We’ve started a new concept today – reflections on the Divine Comedy, with one tercet from anywhere in the whole Journey. Today, from the opening of Purgatory 10:
https://dantescomedy.com/morning-dante-reflection
And we’ve made a new page for resources for the Divine Comedy! Books, videos, podcasts, websites, galleries, etc.:
https://dantescomedy.com/resources
😊
Two things were standing out reading Purgatory 9 this time – one is how the beginning of the change happens through the dream of the Eagle and of being unified with the Divine. In some ways meaning that it is first when the Goal is discovered, or envisioned, or revealed, that the process really has begun. Before that, we have more of a slow preparation, or the Ante-Purgatory in Dante’s words. What ignites the real change, and the real Purgatory, is the Gate – but this is found through, or right after the vision, of the final end point and the Divine Light.
The second thing that stood out this time was the one verse line about looking back once inside of the Purgatory, means to go back out again. In some ways this could be seen as the idea that the learning in purgatory carves out a new track, a new being, a new life, and if one falls back to one’s old tracks, one has to find back into the new again – once more. Staying on the new habits, is the good path to moving forward.
These four short lines fully re-sets the Pilgrim’s Mind (ie: us, the story, the process) and spans out the book’s scope:
my mind, confined till then to what took place,
broke free, and now was eager to explore:
I raised my eyes to marvel at the mount
that grew out of the sea toward Heaven’s height.
And this is exactly where the Book of Purgatory will lead us 😊
We’re slowly digesting Paradiso whilst opening the first page of Purgatory again. The first time we read Paradiso a few years ago it felt exhausting with the lack of concreteness, but in the last few months that has changed. In part because one can read the third book also as a collection or library of essays, with references to the theology and an introductory course to the Medieval Theology and the Mystics of the 11 and 12 hundreds.
At the same time, it feels good to have more firm ground under our feet again, at the shores of the Island of Mount Purgatory. The opening is filled with beauty, nature, new optimism, and refreshing poetry of the skies and horizons. This reading might become very slow, with only small meditations on some days. But it feels great to “be” somewhere in the Comedy again, after finishing the last canto just a few days ago!
..and it left a feeling of only wanting more..
