell and Purgatory. Beatrice, who represents Dante’s ideal woman,
leads passage through Heaven. Given its religious significance, it is not surprising that
The Divine Comedy is structured as a trinity. The three aforementioned sections in
literary terms are known as canticas and total 14,233 lines. Each cantica is made up
of thirty-three cantos, once again giving significance to the number “three.” The poem
has an introduction, which is considered part of the first cantica, thus giving the work a
total of one hundred cantos.

The opening section of the poem, Inferno, finds Dante lost in sin, symbolically
depicted as a dark wood. He is attacked by a lion, a leopard, and a she-wolf and
cannot find a way out to safety, or in the religious context of the poem, salvation. This
situation is represented by a mountain obscuring the sun. He is ultimately rescued by
Virgil who guides them through the underworld. Every sin in Inferno has a punishment
that symbolically, even ironically, levels justice. As an example, sinful seers or
fortune-tellers are destined to walk with their heads attached facing backward so as to
be unable to do what they did in life: see what is yet to come. The three animals that
attack Dante symbolize the sins of being self-indulgent, violent, and malicious. Hell is
structured as nine circles into which sinners are classified. Those suffering from
incontinence or lack of restraint fall into circles one through five. Pride or violence
make up circles six and seven. Fraud and malice are the sins connected to circles
eight and nine. Each of the circles signifies deeper and deeper evil ending in the
earth’s core, the realm of Satan. The punishments for the sins of each circle vary.

After surviving the journey through Hell, Virgil leads Dante to Purgatory, a mountain on
the far side of the world that was formed upon Hell’s creation. The mountain has
seven terraces representing the seven deadly sins. In the realm of Purgatory, sins are
classified more based on one’s motives than on one’s actions. Theologically, there is a
Christian basis although Dante does not rely exclusively on the Bible. Love is a
significant theme in The Divine Comedy. Love becomes sinful when driven by pride,
envy, or wrath. It is also sinful when it is sloth or weak, or too strong via lust, gluttony,
or greed. An additional region of Purgatory is the Ante-Purgatory home of those
excommunicated from the church and those who died who may have been repentant
but had not received rites. Purgatory is an allegory for the Christian life. Souls are
escorted there by angels with the hope that they might attain divine grace. The
structure of Purgatory from a scientific perspective shows a medieval knowledge of
the Earth as asphere.

On the final leg of his pilgrimage, Beatrice escorts Dante through Paradiso, that is,
Heaven. She guides him through the nine celestial spheres of Heaven. While Hell and
Purgatory were based on classifications of sin, Heaven is structured around the four
cardinal virtues and the three theological virtues. The initial seven spheres of Heaven
are concerned with the cardinal virtues of prudence, fortitude, justice, and temperance
and are where those embodying said virtues find themselves. The eighth sphere
contains those who achieved faith, hope, and love, which are considered the
theological virtues and represent the achievement of human perfection. The ninth
circle of Heaven is the place of angels, the beings never touched by sin. A final level,
which in a sense brings the total to ten, is the Empyrean wherein lies the essence of
God. Paradiso is of a more spiritual nature than the other two regions of The Divine
Comedy. Dante interacts with several saints there including Thomas Aquinas, and
Saints Peter and John. At the end of the text, Dante has an epiphany, which although
he cannot fully explain, unravels for him the mystery of Christ, and he feels himself as
one with God.