Canto XXXIV

1
Canto XXXIV

• Judecca
• Treacherous to Their Masters

2
Judecca

• Like a whirling windmill seen after at twilight,
• or when a mist has risen from the ground-
• just as an engine rose upon my sight
• Stirring up such a wild and bitter wind
• I cowered for shelter at my Masters back
• (XXIV. 4-8)
• Indicates fierceness of final realm
• Dantes emotional reaction- looks for support
  from Virgil

3
Sinners Punishment

• Some lie stretched out others are fixed in
  place
• upright, some on their heads, some on their
  soles
• another, like a bow bends foot to face.
  (XXXIV. 13-15)
• Lie eternally frozen in ice in various positions

4
Sinners Punishment

• Now see the face of Dis! This is the place
• where you must arm your soul against all dread.
  
• Do not ask, Reader, how my blood ran cold
• and my voice chocked with fear. I cannot write
  it
• this is a terror that cannot be told (XXXIV.
  20-24)
• Terror Dante feels cannot put into words

5
Satan

• If he was once as beautiful now
• as is hideous, and still turned on his Maker,
• well may he be the source of every woe!
• With what a sense of awe I saw his head
• towering above me! For it had three faces
• one was in front, and it was fiery red
• the other two, as weirdly wonderful,
• merged with it from the middle of each shoulder
• to the point where all converged at the top of
  the skull
• the right was something between white and bile
• the left was about the color that one finds
• on those who live along the banks of the Nile.
  (XXIV. 34-45)

6
Satan

• Represents the Holy Trinity
• Father, Son, Holy Spirit
• Gross perversion of God- symbolic
• Christian theology evil cannot create, it can
  only imitate, so Dante grossly mimics
  Christianity
• Under each head two wings rose terribly,
• their span proportioned to so gross a bird
• I never saw such sails on the sea.
• They were not feathers- their texture and their
  form
• were like a bats wings- and he beat them so
• that three winds blew from him in one great
  storm (XXIV. 46-51)
• Wings create cold wind of hell that freezes the
  souls in the ice

7
Sinners

• In every mouth he worked a broken sinner
• between his rake-like teeth. Thus he kept three
• in eternal pain at his eternal dinner
• That soul that suffers most, explained my
  Guide,
• is Judas Iscariot, he who kicks his legs
• on the fiery chin and has his head inside.
  (XXXIV. 57-63)
• Betrayed Jesus
• Stuck head first

8
Sinners

• Sin of fraud against master is the greatest in
  Dantes eyes
• We voluntarily follow them
• Closely resembles Gods love for us
• Act contrary to love

9
Sinners

• Of the other two, who have their heads thrust
  forward,
• the one who dangles down from the black face
• is Brutus note how he writhes without a word.
• And there, with the huge and sinewy arms, is the
  soul
• of Cassius. (XXXIV. 64-67)
• Brutus and Cassius betrayed Julius Caesar
• Dante believed that Rome was a sovereign city

10
Leaving Hell

• and seized the shaggy coat of the king demon
• then grappling matted hair and frozen crusts
• from one tuft to another, clambered down.
• When we had reached the joint where the great
  thigh
• merges into the swelling of the haunch,
• my Guide and Master, straining terribly,
• Turned his head to where his feet had been
• and began to grip the hair as if her were
  climbing
• so that I thought we moved toward Hell again.
• Hold fast! my guide said, and his breath came
  shrill
• with labor and exhaustion. There is no way
• but by such stairs to rise above such evil
  (XXIV. 73-82)

11
Leaving Hell

• Symbolically they climb out of hell by climbing
  on the body of Satan
• Use him to get out, he cannot
• Fixed at the center of Earths core
• All weight falls to the center

12
Leaving Hell

• Dante questions why they turned around and were
  able to get out?
• but when I turned myself about, you passed
• the point to which all gravities are drawn.
• You are under the other hemisphere where you
  stand
• the sky above us is the half opposed
• to that which canopies the great dry land.
• Under the mid-point of that other sky
• the Man who was born sinless and who lives
• beyond all blemish, came to suffer and die.
• You have your feet upon a little sphere
• which forms the other face of the Judecca.
• There it is evening when it is morning here.
  (XXXIV. 110- 120)
• They are at the center of gravity
• Satan was thrown head first out of Heaven
• Climbing up Satan, they must turn around to get
  out because of gravity

13
Leaving Hell

• You have your feet upon a little sphere
• which forms the other face of the Judecca.
• There it is evening when it is morning here.
• And this gross Fiend and Image of all Evil
• who made a stairway for us with his hide
• is pinched and prisoned ion the ice-pack still.
• On this side he plunged down from Heavens
  height,
• and the land that spread here once hid in the
  sea
• and fled North ti our hemisphere for fright
• And it may be that moved by the same fear,
• the one peak that still rises on this side
• fled upward leaving this great cavern here.
  (XXIV. 118-129)

14
Leaving Hell

• Impact of Satan caused lands of the Southern
  Hemisphere to go up to the North Hemisphere
• All that remained was the one peak in water
• Mountain that leads to Purgatory
• Must climb through the Northern Hemisphere to
  continue journey to Purgatory

15
Symbolism

• of a little stream descending through the
  hollow (XXIV. 133)
• Lethe
• Mythology River of Forgetfulness
• Flows down from Purgatory
• Souls repent, are forgiven and forget their
  sins in Purgatory
• Memories of sins are washed away and delivered to
  Hell

16
Symbolism

• And we walked out once more beneath the Stars.
  (XXXIV. 143)
• Last word in all three sections of The Divine
  Comedy
• Each ends with the soul going upwards nearer to
  Heaven
• Symbol of hope and virtue