Dante – Chapter 10 of the Divine Comedy of Hell

Introduction:

Those who suffer in the sixth level of hell are those who believe in heresy and do not believe in ghosts in the afterlife; Pharinatha, who was the leader of the Gibering Party, solves a question for Dante: Why do ghosts know the future and not the present?

The text begins:

Dante asked Virgil, "Can I see the man lying in the cemetery?" Because the covers of the sarcophagus were all on one side and unguarded. Virgil said, "When they come back here from the Josafah Valley with their flesh, the lids of the coffins will be closed." (The Valley of Josafah is a valley near Jerusalem where God will perform the final judgment, when the soul and body will come together for trial) It was Epicurus and his followers who suffered in this coffin of fire. (Epicurus, ancient Greek philosopher, founder of the Epicurean school.) His doctrine appeared before Christianity and, strictly speaking, cannot be said to be the so-called heresy of the Church. But the Medievals saw him as a philosopher who denied the immortality of the soul; denying the immortality of the soul fundamentally negated Christianity, and thus Dante considered his doctrine to be heresy, placing him and "all his followers" in the sixth hell. "All his followers" refers primarily to dante's day people who deny the immortality of the soul, not to the ancient Epicurean philosophers in general; the suffering of their souls in fiery red graves is a reflection of the burning fire imposed by the Church at the time on the burning heretics) Your question and your unspoken desire will soon be satisfied. (It means that Dante wondered whether any of his fellows were among the ghosts in the tomb, and in particular whether the florentine giberlin leader, Falenata, was there, who was declared heretic by the Inquisition nineteen years after his death, and whose body was buried under the church and exhumed.) He had asked Chaco where The soul of Phrinata was in the Third Layer of Hell, which showed that he was extremely concerned about the fate of this character.

"Ah, Tuscans, (Tuscany, in central Italy, Florence is a famous city in the region, Dante's hometown) you have walked through this fire city alive, and I hope that you who are elegant in your conversation will be happy to stay here. Your accent indicates that you were born in noble Florence. A voice said suddenly. This really startled Dante, and Virgil said, "Look, Pharinata has stood up, and you can see him from his waist." (His full name was Falinata de Uberti.) In 1216, Florence began to split into two rival parties, Guilfo and Giberin, and the Ubberti family belonged to the Giberlin Party. In 1234, Phrinata became the leader of the Giberin party. In 1248, he led the Gibering Party to victory over the Gulfer Party and expelled the latter from Florence. In 1251, the Guilfo party returned home, the flames of the struggle were rekindled, and after his defeat, he and his own family and other Gibering families were exiled. Later, he formed a coalition of all-Tuscan Giberin in Siena, supported by Manfred, king of Sicily, and defeated the Florentine Guilfo army at the Battle of Montaperti in 1260, returning to his hometown in victory and expelling the Guilfo party again. In 1264, he died in Florence)

Pharinatha stood tall and open, as if with great contempt for Hell. After asking dante about his identity, he said something about the partisan struggle.

I saw him standing tall and straight, as if he had great contempt for hell.

A ghost emerges from Pharinata and asks Dante, "If you traveled through this dark cage by genius, what about my son?" Why didn't you come with you?" It was Virgil who led me here, and perhaps to meet someone your son had disdained to meet. (The ghost who asked Dante's question was The father of Dante's confidant friend, the poet Guido Kavalkanti, Kavalkantai Kavalkanti.) Kavalkantai heard from the conversation between Dante and Phrinata that he was a friend of his son Guido, Dante, thinking that he had traveled to hell alive by noble genius, and that his son Guido also had a noble genius, and that he should come with Dante, and when he found out that he was not with Dante, he could not help but ask questions. "The man who was disdainful of going to see" refers to Beatrizi, who symbolizes theology, guido believing in Epicurean heresy, and of course despising theology. "Perhaps" indicates that Dante, because of his arduous and long journey, did not dare to say that he would be able to reach Beatrizi) Dante's words made the ghost mistakenly believe that his son was dead, and he retracted painfully back into the sarcophagus and did not come out.

Pharinata also prophesied that Dante would be exiled and would not return to his homeland in the future, and Dante hoped that he would tell him why ghosts could know the future and not the present.

Phrinata replied to him: This is because the doctrine they believe in believes only in this life, not in the afterlife, and as soon as a person dies in reality, the body and soul perish. Because heresy (Epicureans) believed only in the present and did not believe in places like heaven and hell after death, they could only know the future and not the present when they were punished in hell. According to the principle that sin and punishment are extremely closely related, the punishment here is also reversed. (Don't you believe that there is a future and only believe that there is a present?) Then punish you for knowing only what is going to happen in the future and not knowing what is happening now)

"Tell the ghost who fell down just now that its son is still alive." Dante said.

Dante recalled the prophecies that Farinata had just given about his future fate, and was a little sad; Virgil comforted him with clever words. Then the two of them left the place and walked along a path leading to the seventh floor of hell to the center of the sixth layer; the smell of the seventh floor was so bad that it smelled bad.