Dante’s Sins: A Re-Reading of the Divine Comedy — The Purgatorio
- Dr. Paul Dumol
- 2 days ago
- 2 min read
By Dr. Paul Arvisu Dumol
The Purgatorio
Last week I identified seven scenes in the Inferno that seven centuries of Dante readers have singled out for their intense emotional charge, so much so that many have wondered whether they contained a personal meaning for Dante of an autobiographical nature. I have suggested that they represent sins that Dante was either guilty of or attracted to. Three cantos, in particular, seem to present us with sins Dante was guilty of. That is certainly the case with canto 26, Dante’s encounter with Ulysses, which produced a personal resolution affecting his own life. It seems to be the case as well with canto 5, Dante’s encounter with the lovers Paolo and Francesca, and canto 13, Dante’s encounter with the suicide Pier delle Vigne. Each of these two has tantalizing clues: in the former, Dante faints at the end of the interview; in the latter, Dante is so affected he is unable to speak to Pier. My basis for claiming the Divine Comedy treats of Dante’s sins is the Purgatorio in which Beatrice accuses Dante of two sins. I wish to examine those accusations.
Purgatory is a mountain higher than the Himalayas on an island in what we would call today the southern Atlantic. But the Divine Comedy was written before America was discovered, and so you must not be surprised that Purgatory is surrounded by water and nothing else for miles and miles around. Mount Purgatory is in fact all the earth that used to occupy the space where one now finds Dante the author’s hell. Dante has invented a myth to account for this. When Lucifer fell from heaven, the part of the earth toward which he was falling fled in terror from him and rushed out on the opposite side of the globe, forming Mount Purgatory. The resulting hole was covered over by land on which one now finds Jerusalem and specifically Calvary. On top of Mount Purgatory, one finds the garden of Eden.
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