The Afterlife in the Classical and Italian Traditi

Wednesday’s dialogue about divine will got me thinking about the role of human will (what at least Dante would probably call “free will”) in both the classical and Italian traditions. I liked Khadija’s comment about how, according to Dante’s faith, one cannot be saved by works alone, for one must also have “love in the heart.” What interests me about this comment is that Dante seems to repeatedly stress that such love in the heart is optional — that each person has the ability to chose whether or not he shall seek God’s love inside himself and then make the commitment to follow it. Obviously, Dante illustrates what happens to those who chose not to take this path, but, in doing so, he emphasizes that a condemned person’s fate results from an act of his personal will. I’m not sure how how free will fits into the classical tradition, though I think our reading from Plato’s “Phaedo” might offer some clues on this subject. Plato discusses how those who “purif[y] themselves sufficiently with philosophy” achieve peace in the afterlife, and I suppose this belief implies that one has a choice about whether or not to pursue philosophy in life. However, I’m not sure if free will plays the same role in the other classical texts we’ve read.

Despite the prevalence of free will in Dante’s work, it also seems that, according to Dante, man’s will is ultimately part of God’s larger will. We ended Wednesday’s discussion by analyzing the last line in “Paradiso” and debating whether this line speaks more of acceptance or bliss. Here I think it’s important to look not only at the poem’s last line, but also at the few lines preceding it. Lines 142-145 read, “Here force failed my high fantasy; but my / desire and will were moved already — like / a wheel revolving uniformly — by / the Love that moves the sun and the other stars.” This passage conveys how Dante’s will is subordinate to divine will, as Dante is no longer acting on his own because he is already “moved” by God. Thus, I’d say that this passage stands more as a statement of bliss than acceptance, and that this bliss seems to be so complete as to not allow for anything else; it stands so great as to even prevent Dante from consciously accepting God (…but that’s okay because God is already moving Dante to accept divine will). Therefore, I think “Paradiso”’s conclusion remains a great example of how Dante sees man’s will as a small piece of God’s greater will.

After listening to Friday’s discussion, I thought that this verse from this song really provided a good topic. In both the classical and the Italian traditions, one main concept is that mortals are not equivalent to the gods or to God. The only exception of a mortal becoming immortal is Herakles, in the Classical tradition. Many times, we as mortals become too proud, and we think that we are as good if not better than God/the gods. If we do start to think that, we will be punished-in both traditions.

Both traditions use saints, prophets, or priests/priestesses to speak to the mortals. In the Christian traditions, there were apostles such as Peter or Paul. In the Classical tradition, there were priestesses such as the Cumaen Sybill of Apollo. Like we discussed on Friday, these apostles or priestesses really are the mouthpiece of God/the gods. They are provided to guide us or lead us in the right direction. They actually do act as a guide to us.

In Par. 6, Dante not only engages in a remarkable celebration of the Empire; he is attempting at something that no one had dared to do before him, not even Virgil. He is attempting to give a representation of history that accounts for God’s will or Providence and even for Predestination, “the obscure rationale that regulates Providence.” With Dante, for the first time since the Old Testament, we have a perfectly coherent representation of history as God’s creation. This is a daunting task indeed, because it not only entails that one must convincingly demonstrate that history is crafted by the hand of God; it must also account for the mysterious rationale that has been moving that hand from the beginning of time until the very end of times. Dante knows that and delivers all the way, from the simplest to the most intricate theological issue. His providential history is air-tight, although it does have a few grey areas (… after all being God is not a piece of cake); what is more, it also accounts for pagan antiquity in its extraordinary inter-cultural embrace. Dante’s history is truly the history of histories. Of course, for us readers of Hegels and Marx, it may be difficult to believe him, but this is not the point. What matters is the fact that for seven hundred years Dante’s historiographical model has remained something to be confronted, and contended with by those who have followed him, including Hegels and Marx; and this, I guess, includes us too.

Last year in Ancient Tragedy we read the whole of the Aeschylus trilogy the Orestia. In the last of these plays the Eumenides, the Furies are conquered by the wills of Athena and Apollo. They are denied Orestes, but in return are given the honor and respect of all Athenians. They are turned from gods of justice through revenge into gods of justice who prosecute those who break the law. (They are also connected with sustaining the productivity of the fields and harvest.) However, this does not mean the Furies have been tamed, far from it. They are revered and honored with sacrifices but mostly this respect verges on fear. When sacrificing to the Eumenides one made a sacrifice and then quickly leaves their sacred precinct, this area was to remain as undisturbed as possible. There was still the potential of wrath of the Furies to strike down those who enter their grounds.

Similarly in the Divine Comedy, the Furies have been placed into a hierarchy of justice; specifically they carry out the punishment of divine justice. However, as witnessed by Dante’s encounter with them, the Furies are still very protective of their sacred areas. In the Inferno the Furies have been given rule over Dis and like the classical tradition attack those who disturb this area, which they consider their own. Once again we can see that while the Furies are in a way conquered, they are far from powerless.

I found it interesting that Dante took after Vergil’s concrete measurement of time in the “lower levels” of the journey, but when he enters paradiso, time becomes nebulous and immeasurable, just like the afterlife is with Homer. Dante is embracing both the Greek and Roman literary tradition by allowing time the two possiblities to express time in the afterlife (according to the greeks and romans) to exist in his epic katabatic poem. It is almost a compromise– but, moreso, he is acknowledging those that came before him who also wrote epic poetry about the katabatic experience. Although these elements of time progression are embraced, the time progression of the souls has been altered due to the christian culture that was very much established before Dante lived. Progression is dependent on good works and prayer, and it’s all relative and unique for each soul– as opposed to the souls in antiquity which all had a fixed set of years on the banks of the river, or a fixed set of years until they could enter a new set of bodies. Ultimately, Dante, by acknowledging both vergil and homer’s sense of time in the afterlife, and also including his christian values to the progression of the soul, he embraces the past and his present.

During our discussion today of Dante’s new approach to love poetry - and criticism of previous forms - I was thinking of Paolo and Francesca in Inferno canto 5, and their sin (and deaths) from reading Arthurian romance. I imagine whatever they were reading wasn’t quite the genre of the poets in Purgatorio 24, but the Provenal troubador poetry we mentioned as a source for the dolce stil novo poets definitely would include Arthurian romances, presumably of that sort. This is another critique from Dante of previous styles of writing about love, isn’t it? Even though Francesca’s an unrepentant sinner and perhaps not the most trustworthy of sources, Dante the poet has her point out the unrealistic and even potentially dangerous nature of some poetry.

I found Friday’s in class discussion to be very interesting. While thinking more about it afterwards, I realized that the concept of time is depicted differently by each of these three authors, Vergil, Dante, and Homer.

Vergil limits the time that Aeneas has in the Underworld. Whenever he gets caught up with something, whether it is talking to Deiphobus, the son of Priam, or if he has just stopped to observe what is happening in the Underworld, the Sibyl is always there to remind him that time is running out. On the other hand, as we can see, Odysseus has all the time in the world to find his way back to Ithaka. He wants so badly to go home to see his wife and son, yet interference continues to ruin this for him. It takes him approximately ten years to finally complete his journey and reunite with his family. In comparison to this, Aeneas has a specific amount of time to visit his father, Anchises. He does not have plenty of time to spare. If he does happen to dawdle, the Sibyl is immediately at his side pressing him forward. If Odysseus comes across an obstacle such as Circe, or even his own crew, he has no immediate assistance to guide him.

Dante has even more time than the Aeneas or Odysseus. He states in Inferno “forever through that turbid, timeless air”. However, Dante also has a guide to help him and lead him through Hell in the Inferno. As Dante progresses through Hell, he has as much time as he needs. He meets all kinds of souls including those of Horace, Ovid, and Lucan. Each author portrays time in a different way.

When I read the Inferno all the way through a few weeks ago, I hadn’t thought of Dante approaching the text with inversion/comic reversal. However, when reading I did note that in Canto 32 of Inferno that Dante presents himself with a surprising turn of character in lines 97-99, when he reaches down and grabs Bocca by the hair and proceeds to torment the man to give his name. Now for the most part, the audience has seen Dante’s character hiding behind the protection of Virgil or tentatively proceeding through the steps to go through Hell (mostly in awe or terrified), but I found that this display was a little random/a surprise. Is this a case of a reversal/inversion as we were talking about in class (a reversal of what we have come to expect as a reaction from Dante)?

Also, since we read about the description of Lucifer (who is a reversal in himself, since his name means light-bearer, but he is now the ruler of darkness), I was wondering why he cries from all six eyes (Canto 34, line 53). I am sure that there is some reference that this eludes to, but I couldn’t find it in the text notes and I can’t seem to think of a solid reason off the top of my head.