Dante’s Guide to God:
Church and Salvation in
The Divine Comedy
Skylar Joseph
Tyler Winstead
And
Silvio Defant
As
Dante Alighieri
Dante Alighieri
 Born in Florence c.1265 May-June
Dante Alighieri
 Born in Florence c.1265 May-June
 Loyalties to the Guelphs, caught in
Dante Alighieri
 Born in Florence
 Loyalties to the
Battle of Capaldino
c.1265 May-June
Guelphs, caught in
in 1289
 Studies Theology in Dominican and Franciscan churches
c.1292
Dante Alighieri
 Born in Florence
c.1265 May-June
 Loyalties to the
Guelphs, caught in
Battle of Capaldino
in 1289
 Studies Theology
in Dominican and
Franciscan churches
c.1292
 Accused of bribery& corruption in 1302
Dante Alighieri
 Born in Florence
c.1265 May-June
 Loyalties to the
Guelphs, caught in
Battle of Capaldino
in 1289
 Studies Theology
in Dominican and
Franciscan churches
c.1292
 Accused of bribery
& corruption in 1302
 Initially fined; eventually exiled for 15 years
Dante Alighieri
 Born in Florence
c.1265 May-June
 Loyalties to the
Guelphs, caught in
Battle of Capaldino
in 1289
 Studies Theology
in Dominican and
Franciscan churches
c.1292
 Accused of bribery
& corruption in 1302
 Initially fined; eventually exiled for 15 years
Begins work on The Commedia in 1308
Dante Alighieri
 Born in Florence
c.1265 May-June
 Loyalties to the
Guelphs, caught in
Battle of Capaldino
in 1289
 Studies Theology
in Dominican and
Franciscan churches
c.1292
 Accused of bribery
& corruption in 1302
 Initially fined; eventually exiled for 15 years
 Begins work on The Commedia in 1308
 The Commedia is finished shortly before is death in
1321
The Divine Comedy
The Comedy in our Scope
 Portrayal of the Church: Popes and Saints
 Christian ideals of salvation
 Dante’s method of salvation
 The souls journey to God
The Papacy of the Inferno
1277-1280
 Pope Nicolas III: Nepotism, Simony, Vatican
1294-1303
 Pope Boniface VIII: Political agenda, Simony,
Palestrina
1305-1314
 Pope Clement V: Avignon, Simony
The Eighth Circle of Hell: Fraud (Simony)
Home of previously mentioned Popes
Sentenced to be half-buried into the
ground head-first with a never wavering
flame licking their feet
Obviously a slam on certain Popes
Portrayal of Popes in the Inferno
 “Are you already standing there, o Boniface? The book
has lied to me by several years. Are you so quickly sated
with the riches for which you did not fear to take by
guile the Lovely Lady, then to violate her?” (Canto XIX,
52-57)
Portrayal of Popes in the Inferno
 “Are you already standing there, o Boniface? The book
has lied to me by several years. Are you so quickly sated
with the riches for which you did not fear to take by
guile the Lovely Lady, then to violate her?” (Canto XIX,
52-57)
 “He [Boniface] asked me to give counsel. I was silent.
his words had seemed to me delirious. And then he said:
'Your heart must not mistrust: I now absolve you in
advance-teach me to batter Palestrina to the ground.
You surely know that I possess the power to lock and
unlock Heaven; for the keys my predecessor did not
prize are two.” (Canto XXVII, 98-105)
Portrayal of Popes in the Inferno
 “Are you already standing there, o Boniface? The book
has lied to me by several years. Are you so quickly sated
with the riches for which you did not fear to take by
guile the Lovely Lady, then to violate her?” (Canto XIX,
52-57)
 “He [Boniface] asked me to give counsel. I was silent.
his words had seemed to me delirious. And then he said:
'Your heart must not mistrust: I now absolve you in
advance-teach me to batter Palestrina to the ground.
You surely know that I possess the power to lock and
unlock Heaven; for the keys my predecessor did not
prize are two.” (Canto XXVII, 98-105)
 “For after him will come one of fouler deeds from the
west, a lawless shepherd, one fit to cover him and me.”
(Canto XIX, 127-130)
The Eighth Circle of Hell: Fraud (Simony)
If Popes and the Church
are not our way to God,
then how can we hope to
achieve salvation?
Section II: Purgatorio
Love and Purgatory
 Fate and free will explained in
terms of love
 Love ultimately comes from God,
who is Infinite Love and instills it
in each of his creatures
 God allows each man free will by
dividing up man's loves (desires)
Natural Love vs. Mental Love
 The natural inherently loves the ultimate good
(God); Natural love is one’s innate attraction to
God (whether or not one is conscious of it) and
it is fated
 Mental love can desire whatever attracts it
(usually beautiful things) and must be trained to
desire only worthy things
 All of the sins punished in Purgatory are forms
of perverted love or love expressed in improper
measure.
 Love motivates all human action.
“Love kindled by virtue always kindles another,
provided that its flame appear outwardly…”
(Canto XXII 10-12)
Section III: Paradiso
St. Augustine’s ‘Mystic’ Will
 “Practical mysticism” elevating the appreciation of
will for man
St. Augustine’s ‘Mystic’ Will
 “Practical mysticism” elevating the appreciation of
will for man
“If the world were converted to
Christianity, […] without miracles,
this alone is such that the others
are not the hundredth part…”
XXIV 106-108)
(Canto
Dionysius of the Areopagus
 Dante credits him with
superhuman knowledge of
matters in paradise, especially of
the angelic choirs
 Based on Corinthians II, St. Paul,
who taught Dionysius, while still
living had risen to Heaven and
beheld its divine mysteries, and
afterwards revealed these to
Dionysius
Dionysius of the Areopagus
“And Dionysius with so great desire
To contemplate these Orders set himself,
He named them and distinguished them as I do.
But Gregory afterwards dissented from him;
Wherefore, as soon as he unclosed his eyes
Within this heaven, he at himself did smile.
And if so much of secret truth a mortal
Proffered on earth, I would not have thee marvel,
For he who saw it here revealed it to him,
With much more of the truth about these circles.“
(Canto XXVIII 130-139)
Gregory the Great’s Prayer Power
 Prayer as an almost mystical method of salvation
(resurrection of Trajan)
Gregory the Great’s Prayer Power
 Prayer as an almost mystical method of salvation
(resurrection of Trajan)
“For the one who came back unto his
bones from Hell, where there is never
return to righteous will; and that was
the reward of living hope; of living
hope; which put its power into the
prayers made to God to raise him up,
so that it might be possible for his will
to move.”
(Canto XX 106-112)
St. Bernard and Practical Piety
 Preached the unification of man
with himself. Not in God, but
through God, is our highest
understanding reconciled with
our loftiest desire
 Practical Piety
St. Bernard and Practical Piety
“Now doth this man, who from
the lowest depth of the universe
as far as here has seen one after
one the spiritual lives, supplicate
thee through grace for so much
power that with his eyes he may
uplift himself higher towards the
uttermost salvation. And I, who
never burned for my own seeing
more than I do for his, all of my
prayers proffer to thee, and pray
they come not short”
(Canto XXIII 22-30)
St. Francis and Franciscan Love
 Admired by Dante as a model for his
method of peace and love as salvation
St. Francis and Franciscan Love
 Admired by Dante as a model for his
method of peace and love as salvation
“… take Francis and Poverty for these
lovers. Their concord and their glad
semblances made live, and wonder, and
sweet regard to be cause of holy
thoughts; so that the venerable Bernard
first bared his feet, and ran following
such great peace…”
(Canto XI 74-80)
Final Words
Questions…?
Bibliography
 Catholic Encyclopedia
http://www.newadvent.org/
 Medieval Culture: An Introduction to Dante and his
Times, Karl Vossler, Frederick Ungar Publishing, NY 1958
 Medieval Cultural Tradition in Dante’s Comedy, Joseph
Anthony Mazzeo, Greenwood Press, NY 1968
 The New Encyclopedia Britanica, volume five, William
Benton, Chicago, 1981
 A Diversity of Dante, Thomas Goddard Bergin, New
Brunswick NJ, 1965