A Somewhat Less Divine Comedy
7 centuries ago, Dante Alighieri took a tour with Virgil through Hell. He helpfully left us a road map for our contemporary journey through the same landscape.
There is a lot of truth in history and literature.
Over the past month, I have been re-reading Dante’s Divine Comedy and reinforcing how little has changed in the 700 or so years since Dante put quill to paper.
The first part is the Inferno, describing Dante’s journey through Hell, guided by Virgil, the ancient Roman poet.
In Dante’s Inferno, there are nine circles of Hell. See if you can tell where we are in our journey:
The First Circle of Hell is Limbo. You must cross the river Acheron on a boat to reach Limbo. Limbo contains people who did not accept Christ, the virtuous pagans and people who were never baptized. These are souls who don’t have enough faith to enter Heaven, but also were not sinful enough to be send deeper in Hell.
The Second Circle of Hell is Lust, the home of people driven by lust and were violent winds drag and beat the tormented souls on the rocks.
The Third Circle of Hell is Gluttony where the souls of the people who indulged in voracious feasting and appetite are tortured. The souls are punished by a constant icy and violent storm which rains foul, decaying sludge, mud, worms, and human waste across a putrefying landscape.
The Fourth Circle of Hell is Greed. Greed is split into two groups – the souls of people who spent lavishly and wastefully and those of people who hoarded. They are subjected to the eternal misery of self-pity and lies, never satisfying their own endless, never-ending greed.
The Fifth Circle of Hell is Wrath. The souls here are condemned to eternal combat with each other as they sink into the stinking, fetid waters of the river Styx. If you just gossiped and indulged in little lies, you get to stay near the surface, if you were driven by hateful rage, you get sunk to silt at the bottom.
The Sixth Circle of Hell is Heresy. This is the beginning of Lower Hell. The souls here are those who denied God and Christ. They are trapped in flaming tombs.
The Seventh Circle of Hell is Violence. This circle is subdivided into three segments. The first is for those who did violence to their neighbors. The second is for those who did violence to themselves through suicide. The final one is reserved for souls of people who committed blasphemy, sodomy, and bestiality. It is also the eternal home for unfair money lenders. These souls are dipped in sweltering blood and flames of the river Phlegethon, the depth is dependent on the severity of their offense.
The Eighth Circle of Hell is Malebolge (translated as “evil ditches”), divided into ten ditches (bolgia). It is populated by the fraudulent. Dante and Virgil reach it on the back of Geryon, a flying monster with various and changing (i.e., fraudulent) natures.
In the First Bolgia, panderers sex workers, and seducers are tortured. They are whipped by the demons for exploiting others by seducing them to fulfill their interests.
In the Second Bolgia, flatterers are being tortured.
In the Third Bolgia, Simoniacs who sold the church’s roles and offices are punished.
In the Fourth Bolgia, sorcerers - diviners, fortune tellers, astrologers, and other false prophets - are tormented by having their heads twisted backward and are condemned to walk backward, their own tears blinding them for eternity.
In the Fifth Bolgia, politicians who sold their public offices for money are punished. They are dunked in boiling pitch for indulging in corruption and betraying their country. If they try to escape the scalding pitch, a clawed demon called Malebranche tears them limb from limb if they rise above the surface of the pitch.
In the Sixth Bolgia, all the hypocrites are punished for the false status they built in the society for themselves. They are made to climb a mountain with heavy, leaden robes weighing them down.
In the Seventh Bolgia, all the thieves are punished. They are tormented in a huge pit filled with snakes, lizards, and other reptiles that bite them and curl around their bodies.
In the Eighth Bolgia, the counselors of deception and fraud are punished by being covered in flames.
In the ninth Bolgia, people who separated religion to form their own religion are being punished. They are mutilated for their sins for eternity.
In the tenth Bolgia, the falsifiers are tortured. Alchemists, counterfeits, impersonators, perjurers, and others are subjected to horrific diseases, filth, thirst, disgusting odor, screaming, and darkness.
The Ninth Circle of Treachery is called Cocytus, a frozen lake where souls are frozen in the depths of the Lake depending on the type and severity of their sins. The Ninth Circle is further divided into four Rounds.
The First Round of Ninth Circle is called Caina, named after Cain who murdered his own brother Abel. Here, the souls of people who betrayed their own family and kin are freezing for eternity. Their neck and heads are above the ice where they experience the blizzards without protection.
The Second Round of Ninth Circle is called Antenora named after Antenor, the soldier from Troy who betrayed his own city to the Greeks. Here, the souls of people who betrayed their country are punished.
The Third Round of the Ninth Circle is called Ptolomaea. Here, traitors who betrayed their guests are punished (Ptolemy, son of Abubus, tricked his father-in-law and brothers-in-law with the promise of a sumptuous meal and then murdered them after getting them drunk).
The Fourth Round of Ninth Circle is called Judecca named after Judas Iscariot. The traitors against God are frozen into an immobile and distorted ice statue. There is complete silence in this round.
After crossing Judecca comes the Centre of the Hell. People who committed the absolute sin of treachery against God are punished here. Here Satan resides, trapped in the frozen center of the Ninth Circle. Lucifer, the archangel who betrayed God, is also here, trapped waist-deep in the ice.
We aren’t all the way to the Ninth Circle yet, but you can certainly see it from here.
another great essay Mike! For those unable to read there is video available from The Great Courses.
Where did you get that "we sh*t" white man?