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I Have Some Concerns-Rachael Gregson

 


According to Dante's Inferno, Hell is made up of nine circles that descend in order of severity-Limbo, Lust, Gluttony, Greed, Anger, Heresy, Violence, Fraud, and Treachery. After reading Cantos 1-5, I have a lot to say to Dante here, but before I go off on my main rant, there's a side note I'd like to make. First off, while suicide is the murder of one's self, I'm not sure I believe that that would immediately send someone to Hell. Nine times out of ten people who do this usually have a chemical imbalance in their brain upon their death, and while this was unknown about the body back then, God sure as heck knew. So why in the heck does Dante put suicide victims on that sketched map, turning them into a wood with harpies (what the heck is harpies)?  I don't understand and I'd like to say more, but that would make my post long-winded even before I got to the meat of it.

Moving from the seventh circle back down to the circles closer to the beginning, I find the circumstances of the third circle-Lust- a bit amusing, if not a subtle chauvinist jab. In medieval Christianity, it was common to associate lust with women. Men could not tempt women, but women could darn sure tempt men; if a  couple fell into sin, it was always the "seductress's" fault rather than both of theirs. In this circle, we find plenty of historical female figures. To name one who actually deserved to be down there, there's Semiramis who legalized all sorts of sexual immorality. However, it's surprising to see Helen, Helen who got two sides fighting because she was abducted by Paris because of her beauty. Am I missing something? 

I commented on posts by Hailey Morgan and Madalyn Dillard. 

Comments

  1. Madalyn DillardMarch 14, 2021 at 2:24 PM

    I completely agree with your take on suicide in The Inferno. If I remember correctly, Helen had no choice considering her own body, so it definitely says something about the culture bias of the time Dante wrote his famed books.

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  2. Jamie PetersMarch 15, 2021 at 7:36 PM

    With Helen, much early discussion revolving around her blamed her for the entire Battle of Troy. I am not sure how much access Dante had to it, but I wrote a paper last semester on how Aeschylus blamed her in "The Oresteia". From a modern, largely feministic perspective, we see that Helen was at the mercy of the men that owned her. From a medieval perspective, however, women were considered dangerous, especially if they distracted men from their duties.

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