DANTE'S DIVINE COMEDY - Part 2: PURGUTORIO AND PARADISO

PURGATORIO (PURGATORY)

Purgatory comes from the Latin word ‘purgare’ meaning ‘to make clean’ or ‘to purity’. Found here are souls who committed venial sins and did not repent as well as those guilty of mortal sins. This latter repented before death but are not sufficiently pure to enter Heaven. They must do penance to atone for their sins committed on earth. Mount Purgatory is an island, the only land in the Southern Hemisphere, created with the soil excavated from Hell. On the lower slopes is found ‘ante-purgatory’ which houses the excommunicate, the lethargic, the unabsolved and the negligent rulers. They must wait for a time to enter purgatory to start their penance. Purgatory itself is divided into seven terraces ending with the gate to Heaven. Souls can only move upward from terrace to terrace and never backward because at each terrace they spend enough time to do the required penance and are purified of that sin. The lowest three terraces are reserved for souls with perverted love, the next terrace for those with defective love and the uppermost three for excessive love. For easier understanding, I am using the following table:

GARDEN OF EDEN

Main Category	Specific sins	Terrace	Punishment
Love excessive	The lustful	seventh	They continuously burn in a wall of flame.
	The gluttonous	sixth	They are forced to abstain from food and drink.
	The avaricious	fifth	They lie face down unable to move.
Love Defective	The slothful	fourth	They are made to run continuously
Love Perverted	The wrathful	third	They walk around in acrid smoke.
	The envious	second	They have their eyes sewn shut.
	The proud	first	They carry large stones on their backs, unable to stand up straight.

 

                                               Ante-purgatory: The excommunicate

                                                           The lethargic

                                                            The unabsolved

                                                             Negligent rulers

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PARADISO (PARADISE)

Paradise is made up of 9 concentric spheres. Souls are allotted to the point of heaven that fits with their ability to love God.

The first sphere: Sphere of Mars.          

Souls of those who abandoned their vows.

The second sphere: Sphere of Mercury.    

Souls who did good out of a desire for fame.

The third sphere: Sphere of Venus.         

Souls who did good out of love.

The fourth sphere: Sphere of Sun.       

Souls of the wise.

The fifth sphere: Sphere of Mars.          

Souls who fought for Christianity.

The sixth sphere: Sphere of Jupiter.       

Souls who personified justice.

The seventh sphere: Sphere of Saturn.        

Souls of the contemplative.

The eighth sphere: Sphere of Fixed Stars. 

Souls of all the blessed.

The ninth sphere: The Primum Mobile. 

The abode of angels.

Dante then ascends to a region beyond physical existence, called the Empyrean. Here he comes face to face with God Himself and is granted understanding of the Divine and of Human nature. God appears as three equally large circles within each other representing the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

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There is no mention, as far as I can see, about choirs of angels continuously singing and playing the harp and the souls of the saved joining them. Those images must have come from some very fertile Catholic imagination in course of time.