Questions:

Chat:

• Why did Dante nominate Virgil as the most accomplished & insightful non-Christian?  Virgil illustrates the highest attainment possible for a human mind unaided by revelation.  In making this choice, Dante passes over more obvious nominees, such as: Homer, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle.  Why does Dante pass over these names to choose Virgil?
• Dante wasn't quite as Catholic as the Pope, but he clearly exhibits an intolerant, premodern attitude, condemning even the most virtuous pagans for:

4.34    having merit
          was not enough, for they lacked baptism
4.37    if they lived before Christianity
          they did not worship God rightly
On the other hand, Dante slips or forgets strict theology to rely on nonChristian theories or beliefs.  Identify some of these instances.
• We have an explicit "Outline of the Inferno" specifying the levels of hell (pp. 1386-7).  Nonetheless, I would argue that there is internal evidence suggesting that Dante thought crimes of money were especially evil.  What evidence is there to support or condemn this thesis?
• How many mistakes or willful misreadings of classical literature did you find?  What was Dante's attitude concerning Medea?  Odysseus?
• What was your impression or reaction to canto 34, which describes the nadir or bottom of hell & Satan?

1. How do condemned souls find their proper place or level in hell?
2. What is Virgil's punishment in hell?
3. Before Christ, who escaped hell?
4. Complete this by filling in the blank: "the City of Dis [Satan] draws near

. . . I discern its ____________."
5. Who are the "painted people" who are condemned to wear gilded lead suits?

What was their sin?
6. Who is "the Master of Knowing"?