In
Dante’s Inferno, the themes of sin
and justice are developed throughout the poem. In the beginning of Dante’s
journey through the underworld, he reads the inscription above the gates of
hell. The inscription tells of hell’s origin; “My maker was divine authority, /
the highest wisdom, and the primal love.” As the notes at the end of the
Mandelbaum translation indicate, this is a reference to the trinity – God the
Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost (Dante, 350). All three forms of God
sanction what occurs past the gates of hell, therefore reason dictates that the
associated punishments past these gates must be God’s divine justice. This
logic is used subtly throughout the poem as Dante was rooted in the traditional
Christian views of right and wrong; God is right, anything contradicting Him is
wrong. This idea of justice divined by
God holds wide appeal because it is nearly impossible to argue with the Maker
of the Universe.
Although the idea of justice directed
by God is widely seen in this work, Dante the poet develops his own sense of
justice, not based in the Bible at all. This is seen in his structure of
“better” and “worse” sins and the retribution that accompanies those actions. These
punishments are based on the wrathful idea seen in the Bible of “an eye for an
eye.” The sinners are punished in the afterlife to the extreme based on how they
sinned in life. For example, the gluttonous are punished by being immersed in
mud like the pigs they were in life. Though this retribution is biblical, Dante’s
whole structure of hell – that one sin is more severe than another – is not
biblical at all. In the Christian faith, one sin of telling a white lie is no
less severe than the murder. Dante the poet’s sense of vengeance and
proportional punishment is a thoroughly human ideal and an example of how Dante’s
historical context in 13th century Italy affected his writing.
Despite
the influences as a poet, Dante the voyageur is on a journey toward understanding
the justice created by the Divine and created by the poet. Virgil the guide
leads him toward accepting this truth. At the onset, Virgil is relatively
understanding as Dante is shocked and saddened by the punishment he sees. He
faints from shock and pity. Eventually Virgil feels that Dante should understand
God’s divine justice. The guide even appears annoyed at Dante’s continued pity
in Canto XXIX, when Dante is consumed by the thought of his un-avenged ancestor
Geri del Bello. Virgil chastises him, saying; “Don’t let your thoughts/ about
him interrupt you from here on: / attend to other things, let him stay there…” (Dante,
265). In Virgil’s view, it is too late in his journey for Dante to still feel
pity. This is ultimately the purpose of Dante’s journey – to not feel pity for
the sinners but see the way in which they are punished as just and right, created
by God.
Reading your post on Inferno, I couldn't help but agree with you that there were two different types of justice present in the poem. That God's version of justice, referred to as Divine Justice or Heavenly Vengeance, is him punishing the sinners for going against what he has declared right and good. However, whereas you thought of the second type of justice as Dante the poet's version of justice, I found it more to be humanity's definition of the word, and that it was often in disagreement with what God thought was just. A just human action is seen as what is the right thing to do from mankind’s perspective.
ReplyDeleteNo clearer is this seen than in Canto XIII where Dante is having a conversation with one of Emperor Frederick's advisors who has killed himself. He was a good man in life, but his enemies told lies about him that he said, "thinking I could flee their scorn in death, made me against myself, though just, unjust" (XIII.70). Here we see where man's definition and God's definition of justice differ. Frederick's advisor felt he was ruined by his enemies’ actions that the only just action for him to take was to commit suicide. God, on the other hand, felt these actions to be unjust, and sent him to the seventh circle of Hell.
Justice is very interesting. It was actually the word I looked at for class as I was intrigued by the idea of justice in hell. What I found when I took the text version of the Inferno and searched through it on my computer that there were a few instances of the word. In the text there were exactly four times the word was used. This word was used three times in Canto III when he is first descending into hell. The first time it is used it is used before he even gets into hell. He states that he is inspired by Justice by God to seek divine justice and go into the inferno.
ReplyDeleteThis idea of being driven by justice is his main motivation to be in the inferno. Throughout the Cantos however we can see that Dante starts to doubt his motives and reason for being in the inferno as he descends more into hell he blames God's justice for the suffering he has endured. However it is interesting that because of justice he has that divine intervention throughout his divine mission through hell. He is suffering but at the same time he is being helped. Justice is his motivation and he not only embraces it but later curses it and the pain it causes.