Paradise Cantos 5-7

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0:00Uh good morning. We are uh live. Um so uh we read your comments yesterday and um there are three concerns. The first the major concern is a sound quality. So uh Carol and her team are fixing that. Um second is that there are parts of the video missing because of network issues. And so what Carol and her team are going to do is upload uh um the complete version uh later today or whenever it's ready. Um and the third issue is um the quality of the resolution, the resolution quality. Unfortunately, because it's a live stream, we have to lower the resolution in order to make it more smooth, but we will upload uh a higher quality version later on. Okay. So, thanks so much to Carol and her team for making this possible. And um um so we are going to continue the line calm meeting today. But before I begin, are there any questions or concerns from yesterday? Uh yes. So uh yesterday we got to uh count to four and five five and my point is we were like over four and in four I had this uh really big question. So in K four uh they show themselves to here not because this is their sphere but as a sign for you that in the inferion their place is lowest. So what I take this section to mean is that even though there's no difference in accommodations, so like there's a five-star hotel, there's a four-star hotel and everyone goes to the five-star hotel. However, there is a difference in prestige as in their place is lowest. So my question is uh if there is no

2:01different difference in accommodations, then why does God divide them into casts of prestige? Okay, great question. Okay. So um first of all we are beyond time and space. So everything is together. It's complete unity. Unison. Okay. Does that make sense? That's point one. Point two is that everyone is with God in the imperium. That is what it is in reality. But to make it comprehensible to Dante and to us um Beatrice has constructed the heavens visually in a hierarchy. Okay. And then what is this hierarchy? This hierarchy is the amount of God that you receive in your soul. Okay? So you are all in heaven. You're all with God. But there are certain souls that are able to receive the light of God greater than other souls. And that is what the hierarchy is like. The closer you are to God, the more you are able to receive his light. The more you are in communion with God. And what differentiates your ability to absorb God is your understanding of your relationship with God. Okay. So Ricarda is in the lowest sphere because she thinks that she is unworthy of God. She is unequal to God. Therefore she must obey God. But that's not what God wants. God is all forgiving, all generous. He wants to come into you and become you. So you must welcome him. Ricardo is like, I'm

4:01not worthy God. I am just a mortal. Okay? And so what's happened is she's placed herself further from God because she thinks she's not worthy enough to be closer to God. Okay? Does that make sense? Okay. So that's what it is in reality. Um, but for us to better understand this, uh, they've constructed a hierarchy of spears and each spear has its own distinct characteristics as we'll see as we go along. Right. Any more questions or Yes. Um, okay. Okay, so I was just rereading um Kanto one to four and there was a couple of lines in Kanto 2 that caught my attention because at least I found them to be very interesting. So I'm going to read it out to you guys. Um so from line 23 to 25 it should be but in a span perhaps no longer than an arrow takes to strike to fly to leave. So ideally I think the right order is first for the arrow to leave the bow to fly and then to strike. So why does Dante kind of like intentionally reverse this order in during this part of the text? Okay. Um so first of all we are beyond time and space meaning that what what's happening here in maybe our universe is just one second or less than that. Okay so everything's happening at once. Um and um so he's trying to show you the speed at which things are happening. Okay. Okay. Can you explain that? Um, I actually need I don't have access to a line. Let me It's an KTO 2. Yes. From line 23 to uh 25.

6:09Okay. Line 23 to 25. Line 23 to 25. Okay. Can you read it again? Um, but in a span perhaps no longer than an arrow takes to strike, to fly, to leave the boat. Um, I reached a place where I could see that something wonderful drew me. So, I'm just like interested why Dante is reversing the order that typically an arrow shoots out from a bow because it should be first it leaves the bow, then it flies, then finally it strikes. Um okay so this is poetry and there are different uh conceptions okay but I think what he what he's doing is he's collapsing time does that make sense to you because as you say the cover sequence events is you first leave the bowl then You fly, then you hit your target. Right? But then he's saying, I first hit my target, then I fly, then I leave. So I take this to mean the collapse of time. Does that make sense to you? Yes. We are we are in a place where time and space has collapsed altogether. Yeah. So there's no time then there's no space. Right. So, so there there are the most basic interpretation is that this is happening so fast that it's beyond perception. Do you understand? Because because you because what we're seeing it's human perception, right? It's the human logic and and what what he's saying is that this happening so fast it's even beyond my perception. But another way to interpret this is it's h it's beyond your it's beyond your

8:10perception because it's collapsing time and space. Okay. Does it make sense guys? Can I offer like a thought? Absolutely. Um yesterday you put on your board where there's a will there's a way. And so in a way this reverse order kind of um enunciates the importance of the aim and the goal first and then goes backwards. And um yes, chronologically it's different, but it's the you know, this is inspired by commentary here too. It's um kind of how things actually happen because where there's a will, there's a way. And you start with the goal first, the end first. Yes. And then everything else proceeds. Okay. That's that's beautiful. Thank you. Yes. Yes. Okay. So again, there are multiple explanations, right? Good. Okay. Yes. So, I hope to to add to that because um as I was as I was biking home last night, I was listening to um a book on Einstein and the narrator connected it to Dante just coincidentally. And Einstein's working with space and time and he had this kind of quip that said time is what prevents everything from happening at once. And then they said much like Dante's Paradise where everything can and does happen at once. He didn't pull that line up specifically, but I think that's the answer that Einstein came up with. Yes. Um, you know, I want to add to this point and point out that the greatest scientists, um, they were first and foremost poets. They were the ones who were willing to imagine a new reality. People like Newton and Einstein. So this is something that we've forgotten where before science was driven by the imagination, by intuition, by poetry, by the occult, by by a desire to be closer to God. And now we've broken science

10:10into these logical processes that are compartmentalized. That's why honestly for the past 70 years, we've accomplished nothing. Okay? We've had no breakthroughs for these past 70 years. Okay? So thank you for that. Any more questions before we we we we begin? Yes. This is more of a conceptual question. So yesterday you emphasized to us repeatedly the importance of imagination and intuition. Now uh according to my limited understanding, one of the criticisms of the middle ages is that it relied too much on mysticism and unreason. So if Dante is like almost a representative or a pioneer of the Renaissance which is characterized in opposition to the middle ages which must therefore be comprised of reason and the light of reason and rationality. Why is Dante's work why does Dante's work emphasize intuition and imagination in such a way? Okay. Um so we'll talk about this today. Um but Dante is very much a revolutionary. He's trying to respond to limitations of his uh time and period. And his major concern is that the Catholic Church is involved in geopolitics, meaning that the Catholic Church is trying to be the empire. And he doesn't like that because it obviously creates a lot of problems. It creates a lot of wars. Um, so Donniey's primary concern is that as an empire, the Catholic Church is not focused enough on spirituality, not focused enough on mysticism, on the occult. It's more focused on temporal power, on getting people to obey them. And that's what limited the imagination of medieval Europe. Okay. So we'll discuss this more this morning but um

12:10but does that answer your question for now? Okay. Because our conception of the Middle Ages is almost an anacronistic. Okay. We're we're looking at from our lens. Okay. But in my comedy we're seeing it from Bond's lens. All right. Uh question. Yeah. Um, so, oh, this is really loud. So, one like overall question maybe for the book as well is um just I I still don't really understand how he came up with all of this like like did he did it came to him like in a dream? Was it like multiple dreams and then he then he wrote them down or Yeah. Like did he just imagine it on his desk like sitting on his desk or like walking in a park or something? Like I like how was it? So, and then so in-depth as well like I I don't understand that. Okay. So, there are two major themes today. The first major theme is Dante's revolution against Catholic Church. Okay. What are what are his concerns about the Catholic Church and what is he trying to change about the Catholic church? Okay, that's the first major concern. Second major concern is how did he write this? Because this is a time about computers. This is a time where pen and paper are not that accessible. Okay. And he published it um he published first the inferno in the purgatory and then paradise. But you read the divine comedy it is pretty coherent. Okay. It's almost like he first wrote everything down, then he uh shaped um the uh all three parts to be coherent together to flow seamlessly. But we know for a fact that's how it happened. So the major question is how are you able to even before you write anything down, how are you able to structure in a way that is mathematically perfect? Right?

14:12So something that that we will not probably discuss but something that we should discuss more is the mathematics the numerology of the divine comedy where there are three sections the first section is 34 contos second section is section is 33 that's 100 also the number 33 has a lot of occult meaning because 33 is the age when Jesus died. Okay. Um 33 has a lot of occult um significance. So this is like really weird. How was able to even before I wrote anything down mathematically conceive the entirety of the divine comedy? And this is something that we will address throughout these two weeks because it's really a question of what really is our connection to the divine. Okay. So something that I will argue to you today is that Dante could have only written this if God exists. Okay? If God doesn't exist and randomness randomness is what rules the universe, there's no way he could have written this. It makes absolutely no sense. Only if he is able to channel God, the monad, the source, whatever you call it, is he able to write this down. Okay? And um when we really try to understand divine comedy, you will see that within it is divinity itself. Okay. Okay. So, so, so this is a question that is the fundamental question we're trying to address these next two weeks. Okay. But thank you for that. Any more questions before we begin? Okay. Good. Okay. So yesterday we left off with uh Picarda and the the the Picarda presents an extremely complex

16:13moral dilemma. She did nothing wrong, right? She loved God. She married God by become a nun. Then her brother who is a duke or prince I forget actually he needs her in order to create a military alliance. So he steals her from the convent and marries her all and again she did nothing wrong but she ends up in the low sphere of paradise. Okay, so she's in heaven, but it's a furthest from God. And Donnie is like, "This makes no sense. She right. She did everything the Catholic Church told her to do. She follow her heart and she ends up the furthest from God." And what we said is it's because she did not actually practice her will. She did not show her true faith in God, right? And there are many things she she she could have done. She could have ran away. She could have threatened to kill herself. She could um and so there are many things she could have done. Okay? What I'm going to do now is go deeper into this uh story and show you how complex it is. All right? And then we I want us to use our imagination or intuition to figure out what the proper choice would have been. All right. So So let me explain the um situation. Okay. All right. So So let me set up for you. Okay. We know that Picarda has made a vow to God. I'm going to marry you God. Um and what Beatrice tells us is that making of how is a very serious thing.

18:13Making a promise is a very serious thing because the greatest gift God has given you is your free will. And when you choose to surrender your free will as a gift to God, there's really nothing you can do to compensate for breaking this vow. Okay? So Ricarda, the issue is that she has a vow to God. All right. Now, her brother, and again, I don't know if this is historically true, but I'm going to create a situ a scenario for you guys, okay? Her brother has a friend and the two are trying to conquer Italy together and they're in a battle. Okay? And before this battle, the brother says to the friend, you know, the Picard's brother, if we win this battle, I swear to God that I will give you my sister as a bride. Okay, so it's another battle, right? And they win the battle. So that's that's that's a situation, right? Her Carter has run off to a nery. Her brother is like, "Oh, okay. I swore to God that I would give my sister as a bride. Therefore, I'm obliging my God to do whatever I can to get her back. Okay? Right? Because I I made a vow to God. Um so now let us think deeply, okay? and say let's say for whatever reason both Picarda and her brother have true faith in God meaning they will do whatever they can to ensure they do not break their vow to God right so here we have Picarda saying you know

20:15what I am on the roof and if you come and get me from the nunny I will go jump off the roof and kill myself I don't care what the Catholic Church says says, "Yes, I know it is the greatest in the world to commit suicide. I understand that. But my vow to God is greater than the Catholic Church." Okay. And then the brother's like, "Well, Picarda, I also mean a vow to God be and God has given me victory in battle and therefore I cannot betray God. God has already given me the gift of victory in battle. So I must give you to um uh my friend. Okay. So now what we're going to do is we're going to use your imagination and intuition to figure out how first of all how this will play out but also what is the proper or right uh choice. Okay. So here is like you know what if you come and get me I'm going to kill myself. What's the brother going to do? Yeah. Um, personally I think uh assuming that the brother has true belief in God, I think this hypothetical is a little bit weird because as you mentioned before uh our free will is our most precious gift from God and only the only person you can promise you can surrender your free will to is the person who gave it to you as in God. However, the brother here is playing God. The brother here is presuming on behalf of another to take away her free will. I know that in the Catholic church uh a wife swears obedience to her husband upon marriage. But this is the Catholic Church. This is not Dante's God. So how dare this brother who has true belief in God presume to strip her his sister of her free will? Um okay. I I understand. But like Let's just play

22:16this game, okay? Let's just first use our imagination and play out this story, okay? Let's let's imagine we're writing a movie, right? And this make a great movie, by the way. So, Ricardo is like, I'm going to kill myself. What would the brother do? Well, I think definitely his her brother going to save him because because the brother have a commitment with his friends. He need to win the battle. So I believe in order to win the win the war the brother will not allow her sister to die. That is why his her brother going to save Picarda if she want to suicide. No no no no she's already dead like oh she's already died. No I'm saying like you come into the comment I'm going to jump myself I'm going to throw myself off the roof. I'm going to kill myself. How how can he she possibly he possibly save her? Okay. All right. So here what he's going to do now is say you know what Ricarda I'm going to kidnap our mother. I'm going to kill her unless you come out the covenant and marry my friend, right? That's something he would do. Yeah. Why couldn't he just marry his own daughter or like another sister? Because he made a vow, right? He said before this battle, if we He saying this to his friend, I swear to God, if we win this battle, I will give you my sister Ricarda as your bride. Okay. So he's already made this vow. All right. So we are now now the situation is the Duke presents their mother. Okay. And says, "Hey, Picarda, you come down now. I'm going to cut off her head." Right. He he go gets another brother. No. No. Um, Picarda go gets their father and then says, "If you kill our mother, I will kill our father." Okay guys, this is not how it works.

24:18Okay, so now it seems like Ricardo has no choice, right? Because I mean to kill yourself is one thing, but to end up killing yourself and your mother is something you cannot possibly do. So what she does now is surrender, right? But if she believes in the will of God and if she has will, she if she has faith that God is standing on her side, she'll have faith that her mother won't die. So she'll still be standing on top. Okay, let's just say she has complete faith in God. The correct choice would be to surrender. Why? Okay. Because it's not just her, it's her it's her mother. So if it's just her, it's her choice to make. But if it's her mother, then um Okay. So this is hard. Okay. But I want you guys to imagine this. It's really hard. But what's happened is the brother says you either surrender Vicarda or I will cut off our mother's head. Carter is like fine I surrender. What happens to the friend now? Yeah. I think he'll feel I think he'll feel really bad about it and maybe just like can he withdraw from the vow and be like release you from the vow. I think if you're that friend it's very hard to go through the marriage, right? Yes. Because what does a friend want to do? At first he just wanted to get married but now he's But why do you want to get married? Uh for alliance. Yeah.

26:18For power, right? Okay. So, so if you are a person hellbent on power and you see the scenario, you're like, "Screw this. I'm not getting married." Why would you do that? Because you're not gaining power. You're losing. You're losing all the power. Why? Not just that, but it's like you're breaking that family apart, I guess. Yeah. You're not actually forming the alliance that you want. What the think of you? Uh, the mother slayer. Yes. And what would what do your soldiers think of you? Yeah. Do you understand? Yeah. Okay. So, it's really interesting how if you use your imagination, intuition, you just play this out. Okay. Yeah. But does the friend have a moral obligation to not go through with this? Like is it would it be moral of them to do? Right. So that this is a moral dilemma, right? because they they've already made a vow to each other that if we win this battle then I will marry Picarda, right? Okay. So, so this is the point here. The point is nothing in life is as simple as it seems. There's complexity. Okay. And this is a question like given this hard choice, what do you believe to be right choice and and how do you come to this choice and what Dante is saying is just your faith in God will lead you to the right choice. Right? So Parna cannot possibly math out what's going to happen. So particard is like I know it is wrong for me to break my vow to God and if I break this vow to God it is worse than my own life. Okay. So that's her faith. And the brother's like, "No, I've already made this promise to my friend before God. I

28:18cannot break this vow and therefore I have no choice but to up the ante, right? To gamble basically. He's not going to he's not really going to kill his mother, right?" And Picarda knows in this situation where my mother's life is being threatened, I have no choice but to surrender because obviously my brother is so power hungry. He's he's he's willing to destroy the whole world, right? And when this happens, then God intervenes and implants ideas into people. And the friend's like, "Screw this. This stuff is crazy. I probably don't want to get involved." All right, you understand? So the idea that Dante's the idea that this thought experiment shows us is you can never ever truly strategize. You can never ever truly math things out. Okay? The your best guide is your intuition. Your best guide is your faith and your will. And then things will naturally manifest the way you want them to manifest. Okay. Uh yes. Um does that mean so does that mean that if as long as you have the faith in you uh whatever you do um the god will lead you to the result. Okay. As long as you have faith, God will give you what you want. As long as you have the faith in you, um uh the the things you do and uh the God God will lead you to the right answer.

30:20Um okay. So in Dante in life there are no easy answers. Okay? If I were to say to you have faith in God everything will work out that's irresponsible. That's the wrong way to to perceive things. Okay. The major idea is that the world is extremely complex and often in life it's better to trust your intuition than to trust your logic. Okay, does that make sense? Your intuition comes from your connection to God which is an expression of your faith in God. Okay. Okay. So when you say have faith in God, what it's really saying is have faith in yourself. Have faith in your intuition. Do what you believe is right. Okay. Uh yes. Since we're on the topic of hypotheticals, I would like to know if it's possible to be put into a situation where you have to betray a vow you made to God because you love God. So for example, say there is this monk who swore never to kill anyone. And right there there is a man uh who is invincible to everyone except the monk. Like you know how hypotheticals work by this point and he's about to push a button that would destroy God. So what would you do as a monk? You love God so much you don't want God to be destroyed. So you kill the man and you break your vow. Is a situation like this possible? Okay. So the answer to this is what do you think is the right thing to do? Oh yeah. So my question also just like her you know I think our people have their own perspective. You can believe your own god. I believe my god but is

32:21there possibility that god is almighty god? It means that it is truth. Everyone just for looking forward to the one truth or is this people have their own you know imagination. So this is my question. So is there kind of almighty god there or just the god which is our existing in individually you know. Okay. So in divine comedy um the god that presented is not the god of the bible. It's not the god that you know. Okay. This is it. This is in um platonic philosophy what is called the monad. the source, the center, okay, the soul of the universe. We will go into what this God is later on. Okay. Okay. So, I'm not Okay. So, what's really important is to appreciate that great poetry excites the imagination. Okay. It raises questions for us to ponder and whatever problem arises ultimately you can't say hey what would you know uh my parent want me to do what would the Catholic Church want me to do you have to look inside your heart and ask yourself what does my heart want me to do and that's often in life your best guide to the answer. Okay, does that make sense, guys? Yeah. So, a follow-up question. Since you said in relation to my hypothetical that you should act as what you think to be right, then we assume that the monk acted in what he thinks is right and he killed the man betraying his vow. However, because he act in the way that he thinks is right, he still has the most of God in him and he went to the uppermost layer of heaven. Let's say that. So, what you are saying right now is Picarda's actions don't matter that

34:22much. She only has to forgive herself and rationalize her actions because if she rationalizes her actions as an act of love to God, then she would be able to ascend beyond her lowest sphere. Is that what you're saying? Okay. So there is a fundamental um error in your logic and the fundamental error is that it is up to us to be able to rationalize away our sins. Okay, that's what what you're assuming. We have the power to think away what we've done or rationalize away what we've done. Okay. And um we don't and it's hard it's a hard concept to understand okay because you think that okay these people in history um who've killed millions of people like Stalin people like Hitler people like Gen Khan right well logically they did what they did because they felt it was right. I have to save my people. I have to uh make my people happy and I that's why I need to start these wars. Okay, that's what we think they think. But what if you study literature, what you recognize is that there are many different dimensions to the soul. Okay? And maybe on the surface you can lie to yourself, but in your heart, in your true self, you know exactly what the truth is. Okay. Okay. So like because you're using logic, you're using philosophy and sometimes it doesn't get you anywhere. So, so, so, um, I will leave you with

36:24this idea, which is, do you know what happens when people take psychedelics or when they have near-death experiences or they do meditation? Do you know what happens? Okay. The thing that happens is you are able to a central level where you're able to see yourself from the lens of the person you've hurt. Does that make sense? You're able to see when you die or you're near death the totality of the pain you've caused the world. Okay, it's pretty amazing. But people who take who who do psychedelics I aska um people who have near-death experiences they all say this when this happens to you when when you actually ascend when you leave your corporal body the first thing that happens is something called a life review where you're able to see once and for all the totality of the pain you've caused other people. Even that cat you kicked. Okay. You you you you can see it and you're like, "Wait a minute. I don't even remember I kicked a cat." No, you're able to see it. Okay. All right. Does that make sense? So, just because you think something doesn't mean it's all you're able to think. Okay. Wait, professor. So, that So, does Do you mean that like if I meditate enough like I'll be able to kind of like foresee the future and see who will win like the 26 World Club cup or something like I I never said that. Uh uh professor uh do you mean that it's kind of butterfly effects? It means that I do something but I don't mean to to to

38:24do something for for other people. For example, maybe I just fell in love with a girl but I don't know there's another girl who doesn't love me too. So it's it's got to hurt. Is that all right? So, so let me rephrase it in a way, okay? Um, is everything you do is being recorded by the universe. There is an eternal memory of you do in the universe. And this eternal memory is stored inside you as well. And even though you don't know this, even though you don't remember anything, when you die, after you die, this eternal memory will be revealed to you in its totality. The question for you is, do you want to when you actually see this all this recording of your life and you see all the pain you've caused other people, do you want to deal with that? Okay. And this is a truth that's embedded in all religions and this is something that is also uh embedded in divine comedy. All right? So this is something that we will discuss later on. But I want you to remember this idea. Everything you you do you do first of all it's being recorded in by the universe. Second of all everything you do impacts the universe in a certain way. Okay. So if you live a good life this brings happiness to universe. If you live a bad life it brings sadness to universe. Sorry I have questions. So I curious about the relationship between this kind of memories and uh physical materials that matters. Where's your memory stored? Uh physical material. Yeah. Where's your memory stored? So in brain. Are you sure? Uh uh I I am pretty sure. Have you have you talked to a neuroscientist? Yeah. Yeah. Actually I choose a

40:25philosophy of cognitive science. Okay. Someone Google for me what evidence do we have that memories are stored inside the human brain. We have nothing. Google it for me. Yeah. Go ahead. Uh um evidence that the memories are stored inside the brain. Great. Can you just read it, Carol? Uh okay. Um memories Memories are not video recordings stored in a single file. Instead, they're encoded by altering the physical connection signapse between neurons. When you learn something new, neurons form stronger or newer connections through a process called long-term potentiation. Um, anyway, NIH researchers uncover how the human brains separate da da da. Where are memories stored in the brain? Memories aren't stored in just one part of brain. Different types are stored across different we don't know. Okay. This is all sonic garbage for like we don't know. Most basic question is like where are your memories stored? We don't know. Yeah. Um technically we do know. Uh so uh um so there's this very famous case of this person called HM. he had his hippocampus was um damaged and so he no longer had long-term memory. And so to some extent through animal um psych experiments we can understand that memories at least the function of memory is supported by the hippocampus in uh relation with the cortex.

42:25Okay. So that example, that case study shows us that he cannot access long-term memory. Does that make sense? It does not prove that he no longer has long-term memory. It just means he lacks access to his long-term memory, right? Um it's that he was not able to form long-term memories. And no, but but I'm saying like how do you know for sure he's not able to form long-term memory? It shows us he cannot access long-term memory. And it could be because he cannot form long-term memory. It could also mean that there's there's a disconnection between his long-term memory and his consciousness. Right? So, so I have further questions like if if we assumes that the memory is not stored in brain, so what's the physical realizers of memory or if memory don't uh naturally needs just physical realizers? So, what's the relationship between uh memories and phys physical materials? Okay. So um there have been recent neuro neurosic studies that um argue that our memory our consciousness is stored inside the universe. Okay. So think of the internet and our brains are just um smartphones that access the internet. So our memories are stored on the cloud and what our brains do is it access the the cloud. Uh yes. Uh but how would you possibly explain the fact that um say a person who can um form long-term memory before but he's getting older and older and he got um a part of his hippoc campus degraded and then he forgot a lot of things. He even forgot who who he was and how could you explain how hippocampus like a specific region in your brain is not related to your memory. So you have a computer right? When you buy the computer the internet connection is very smooth. You can download things really fast, right? Over time, as you as

44:26you use it more and more, the connection becomes worse and worse because it's an old computer. It's the hard like the hard drive in the computer was um broken or like just with war with time, right? And there are different types of memory, right? There's memory you can store in your computer. There are memories you can store on the cloud. There are memories you can access through other parts, right? And I want to add up to the the psychedelic question you you raised before. So um it's a chemical um compound that actually I I study neuroscience in college. I like it actually hits a certain receptor in your brain that cause like a down um downward signaling effect that u makes you meditate, makes you trip and all that. And this is a very physical or like chemical thing. Uh but now you said the memory is not about this uh material thing um but rather related to the the universe or um some more spiritual kind of realms. Um how would you explain the differences? Okay. So first of all there different psych psychedelics right and what is interesting is depending on on a psychedelic you'll have different experiences. So, for example, if you're on Awasa, you'll see like demons and spirits floating around you, like the entities. Yeah, I've heard of that. Um, but the majority of um psychedelics, they they actually hits the similar regions or like at least the like maybe they share 70% the same like 5HT2A receptors in your brain. That's the the serotonin thing it hits. And if yeah there are lots of differences like psilocybin like LSD and all that but um the effects are more similar than they're different would you agree okay so again what's happening is that you're looking at the at the hardware issues

46:26and you completely ignore the software does that make sense you're like okay okay this connection this fiber optic connection um you are analyzing it and detailing it how it works. But who cares? What what what matters is the information you're downloading. Why are you able to download certain information when you take a certain psychedelic? And the argument is that our brains exist in order to anchor ourselves to this material world. We have to believe that this material world is what's real. Because if you just do if you if your brain just can do whatever it wants. It's able to access all the information on the internet, the computer going to explode, right? Yeah. So your computer has to be strategic about what information it um absorbs in order to navigate the world, right? Ultimately, you just have to survive. You have to you have to like get food. You have to like get along with other people. You have to have sex. You don't have children, right? Yeah. And this is what Yeah. So the so so the the your brain is strategic in how it absorbs information and then how it actually perceives this information. Yes. We're say it filters out a lot of information. But when it filters out 99% of all information. Yeah. And when you take psychedelics, it actually like reopen the gate of receiving more information. And so you're now able to see all these different forces at work including spiritual forces and also when your ego is shut shutting down. Right. Exactly. Yeah. And so your ego shut down and so you're able to see it from more objective lens. Okay. Does that make sense? So that that you would say is actually more objective. Okay. The point I will make is that the period we're living in today in the year 2026 in China, it is a unique period in human history. We go back to most of human history. Okay. Most cultures were animistic, shamanistic, meaning it was just assumed that there were ghosts and spirits all

48:27around you. Yeah. Like trees have spirits and animals have spirits, but now we just use that as resources for our own needs, right? Do you understand? It's just weird to me how for the vast majority of human history, we just assumed that the universe is conscious, that there is a god, that there are spirits all around us. They manip and these spirits manipulate us. Okay? And like for the past 50 years, we're like, "No, it's just us and that's it." And we don't we don't know how consciousness works. We have absolutely no idea where memories are stored. Uh yes. Uh I want to add a comment. So if the brain uh if the memory is stored in the hardware is stored in the brain as a hardware um there should be a upper limit. But actually there's not a upper limit. Exactly. So we cannot possibly explain how we're able to have have these conversations, right? Like if in fact that the brain is like a computer and there are synapses, then there should be a limit to the storage of the memory, right? But we know for a fact that there are certain people who can memorize Paradise Lost and recite it. There are people who can memorize divine comm and recite it. Excuse me. Yeah. Right. And and then we also know the human brain is able to take tremendous leaps of imagination which if if it were to translate into a computer would require like entire worlds of computer that processing power in order to make the imaginary leaps that we make. Right? That's why I think a full reductionist view of the human brain and the the relationship between the physical and spiritual is is um um not not ideal because yeah we I I mean I study neuroscience. I know uh like the something about the brain but but like

50:27we still cannot just um just like give up the the spiritual part about it. So so again I go back to divine comedy. Okay. If God doesn't exist, I have no idea how this was written. If God does not exist, I don't know how this was written. I just don't. How could one man over the course of 20 years without any computers by himself? Okay? Like literally by himself in his room, he's able to conceive all this. And then almost a thousand thousand thousand years later we're able to sit down together and read it and understand completely what he's trying to convey and not only that but we find what he's trying to convey beautiful and truthful. How does that work? Uh, professor uh is is that possible that this just like people right now just get smoking, get drinking, the nicing or even the you know marijuana which just can inspire people to get a high so that they can make you good use of their brain for more than other people. Maybe normal people they got only have 30% of their brain but he can just make use of about 100% or maybe is it possible? Okay. All right. So, um I mean the reality is that we don't have a Dante in this age when we have access to all the world's information when we have unlimited wealth. I mean, compared to Dante, we're all kind of stupid. I I don't understand how this works. Okay. All right. So, so let's let's continue the divine comedy. Okay, one one last comment and then we'll continue the binding comment. Okay. So, I think uh in this discussion I think it's really important to separate the inside from the outside. So, if you're talking about the inside, if you're talking about the literary genius

52:27of the divine comedy, then I absolutely agree with what you said. I think it's an amazing work and I think if you're talking about God in the context of the divine comedy, then I absolutely agree with everything you said about divine inspiration. However, if you're going to take this to a outside, if you're going to take this to our present day, if you're going to take this to our brains, our neuroplast plasticity, then I have to say that I am not convinced by your arguments because I personally do not believe in God and because many others do not believe in God. And I think it's kind of it's kind of weird that we're trying to take an argument from divine comedy outside into our present day science. Okay. So, this is a class um of speculation, of inquiry, of debate. Okay. So, um you can believe whatever you want. All right. Anyway, let let's continue. Okay. Uh Carol, could you continue to read, please? Sure. Um we're picking up at KTO 5, line 43. Um paradigm. Two things are of the essence when one bows a sacrifice. The matter the matter of the pledge and then the formal compact one accept this last can never be annoyled until the compact is fulfilled. It is of this that I have spoken to you so precisely. Therefore, the Hebrews found it necessary to bring their offering. Although, as you must know, some of their offerings might be altered. As for the matter of the vow discussed above, it may be such that if one shifts to other matter, one commits no sin. But let but let none shift the burden on his shoulder through his own judgment. without waiting for the turning of the white and yellow keys. And let him see that any change is senseless unless the

54:28thing one sets aside can be contained in one's new weight as four and six. Thus, when the matter of a vow has so much weight and worth that tip every scale, no other weight can serve as substitute. Okay. So, the idea here is that take your vows seriously. So uh in her book the human condition Hannah Rand said that there are two actions okay that make us fundamentally human. There are two things that we do that we can all do that make us fundamentally human. The first is to make promises. Okay? Because when you make promises what you're doing is you're bonding yourself to another person but you're also bonding yourself to the future. You are imagining together a future. Okay, does that make sense? So making promises is a very very serious thing that only humans can do and which expresses our humanity. But then there's another thing that we do that makes us fully human and which expresses our human humanity. Do you guys know what it is? Number one is to make promises. What what's the other? H breaking promise is not a good thing. But but that's half the answer. Swear. Huh? Swear. That's That's making a promise. What's the other thing that makes us truly human? Which expression our humanity which uplifts our humanity? H language speaking. Love. Animals can speak. Animals can love. Gratitude, art, and imagination. Uh, no. What? Yeah. I I would have said to create things. No, there's there's something else that's that makes us uniquely human. Self reflection. Self-reflection.

56:29Yeah. Maybe language like a development. An action, guys. Think of an action that you do with people, not by yourself, but with other people. The first make promises, right? Making promises to affirm your individuality with another person and to imagine a better future. Maybe to lie, but it doesn't uplift, but it's something that humans Yeah. lying is a bad thing. Something that is truly divine that we that we can do. Can I say? Yes. Sacrifice. Uh sacrifice. What do you mean by that? Um the giving of oneself for another person's good but inconveniencing and potentially hurting oneself. Okay. All right, that's close. But it's it's actually much more spec specific than that. Okay. Okay. Good. Okay. All right. All right. It I mean it's something that happens every day, right? So, for example, um we're walking on the streets. Okay. I don't see you. I'm I'm really walking really fast. So, I bump into you and you fall down, right? And I say, "I'm sorry." You apologize. Okay. And you forgive. Do you understand? These are the two things that makes us truly human to make promises and to forgive each other for breaking promises or for making mistakes. Okay. So this is a really important idea because you ask yourself what makes a good society? What makes a just and happy society? And it's these two things. If people feel empowered to make promises and if people feel empowered to forgive each other because often guys it's hard to forgive each other then this is a good just moral divine society. Okay. Does that make sense? All right. So

58:32um we as humans should strive to create a society in which we can make promises and we can forgive each other. Okay. All right. Um so making promise is a very big thing and what diet is saying is that sometimes you make a promise that is so valuable that you can never compensate for it. Okay. And the example she uses Picarda makes a promise to God. Okay. And there's something she could do to compensate for this. But she also recognizes that nothing in the universe is absolute. And so she's going to um explain that the situation is much more complex than we think. Okay. Can you can you can you continue can you read please? Sure. Um Paradise Kanto 5 line 64. Let mortals never take a vow in Jeff. Be faithful and yet circumspect, not rash as Jeepa was in offering his first gift. He should have said, "I did a miss and not done worse by keeping faith." Okay. Okay. This is really interesting. Okay. Does anyone know who Jetpa is? Okay. All right. So, let me tell the story of Jetpa. This is in the Bible and it's in the book of Judges. Okay. And Jetpa, he's he's obviously a leader of the Israelites. Okay. A leader of the Israelites. And he goes to war. He goes to battle and he says, "Dear God, I swear to you, if I win this battle, if you let me win this battle, I will give you as an offering the first person to walk in my door." Okay? Right. He's made this vow to God and according to Beatress, if you make this vow to God, you must keep it. Who's the first person? So, he wins this battle. Okay.

60:32And who's the first person that walks in the door in his house? You guys know? His daughter. His daughter. He's completely screwed now, right? So, what does he do according to the Bible? Well, yeah. She he kills the daughter. Okay. According to Petri, is this good or bad? No, it's not a gray area. What did she say? What What did she literally say? And and what you should have said, I did a miss and not done worse by keeping faith. He should have broken the vow. She said, "W make that vow, man. I don't care if you make that vow to God. If you have to kill your daughter, don't keep that vow, man. So, this is a paradox, right? Someone someone help me understand this paradox. It would seem that like Viet Picarda has ended up in the bottom level of heaven because she's she had fear in her vow. So, she didn't she didn't complete her vow with 100% total faith. And so, here he's he's putting himself in in some sort of lower level or even maybe out of heaven. I'm not sure. But he's never going to get the higher levels of heaven because he's he's not taking his vow seriously. But it was a vow that he could never commit. Who? Um it seems to be Jebid. What's No, no, no. So, Jeba is a reference. Okay. Beatric is talking and she she's explaining to Dante um take your vow seriously and don't be like Jeffa but that's a paradox because Jeffa did take his vow seriously right so someone explain to me the the

62:32the the reasoning here do you understand it's a paradox she said take your vows seriously and don't be like jeta who did take his vows seriously uh yes new than than new. Okay. Yes. I think taking it seriously is understanding the the weight of the vows you make that when you make a vow you you like you know taking vows seriously and don't simply make the wrong vow and make the vows in haste. Okay. Yes. Yeah. I agree. It's the same. It doesn't it doesn't help me understand the paradox here. There's a paradox. Yes. So what I'm trying to say is I think that God uh God instituted all of this understanding into us so that we will be able to follow his rules. So as I mentioned before like the first time when we when we were doing the hypothetical about Picarda uh I mentioned that if you truly believe in God then you should truly respect God's gifts and you should truly respect God's most precious gift which is free will. So maybe God instituted this understanding into us so that we will be able to not make promises such as this. It's like it's like prevention. It's like a vaccine. It's like a prevention shot. Is that possible? I I still don't understand what you're trying to say. Explain to me the paradox where Petra said take your vow seriously and don't be like JetBA who took his vows too seriously. It's a paradox. Uh no, sorry. We uh you you first. Could this be like a jab at the Catholic Church? Yeah. Well, everything Donnie does is a jab at the Catholic Church, but but yeah, can you explain? Well, just saying that obviously there was jeter from the from the Bible and that he obviously followed through with this vow, but used sort of zero uh circum circumspect and rationality to look back and realize that it's wrong. And maybe at the time of writing a lot

64:32of religious people would have taken more of that view but he's showing that you need to sort of have more tact. Okay. Uh yes. Well my answer would be that um Hannah Erin said that like the first thing is what makes us human is to make promises and then the second thing was to forgive forgive ourselves and this is probably to forgive ourselves is more important than making promises. So what Jeffa should have done is just forgive himself. Forgive himself for breaking the promise. Yes, that's right. So that's what Beatric wants. Like just Jeff, you did make a promise but you did it in you did it rashly, right? So just forgive yourself and not kill your daughter, man. Yes. So I think that we should understand this by looking at like all the three works of Dante because like I read Infernal first and I think that in infernal if you uh commit like treachery against kin that's not just you know murder and that's that that that doesn't mean that you just belong to the seventh circle. You get put like way lower. Yes. So um I think that this is kind of what Beatatrice is kind of saying. So like compared to breaking a vow, like if you kill your daughter, you're going to end up like farther away from God, you're going to end up in hell. While if you break maybe a promise, you will probably end up like Picarda. So that is still much better than ending up in hell. But why is church so bad? Why why why would be worse than breaking a vow to God? I think it's like the violence of it all and also because they are like your own flesh and blood. So, you know, that would be kind of gruesome. So, um so, so let let's do the hypothetical where okay, the problem is that JetBA

66:32um had to kill the daughter. Okay, let's just say, okay, the person coming in the door is not the daughter, but the ant. Now it's okay, right? Now it's okay because it's not the daughter, it's the ant. Let's let's kill the ant. I think he would if he would kill the ant then like he would probably still end up like in the seventh circle or lower. I think so as well. Okay. So So now it's like it's not the ant, it's the neighbor. That's That's okay now, right? No, actually actually in Inferno, if you kill your neighbor, you also end up Okay, you're still bad. Okay, let's give you the the daughter. Okay, how about I don't know, stranger. Yeah, the stranger. That's still murder. That's still So, no matter who he kills, okay, he's still going to hell, right? So, so what's going on here? You say flesh and blood, but it's not flesh and blood. And it's not treachery, especially in this case. He's not. Yeah. But in this case, because it's flesh and blood, that's why it's so bad. That's why he is like the key example that I understand, but I'm saying like, let's just switch and say it's not the daughter. Let's just say it's a complete stranger. Is it okay now? Okay. All right. Okay. So, this is hard. Okay. Okay. So, what I'm going to do now is I'm I'm going to present a hypothetical. Okay. And let's just say I um I have a wife and I love my wife. Okay. My wife says to me, "If you truly love me, you will go steal a million dollars from the bank so I can buy a Porsche." This is just hypothetical. My my my wife would never do that. What's my response now? If you truly love me, you go and steal a million

68:33dollars from a bank and buy me a Porsche. Is it possible about the sabotage? I mean, just you love me, so you have to do something for me. Is it kind of the excuse because you want to take control over you? Is it possible? What is my proper response? My my So, you're saying my response should be, you know what? Um, I'll go rob a bag and buy some jewelry. is is like what's what's my reput response? Oh yeah. You wish you say if you really love me and you you can't force me to to buy for you buy something for you. Okay. Okay. Okay. All right. All right. Okay. So So this is really key to understanding D. Okay. So my wife says to me, if you truly love me, you will go rob a bank and buy me a Porsche, right? or go start a business and make a billion dollars. And so you think I should go go and make a billion dollars to show my wife, show my love, my my love to my wife. Does that feel right to you? What's the right thing for me to to to do here? Yeah, because it's to investigate why she would make such a request and try to get to the truth of it all. Yeah. So, I ask her like, "Do you really want me to do it?" Just, "Yes, I really want you to do it." I'm so stuck. Right. Maybe just Yeah. Who? Sorry. Who? Who? Who? Okay. Maybe just leave her. I should leave her. Yeah. Because that that does mean that she doesn't actually love you because the real love is unconditional. Yeah. Actually, I Yeah. Yeah. It's like I probably going to hold a similar

70:33opinion. Maybe we just leave her because uh because like based on the plot's cave theory like you mentioned in the in the video and I think if she just cannot know what happens beyond the mirror then and we never can wake up a person that do not want to be awake you know so we will possibly just leave her and find someone else that we have the like similar similar opinion or the similar uh I was just saying you'd say no. Yes. Okay. All right. So, all right. This is hard. Okay. But the right decision, the right course is just to walk away from her. Right. Because the logic is this. If she's making you this request, like if you truly love me, go steal me a million dollars, right? Well, first of all, she doesn't love you, right? She can't possibly love you if she's making this request because if you go rob a bank, they're going to put you in prison, right? You're not going to get them. You're not going to go by the car. You're going to go to prison. Okay, that's number one. Number two is if she doesn't love you, right? You being with her is wrong. You understand? So, you should just let her, if you truly love her, you should just let her go find someone who's right for her. Does that make sense? Okay. So, this goes back to this case where Zeba is saying, "I love God so much that I'm willing to give him my first daughter." And God's like, "That's not what I want, man. I don't want this crap from you." You understand? So what faith is is first and foremost understanding the nature of God. You understand? God is first and foremost love.

72:35And when you kill your daughter, you it's an act of treachery which degrades love in the universe. So you are not obeying God. You're betraying God. You understand? Does that make sense? If my wife were say, "Go rob a bank to give me a million dollars." Okay, I have to say to her, "No, it's because I love you that I'm not going to do this. If I go rob the bank, it's only because I want to possess you. It's only because I want to control you." That's an act of betrayal of love. Okay? Okay. Does that make sense? Okay. So, the paradox can only be resolved if you understand that the nature of God is love itself. And because God is love itself and because God loves you unconditionally, God would never ever ask you to hurt someone or betray yourself. Does that make sense? And so when you make this vow, I promise you God that if I win this battle, I will I will kill the first person who walks in the door. God's going to ignore you. Okay? Do you understand? I don't care. No one cares if you make this promise. God doesn't care if you make this promise. God's just going to ignore you because it came through rashness. It It was because you don't understand God. Okay? If you don't understand God and there's no connection, there's no way you can make this vow. Yes, that's exactly what I meant what I meant to say. So, if you truly understand God, then you would never make such a vow. It's like a vaccine. God has put it put us put in us the understanding that we would not make such a vow. That's the vaccine to prevent us from something doing something like this. Okay. Yeah. But then why do people make make these vows? Because because they have not taken the

74:36vaccine because because they have not been in contact with God. Therefore, such a vow is ungodly. How do they break their connection to God? By understanding themselves more fully. Like I'm like I said, God made provisions for us and it's up to us to discover these provisions. It's up to us to make ourselves his vessel. Is that what you're saying? No, no, no. I'm I'm saying like how did we lose our connection to God? You're saying we lost our connection to God, but how do we lose it? Because why would we why would we lose it? It makes no It makes no sense. like because we have free will as you mentioned before whether or not to lose our connection to God. How did why did Jeffa make this make this vow? Why did Jeffa make this vow? What's the reason? Yes. I think he was in the really hard to win battle and he wanted God to really help him. He wanted power. Yeah. You understand? Yeah. He wanted power and that's what moved him away from God. You understand? When you want power, you want worldly power, that's what severe connection to God. You've always had it, but you lose it when you want power. Okay. All right. Can you can you can can you read uh Carol, can I can I ask before we move on? So life seems to be fraught with mindfields of vows that people can make on your behalf. So we've got Picarda's brother has made a vow on her behalf. And I understand she ends up in the bottom level of heaven essentially because she had 90% faith instead of 100% faith and she was a bit fearful. But so Jeepa's daughter is uh has this vow essentially bestowed upon her. And you said that God ignores vows when they're made

76:37incor incorrectly like like sinfully or ungodly. I'm getting the wording wrong, but that there is some connection here with Carta and her brother because the vow was made for for power there as well. and her place in heaven suffers because of this whole seemingly situation. So I guess maybe my my question is getting toward like where would Jebza's daughter be in the hierarchy of would she end up in the inferno because submitting to her father's death would be like a form of suicide? That's a really interesting question. Yes. Okay. So, um, sorry. Why would Jeff be inferno and not in paradise? Do you guys know why? Okay. Yeah. I I your question. Okay. But like first my first question is, do you guys know where Jeffa would be in Inferno? He's actually not. Uh, so where would Jeff be in in in in in Divine Comedy? Which which level? Inferno, purgatory, or um paradise. But why Inferno? He killed his daughter. No, he's actually inferno because he's not a Christian. Okay. Uh he's inferno because um he was born before the time of Jesus. Therefore, he could not become a Christian. Therefore, he cannot access heaven. Okay, that's point one. Point two is where would Jeff's daughter be? You guys know purgatory? Why purgatory and not anywhere else? Um I mean following that logic um has not known Jesus but um not knowing how

78:40she has acted in her own life. I'm just assuming that she has not killed anybody else. And so this is um she was killed against her presumably against her own will and even if it's her will she was the victim. Yes. Who's the hero of the story? Who's the hero of the story? If you read the Bible, who who's the hero of the story? The daughter. The daughter. But why the daughter? Um because she understands the importance of the vow. She wants to keep it despite that she has to sacrifice herself. Yes. Okay. If you read the Bible, it's clear the daughter who is the hero of the story because she was willing to sacrifice herself to ensure her father keeps keeps about, right? Because if you read the Hebrew Bible, the worst thing you can do is not give your vow to uh God. Uh so she would actually be in paradise. Ah okay. Does that make sense? So this is a this is a paradox of divine comedy where there's a rule that if you're not a Christian, you are not you can't be in paradise. You can only be in purgatory or in inferno. But because of the nobility of her sacrifice, she gets elevated to paradise. Okay. Right. And so it doesn't logically make sense, but it makes intuitive sense. Does that make sense? Yes. Part where you said the sacrifice, the daughter made a sacrifice. Okay. The story is this. Okay. Yeah. The story is that JetBA to win a a war because he's leader of the Israelites. Okay. And the Israelites have lots of enemies uh because it's the Middle East, right? And they win this battle. Um, but before the battle, Jeff says, "If I win this battle, I swear to God, I will offer as sacrifice whoever walks in my door." Okay, he makes this vow.

80:41He goes home. The first one to walk in the door is his daughter. Now he's screwed. Okay, because either you kill your daughter or you defy God, right? So he is completely utterly screwed. So what the daughter says is, "Father, let me make my own offering. Let me sacrifice myself willingly so that it absolves you of the guilt of killing me and it allows you to fulfill um your promise to to to God." And why this is worthy of paradise is it is an act of love because it is completely selfless. You understand? Okay. And when you commit acts of love, you are elev elevated to uh paradise. Okay. Is that clear guys? Sorry. So you mean willingness is the necessary if it can be you know up level into the paradise? Excuse me. the willingness because you said you will to die. It means that you can go to paradise. Is that what you mean? No. No. I just said a selfless act of love is what elevates you to paradise. Not the will, not the desire, but the action itself that's driven by the will and the desire. Yes. But there should be acts of love before Christianity. That's why she's in heaven. She's not a Christian. She's a Hebrew. She doesn't believe in Jesus. But if God could put her anywhere, God would put her in paradise. Okay? In fact, when we read, what you will discover is there are quite a few pagans in paradise. Okay? So, this is subversive because the rule is unless you're a Christian, you can't go to paradise. You read Divine

82:42Comedy, there are there are some pagans in paradise. Okay? Does that make sense? Uh, yes. Isn't offering herself some sort of suicide and isn't that a sin? Um, yeah. The Catholic Church, uh, for the Catholic Church, suicide is a sin. But these are the Hebrews. These are these are the Israelites. Okay. So, this is a different cultural context. And it's not really uh Yeah. Okay. Does that make sense? All right. Okay. All right, let's So, Carol, can we keep on going? Okay, Paradise KTO 5 um line 67. He should have said idimus and not done worse by keeping faith. And you can find that same stupidity. So, so you see the paradox in in the sentence, right? Doing worse by keeping faith. How does that make any sense? Right? Am I going? And you can find that same stupidity in the Greeks chief when her faith when her fair faith made Ephenia grieve and made the wise and made the foolish weep for her when they heard tell of such a right. Okay, so this is also a really interesting story. Okay, so she's saying that there are two really stupid people in this world. First is Jetba, the other is Eggman. Okay, so uh this is Trojan War and what starts the Trojan War of course is that Paris of Troy steals Helen of Sparta and so Helen is the most beautiful woman in the world and all the Greeks fight for Helen and it seems like a war is about to break out among the Greeks and so what the Greeks decide to do is you know what we'll just cast lots and whoever wins will marry Helen and everyone else is obligated to

84:42fight for Helen if someone seal tries to steal Helen. Okay, does that make sense? It's an oath before the gods. And so Helen marries Manalas uh the brother of Egenon and the king of Sparta. Then Paris steals Helen and now the Greeks are obligated by this oath to go and destroy Troy. And this what this is what starts the Trojan War and Agame Manon is the leader of the Greek army. So the Greeks assemble this huge fleet off the um coast of Greece and they're about to sell the Adriatic and move and and war against Troy. The problem is that Agamenon kills like a secret animal to Artemis, the the the the goddess of the hunt. And Artemis gets angry and says, "Screw you. You Greeks aren't going anywhere." And she destroy she she so there's no more wind. Okay. So the Greeks are stuck where they are. So Aman is like, "No, we need to go to Troy because of this oath to the gods." And he talks to a prophet and says, "What can I do to restore the winds?" And the prophet says if you kill your daughter Ephagenia Artemis will be appeased. Okay. So the second manon kills Ephagenia even though is extremely popular among the people and it's also like his daughter. Okay. So this was stupid. And ultimately, if you know the story of um the uh Greeks, what happens to to Egon because he killed Ephagenia? You guys do you guys know the story? Yeah, I think um if mother Clayton Mestra um revenged on a

86:43your daughter were killed by your husband, what did you do? You probably go kill the guy. Okay. Tamestra plots this vengeance against Egamenon. And so when comes home, Famero kills him for killing Epigenia. Okay. So um um should could have could Eggman have known this? Could Eggman have predicted this? Probably. Okay. So that this is why it's stupid, right? Okay. So just I understand it's important to keep your vows to the gods but like what is saying is like use your brains people. Okay. All right. So Jeffa was stupid. Eggman was stupid as well. Okay. Keep on reading. Uh Carol Paradise Kanto 5 line 73. Christian, proceed with greater gravity. Do not be like a feather at each wind, nor think that all immersions wash you clean. You have both testaments, the old and new. You have the shepherd of the church to guide you. You need no more than this for your salvation. Okay. Um, what what is she saying here? Okay. What is she saying here? What she's saying? Okay. Yes. It's important to keep your vows to God, but at the same time use your brain. And how can you use your brain? You have both testaments, the old and the new. You have the shepherd of the church to guide you. You need no more than this for your salvation. This is very subversive. If I'm in the Catholic Church and I and I hear this, I'm I'm

88:43pissed off. Why? You don't need the priest. You You don't need a priest. But what do you need? Bible. The Bible. Do you understand? Okay. What do you are not allowed to do at this time if you're Catholic? To read the Bible. Read the Bible by yourself. You're not allowed to do that. And what Donnie is saying is like, hey, if you really want to understand what is true, read the Bible for yourself. Okay. Yes. So, this is something I'm really uh confused about. So, first you said that we should follow our intuition because our intuition comes from God. And then you said that we should use our brains. And then you said that we should read the Bible. However, if we presume that God is above all of this, if we presume that God does not need to make himself manifest in such things as the Bible or even the Catholic Church, then what is God? How should we get closer to God? Okay. All right. So, first let's ask a question. Okay. Have you read the Bible before? Okay. What's the problem with reading the Bible? There's loads of versions. Excuse me. Loads of versions. Loads and loads. It's pretty complicated, man. So, what's the only way you can actually read the Bible? Use your intuition, man. You understand? Try reading the Bible using logic. Good luck with that one. Right. What What's the contradiction here? What what Donn is saying is okay. Yes, I understand that you made the this vow to God and you want to know what to keep and what to what to break. Use your

90:43intuition. How? Read the Bible, listen to the priest. Okay? Once you have these two elements, go to church, listen to the priest, read the Bible. Then this will be the path to your salvation. So what what he's really saying is use your own judgment, use your intuition, use your faith. Yes. So what you are basically saying here back to my inside outside metaphor. So what you're basically saying here is that we have to use our intuition but our intuition is not entirely of our own control because we cannot use our intuition to forgive ourselves of everything we have ever done and therefore our intuition is something outside of us and therefore God is a concrete existence somewhere outside of us. Okay. All right. So let's try to make this simple. Okay. It might be wrong but let's try to make it simple. Okay. Your intuition is ultimately your connection to the divine to the universe. Okay? Because like where does your intuition come from? It comes from the source. But there are ways in which to strengthen this connection. Okay? Knowledge, reading, inquiry, debate, love, faith. Does that make sense? So live a life of love, faith, inquiry, pursuit of knowledge and this will strengthen your intuition. Because for Dante, science and intuition are not mutually exclusive. They are independent. They are codependent. Only with intuition can you truly be a scientist. Does that make sense, guys? All right. Uh let's let's let's keep on going. Um, Paradise Kanto 5 line 79. If evil greed would summon you

92:43elsewhere, be men and not like sheep gone mad, so that the Jew who lives among you not deride you. Do not act like the foolish wantum lamb that leaves its mother's milk and heedless wants to war against and harm its very self. These words of Beatus I hear transcribed. And then she turned, her longing at the full to where the world is more alive with light. Her silence and the change in her appearance imposed a silence on my avid mind which now was ready to address new questions. And even as an arrow that has struck the mark before the bow cord comes to rest, so did we race to reach the second realm. When she had passed into that heaven's light, I saw my lady filled with so much gladness that at her joy the planet grew more bright. And if the planet changed and smiled, what then did I, who by my very nature am given to every sort of change, become as in a fish pool that is calm and clear. The fish draw close to anything that nears from outside, if it seems to be their fair. Such were the far more than a thousand splenders I saw approaching us. And each declared, "Here now is one who will increase our loves." And even as each shade approached, one saw, because of the bright radiance it set forth, the joyous with which that shade was filled. Consider reader what your misery and need to know still more would be if at this point what I began did not go on. And you will uninassisted feel how I longed so to hear those shades narrate their state as soon as they appeared before my eyes. Oh you born unto gladness whom God's grace allows to see the thrones of eternal triumph before your war of life is ended. The light that kindles us is that

94:44same light which spreads through all of heaven. Thus he would know us. Say yourself as you may please. So did one of those pious spirits speak to me. And Beatatrice then urged, "Speak. Speak confidently. Trust them as you trust God." I see plainly how you have nested in your own light. See, you draw it from your eyes, because it glistens even as you smile. But I do not know who you are or why, good soul. Your rank is in a sphere concealed from mortals by another planet's ray. I said this as I stood turned toward the light that first addressed me. And at this it glowed more radiantly than it had before. Just as the sun, when heat has worn away thick mist that moderate its rays, conceals itself from sight through an excess of light. So did that holy form through excess gladness concealed himself from me within his rays. And so concealed concealed he answered me even as the next KTO is to sing. Okay. All right. So what's happening of course is that Dian Futures are traveling through the cosmos. They're going from spear to spear. They are now in a new spear and the person they meet is Justinian. Justinian uh was emperor of the Bison empire. Okay. the probably the greatest emperor of the Bian Empire and he will now talk about the history of Rome which we'll read the next kanto um question there's a word here that shouldn't be in the divine comm weird word if you are a Christian if you're a practicing Christian you hear this word and you basically shudder you you're like what? Okay. It's like

96:45it's it's like basically someone hitting you. What is this word? The word doesn't really belong and it should not be here. There's a word four letters, guys. Four letter word that should not be in in heaven. It makes absolutely no sense. H what? What's the word? Holy. Holy. No. Holy is a word that you would want in heaven. Yes. Born. Huh? Born. No. There's a word that's like what is it doing here in heaven? You're like this is wrong. All right. So it is to me. Yes. Thank you. God, what is going on here? You guys understand this? Yeah. You're like you're a Christian. There's one God. And it is secular to say there is another god. There can only be one god. What is she say? Peter says speak confidently trust them as you trust god. Peter says to Justinian talk to Dante. Speak the truth. Talk to them as you trust God. It's a really strange word, right? Does the gods here refer to like the Greek gods? I mean, I think yesterday we talked about how at the beginning of the contos like Dante prayed to, for

98:46example, the Apollo and the Muses even though he was like Christian. Yeah. Well, I mean like that that can only be the that can only be the reference, right? Because Christianity is monotheistic, meaning just one God. The Greeks are polytheistic, meaning many gods, right? So, so the idea I'm trying to convey is that there's a subversive quality subversive quality to divine comedy. You can choose to just read it like as a Christian text. And quite honestly, most people do read it as Christian text. And in the ne and I point this out because in the next conto we will for Justinian read the entire history of the Catholic Church. Okay from its beginnings in Rome to uh the Holy Roman Empire. Okay. And that is the official chronology as presented by the Catholic Church. But what I'm trying to show you is that there are small things embedded throughout the text that subvert the traditional understanding of Christianity. It doesn't make sense, guys. And unless you read it deeply, you can't actually appreciate it. Uh yes, we see this as a humanistic perspective. Like uh we often say uh modern day celebrities are called stars, right? And sometimes we say gods of the literary cannon and sometimes we almost worship the greats in our history. And can this be seen as this pioneer of the humanistic perspective that uh humans can be great in and of themselves even those who are not great through religion like pagans, like Archimedes. Exactly. Okay. And and what what you say is the Renaissance. Okay. What makes the Renaissance a revolution in human affairs is that as you say um it uh

100:47celebrates the human spirit and how the human spirit can be a force for innovation and good in the universe and this is unique in Europe at this time. Okay. And it starts with Dante. It is Dante that launches the Renaissance as well as modernity. It is Dante that promotes the idea of the individual that we take for granted today but which was revolutionary back in his time. Okay. So, so yes. All right. Um so, um we have another 20 minutes but um I want to talk about some ideas. Okay. So I don't want to give you the impression that our discussion is the end all and be all that we've uncovered the truth. I want to go over into the limitations of a discussion. Okay. The first limitation as you can appreciate is this is written in Italian. We are reading in English because we don't speak Italian. This is a severe limitation because it prevents us from doing literary analysis. We can't study the words. We can't study the diction, the syntax. Okay? And so it limits our true understanding of what Dante is trying to convey. It doesn't make sense. Unless you read this in Italian, it's impossible to truly decipher his meaning. That's important. And we've invited someone Italian to come u read some passages for us later in the workshop. Yeah. And that and that'd be great. But but the point I make is like unless you read it in Italian by yourself, you'll never truly understand it. Okay. Okay. That's point one. Point two is that uh we discussed this before but in the line there's a lot of numerology and mathematics because you think about it for Dante mathematics is the underlying

102:48truth of the universe. Okay, mathematics numerology is what provides the structure of the universe and there's a lot of actually numerology and mathematics within the divine comedy. The most basic example is a structure where it's 34 ktos in inferno, 33 in purgatory and 33 in um uh paradise. And also like if you look at the structure of the poem, it's three lines by three lines by three lines. Okay, there's clearly a numerological significance to number three because of what? When you think three, what do you think? Trinity. The trinity. Okay, do you understand? Okay. So what Dante is doing is he is using mathematics in order to portray the divine structure of the universe to express its intent sorry its intentionality. Okay, its design. Okay. So unless you really study the mathematics, it's again hard to understand the divine comedy. We're not going to do that because a lot of mathemat mathematics is in Italian. Okay. Mata mthematics would also include syllables and the rhymes and all that. Okay. So, we can't do the numerology as well. The third thing that we're missing that's very important for divine harmony is astrology. Okay. So, at this time in history, astrology is science, right? You think that the movement of stars will determine the course of events. And if you read Divine Comedy, if you you look at paradise, obviously there's a lot of astrology here, okay? Obviously, the way that the stars have positioned, the way that D is looking at the stars from a certain angle, it's all significant, but I don't understand any of this stuff. Okay? So, astrology is also very key. Then you have uh the symbology.

104:51So we looked at certain symbols last class. For example, the four circles and the three crosses and we pointed out how you can have lots of rich discussions over the meaning of these symbols. There are lots of symbols scattered throughout divine comedy and obviously there's a lot of deep meaning uh under these symbols but unless you actually study symbology you don't know what they are. Okay. Um, what what Don is doing that's very important is that he's combining different traditions together, right? Not just the Christian tradition, but also the pagan tradition, also the um Islamic tradition, uh the Gnostic tradition. There's all sorts of traditions that he's combined together in order to create the symbology uh the im imagery that underlies the divine comedy. Okay. And the last element that we can't look at is the occult. Okay. The occult esoterism. What is the occult? The occult is basically talking to demons and angels. Okay? And if you actually know the occult, you will understand there's a lot of occult symbolism, a lot of occult references into the Dying Comedy. I don't know these references so I cannot bring them out. Uh yes. Um personally based on my understanding I would argue that the original meaning of the word oult is actually the hidden and the oult can refer to more than angels and demons. In fact if we're referring to that we often refer to them using uh for example demonology. So the oult can also refer to other topics. Yeah. Right. The cult just means what's hidden from us or what is esoteric. Okay. Yes. Um but but most people refer to it as just talking to demons and angels. Okay. Um and clearly Donna spends a lot of time talking to do

106:52to demons and angels, right? So all so um and and the last thing I would say is just magic. Okay. Magic uh manifestation. So why I bring this out is like there is an entire universe in the divine comedy we cannot access because of limitations of our language because of limitations of our knowledge. So um even though you know we're having these rich discussions appreciate that it's only a small fragment of the entirety of the divine comedy and the entire purpose of this class is to encourage you to spend your entire lifetime studying the divine comedy. There's about 20 of you in this classroom. I guarantee you if you would to spend the next 50 years studying divine comedy, each and every one of you would have a radically different interpretation of divine comedy because some of you may learn Italian and go study numerology. Some of you may learn learn Italian and go study symbology. Okay? In which case you present a radically different conception of the um of your understanding. Another way of saying this is The divine comedy what it really is is the secret bible of humanity right the bible is the major religious text for most people in this world but if you are an intellectual if you are an inspiring uh writer the divine comedy is um what will guide you in your imaginations okay if you read the divine comedy throughout the entire life I guarantee you you're going to be one of our greatest intellectuals, one of our greatest writers, greatest thinkers because there's so much richness. Um, also like if you actually read the

108:54divine comedy and you study things like the Cabala, you can you know the Cabala comes from Divine Comedy. Okay, this is something that that we might discuss later on, but the Jewish Cabala is basically inspired by divine comedy. something that people don't rec recognize. But if you're a really smart person, you're really interested in the esoteric, in the occult, in magic, in God, then the divine comedy is the best source material that you can have. Okay. And again, um I I am just amazed at the level of accomplishment. I mean it is I think certainly the greatest individual human achievement in history far greater than um Einstein or Newton. But also I think that if we were to rank Divine Comedy to other great achievements, okay, the pyramids, the nuclear bomb, the computer, whatever, I still think the Divine Comedy is superior. Okay, that that's my own uh feeling. Um also I I will um say that because I have access to all this okay the six things I'm missing my for my capacity to fully analyze divine comedy it also means we'll probably skip certain sections okay does that make sense because certain sections are heavy into the cold astrology and mathematics and there's really no point for us to read it because like I don't understand what's going on right okay so any questions about this yes do you remember the first time you read divine comedy and how it felt like and what yeah I I had no idea what I was reading. I mean I I I I I started reading Divine Comedy about four years ago for the first time. I I didn't read this at Yale. Um um you I think you have to take Italian to read Divine Comedy. I I can't remember. Um and for the for like many

110:57many months I didn't understand anything. Okay. Like I would read the words like I don't understand what's going on. Okay. I would watch videos. I would I think I watch like 100 video 100 hours of of like videos explaining to me what divine comedy is. It made me even more confused. Okay. Try try it. Try going on YouTube. Try watching what these professors say about divine comedy. It will just confuse you even more. And so I'm really really frustrated. But I am I have to teach this to my students. Okay. I'm teaching at a high school and I've taught Homer, I've taught Plato, and I'm like, I should teach Dante as well. So, I'm like, oh my god, I'm gonna I am going to be a complete idiot, okay? But I really really want to teach this to my student because I really want to teach great books. And then one morning I wake up and it felt as though Dante walked in my dreams and he gave me certain ideas and he said love. Okay, if you want to understand the divine comedy, think about what love is. Think about what the meaning of love is and that will lead you to the right path. And then divine comedy started to like open up to me like the words started to connect together. Okay. And and and it goes back to the idea of picarda where if there's a will there's a way where I for like four months felt completely hopeless like this is impossible. This is just stupid. I can't understand what's going on. All these YouTube videos are making more more confused. I thought hopeless. But when you really want it, the universe will respond. Maybe not the way you expect, maybe not in the way you want, but it will respond. It will guide you to the right path. Okay.

112:59So, it's only a question of will and desire. Yes. So something I would like to comment on something that I noticed and I think it's interesting but understandable given its time is that so in fantasy like in fantasy fiction there are two types of magic. There's hard magic and there's soft magic. And hard magic is when you do something like one plus one and you expect it to equal two. And soft magic is when you don't know what will turn up. Magic just turns up when it needs to. So I think Dante's magic, Dante's uh esultterism is closer to soft magic than hard magic. But it's already showing the basic signs of hard magic, which I think is really interesting because in Catholicism, you cannot expect God to do anything. So Catholic magic or miracles is absolutely soft magic. However, as we evolved, as the disciplines of uh the Cabala, as the disciplines of cultism evolved, we gradually got ourselves some rituals. we got ritualism and that evolved into hard magic where we do something and we expect something to happen. Okay. I I agree with that. Yeah. Um what I'll also say is that I really think Divine Comedy is the word of God. It's a universe speaking through Dante. And that's why I say it's perfect. Okay. I've not been able to find a flaw in the Divine Comedy. I mean like look look at it beauty of its structure. Look at the beauty of its language. Look at the look at the economy of its ideas. Okay, we're able to take one sentence and have like hours and hours of discussions based on this. So, um I I I I think it's going to be worth your while to spend the rest of your life studying Divine Comedy. It it is that it is that that good. Um and um there is magic definitely magic in this and the more you study the more you will discover. Okay, I cannot say this about the Bible. I'm sorry. I've

115:00actually said the Bible it is a complete mess. Okay, if you actually said the Bible you're like uh what's going on here? Um but Divine Comedy, the poetry makes it perfect, right? Because let's just say you're in the Middle Ages and you hear Dante recite poetry, right? What are you think? What are you thinking? It's God, right? It's God taking possession of Dante and D is reciting the the poetry. Same thing if you know you go to a concert and you might have a favorite musician, but when the musician is singing, you think it's the universe singing. It's God that's singing, right? It touches you that that deeply. All right. Okay. So, um when we come back from the break, we will go into the history of the Catholic Church. Okay. We first we'll show you the official history of the Catholic Church and then we will show I'll show you how Dante presents a new uh understanding of um Jesus. Okay. All right. Any questions? Okay, guys. So, so I'll see you after the break. Okay. What I'm going to do before we read Dante is I'm going to introduce the Catholic version of history. Okay. So um the end point of history is the Catholic Church because the Catholic Church is the manifestation of God on earth, right? It is heaven on earth. So all the events that led Catholic Church were pre-ordained. They were intended by God. Okay? And the thing

117:00that starts history and which leads the Catholic Church is of course Rome. Rome. It is God's intention, is God's will that Rome conquer the world. So it starts off this very small poor place in the Italian peninsula. Then it gradually expands outwards and then it conquers until it conquers the entire Mediterranean. Right. It destroys Carthage, Nethopenic Wars, and now it controls most of the world, spanning the Mediterranean from Spain all the way to Egypt all the way to Syria and the Levant. Okay? And this is the Roman Empire. Now, during the course of the Roman Empire, a civil war breaks out. Okay? And of course, Julius Caesar will win this war, but he will become assassinated by Brutus and Casius. And this will lead to the rise of Augustus Caesar. And after Caesar dies, Ted Caesar will come in to power. And as during the time of emperor of Caesar, Christianity is born and it spreads spreading throughout the uh Roman Empire. It is a miracle because in the beginning of the first 100 years it's persecuted. It's a very fringe religion but by about 300 year 300 it becomes the official religion of the Roman Empire because of Constantine and Constantine um will decide to shift his capital from Rome to Conenopole which is modernday Istanbul and this begins the Bisantine Empire which is the Eastern

119:00Roman Empire. And uh the great emperor of the bison empire is of course Justinian who we are meeting or who who we have met in common and Justinian will narrate the story of the Roman Empire. Okay but it's basically like this. Now you know as we know the Roman Empire does split in half between the western and the eastern. The eastern empire will fall to the Turks in the 16th century. um about a thousand years later, but the Western Empire falls about the year 400. Okay? And when it falls, uh Europe is broken into different kingdoms uh different factions and about the year 800 uh Charlemagne uh of the Franks will unite all of Europe and create something called the Holy Roman Empire. Okay. Um, and the Holy Roman Empire will last until who do did I tell you history? Who who destroys Holy Roman Empire? Excuse me? No, that's the Roman Empire. Who destroys the Holy Roman Empire? Did you guys know your history? Napoleon. Napoleon. Yes. Napoleon Barton. So, that's a long way. Okay, this is this is about 18 1800. So the holy empire lasts for a long long time and from the perspective of dominant Europeans this is all the stability the the continuity it's all because of the will of God. Okay now over the course of this time as I said Christianity will develop okay and Christianity will come to replace the Holy Roman Empire as the most powerful force in the world. So it starts of course with the birth of Jesus

121:02in about 4 BCE. Okay. And then 33 is when he is crucified and with his death it will begin the it will begin Christianity. Uh what will happen is that Peter will become the first bishop of Rome. Basically the first pope. Okay. And then Paul uh will build the foundations of Christianity. The I and we'll meet both Peter and Paul in divine comedy. Not Jesus but Peter and Paul. Then what happens is that Christianity spreads and it becomes official under Constantine. Okay. So now the Catholic church is official. Now in about 325 this is something called the council of Nikia. Nikia is in modern day Turkey but the council of Nikia is a radical turning point in Christian history because before every single place in Europe had its own distinct church that blended Christian elements with local pagan practice. The council attempt to standize Christianity by resolving certain theological conflicts within the church. Okay. And there are quite a few major conflicts. The first major conflict is um the nature of Jesus. Okay. So, everyone worships Jesus. That's why you're a Christian. But what was Jesus? There are some who said that Jesus was God incarnate, right? There are some who said Jesus was a man who was anointed by God to be his messenger. These are two extremes. And the solution that they came up with is that God is both man and God. Okay, it's really important for you guys to

123:02appreciate. Jesus has a dual nature. Both God and man, both divine and both um human. Why is this important? You have to have Jesus both as divine and as human. Why? Do you guys know why? You can't be like this guy's a man. You can't be this guy's a god. You have to It has to be both. Why? Yes. Well, from a literary perspective, like we all like a main character we can relate to. And if Jesus was holy God, then we can't relate to him that much. And if he was holy human, then well, what business does he have doing all these nice things for us? Um, okay. But there's actually a much more reason. Yes. Um, because therefore he can save all the human by how? By um salvation. Um okay so the main reason is the crucifixion right right doesn't make sense guys crucifixion so idea is that his sacrifice only makes sense if he could die you understand God you crucify him who cares that's nothing so he needed to have a human element in order for his sacrifice to be worthwhile to be worthy of redeeming us. Okay, so that's one major theological debate and quite honestly it still goes on today. There are like literally hundreds and hundreds different of different sects of Christianity arguing about this. Okay. Um but the big really big question is the relationship between God, the Holy Spirit and Jesus, right? Because now we've um affirmed that Jesus is God. That's why we worship him. That's why we're Christians. But why are why does

125:02the God appear in the Bible and why does the Holy Spirit and why is Jesus? Right? Worship between these three. And historically there have been different explanations. The council is important because it established the holy trinity. Okay. The holy trinity. The concept here is God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are separate but one. It doesn't make sense. They are both different but the same at the same time. Okay. So, the council establishes the Holy Trinity. And quite honestly, most Christians were a gasast at this idea. This started civil wars. This this is what launched civil wars throughout the Christian world. Okay. But the Bosian Empire enforced the Holy Trinity throughout and even today there's still arguments about the the Holy Trinity. Okay. So this is a custom really important idea to keep in mind because finally we'll discuss this from the divine harmony. Then we go to about 400. Why is this important? because Rome falls. The barbarians, Visigoths, they overrun Rome. And if you're a Christian, you're like, "This is a question of faith." Because you were taught that Rome is heaven on earth. It's where the Catholic Church is. So why would God not protect Rome? And so at this time um the major Catholic theologian named Augustine okay um he writes a book called city of God in the city of God what it argues is there are two cities in the world there

127:02is Rome and there's Jerusalem Rome is a seat of temporal power Jerusalem is a seat called spiritual power. Rome was meant to fall so that Jerusalem may rise. What is Jerusalem? Jerusalem is the Catholic Church. Okay? So in other words, the Catholic Church is out of history. The Catholic Church does not care who is king. The Catholic Church does not care who is rich or who is poor. Doesn't matter. is all temporal issues, earthly issues. What the Catholic Church cares about is who goes to heaven and why. Okay. So, Augustine establishes this separation between church and state where the church is out of history, beyond history. It doesn't care who's king. This is why in the 1800 Charlemagne is a problem because Charlemagne wants to have the authority of Catholic Church because he wants to become the new Roman Emperor and the Pope grants it to him. The pope anoints him emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. Right? If you don't have holy in here, holy, then you need the church. So now the church becomes embedded in temple politics. And this is what leads to Dante running the Divine Comedy because he is angry at the fact that because the church has involved itself in temporal politics, now all of Europe is in factional politics. Right now you have two major seats of power. The Holy Roman Empire Empire as well as the Catholic Church. And they're always fighting. Okay? The Holy R woman Roman Empire is fighting to figure out who will be pope. That's not a temp temporal issue. That's not a worldly issue. The Vatican is fighting to install a

129:02friendly emperor in the Holy Roman Empire. Okay, this is happening for centuries and this is leading to wars throughout Europe. It's also leading to massive oppression, massive censorship, the destruction of creativity in Europe. And this empowers Dante to write the divine comedy to address a lot of these histories. Okay. So what Dant is going to do is the first thing he's going to do is present the official story of the Catholic Church and then he's going to make some adjustments to it. Okay. To reconcile the differences. Now, um, some really important history that Dante will go into is why did Jesus have to die? Okay. What was the point of the death of Jesus? And as you know, it was to redeem us from our original sin, right? Adam and Eve at the beginning of time. God gave him a very simple order, very simple instruction. Do not eat that stupid fruit. Okay? Anything else, but don't eat that fruit. And they eat the fruit. And that's the original sin. And then we humans because we disobey God became lost uh became evil. And it was Jesus who came to redeem us in the eyes of God. Right? And so um that's why he was crucified. Now if you read the Bible, what it tells you is that the Jews were responsible for the death of Jesus. So now God has to avenge his only son. So what happens

131:02in the year 70? the Romans destroy the second temple. Okay? And if you know modern day history, that's that's what's led to a lot of problems today. Okay? But in the year 70, the Jews rebelled against the Romans. The Romans under Titus sent a huge army and they burned down the second temple. And this revenge for um uh for the Jews betraying Jesus. And so if you're a Christian, you learn this history. But obviously this raises a lot of issues. Why did why was murder the murder of Jesus necessary to redeem us, right? What is one wrong make right? Okay, that doesn't really make any sense. Also, why would God need to punish the Jews if this all part of the plan to begin with, right? The Jews did nothing wrong. Okay, yes, the Jews did betray uh Jesus, but wasn't this part of the plan to begin with? The Jews were just doing their part. So, why did God have to punish the Jews? Okay. So clearly there are issues with um this history and this history is important because if you know European Europe your European history it's led to a lot of evil in Europe right for example anti-semitism in Europe. Um so Dante feels compelled to reconcile this history and present it in a way that um we can appreciate and which will lead us closer to the monad to God. And that really is the genius of Dante where he can take this complex convoluted history

133:02and turn it into a philosophy for us to appreciate and for us to act upon. Okay, does that make sense? Any questions about this introduction before we read Dante? I guess. Um, so does Dante believe that Jesus is God or not? Or does he like to how many parts does he agree with the Catholic Church? Okay. Um, that's a really good question and the answer is we'll never know because Dante is running at a time in history where um, you could be killed for defying the Catholic Church, for committing heresy. Okay. So, a lot of things he does, it's going to be subtle. It's going to be nuance. We'll never truly know his true feelings, but if I had to guess, um, I would say that Dante in his interpretation of the Bible in in his interpretation of Jesus, he felt that Jesus was a great spiritual leader who was divine in nature, but so is Dante. Okay, does that make sense? So um what what Donna would say is look I'm writing this poetry because God has taken possession of me in order to relay a message to all humanity and that's what he would probably say about Jesus Jesus as well where Jesus is divinely inspired to spread a message of hope and salvation to the people around him. Okay. Now um sorry did did you want to say something? I wanted to say something like the the the history you just presented earlier about Jesus's murder, so to speak. Was it meant to be factual or was it meant to be biblical? Um, so this is the official Catholic history, right? I'm I'm not I'm not making a comment if this is true or false. I'm just saying this is what the Catholic Church teaches its followers.

135:02Okay. Okay. Am I right here? Okay. If if you're Catholic and I get it wrong, please please let me know. Okay, I present this to you because um Justinian will say the same thing. Okay, but I'm putting this in simple terms so we we understand what what what he's saying and then Donnie is going to argue against this. All right. Okay. Uh so let's go back to Jesus. All right. So um something to keep in mind about Jesus is if you really want to understand the essence of Jesus there is a part of Bible that I think is pure poetry it itself has to be divinely inspired just like the divine comedy and um I think we should read it together okay it's called the sermon sermon on the mount okay so so so Carol will read the sermon on the mount Okay, just so we can understand who Jesus is and how he thinks. We don't have to read all of it. It's pretty long, but but we we'll read a few paragraphs. Okay. Um, this is from the Gospel of Matthew, um, the NIV version. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. Blessed are the pure in

137:05heart, for they will see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God. Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Okay. All right. Stop. Okay. So, um, you can hear the poetry. You can hear the beauty and the truth. Now, um this is very powerful. It I think it moves every one of us today. Okay? Some sometimes I just cry hearing this. But this is especially powerful 2,000 years ago when Jesus was alive. Why? Because the Roman eye Roman Empire was really really evil. The Roman Empire's Romana marked a time of tremendous inequality where few people had everything and where most people were slaves. So in this time, what do you do? Well, if you revolt like Spartacus, they'll come and they'll crucify you and your family, right? You you can try to rebel, but there's no point because it is the empire. It is everywhere. It is everything. you can't possibly get become rich because all the wealth has been monopolized. Yes, I would have to say that uh while this is from a modern day perspective true, I think it is a slightly anacronistic perspective because in the age of the Romans, wealth equality was a thing that was taken was taken like as granted in society and also Christianity is not free of its wealth inequality especially after its legalization and also also Roman slavery was not as widespread or as cruel as we think many Roman citizens. would enter slavery as a way to free themselves from their debt. So I'm saying that while this all of this is true from a present day and from a Christian perspective, it is slightly anacronistic. Okay. So let me ask you this question. Let's just say that you are a young

139:06person living in the world today. The baby boomers have everything. You went to school. Now you have $100,000 in debt. Um and you have absolutely no job prospects. The best you can hope for is maybe to become a gig worker, right? Work driving a yuber. Uh you have no chance of getting married. You have uh no prospect of ever owning a home. How do you feel? How would you feel? I'd be pretty pissed. Yeah. Again, I think this well this is absolutely true on present day and it highlights some of the most poant questions that we face in our present day. I think it's a slightly anacronistic perspective if we apply it to the Roman Empire. Okay. All right. Fine. Okay. But I'm just saying like maybe a thousand years ago we'd be like, "Wow, young people in the year 2026 have it all, man. They have cars, they have computers, they have air conditioning. They are. They must be the happiest young people ever in human history, right? You guys have porn in your computer, right? You guys can fly to Beijing and take this class. What are you complaining about? Well, I'm pretty sure the slaves back in the Roman times had a lot more to complain about than you guys. Okay. All right. So, even though Okay. Well, maybe they weren't that bad off. Relatively, they felt hopeless. Okay, if you were a slave in the Roman period during this time, and again, 90% of the population were either poor or slaves, you hated your life, right? And so, what is your hope? Well, what Jesus is saying is you have been brainwashed. You have been indoctrinated to believe that only

141:06wealth matters. Okay? Blessed are the poor. You are what? Who God truly truly loves. Don't seek wealth. Seek poverty. Poverty is the path to God. That it's a message of hope. It's a message of salvation. It's also a message of liberation. The greatest revolution you can commit as an individual is to recognize the humanity, the divinity in yourself regardless of what people in authority tell you. Right? This is why this message is so powerful and it resonates and that's why Christianity spread so far because it is a message that speaks to the human heart in a time of anguish. Okay? And this is this is a spirit by the way that Dante will try to remember or conjure up in the divine comedy. Jesus was not an empire builder. He didn't care about the church. There's no Catholic church um when he was around. He was part of a movement called the poor. Okay? Have you guys learned this history? The poor. Okay. the poor and the poor. This movement is basically we give out material wealth. We will travel as beggars and we will only u accept charity. Okay, we won't accept money but we'll accept food and lodging. And there's a very powerful passage in was it Matthew? But like basically actually it's it's in most of the gospels, but a young man uh says to Jesus, "I want to be like you. How can I follow you?" And Jesus is like, "Do good works." And then the young man's like, "No, no, I want to do more." And Jesus

143:07is Jesus says, "If you really want to be one of God, give up your wealth." And then the man says, "I can't do that because I'm filthy rich, man. I have lot of money. I'm not going to give up my wealth. And then Jesus says to others, "Truly, it is harder for a man to what what was it?" Yeah. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Go ahead. It's harder for the camel to pass through the eye of an needle than for a rich man to get into heaven. Exactly. Okay. That is Jesus. That is a spirit of Jesus that Dante recognizes. And um when Dante talks about uh St. uh Francis of Aisi right he will conjure up he will help us remember that this was the real Jesus a man who taught people the path to salvation is through your spirituality. It is through kindness through generosity through love. Okay, that is the Jesus that I think Dante understood. Yes. But wasn't Dante an aristocrat himself? Like someone who had power and money and stuff like Hey, sorry. What What's your point here? Well, I mean, if he wanted to be like Jesus then or like or spread his message, then he didn't live exactly that life. He lived a life of like power, right? Or like he was an aristocrat himself. Um so um first of all I mean Dante came from a good family but he was not an aristocrat by the standards of Flor Florence. Okay. Also let me ask you this question. Was St. Francis of Aisi you know the man who became the founder of the physical movement who gave up all wealth. Was he born rich or poor? Do you know? Guess

145:08he was very very rich. his family was very very rich. And that's why what he did was so significant. Right? If you're born poor and you're like, I don't want money. Is that hard? But if you're born rich, you're like, you know what? All my friends are rich. I' I've born rich, but I'm going to give up all this money. That is an action that is truly inspired, right? It's truly divine. Yes. Um, this isn't related to Jesus necessarily. So what Dante what I think Dante is doing I think it's actually a pioneering it's actually a early version of Protestantism. So a a kind of place where you return to God where you return to Jesus instead of returning to the Catholic Church. So my personal opinion about the Catholic Church is that despite preaching the gospel of poverty, despite condemning having a lot of money and using it to do evil things, it actually enabled a lot of the power structures that allowed medieval European society to become so unequal and so feudal. So my point is that Dante is actually subtly pioneering this return to Jesus's own values, bypassing the Catholic Church. Yes. Okay. All right. So that's true. But um something that you guys don't appreciate is there was always opposition towards the Catholic Church throughout history. Do you understand? The Protestant movement was not new. It was always there. Okay. So there were two um major oppositions to the church. Okay. The first argument is that the church is too worldly. Meaning that these priates were these bishops were filthy filthy rich. And like sorry, but the apostles, you know, they swore to poverty. Jesus swore to poverty. So that's betraying the church. So throughout this history, okay, it's been covered up, but throughout this history, there were all these movements throughout Europe that um criticized the

147:09church for corruption and who sought to return to a life of poverty. Some of these movements the church actually co-opted, right? So the um the Benedictines and the Dominicans and the Franciscans were co-opted by the church but they came about because of their harsh criticis criticism of church power and wealth. Okay. The second thing about the church was um for Jesus taught. Okay, this is really important. You read the Bible, he actually says this. But Jesus taught that we all have a direct connection to God. Okay? That's what Jesus taught. But the church says, "No, no, we are born in sin. Therefore, we have betrayed God. Therefore, we must now rely on the church to connect us back to God." Okay? But throughout most of this most of this time, there were a lot of people who refused to accept this. And the one major groups of course is called the Cathars. I'm not sure if you know this history, the Cathars. Okay, there are a lot of these um Christian sects that taught that we had a direct connection to God. Okay. Um and so they were suppressed. This launched the Albin the Albaian crusade. Okay. So this is really important for you guys to understand. The Protestant movement was not a sudden revolution. It was always there. The Protestant revolution was just successful. Okay. But there but throughout history at no point was there not opposition towards Catholic Church for these two reasons. Because the church was seen as corrupt and because the church denied direct access to God. Okay. And this is something that Dante

149:09will discuss at great depth in the div in the divine comedy. Does it make sense? So one last thing that you guys need to know is in the year 1321, this this is the year when Dante finished the line comedy and the moment he finished like I don't know a few months later he died. Okay. So basically you could argue that he kept him he kept himself alive in order to finish the line comedy and then when he finished it he's like my mission is done. I can now rest and be with with God. But in the year 1321 um at this time in history the explanation for why Jesus had to die on the cross is radically different from today. today. Why? Why do we think Jesus died on the cross? What what's what's explanation to redeem us from our sins? Right? Okay. Back then, the most popular explanation is something called the ransom theory. The ransom theory. Okay. And it goes like this. What? Who made us eat that fruit? Satan, right? Disguised as a serpent. So when we ate that fruit, we turned away from God and became slaves to Satan. So now this is a problem because if God is to redeem us, he needs to pay a ransom to Satan, right? Let me finish first. Okay? And so if you're God and you need to make a deal with Satan, what can you offer to Satan that would allow him to free us? The answer is his only son. Okay. But Satan didn't recognize that

151:09the only son was so divine that he could resurrect. Okay. So Satan So even though Jesus did go to hell, he was able to escape it as well. So at this time in history, this is the most popular explanation for why Jesus had to die on the cross as a ransom for our sins. Okay? And over time it becomes generalized to become he redeemed us from our sins. So this is the most popular theory at this time and Dante will respond to this theory. Uh yes. So I think uh again I'm just picking out words picking hairs here but I'm saying that Satan made us eat the fruit. Satan did not make us do anything. Satan tempted us to eat the fruit and we did it of our own free will. Because if Satan made us ate the fruit and if we really became slaves to him, then Satan will be more powerful than God because he could sub subvert God's most most holy most precious gift which is our free will, which doesn't make any sense, right? Yeah. Okay. Yeah, that that that's right. So we we are our free will chose to become slaves to Satan. Does that make sense? Because when we became tempted by Satan, we turned away from God and became like Satan. Okay? But that is assuming that Satan is as powerful as God and Satan has the right to receive the gift of reward. Okay? So, so look, I'm not arguing about theology, okay? I'm not arguing about these ideas. I'm just saying what people believe at this time and what the church taught at this time. And because I need I need to explain to you why Ton Dant is doing what he's doing. Okay. Okay. I'm not going to argue this is right or wrong. I'm just saying this is what people believed at this time. Uh does that make sense, guys? Okay. All right. So, this is the background. And so, we're not going to read uh Dante together. Okay. And so, for the first KTO, Justin is just going to tell us the history of the Catholic Church beginning with Rome. And keep in mind there are

153:11two things that upset Dante. The first is why did Jesus have to die? The second is why did um um uh uh God have to destroy the temple? Okay. All right. Uh can you read Carol please? Paradise KTO 6 from the from the beginning after Constantine had turned the eagle counter to heaven's course the course it took behind the ancient one who wed Levvenia. Okay. So Constantine of course is a person who makes Christianity the official religion of Rome. The eagle is the Roman Empire itself. Okay. The eagle is a standard of the Roman Empire. When you see the word eagle it means the Roman Empire. Uh the ancient one who led Levvenia is Inius. Okay. Um, and in many ways, Divine Comedy, it is a reimagination of Virgil's great epic poem, The Ini. I'll discuss this next week. Okay. But but that that's some background. Keep on going. 100 years and more, the bird of God remained near Europe's borders, close to the peaks from which it first emerged. Beneath the shadow of the sacred wings, it ruled the world from hand to hand until that governing changing became my task. Caesar I was and am Justinian who through the will of primal love I feel removed the vain and needless from the laws. But I grew before I grew attentive to this labor, I held that but one nature and no more was Christ. And in that faith I was content. But then the blessed Agapitus, he who was chief shepherd with his words turned me to that faith which has truth and purity. I did believe him and now clearly see his faith as you with contradic.

155:15As soon as my steps shared the church's path, God of his grace inspired my high task as pleased him. I was fully drawn to that and trusting to my belliserius my arms I found a sign for me to rest from war. Heaven's right hand so favored him. Okay. All right. So so the background is this. Okay. Justinian is emperor of the Basian Empire the eastern Roman Empire. And at this point in history uh the Roman Empire is divided into the eastern half and the western half. Okay. It's basically split in two. And because it's split in two, there are many different variants of Christianity. Most variants do not accept the Holy Trinity. Okay? So, Justinian goes on this holy crusade to conquer and unite all the Roman Empire and enforce the Holy Trinity on everyone and he succeeds. And his general at this time was Bis Biserius. Okay, keep on going. My answer to the question you first asked ends here. And yet the nature of this answer leads me to add a sequel so that you may see with how much reason they attack the sacred standard. Those who seem to act on its behalf and those opposing it. See what great virtue made that eagle worthy of reverence beginning from that hour when palace died that it might gain a kingdom. You know that for 300 years and more it lived in Alba until at the end three still fought three still fought three contending for that standard. You know how under seven kings it conquered a neighbors its neighbors in the year reaching from wrong Sabine women to Lricius's grief. Okay so the woman Lricia's uh suicide this is all part of the early history of the Roman Republic. Okay, we don't have time to go into this history, but what he's doing is summarizing the history of the Roman Republic, which then gives birth to the Roman Empire. Okay, keep on

157:16going. and what it did when carried by courageous Romans who hurried to encounter Brenis Purus and other principates and cities through this for quitus qui Quincius who named for his disheveled hair. The Di Desai and Febi gained the fame I gladly honor. That standard brought the pride of Arabs low when they had followed Hannibal across those alpine rocks from which po you descend. Beneath that standard, Shipio Pompei, though young, triumphed and to that hill beneath which you were born, that standard seemed most harsh. Then, near the time when heaven wished to bring all of the world to heaven's way, Serene Caesar, as Rome had willed, took up that standard. And what it did from var to rine was seen by the Iser sa zon and sen and all the valley floors whose rivers feed the rone. And what it did once it had left Ravena and left the Rubicon was such a flight as neither tongue nor writing can describe. That Standard led the legions onto Spain, then toward Durazzo, and it struck Felia so hard that the warm Nile could feel that hurt. It saw again its source and Tandros and Sim Samoas and the place where Hector lies. Then roused itself the worst for Poleamy. from Egypt lightning like it fell on Juba and then it hurried to the west of you where it could hear the trumpet of Pompei. Okay, so again he's just reciting or just summarizing Roman history where and but the point is the tone is that this is all pre-ordained by God. The rise of Rome was so quick that it had to be divine. Then with Rome comes Julius

159:18Caesar who will now birth the Roman Empire by conquering Gaul by conquering everyone basically. And it's all been pre-ordained. Okay? Nothing can stop it. Not not the Carthaginians uh not even civil war can stop God's plan. Keep on going because of what that standard did. With him who bore it next, Brutus and Cashes howl in hell, and grief seized Modina Perugia. Because of it, sad Cleopatra weep still as she fled that standard. From the aspen and atrocious death, and with that very bearer, it then reached the Red Sea shore. With him, that emblem brought the world such peace that Janice's shrine was shut. But what the standard that has made me speak had done before or then was yet to do throughout the mortal realm where it holds rule comes to seem faint and and and insignificant if one with clear sight and pure sentiment sees what it did in the third Caesar's hand. Okay. So the third Caesar is Tiberious Caesar, right? The first is Julius Caesar, Augustus Caesar and the third is Tiberious Caesar. Tiberius Caesar is important because that this is during the time of Jesus, right? Jesus is now working as a prophet during this time. Keep on going for the true justice that inspires me, granted to it in that next Caesar's hand, the glory of avenging his own wrath. Now, marvel here at what I show to you. Sorry. The glory of avenging his own wrath refers to the crucifixion of Jesus, right? God is angry at us. In order to dissipate his anger, he must sacrifice his only son, Jesus. Okay, that this is what it refers to. Keep on going. Now, marvel here at what I showed to you with Titus. Afterward, it hurried toward

161:18avenging vengeance for the ancient sin. So, Titus is the general that will destroy the Jewish rebellion and burn down the second temple. Okay? This is and and the Catholic Church teaches people at this time that this is vengeance for the Jews betrayal of Jesus. Keep on going. And when the Lombard tooth bit Holy Church, then Charlemagne under the eagle's wings through victories he gained brought help to her. Now you can judge those I condemned above and judge how much men have offended have become the origin of all your evils. For some oppose the universal emblem with yellow liies. Others claim that emblem for party. It is hard to see who is worse. Let jibalines pursue their undertakings beneath another sign. For those who sever this sign and justice are bad followers. Okay. So now what Justin is saying is that in this time people have misused the legacy of the Roman Empire to conduct their own wars for political gain. Okay. So I said before that with the birth of the Holy Roman Empire the church becomes embroiled in European geopolitics and this leads to wars throughout this period. Dante is forced into these wars because right now in this in history this this about the year 1300 the Giblines and the Gves are at war with each other. The Gves um support the Pope the Giblines support the Holy Roman Empire or the other way around. I can't remember it. Okay. And what happens is the Gs and Donny's part of the G. They defeat the Giblines. And so the the gelves control Florence. And what happens next of course is you guys know the GS divide into two factions, the blacks and the whites. And these are before the same political party. And now they're fighting each other for power. And at first the whites

163:19win and exile the black welves. The black welves then stage a stage a combat and then kick out the white which exiles Dante. Okay. And what uh and what Donn is saying to Justinian is that this is all a corruption of the teachings of the church. Okay. The church should not be involved in temporal politics. We should not be fighting uh for the legacy of Rome. Okay. Keep on going. And let not this new Charles strike at it with his gels, but let him fear the claws that stripped a more courageous lion of its hide. The sons have often wept for a father's fault. And let the son not think that God will change the emblem of his force for charles's liies. This little planet is adorned with spirits whose acts were righteous, but who acted for the honor and the fame that they would gain. And when desires tend toward earthly ends, then so deflected rays of the true love mount toward the life above with lesser force. Okay. So again this is a central idea in divine comedy. Okay. God is always calling to us. We always return want to return to God. But because of free will we can choose where to direct our energies. If we direct our energies towards God we become closer to God. But if we direct our energy towards power, earthly gain, materialism then God then we will turn away from God and God will shine will shine less brightly on us. Okay. Keep on going. But part of our delight is measuring rewards against our merit. And we see that our rewards are neither less nor more. Thus does the living justice make so sweet the sentiments in us that we are free of any turning toward iniquity. Differing voices join to sound sweet music. So do the different orders in our life render sweet harmony among these

165:20fears. And in this very pearl there also shines the light of Romeo, of one whose acts, though great and noble, met ungratefulness. And yet those provinileals who schemed against him had little chance to laugh. For he who finds harm to himself and others's righteous acts takes the wrong path. Of Raymond Behringer's four daughters each became a queen. And this poor and a stranger Romeo accomplished. Then Behringer was moved by vicious tongues to ask this just man for accounting. One who given 10 gave Raymon five and seven. And Romeo the poor the old departed. And were the world to know the heart he had while begging crust by crust for his life bread. It though it praise him now would praise him more. Okay. So this is very similar to the message of Jesus. Okay. Okay. What Jesus taught his followers is all this wealth that we see in this world, it's a false wealth. It's nothing. It's poverty. The true wealth is with God. So do what is right and you'll be rewarded in heaven. And that's what he's saying what what um Don is saying for Justinian. There was a man Romeo who was very much like Dante who was participating in these wars but because he chose to do good um the people turned against him and even though he suffered in on earth he was exiled he was impoverished just like Dante ultimately he was given uh tremendous reward in heaven. Okay. So, make your choice. You can either choose a life of wealth here and a life of poverty up there or a life of poverty down here and a life of poverty up there. Okay. It's entirely your choice. It's your free will. Okay. All right. So, what's happened is that we now know the official story of the Catholic Church as told by Justinian.

167:21But again, this raises a question for Dante, which is tell me exactly why Jesus had to kill himself again. It doesn't make any sense. Okay. And what Beatus is going to do is explain um Jesus sacrifice in a way that I think is the most powerful explanation ever. Okay. But before we start, does anyone here know why Jesus Jesus had to kill himself? Oh, first. Yeah. Yeah. You go first. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I think Jesus is trying to cure cure himself just because he want to show that he's not he's really the the the son of God because some people keep doubt on him and even the you the Judah you know the the the disciple right who just said that he just you know because of the silver coin right he just tried to betray the the Jesus maybe Jesus want to people to know that he is the true God yeah and certain certain denominations teach this yes to prove that he is truly divine because he can resurrect himself Okay. The sacrificing your own son has to be like the biggest representation of love and that's the love that God has towards us. Okay. Could you elaborate on that? As in there's there's nothing harder that someone could do than sacrifice their own son. But the fact that God did it for us to clean us from our sins shows how much he loves us. Um, okay. But did he really sacrifice his son? Because Jesus didn't die, right? But he was willing to show us. Okay. He showed us. Okay. Yes. Okay. That that's actually Donna's explanation as well. Yes. I have like two questions. The first one

169:22is that uh Jesus sacrificed to prove that he is divine. So if he proves that he is divine through a concrete thing like rising up from the dead, then that's not that's not faith anymore, is it? That's just I saw him rise from the dead. It's a fact. And the second question is that God sacrificed his son. So uh as God's son, Jesus is both human and divine. And because he's he is part human, he has free will and therefore he can choose whether or not to be sacrificed. So I think maybe a more appropriate framing would be Jesus chose to sacrifice himself. God did not sacrifice anybody because God cannot take away that gift. Right. No, you're exactly right that No, no, you're right. Jesus did sacrifice himself. It was his choice to sacrifice him. You're right. Okay. But the idea is that Jesus and God are the same thing. Right. Okay. All right. So So let let let's read this. Okay. And this is a really powerful section. I want to make sure we appreciate the logic here. Okay, we we we can skip the first three lines because that's just Latin. Okay. Thus, even as he wheeled to his own music, I saw that substance sing, that spirit flame above whom double lights were twined. and he and his companions moved within their dance. And as if they were swift as sparks, they sped out of my sight because of sudden distance. I was perplexed, and to myself, I said, "Tell her, tell her, tell her the lady who can slake my thirst with her sweet drops." And yet the reverence that possesses all of me, even on hearing only be and ice, had bowed my head. I seemed a man asleep. But Beatrice soon

171:22ended that for she began to smile at me so brightly that even in fire a man would still feel glad according to my nevering judgment. The question that perplexes you is how just vengeance can deserve just punishment. Okay. All right. Okay. This is a really important sentence. Okay. What it means is God should be angry at us for betraying him, for eating the food when he told us not to. Okay, this is just vengeance. He should be angry at us. But why would it involve the sacrifice of his only son, right? Just punishment. Why should this man who's innocent, Jesus, have to sacrifice himself in order to appease God's anger at us? That doesn't make any sense, right? Okay. Uh, keep on going. But I shall quickly free your mind from doubt and listen carefully. The words I speak will bring the gift of a great truth in reach. Since he could not endure the helpful curb on his willpower, the man who was not born damning himself damned all his progeny. Okay, stop. Who is this man? Yeah, it's Adam, obviously. Come on. Right. Okay, keep on going. For this mankind lay sick in the abyss of a great error for long centuries until the word of God willed to descend to where the nature that was sundered from its maker was united to his person by the sole act of his eternal love. Okay. So now there's a separation between God and us.

173:22And the question is how do you reconcile? Right? There's anger now. God is angry at us and we um basically screwed up and we don't even know how to ask for forgiveness. Okay, so this is a shism. This is a separation. Okay, keep on going. Now set your sight on what derives from that. This nature thus united to its maker was good and pure even as when created. But in itself, this nature had been banished from paradise because it turned aside from its own path, from truth, from its own life. Okay? So, we were born good. Okay? And we know we're born good because in the Bible, it says that when God created man, God breath breathed the spark of life into us. Okay? So, there's an essence of God within us. Therefore, we are born good. But because of free will, we can choose to do stupid things. We can choose a path of evil. Once you pick a path of evil, what often happens is that becomes like a snow snowball, okay? Rolling down and accumulating. So we do one stupid act, then we do another, then we do more evil, keeps on going. And we don't really know how to get back on the correct path. Okay. Uh, keep on going. Carol, line 40. Thus, if the penalty the cross inflicted is measured by the nature he assumed, no one has ever been so justly stung. Yet none was ever done so great a wrong if we regard the person made to suffer he who had gathered in himself that nature. Thus from one action issued differing things. God and the Jews were pleased by one same death. Earth trembled for that death and heaven opened. You need no longer find it difficult to understand

175:23when it is said that just vengeance was then avenged by a just court. But I now see your understanding tangled by thought on thought into a knot from which with much desire your mind awaits release. You say what I have heard is clear to me but this is hidden from me. Why God w precisely this pathway for our redemption. Okay. Right. Okay. So this is the question. Okay. If you are God and you are infinite and eternal, why do you have to pick a particular way in which an innocent man, Jesus, was punished? He could choose to be punished, but it seems unjust. Okay, it seems wrong. Okay, keep on going. Verse 58, brother, this ordinance is buried from the eyes of everyone whose intellect has not matured within the flame of love. Okay, so what what's she saying here? This is really important, is you don't understand because you don't love enough. If you become a parent and you love your child unconditionally, then you understand why God had to do what he did. Okay? God is eternal and infinite. There are a million solutions and he picked the best possible solution. And if it sounds stupid to us, if it sounds wrong to us, it's not his problem. It's our problem. It's because we don't understand love enough. Keep on going. Verse 61. Nevertheless, since there is much attempting to find this point, but little understanding, I shall tell why that way was the most fitting. The godly goodness that has banished every envy from its own self, burns itself, and

177:24sparkling so it shows eternal beauties. All that deres directly from this goodness is everlasting, since the seal of goodness impresses an imprint that never alters. Whatever reigns from it immediately is fully free, for it is not constrained by any influence of other things. Even as it conforms to that goodness, so does it please it more. The sacred order that gleams in all things is most bright within those things most like itself. The human being has all these gifts, but if it loses one, then its nobility has been undone. Only man's sin anuls man's liberty makes him unlike the highest good so that in him the brightness of its light is dimmed. Let me stop. Okay. All right. Okay. So, do you guys understand what he's saying? What Petri is saying is that God is perfect. God is pure love. God is all generosity, all forgiveness, all truth. And we were created in his image. And so we share all his qualities. The problem is we have free will and we are immature. And the moment we choose to sin, we turn away from God and therefore we lose our divinity. And once we pick this path, we can only compound our own mistakes, our own evil. Okay, does that make sense? The moment we turn away from God by sinning, we're lost now. Okay, keep on going. Verse 82. And man cannot regain it his dignity unless where sin left emptiness, man fills that void with just amends for evil pleasure. For for when your nature sinned so totally within its seed, then from these dignities, just as from paradise, that nature parted, and they

179:26could never be regained, if you consider carefully by any way that did not pass across one of these fords, either through nothing other than his mercy, God had to pardon man, or of himself, man had to profer payment for his folly. Okay. All right. So, okay. What she's saying here is, okay, we screwed up and this is the worst thing that we could have done. Okay. And now there only two ways to redemption. The first way is if we make amends. Okay. But there's a problem with that. What's the problem with that? How can we make amends for the original sin? Okay, first of all, what is the original sin? Do do you guys know what the original sin is? Uh uh yeah, go ahead first and and then you Okay, we ate from the knowledge. But but what is that? What motivated us? Uh yes. And and and then you like like I know you know. Okay. But but yeah, go ahead. So basically like uh there was the garden of Eden and there was Satan. He turned into a snake and he was like, "Hey Eve, eat this apple." And Eve, it wasn't an apple, by the way. But but but why do we do it? Why do we eat the fruit? Because we Well, the problem that God has with it is that we disobeyed him. He told us don't eat the fruit and we ate the fruit. Why was he angry at disobedience? Um sorry go ahead. The fact that we want to become God. Exactly. Do you understand? The problem was not disobedience. The problem was a serpent told Eve. You eat this food and you'll become like God. Meaning we want to overthrow God. Okay? This is the original sin, not the stupid

181:27fruit. Okay? Who cares if you eat the fruit? The the original sin is our hearts became evil. Our hearts became so evil and vicious that we wanted to kill God and become God ourselves. That is the issue. Yes. So where did it say that we want to kill God? Like this is this is monotheism. I know but like where do you say we want to kill God? We want to be equal with God. That does not mean we have to kill him. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry. Just just like she said the saying you don't want to kill him just you can't replace them. You can be be like that but not guys. Guys um you need to understand something. Um when we we are working in historical context do you understand at this time in history what the Catholic Church teaches its followers it's flock is that the original sin is our pride okay this is this historical fact this started with the Bible and in the Bible it literally says that the serpent tempted Eve to eat the fruit because it would make her like God. It's literally in the Bible in Genesis. Okay. Then what Augustine who will take this and say the original sin is our pride and this becomes the official doctrine of the church. Okay, you guys you guys appreciate this. I'm not arguing with you this is right or wrong. I'm saying this is what is historically true and this is what Beatric is saying. Okay, according to the doctrine of the church, we want to be like God and like how can you make amends for that? And the answer is you cannot make amends for that. You want to kill God. Okay? There's no way that you there's nothing that you could do to appease God or make amends or redeem yourself because you did the worst thing possible in the universe. Okay?

183:28Excuse me. The worst thing that you could do. Yes. Okay. But the worst thing that humanity has ever done in the universe is to try to kill God. Okay. Okay. Verse 94. Now fix your eyes on the profanity of the eternal council. Heed as closely as you are able to my reasoning. man in his limits could not recompense. For no obedience, no humility he offered later could have been so deep that it could match the heights he meant to reach through disobedience. Man lacked the power to offer satisfaction by himself. Thus, there was need for God through his own ways to bring man back to life intact. I mean by one way or by both. But since a deed pleases its doer more, the more it shows the goodness of the heart from which it springs, the godly goodness that imprints the world was happy to proceed through both its ways to raise you up again. Nor has there been, nor will there be between the final night and the first day a chain of re a chain of action so lofty and so magnificent as he enacted when he followed his two ways. Okay. All right. Okay. So this is beautiful. Okay. But this is the logic. The logic is we can't forgive ourselves. So God must redeem us. But God has to redeem us in a way that changes us for the better. And so he has his son. The thing about his son is that it's a dual nature, right? Both man and God. Okay? So the fact that a man Jesus is going to redeem us will give will will help save us. Okay? Because now we are engaged in our own salvation through Jesus. Does

185:31that make sense guys? Keep on going. Verse 115. For God showed greater generosity in giving his own self than that man might be able to rise than if he simply pardoned. for every other means fell short of justice except the way whereby the son of God humbled himself when he became incarnate. Okay, so there's a million solutions. Okay, and God spent a thousand years, 2,000 years, who knows, thinking think of a solution. And his answer is, well, first of all, I can't just forgive these guys. They learn nothing. Um, and I need them to do it themselves, but they're humans and they're kind of lame, so they can't do it themselves. So, the only solution is for the son of God to become man. Okay, that's the only solution. A million possible scenarios, there's only one scenario that could possibly redeem us, and it's for the son of God to become man and to be sacrificed. Okay, that's the only way forward. Come on. Verse 12, 12:1. Now to give all your wishes full content, I go back to explain one point so that you too may see it plainly as I do. You say, I see that water, see that fire and air and earth and all that they compose come to corruption and endure so briefly. All right. Stop. Okay. All right. So what I'm going to do now is help us appreciate the genius of the sacrifice of Jesus. Okay? So I'm going to give you a thought experiment. The thought experiment is this. You are a mother or a father, who cares? You're a parent. Okay? And you have a daughter named Eve. And one day you bring home a dog. Okay.

187:36And um Eve asks you, "Do you love this dog more or do you love me more?" And we're like, "We love you both. Come on, man. Of course we love you both." And then Eve's like, "Okay." Then Eve can't sleep because she's really disturbed by this question. Does my mother or father love me more or love the dog more? Okay, so she so then she comes up with this brilliant solution to solve this problem which is she kills the dog, right? She's like, I'm going to kill the dog and that's going to show me if my parents love me more or love the dog more. Okay. Now, as the parent, you're completely screwed. Okay? Because let's think about this. What do you do? You told Eve, you love them both. You love both the dog and Eve, your daughter. Your daughter is confused by this. And so he's like, "Well, I'm curious now who my parents really love, so I'm gonna kill the dog and see what happens." Okay. And so what do you do? Maybe I would just say that this dog is the dog I love most and you're the daughter I love most. So if in that case the dog's dead. Yeah. If in that case the the girl do not like to test it because she knows that he's the only uh one. So the dog is dead. He's already dead. Yeah. So, what do you do? What do you do? I would um I mean in the context of Jesus, you punish yourself in a way. So, they would see that um what you did hurt them more.

189:40Um and so to you like to forgive them, you have to punish yourself. Yeah. Okay. Okay. So, that's the logic. Okay. All right. So, like because you're you're kind of screwed. Okay. If you don't do anything, what's Eve going to do next? Kill more animals. Okay. So, you cannot do any you cannot do nothing. You got to be like, I forgive you, Eve. Oh, you're just a kid. Don't worry about it. Okay. You have to do something. Okay. But if you punish her, that proves to her you love the dog more. Right? So, anything you do, you're kind of screwed. So, your only solution, okay, of a million possibilities is you punish yourself. You hit yourself to show Eve, I have to punish you, but um and you punish yourself. And when she sees that, what does she think? She thinks my father, my mother truly truly loves me. And will she ever kill an animal again? No. Okay. Because she's seen what will happen if an animal dies, the parents will suffer. And so she's convinced by the love of the parent and therefore she's now fully committed to loving her parents to the best of the ability. Okay, that's the logic behind the sacrifice of Jesus to show all of us that God truly loves us so that we can now return to loving God. This is reconciliation. Okay, does it make sense guys? Uh yes. Um, I think this is a very strange metaphor because if I was the parent, I would send Eve to therapy. Like I think you would send what? I would send Eve to therapy. Like I think this is a very absolute situation. Like it's either punishment or it's allowance. Like why couldn't there be a middle? Why couldn't there be education in the middle? Okay. You send Eve to therapy.

191:40Okay. What does a therapist tell Eve? I'm I'm not I'm not a I'm not a therapist, but therapy has been proven to work on a lot a range of conditions inre including sociopathy. Okay. But like I but like like we're just doing this as a thought expert. Okay. All right. You know what? I'm gonna call the police and the police going to come and arrest Eve. Oh, you know what? Screw this. I'm going to call the therapist and the therapist will come and solve this problem with me. Is it will this make the things worse or better? Why? Well, the the therapist would probably side with Eve and then they would like start to like call the dad a bad parent or something. No, no, no. What's the therapist going to do? Have you guys been to a therapist? Therapists don't do that. They're going to interrogate Eve and that's probably going to make her very uncomfortable. They'll probably a therapist will probably make her take pills. Okay. Yeah. Right. And that's a punishment in which case what what what does it tell Eve about her parents? Her parents don't love her, man. Right. They're like, I don't do this crap. I'm going to send her to a therapist. Yeah. No, I think that's uh to be honest, I think in the context of this metaphor, that is a really uh irresponsible way of thinking because as a parent, I am not a psychological expert and I do not have the resources to help my child and to help my child. I have to give her I have to give my money and give my time to someone who is more licensed, who is more qualified than I am to help my child. Your your what? But your parents know you the best. Like your parents should be the ones that could help you. you know, the random stranger like I mean doesn't work here in China, bro. I don't I don't think this is really I don't think this is really relevant. I

193:40think that's the rational course of action. Yeah, but the point is not about what's rational to do. It's about like Eve is trapped in this dilemma where she believes that if you send me to therapy, if you punish me by just a little bit in any means anyway, it shows to me that you don't love me. Yeah, that's her logic, you know. Then you you kind of in her logic, you have, you know, but how is therapy a punishment for her? It is a punishment. Whether you slap her, you scold her, you guarantee that if you kill a dog, okay, and you go to therapy, they're going to make you take pills. I guarantee you, okay, and that may not be the best solution. Yes. But as a parent, do we take ease logic as as permanent? Do we do we accept that or do we do do we need to kind of, you know, do something on our own behalf to kind of try to tweak that logic or change that logic? I'm actually confused like how there must be something wrong with Eve beforehand like your education, right? for for her to be able to kill the dog. This is just again we need to use our imagination, right? But I do look I do have kids. So it's which is why this is particularly concerning for me like I would be the first guy to try to try to sit down with Eve and try to understand where she comes from and then and then we go from there. like maybe maybe you know listen I listen um I have three kids and any of them could pull this crap on on us. I mean like that's just how kids are. I mean like I'm not saying my kids are going to do this but I'm saying like I can imagine them doing this thing doing this crap on me. Yeah. So um I noticed that a lot of you have like issues with outsourcing help for your kids. Well, what I have to say is uh your kid needs food and your kids

195:40needs water, right? So, as a parent, are you going to farm the food yourself and get the water from the river yourself because you want to do everything for your kid because you're the one who knows them best? Of course not. But I I don't understand why you're convinced that a therapist knows exactly what he or she is doing. I you're you're convinced that a stranger with a PhD knows more about the child than you, the parent. Um, yes. I'm convinced that they know more than you. I'm not saying that they know everything. I'm convinced that they know more about the child's behavior, behavioral patterns than you do. Okay. But then there's a question of risk, right? Like the therapist has different skin in the game than you as the parent. So naturally even though the therapist might might have the set of tools the application of those tools coupled with the risks you take as the parent to the kid I think in the end the parent it still falls on the parent. Okay. Are you okay are you okay with this scenario? Okay. Let's just say God's like you know what I really shouldn't send my son to crucify himself. That's kind of stupid. I I don't know what I'll do. I'll create this alien species. Okay that is infinitely wise. I'll have them calm and rule over humanity. Are you okay with that? It depends on what way they're winning over you. The thing about therapy that most people don't realize is that the therapist doesn't force you to believe anything. The therapist doesn't yell at you. The therapist ask you and they subtly guide you towards something better. They give you a choice. They give you your free will. They respect your free will. That's what a lot of people don't realize. Okay. So, you and I are just have to disagree about therapists. Okay. All right. therapists don't actually well it doesn't matter. Okay. All right. Okay. But but but we're trying to explain the logic of Dante, right? And this is a really good explanation and I think it's a very convincing explanation for why Jesus had to die. Okay? It is not about redemption. It's not about justice or

197:44vengeance. It's really about inspiration and education. Right? Because once we've seen and once we know that Jesus killed himself for our sins, it gives us a spiritual power and it makes us closer to God. And this is why this marks a radical turning point in human history. Does that make sense, guys? Okay. Because before you you ask yourself, why is it there are two billion Christians in the world? I'm not a Christian by the way. And why is it that everyone says that Christianity marks a radical turning point in human history? And now Dante provides an answer. Okay? Because the death of Jesus, the sacrifice of Jesus is able to rekindle a spark in us that was once lost. Okay? It's drawing us closer to God. Before we were on the wrong path. We were in a desert and we were lost. And now we see the light and we're moving towards the light. Okay. All right. So, do do you guys understand the logic here? All right. Any questions about this? Okay. All right. But you can also see and this is really important guys. This beautiful explanation also subverts Catholic theology. Okay? Do you you understand? Because before Catholic theology was based on vengeance and justice. Now it's based on love and sacrifice. Does that make sense guys? Okay. Before the operating principle was one of fear of vengeance now it is love everything happens because

199:46God loves us and that's why God had to be so uh careful and deliberate in his solution to this problem. Okay, got it. All right, let's let's keep on reading. Verse 1-7. And yet these two were things created. If what has if what has been said above is true, then these things never should be subject to corruption. Okay. All right. So um the question is if it is true that God is perfect, everything God does is perfect. Why does imperfection exist in the world? For example, our bodies, right? Our bodies are imperfect. We feel pain. We die. So why is there imp perfection in the world? Keep on going. Verse 130. Brother, the angels in the pure country where you are now, these may be said to be created as they are in all their being. Whereas the elements that you have mentioned, as well as those things that are made from them, receive their form from a creative power. The matter they contain had been created, just as within the stars that wheel about them, the power to give form had been had been created. The rays and motion of the holy lights draw forth the soul of every animal and plant from matter able to take form. But your life is breathed forth immediately by the chief good who so enamor it of his own self that it desires him always. So reasoning you also can deduce your resurrection. You need but remember the way in which your human flesh was

201:46fashioned when both of the first parents were created. Okay. All right. Okay. So, um why is there imperfection in the world? Why is it that plants wither and die? Why why is it that we wither and die? Why? If God is perfect and everything God creates is perfect, then why is there imperfection in the world? Yes. If everything is perfect, there's no meaning. Okay. What What does Dante say? I mean, Dante tells us. Okay. Yes. Because of the original sin. Excuse me. Because of the original sin in the Garden of Eden when the humans sinned. But but that doesn't explain the plants and the animals and decay. Yes. Um so God God is perfect and he make us imperfect. So therefore we can be uh be better. Therefore God can be more perfect. Uh okay. All right. So what what this is saying, okay, is that the God's perfection, right? Does God have the time to create the stone or the plant? Does he? Does God care? This table, was this created by God? This table, what what created this table? Uh, yes. And h and and how did we create this table? From trees. And what created trees? God created the trees. God created the small trees and become a big tree, right? So God created seeds.

203:51Okay. Right. So you guys understand God created the laws of the universe. You understand the laws of the universe is is what gives rise to plants where seeds like become trees right that's following the law of the universe but it was God who created these laws of the universe and um and then God lets these laws of universe do what they do. Okay do you understand? So it's God who created the law laws of physics who are governed by the laws of physics. Okay, how are we different from the other creations in the world? Okay, all the other creations in the world are governed by the laws of physics and biology and chemistry. Okay, these laws are perfect. These things that are created are not perfect. We are different. How are we different? Yes. Um, we have consciousness and we have free will. So, we can like direct our own fate and we can like subvert some laws that like animals are bound to for example like instincts we can suppress instincts okay yes but but but like I'm asking you how this happened right because law god creates the laws of the universe which then gives rise to everything including us we're different but we're different from everything else right so how was this possible yes because we're made in the image of God but all all the other creatures aren And so we have his traits I guess or we are most like him. So we have free will. Yeah. But how did you um how did your body come into being? Does your body follow the laws of biology? Yes, it does. Right. So what happened? Why are we different from animals or trees? Oh yeah maybe. Okay. Uh yeah according to the Bible uh I remember is Genesis it

205:51said that the the God who just do not allow the the human to to eat fruits right but the human just choose to eat the wisdom fruit so so it means that he betray god right okay guys we are trying to read Dante okay okay it's like let's let's read line 139 to the end again okay he tells you the answer just just read it carefully we'll we'll read it we'll read it first The the rays and motion the rays and motion of the holy lights draw forth the soul of every animal and plant from matter able to take form. But your life is breathed forth immediately by the chief good who so enamemers it of his own self that it desires him always. So reasoning, you also can deduce your resurrection. You need but remember the way in which your human flesh was fashioned when both of the first parents were created. Okay. Why are we different from animals and trees? Have a soul. You have a soul. How do we know we have a soul? Yeah. It says here, guys, you have to read Dante. Okay. Your life is breathed forth immediately by the chief good. Okay, do you understand? And how do we know this? Because it says so in the Bible, right? How did God create Adam? You guys know how did God create Adam? What is Adam crafted by? Dust and soil. Does and then what happens? breathes into him and brings him to God breathed into him and that's what gives Adam life. Okay? So in other words, God put a part of himself in us. We call this a soul. And because God put

207:52a part of himself in us, what is our greatest aspiration? To desire him to return to God. You understand? It's like I give you my finger. Okay? And like my finger is like I would rather be part of a hole. Okay? So your finger is always desiring to return to him. Do you understand? Okay. So that's what this is saying. This is saying that God breathed himself into us. There's an aspect of God in us and this aspect is always looking to return to God. At the same time, God is always calling for us to return to him. Okay? And this is a fundamental logic of the universe. Everything we do is because we want to return to God. Okay? It doesn't mean we know how to do so, but we want to do so, right? Does that make sense? Then then why do we need to live in the first place? Like why do why do we need to live? Why did God create Adam? What what does the Bible say? Why did God create Adam? God wanted relationship. He was lonely, man. Yeah. He wanted to know himself. He was lonely, right? Yes. So I have a question. So according to this theoretical framework like you have humans and you have other life as in planted animals. So technically planted animals are closer to God than we are because they live in perfect almost blind obedience to God's natural laws. That is the laws of physics and the laws of biology while we humans con consistently defy these these laws. No, that's the complete opposite of what what I what I just said. Yes. None of them have souls. Okay. So God creates a universe. The

209:52universe is governed by these laws that he creates. Okay. Okay, the laws of physics. This gives rise to everything including evolution which creates us, right? What makes what makes us unique is God touched us. God put a part of himself into us. And this part of our ourselves that we don't really know the soul. What it what it always desires is return to the whole. We're a part we want to return to the whole. Okay. Everything we do is because we desire to return to the whole. Okay. Does that make sense? That's our greatest desire to return to the whole. We may not know it. We may be we may be ignorant of it, but that's what we what we truly truly aspire to. Okay. All right. Um, so reasoning you can deduce your own resurrection. You need remember the way in which your human flesh was fashioned when both of the first parents were created. What does this mean? What's the message here? Yes. Go ahead. So basically he was saying that um both of the first parents refer to Adam and Eve obviously and basically he is restating that thing in Christianity where the soul is immortal. So if you can remember a time before your corrupt flesh, then you're immoral now. Yes. Exactly. Okay. Uh sorry. Did do you want to say something? Okay. So what this is saying is like remember that you think you're a body. You think you're a human. But what you are really is an aspect of God. That's what your soul is, an aspect of God. And that makes you eternal. Okay? So in other words, you can't possibly die. You can only be reborn and re be reborn. Okay. So if this is

211:55the case, what's the purpose of life? Right? Because today you're taught that the purpose purpose of life is to seek immortality, to live forever, to be wealthy, right? Don't die. But this is telling us, well, you weren't going to die anyway. Who cares? Then what's the purpose of life then? Yes. Somehow I believe life is just about being happy, making yourself as happy as possible without harming other people. But I'm pretty sure that this is the perspective that Dante explicitly disagrees with. What would Dante say? Um, well, he rejects the materialism of the Catholic Church, obviously. And basically he's the pilgrim Dante is alive here. He is uh flesh and blood here and yet he isoop he is climbing up to heaven. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. He's b up into heaven. So basically what what he's trying to say what I think he's trying to say is that uh we have to pursue not material pleasures but a spiritual good. Okay. So um anyone else? What what's the point of our existence? Oh yeah, maybe because the god just try to come back. So he just hope that people can bring him back because we're the part of them. We're just like maybe a single or what? He just wait us to to bring him back just like we make machine man, right? Or Robert Robert will sometime bring us. So So you see like God wants to come here. Yeah, he will come back because he leave away, right? He will come back. So just like he said, I will come back if you trust me and I will come back. I I don't understand why God wants to come here. Okay. Anyone else? Yeah. I think in the last few lines he kind of says that we want to desire him. So to know him and become like him, I guess.

213:56And just like even in paradise, you want to get closer to him even in paradise. Yeah. But I'm saying how do you do that then? I guess to know him and be more like him or desire. I I I know but I'm saying how right I think I think Dante would Dante would say um the point of life is to to love and to imagine use imagination. Okay. So these things are the same thing. The the the goal is to love. Okay. Why would that be the most important thing you can do in life? Yeah, because God is love. I understand that God is love. Um, but what's different? But what's different between our world and his world? Why are we here? Yes. Um because we I mean according to Dante like we're fragments of this love, right? If God is love, we are fragments of this love and we our journey for each and every one of us is to return to the source. So I just Okay, but then like why don't you kill yourself like right now? No, you wouldn't you wouldn't be able to return to the source if you kill yourself. That's not that's that will lead you. Then then how do we return to the source? To love to amplify whatever that is within us which was breathed into us in order to to to get closer to the source. Okay. Anyone else? We should act in accordance with natural law. What is natural law? The morality that's set up by God. Okay. Right. Okay. Try to be specific. Okay. Yes. Did did you have a Okay. All

215:58right. Anyone else? Yes. Maybe we should try to exper experience more. We we should experience more because God can can't experience as a human. Okay. All right. Okay. Okay. So, let's do a film about this. Okay. Everything God does is perfect. Everything God does is for a perfect reason. He created this world which is governed by perfect laws but it's imperfect in that well uh there's evil, there's pain, there's hunger, there's agony, there's suffering. What's the point of all this? Why would he create a world like this? Yes. Well, if I didn't know about whole baptism thing, I would say that we are here and we have to live a full life and we have to live a good life because we have original sin and we have to redeem our souls which are after all afflicted with original sin from the Adam and Eve business from original sin. But there's this whole baptism thing and therefore my explanation is null and void. Okay. All right. So an idea that you guys need to remember is like we don't have to redeem ourselves because Jesus already did it for us. Do you understand? Okay. This is a major assumption of divine comedy. So now the question then is if we're redeemed, everything that we everything that um is done is for a purpose. Everything is in the in the mind of God. Everything he does is for a perfect reason. What is the purpose of this world that we live in? Uh maybe there's uh you know just like experiment how about we're living uh in the two world the one world is perfect world just what god created there's no misery no no saying everything is perfect but the other world is like us

217:58where maybe just like hell you know we're in agony and we are in despair so maybe God try to test or try to make experiment just like we we put the rats into two maze right and try to find out uh if just give them the right the food and and I like to to to circle around a maze so the the right will try to knock down the door and try to find the food. So maybe Yeah. Yes. Yes. Go ahead. Maybe because love is made perfect in pain and agony maybe like that way. So it's can can you explain like you cannot show or exercise or prove love without paying a price for it. So then the other side of the coin is that you have to pay a price or you have to deal with some sort of ugly evil things to see what's beautiful maybe to Yeah. But I mean like why would God do this? What's the point of this? Okay. All right. Let me ask you this question. What is it that we have that God doesn't have? flesh. Human body. Okay. Is that impressive? Mortality. Mortality. Death. Yes. Imperfection. Imperfection. Yes. Evilness. We can be evil. Yes. Okay. Um. Okay. Let's let's now step back and think about what's happening. Okay. Beatrice and Dante are together, right? What is the relationship? Teacher, student. Exactly. It's teacher student, right? Because D is asking questions and Beatric is providing answers. Are Beat's answers perfect? Are they perfect? Are they the absolute truth? Yes, they are. Yeah, I understand. You can argue with her, but I'm saying like in I'm saying that in the in par in

220:00paradiso itself like Beatatrice admitted that her her words are but an imperfect reflection of the truth like she is trying to communicate the truth but she is doing it to Dante and Dante is not able to take the truth in his present form. Okay. All right. Okay. Let's Okay. Let's take it step by step. Okay. First, we've established that the relationship between Beatatrice and Dante is teacher student. Okay, that's point one. Point two is even though you could be right and like what Beatric, how Beatric expresses herself where Dante is imperfect, her understanding of the universe is perfect. Correct. Yes. Because she represents God. Everything she says is perfect. We may not understand what she says. Donna may misinterpret what she says, but everything she says is perfect. Okay, that's number two. Number three then is what then is the point of teaching Dante so that he can be the mouthpiece and tell people okay like a prophet so so historically I can I answer well Dante the divine comedy is you go through hell first to get to heaven so earth is hell and you can learn in from all the materialistic things you can learn if they're good or not and then return to God yourself. But you have to go through inferno first. Okay. All right. So in the Bible there is a book called Ezekiel. Okay. Ezekiel actually draw it up. Okay. Okay. Right. So we're ask Google. Okay. How does Ezekiel receive the word of God? All right. So Ezekiel, it's a book of the Bible and he he goes up to heaven and he goes up to heaven to receive the word of God just like Dante is receiving the word of God. How does Ezekiel receive the word of God? Do you think

222:12Okay. So a is stupid. Okay. No, no, no. If you read the Bible, okay, how does Ezekiel literally receive the word of God to me? Could speak to God. He had a relationship with God. No, no, no. What God did was take the scrolls, right? The scrolls carry his message and then and then what what what did God do? He stuffed it into the mouth of Ezekiel and Ezekiel literally ate it. Do you understand? If you want to make sure the prophet delivers the right message, you stuff it down his throat. Do you understand? So why is Peter wasting all this time dealing with Dante? Yes. Did Ezekiel agree to have this stuff down his throat? Um, so like Dante is going through this experience uh and not just have all of the information stuffed down his throat because the journey is what matters more than the information. Don't you think accuracy matters more? Like if God wants to deliver message to his people, don't you think like accuracy matters? Right? I think it's not about like is it maybe it's the idea that it's not the end result or the accuracy. There's not a right answer, but it's the individual transformation and the individual journey that matters more. Why though? I'm trying to figure this out. Okay, I'm trying to figure out Okay, like in Ezekiel, you can just stuff the message down a person's throat so that so that he never forgets it. Okay, and all and he must quote it word for word. Right. But not only does Dante But not only does Beatus not stuff

224:14anything down her throat, but what happens after Dante goes home? Do Do you guys remember what happens a after he goes home? He forgets a bunch of things. He forgets everything. Not everything. Basically everything. Okay. This is like really weird to like forgot to deliver a message to people. Like, let's pick a guy who I have to teach and then he'll probably forget most of most everything I teach and he's going to go back and he's going to have to remember everything. Okay, this is a really silly way of doing things, but God is perfect. Everything God does is is for a reason. So, what's the reason? So, can it can it be that God wants us to utilize our one gift that he's given us, free will, to freely choose to be nearer to him, and we each have to take that trip or that process individually? Dante can't take that trip for us. Yeah, that that is correct. Okay. So, how can Dante deliver this message or how can Dante help us go on this journey ourselves? by by writing this book. Exactly. There you go. That this is why this had to happen. Okay. What is it that we have that God doesn't have? How is Donnie able to write this? We have a concept of space and time. So like how how did Donnie write this? Yes. Oh. Oh, I know. Um, we h we don't know things. God is all knowing. God knows everything. So, we can How did write the divine harmony? He's channeling God. He channel God, but it was through him, right? So, what did he do? Think that he utilized uh the things

226:15that he was trying to preach against as in logic and rationalism. What did he use to create this thing? Pencil and paper. Do you guys not have it? Imagination. The imagination. Do you understand? What's it that we have that God cannot have? The imagination. Why can I God have imagination? He's perfect. You understand? If you're perfect, you know everything. You cannot fail. Therefore, you cannot have an imagination. Okay? That's why Beatrice cannot come to our world and communicate with us directly because she lacks the imagination to do so. Right? That's the entire point of this journey. Dante must go through this journey himself in order to experience the truth of God. But then he must use his imagination in order to help us go on our own journey. And that is by writing divine comedy. The entire purpose of his visit to heaven was so that he could write the divine comedy. Okay. Basically, he's a journalist and he's been invited to heaven to do some reporting and come back and then write in a very nice way so that we can all go on this journey our ourselves. Okay. That's why Dante had to go to heaven. That's why he had to write Divine Comedy. Okay? So that we can by ourselves go on this journey to heaven and discover what God truly is. Does that make sense, guys? Again, everything God does is for a perfect reason. If you don't know it, it's because you're not thinking hard enough. Okay. Yes. Okay, this might be pushing the point here, but if God is perfect and there's nothing that we have that he doesn't have, then how does we have

228:16imagination and he doesn't? Yeah, that's a good question. Why? What is that we have that God doesn't have? Oh, yeah. Maybe maybe because God is invincible because God can live forever. But but life is limited. So people have imagination because if you're limited, so you just always want to know more about Yeah. Exactly. Yes. Go on. Imagination isn't a skill that something you have. It's something that you lack. So if you already know everything, there's nothing to imagine. But we can imagine because we have gaps in our thinking. So yeah, because our lives are limited. We want to transcend to um higher realms or higher consciousness. We that's why we imagine. Okay. Yeah. But the major point is that what D is saying is that we humans are not um lesser beings. We are co-equal with God because even even though God has perfection, we have imagination. And so if you're God and you're trying to extend the boundaries of the universe, right? You're trying to create more things in the universe, you can't do do so yourself because you're perfection. Okay? So you must use humanity. So everything that happens is for a divine purpose. You understand? And as you say, the reason why we have we have the imagination is because we have bodies and our bodies can suffer, bodies can feel pain, bodies can die. And what excites the imagination is the fact that we can ask questions. We can make mistakes. We can not know. Okay. Does that make sense? Yes. So, we're going quantity over quality here, right? Because God could create anything he wants, but he is absolutely

230:19perfect. So, he is tired of having to create everything. And so, he wants people to create more things that he couldn't think of. But these things are going to be imperfect because these people who create are going to be imperfect too. Is that right? Um okay. So let's just say you're God. Okay. And you want you want to create a perfect world and you do create a perfect world. What's the problem with that? It becomes eternal, right? What what is eternity? Nothing ever changes. Eternity is death. You understand that? Eternity is death. So your only solution to life is infinity. Does that make sense? God is eternal. We are infinite. Love is eternal. The imagination is infinite. Okay? God is not capable of the imagination. Therefore, God had to create us. Okay? Does it make sense to you guys? Yeah. Um well actually I think God maybe just want to us forever because in the in the Bible is that the people they they don't need to wear clothes they're naked and they got surrounded by the light. They're in the light ball. So it mean they will live forever. But just because the people who just you know try maybe out of curiosity so is been rural by the snake. So it's just sitting right. So just eat a fruit and there's another tray instead of the the tree with the fruit uh with the wisdom there's another trade that is the longevity but the people just choose to to pick the fruit from the wisdom. Okay. Okay. All right. Yeah. Okay. Yes. Well, I have a unrelated question. So um why haven't anybody else traveled to

232:20paradise and write a uh book just like Dante? Why there's a billions of people that only Dante have went to paradise and wrote a book? What's the answer? Uh uh well I I don't know if I can answer a question but I do uh you know just like I maybe I was in my dream that I I can see something in my dream that I was in hell and in hell uh people just feel suffer but there's another place that I also can saw in my dream is that people think everything is for free everything is for free so that's really chaotic yeah maybe maybe there's so many universe some of the universe Because you know people just like beast some of the universe. Why was there a Jesus? Why couldn't Why couldn't there be a second Jesus? There was only one Jesus. Why was there just one Jesus? Someone else can't come and be another Jesus. Why not? Because Jesus is uh a facet of God. And if we if another Jesus comes in and also says, "Oh, we're going to redeem you of all your sins." Then that's basically saying the first Jesus didn't do his job. So the first Jesus will be imperfect. And that wouldn't be very nice, that would it? Okay. Okay. So, I think Dante was a messenger from God. Okay. So, you asked a question earlier today. How did Dante How was Dante able to do what he did? Okay. So, here's some facts about Dante. The man died without a country. He was in exile. He was living off the generosity of his patrons. And after he finished Divine Comedy in 1321, he died a few months later. Okay? He didn't experience any fame, he was never paid for the divine comedy. And as you can see, it is really

234:20hard. Okay, it's hard for us to read it, but imagine how hard it is to write it. But he was doing it without a particular reward. What was his reward for doing this? He was not famous in his time. He he became famous later. In fact, while he was alive, he was despised by his own people, the Florentines. In fact, um the Catholic Church was so angry at him, they were they actually wanted like to dig up his body and burn him at the stake. Okay. So, what motivated the man? how he's able to focus 20 years of his life on running something that may or may not have been burned by the Catholic Church, that may or may not be read by people. Okay? And the only answer that I think makes sense is the moment he was born, he knew what his mission was. And throughout his entire life, the divine comedy in his complete form appeared to him in certain fragments. And in his head, he kept on um imagining these different parts. And then when he finally conceptualized the entirety of Divine Comedy, he then wrote it down. Okay? And why I say this is okay I have problems understanding what motivated man for 20 years to write the divine comedy but also like think about the impact of the divine comedy in our world. Not only is divine comedy the source for the renaissance, it's also the source for the Protestant Reformation, Sic Revolution, the

236:21Enlightenment, modernity itself. It changed the entire world by itself. And you're telling me this is all an accident. And you're telling me, oh well, you know, he's he's just got lucky. 20 years every day working his ass off to put this together. not knowing if it'll be read one day and 100 year 100 years after it is published it forever changed to the world. It is recognized today as the most important literary achievement in human history. Today we read it and we can see its power even though we are no longer part of his world. Right? Even if you don't know any history, you can still read the Divine Comedy and feel its beauty, feel its power. How is this possible? Unless this is all designed by God. Unless Dante was a messenger of God himself and he knew from an early age this is his mission and he structured his entire life for this mission. I don't know. Yes. Um again I think that's a very absolute perspective and it I think it actually diminishes the value of Dante and of the divine comedy as a humanist. So uh the Renaissance is characterized by his humanism while it is not separate from in the Catholic church while it's still heavily influenced by religion. I think it's important to know that Dante was a great person and that he did not need a god to make his writing even greater. Similarly, we do not need a god to understand to understand what Dante Dante wrote to appreciate it for its greatness. I think as humans, our value is enough. Okay. Um I don't disagree with what you say. Okay. But like like I want to emphasize certain points about this class. Okay. First of all, this is not an academic seminar. This is about intellectual speculation. It's about

238:21going on a journey like Dante went on his journey to figure out the structure, the secrets of the universe itself. That's point one. Point two is on this journey it has to be leap of faith. Okay? You have to believe that this is divine. You have to believe this is perfection. You have to believe that when you enter the divine comedy, you are entering into the soul of the universe itself. And my argument to you is that if you take this leap of faith, if you open your heart, if you open your mind and you fully embrace divine comedy, you'll be transformed by it. Okay? And you know what? If it is not true, there's actually no harm to you. Okay? But if I'm correct, this could be the most life transforming experience in your life. So why not just take the risk? put away your delusions or your beliefs about our world and fully embrace divinity. Okay? And I'm saying only by doing that can you truly appreciate the divine comedy. Is that clear to you guys? Okay. Okay. That's it for today. We'll continue tomorrow. Okay.