The Background And Interpretation Of Dante S — страница 3

whole, is really a summary of all the knowledge man had built up to that point. It contains Aristotle s theory of the celestial spheres, the ethical and moral views of the Church, a combination of the Catholic and Ancient Greek religions, and the political views of the time. Dante manages to pull these together to create a bleak, scary and very intelligent outlook on the afterlife. We can call Dante a Renaissance man but the question is, is that appropriate? He is still bound by the medieval thought, attitude and doctrines that ruled over him for most of his life. Dante should be seen more as a bridge between two changing worlds. His understanding of poetry and allegory still influences writers of our century like T.S. Elliot, and his thought is examined in universities all over

the globe to this day. Some may look to writers like Dante to fill in the blanks we have about our own faith. One might even go as far to take it literally. It is at this point that we begin to loose the message. We must look at Dante s greater scheme of things to try and decipher the whole picture he was trying to paint, rather than looking at only a stroke here and there. Looking solely at Dante s Inferno we see a wrathful and hateful God, which goes against our Christian teachings of an all loving God. The message of Inferno was not to pinpoint evil souls, but to recognize that they put themselves in that position, and that God was only doing what had to be done, giving the reader the message that he should not try to damn himself as they did, but instead to rise to spiritual

grace.