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Ascend - The Great Books Podcast
Purgatorio: Beatrice (Cantos 32-33) with Joshua Charles and Dr. Frank Grabowski
01:29:46
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- [00:00]
A
Today on Ascend the Great Books Podcast, we finish Dante's Purgatorio by discussing Cantos 32 through 33, dealing with the apocalyptic imagery that Dante the poet gives us at the top of Mount Purgatory. Along with continuing to discuss the imagery and meaning of Beatrice, we are joined by two wonderful guests to explore these concepts. Dr. Frank Grabowski, who serves as the Dean of Faculty at Holy Family Classical School, and also our friend Joshua Charles from Eternal Christendom, both do a fantastic job. I'm very thankful for both their comments and insights and I'm very thankful for all of you. I'm thankful for everyone who's reached out and said that this has been a very fruitful Lenten read for them, that reading Dante's Purgatorio has helped them configure themselves to Christ and become more beautiful as Christ is beautiful. And I particularly want to say a shout out to Sarah Walsh. Your husband wrote in, said you enjoyed the podcast, had you been listening along, and that you are coming home to Holy Mother Church, the Catholic Church this Easter. So God bless you, everyone listening stop. Say a little prayer for Sarah Walsh as she comes into the church and thank you for all your support and thank you to everyone else who listens. We appreciate hearing back from you again. This is 100% listener supported. Go check out our Patreon page. We write guides, do whatever we can to do to help you read the great Books. I'm very humbled to learn alongside you. And so you may say, hey, what are we doing after Dante's Purgatorio? What are we doing after Lent? What are we going to read next week? I'll cover those things at the end of this episode, so stay with us. But today join us for a wonderful conversation on Dante's Purgatorio. The very end, the finale. Cantos 32 and 33. Welcome to Ascend the Great Books Podcast. My name is Deacon Harrison Garlick. I'm a husband, father of five and serve as Chancellor General Counsel for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Tulsa. We're recording on a beautiful afternoon here at the Chancery. If you're new to Ascend to our weekly podcast, it helps guide you through the great books we've read. The Iliad, the Odyssey, many of the Greek plays, several of the Platonic dialogues with a reread of Homer's Odyssey this summer before the movie comes out, and then also Plato's Republic on the docket for fall of 2026. Check us out on X, YouTube, Facebook and Patreon. We appreciate all of our supporters. You guys are awesome. We very much appreciate all of you. They have access to written guides and also to community chats with other people reading the Great Books. Visit thegreatbookspodcast.com for our reading schedule and more information. Also, thank you to the center for Beauty and Culture at Benedictine College and Dr. Jason Baxter for promoting our read of Dante's Purgatorio this Lent. And as you all know, I have been reading Dr. Baxter's translation throughout the slint. It has been beautiful and wonderful, and I have very much enjoyed it and enjoyed his support of the podcast. Today we have our final episode on the Purgatorio. It's been a beautiful journey up the mountain of Purgatory with Dante and also with all of you. And it ends today with a lot of apocalyptic imagery in Cantos 32 and 33. Some of my favorite images actually in the Divine Comedy. To help guide us and end well on our journey, we have two amazing guests. First, we have a man who needs little introduction for longtime friends of the podcast. He helped us tremendously through the Odyssey, the Greek plays, and Plato. And so we welcome back to the podcast Dr. Frank Grabowski, the dean of faculty for Holy Family Classical School. How you doing?
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B
I'm doing great, Deacon. It's great to be back. I'm a little out of my element with Dante, so I'll try to. I'll try to incorporate or smuggle in as much play doh. As I can.
- [03:42]
A
Good. Now, we appreciate you being here. Second, we have Mr. Joshua Charles, who runs Eternal Christendom, which is focused on rediscovering the true good and beautiful in the Catholic tradition via podcasts, online resources, infographics, and much, much more. Joshua, welcome back to the podcast.
- [04:00]
C
Thank you, Deacon.
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A
Appreciate it. I should mention I'm a. What am I? An advisory board member.
- [04:05]
C
Advisory board? Yep.
- [04:06]
A
That's my official title. I love all your all's work. It's great. I really like the typological infographics you guys have started releasing on X. Those are great.
- [04:14]
C
Yeah, yeah. Thank you. Appreciate it.
- [04:17]
A
And also Joshua was one of our very first guests on the podcast ever. I think you were actually our first episode that was topical. That wasn't actually reading through, that was just on like a topic. And we had a wonderful conversation on the early church fathers. And also Eternal Christendom was just getting off the ground. It was a good conversation.
- [04:35]
C
Yep. And you've been on with us to talk about your conversion, so. And we. We've got many more things to talk about in the future.
- [04:41]
A
So, yeah, no, very good. Okay. Dr. Grabowski, so you read the Purgatorio with your students, your high school students at Holly Family Classical School, when they ask you why they have to read this text? Why is this, why is this a text worth reading?
- [04:57]
B
Well, we're still in hell, so currently we are eight cantos in. So we're up against the wall of Dis. You know what's so interesting about this text is that we had just finished Beowulf and the students were. And it was perhaps because of the translation we used, the Tolkien translation, which is a bit impenetrable. They didn't connect with it. But it's amazing just how willingly and lovingly they've dived into this text. So I think to answer your question, the students, it's almost self explanatory to them, but the Divine Comedy, including Purgatorio, represents the height of medieval art and literature and medieval thought. So it's this culmination of this long tradition that goes all the way back to pagan Greece. And so it's this lint roller that has picked up all of these things and how Dante incorporates scripture. And so it's really enchanted. The students have become really enchanted by this text.
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A
Yeah, really well said. A lint roller. I'll have to imagine that that's not the image that immediately comes to my mind when I think of the comedy.
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B
But certainly my mind is a lint roller sometimes. That's good.
- [06:12]
A
I appreciate that. So I'm excited to jump in to the Cantos with you guys and discuss them. But before we do that, Joshua, tell us about journal Christendom.
- [06:22]
C
Well, thank you, Deacon. Our goal is to basically take the sources of the great tradition of Christendom and bring them alive in a digital, distracted, culturally orphan context. And the goal is to help people become, remain, and deepen their lives as Catholics hidden with Christ and God. That's quoting Colossians 3. 3. So we've actually got some very, very exciting projects we're working on related to making the writings of the Church Fathers. I'll just say at this point, much, much, much more accessible, intuitive, you know, be able to find all the treasures related to the Eucharist, the other sacraments, the papacy, Our lady much, much more easily hoping it can be a game changer project. So, you know, we're gonna go far beyond the Fathers, assuming, assuming we've got a long history ahead of us, but we're definitely overwhelmingly focusing on the Church Fathers for the time being because I think we, we Definitely need a recovery of them in our day for a variety. Variety of reasons, but that's the gist. So weekly podcasts, lots of articles, millions of words of content on the website, and a whole lot more coming. So thank you for letting us share.
- [07:28]
A
Yeah, no, very good. And everyone go check out Joshua on X, where he's sharing a lot of good insights on the early church fathers, kind of how he got his start, how I got to know him as well. And also go make sure you guys go check out the Eternal Christendom podcast. Excellent guests. You guys always have good conversations. I appreciate it. Okay, diving into the Purgatorio. So let's look at Canto 32. These Cantos are wonderful. They're apocalyptic, they're weird. Like, they remind me of the Inferno. I really like them. The first time I read the Purgatorio, like, these were the Cantos, I was like, oh, finally. This is the kind of Dante that I enjoy reading because I was very immature in my own spiritual life and didn't really appreciate all the terraces. And they were very straightforward and basic and had a pattern. I enjoyed this. I enjoyed this a lot, this kind of pageant. So I think a good place to start, maybe, as I try and understand the beginning of 32 is actually at the end of 31. So the very. Just to kind of contextualize this again, right? So we have Beatrice finally. After two canticles, we finally have Beatrice. And that meeting might not have been as warm and fuzzy as a lot of people had anticipated. It wasn't the first time I read it. Right. She's very harsh, and she kind of walks him through what we saw in the last Canto. She really walks him through kind of a sacramental confession, right? He calls out that sin. He has to repent of it. He's going through this entire process. And so one thing, I think, at the end of 31 that's very helpful is at like, 1:33 or so they say, it's the ladies, her attendant ladies, which is the seven virtues, right? These are the seven ladies, the four cardinal virtues, three theological virtues. They say, now turn, oh, Beatrice, now turn your holy eyes, such was their song towards your faithful one. He's traveled many miles to see you. And so that's then how Canto 32 starts, is that this is then the first time. This is then the first time that Dante the pilgrim has actually looked Beatrice in the face. And he has yearned for this for a decade. So it says at the beginning, tercet, from a decade long thirst that all my other senses were extinguished. So Beatrice dies in 1290, and the, I guess, fictitious date of the comedy is 1300. So he's waited a decade to do this. And I just thought it was really interesting because, you know, Beatrice's eyes, there's a lot of imagery there. She has a smile, which I think is interesting, which is very much juxtaposed to her kind of harshness earlier. And then it's too much. It's too much for him. Even the ladies, he says, I was forced to turn away. And on verse nine, it says, the goddesses. That's the seven virtues let out too much. He finally gets to see that kind of, like, feminine form, that wisdom, that divine revelation, that grace. And he can only look it in the eyes for a short period of time, after a decade of yearning for it. I just want it to be a beautiful scene. Yeah.
- [10:25]
B
I think it brings to mind Aristotle's idea of the sensus communis, which is the part of our soul or our mind that is able to collect and actually structure the experiences that we're receiving. And so what we see and what we smell and what Dante here is experiencing is a kind of sensory overload where, like, every other sense shuts down. In the Hollander translation says, all my other senses were undone. And so the only sense that's working at this time are the eyes. It's like you can't smell anything or hear anything that. That he's been. You know. Undoubtedly all of his other senses have become useless to him because of that wand, because of what he's seeing.
- [11:08]
A
Yeah, I appreciate it, because I think that we're finally seeing this relationship of who Beatrice is. And now Dante, in this new state, can actually start to look her in the face. And we kind of see this as we move into this new pageant that we have. So if you look at. We know something's going to happen, because the whole pageant, this whole procession, starts to move. They're going to go off into the deep and lofty wood and around line 36. I would say that's somewhat dispositive. This is when Beatrice dismounts, and so she's like, part of this pageant. So I just want to lay out maybe a few tersets here, because I found the imagery here really compelling. But also, I don't know if it's confusing, but there's a lot of simultaneous images that come together. And trying to parse these out, I think is really interesting. So Beatrice dismounts, and they're in Front of this. This tree. And it says, I heard from all a murmur, Adam. And then they circled around a tree despoiled of every leaf or bud on every branch. And so this is the tree on its, like, face. It's a literal meaning. It's a tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And this is like they're around this. So this is really interesting. The pageant comes back to center on this particular image. And then there's next terse. It talks about that the branches were broader the higher up they were. Its height would even be admired by Indians had it grown within their forests. So this is a disproportionately super large tree here before them. And then the griffin. Blessed are you, O Griffin, because you did not use your beak to split this tree. Though it is sweet to taste, the stomach's always racked with pain thereafter. The griffid being, as we talked about last week, the symbol of Jesus Christ. It's the animal of two natures. It has an eagle and a lion. And what's fascinating is that then at line 48 is the only time the griffin ever speaks. And thus the seed of justice is preserved. I'm just interested, like, what did you guys make of this section?
- [13:07]
C
I can say something or. Okay. Well, in general, my understanding is that Beatrice represents grace. Is that correct?
- [13:17]
A
Yeah, she's multifaceted, but grace is certainly one of them.
- [13:19]
C
Yeah. So it's interesting just to go back very, very briefly about her. Dante not being able to look at her in the translation I have, Mandelbaum, you stare too fixedly. And that he can't quite bear it. It reminded me of Moses and the people not being able to look at Moses. It also reminded me of the sense that, know when we're baptized, we're obviously made completely new, but we're not. We're not at the maximal state at which we could be if through a life of sanctity, penance, sacrifice, et cetera, we live that way to the end of our lives and are received, you know, afterward. And so it just the very idea that he arrives at this point where he can he. That he can see something different. But even once he sees it, initially, it's still too much for him. And it also reminded me of the image in Scripture of the seraphim who are constantly before God with all the eyes and even wings covering their eyes and whatnot. But when they see God, as it were, all they can say, I mean, what we have in the mass, song to, song to Sanctus. Holy, holy, holy. And so I just found those connections interesting. I don't know if you guys did, but. No, as far as in the translation I have. Thus is the seed of every righteous man preserved.
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A
Preserved.
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C
You know, it's a. It's a nod to the fact that our Lord is the new Adam and he preserves within himself the essence of humanity as originally, you know, created by God to be in communion with him. So that would be. Those would be my thoughts.
- [15:00]
B
And just to add to what Joshua was saying, I. I think that that line too fixedly, where the virtues are cautioning Dante, it seems like the virtues are telling Dante to not fall into the trap. Of course, quietism, where you're just staring directly into the sun and you're becoming detached from worldly concerns. Because what he's about to be presented here is this rich allegory of history of the church as we'll get to. There's Christ and there's the cross, but then the chariot becomes perverted and grotesque and so much like the prisoner. I told you I'd smuggle Plato into this. In the allegory of the cave leaves and sees the sun, beholds the sun. He eventually does have to turn away and come back. And so the virtues are preparing Dante for what's he's about, this, this acid trip of a hallucination that he's about to witness.
- [15:57]
A
Yeah, good thoughts. I appreciate. I appreciate the biblical illusions. I also appreciate the juxtaposition between the staring at Beatrice's face is like a speculative. And now we're going to have this pageant about the church militant, about the history. Very practical. I appreciate that juxtaposition. Yeah. The tree itself, I think, is complicated because, you know, Dante, you read Dante the same way you read scripture. So you have your four senses. And so what's interesting here is that the tree itself literally is a tree of the knowledge of good and evil. That's its literal thing of what it is. So, like where the griffin represents Jesus Christ, the tree is both the tree of the knowledge of good, evil, and then something else. What's interesting is, is that because Dante says, Dante the poet, that the griffin, like, basically you were humble not to destroy the tree, but you were. You kind of like submitted to it. And then in that terset, right after where I stopped, after the griffin speaks, I think the one and only time, you have this really interesting thing where the griffin then pulls his chariot, which is the church, and basically connects it to the tree. So what derived from sacred tree to sacred tree was bound. So our Lord. This imagery connects the church, to this tree. What's interesting is that Musa says, well, the tree is literally the tree of knowledge, of good and evil, which represents. So you have one comparison there very quickly of, you know, how man fell and then our redemption. So you have the tree and you have the church, these two things together. And Jesus Christ is the one that brings these together. Okay, great. The other one, though that's a little bit more subtle, is that the tree represents temporal justice. It represents basically empire. It represents in a certain way the temporal authority of man. And our Lord then connects his church, the spiritual authority, to the tree itself. And this is how these things were supposed to work. And this is how you kind of start to make sense of some of these tercets, like at like 40 and others. And also what the justice is in this, that our Lord preserved the justice that was amongst men in the temporal authority. And then it's perfected by being connected to the chariot. And we've seen this throughout Dante, the whole time that Dante's constantly trying to discern and ferret out, or maybe he knows and that he's actually just presenting something to us of where the lines between the temporal authority of the church and the spiritual authority of the church, where are these lines? And we'll see in this pageant, he has very clear and straightforward ideas about sometimes this has been conflated.
- [18:27]
B
And to add to this, and Deacon, you and I spoke about this prior to the recording, is how Musa and some editors will point out that in grafting the chariot, or at least the pole of the chariot to this tree, the pole represents the cross that Christ was carrying to his crucifixion. And so there's the story that goes back to this apocryphal. There's an apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus, and this is reported in the golden legend that Seth, one of Adam and Eve's offspring, was given by the angel Michael a shaft, or maybe their seeds which were planted giving rise to a tree. Right. So this, the branch was from the tree of knowledge. And so it's from that subsequent tree that the cross was carved. And so there's just a beautiful image of grafting the cross back to its source, or it's, you know, the grand grandparental source. And to me, that's just, you know, there's really not much more to say other than it's a remarkable symbolic image that Dante's putting before his readers.
- [19:46]
A
Yeah, I, I go ahead.
- [19:48]
C
I wanted to offer a thought on that by first going back to an earlier observation, you made deacon about the Beatrice's harshness. Over Christmas, we read some Christmas sermons from Saint Pope Leo the Great with eternal Christian. Gavin Ashenden read it because of his mellifluous British voice and way better than mine. But it was really beautiful because Leo was basically reminding us that as we're looking at this sweet baby, that he also came to die. And so, you know, grace is not this cheap thing that speaks to us, only pleasant things, right? I mean, even in baptism, we are baptized into Christ's death, and then we rise a new life. And so to connect with the point just made, it was interesting to me that Christ is joining these two things. It reminded me of Apocalypse. I'll just read it really quick from Revelation 5. And I saw on the right hand of him who was seated on the throne, a scroll written within and on the back sealed with seven seals. And I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice, who is worthy to open the scroll and break its seals. And no one in heaven or on earth or under the earth was able to open the scroll or look into it. And I wept much that no one was found worthy to open the scroll or to look into it. Then one of the elders said to me, weep not. Lo, the lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David, has conquered so that he can open the scroll.
- [21:21]
A
And.
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C
And it's seven seals. Now, not trying to switch to a different book here, but the idea that only he could do it and that, you know, God's original warning to Adam and Eve was, if you eat of this tree, you shall be like, you know, they shall be like us. Right. You know, sort of trinitarian self consciousness there. And so that Christ actually can consume this tree because he already possessed it from eternity and somehow joins it to this chariot of the church and makes its riches accessible. But it's not without the shedding of his own blood. So I think those are just multiple biblical and soteriological things that come to mind in this for me.
- [22:03]
A
Yeah, no, that's very good. I appreciate you kind of parsing out the biblical depth there. I appreciate Dr. Grabowski pointing to that apocryphal legend because it's very much what Dante's referring to, because you're very right to point that out, because it's the only way to make sense of that line where he says, derived from sacred tree to sacred tree was bound. So it's only that legend that then shows what this actual circle is. So I appreciate you doing that. One of the things Though that really caught my attention. Is that. So we have this, right? We have the. The griffin. He's put the chariot here. It's at the tree. And there's peace, right? Peace is a tranquility of order. There's peace and there's singing, and Dante falls asleep, Right? This is a very peaceful, restful moment. Things are okay. And one thing I'm still kind of. Kind of Contemplating is when Dr. Jessica Houghton Wilson came on the podcast, one of the things that she pointed out was, is how important it is to notice that the middle canto of the entire Divine Comedy is in the Purgatorio. And we looked at very carefully, like, what is in that middle canto, and then also what's book ending it, like, what's on either side of it. And it is about freedom. It's about Don. It's a very famous passage where Dante talks about freedom. But the middle canto particularly, I thought was interesting, is not about the individual soul, but is about society. It's about the church. It's about the harmony that the temporal power and the spiritual power should be in so that us pilgrims going through this life can actually have the two lights that are supposed to be guiding us, the temporal power and the spiritual power. So here I actually found this to be an image of what Dante talked about in that canto, because here they come together. If you read the tree as that temporal authority, they come together by the will of the griffin, and there's peace, and he falls asleep. I think that that's really something that Dante's heart yearns for, is to have this type of peace back in Italy and in Christendom and to restore the
- [24:11]
B
Church to its proper state. Right not to be governed by corrupt popes or to be influenced by secular powers.
- [24:21]
A
Correct. But that doesn't last very long. So he gets his, you know, beauty sleep. So let's get up. What are you doing? Line 72. And then we get these. We get these images from the Transfiguration from Mount Tabor that something is happening here. What's interesting is, too, is that Beatrice then starts to play a different role. So we see that the Holy. The one that wakes him up, I'm pretty sure, is Matilda. There's still this kind of, like, kind of esoteric female character that we have. He's like, where's Beatrice? I was like, well, now she's seated underneath the tree. So now he's watching this. So now we're gonna have this pageant that incur. So he's standing there. She's underneath the tree. And we're gonna see this. This pageant. And I loved, actually, Joshua, I thought you would love this, just like some of your podcast episodes. The way Baxter translates this is down at starting about a hundred. He says you now will be a forest dweller for a time, but then with me, a citizen without end within the Rome where Christ is Roman.
- [25:26]
C
Yeah, yeah, yeah. That really struck me as well.
- [25:31]
A
Yeah. So obviously there's this, to be quite frank, an eternal Christendom where we will. For a while you're in this forest, right, this pilgrimage. But then you will dwell with Christ in the eternal city, the eternal Rome, where Christ is Roman for all time. It's a beautiful image.
- [25:46]
C
Well, and if people want to dive a little deeper into the podcast you're referring to, or really the book which I recommend is Dr. Alan Fimister, called the Iron Scepter of the Son of Man. Romanitas is a note of the Church. So very interesting analysis, prophetic and otherwise there.
- [26:02]
A
So one thing, too, I guess I would point out, is how much he's alluding to St. John throughout these passages. He's constantly borrowing references from the Apocalypse, particularly about John being told to write what you see. Remember here it's remember what you see, so you can write it down. And then we get this pageant. So maybe I'll just say a few of them and then we can stop and discuss. You can make an argument. There's seven or eight of these, like, scenes that come in that are going to tell us a little bit about Church history. And so the first one we get is we get this, something like a bolt of lightning, right, that comes down, but it's. It's an eagle, right? The bird of Jove of Jupiter. And it descends on the tree and rips away all the bark, et cetera, and strikes the chariot with all of its force. So this is typically seen as the early Church persecutions. So this is the Church, this nascent, you know, being grafted onto the tree, this nascent entity that it is then struck by the eagle and is suffering these attacks. Then we have a fox. And this is very biblical also Aesop's Fables, right? This is the kind of clever enemy, right? This is not the eagle, the power. This is the shifty one. This is the tricky one. And this is heresy, right? This fox that comes into it. And notice it's Beatrice that has to come in and shoo the fox away from the chariot, right? It's Beatrice and her wisdom, grace, divine revelation, etc. She pushes the fox away and then we get this really interesting line, the third one, it's around, I don't know, 124, where it says, then whence it came before I saw the eagle returning to the chariot's floorboard, where it left its feathers behind. And then a voice like one who's mourning from the heart came forth from heaven. Oh, my little boat, the evil that you carry. So Musa makes an argument that this is St. Peter, right. Crying out for his ship. Right. The baroque of Peter. And that these feathers here, that the feathers from the eagle. The eagle kind of representing a disordered temporal authority is that leaving those feathers behind them is a sign that the Church starts to assume a certain level of temporal authority that it really should not have. Right. And so now these little feathers are starting to, you know, accumulate here on the chariot. Any kind of thoughts on these kind of first three pageants that we have?
- [28:38]
B
Yeah, I've read that the one could. One could understand the feathers to be temporal power, but maybe more specifically wealth, the corruption that wealth brings about.
- [28:48]
C
Yeah.
- [28:49]
A
Some of the commentators think it's the donation of Constantine.
- [28:53]
B
Yes.
- [28:53]
A
So people are familiar with that kind of mythic. It's mythic to a certain degree, I guess. So there's a idea that Constantine basically donated the entire Western Roman Empire to the Catholic Church and just said, hey, go do this. And Dante, he's referenced this several times actually, in the Comedy. So Dante always sees this as a negative, that this conflated the role of the Church. The Church should not be doing that. It's not entirely mythic, or at least I would push back, because there are times that Constantine in the Eastern Roman Empire relied heavily upon the Roman Church to help govern the Western Empire. Because just like we've seen actually sometimes in Third World countries, the only functional institution was the Church. And so the Church takes on certain temporal power. I think we always think that has to be for, like, greedy, Right? Oh, she has to be assuming that for greed. But in certain times in Church history, she's taken on these roles because the secular side, the temporal side, has collapsed and there's no one else here to do it. But Dante sees this as an incredibly dangerous thing to the Church. Well, and it's.
- [30:02]
C
I don't know if Dante intended this. You guys can push back if this is, you know, overly interpretive on my part. But obviously their feathers getting into the. The bark, the chariot, because it's an eagle and we know what the eagle represents. But it is interesting that it's being weighed down by the lightest Thing. I find that juxtaposition interesting. And so, I mean, I think you could interpret that in many ways to be weighed down by the lightest thing. Well, if it's wealth and luxury and whatnot, this is something that I think most of us just kind of, you know, assume will make our lives easier and more leisurely and whatnot. You know, our smartphones. Oh, this will make us more productive and give us more free time. Yeah, right. You know, and so there's just. There's just this constant temptation to, you know, lust is obviously a very clear example, but fame. Oh, if we're just more well known or if we've got more power or, you know, endless money, it's. You know, Deacon, I'm sure you've had similar experiences, but, you know, I've met some wonderful wealthy people. But I must say, on the whole, the more I've met them, the more I don't want to be them. That's just frank. And not because it's like not pulling a Pharisee of thank you, Lord. I'm not like them. No, not at all. But just that I have seen what wealth can do to people. And it's like you have more abundance than you could ever need, but it's their feather. But it's these. This thing that should be lightning wealth, but it's weighing down your chariot, you know? And so I don't know if you guys think again, that's over interpreting. But that juxtaposition was interesting to me.
- [31:44]
A
Well, one thing you can, I think, to your point, Joshua, is that you can make a distinction that some of these things are goods.
- [31:53]
C
Yes.
- [31:53]
A
Right. So, like, temporal authority is a good helping keep society from falling apart is a good doing Certain good. The question I think that you can have is like, but is this the good for you? Does it align with your telos? Right. Does it align with your purpose? Is this what you're supposed to be doing? Or does it conflate and confuse and maybe even corrupt. Right. What your actual purpose is? And I think that obviously we're gonna see several stages that actually have the same. It kind of functions by degree. So here, this Constantine, there's the first kind of shedding of these feathers that the church is absorbing a certain amount of temporal authority that Dante does not think it should have. Yeah.
- [32:30]
C
And just. I think that's a great point, because I think the key is. I mean, even the whole arrangement of the Divine Comedy is an ascending through layers, Right. So no layer, every layer has its place, but it's Ordered according to a hierarchy. And so it's a matter of the higher ordering the lower. And so, yes, feathers aren't bad or they're not evil in and of themselves. Neither are eagles. But when the higher is lowered by the order, they weigh down the chariot.
- [33:07]
B
And to your point, I mean, Dante says this very thing around line 138.
- [33:14]
C
138, you said?
- [33:16]
B
Yes, 138 by plumage offered perhaps with kind and innocent intent.
- [33:21]
C
Yeah, perfect.
- [33:23]
B
You're right, Joshua. It's, it's, you know, these impulses that we have or these. These things that are, you might say, morally neutral have to be filtered by reason and properly ordered. And so money in and of itself, right. It's often spoken of as the root of all evil. But. But money itself is good, and power itself is good, and pleasure itself is good. It's only when they're treated as being highest good or when they aren't properly oriented by reason that they become corrupted.
- [33:57]
A
Yeah, very good. Yeah, very good. Okay. So we have early church persecutions with the eagle. We have the fox with heresy. We got first thing of feathers with the donation of Constantine. Then fourth, around 1:30, we have this really fascinating thing where a dragon emerges and then its tail comes bursting through the bottom of the chariot and it's ripped back down through. So this, I'd love to hear kind of what you guys think and maybe what other commentators think. So this is like one of the most ambiguous ones. I think a lot of people think it has to refer to some type of schism. I thought that one of the more interesting interpretations is that it refers to Islam. And so because Islam, obviously, for Dante and for the church, even the early church. Right. The 7 hundreds of St John Damascene, our last of the early church fathers in the east, and then also with the medieval church, that Islam was a schism. Right. It was a Christian heresy. It wasn't seen as a completely different religion. And so here. And obviously by Dante's time here in 1300, the fictitious date, they're already bumping up violently against Islam. Right. This is a terrible problem that they're havoc. So I thought that was one of the more interesting interpretations of the dragon.
- [35:11]
B
Those are the two that I'm aware of. The great church.
- [35:14]
C
Yeah, because It's. Oh, sorry, Dr. Grabowski, go ahead. Oh, no, just that in my translation, it dragged part, you know, referring to the tail, drawing its venom tail back to itself. So it goes up through the chariot from the bottom, is withdrawn, it retracted again, and it dragged part of the Bottom off and went its way undulating. So, you know, the chariot is less after this encounter. So. So.
- [35:44]
A
And that would support the schism?
- [35:46]
B
No, I was gonna say that would support the schism theory or theoret.
- [35:50]
C
Yeah, I, I agree it probably leans that way, but maybe also like Islam killing Christians, you know, or something like that. You know, maybe. Maybe that too. But. But yeah, yeah, I think either could work. But I agree it's probably stronger on the schism.
- [36:06]
A
Well, the imagery, I mean, I think both of you are correct insofar as. Yes, it's just another image. Yes, it seems to do schism, but the nature of the imagery increases tremendously in that passage. Right. So we have like a little fox and then we have like some feathers, and all of a sudden we have a dragon ripping off a bottom of the chariot. So I think both of them, whatever he's referencing there, if it is on that schism, it also comes with a very heavy dose of violence with it, even in the imagery that he presents. Okay, so the fifth one then.
- [36:36]
C
Oh, sorry, one of. In my translation, at least. And what was left, meaning what was left of the chariot was covered with the eagle's plumes. So let me see if I go back to the ingle, down into the chariot, leave it feathered with plumage. Okay, So I don't know, again, I don't want to overly do it, but he emphasizes, once more, he, he's. I don't. You know, when he, when he mentions the eagle, at first he doesn't refer again to the fox, but when he mentions the dragon, he refers back again to the eagle. So I don't know, maybe if it, if it is a schism. I'm forgetting exactly what schism. This. It was before the Great Western schism, wasn't it? Or at least it was around the Avignon Papacy or something to that effect.
- [37:24]
A
Yeah, yeah. This ends with the Avignon Papacy. Yeah, it's prophetic towards it. Yeah, yeah, I think that one way to read that too. It's interesting because that's what Musa sees as the fifth one, is that it's covered with feathers again, what's left is now the fifth pageant. And I think you could, you can tether those, I think, pretty easily. Where. If the dragon is that schism, but it's also Islam, which means it's coming in with all of this violence in the wars and etc. That you can see, then why the Church, with a fractured infighting, Europe is then absorbing more and more temporal power to try and keep things together. And it's interesting because that's where Dr. Grabowski mentioned with good intentions as grass would cover over living earth. So here it's interesting. It's not we're going to see full blown corruption. That's not here. This is Dante warning that the Church has absorbed something, even for the best intentions, that he is very concerned, has a corruptive element to it.
- [38:23]
B
And I'd just like to add one thing. When I was reading this, I was becoming really emotional because of just the, just the utter wreckage that this chariot has become. And you want the griffin to come back and to scare off this little wily fox and do battle with this dragon. And yet this chariot is at the mercy of all of these monsters.
- [38:47]
A
Yeah, I mean even, I mean the last one, or I guess six, is that it's, it's transformed, right, by temporal power. So Musa sees this as the sixth stage in this pageant, is that now all of these feathers, right? This thing that it's been accumulating finally, then transformed the chariot into something that it wasn't even in the beginning. And so you get this like, I think very grotesque imagery, like around 148, you know, this thing has become like a monster. And on top of it now is a harlot, loosely dressed, who sat upon the cart, allowing her restless eyes to wander. So this is clear St. John apocalyptic imagery, right? So this is the beast and the harlot. And now he's using this as imagery for the Catholic Church. This is like a Protestant heyday here, right in. Right. This is what I grew up with. And so Dante is using this to show what the Church has become. And so a lot of people read the harlot as the papacy, that it's been something that's now hoard out to the world. It's not doing what it needs to be doing. And then you get this giant. And this is at like 150, like one who worried that she'd be stolen. I saw a giant right up against her side and they were kissing every other moment. And so most people read this as, this is the king of France, this is Philip the Fair. So this is like 1285 or so, where basically what's happening in Dante's time is that the Church absorbs all this temporal power and then somewhat ironically, it becomes subject to another temporal power, the King of France, who then exerts a massive amount of influence over the Church. And so the harlot, right, who's now on top of this beast, is like flirting with the giant. It's A completely grotesque scene.
- [40:42]
C
Yeah. It reminds me of when this relationship is rightly ordered. And one of the, you know, great moments in the history of the Church in Christendom is St Ambrose denying Communion to Emperor Theodosius. And obviously, Ambrose wasn't a pope, but he. He, you know, believed in the papacy and. But he denies the. This man who has just slaughtered 5,000 Greeks in Thessalonica. And he says, no. He said, I won't even offer the sacrifice in your presence. You know, famous painting, you know, no, you cannot, you know, get into the Church. And so. But this is the opposite of it at this point. And so, you know, not getting into present things too much. But I think all of us, we're not entirely unfamiliar with the reality of ecclesiastical authority not going the route of St. Ambrose when it comes to the. The treasures, and indeed, the ultimate treasure of the Church, our Lord's body, blood, soul and divinity, and the Blessed Sacrament. So this. It felt very familiar, but. But in a way that's oddly comforting. And, you know, I'm not intending to switch topics here, but it is one of the reasons I did come into the Church because I realized that, you know, it really stinks sometimes, but it's always to some extent, been that there are ages when it's worse and better. But. And we can go into some patristic reasons for that, as far as just the wheat and the tares and the one field and the clean and the unclean and Noah's Ark. So, again, it's awful, but at the same time, it's like, oh, I'm kind of comforted when I see that there's nothing new under the sun at the same time. So kind of a mix of feelings.
- [42:37]
A
Yeah, no, it makes sense. I mean, it is something that I think as a convert as well, you know, eventually you're not joining the Catholic Church because she's perfect or she's, you know, never made any mistakes or whatever. Ultimately, you join the Catholic Church because she's the church that Jesus Christ started. And then you have to take her as you will. Right? She is what she is. And then she's. She is as she is in a certain time and also in a certain place, and that becomes all very incarnational of actual human beings, you know. And so the problem with the Catholic Church is that it's populated by humans, and we tend to err and error a lot. So, no, luckily, this is also. The Purgatorio is one about grace and mercy and forgiveness. However, we're not quite there yet because the harlot wants to flirt, right? And so I found this really fascinating. So the harlot, where is this? This is like 154. And yet, because she set her greedy and vagrant eyes on me, her lover. This is Dante, the pilgrim. He beat her from head to foot, ferociously. And then full of fear and raw with rage, he unloosed the monster and took it into the woods, which made for him a kind of shield to guard his harlot and his beast. So this is fascinating. So let's unpack this. So the harlot who represents the papacy looks at Dante with these kind of like, greedy eyes, and the giant who represents Philip the Fair does not like this. So he beats the harlot and then drags the harlot out. So what do we make of this? Well, there's a few things I think, that we can think about it. One you can read. Remember Dante, the pilgrim throughout most of the Comedy represents humanity. He represents the Christian man, right? This is him going on this pilgrimage, etc. So some of the commentators will say, like, this is the harlot, the papacy having a moment of actually looking back to the Christian population of what it should be doing and looking back to what its true lover should be. You know, the actual, you know, Christendom. And obviously, the king of France doesn't like this. And so he beats the harlot and then the dragging her out to the woods. This is interesting because as you guys know and many people listening, this is the Avignon papacy. This is when the king of France drags out the papacy from Rome. And unfortunately, then the Pope, we have a period of time in which the Pope resides in Avignon in France, and the king of France exerts a massive amount of influence over the papacy. What's interesting here is, is that the fictitious date for the comedy is 1300. Avignon starts in 1305. So this is actually a prophecy is what he's saying. The harlot is engaging in this type of actions and eventually she's going to get beat and then she's gonna be drug out to the woods. It's a fascinating scene.
- [45:29]
B
It's not the first time that Dante does this. Of course, he does that in the Inferno as well with Chiaco. He also makes one of these after the fact prophecies. But I'm wondering, Deacon. So I think I was really drawn to that particular passage too, because it's the first time the pageant where the pageant recognizes Dante. Up to this point, he's just been a spectator and it's as though now he is part of the pageant. And so is this the harlot. And so I'll ask you gentlemen this question. Is this harlot flirting with date, Is she looking to find a new lover? Or is this an act of desperation on the harlot to try to escape from the giant?
- [46:16]
A
Yeah, I think two things come to mind. One is an interpretation that I shared that, like, oh, this is the harlot, like, turning back to who her lover should be. But what's interesting is that. And that kind of makes sense. So then the king beats her and drags her away. And that also coincides with how we've mainly seen Dante the pilgrim, as an analogy for the Christian, you know, the. The Christian throughout the text. But it is. I mean, I'm open to other things because, you know, the way he describes it, he doesn't really describe it as a redemptive scene for her. Right. He says, and yet, because she set her greedy and vagrant eyes on me, her lover beat her from head to foot ferociously. He doesn't actually use any redemptive language there. So, I mean, I, I'm open to other interpretations of, of what that would mean, but the papacy, maybe having a, A brief moment of clarity back to the Christian man is, I think, one read.
- [47:09]
C
Yeah, I mean, I think every. Every outpost of the city of man, the city of the devil, doesn't want to be recognized as a wolf. And so if that interpretation is correct, it's like, well, this moment when the papacy is. Is more aware of its sheep,
- [47:32]
A
then
- [47:32]
C
if it's more aware of the sheep, it's more aware of the wolf. And the wolf doesn't want to be recognized as such. And so I think the church, the hierarchy, laity too, who are in powerful positions, but they're always most in danger when they forget Jesus words about scandalizing the little ones. So it's almost like if this interpretation is correct, it's like the papacy is getting a glimpse of the little ones again. But before he can appreciate it too much, the giant's like, ah, nope, nope. It's about. It's about you and me, you know,
- [48:09]
A
so, yeah, that's an interesting parallel. That's a really interesting parallel. One other note that I would make is historically who the harlot is. So it is the papacy, but it's also Boniface viii. And this is interesting because Dante, I think Boniface VIII is really interesting for Dante because obviously, clearly he hates him. He's mentioned all the time, and he's also right, yeah. However you can. Boniface VIII also shows you how much Dante respects the papacy because he's all, there's a second shoe to drop with Boniface viii. And this is the fact that he was beaten, this is actually how Boniface VIII died. So Boniface VIII was beaten by these Frenchmen, by the, by the kind of henchmen of the king, and was mocked and held captive. Eventually he's let free, but he dies of his injuries. Not to. Not too later. And so Dante's actually already mentioned this several times in a positive way, almost like as a martyrdom of, like, look at how, you know, the vicar of our Lord suffered. So I just want to point that out because I think it's so, so interesting that Dante, which I think he rightly does, can make a distinction between the person in the office who might fall quite short of the expectations of that office while still respecting the office itself. Because I don't think, I mean, not to push like too deep into this because obviously we have a lot of non Catholics that listen as well. But like, I don't find Dante to be like a proto Protestant. Like he's not going to take the corruption of the papacy and use that to toss out the papacy at large. Dante seems to have a real heart for a papacy in a church that would be refreshed and renewed in its mission for the glory of God and salvation of souls. And he finds that it's been corrupted way too much by a temporal power. But as we'll see here, I don't, I think he still. Dante's politics is very difficult to parse out. But I still think that Dante understands that the church stepped into this power because of a gap. And he knows that because. Let me kind of maybe put a cap on this. Where is this? It's in Canto 33. It's in the next one. It's who he's waiting for. It's the end of the pageant is who are they waiting for? So the pageant becomes prophetic and it's who are they waiting for? And interestingly, it's not the griffin, it's not Jesus Christ, it's the leader. Yeah. It's a hero. It's a temporal leader. And so I think, though, and this. And that goes back all the way to the greyhound at the very beginning of the comedy, if you remember, who's going to come and scare these beasts away. Right. The lion, the leopard and the she wolf, particularly the she wolf. It's the greyhound. It's a temporal leader. It's a true inheritor of Caesar. And I think that's something that really, that's difficult for people to parse out is people like, are like, oh, Dante just rails against the corruption of the papacy. Yeah. But Dante also wants a Caesar. Dante also understands that the papacy is getting pulled into temporal power because the temporal side is also a complete wreck. And by the way, it doesn't get fixed. And then another Italian, Machiavelli, is going to have a very different response to how we're going to have to fix these problems. So, no, I think that Dante's corruption or not his corruption, I think Dante's critiques of the Church and the papacy really have to be set within the overall context and his overall teachings within the Comedy.
- [51:34]
C
I had a question for you guys and maybe you would or wouldn't know. I don't know. But I mean, I was verifying. I was like, I'm pretty sure Boniface VIII did Unum sanctum, which is a pretty. A pretty strong statement about the authority of the spiritual over the temporal. So I'm just kind of curious how. How that would fit into this and. And why he would consider Boniface and hell and whatnot.
- [52:00]
A
Yeah, yeah. Unum sanctum. Yeah. One of the. One of the most famous documents articulating the traditional Catholic political teaching of duo sunt.
- [52:09]
C
Right.
- [52:10]
A
There are two powers. And even in my. And I've probably slipped, but in my own speech, you'll note that I have talked about temporal power and spiritual power. I have not talked about church and state.
- [52:21]
C
Correct.
- [52:21]
A
I don't think that's the right way to read this. And I don't think it's the way that Dante reads it either. Both powers are held by the Church. You have the spiritual power is held by the clergy. Right. Ecclesiastical power, and then you have a temporal power is held by the inheritor. It should be held by the inheritor of the Caesar. And. But the thing is, it's part of the Church because the laity are baptized.
- [52:45]
C
Yes.
- [52:46]
A
And so Boniface makes the same argument too, that they're both held with inside the Church. You also get other writings that it's the two lights upon which man is guided. But you go all the way back to the 4002 in the actual letter that coins the term duo sunt. There are two. This is it. They're both held by the Church. So no, I think that Dante sees Boniface as way over exerting his temporal authority. But at the same time, Dante understands that there can't be a gap. There can't be a vacuum. We have to have this Caesar that comes in that can actually stop all, basically stop Christians from killing Christians. This is. This is, I think, maybe throughout a thesis. This is the biggest. One of the biggest shames of medieval Catholic Europe, that it could never actually organize itself into a true empire, and it constantly fought and killed themselves. So you think about the problems with the Crusades and all these things. They can't do all this stuff because you have England, you have France, you have constant internal strife where they cannot create a new Rome, a true. A true Roman Empire. I think Dante knows that. But then Dante also, I think, is very heavily on subsidiarity. And so even though he wants a Caesar, he also wants Florence, the Republic of Florence, to have a lot of freedom as well. Dante has a very particular articulation of the politics that I don't think. Like, they don't line up one for one with, say, Boniface viii. And then there's a lot of blood on the floor. Conversations about whether Dante's articulation of dual sunt and his own writing on the subject aligns with kind of what we would see the traditional Catholic understanding of it at large, if that makes sense. Right. Some people do a lot of gymnastics to make those harmonize. Not entirely sure they do, but yeah. Boniface VIII also.
- [54:42]
C
So you would think that Dante would perhaps reject aspects of Unum Sanctum or would just see that Boniface was exercising licit authorities discussed in Unum Sanctum inappropriately.
- [54:56]
A
My hot take would be that I think Dante sees that Boniface goes too far. Okay, So I think you could make the argument that Unum Sanctum is fine because of how it articulates that both powers are held by the Church.
- [55:12]
C
Yeah.
- [55:13]
A
But the way that Boniface exercises that, particularly then, against Florence, is clearly obviously not aligned with how Dante thinks that's actually supposed to be done.
- [55:22]
C
Okay, okay, okay.
- [55:25]
A
Let's look at Canto.
- [55:26]
C
I just found the historical details. I'm going to look up after our time together. I don't know some of the. Some of the background there.
- [55:33]
A
Well, if you can figure out Dante's politics, you let me know. But it sounds.
- [55:37]
C
Okay. Fair enough.
- [55:39]
A
Okay, let's look at Canto 33. Okay, so what's interesting is this starts off, we get the virtues again, now three, now four.
- [55:48]
B
Singing.
- [55:48]
A
We have Beatrice, who now is in mourning. She's weeping, actually, to the degree like Mary before the cross. This is line six. That second Turset so moved that Mary was transformed, but little more before the cross. It's interesting, too. I think one thing I didn't really appreciate until rereading Canto 33, is that Matilda is the ordinary feminine aspect at the top of Purgatory. And it seems. I mean, what's. I think what's implied here is that it's Matilda that is the ordinary person who greets the souls and walks them through this process. And then Beatrice is the extraordinary character who's actually really only here because Dante is here. Because the one thing I always forget is that Statius is still here. Right? Statius is still standing here. He's mentioned somewhere. Maybe it's a little further down that he's mentioned. But when they go to the river, it's like, oh, yeah, by the way, Statius, you need to come too. And it's like, oh, yeah, Statius is still standing here. That's good to know. But the woman, Matilda, she's the one that actually is like, processing this and, like, moving through this. But then we get an explanation. Like, Dante basically is a little bit perplexed and asks for a little bit of a explanation of what he's just seen. And so this is around 34. He says, know the vessel which the serpent broke both was and isn't, but let the one who has the guilt not think God's vengeance fears resistance. So again, you get this, I think, allusion to the king of France, the eagle who left behind those feathers that turned the cart into a monster. And later prey will not remain without an heir forever. So there's your who's coming, as we alluded to earlier. So this is really interesting. So this is the empire. This is the greyhound, that there's going to be someone who finally comes in and can organize basically, Christendom back into a harmonious empire. And I think that aspect of Dante is often missed.
- [58:06]
C
It's interesting because I'm seeing more language from the Apocalypse. Let's see. Oh, darn, where was it? I'm sorry. Know that the vessel which the serpent broke was and is not. That's right. In Apocalypse 17, there's that language about the beast who is not. I'm sorry, who is not was, but will be again. So he seems to sort of be reversing that in my translation. But he whose fault it is may rest assured. God's vengeance fears no hindrance. And then the eagle that had left its plumes within the chariot, which then became a monster, and then a prey. Again, going back to. I'm forgetting whether it's Apocalypse 7, 18 or 19, but where the horror I'm sorry, the. The monster attacks and destroys the horror. The beast destroys the horror. So this is again, drawing from John's Apocalypse, where. And. And I think we see that with. I think you could argue that John's Apocalypse is. I don't. I don't think the church. I don't think Catholics can do a fully preterist interpretation of Apocalypse, but it's also pointing back to the Pharisees and the Sadducees teaming up with Rome to kill our Lord and also Judas, of course. And so there's this sense of like, oh, we can team up with this temporal power to obtain our ends. But then, of course, what happens 40 years later? You know, millions of Jews are killed in Jerusalem, the temple's destroyed, and they're exiled, you know, for. For almost 2,000 years. And so those are just some of the thoughts I was thinking when I was reading this about these. These deep dynamics of. And also just what we were talking about earlier with. With the sins that seem light, they seem like feathers, but they weigh down the cart. And likewise, with so many sins, there's this tantalizing aspect. But when we even take that second look, you know, as it were, you know, it's got us, and it will. It will. You know, it will destroy us. The thing that we think we're joining ourselves to for a benefit will ultimately destroy us.
- [60:20]
A
So, you know, to that point, there's another illusion, and I'm not sure I fully appreciated this in 43, he says, when God will send a 510 and 5 to slay the lecherous woman and the giant with whom she dallies. And so this is the. The 510 and 5 is again, a reference to apocalypse. That's 1318. And Baxter says here it's Dante's hope for a political hero, the greyhound, to return. But here's something I found really interesting that actually, that actually just occurred to me was it, he says, it will slay the lecherous woman. So what's interesting is that means that the temporal power reestablishing itself will have a puritive effect upon the papacy and the spiritual power. It will cause then the harlot to go back into the chariot, and actually the chariot to be a chariot again, and for it to actually play its role as a church. That's something I didn't appreciate until now that it really has. It's going to have a puritative effect upon the spiritual power, I think we see. I mean, you guys are part of better than I am, but like golly, you know, one thing I can't wait. I cannot wait to read scripture on this podcast. I mean I love reading Dante and then we're going to read some more Plato and then we're going to read Aristotle and I'm going to have a lot of patience because it's going to be a while. But I cannot wait to read through scripture in this deep meditative way, particularly after reading all these great books, et cetera. Like I'm already like yearning for it. Even though on our current reading pace I'm going to have to hand off this podcast to my 11 year old in about 50 years. But anyway, to actually make it past like the Aeneid or something. So. But this is what I just, yeah, you see this a lot in the Old Testament, that the temporal, like that, the temporal side, the temporal authority inside of Israel because Israel is a pre figurement of the church and the temporal power and the spiritual power are both inside Israel. And it works the same way with the new Israel. And several times in the Old Testament the temporal power has to come in and have a puritative effect upon the spiritual, which is really fascinating because I don't, and I don't think this takes away from it. But just because the greater sword, if you will, is the spiritual and also if you do the lights, the luminaries that guide us on our pilgrimage, the spiritual is the sun and the temporal is the moon. That doesn't actually mean that the temporal can't come in and help clear house on the spiritual every once in a while.
- [62:44]
C
Well, I don't think most people know that papal elections. I believe it was the Austrian emperor at some point or the Austro Hungarian emperor. Correct me if I'm wrong in that, but I know there was an emperor up to, you know, World War I that had a veto on papal elections. I don't think most people know that. He of course couldn't choose the Pope, but if the conclave came back with a choice and the emperor didn't want, he could be like veto. You know, so, and then of course you're right, Josiah, Hezekiah, a number of other great temporal rulers in Israel. And it, it strikes me that, you know, the corruption of the worst, corruption of the best is the worst. You know, if, if the spiritual power is out of whack, the nature sort of has to reassert her herself and, and, and so kind of like Horus is, if you're going to, you know, try and sweep it away, it'll come roaring right back and so, yeah, those are just some of the disorganized thoughts that come to mind when you say that.
- [63:44]
A
It's interesting. We talk about that the corruption of the best is the worst. And we see that like very clearly with the. The harlot and the grotesque beast and things of that nature. It's interesting to me that the temporal power is not. Doesn't really play its own role in the pageant. It's just really absent. Like, he doesn't really show it as something that's like fractured and causing problems. I mean, obviously you have the giant that represents like one, but it's not like the whole pageant is not duo sunt, if that makes sense. The two parts aren't shown equally. It's very much focused on the corruption of the spiritual side, which I think is fascinating. Okay, so let's move on after we get the hope and prophecy, if you will, that a greyhound will come and fix all these things. And he actually still. I mean, this actually goes on for a bit because then we go back to talking about the tree. So again, if you talk about. If you think about the tree both as literally the tree of knowledge and evil, but then also representing this like temporal justice, this natural justice, maybe even temporal authority, it actually goes back into that conversation. You see, in like 60, it talks about it down at 64, your mind is sleeping. If you can't see how our lofty trees inverted top in height must come about for special reason. Musa makes a comment again that this is an allusion to a divine temporal authority, an empire, if you will. So, yeah, maybe I should take back my statement that maybe the temporal side does have its own strong analog throughout the pageant. It's just more subtle.
- [65:25]
C
So when he says in my transit, whoever at 58, whoever robs or rends that tree offends with his blaspheming action God, for he created it for his sole use. Holy. So would you see in that something like Boniface going too far with temporal authority, you know, the tree being temporal authority, and that it has its own. I mean, the church is teaching, even from Boniface, is that the temporal authority, as far as I'm aware, has its own proper sphere. And if the papacy assumed the temporal sword, it was never to do so on a permanent and ongoing basis, just as a steward of sorts, immediately hand it back to the temporal power. Am I getting that right?
- [66:17]
B
No, I think you're right, Joshua, because if you go back a couple of verses to 57, Dante refers to the not once but twice plundered tree and so the initial plundering would have been Adam, and the subsequent plundering would have been that of, you could say either the harlot or the giant. But in either case, it would be a temporal power of some. Of some kind or other.
- [66:45]
C
Okay, okay, yeah, I agree.
- [66:48]
A
And actually, I think, Joshua, you're questions are right on the mark. Because it's interesting that at 72, we get kind of a narrative comment. You see God's justice in the interdict and read the tree according to its moral sense. So this is interesting because several times Dante breaks the fourth wall and tells us, like, you know, pay attention what I'm doing, et cetera. I thought it was really interesting here that we actually, I think this is actually, it's not breaking the fourth wall because I think it's actually being instructive to Dante the pilgrim, but we're being told, in what sense you need to read this. And so that's what's interesting because I think that's what you're naturally pulling towards is, okay, so if this is the literal and then this is the allegorical, what then is the moral? Like, how do I apply this to my life? Where do we actually see this? Yeah, I think that's an incredibly natural movement to that. And then obviously the last one is the anagogical. How does this apply to the end times, to my own final end? And I think that's one of Dante's angsts is that one of the reasons that we need duo sunt, that we need these luminaries in our life to provide us guidance is because when we have temporal and spiritual peace, it is very good for the souls and for the common good. And we see this flourishing amongst man. But then when we see a fractured temporal power, we see maybe a bloated spiritual power, then it causes all kinds of problems. This is why all of hell is populated with Florentines, right? Everyone from Florence is in hell. Why? Well, Dante's there, but also because he presents it as a community that is so deeply fractured and full of sin that there's no way to live a holy life. How is this going to work? Right? Sure, in Sodom and Gomorrah you might get lot, but that's one person out of like the whole community. So I think we sometimes, we're Americans, we're very atomized, right? We're very individualistic. But I think Dante helps us understand it. Like, no, there's a commonality to the Christian walk and a peace in both the temporal and spiritual side that we should Pray for and work for, for the good of my neighbor, because I might be able to endure certain agitations in life, but my neighbor won't, and it'll be a stumbling block to them, or they'll get lost in the dark or any of these other things. And I think Dante's very sensitive to this.
- [69:14]
C
Well, I saw in a commentary that Kantos 32 and 33 really switched to from the sort of individual journey of Dante through purgatory to the sort of more, you know, public, you know, common, common good perspective. I had a question for both of you really quick. Sorry, I meant to mention earlier is the meaning of the 510 and 5. I had seen a commentary, I think, that mentioned this referred to a particular leader. This is around line 43 or so 44. Do you guys know what that refers to?
- [69:50]
B
I think, Deacon, you can confirm or disconfirm this, but it's an anagram. So the Roman numerals would be dxv. Okay, so dux is the Latin for leader or commander. And so it's just like numerology or however you want to put it.
- [70:11]
C
Yeah, to represent a temporal leader.
- [70:14]
B
Yeah, he's just flipping the second two letters.
- [70:18]
C
Got it, got it.
- [70:19]
A
And it's brilliant because it's also a passage from Scripture. It's also from the Apocalypse.
- [70:24]
B
Oh, wow.
- [70:24]
C
Yeah.
- [70:25]
A
Yeah. So there's multiple layers there. So where should we go next? I mean, we have this kind of, like, slow playout where it talks about the Empire. And I think one of the things that it kind of ends this way, and I thought was that. I mean, that not the whole canto, but a certain passage ends really in a fascinating way in line 90, where it says, and see how far your way departs from the paths of holiness. And hear how out of tune the highest heaven is from Earth. I really. I don't know why. It just really captured my read when I was looking at this morning of. Okay, look at all of this. Look at what's happening and see how, like, what kind of discord this is between heaven and earth for our Lord's Kingdom, the Church, you know, exists on both heaven and earth, as our wonderful Lord's Prayer tells us. And look. Look what you've done. Look at how terrible this is. I don't know. I found that to be. It's very simple. But for whatever reason, seeing the Church Militant so out of harmony with the Church Triumphant, because that's really kind of the ending of that section, because then it moves off to the river, that's something Dante is being shown is that your earthly life, the earthly life of the Church right now is incredibly discordant.
- [71:45]
B
There's also a philosophical point that he's making here, beginning with line 85. This is Beatrice. It is Beatrice speaking, correct at this point, she's addressing Dante. She says, so that you may come to understand the school you have followed and see if what it teaches follows well my words, and see that your way is as far from God's. And so the question that the reader has to ask himself is, well, which school is she referring to here? And I was inclined to think that it's the school of philosophy known as Aristotelianism or Aristotelian Thomism, that there are certain limits, that that school of thought successfully navigated Dante to this point. But he needs a new school or he needs a new way of understanding. And so maybe this is again my Platonism coming through. But I do think that there is, there, there is perhaps a shift here where we have to abandon Aristotelian science for something perhaps more mystical or something that is more direct and immediate. So it's an exchange of like, ratio, a discursive reasoning for intellectus, something that is more intuitive.
- [73:06]
C
Well, it's interesting. Again, I may be over interpreting this here, if you guys think, tell me, but you know, a little bit before that, Dante asked, but why does your desired word ascend so high above my understanding that the more I try, the more I am denied? And again, I don't want to over interpret, but I, you know, I'm in the fathers a lot and you know, observation that many of them make is that the pagan schools started to splinter more and more and more, and there was no authority to resolve them into unity. And you guys are probably more familiar with the history of Greek philosophy than I am, but it just strikes me that, you know, the heyday of the Roman Republic was centuries. You could argue, you know, a century or more before Christ. And likewise with philosophy, Plato and Aristotle are centuries before our Lord, but that when our Lord actually arrives, you know, it's like this idea that you've got Roman order, Greek reason, and Jewish revelation all at the same time. Our Lord comes. But it's not that each of them is at their apogee. In many ways, they're at their worst point ever, right when our Lord arrives, you know, the Republic has sort of begun its transition into an empire. You know, the Jews are fractured. They've got different schools of thought. They've even got two seemingly two high priests and a. And a non Jewish king, you know, an Idomenian. And then the Greeks, the philosophical stools just keep splintering and splintering. So this idea that nature kind of gets like as high as it can go, but then it can't, whatever that height is, it can go without grace. It can't even quite maintain that by its own strength. Then it starts kind of dipping a bit again. I. That was just an image that kind of came to mind when I was reading Dante's question to. To Beatrice. So all good thoughts.
- [75:00]
A
I don't have a great critique of what she means thereby the school. I thought that was really fascinating. I mean, I'm glad you brought it up. I didn't bring it up because I have no idea what to say about it. I mean, I just, you know, he. Current, He. He clearly is pulling from an Aristotelian, Thomistic school. He. Now, he's not a slave to it. We see he deviates from Thomas on a few key issues, but he's typically referred to as like a grand student of Aquinas. Right. His. His master, Dante's master in exile, was a student of St. Thomas Aquinas. But I would be really. So one thing I would be interested to watch as, as we go into paradise, what type of school does he pull from? That would be very fascinating. And I'm actually really fast to read paradise, because the first time I read it, I could not stand it. It was so boring and I couldn't figure it out. And I really just finished it because I read like half of it and I was like, it bothered me an OCD to read half a book. And so I worked through it. So I'm very much working at next Lent. So you can join us for Lent 2027. We'll read the paradise together and finish the Comedy. But I would, I think, to track this question of the school. I'd be really interested to see what school is predominant as he works through Paradise. Because my suspicion is, even though I. I share some of the same presuppositions as Dr. Grabowski, is that a lot of our famous saints become very Platonic when they have to talk about heaven. Heaven is very Platonic. It doesn't lend itself to an Aristotelian epistemology very well. And so obviously here he doesn't have a whole lot of Plato, he has a lot of Augustine and he has a lot of Dionysius to pull from. So that might be just something that we watch as this thing develops. Okay, so here he is to the river, the second river. Correct. So this seems to be Matilda's actual role. So this, this seems to be Matilda's actual role is that when the souls would come up to the earthly paradise, she would help then basically baptize them. We got this kind of beautiful scene in which she doesn't go into the water, she just drags them out into it, where this is her job. And the lyci, right, or lise, whichever way you want to pronounce it, resolves or kind of dissolves the memory of sin. And that's an interesting thing. We've kind of played on that a little bit because obviously the souls in paradise still remember things they did wrong. So this could be like the passions, like the memory of the passion of sin. It could be the attachment of sin. It doesn't seem to be a clear, just like wiping of the memory. But then you have another river that for the most part, a lot of people argue was Dante's invention. It does seem to have some echoes in the tradition. And so this, which has like 14 ways to pronounce it, right? You know. Nay, you know, a.
- [77:46]
B
You know, that's how I would pronounce it. Yeah. U in the Greek derivation would be good mind or good memory.
- [77:56]
A
Yeah. So my understanding is that this river that he's come to. So I mean, let's do this in the text. So this is 127. This is the memory of. Restoring the memory of good deeds. So kind of the opposite of the first river. So the first one's wiping away the memory of sin. Right. This disorder, these bad deeds. And now the second river is going to be restoring the memory of good deeds. And so this is 127, where he's going to be taken into this river. And then what I mentioned earlier is Statius is here. So it's like, oh, yeah, by the way, Statius has been here the whole time. He's at 1:34. And Mathilda's like, oh, yeah, by the way, Statius, do come with me. Right. You're going to do this too. And then it's interesting because then we get like an incredibly abbreviated to tercets. It's like, hey, by the way, this was amazing. I can't even describe it. I don't even have words to it. Also, I ran out of room on what I have subscribed. I mean, he says that I didn't get up. He says, where does he say. Where does he say that? But since the pages set aside for this, my second canticle are full already. So he's Full. And this is interesting because, and I'm not a good scholar on this, but Dante plays with the mathematics of the Comedy. This, this tercet the threes, like the Canto. You can read the Divine Comedy by stacking it on top of one another. And the cantos in the comedies relate to one another vertically as well. I mean, there's a whole nother area of Dante that I, I do not know very well. So he has to be very particular about how he articulates things and where he articulates them. But we get kind of what I found to be a somewhat abbreviated deal about the river here of restoring the memory of good deeds. And then we get though that what this does is it prepares him to ascend, prepares him to then ascend to paradise. And we get an ending again with pure and ready to climb up to the stars. Another beautiful ending for those who don't recall. The Inferno ends with stars as well, and so will paradise. What do we make of this last bit?
- [80:07]
B
So I, so I'll, I'll give my two cents. I, I read this and again, I, I can't help but think that Dante here owes a great debt to Plato. So three things. Number one, there's, you know, a right good mind or good memory. And so those who are familiar with the podcast on the Meno, Plato's Meno, there's this theory that Socrates puts forward that learning is recollection or anamnesis. So this emphasis that Socrates places on remembering, that the slave boy doesn't learn the answer to the mathematical or the geometrical problem, but rather he's going through a process of remembering. So that would be number one. Number two, Dante's remark that he can't really write what he's experiencing, that it's somehow inexpressible or ineffable. That too is very Platonic. When you say, for instance, read his seventh letter. He talks about how none of his true philosophies have ever been written down. That at some point language becomes sort of limited, right? That it becomes useless. And then the third is what I love how he ends this in the Hollander translation. From those most holy waters I came already remade. Now, that word there also refers back to the tree in Canto 32, the remaking of the tree as are new plants. So he is like a plant, right? He's likening himself to the tree of knowledge. But anyone who's read Plato's Timaeus knows that Timaeus, when talking about the creation of man, describes or refers to man as a heavenly plant. So again, maybe I'm importing way too much Plato into the text, but knowing just how much of a genius Dante is, I can't help but think that he is indeed smuggling some of this into the, into the text.
- [82:19]
A
Yeah, I mean, he might be right. I mean there's a lot of Platonic influences there, like I said, through St. Augustine, through Dionysius. Also they have a Latin version of the Timaeus as well in this. So. No, I, yeah, I really like that question of tracking what school of thought makes a big imprint on paradise. No, I'm looking forward to that. Joshua. Any, any kind of like final thoughts.
- [82:40]
C
Well, is he, is he also bringing in baptism here? You know, in my. From that most holy wave, I now return to Beatrice. Remade as new trees are renewed when they bring forth new bows. I was pure and prepared to climb unto the stars, you know, and the stars in the book of Apocalypse are obviously angels in the heavens, but they also represent leaders. This is also in the Old Testament as well. It's what St. John's drawing from. And the dragon, you know, swiping down the stars. But to go there, he does need to be baptized. So is this some sort of baptism?
- [83:20]
A
I mean, I think he's.
- [83:21]
C
And there's, Sorry, one more thought is to combine with Plato. I don't know if he's doing this. I, I'm not a scholar enough on these things, but you guys perhaps know more, especially Dr. Grabowski. But, but you know, obviously Plato's notion of memory isn't entirely Christian. But, but this idea of like Christ recapitulating Adam, it like he doesn't make an entirely new thing. He recapitulates an old thing. You know, when we're baptized, we're baptized on the eighth day or the first day. You know, it's like, you know, Christ isn't inaugurating a French Revolution where There's now a 10 day week. It's like, no, it's going to be a second week.
- [83:58]
B
Weak.
- [83:59]
C
It's going to still maintain the weak, but it's a second one. And so is he perhaps combining Platonic and Catholic notions of rebirth here?
- [84:09]
A
I mean, I think that's certainly arguable. I mean, I think the baptism illusions are evident.
- [84:14]
C
Yeah.
- [84:15]
A
Because I think one thing that really stood out to me on the Lethe is that he also swallows the water. Right. It also has to have an interiority to it. We don't get as many details, I don't think on this one, but that was something I thought was really interesting that he's, and it's almost, it's almost forced, it's almost violent as I, I had to swallow, gulp this water. So, no, I think he's pulling like he does often. Right. Both sacred and pagan imagery to show the same thing. So you get these two rivers kind of rooted in paganism that he's adopted into Christian context and then uses a lot of baptism language as well.
- [84:53]
C
All right,
- [84:55]
A
Joshua. And Dr. Grabowski, any, any kind of final thoughts or comments on these Cantos?
- [85:00]
B
Well, for me personally, I, I, I just really enjoyed reading it. I, I, like I said earlier, this was just, it was so hallucinogenic and psychedelic and, and it shows you, I mean, so how cinematic they were. I mean, they, they, they lend themselves to the imagination. Just you being able to conjure up these, these images in the head. And so I think this is, you know, Dante at his, as his spectacular best. You know, his, his ability to create spectacle within the reader.
- [85:35]
C
Yeah, I would just say that in general, I, I love the Purgatorio a lot. I'm, I, I need to reread the whole thing as a Catholic, but, but this idea that, you know, Purgatory is a place of punishment, but it's a, it's a purifying punishment. It's where, which, you know, the punishment of hell is not. And so, well, what's the difference? The difference is that, you know, the will is adjusted. In Hell, the will is set forever, eternally, but in Purgatory, the will is adjusted. Just as a general comment, you know, I, we, I wasn't with you guys in the other Cantos, but, but, but, yeah, it's one of the reasons why, even as a Protestant, I love the Purgatorio, and, and so thank you guys for having me.
- [86:17]
A
No, thank you. Thank you. Well, I think one thing I want to say before we close is just a thank you to everyone who read this over Lent with us. And I think what I want to invite people to do is that just to stay with it, if that makes sense, like, this isn't just something that you read and you set aside. I think what Dante has offered you here really is a guidebook to the ascent of the soul to God. How do I become more beautiful as Christ is beautiful? And Dr. Baxter, all the way at the beginning of the podcast when he gave our introduction, actually did talk about using the Purgatorio as his examination of conscience before confession of looking at, where have I sinned? Where are these things that I can look at what terse. What terraces am I on? And then we have a prayer. You have a Beatitude, you have bad examples, you have good examples. You have the contrapasso. This is an entire library inviting you to be holy, to have sanctification, to have theosis. And so I would say that for those who really want to take the soul seriously, they really want to say, how can I become a better person? How can I configure myself to Jesus Christ? The Purgatorio is a book to live with. It's a book to reference time and time again. Obviously, everyone has probably given up something for Lent. If it's something that you should give up anyway, stick with it. Or use the Purgatorio as a guide. Think about good examples, bad examples. Incorporate the prayers, incorporate the Beatitudes. There's all kinds of things that you can do. And I would just say, like, shifting into that moral sense. Just hold close to this book. This is a book that, like we said at the beginning, is probably the most human because it is the one that's in time. It's the one in which people are saved and want to be saved, but they're imperfect. Right. So I would just feel able to kind of stick with it and hold close to that, if you will. All right. Dr. Frink. Rabowski, we really appreciate seeing you again. It was always great to have you on the podcast.
- [88:14]
B
Thank you. I thought that I was banned, but I. Apparently I wasn't.
- [88:21]
A
You're a cornerstone.
- [88:22]
B
I'm a cornerstone.
- [88:23]
A
You can't be banned.
- [88:25]
B
Oh, dear me, no. As always, it's a pleasure, Deacon Harrison. And I mean, you are doing a great service to the promotion of the intellectual life, for sure.
- [88:37]
A
Well, I'm certainly a student, so there's. There's dangers of learning alongside me as a student, but hopefully we're learning from the masters as we. As we work through this. Joshua, it's always good to see you again. It's wonderful to welcome you back to the podcast.
- [88:51]
C
Of course.
- [88:52]
A
Remind us where we can find out more about you and your work.
- [88:55]
C
Eternalchristendom.com and we're doing a lot of stuff, like I said, an exciting church father web app. You and I need to talk about it more offline. But, yeah, turnocrist on podcast, written resources, all that fine stuff. So.
- [89:10]
A
All right, everyone, thank you again for joining us in this Purgatorio. Check us out on X, YouTube, Facebook, and Patreon. Check out the Great Books podcast.com for a reading schedule. We're going to have a few topical episodes for the next couple weeks. And then we're going to start reading the Odyssey in anticipation for the movie coming out this summer. So you can read the Odyssey with us and also be disappointed in the movie. It's gonna be a great time. So a 12 week study. It'll be wonderful. And we will see you guys next week. Take.