Now the firm margin bears us, under the vapor
Rising from the stream to form a shade and fend
The fire off, sheltering both banks and water.
As Flemings between Wissant and Bruges, to defend
Against the tide that rushes in on them,
Construct a bulwark to drive the sea from land;
And Paduans on the Brenta do, to stem
the water and protect their castle and town
Before Carentana feels the heat – in the same
*10 Manner those banks were made, except the one
11 Who built them did not make them as high or thick,
12 Whoever he was. And I could not have seen
The wood that lay behind us, had I looked back.
*10 a tale imagine eran fatti quelli,
11 tutto che né sì alti né sì grossi,
12 qual che si fosse, lo maestro félli.
10 In such similitude had those been made,
11 Albeit not so lofty nor so thick,
12 Whoever he might be, the master made them.
As you can see the original Italian and then the translations above. Notice the difference in line 12. I usually use Robert Pinsky’s translation which is the first one. But it seemed to miss something that is brought out in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s translation which is the second translation.
Dante and Virgil are walking along embankments that resemble some dikes and earthworks he knows. He calls God the Maestro who made the architecture of Hell. Dante often uses double comparisons and he does so here when he compares two earthworks built to protect against floods and tides.
We are still in the seventh circle and in the third ring. The seventh circle of Hell is for the Violent. The first ring was the violent against others, the second ring was violence again self and the third ring was violence against God. Within the third ring there are those who suffer from lying on the burning hot sand and the fire raining down on them. They were the blasphemers who were violent against God’s person. But there are other ways to be violent against God. So there were the ones who sit hunched on the sand and another group that wander aimlessly, constantly moving on the sand. This hot, burning sand and the rain of flames make this a desolate, barren desert. Unproductive. As are the homosexuals. Their sex produces no children, they are unfruitful.
When we encountered another troop of souls
Who looked at us the way that men will look
At one another at dusk, when daylight fails
Under a new moon: knitting their eyebrows at us
The way old tailors do when threading needles.
While I was being examined by them thus,
One recognized me, and took me by the hem,
Crying, “Why what a marvel!” I fixed my eyes
On his scorched face as he reached out his arm
And the baked features I saw did not forestall
My knowing him – I reached back down to him
My hand toward his face, and answered his call:
“Are you here, Ser Brunetto?”
As a group of men come by Dante and Virgil, the poet, describes them with an image suggestive of homosexuals who gather and cruise looking for other men to have sex with. “Who looked at us the way that men will look at one another at dusk, when the daylight fails under a new moon”
Ser Brunetto Latini (1220-1294) was a Florentine Guelph, highly educated and involved in politics. He was also exiled after the battle of Montaperti in 1260. He lived in France until he was repatriated in 1266. He was a serious intellectual and writer. He was a teacher to Dante who highly respected him. He was a homosexual, sodomite. Dante treats this man with respect and affection. He recognizes his good work. But it’s not enough to be saved. Salvation comes from repentance and asking Jesus Christ to forgive us and be Lord of our life. We must be born again.
It is not that God hates the homosexual. God hates the sin of homosexuality and what it does to men and women who are unrepentant and who pursue it as a “lifestyle”. They don’t realize the bondage they are getting themselves into when they refuse to label it as sin and something to repent of and be saved from. Their sin is no less than any other sin and no more than any other sin. It is sin and sin is what will keep us from freedom and from eternal life in Heaven. Whether it’s the sin of gossip, the sin of sex outside of marriage, the sin of murder, the sin of murmuring, complaining and sulking or the sin of anger… all sin is destructive and the wages of sin are death! God wants to save us from this bondage to sin and the wages of sin (spiritual death and Hell). He sent His Son to die on the cross to pay for our sins, all sin, any sin. But we have to repent, ask forgiveness and accept Him as Lord. It’s our choice. Dante, the poet, treats this homosexual with kindness and respect as we should treat others. But he also leaves the reader with no uncertainty about the sinfulness of practising homosexuality. No matter how “good” a person is, no one is without sin. These sinners are unrepentant homosexuals and they made their choice so the punishment is of their own making. As it is with any unrepentant, unsaved sinner. In his 2nd part of the Comedie, Purgatorie, you will see repentant homosexuals. Those who realized their sin and their need of a Savior. God did not leave homosexuality up for interpretation. He is very specific about it’s sinfulness. (Again, no more or less than other sins and God is specific about them too.)
Leviticus 18:22 You must not lie with a man as with a woman; that is an abomination.
Leviticus 20:13 If a man lies with a man as with a woman, they have both committed an abomination. They must surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.
Deuteronomy 23:17 There shall be no whore of the daughters of Israel, nor a sodomite of the sons of Israel.
Romans 1:18-32;2:1-11 18 But God shows his anger from heaven against all sinful, wicked people who suppress the truth by their wickedness. 19 They know the truth about God because he has made it obvious to them. 20 For ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see his invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature. So they have no excuse for not knowing God.
21 Yes, they knew God, but they wouldn’t worship him as God or even give him thanks. And they began to think up foolish ideas of what God was like. As a result, their minds became dark and confused. 22 Claiming to be wise, they instead became utter fools. 23 And instead of worshiping the glorious, ever-living God, they worshiped idols made to look like mere people and birds and animals and reptiles.
24 So God abandoned them to do whatever shameful things their hearts desired. As a result, they did vile and degrading things with each other’s bodies. 25 They traded the truth about God for a lie. So they worshiped and served the things God created instead of the Creator himself, who is worthy of eternal praise! Amen. 26 That is why God abandoned them to their shameful desires. Even the women turned against the natural way to have sex and instead indulged in sex with each other. 27 And the men, instead of having normal sexual relations with women, burned with lust for each other. Men did shameful things with other men, and as a result of this sin, they suffered within themselves the penalty they deserved.
28 Since they thought it foolish to acknowledge God, he abandoned them to their foolish thinking and let them do things that should never be done. 29 Their lives became full of every kind of wickedness, sin, greed, hate, envy, murder, quarreling, deception, malicious behavior, and gossip. 30 They are backstabbers, haters of God, insolent, proud, and boastful. They invent new ways of sinning, and they disobey their parents. 31 They refuse to understand, break their promises, are heartless, and have no mercy. 32 They know God’s justice requires that those who do these things deserve to die, yet they do them anyway. Worse yet, they encourage others to do them, too.
1 You may think you can condemn such people, but you are just as bad, and you have no excuse! When you say they are wicked and should be punished, you are condemning yourself, for you who judge others do these very same things. 2 And we know that God, in his justice, will punish anyone who does such things. 3 Since you judge others for doing these things, why do you think you can avoid God’s judgment when you do the same things? 4 Don’t you see how wonderfully kind, tolerant, and patient God is with you? Does this mean nothing to you? Can’t you see that his kindness is intended to turn you from your sin?
5 But because you are stubborn and refuse to turn from your sin, you are storing up terrible punishment for yourself. For a day of anger is coming, when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed. 6 He will judge everyone according to what they have done. 7 He will give eternal life to those who keep on doing good, seeking after the glory and honor and immortality that God offers. 8 But he will pour out his anger and wrath on those who live for themselves, who refuse to obey the truth and instead live lives of wickedness. 9 There will be trouble and calamity for everyone who keeps on doing what is evil—for the Jew first and also for the Gentile. 10 But there will be glory and honor and peace from God for all who do good—for the Jew first and also for the Gentile. 11 For God does not show favoritism.
1 Timothy 1:9-10 9 We realize that law is not enacted for the righteous, but for the lawless and rebellious, for the ungodly and sinful, for the unholy and profane, for killers of father or mother, for murderers, 10 for the sexually immoral, for homosexuals, for slave traders and liars and perjurers, and for anyone else who is averse to sound teaching
1 Corinthians 6:9-10 9 Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who submit to or perform homosexual acts, 10 nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor verbal abusers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God.
Dante wants to talk to him and offers to sit down with him. But Ser Brunetto says if he stops for an instant, he would have to lie still in the sand for 100 years without slapping the flames off. So he asks Dante to walk with him. You will notice that Virgil is not introduced by name and seems excluded from this conversation.
I bent my head, as in reverence. He said,
“What destiny or fortune makes you come
Before your day; and who is this guide?”
“In the bright life above,” I answered him,
“I came into a valley and lost my way,
Before my age had reached its ripening time –
I turned my back on the place but yesterday
He appeared to me at dawn, when I had turned
To go back down, and this path is the way
By which he leads me home.” Then he returned:
“If you keep navigating by your star
You’ll find a glorious port, if I discerned
Well in the fair life. Had my years been more,
So I could witness how heaven has been kind
To you, I would have wished your work good cheer.
But that ungrateful, malignant folk who descend
From those brought down from Fiesole long ago,
And who still smack of mountains and rocky ground,
Will make themselves, for good things that you do,
Your enemies – and there is reason in that:
Among the bitter sorb-trees, it seems undue
When the sweet fig in season comes to fruit.
The world’s old saying is that they are blind:
A people greedy, envious, proud – see fit
To cleanse their habits from yourself. You’ll find
Your fortune holds such honor as will induce
One party and the other to contend
In hunger to consume you – then the grass
Will be well kept at a distance from the goat.
Let the Fiesolan beasts go find their mess
By feeding on themselves, and spare the shoot
(If any still should grow on their heap of dung)
In which the sacred seed is living yet
Of Romans who remained when Florence went wrong,
Becoming a nest for the malevolent.”
Fiesole is a town and commune of the Metropolitan City of Florence in the Italian region of Tuscany, on a scenic height above Florence, 3 miles northeast of that city. IT was probably founded in the 9th–8th century BC. The first recorded mention of the town dates to 283 BC, when the town, then known as Faesulae, was conquered by the Romans. In antiquity it was the seat of a famous school of augurs, and every year twelve young men were sent thither from Rome to study the art of divination. An augur was a priest and official in the classical Roman world. His main role was the practice of augury. Augury is the practice from ancient Roman religion of interpreting omens from the observed behavior of birds. When the individual, known as the augur, interpreted these signs, it is referred to as “taking the auspices”. Depending upon the birds, the auspices from the gods could be favorable or unfavorable. Sulla colonized it with veterans, who afterwards, under the leadership of Gaius Mallius, supported the cause of Catilina. Fiesole was the scene of Stilicho’s great victory over the Germanic hordes of the Vandals and Suebi under Radagaisus in 406 AD. During the Gothic War (536–553 AD) the town was several times besieged. In 539 AD Justin, the Byzantine general, captured it and razed its fortifications. It was an independent town for several centuries in the early Middle Ages, no less powerful than Florence in the valley below, and many wars arose between them; in 1010 and 1025 Fiesole was sacked by the Florentines, before it was conquered by Florence in 1125, and its leading families obliged to take up their residence in Florence. Dante reflects this rivalry in his Divine Comedy by referring to “the beasts of Fiesole.” – Wikipedia
Florence was populated by Romans who destroyed Fiesole to end Catiline’s conspiracy. They made the Fiesolans move to Florence and the Roman/Fiesolans were the result. Fiesolans were considered base, inferior. Hicks from the sticks. Or, as Dante’s Brunetto says, they “still smack of mountains and rocky ground”.
Sorb tree, Sorbus domestica, is a long-lived tree, with ages of 300–400 years for some. It is generally rare now, listed as an endangered species in some countries. The fruit is a component of a cider-like drink which is still made in parts of Europe. Picked straight off the tree, it is highly astringent and gritty; however, when left to blet (overripen) it sweetens and becomes pleasant to eat. – Wikipedia
Brunetto is telling Dante, the pilgrim, that he had recognized Dante’s talent when he was young. He said Dante could go far. He saw him as “a sweet fig in season” among sorb-trees. The sorb tree fruit, when picked, is astringent and gritty. It only becomes sweet when you pick it and let it sit to overripen. He also compares Dante to a “shoot in which the sacred seed is living yet”. Brunetto prophesies that Dante’s good work will draw envious attention from his fellow Florentines and it will result in exile.
“The world’s old saying is that they are blind: a people greedy, envious, proud – see fit to cleanse their habits from yourself. You’ll find your fortune holds such honor as will induce one party and the other to contend in hunger to consume you – then the grass will be well kept at a distance from the goat.”
Another thing to notice is how Dante can go from a classic style to an earthy, peasant boot-on-the-ground style. He can talk about classical writers and quote from them and then he can use the local peasant vernacular when he wants. He can bring images of courtliness and sophistication as well as the barnyard and marketplace.
Here is an example of Brunetto’s courtly, intellectual, sophisticated words:
“If you keep navigating by your star you’ll find a glorious port, if I discerned well in the fair life. Had my years been more so I could witness how heaven has been kind to you, I would have wished your work good cheer.”
Here is an example of Brunetto’s dialogue degenerating into the common:
“But that ungrateful, malignant folk who descend from those brought down from Fiesole long ago, and who still smack of the mountains and rocky ground will make themselves, for good things that you do, your enemies – and there is reason in that…. Let the Fiesolan beasts go find their mess by feeding on themselves, and spare this shoot (if any still should grown on their heap of dung) in which the sacred seed is living yet of Romans who remained when Florence went wrong, becoming a nest for the malevolent”
“Could I have everything for which I long,
You would not still endure this banishment
Away from human nature,” I replied.
“Your image – dear, fatherly, benevolent –
Being fixed inside my memory, has imbued
My heart: when in the fair world, hour by hour
You taught me, patiently, it was you who showed
The way man makes himself eternal; therefore,
The gratitude I feel toward you makes fit
That while I live, I should declare it here
…
This much still
I say: so long as conscience is not betrayed,
I am prepared for Fortune to do her will.
My ears find nothing strange in what you have said:
As Fortune pleases let her wheel be turned,
And as he must let the peasant turn his spade.”
Dante’s reply to his old teacher is sad. He wishes his teacher was not in Hell. His teacher had been a father figure to him and taught him so much. He was a good man. But again, a good man is still not good enough to get into Heaven. It takes a man who is perfect and sinless and we are born in sin. Only Jesus was born sinless and walked His life sinless and therefore could pay the price for sin. All we have to do is accept His sacrifice and acknowledge Him as our Lord and Savior. Then His blood is appropriated to us. What a gift! What a blessing!!!
Notice a teacher’s relationship with their student is more than just an imparter of information. A real teacher will have a relationship with his/her students and will help guide that student towards a better life. A teacher inspires a student to continue learning long after the teacher is gone. A teacher shows them how to acquire knowledge and how to apply and study. A teacher motivates them to look for higher things and equips them to go after them.
Today, we have wonderful, talented, dedicated, and they were called to be teachers. They are highly educated and they are available to our students in public schools for free (it costs taxpayers, but every child, regardless of finances, is offered a free public school education). But we are strangling many of our teachers who find they have to spend their valuable time keeping records, fulfilling administrative duties, checking off boxes on their long list of government regulations, giving government tests and keeping statistics. They have to go through training meant to manipulate how they teach and are forced to follow so many guidelines they are almost nothing but robots now. They have to teach common core. They have to do teach this or that so the students can pass the government tests. They have to use this book and can’t use that book. They have to say this and can’t say that. I don’t know how teachers do it. They are hamstrung.
How did it become this bad? Teachers who weren’t talented, weren’t dedicated, weren’t called to be teachers got jobs as teachers. They just took a job and they didn’t invest in their students. But, because of teacher unions, they couldn’t be fired. Because of universities’ tenure systems, they couldn’t be let go. Everyone wants job security, good pay and benefits, I can’t blame them for that. Unfairness and office politics also caused unions to form. But protecting those who can’t, or won’t, do a good job meant students were coming out of classes knowing little and caring little. Our education system began to sink. The government decided to spend more and more money and regulate teachers and administrations to death to try and bring our education system back up. It hasn’t worked. We’ve overburdened the good teachers and taken the talent for teaching, the gift of teaching, out of the equation. Instead of an educational system of excellence, our expensive education system is barely adequate. Throwing more money into it hasn’t worked. New buildings, busses, fancy cafeterias, big sports programs, teaching fads and marketing haven’t worked. We’ve got kids who can barely read graduating high school. The whole system is an expensive, and dumbed-down day care.
I don’t blame any one group of people for this. Not teachers, not administration, not parents, etc. I blame them ALL for it. Helicopter parents and the opposite extreme parents, who aren’t engaged at all with their children’s education, are problem parents. Parents who won’t allow their child to be disciplined are problem parents. Parents who refuse to acknowledge their child is a problem are problem parents. Parents who don’t encourage learning in the home are problem parents. Teachers who have abused students, molested students are problem teachers. Teachers who passed students just to get them out of their class and pass along a problem are problem teachers. Teachers who are bullies or malicious to their students are problem teachers. Teachers who don’t care about their students, don’t care if they learn and just basically babysit are problem teachers. Teacher unions who insist no teacher is accountable are problems. Teacher unions who insist no teacher can be fired, disciplined or held to account are problems. Administrations that don’t stand behind their teachers and don’t take into consideration the teacher’s professional opinions are problems. Administrations that cater to families and allow students to get away with all their shenanigans, being rude and threatening to teachers, not doing the work required to pass… they are part of the problem. Administrations that demand testing produce good results, even to the point of fudging the results, manipulating the results, or forcing teachers to teach only according to testing… are problems. The Education Dept is itself a problem. It’s a huge bureaucracy that is basically there to provide salaries for it’s workers. They do whatever they have to in order to get funding so they can keep their salaries, their cushy jobs, their positions. They are ensconced and they don’t care about students or teachers. They care only about the money and what they can tell Congress in order to get more money. I blame contractors who build new school buildings or remodel old ones. They are in it for profit, not for the ministry. They will overcharge because of the big pockets. The architects will overplan because of the big pockets. The materials will be substandard in order to make the profit margin larger. There is a big bucket of money and everyone has their hands in it when a school is built or remodeled. And taxpayers don’t have any control over how that money is spent.
For instance, we just had a new high school built in our district. They purchased hundreds of acres, most of which is not used. They built a state-of-the-art football stadium with jumbotron and custom luxury buses for away games. Now what percentage of the school population plays football? Of that small percentage on the team, how many will go on to play football in college? Of that tiny percentage, how many will go on to play football professionally? But each high school MUST have it’s own stadium with parking, jumbotron, sound systems, cameras, etc. Then you have the gym for the basketball games. Then you have the baseball field for the baseball games, and the soccer field for the soccer games. All of this expense for sports that has nothing to do with education. Each and every single high school has to have the track fields, football stadium, gym, soccer and baseball fields with all the luxuries of parking lots, training rooms, locker rooms, jumbotrons, sound systems, etc. Back in my day, you shared football stadiums and baseball fields. Today, those sports fields are unused most of the year. Only during practice and games are they used. High school football season starts with training in August and goes through maybe November if they get to do championships. Take the total hours in a day (24) and ask how many hours that stadium is being used. Let’s say about 2 hours practice time 5 days a week during the season and the actual games. Now get the percentage against all the hours in a year. You would calculate that those fields are used very little in comparison to their expense. And it’s not just building them. You have to maintain them so it’s a constant expense.
Don’t get me wrong, I know kids can learn a lot from sports and arts. My point is, they did it before all this money was spent but now we are throwing a huge portion of a school’s budget into things that aren’t educational. They spent tens of thousands of dollars just on signs, an outdoor amphitheater and a fountain. There is the band room and the auditorium that must be built which has nothing to do with education. The fancy cafeteria with it’s choice of food stations. A library! A library! Students don’t read and they use their computers and tablets to do any research. Why have the expense of a library that is not used any more? It used to be a library was necessary for research and study but it’s not any more. The technology and computers that are given to every student. We had better education BEFORE all the expense. If it meant that we were getting better educated children out of all this money spent, I would be all for it! But we are getting children out of our education system who barely know how to read, who don’t know how to write sentences, that know nothing about history. They can’t tell you who the president of the United States is or the difference between the American Revolutionary war and the War of Northern Aggression.
So, yes, it’s everybody’s problem. The good parents, the good teachers, the good administrators,… these are drowned out by all the bad. I highly respect those teachers who are gifted, educated, called and who love the job. For you to keep your enthusiasm and love for the kids despite all the roadblocks these bad people put up… you are exceptional!!!! You are like Dante’s teacher, “your image – dear, fatherly, benevolent – being fixed inside my memory has imbued my heart: when in the fair world, hour by hour you taught me, patiently”.
“It was you who showed the way man makes himself eternal”. Dante, the poet, used his God-given talents and education to a higher purpose. He didn’t waste it. He used it for God. Therefore Dante will receive heavenly reward. His work pointed towards God. His writing and creativity was used to point to God and salvation through Jesus Christ. He didn’t squander his God-given talent and education on base things. He knew God would reward him whether those on earth did or not. He could accept whatever “Fortune” did because his reward was guaranteed by God, not man.
Next Dante asks Brunetto to tell him of any others on this level of hell that he would recognize. Brunetto says he will name some but can’t name them all because there wasn’t enough time.
“It is well,”
He answered, “for me to say the names of some
But nothing of the rest. To name them all
Would demand speaking more words than we have time –
All clerics and men of letters, all renowned,
And in the world all stained by this one crime.
Priscian trudges in that unhappy band,
As does Francesco d’Accorso. And if you crave
To see such scurf, among them you can find
One whom the Servant of Servants asked to leave
The Arno for Bacchiglione; and there
He left his body, distended in its nerve
And muscle. And now, although I would say more,
My speech and walking with you must be brief:
On the sand, I see new smoke rise, where appear
New souls, with whom I must not be. I live
In my Tesoro – your judgment being won
For it, I ask no more.” And he went off,
Seeming to me like one of those who run
Competing for the green cloth in the races
Upon Verona’s field – and of them, like one
Who gains the victory, not one who loses.
The sodomites whom Brunetto will not name are clerics and “men of letters” who are “stained” by their sin.
Priscian was a great Latin grammarian of the early sixth century. He was born at Caesarea in Mauretania and taught grammar at Constantinople. His famous work, the Institutiones grammaticae, a systematic exposition of Latin grammar was immensely popular and the recognized authority on the subject.
Francesco d’Accorso (1225-93), a Florentine, was was the son of a jurist who interpreted the Roman law at Bologna, and died in 1229, at the age of 78. Born at Bologna, where his father taught at the university, Francesco also became a celebrated lawyer and professor of civil law. He is celebrated for his Commentary upon the Code Justinian. In 1273, when Edward I passed through the city on his way back from Palestine, Francesco accepted the monarch’s invitation to accompany him to England. He lectured for some time at Oxford. The Bolognese, in an attempt to keep the eminent jurist at their university, had forbidden Francesco to go under pain of confiscation of all his property. This threat was executed in 1274, when he was proscribed as a Ghibelline. His belongings, however, were restored to him on his return in 1281 to Bologna, where he died three years later. – Charles S. Singleton
Andrea de’ Mozzi (died 1296). His family were White Guelphs. A Florentine, he was made bishop of Florence (on the Arno River) in 1287 until he was transferred to Vicenza (on the Bacchiglione River) by Pope Boniface VIII in 1295 for his riotous living. Andrea was fond of saying ‘The grace of God is like the turds of goats, which, falling from on high, drop hither and yon dispersedly.’
Pope Boniface VIII is sarcastically called the “Servant of Servants” and was Dante’s enemy.
Trésor (in French, Tesoro in Italian, Treasure in English) was Brunetto’s prose encyclopedia written in French. In his encyclopedia he tells the story of Florence’s founding by remnants of Roman legions (aristocrats) and the villagers of Fiesole, the beginning of the internal divisions that would become the Whites and the Blacks. Brunetto believes his name will live on through his book, “I live in my Tesoro”.
Brunetto says he must leave because he sees new smoke from the sand which means new souls, “with whom I must not be”. For some reason he must stay separate from these new souls. There is a separation in groups. Could it be because of the groups practiced different sexual deviancies? Sodomites, pederasts, etc.?
Poor Brunetto dashes off like one running a race, running as fast as a winner in a race. In Verona they had races where the men ran naked. The winner won a green cloth and the loser won a rooster that he had to carry through town. Brunetto may look like a winner but he was last in place with his group and he did not run his race in life
as a winner.
1 Corinthians 9: 24-27 (BSB) 24 Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? Run in such a way as to take the prize. 25 Everyone who competes in the games trains with strict discipline. They do it for a crown that is perishable, but we do it for a crown that is imperishable. 26 Therefore I do not run aimlessly; I do not fight like I am beating the air. 27 No, I discipline my body and make it my slave, so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified.
Excerpts of Inferno are from a new translation by Robert Pinsky.
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