Dante's Divine Comedy

Dante encounters seven popes in the Divine Comedy, five in hell, one in purgatory and one in paradise - that last being Saint Peter. His condemnation of individual popes and, I think, the papacy is extraordinarily strong and discomforting to relate. But was it all revenge? Did he fall for the politics too? Or was his message one of renewal, revival and reunion with God? Dante was concerned about salvation, the role of women and friars, the love of the gospel, and the fate of Christian...

“Circles of hell" has become commonplace in language. But what was Dante trying to show us when he wrote the inferno? What has been lost in translation, with this first canticle in Dante’s trilogy now part of a secular culture? Jason Baxter talks about his new translation of the Inferno with Mark Vernon. They discuss what Dante could convey in language and why the text never ceases to offer fresh insights. How can we understand his encounters with figures from Virgil to Ulysses? What is it t...

Dante lived through a period of almost total social collapse. Civil war and city-state terror, practiced by the church as much as secular powers, drove him into exile for the last 20 years of his life. For a while, he lost everything. But then, through the trauma, he regained a ground and rediscovered the fullness of life. The Divine Comedy is the product of that transformation. The journeys through hell, purgatory and paradise hold nothing back, be that terrible tortures of extraordinary de...

Reason fails before the greatest spiritual truths. That much is not news. But part of the genius of Dante is his conjuring of images that reach beyond the impasses of paradox and seeming contradiction. I consider 8 such moments when Dante sees the unsayable and offers images of the ineffable. - how darkness leads to light - how appearances can be the opposite of the truth - how the immediate eclipses wider perspectives - how all faces are the divine face - how “I” and “we” coincide - how div...

Dante would seem to be a key candidate for infernalism, the doctrine of endless punishment in hell for sinners who failed to turn to Christ. He’s said to be medieval and isn't that what they believed then? And doesn’t his Divine Comedy clearly, indisputably say as much? But Dante’s whole point is that nothing is as it seems to the unawakened eye. I think what Dante is doing is taking evil completely seriously and showing why eternal damnation not only isn't, but can’t be the final result. An...

Dante coined the word "transhumanise" in the Divine Comedy, 700 years ago. "Trasumanar" is the transformation he will undergo in order to share in the life of paradise. Today, the word has associations that are strikingly related to Dante's; partly quite similar, though changed in subtle but crucial ways. Understanding those differences illuminates the dangers of transhumanism today and how it might limit, not expand, our humanity. I consider this constriction across half a dozen areas on t...

Bernard Carr is a leading cosmologist who worked with Stephen Hawking and now investigates time, multidimensionality and consciousness, amongst other things. Bernardo Kastrup cites him as at the vanguard of the great task to integrate matter and mind. So I was delighted to get the chance to ask Bernard about images from Dante. We talked about relational cosmologies as advocated by Carlo Rovelli, who has talked about being inspired by Dante, and whether alternative images ...

Various human experiences are deepened and resolved as Dante travels through hell, purgatory and paradise. The Divine Comedy can be read as an examination of this transfiguring of perception. From the alienation of hell, through the transforming time of purgatory, to the ever-expanding awareness of paradise: Dante show us how time & love, seeking & suffering, telepathy & transhumanising can change to reveal divine life without limit. For more on Mark's book on the Divine Comedy ...

Paradise. Destiny for a chosen few? Dismissed today by many. Or might it be the end for us all? Dante tells us to follow closely in the richest, subtlest and most expansive part of the journey conveyed in the Divine Comedy. He shows us how to develop paradisal perception, the way to know this experience of reality now, and to become ready for it in the hereafter. Paradise is when the deepest truths become clear, the most intimate participation with life is known as divine. This is the thir...

The liberal world and western churches increasingly seem to suffer from the lack of a sophisticated understanding of erotic love - an approach not merely governed by morals but arising from insight into who we are and our deepest nature. Erotic love can be felt on nearly every page of the Divine Comedy, in perverted and desperate forms, as well as in free and joyous souls. He understood that eros has a goal as it draws us towards God, though that goal is readily thwarted as we traverse its ...

This episode of the Sheldrake-Vernon Dialogues continues Rupert and Mark's exploration of Dante’s Divine Comedy, taking a lead from Mark’s book, Dante’s Divine Comedy: A Guide for the Spiritual Journey. Dante and Virgil have found the way out of hell and a new adventure begins on Mount Purgatory. They first encounter souls who are shocked by their deaths and bemused by the afterlife. Then, the transformative ascent up the various terraces of the mountain begins. On each, souls are reck...

John Vervaeke, Paul VanderKlay and Paul Anleitner asked what "God" means, with John challenging the Pauls to talk about God via Light, Love, Logos and Life, so as not to hide behind the "g" word. Drawing on Dante, I offer some thoughts... The original conversation is here - https://youtu.be/UGq34dLXrFI More about Dante and my work - http://www.markvernon.com

Audible have released the audiobook of Dante's Divine Comedy: A Guide for the Spiritual Journey. I hope you enjoy the first chapter, Inferno 1. For more information go to Audible. And for more on the book as a whole see my website - https://www.markvernon.com.