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0:07Okay. Okay. All right. Um, good morning. Is the sound on?
Okay. All right. Okay. So, good morning. Uh, a few announcements before we uh start class.
Um, first of all, I would like to make a series of apologies. Um, there are a lot of people watching online. So, I thank everyone for taking the time to watch uh these videos online. And some of you have been complaining about the sound quality as well as the video quality. Uh, first of all, I want to thank Carol and her team for making all this possible, but I need to remind people that this is an academic facility.
This is not set up for a YouTube live stream. So, I apologize um if this is not up to par. Um but Yale, the Yale Beijing Center was not set up to be a YouTube live stream facility. It was set up to an academic exchange facility. Okay, that's point one.
Um point two is um I made many factual mistakes yesterday. I've been making a lot of factor mistakes throughout uh this course. So, um, to be honest with you, this is my actually my first time reading Divine Comedy in Fo, okay? I've taught Divine Comedy for the past four years, but it's always I skip through sections that I think are important so that I can teach it. Uh, because my strategy is to teach to learn.
So, I basically learn what I need in order to teach. And that's been very unfair to uh Dante. Um, so if I'm making mistakes, it's because a lot of this material is new to me and so I see teaching as a process of co-creation of co-discovery. Okay. So uh thank you for your patience and for your uh understanding
2:07and again the what we're trying to do is we're trying to understand Dante thematically rather than factually. I hope that after class you do go and review what we've learned and make sure that you understand what's going on and to also to fix a lot of errors. Um and my third um apology is that I got emotional yesterday and um I think a lot of it is that um when I teach I have a lot of goals in mind. I have a plan in mind and I get very impatient when um I lose focus. I like f I like feedback.
I like to be challenged but sometimes when I am challenged too much I get a bit exa uh I get frustrated. Okay. So I apologize for for that. Okay. So um before we be in class I want to I want to address an issue from last class.
No actually first before I begin are there any questions from last class that you have. Okay. All right. So I want to address an issue from last class which is the idea of lust. Okay.
Um and we never really reach a satisfactory resolution to the problem the sin of lust. Why would lust be an issue? And again um we have to assume that Donnie knows what he's doing. So unless we are able to explain to ourselves clearly and explain to others clearly we have not arrived to the solution. Okay.
So um um Edward when we were talking about lust yesterday okay you had a very interesting comment. Could you repeat that comment? Do do you remember your comment about Picarda and uh Franciscoca the parallels? You may
4:07not remember but Oh, that was you. I'm sorry. I'm I'm sorry, Jay. Okay. Could could you could you repeat that?
Um so there seems to be symmetry um with regards to the looping. I I don't know. It's like the ex-programmer in me is thinking like like with Picarda, she's stuck in the loop right in in the lower levels of heaven. And then um where uh in hell we see that people in lust in the in that hurricane tornado as well as uh um uh the people that are uh uh uh gluttonous they're they're also stuck in an endless cycle. Right.
So I I just appreciated that symmetry.
Yes. Okay. So the key to understanding um the idea of lust is to appreciate the symmetry in the um divine comedy. Um you also need to appreciate the totality of the divine comedy in that he's presenting a complete vision. Okay.
So we know from paradise we know from paradise that Dante's ultimate message is to live a life of faith, hope and love. He goes on to define these three concepts as faith is the imagination to believe that God does exist that heaven and hell exist and that God loves us. Okay, without these things it's hard to understand the world and arrive at truth. Uh hope is the idea of arrogance where you have to believe that you do matter and whatever you do impacts the universe. That's why people like Rachel, ROF, Beatatrice, Rebecca are next to God because these are in individuals who had no power, who had no status, but they chose to live a life of goodness and as a result, God rewards them the most.
Okay. Um, love
6:08is action, right? to not just be passive but to be active to believe that injustice anywhere is injustice everywhere. Okay. And so in other words what Donnie is really saying is to live a life of love and imagination. That is the ultimate message of the divine comedy.
But now we have to reconcile this message with the theology of the Catholic Church at this time and how people understand the world at this time. Now um in this time there are the seven deadly sins. And now what's interesting is that Dante does put for the seven deadly sins in Inferno, right? They are lust, um, gluttony, greed, and wrath. Okay.
So, these these four he does put in the infernal. But there are three others that he does not actually put in the infernal. He will put them in purgatory, but not infernal. Okay? And they are um envy, pride, and sloth.
Okay? basically laziness. All right. Okay. So, we need So, what Dian does is he replaces these things with other things.
Okay. Um, basically envy, pride, and sloth are not in inferno. You're not punished for these things, but you're punished for um fraud, violence, and treachery. Okay, not only that, but he separates he separates the inferno uh with geographic uh dividers. Okay, remember how he they they cross the Aaron River in order to
8:09access um the inferno, but then they also have to cross the river sticks to access this, which is the capital city of Inferno. Okay. And but even when we go inside this, we'll find that there actually also major geographic dividers as well. So what Donna is is suggesting is that the more you climb into hell, the greater the crime. Okay.
So we need to we need to to think about what the difference is um amongst these different sins. And I mean the most basic difference is lust, gluttony, greed and wrath. There are things you do to yourself. Okay. And violence, fraud, treachery is are things you do to other people.
Okay. That that is the clearest difference. Um and what this matters is that if you with vi violence, fraud and treachery, you are disrupting others capacity to live a good life. All right. Uh so that's point one.
Um point two is traditionally these things these sevenly de sins are an expression of the ego right it's like too much you are you want things too much you are expressing ego too much and that's why you have these seven deadly sins but we already said that in paradise arrogance is key to hope so How do you reconcile this dichconomy? Right? And the answer is that what Dante is going to do is show that you have these things, lust, gluttony, greed, and wrath because you don't have enough ego. Does that make sense? Not enough will.
All right. Not enough will and desire. All right.
10:10So if you if you reread divine comedy and you look at these four uh circles, lust, gluttony, greed, and rap, it's like they don't have enough ego. They don't have enough will. They don't have enough hope. Okay. Uh uh do you have a question, Jor?
Uh well, that's that's quite powerful to me because um you're saying that uh it's a spectrum like ego, free will, imagination is a spectrum. Yes.
And it goes it goes on the paradise side positive and and and the lack of it causes positive stuff,
right? Okay. Okay.
Yeah. Exactly. Okay. So, let let me give you an example to illustrate this with will. Okay.
with sorry with lust. So, again the story of lust is Francisca who f who is married but she falls in love with um her husband's brother and they have this illicit affair. The husband finds out and kills both of them. And what Franc Francisco Francisco says is that oh what motivated me is um I was reading these romance novels and I was so enraptured by the plot by the idea of falling in love with someone else that I just did it. Okay.
And and if you know your literature you know that this is the plotline of Madame Bovery right by by um um Yes. Right. That's exactly the plot line. Okay. this you know very bory woman she's border she's bored she reads these romance novels and that's why she starts an affair okay so this is this is how he depicts lust but normally we depict lust as maybe uh the most common example is you really like like a woman and you you know pay her a lot of money right for sex prostitution right so this is a very different conception where uh in a normal understanding prostitution it's the expression of your ego like see I have a lot of money.
I I can buy you out. Whereas with the Francisca story, it's not enough will and desire. It's
12:10like you are escaping your life, right? You're in falling in love with an idea as opposed to a person. Okay? And now to further illustrate this further, I'm going to give you three examples. And then what I want you guys to do is to rank them according to sin.
Okay? The first example is
[clears throat]
Um, you love a woman and you give her, I don't know, a million dollars to sleep with her. Okay, basically a million dollars. Second is um you fall in love with a beautiful actress. Okay, who like who knows like like just anyone. Okay, I I don't actually know famous Hollywood actresses.
Jeffrey Lopez maybe. Okay. All right. So you write you spend the rest of your life writing love letters to Jennifer Lopez. Okay.
I I seriously don't don't know that many Hollywood actress actresses. And the last thing you do is okay we are living in an age of AI. So you buy yourself an AI wife. Okay. A robotic wife.
Right now I want you guys to use imagine and and tell me like these three which one is the worst? In Dante's opinion, which one is the object worse? Yes,
I think probably the third one cuz uh you don't really need to like that much of that much of like a strong will to process like a sex robot. And um and and the second one will be the second like uh um so will be maybe like uh keep writing love letters to the Hollywood actress actress cuz it's just like you're not really taking the actions, right? You're just like writing the love letters and uh least the sinful one is
14:11just to like to hire a prostitute to pay her a million dollar. At least you're like,
"You're not care about $7 million, man."
Oh, yeah.
Sorry. Yeah. All right. Okay. Yeah.
Okay. Any other interpretations or opinions? Yes.
I think the first one of giving the million dollars is the worst sin. And then uh the love the love letters is the second sin and the AI wife is the third sin.
Okay. So, explain your logic. I think the the million dollars is the worst sin because you can directly negatively affect someone else because with the other two like writing the love letters, they're just receiving your praise. With the AI wife, it's more damaging yourself. Whereas the first one, you're kind of coercing someone else into doing something bad.
So, it could affect her future capacity to love or have connection.
Okay. Anyone else? Yes,
I think the if you're fall in love with a actress, I mean no matter what uh he or she is a celebrity, right? So it doesn't mean that celebrity cannot be loved but it because love is free will right? So you can love love her love anybody want this is real true love I suppose but AI wife is different because AI is not real person. So uh I don't think the love can be uh produced you know if you just fall in love with something and uh and also when you're love with uh some people and give them dollar I think it's it's all right unless you just you don't only want sex you want to have comfort maybe it's okay just like you give your money to your wife right
right um anyone else uh yes
so in Dante's time these aren't my opinions in Dante's time then they would see lust as um natural and unnatural. And natural lust would lead to marriage and reproduction.
Yes.
And so um if God is love, you could not have bring God into the number three,
16:12the robots
um relationship. So that would be the worst. Yes.
And there's a possibility that
you fall in love with the prostitute and get married or Jennifer Lopez falls in love with you and gets married and has babies and that's good in God's eyes,
right? Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.
Good. Number three. Yes. Anyone else? Uh yes.
Um so it's like the triangle theory of love. It's either errors which is passion with the body and then there's friendship which is connection with the soul and then commitment or something which is linked into marriage. And so in that triangle the prostitute fulfills the body part. So it's not as bad. It's one part of one aspect of love.
And then the letters for Jennifer Lopez is the soul connection or friendship aspect. But I think the worst is the robot one. Uh because it's neither all all three. Yeah.
Good. Okay. Right. The obvious answer is number three. Okay.
Um and how and how we know is we can actually go back and and like use these three action criteria. Faith, hope, and love. Okay. And I mean there are different formulations you provide. Both of you provide really good formulations.
But the main reason is you basically given up on yourself, right? Think about that. Think about it. You marry a robotic wife. That is despair.
You don't take yourself seriously anymore, right? You are so lonely. Uh you are so uh humiliated that you're like, you know what? I'll just go I'll just go and marry a robotic wife just to keep myself company. Okay.
So for Dante and for the Catholic Church as well, number three is the worst possible um sin and it's express Yes. Didn't we say that uh sins that impact others are worse? So like the robot robotic wife is only concerning yourself but giving a million would be abandoning yourself and also the others life because because she has a million then she's going to go into a life of like spending and all.
So concerns two person which I see as
18:13worse.
Right. Right. Right. You're right. Okay.
So it's conditional. Okay. We're assuming that in number one um she's a prostitute and she just agrees. Right. um like like she's willing to do this.
We agree. But if if she if she's being coerced to do it, then obviously number one is a lot worse, right? And we'll actually go into that um as we descend into hell. Okay. So, but we're we're assuming like this is not impacting the other person.
Okay. But thank you for that. Yes.
Can we also say it's three because it inspires the least imagination.
Exactly. Right. Yeah. So again, we have to think about the totality of the divine comedy, right? We want to live a life of faith, hope, and love.
And living a life of faith, hope, and love means taking yourself seriously. Okay? Like don't be passive, be active. And number three, um, is basically giving up life. Okay?
And that's why lust is a problem because lust is like you're escaping into a fantasy, right? Francesca is escaping to a fantasy. If she really loved um the husband's brother, they would just elope together, right? But it's not like that. like, you know, she she's what what what she's doing is she's reading a romance novel and she's trying to project her fantasies onto another person, right?
And she doesn't really care who that person is. She has absolutely no feelings for that person. And when but when she does that, she's not taking herself seriously enough, right? She doesn't really have uh faith, hope, and love. Okay?
Does that make sense? So that helps us explain why lust is a problem and how it fits into the larger danten cosmology. All right, any questions before I continue? All right, my next point is this. Um, for the next two three days we will finish the inferno and the inferno is very different from paradiso.
Okay. So think of periso as ultimately
20:13sorry this is fine okay thank you vision okay or the apocalypse so in thank you so so in the in the biblical tradition in the religious tradition uh the apopulates means revelation okay what god shows you what the vision is. So, think of Paradiso as uh Dante's last will and testament. He's telling us what his vision for the universe is, for the for the future, for uh for us is. Okay. The Inferno is different.
The Inferno is what we call prophecy. And you're like, "Wait a minute. Aren't they the same thing?" Okay, today, yes, they are the same thing. But back then prophecy is very different from vision. Okay?
Prophecy is a critique of the present, right? If you read the Bible, all these people, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, they've come down to criticize the Israelites to crit to like say, "You guys are sinning." Okay? If you don't sin, God's going to come and punish you. Okay? That's what prophecy is.
not one of like like fortunetelling but one of social critique. So that that's what the inferno is. It's fundamentally a social critique. [snorts] And so what I want to do today is basically read the inferno and understand it ultimately as Dante criticizing his society, the people around him. And also what I want to do is I want us to think about do his criticisms of quarantine society apply to us today.
Okay, why this is important is that there's a really good reason why
22:13the kadia okay at the time in history when wrote it's called laadia but later on people apply the word divine to it meaning it is the word of god okay because dies in the year 1321 and um in year 1321 when he dies people don't really understand what this is what's going on, right? Because we have in paradise uh Peter lombasting the Catholic Church. We also have Beatrice in her final words cursing humanity. Right? You guys are hopeless.
We sent the Savior to you and you ignored him and you're all going to burn in hell. Okay? And this is very much part of prophetic tradition, right? So, if you're reading this in the year 1321, you um just don't know what's going on. But this happen something happens in year that convinces that everyone that Dante is a prophet.
Do you know what happens in year 1357 in Italy? Can you guys guess? I'm pretty sure you know what it is. Come on. This thing kills A lot of people the black death.
Okay. And how would they interpret the black death? Divine retribution, divine judgment. Okay? Do you understand what happens after black death is the renaissance, right?
When they fully embrace Dante. You guys understand the sequence of events. 1321 Donnie dies and he's cursing cursing humanity. says like the heavens curse you, right? And then was like, well, you know, so what?
1357, the black death where at least, okay, at least a third of Europe dies. Can you imagine that? A third of Europe dies.
24:14Some places it's even half or threequarters of the population. Okay, this is a complete disaster. Okay. The worst possible calamity to befall on humanity at this time. And so you can only interpret this as divine retribution or judgment.
Okay. All right. And Dante knows it's coming, right? Because all prophets knows knows it's coming. That's why they're so angry, right?
They're like, you know, if you just read the Bible, whether it's Isaiah or uh Daniel or just any of the prophets, okay, they're really, really angry because they know it's coming. They know God will have his vengeance, will have his retribution. Okay, but this again creates a paradox for us because if Dante knows it's coming and he's very angry, but he also says that God is all loving, all forgiveness, all mercy. How can we reconcile this paradox? What's the logic of this?
Yes.
Uh that God is trying to show humanity something.
No, he's not trying to show, right? Because a third of humanity will die. What? What's going on here? This is punishment.
We just said that if you love someone, you don't punish someone. Okay, let's use your imagination. Okay, let's just say we're a parent and we have a child for for whatever reason. Okay, we don't know why, but for whatever reason, this child has become a drug addict and he or she commits a lot of crime in order to feed his or her drug addiction. If we truly love our child, what would we do?
Yes.
26:16U send him to the rehab. Send him to the rehabitation.
Okay. Okay.
Right. Uh any other suggestions? The person has
kick him out.
Call the police. Right. Because he or she has stolen a lot of money, commit a lot of crimes in order to feed his or her drug addiction. He or she belongs in jail. Okay.
Is this retribution? Is this vengeance? Or is it love? What's the difference?
Love.
But why is love? They're trying to control the amount of harm they have on other people.
Okay. Any other
this uh you're bringing up the the good Samaritan issue in the Bible where like the per the person who like uh helps them is actually enabling them and the person that like ignores them makes them realize on their own their errors and fix themselves.
Okay. Right. Okay. So the logic is this. The logic is like if you truly love someone, you want what's best for that person, right?
You want that person to live the best possible life. That that's what love is. And if the person is like has a drug addiction, that person cannot live his or her best life. She had to do something about it. Okay?
And like enabling it, sending sending sending him or her to rehab, that doesn't really solve the problem. Okay? What you have to do is basically let him or her hit rock bottom before he or she can lift himself up. Okay, does that make sense? Okay, so apply this to the black death.
Why would God unleash a black death? God didn't do this, but I'm saying like why would people think it's it's it's God?
Humanity is humanity has a lot of problems and God needs to make us reach rock bottom to realize our problems and fix them ourselves.
Right? Okay. So that is the message of the divine comedy. Okay. And it's the
28:16inverse of Catholic Church. The Catholic Church is don't screw up and you go to heaven. Um and if you screw up, you go to hell. Okay. So it's a high risk situation.
For Dante, there is no risk. God will forgive you always. But because God will always forgive you always, that gives you responsibility to live your best life. Okay? to live a life of faith, hope and love.
And if you cannot live that, even if you want to live that, you cannot live that, then God will intervene in a way that permits you to live that. Okay. So another saying this is society has has become so corrupt has become so evil so sinful that an ordinary person like Dante cannot live a life of faith hope and love anymore in that situation there will be divine judgment. Okay, there God has to inter intervene because if God truly loves us, God needs to ensure that we have the opportunity to live a life of hope, faith and love. All right.
Yes. uh I agree with your professor and and also it make me recall the memory that you know if the uh your uh for example family member would just mean you know in the sick bed right and keep waiting for death and at that time you know I think a lot of people just don't believe in money they believe in God because only the god can can you know can give him back or can just you know let him recover so maybe god is try to test people and just let them to know that uh what you chasing for the money the power is useless in front of the units, right? It's like you know the uh [clears throat] so right now uh you know uh we can call COVID 19 right so maybe yeah
okay all right okay so so um to start
30:17off our discussion of Dante as a prophet okay as a social critic uh as someone who is telling people that divine vengeance is coming um this is a comment from uh YouTube it's the same person who who commented about uh Peter and the coin okay it's a very good comment So, so we're going to read it to to like understand uh Don as a prophet. Okay. Uh uh Carol, could you read please?
Sure.
It is wild how many people in this lecture treat Dante like a harmless academic monument, completely missing why he was a true hero for the people. Dante Aligaryi was not born into absolute luxury or the upper class. As the son of a low-level money lender, he had to completely hustle his way through his academics using sheer intellectual genius to break into elite philosophical and geometric circles. He was also hardened, a hardened combat veteran who fought on the front lines as a cavalry man for the Florentine army at the bloody battle of Campalino in 1289. He was a champion who used his hard-earned political power to protect ordinary citizens from a corrupt predatory establishment.
In 1300, he was elected as a ruling minister of Florence and immediately passed bold laws to strip the corrupt local Franciscan Inquisitor of his power, stopping the church from weaponizing heresy checklists to extort bribes and plunder the financial purses of wealthy families. Dante even sacrificed his own personal life for the law, voting to exile his own best friend to keep the peace and prove that justice belongs to the people, not political factions. The papal establishment struck back with absolute malice. Pope Bonafas Bonafas VI lured Dante to Rome on a fake diplomatic mission while secretly launching a military coup that tore down Dante's home, seized all his assets, and locked his name into the infamous book of the nail registry, sentencing him to be burned alive at the stake. Forced
32:18into a brutal 19-year exile as a hunted fugitive, Dante never backed down. He proved that the ultimate weapon against a blood soaked political apparatus is radical uncensored love and spiritual freedom. He used his poetry to expose the rulers who financialized grace, putting corrupt popes in hell while they were still alive while preaching that the entire universe is actually powered by his decentralized unbannable divine love that no empire can ever trap behind a pay wall. The institution was so terrified of his message of human liberation that in 1329, Cardinal Bert de BJ sent armed men to dig up his dead body and burn his bones to ashes, forcing local Franciscan monks to hide his skeleton in a wall for centuries. Dante was a rogue insider who gave up his wealth, his status, and his safety to shield the divine spark and build an eternal escape hatch for humanity.
Okay. Um so of course there's a bit of exaggeration in it. Okay. But the essence is very much true. He is he was a prophet and this is a life of a prophet one of constant alienation, persecution and exile.
Right? And there's no other way. U he chose to live a life of faith, hope and love. And when he cannot do that then he knows that society is unjust. When societyy's unjust then God will eventually have to intervene.
Okay. And that's why in Pyiso in this place of uh grace and mercy and love Peter and Beatrice will go on this tirade against humanity. Okay. It is a promise of divine judgment. All right?
And so we will what what what we'll do today and tomorrow and we will focus on what's going on in Florence Florente society to make Dante uh demand divine vengeance retribution. Okay. Not not only is he a prophet
34:18telling people that divine retribution is coming but he's also a messenger of God. an angel who is demanding from God de divine retribution and judgment. Okay. All right. So, uh we're going to pick up from infernal.
Uh where where did we end last time? Okay. So, so so so let's let's do number 10. Okay. All right.
But are there any questions about this before we start reading? Again, the goal for today and tomorrow is figure out what's going on in Florentine society to make Dante so angry at the world. Okay. Why does he feel so hopeless? All right.
Okay. All right. So, let's let's uh Okay. Can now by a narrow path that ran between those torments and the ramparts of the city, my master moves ahead. I following.
Oh, highest virtue. Are you who lead me through these circles of transgression at your will? Do you speak to me and satisfy my longings? Can those who lie within the sepokers be seen? The lids in fact have all been lifted.
No guardians washing over them. And he to me they'll all be shuttered up when they return here from Jehophat together with the flesh they left above. Within this region is the cemetery of Epicurus and his followers. All those who say the soul dies with body. And so the question you have asked of me will soon find satisfaction while we're here as will the longing you have hid from me.
Okay. All right. So, so remember where we are. Okay. We've crossed the river sticks and we are now in the city city of this which is the capital of hell.
And so we are now meeting the worst offenders. These are people who have not only sinned against themselves but they've sinned against others especially God. And uh the first people we meet are the heretics. Okay. the people who have misled uh people from God and their
36:18punishment is they basically lie uh in these tombs and they're burning to to death. And Virgil says the main heresy is the the Epiricus and his fathers the Epicurans believe that there is no soul. There's no heaven and hell. So, all that means is while you're on Earth, just have a blast, man. Have a feast, eat the best food, have sex every day.
Uh, wear the best clothes. Just enjoy yourself. And for Dante, this is just pure heresy. Okay, he hates his idea because if you think about it, why he hates his idea is that it completely removes the need for faith, hope, and love. Right?
If there's nothing after this, why have faith? Why have hope? Why have love? Okay, so for Dante, he takes great offense at the Epicurans and everyone that's burning here are the Epicurans. Okay.
All right. Let's keep on going.
Line 19. And I, good God, the only reason I have hit my heart was that I might speak briefly, and you long since encouraged me in this. Oh, Tuscan, you who pass a life across the fiery city with such seemly words, be kind enough to stay your journey here. Your accent makes it clear that you belong among the natives of the noble city I may have dealt with so vindictively.
Okay, so Dante and Virgil are talking and then someone overhears them. This is Kavakante who is uh someone that uh Donnie uh knew very well. Okay, Kavakante. And Kavakante hears Donnie's accent and says, "Hey, you must from you must be from Florence. Let's talk." Okay.
All right. Keep on going.
Line 28. This sound had burst so unexpectedly out of once a pulker that trembling, I then drew a little closer to my guide. But he told me, "Turn around. What are you doing? That's Finata who has risen
38:20there. You'll see all of him from the waist up." My eyes already were intent on his, and up he rose his forehead and his chest as if he had tremendous scorn for help. My guide, his hands encouraging and quick thrust me between the pokers toward him, saying, "Your words must be appropriate." When I draw closer to closer to his poker, he glanced at me and as of in disdain, he asked of me, "Who were your ancestors?" Because I wanted so to be compliant, I had no thing for him from him. I told them all. At this he lifted up his brows a bit, then said, they were ferocious enemies of mine and of my parents and my party, so that I had to scatter them twice over.
If they were driven out, I answered him, they still returned both times from every quarter. But yours were never quick to learn that art. At this there rose another shade alongside, uncovered to my sight down to his chin. I think that he had risen on his knees. He looked around me just as he longed to see if I had come with someone else.
But then his expectations bent. He said in tears, "If it is your high intellect that lets you journey here through this blind prison, where is my son? Why is he not with you?"
Okay, so this is very important. Okay, so let me explain what's going on. Um, Dante is talking to someone and then someone else overhears and this person is Kavakante. So sorry, I I I misspoke. Okay, the first shade is not Kavante.
The second shade is Kavante. And Kavakante knows it's Dante. And Kakan says um if it is your high intellect that let you journey here where is my son? Okay. What what is important is that um the son of the shay his name is Gaido and Gaido and Dante are competitors.
They're both poets. They're trying to be the best poet in Florence, right? And what guy and what cover is saying to Dante is, hey, if you are able to make it here with your poetry, then
40:20where's my son, right? He's at least equal to you. It doesn't make sense. All right. So, so let's see what Dante uh says.
Line 61. I answered, "My own powers have not brought me. He who waits me there leads me through here perhaps to one your guido did disdain his words the nature of his punishment these had already let me read his name therefore my answer was so fully made then suddenly erect he cried what's that he did disdain he's not still alive the sweet light does not strike against his eyes and when he noticed how I hesitated a moment in my answer he fell back supine and did not show himself again
okay so this is a really crucial scene okay so imagine what's going on Kabakante asks Dante where is my son and Dante is like um uh God disdains him and then Kavakan is like then my son is dead and D and D knows for a fact that his son is not dead okay but Donnie does not correct him all right do do you guys understand what's going on here's the question why Is Dante doing this? Okay, let's imagine it were you, right? Like you meet the father of your of your friend and your father says, "Why isn't your friend?" And the father says, "Why why isn't my son with you?" What should your answer be? Maybe just tell him the truth if I were the friend of
Yeah. Just tell him like he's living a great life back in Florence. That's why he couldn't be here, right? But instead, Dante kind of lies and says, "Well, um, it's your son is kind of dead." Why would he do that?
42:24Uh, yes. I mean so that the father knows that the son is not in hell because if he was dead well I mean because he is in hell so um if his son were dead then he would know if he would be in hell. Oh, that's a generous explanation, but um it's you're still lying. You know he's alive back in Florence, right? Why would he do that?
Yes.
Oh, he's in hell. Go with the flow. Right. Like I noticed too like as he as we descend, you know, further we descend, he his his responses seem to be more pious, more cruel.
Okay. All right. So, let me tell you a story. Okay. This happened um in China where there were two students at uh Chinua University or was it Piggy University?
I can't I can't remember. Okay. But one of the top university in China and they're best friends and they're they're roommates and one the one of the girls receives a graduate off from Princeton University. Okay. and she but she's not in she's not in a dorm.
It's her classmate who gets it. Okay. So, what does the classmate do? They're best friends. They're both they've been dormates for the past four years.
They're both aspiring to go to the league. One of them gets in. The envelope comes to the other person. What this other person do with that envelope? Can you guys guess?
She throws it away. Isn't there like email now?
I I understand.
Thank you. I'm saying like before in the 90s. Okay.
Why would that happen?
Jealousy.
Yeah. Can you But but like but like but like let's explain this. Okay. Let's this. They've been living together for four years, right?
They at the best university in the world. Regardless of what happens, both will aspire to both
44:25will live great lives, right? Even if even if they say in China, they're still going to be great people. They'll be rich and all that. Yes.
I think it's the fact that it's uh harder to accept the person you are the closest with who are equal to you in every way, at least in your eyes, suddenly got so elevated out of you. So that's there's also luri that if a crab is trying to climb out of the boat, the other crabs will grab him down.
No. Okay, I understand that. Okay, that's that that that that's correct. Yes, I understand. But I'm I'm saying like what sort of culture, what sort of environment would would create that, right?
Because in theory, right? You would want the best for your friend.
You you like like if if you received the envelope, you would open it and you' be like, "Oh my god, my my best friend got into Princeton. Let me tell the whole world. Let's let's organize a big surprise party for her." Right? That's what you should naturally do. So, so, so the question I'm asking is like what sort of culture, what sort of environment, what of society would make someone do that?
Yes.
A culture that
Oh, sorry. Sorry. You you Okay.
That could be meritocracy because if you think you provided the same efforts, then if someone has something you
It's a meritocracy. Okay. It's a meritocracy. This this is the key. Yes.
Okay. And how do we know it's a meritocracy? Because we live in it. Okay. We know exactly what happens in a meritocracy.
All these students. But did did you
just to add I think I that was what I was trying to say also. You see this a lot in sibling rivalry.
Yes.
Too. Because the closer you are to another person, the more more it impacts you, their success, their so so you know.
Right. So a meritocracy is a high pressure winner takes all unforgiving culture, right? Dante and Gido are competing to be the
46:25best poet in Italy. And right now who who's probably in the lead?
No, the other guy. Okay. Right. You understand?
Yeah.
That's why he tears up that envelope. He's like, screw this. Do you understand? Okay. So, there's a lot of things going on and that's why this is a great story because it shows you how sinful Dante is, right?
He's full of fear, anger, and hatred. But at the same time, it gives you glimpse into the larger Florentine society where only the best are appreciated. Everyone else is discarded. Right? And it's no different from today because we because back then it was a bit of a meritocracy but today it's also a meritocracy.
And do you guys live like living in a meritocracy? Probably not. Okay. I I mean if you I don't but what but I mean you could. Okay.
But so do do you guys understand this?
Hey what's going on? Yes.
It's a culture of winners and losers, right? Never in a pure meritocracy it will be a hierarchical and obviously by numbers sheer number of souls being happy you'd have less of them right
right okay and ideally you would live in a society of community right where people are helping each other but here in Florence at this time it's winner take all it's um it's yes
but meritocracy um gives equal chances to relatively can give equal chances to people who were not born who didn't win the birth lottery and also you could say it has high efficiency.
Yes. Yes. That that that's what you what you were taught. What's Yeah. But yes,
I see some quite interesting parallels between uh the meritocracy argument and how we saw in Paradiso the arguments against logic because it's this idea that oh we have this system and through logic or pure meritocracy we will come to some ideal solution but we see both
48:27with meritocracy and the idea of logic that we don't there's something deeper there.
Yeah. I mean like okay I mean like let's think about how schools work nowadays right kids go in and they compete against each other on tests and if you do on tests you're smart if you do on well if you don't do well on test you're stupid and the smart kids are funneled into elite universities where they compete against more people then they are funneled into life where they compete against more people right are these kids happy probably Not okay. So then you ask yourself what's the point of this? Yes.
So what would be the opposite of meritocracy? You know what would be what what other system would you put in place rather than meritocracy?
Okay. Um well what are some other options we have? Because um to me intuitively the opposite of meritocracy is like nepotism or favoritism or uh you know like you know birthright and that stuff.
Okay. So so so yeah you're right. Okay. So one possibility is the aristocracy, right? Where you have nobility in charge and they're in charge forever.
Why would that be a bad system? Yes,
because power is inherited. So you have to win the birth lottery in aristocracy. So nobility is passed down through blood and you cannot other people cannot have a chance.
So there's no social mobility. Yes.
Yeah. I mean if the same people are in power then and then the parents always like give their same values to their children then nothing will ever change. So there will be no like mobility, social mobility, no like change basically. So
So are you saying we have social mobility in a meritocracy?
50:27More than more than an
I would say more than in an aristocracy.
Okay. Um [laughter] I suggest going to an elite university and like just doing a study of like how many rich kids there are there. Okay. As opposed to like poor kids. Yes.
Yeah. Isn't Isn't half of all elite universities like legacy?
Yes. [laughter] I I appreciate that. Yes. I I Yes.
And are you calling that a meritocracy then? It seems like
that's a problem, right?
Like Yes.
Yeah. I was just going to say meritocracy. That's why it's just a label, right? It's whatever we want to call it. It's just using the same stick to measure society like money like [snorts] all these prestige and all that, right?
Okay. So, so, so, so, okay, we have a situation where, um, basically half the kids at these elite universities, um, but but not at Yale, right? [laughter] No, not at Yale. Um, so at least half the kids there are legacies. Um, so it's basically an aristocracy or an oligarchy.
Okay. How, but how are they different from previous nobility? Yes.
I feel like in a meritocracy, people value their own personal skill more than where they come from and like the connections that they have. For for example, in a meritocracy, we value education. We value people who have skill and talent and we value like critical thinking and problem solving and all these skills rather than like who your family is and what your birthright is.
Is that really true? Yes.
So I think mar meritocracy is like upgrade from aristocracy which is purely legacy. So like right now in America elite university if you read Columbia
52:28professors um the excellent sheep it talks about the problem of marriiocracy that kids in elite universities think that they earn their place by hard work. But I also learned about educational philosophy and research. We know that uh social economic status have a better bigger impact on the the kids IQ than the IQ itself like you know on the kids uh academic performance than their brain powers and everything else combined. Um and so therefore metocracy today it is still in a way affected by aristocracy. But if you truly believe in meritocracy, you'll be like, "Oh, I earned all this because I worked so hard and you didn't know that your parents actually also gave you the birth lottery."
Yeah. So that's the first problem with meritocracy. Okay. Yes, I know meritocracy is about fairness. But why is it then that we live in in a point in history when there's never been much more inequality and lack of social mobility?
Okay, this is just economically true. There's just like this time in history, the era we're living in now is the most unequal in human history. Okay? And a lot of the reason is that uh people who been for meritocracy think they deserved it, right? So they are much more likely to increase inequality because they think that this is fair whereas before nobility at least they were embarrassed about it.
Right? Okay. That's the first problem. Second problem is I don't think it's actually true that in meritocracy people care about skills and talent. I think in meritocracy people people care more about credentials, right?
And sometimes credentials and skills are not the same thing. Okay. So, so, so, so again, we're we're just thinking about our context and how to apply it to Donny's context. Okay. But regardless, one major issue at this time in history in Florence is the competition among people.
So that they feel they think that they're all
54:28enemies. Even friends think they're enemies. Okay? And this anidote illustrates that, right? And I mean this I mean like what Donnie did is it is it pretty bad?
Cool.
It's cruel, right? I mean, it's no different from the classmate ripping up that Princeton offer, right? And just like hiding it from her classmate. It's pretty cruel. And that's the idea here where this competition is leading people to the greatest cruelty, unimaginable cruelty.
Like the father is dead, man. The father is burning in hell. You still have to punish him. Excuse me.
It's like killing him twice.
Yeah, right. Because like your only consolation if you're burning in hell is well my at least my son is doing well back in Florence he's still a great poet right that because like like obviously him asking the question just just shows him how proud he is of his son right if you Donna can get here well so can my son right so it's his love for the son and that pisses off like no your son your son is also burning in hell thank you very much okay all right but but you see how this story is just revealing to us a larger social context. Okay. All right. Uh let's let's keep on going.
Line 73. But that greathearted one, the other shade at whose request I'd stayed, did not change aspect or turn aside his head or lean or bend, and taking up his words where he'd let left off. If they were slow, he said, to learn that art that is more torment to me than his than this bed. And yet the lady whose ruler here will not have her face kindled 50 times before you learn how heavy is that art. And so may you return to the sweet world.
Tell me, why are those citizens so cruel against my kin and on all of their decrees?
Okay, so now Donny's left Kavakante because Kavakant is in despair, right?
56:29Uh and now he's talking to Ferinita and Ferinita is also contemporary of Dante. And Feronita um is an aristocrat who led um thought his enemies to conquer Florence. Remember at this time at this time Florence is in a civil war between the Gib Giblines who are aristocrats nobility and the gelves. The gues are merchants. They are the middle class.
Okay. And Donnie belongs to the gues. Okay. So this is a class warfare. And um the Giblines uh are supported by the Holy Roman Emperor and the Gelves are supported by the Pope.
Eventually the GS themselves will fracture between the black welves and the white Gelves. Okay. Uh but um the Farah uh uh Farah Nita he is a Gibbling. Okay. He's an aristocrat.
Okay. All right. Um, can you keep on reading
line 85? To which I said, the carnage, the great bloodshed that stained the waters of the arvia red have led us to such prayers in our temple. He sighed and shook his head, then said, "In that I did not act alone, but certainly I'd not have joined the others without cause. But where I was alone was there where all the was all the rest would have annihilated Florence had I not interceded forcefully." Okay, so this is a very famous episode from this history where after the Giblines uh take over Florence, they want to kill all the Gs. Okay, they want to kill all the families of the gues and um destroy all the property of the Gs.
And Feronita, he intervenes and says no, we can't do that because this is Florence. We are first and foremost citizens of Florence and then we are Giblins, then we are partisans. Okay. So, so he heroically saves Florence and uh Donn is paying him homage here. Keep on going.
Line 94. Ah, as I hope your seed may yet
58:29find peace, I ask. So, may you help me to undo the knot that here has snarled my course of thought. It seems, if I hear right, that you can see beforehand that which time is carrying, but you're denied the sight of present things. We see even as a as men who are far-sighted those things he said that are that are remote from us. The highest lord allotss us that much light.
But when events draw near or are our minds are useless. Were we not informed by others we should know nothing of your human state. So you can understand how our awareness will die completely at the moment when the portal of the future has been shut. Then, as if penitent for my omission, I said, "Will you now tell that fallen man his son is still among the living ones? And if a while ago I held my tongue before his question, let him know it was because I had in mind the doubt you've answered."
Okay. So, here Dante is so embarrassed he tells Fer Fonita, "I can't go back to Kavakante and apologize, right? But could you do it for me, please?" Okay. All right. So again, it shows you how problematic Dante is at st at at this stage in his life, right?
He's full of fear, hatred, and uh envy. Keep on going. Line 115. And now my master was recalling me, so that more hurriedly I asked the spirit to name the others who were there with him. He said, "More than the thousand lie with me, the second Frederick, is but one among them, as is the cardinal.
I name no others. With that, he hid himself, and pondering the speech that seemed to me so menacing, I turned my steps to meet the ancient poet. He moved ahead, and as we made our way, he said to me, "Why are you so dismayed?" I satisfied him, answering him fully. And then that sta sage exhorted me, remember the words that have been spoken here against you. Now pay attention, and he raised his finger.
When you shall stand before the gentle splendor of one whose gracious eyes see everything, then you shall learn from
60:29her your lifetime's journey. Following that his steps turn to the left, leaving the wall and moving toward the middle along a path that strikes into a valley whose stench as it rose up disgusted us.
Okay, so you know, uh, Virgil sees the anguish in Dante's uh, face. And so Virgil asks, "What's wrong?" And Don explains, "Well, because I lied to uh Kante and told him his son was dead." And Virgil is like, "Focus on your mission, Dante." Okay, you you are you are about to meet Beatric. Focus on that. All right. All right.
Let's go to 11, please. KTO 11. Along the upper rim of a high bank formed by a ring of massive broken boulders, we came above a crowd more cruy pent. And here, because of the outrageous stench thrown up in excess by that deep abyss, we drew back till we were behind the lid of a great tomb on which I made out this inscribed. I hold Pope Anastasia enticed to leave the true path by Fotinis.
It would be better to delay desens so that our senses may grow somewhat used to this foul stench and then we can ignore it. So said my master, and I answered him, do find some compensation lest this time be lost. And he, you see, I've thought of that, my son. Within this ring of broken rocks, he then began, there are three smaller circles like those that you're leaving, they range down. Those circles are all full of cursed spirits so that your seeing of them may suffice.
Learn how. Learn now the how and why of their confinement. A very malice that earns hate in heaven. Injustice is the end. And each such end by force or fraud brings harm to other men.
However, fraud is man's peculiar vice. God finds it more displeasing and therefore the fraudulent or lower suffering more.
Okay. Okay, so they're descending down to hell and uh they will first enter the
62:32circle of violence and there are three different types of violence. Okay, violence against others, violence against yourself, suicide, and violence against God. Okay, that's the uh circle of violence. And then they'll go even further down to the circle of fraud. Okay, so uh what Virgil tells Dante is that fraud is worse than violence.
Can someone guess why that'd be the case? Why would in Dante's framework fraud is worse than violence? Like violence is like you kill someone, right? But what's fraud? Fraud is just you lie to someone.
What? What? Why is that different? Yes. Because fraud impacts the imagination of someone and you like like destroy a part of their reality for like to something that's not even true.
So when you when you kill someone, they're dead. But when you when you like lie to someone, you kill their perception of reality, which is even worse because they can't experience life as it is, but
they like [clears throat] have to live up to a lie.
Exactly. Exactly correct. Yes. Okay. So did did you want to add add to that or
Okay. All right. So again, the filler, right? Donnie wants us to live a life of faith, hope, and love. But for that to happen, you have to have faith.
But if people are lying to you all the time, right? Or people are cheating you all the time, that makes you question reality itself. That that that makes you question your own faith. And so that's problematic. Okay?
Whereas if someone does violence to you, it's like, well, you know, the guy's an or whatever. Okay? Okay. Let's let's keep on going.
Line [snorts] 28. The violent take all of the first circle, but since one uses force against three persons, that circle's built of three divided rings. To God and to oneself and to one's neighbor, I mean, to them or what is theirs, one can do
64:32violence, as you shall now hear clearly. Violent death and painful wounds may be inflicted on one's neighbor. His possessions may suffer ruin, fire, and extortion. Thus, murderers and those who strike and malice, as well as plunderers and robbers. These in separated ranks the first ring racks.
A man can set violent hands against himself or his belongings. So within the second ring repents, though uselessly whoever would deny himself your world, gambling away, wasting his patrimony and weeping where he should instead be hap be happy. One can be violent against the godhead one's heart denying basing him and scorning nature and be good and the good in her. So with it with with sign the smallest ring has sealed both Sodom and Cahords and all those who speak in passionate contempt of God. Now fraud that eats away at every conscience is practiced by a man against another who trusts in him or one who has no trust.
This latter way seems only to cut off the bond of love that nature forges. Thus nestled within the second circle.
Okay. So again here explains it right. The problem with fraud is it destroys people's capacity to trust. Without trust, there can be no love. Okay?
That's why it's worse than violence. Okay. Uh keep on going. Line 58. Hypocrisy and flattery, sorcerers and falsifier, sime and theft and bariters and panders and like trash.
And in the former way of fraud, not only the love that nature forges is forgotten, but added love that builds a special trust. Thus in the tightest circle where there is the universe's center seat of this, all traitors are consumed eternally. Master, your reasoning is clear indeed. I said, it has made plain for me the nature of this pit and the population in it. But tell me, those the dense marsh holds, or those driven before the wind, or those on whom rain falls, or those who clash with such harsh tongues, why
66:33are they not all punished in the city of flaming red? If God is angry with them, and if he's not, why then are they tormented?
Right. So, okay. So, the last three major circles are fraud, uh, sorry, violence, fraud, and treachery. Why is treachery the worst possible sin? Uh yes,
because uh societywide uh treachery will have knock on effects because if you're treacherous to someone else, then they're more likely to do it to someone else and
Exactly.
destroy society.
Exactly. That's the idea, right? Where love is a virtuous circle, but treachery is a vicious circle. If you're betrayed by someone else, your first instinct is you betray another person, right? It's a chain of events.
That's why treachery is the worst possible because it is altering the very fabric of reality itself. Okay? Fraud distorts your perception of reality. It it makes you misperceive reality, but treachery makes you want to shape reality against God. And that's why it's the worst possible sin.
Okay? Does that make sense? All right. Let's let's see where we're going. [snorts]
Line 76. And then to me, why does your reason wander so far from its accustomed course? He said, or of what other things are you now thinking? Have you forgotten then the words with which your ethics treats of those three dispositions that strikes at heaven's will? Incontinence of malice and mad beiality, and how the fault that is the least condemned and least offense God is incontinence.
If you consider carefully this judgment and call to mind the souls of upper hell who bear their penalties outside the city, you'll see why they have been set off from these unrighteous ones and why when heaven mentions hammers at them, it carries lesser anger.
Okay, so Don is asking like why is hell partitioned in this way? And uh Virgil says well because of incontinence,
68:34malice and madiality. Okay, incontinence is basically you're not taking yourself seriously. You lack will, right? That's why um lust and uh wrath and greed and gluttony are outside of the capital city. Okay?
They're not that serious. You're just doing harm to yourself. Whereas uh if you go to if we go go into this and you see heresy and fraud, it's malice to other people. Okay? That's why they have to be punished separately.
Okay? Let's keep on going.
91. Oh son that heals all sight that is perplexed. When I ask you your answer so contents that doubting pleases me as much as knowing. Go back a little to that point I said where you told me that usery offense divine goodness unravel now that not philosophy for one who understands points out and not just in one place he said how nature follows as she takes her course the divine intellect and divine art. If you read your and if you read your physics carefully, not many pages from the start, you'll see that when it can, your art will follow nature.
Just as a pupil imitates his master, so that your art is almost God's grandchild. From these two art and nature, it is fitting, if you recall, how Genesis begins for men to make their way to gain their living. And since the user prefers another pathway, he scorns both nature and herself and art her follower. His hope is elsewhere. But follow me for it is time to move.
The fishes glitter now on the horizon. All the way is spread out over a chorus. Only beyond can one climb down the cliff.
Why are money money lenders punished? Why are usurers punished? Why are bankers punished? And and Donnie comes from a banking family by the way, right? His father was a money lender.
Why are what's the problem with with users? Yes. Um maybe because fraud because the banker always try to keep telling lie.
70:34No no it's not fraud it's something else. What what is it?
I think in the Bible it was a sin to lend money and everything because it doesn't produce any actual good. It's like using money to make money. So you don't actually pay or work hard you know to earn your money.
Right. Exactly. Okay. So do you understand this idea right? Faith, hope and love is that you are part of the creation process.
You are a co-creator of God. But with money lending you're charging interest. So you are basically exploiting other people's capacity to co-create with God. You're not doing anything. You're just charging interest.
Does that make sense that uh did did Yes. So I I my initial guess was that it was related to like the the Jewish ability to lend money where the Christian had a prohibition against it. But I you just said that Dante's family were money lenders. So, can you reconcile the difference that Dante is now committing his father to hell essentially?
Um, yeah. So, this is like really interesting, right? But if you contrast, uh, if you just look at everyone from Donny's life, okay, the vast majority of them are actually in hell, okay? Some of them in purgatory. There's exactly one, his great-grandfather, who is in heaven.
And that's a great thing about Dante, right? He's like, "Don't think about family. Don't think about friends. Think about God's justice. Think about what God's will is.
Think about things objectively. And if you can go beyond faction, if you go can go beyond family, then God's reasoning will make sense to you." Yes.
I think that's what um Jesus also preached him. Exactly. He told all his disciples that they should all leave their families behind and start a new life where they are not bound to their Yeah.
Right. And like if you think about the greatest act of faith, hope and love at this time in history is to leave your family behind. Right.
72:34Because like at this time the only thing you can depend on is your family, right? So, so, so what both Jesus and Donn are saying is live a life of justice and God will support you. Okay? And that's a life of faith, love, and hope. Okay?
All right. All right. Let's let's keep on going. Count to 12. The place that we had reached for our descent along the bank was alpine.
What reclined upon that bank would too repel all eyes just like the toppled mass of rock that's struck because of earthquake or eroded props the adage on its flank the side of Trent where from the mountain top from which it thrust down to the plane the rock is shattered so that it permits a path for those above. Such was the passage down to that ravine and the edge of above the cracked abyss. There lay outstretched the infamy of Cree, conceived within the counterfeited cow, and catching sight of us, he bit himself like one whom fury devastates within. Turning to him, my sage cried out, "Perhaps you think this is the Duke of Athens here, who in the world above brought you, oh your death. Be off, you beast.
This man who comes has not been tutored by your sister. All he wants is coming here is to observe your torment." So this is the the monitor and of course the person who kills the monitor is Thesius who becomes the first king of of Athens. Okay. Um that that's just a a mythological reference. Uh it doesn't really matter for the story.
Keep on going.
Line 22. Just as the bull that breaks loose from its halter the moment it receives the fatal stroke and cannot run but plunges back and forth. So did I see the minur respond and my alert guide cried, "Run toward the pass. It's better to descend while he's berserk." And so we made our way across that heap of
74:34stones which often moved beneath my feet because my weight was somewhat strange for them. While climbing down, I thought, he said, "You wonder perhaps about that fallen mass washed over by the inhuman rage I have just quenched. Now I would have you know the other time that as I descended into lower hell, this mass of boulders had not yet collapsed. But if I reason rightly, it was just before the coming of the one who took from this the highest circle of splendid spoils that on all sides the steep and filthy valley had trembled so I thought the universe felt love by which as some believe the world has often been converted into chaos and at that moment here as well as elsewhere these ancient boulders toppled in this way. But fix your eyes below upon the valley for now we're near the stream of blood where those who endure others violently boil.
Oh, blind cupidity and insane anger which goed us on so much in our short life, then steep us in such grief eternally. I saw a broad ditch bent into an arc so that it would it could embrace all of that plain precisely as my guide had said before. Between it and the base of the embankment raised files of centaurs who were armed with arrows as in the world above they used hunt. On seeing his descent, they all rained in, and after they had chosen boughs and shafts, three of their number moved out from their ranks, and still far off, one cried, "What punishment do you approach as you descent the slope, but speak from here? If not, I draw my bow." My master told him, "We shall make reply only to Shiron.
When we reach a side, your hasty will has never served you well." Then he nudged me and said, "That one is Nessus, who died because of lovely Diona, and of himself wrought vengeance for himself." In the middle, gazing at his chest, is mighty Chiron, tutor of Achilles. The third is Fus, he who was so frenzied, and many thousands wheeled around the mo their arrows aimed at any soul that thrusts above the blood more than its guilt a lot. By now we had drawn near those agile
76:34beasts. Jon drew out an arrow with the notch. He part of his beard back upon his jaws. When he uncovered his enormous mouth, he said to his companions, "Have you noticed how he who walks behind moves what he touches?" Dead souls are not accustomed to do that. And my good guide now near the centur's chest, the place where his two natures met, replied, "He indeed alive and so alone and calls to me to show him the dark valley.
Necessity has brought him here, not pleasure. For she he who gave me this new task was one who had just come from singing Hallelujah. He's no robber. I'm not a thief. But by the power that permits my steps to journey on so wild a path, give us one of your band to serve as our companion, and let him show us where to forth the ditch.
And let him bear this man upon his back, for he's no spirit who can fly through air." Then Sheron wheeled about and right and said to Nessus, "Then return and be their guide. If other troops disturb you, fend them off." Now with our faithful escort, we advanced along the blood red boiling ditches banks beside the piercing cries of those who boiled. I saw some who were sunk up to their brows and that huge centur said, "These are the tyrants who plunged their hands in blood and plundering. Here they lament their ruthless crimes. both Alexander and the fierce Dian um Dagius who brought such years of grief to Sicily.
That brow with hair so black as Alino that other there the blonde one is Oito Veste who was indeed undone who was in the world above by his fierce son.
Okay. All right. So um they are in the first um place of violence and these these are people who commit violence against others and for their and so for their sin what's happening is that they bo they are drowning in a boiling uh lake okay and they ever try to get out of it centers come and shoot arrows at them okay that's that's what they've done to other people okay now inside this uh boiling lake is Alexand the
78:37great What's problematic about this? Why why this be paradoxical? [clears throat] What's the paradox here? When you think of a great, who else do you think of?
Genghask Khan.
Genghask Khan. Who else?
Napoleon.
Napoleon. Who else?
Okay, guys. Guys, this is year 1300. Okay, so unless I go too far, they don't even know who Gangaskhan is at at this time. Okay. But I'm saying like in the year 1300, if you think of Alexander the Great, who do you think of?
Caesar.
Julius Caesar, right? Where's Julius Caesar? He's in limbo. I don't understand what's going on here. Where's Alexander the Great in the circle of violence, but Julius Caesar is in limbo.
They did the same thing, right? They're both great conquerors. They killed a lot of people for their own personal glory. Why would the great be in here the circle of violence and the Julius Caesar is like in limbo? Why would that happen?
Yes. I mean my guess is like if Dante has Virgil as his guide, Virgil cannot like see Caesar in heaven because Virgil was appointed by Augustus um the adopted son of Julius Caesar to write the Inad. Right. So like if he like sees Julius Caesar in in the like one of the worst circles and that be like pretty problematic.
Exactly. Okay. Yeah. Right. Because if Virgil um is the great poet and we will learn in paradise that the Roman Empire is what gives rise to Catholic Church and is part of God's will.
Yeah. Then it makes sense put Julius Caesar in um limbo. But this raises another question. Where's Augustus Caesar? Okay.
We we ask Chhat BT. Let's let's ask Chacht. All right.
80:37Just just just just just Google this. Like where is Augusta Caesar in the Divine Comedy? Oh, wait, wait. Sorry. Before Before we we do this, can you guess where where he'd be?
Yes. Not lower, right? Because who's more important, Julius Caesar, or Augustus Caesar? I would think Augustus Caesar because Augustus Caesar is the one who who create the Roman Empire, right? Which then becomes a Catholic church.
So where should he be? At least purgatory, at least limbo, possibly even paradise, right? But let's let's figure this out. Okay, again, logically speaking, we just extend extend your logic, right? He should be somewhere nice, whether it's limbo or purgatory or even paradise.
Where where is where but where's Argus Caesar located in divine comedy. Does he appear? August Caesar is one of the most important historical figures, right? The greatest emperor of Rome, the man who created the Roman Empire. Where is he?
I think he's in limbo.
No, no, no, no. I'm asking you where in the divine comedy is. If we're looking for divine comedy, where can we find our guesses Caesar?
Uh, in uh KTO one, I think.
82:39Does it? No, I'm saying physically like where where is he situated? Where to say purgatory? We see Julius Caesar in limbo. We know he's there.
We see Socrates in limbo. We know he's there. We see a great being burned alive in the circle of violence. We know he is there. But where is Argis Caesar physically in Divine Comedy?
He's nowhere guys. He does not exist physically in the nine comedy but he does he is referenced in the nine comedy by who?
Virgil is what keeps the memory of Caesar alive. But August Caesar has disappeared right so this is a huge problem. We know Alexander the great because uh it's written here he is burned in circle of violence. We know Julius Caesar is in limbo. We don't know where Garza Caesar is.
And the only time August Caesar is mentioned, it's because Virgil speaks him out. Right? It's only Virgil that's keeping keeping alive the man of Augusta Caesar. [laughter] This is very confusing, right? Okay.
So again, it's meant So the subversive comedy first and foremost, it's meant to be subversive. It's meant to undermine our traditional understanding all things. Okay. So do you think how do you think Donnie feels about Augusta Caesar? Well, just can you explain?
84:40Conflicted. The only reason I can think of that he's not there other than when Virgil mentions him is Dante cannot decide where to place him.
Yes. I mean [clears throat] during Augustus Jesus was killed.
Yes. Was it Augustus? No, it was not Augustus. It was Tiberius.
Oh, was it not Dorian?
Yeah, it was Tiberious.
Oh, okay.
Yeah. But but it was during Augustus that Ces that Jesus was born, right? And what the Catholic Church teaches you is that without the without Augustus um then Jesus could not have been born and the way could have been paid for the for Christianity to arise. Okay. So Jesus was killed during T Jesus was killed during Tiberius and um Jesus was born during Augustus.
Okay.
Yes.
I think like Dante naturally don't like uh Augustus cuz it's uh cuz August is the one who ordered Virgil to write the Ania, right? and is also August the one who promotes piety which is what Dante like disagree with
right so uh [clears throat] so the greatest um act of faith love and hope is poetry right Virgil is a divine po prophet divine poet that's how he's able to do this because God willed it so August Caesar what he did was he took this gift of poetry which is divine. He corrupted it to serve the ends of empire. And that's why Augustus is not mentioned or sorry he's not he's mentioned but he's not he's not given a place in the divine comedy because what Donnie has done is he has he has a he has basically cast him to to a place worse than hell
86:42which is annihilation. Okay. He is beyond the universe. God has forgotten him. God has cast him away from this universe.
There can be absolutely no redemption for him. Okay? God wants to forget about him because his crime was so great. It is the greatest crime in the world to try to corrupt the message of God to serve your own political ends. Does it make sense, guys?
Because like again you have to explain to me where Augustus is. He's not in Divine Comedy and he is one of the most important historical figures ever in in history. Yes.
But isn't Virgil then like a I mean he's part of this, right? Because he wrote it down like he could refuse to write down this poetry that goes against God. So I mean
Right. And that's why Virgil is in hell, right?
But he's only in limbo. Um, right. But he's still he's still in in hell, right? Okay. And and also like remember what Don is trying to do is he's trying to awaken the reader.
You understand? Because at this time in history, everyone is reading uh the Iniad. Everyone loves the Iniad because, you know, you're sort of forced to love the Iniad. And so he needs to take you away from the Iniad. It has to be a process of slow discovery, okay?
An epiphany where Virgil is probably the villain here, okay? And and as we go on, we'll we'll we'll recognize this, but not at this stage. Okay? Does that make sense? It's a journey.
Okay? It's not only Darn's journey from sin into virtue, but it's also our journey from ignorance into the light. Okay? All right. Does it make sense, guys?
All right. Let let let's let's keep on going.
88:42Line 115. A little farther on, the centaur stopped above a group that seemed to rise above the boiling blood as far up as their throats. He pointed out one shade alone apart and said, "Within God's bosom. He impaled the heart that still drips blood upon the temps. Then I got caught sight of some who kept their heads and even their full chests above the tide.
Among them many whom I recognized, and so the blood grew, always sat shallower until it only scorched the feet. And he here we found a place where we could forge a ditch. Forge a ditch. The ditch. Just as you see that on this side the brook continually thins.
The centaur said, "So I should have you know the rivlet along the other side will slowly deepen its bed until it reaches once again the depth where tyranny must make lament. And there divine justice torments Aillaa D who was such a scourge upon the earth and purext to eternity. It melts the tears that boiling broken locks from Reneer of Cornetto, Reneer Po, those two who waged such war plung the high roads. Then he turned around and crossed the fort again.
Okay. Cont. Nessus had not yet reached the other bank when we began to make our way across a wood on which no path had left its mark. No green leaves in that forest, only black. No branches straight and smooth but not at gnarled.
No fruits were there but breers bearing poison. Even those savage beasts that roam between Suchina and Cornetto. Beasts that hate tilled lands do not have ps and dense. This the nesting place of the foul harpies who chase the Trojans from the states um states with sad foretelling of their future trials. Their wings are wide, their necks and faces human.
Their feet are talent, their great bellies
90:42feathered. They utter their laments on the strange trees. And my can and my kind master then instructed me, before you enter farther, know that now you're within the second ring and shall be here until you reach the horde sand. Therefore, look carefully. You'll see such things as would deprive my speech of all belief.
From every side I heard the sound of cries, but I could not see any source for them. So that in my bewilderment I stopped. I think that he was thinking that I thought so many voices moaned among those trunks from people who had been concealed from us. Therefore my master said, "If you would tear a little twig from many of these plants, the thoughts you have will also be cut off." Then I stretch out my hand a little way and from a great thorn bush snapped off a branch at which its trunk cried out, "Why do you tear me?" And then, when it had grown more dark with blooded asked again, "Why do you break me off? Are you without all sentiment of pity?
We once were men and now are aid stumps. Your hand might well have shown us greater mercy had we been nothing more than souls of serpents." As from a sapling log that catches fire along one of its ends, while at the other it drips and hisses with escaping vapor, so from that broken stump issued together both words and blood at which I let the branch fall, and I stood like one who's afraid. My sage said, "Winded soul, if earlier he had been able to believe what he had only glimpsed within my poetry, then he would not have set his hand against you. But its incredibility made me urge him to do a deed that graced me deeply. But tell me who you were so that he may to make amends refresh your fame within the world above where he can still return.
To which the trunk your sweet speech draws me so that I cannot be still and may not oppress you if I linger now in talk. I'm the one who guarded both the keys of Frederick's heart and turned them locking and unlocking them with such dexterity that none but I could share his confidence. And I was faithful to my splendid office, so faithful that
92:43I lost both sleep and strength. The who never turned her harlot's eyes away from Caesar's dwelling, she who is the death of all and vice of every court, inflamed the minds of everyone against me, and those inflamed, then so inflamed austed that my delight honors turned to sadness. My mind, because of its sustainable temper, believing it could flee disdain through death, made me unjust against my own just self. I swear to you, by the peculiar roots of this thorn bush, I never broke my faith with him who was so worthy with my lord. If one of you returns into the world, then let him help my memory which still lies prone beneath the battering of envy.
Okay, so now we are in a forest and these are people who have killed themselves. They commit suicide. They've committed no other sin but suicide. Okay. And what's happened is they've been transformed into trees.
So they don't take their bodies seriously. So now their bodies are now just trees. And what happens is that the harpies come and uh eat the berries that they grow. Okay? They feel this eternal torment.
Um and then Donnie talks to one of these trees and um this person is a person that Donnie knows as well and he's a historical character and he was a counselor to a king who was accused of treason. He was virtuous. He was talented, but uh once he was accused of treason, um he was innocent of treason, but he kills himself in despair. Okay? Why would this be a problem?
Why would this be a sin? Why is suicide a sin?
Yes.
So firstly, you're abandoning all of faith, hope, and love. Uh and secondly, similarly to treachery, I think uh societywide, it damages other people and could therefore affect other people's potential to love and connect in the future.
Exactly. That's exactly correct. Yes.
94:43First of all, you are supposed to live live a life of faith, hope, and and love. And this is the opposite, right? Where you just don't believe in God anymore. It's basically rejecting God and says, you know, like this is so hopeless. Even God can't save me.
Okay. The other thing is like you become a bad role model to other people as well. You show that you uh who is a very virtuous talented person you of all people should have faith hope and love and by abandoning yourself you abandon God and you abandon society as well. Okay. All right.
So thank you. Excellent.
All right. Let's keep on going. My mind because of its distainable temper, believing it could flee disdain through death, made me unjust against my own just self. I swear to you, by the peculiar roots of this thorn bush and never broke my faith with him who was so worthy with my lord. If one of you returns into the world, then let him help my memory which still lies prone beneath the battering of envy.
The poet waited briefly. Then he said to me, since he's silent, do not lose this chance, but speak and ask what you would know. and I do you continue ask of him whatever you believe I should request I cannot so much pity takes my heart then he began again imprisoned spirit so may this man do freely what you ask may it please you to tell us something more of how the soul is bound into these knots and tell us if you can if anyone can ever find his freedom from these limbs at this the trunk breathed violently then that wind became this voice you shall be answered promptly when the spa savage spirit quits the body from in which it has torn itself. That minnow sends it to the seventh mo. It falls into the wood and there's no place to which it is allotted.
But wherever fortune has swung that soul that is the space where even as a grain of spelt it sprouts. It rises as a sapling a wild plant and then the harpies feeding on its leaves cause pain and for that pain provide a vent. Like other souls we shall seek out the flesh that we have left but none of us shall wear it. It is not right for any man to have what he himself has cast aside. We'll drag our
96:45bodies here. They'll hang in the sad wood, each on the stump of its vindictive shade. And we were still intent upon the trunk, believing it had wanted to say more when we were overtaken by a roar. Just as the hunter is aware of chase and bore as they draw near his post, he hears the beast and then the branches as they crack. And there upon the left were two who scratched and naked, led so violently that they tore away each forest bow they passed.
The one in front, "Now come death, quickly come." The other shade, who thought himself as though was shouting after him, "Lano, your legs were not so nimble at the joust of Topo." And then, perhaps, because he he'd lost his breath, he fell into one tangle with a bush. Behind these two black filled the wood, and they were just as eager and as swift as grey hounds that have been let off their leash. They set their teeth in him where he had crouched, and piece by piece those dogs dismembered him and carried off his miserable limbs. Then he who was my escort took my hand. He led me to the lacerated thorn that wept in vain where it was bleeding, broken.
Oh, Yakapo, it said it said the Santo Andrea, what have you gained by using me a screen? Am I to blame for your indecent life? When my good master stood beside that bush, he said, "Who are you who through many wounds must breathe with blood your melancholy words?" And he to us, "Of spirits who have come to witness the outrageous laceration that leaves so many of my branches torn, collect them at the foot of the sad thorn. My home was in the city whose first patron gave away to John the Baptist. For this reason, he'll always use his art to make it sorrow.
And if along the crossing of the Arno, some effigy of Mars had not remained, the citizens who afterward rebuilt their city on the ashes that till I had left them left to them would have travailed in vain. I made of my own house my gallows place.
Okay, let's move on to count of 14. I'm sorry we went too fast. Okay, but again, um we're trying to finish the line comedy and we're trying to develop the major themes of it. Okay, so um the next
98:47few contos are extremely important. Uh, and here again we're trying to figure out what is wrong with Florence. Okay. Um,
KTO 14. Love of our native city overcame me. I gathered up the scattered boughs and gave them back to him whose voice was spent already. From there we reached the boundary that devised the second from the third ring and the sight of a dread work that justice had devised. To make these strange things clear, I must explain that we had come upon an upon an open plane that banished all green things from its bed.
The wood of sorrow was a garland around it, just as that wood is ringed by a sad channel. Here at the very edge we stayed our steps. The ground was made of sand, dry and compact. A sand not different in kind from that on which the feet of Ko had once tramped. Oh vengeance of the Lord, how you should be dreaded by everyone who now can read whatever was made manifest to me.
I saw so many flocks of naked souls all weeping miserably and it seemed that they were ruled by different decrees. Some lay upon the ground flat on their backs. Some huddled in a crouch and there they sat and others moved about incessantly. The largest group was those who walked about. The smallest those supine in punishment, but these had loose their tongues to tell their torment.
Above that plain of sand, the stended flakes of fire showered down. Their fall was slow as snow descends on Alps when no wind blows. Just like the flames that Alexander saw in India's hot zones where fire when fires fell intact into the ground on his battalions for which wisely he had his soldiers the soil to see that every fire was bent before new flames were added to the old. So did the neverending heat descend. With this the sand was kindled just as tinder on meeting flint will flame doubling the pain.
The dance of wretched hands was never done. Now here, now there they tried to beat aside the fresh flames as they fell. And it began to speak. My master, are you who can defeat all things except for those tenacious demons who tried to block us at the entryway? Who that giant
100:48there who does not seem to heed singing? He who lies in scorns and scowls. He whom the rains can't seem to soften. And he himself on noticing that I was quering my guide about him cried that which I was in life. I am in death through hov where out the smith from whom he took and wrath the keenedged thunderbolt with it with which on my last day I was to be transfixed.
And if he tire the others one by one in Montibello at the study forge while bellowing, oh help good Vulcan help, just as he did when there was war at Flegra and cast his shafts at me with all his force. Not even then would he have happy vengeance. Then did my guide speak with such vehements that I had never heard him use before. Oh, Capanas, for your arrogance that is not quenched, you're punished all the more. No torture other than your own madness could offer pain enough to match your wrath.
But then, with gentler face, he turned to me and said, "That man was one of seven kings besieging thieves. He held and still, it seems, hold God in great disdain, despising him. But as I told him now, his malad addiction stood well as honor ornaments upon his chest. And now follow me and take care. Do not set your feet upon the sand that's burning hot, but always keep them back close to the forest.
In silence we had reached a place where flowed a slender water course out of the wood. A stream whose redness makes me shudder still. As from bullet came pours a brook whose waters then are shared by prostitutes. So did the stream run down across the sand. Its bed and both its banks were made of stone together with the slopes along its shores, so that I saw a passageway lay there.
Among all other things that I have shown you since we first made our way across the gate, whose thresholds were forbidden to no one, no thing has yet been witnessed by your eyes, as notable as this red trivial, which quenches every flame that burns above it. These words were spoken by my guide. At this I
102:49begged him to bestow the food for which he had already given me the craving. A devastated land lies in midsea. A land that is called cit. He answered me. Under its king the world once lived chastely.
Within that land there was a mountain blessed with leaves and waters. And they called it Ida. But it is withered now like some old thing. It once was chosen as a trusted gradel for Ria for her son. To hide him better when he cried out.
She had her servants clamor. Within the mountain is a huge old man who stands erect. His back turned toward damiata and looks at Rome as if it were his mirror. The old man's head is fashioned of fine gold. The pure silver forms his arms and chest, but he is made of brass down to the cleft.
Below that point, he's of choiceless iron except for his right foot made of baked clay, and he rests more on this than on the left. Each part of him except the gold is cracked, and down that fissure there are tears that drip. When gathered, they pierce through that caverns for and crossing rocks into this valley from Acron and sticks to Flagthon. And then they make their way down this tight channel. And at the point past which there's no descent, they form Coxitus.
Since you're to see what that pool is, I'll not describe it here. And I asked him, but if the Rivlet must follow such a course down from our world, why can we see it only at its boundary? And he to me, you know this place is round, and though the way that you have come is long and always toward the left and toward the bottom, you still have not completed all the circles, so that if something new appears to us, it need not bring such wonder to your face. And I again, Master, where's Flesh Thawn, and where's Leaf? You omit the second, and say this rain of tears has formed the first.
I'm pleased indeed, he said, with all your questions. Yet one of them might well have found its answer already when you saw the red stream boiling. You shall see. But past this abyss there
104:51where the spirits go to cleanse themselves where their repentant guilt is set aside. Then he declared, "The time has come to quit this wood. See that you follow close behind me. These margins form a path that does not scorch and over them all flaming vapor is quenched."
Okay. All right. So two comments. Okay. The first comment is that clearly the geography of hell really matters.
Okay, if Donnie is going to spend a lot of time describing how these rivers glow, um how hell is constructed the way it is, then it clearly matters. But again, I don't have the knowledge of the occult, of rituals, of magic to fully appreciate why this matters. Okay, clearly if you visualize this, there is symbology at work, right? Um um at this time in history, it's very common for people to engage in magic, basically using symbols, using chants, using rituals in order to summon angels, to summon demons. Um, and if you were to again draw this out, um, if you were actually to act this out, then it's all then that gives you insight into how these things work.
Uh, but again, I'm not I I don't have any expertise in symbology, in the occult, in magic. I I don't I don't know to comment. Okay? So, if you really want to understand Dante, then you then you need to do a lot more research into the occult. That's point one.
Point two is what is strange about this KTO is for the first time we are meeting a nonhuman who's being punished. Right? Throughout the inferno, we met humans. And they could be myth mythological or real, but they're being punished. And for the first time, we are meeting a non-human, a giant who's being punished.
And how and what is his reaction to being punished? And and in this and in this pun and then in this it's uh violence against God. Everyone's running. There's
106:52like um fire uh and brimstone being held being being rained down on them. Okay. So, they're trying to dodge all these missiles. And how and how does does this giant feel about all this? Anyone?
What is his reaction?
He's crying.
He's not crying.
He's happy, right? Or rather, he's trying to appear chill.
Yeah. He doesn't care, right? So, so what's the message here? You have a giant who's like, "Ah, whatever, man." Like, missiles are being uh rained on me. I don't care.
Who cares? And the other humans and the others are like dodging. the humans are dodging or running away. Um, what's going on here? And again, this is the only time when we have a nonhuman human being punished and the entire scene is like he's this is complete apathy and Virgil says, "Oh, you're so arrogant." What's the message here?
Uh yes,
I just guessed maybe the great men they they want the people who care about them but uh Ding do not care about him. It means that they're nothing. So maybe this punishment for those great guy who saying they're great but actually they're not.
Yes. Yes. Um maybe because hell should only impact humans. Um you know because the human is seen or Dant sees the human as the um middle of the universe basically the Yeah. So God doesn't really care about giants.
He cares about humans more.
So what is the function of hell? Why does hell exist? to force reflection.
Yes. Okay. So, what's going on here is
108:55if you just analyze the text, what what is suggesting is that only we humans can be punished because only we humans can create our own path to redemption. Okay? Does that make sense? The giant will not be redeemed. He doesn't really care, right?
But we we we are being punished because at the very heart of who we are, we are divine spark that can never be extinguished. So even though it feels hopeless, even though you give up hope, there's still that spark in you. And that's why you're being punished to force reflection, to force you to recognize the divine spark in you. That's why the punishments are constructed the way they are to show you what your sin has caused to show you to visualize the sin for you. Okay.
All right. And again, um, when Virgil talks to these people, when when what they always say is talk to Dante so that he will write about you, so that he will be remembered. Okay? And so even though you think you are in hell, remember there are still people who remember who you are. And that is your path to redemption, right?
The fact that regardless of how low you've sunk, remember there's still people who remember you. there's still people who love you. Once you believe that, that is your path to redemption and salvation. Okay? So, for Donnie, what's really important to understand is that we're our own redemption and salvation.
Okay. Any more any questions or comments? All right. Let's let's let's move on. Okay.
This is Kanto. This is KTO 15 of Inferno. KTO 15. Now one of the hard borders bears us forward. The river mist forms shadows
110:56overhead and shields the shores and water from the fire.
Just as between Wist and Bruge, the Flemings in terror of the tide that floods toward them. Have built a wall dyes daunt the sea. And as the paduans along the Brena built bull works to defend their towns and castles before the dark days fall on Carantana just so were these embankments even though they were not built so high not so broad whoever was the artisan who made them.
Okay. So here in these in these um lines what Don is revealing is that the geography of hell matches that of the geography of Italy. Okay. Right. So, so this is clearly he's trying to say that this hell that that I that I am describing to you, I'm actually describing Italy at this point in history.
Okay. Uh, keep on going.
By now, we were so distant from the wood that I should not have made out where it was, not even if I turned around to look. When we came on, a company of spirits who made their way along the bank, and each stared steadily at us, as in the dusk, beneath the new moon, men look at each other. They need their they knit their brows and squinted at us, just as an old tor at his needle's eye. And when that family looked harder, I was recognized by one, who took me by the hem, and cried out, "This is marvelous." That spirit having stretched his arm toward me, I fixed my eyes upon his big brown feature, so that the scorching of his face could not prevent my mind from recognizing him. And lowering my face to meet his face, I answered him, "Are you here, Sarah Brunetto?" And he, "My son, do not mind if Bernetto Latino langers for a while with you and let the file lets the file he's with pass on ahead."
Okay. Okay. So, this is a very important passage in the Vancouver. Okay. So, let me explain what's going on.
They are in um the circle of violence and these are this is like the worst people. These are people who committed violence against God and nature. Okay. And so the main
112:57crime is homosexuality basically. Salami and Sir Bernto is very important because he's essentially Dante's teacher and father. Okay. This is a person that is dear to Donniey's heart. Only Beatrice is actually more dear to Dante than Sir Bernato.
And you can see in their words how affectionate they are towards each other. So Sir Bernetto, he uh is a homosexual. He's condemned to the circle and he's running with other homosexuals in the circle. And the thing is, if you stop, if you ever lie down, you rest, you're condemned even more. Okay?
So, what he's saying is like, Dante, I love you so much. I'm going to stop and be punished even more so I can talk to you. Right? So, this is showing the affection between Sranetto and Dante. But this raises a really huge problem for us.
Does Dante really think homosexuality is a problem? It's a sin, right? This is Does really believe this? So again, this is Serenetto, the person that Donnie loves uh like a father and superto loves him like a son. And they've they've always been very close.
And you would imagine that Dante would put him in either purgatory or in paradise. And he doesn't do that. He puts him in inferno. But not only that, but he puts but Subetto was a virtuous person who who really only who only did one thing which is like he was a homosexual. That was that was it.
Okay, that that was the extent of his sin. And for that and for
114:58that only he's condemned to run around with other homosexuals for all of eternity. Okay, this is a huge paradox. Uh yes.
I think it's because homosexuality cannot bear children. And so in that sense, you don't have the hope for the future because you don't have a future generation to remember you or to contribute to the creation of God. And so that's why sodomy is such a big sin.
Okay. And so how how would you compensate for that? What did he do to compensate for the fact that they didn't have children? What did he do to show that he had faith, hope, and love? Yes.
through education.
Excuse me.
Through education.
Through education. What? And what else?
Can you guess his guess?
Well, he he taught Dante, right? So,
what did he teach Dante?
Faith, hope, and loss. I don't
like what was he teaching her off? Did like like at this time in history? Huh?
Well, maybe poetry.
Yeah. Yeah. Right. He was a poet, right? So, yeah.
Okay. I understand. He doesn't want to have children and that shows his lack of faith, love, and hope. But we already said that poetry is always an expression of faith, love, and hope. Yes.
Well, I think him being in hell just shows that it isn't Dante who puts him in hell, but it's the Catholic Church, and the Catholic Church says that homosexuality is a big sin. But Dante wouldn't say that. So, it's not him who puts people in hell, right? It's the Catholic Church. But it's Donn who put Beatatrice in heaven.
Do you understand? So why would Donnie do that? Why would Donnie put Beatatric in heaven and then put his teacher, his father figure in hell? And again, I mean, the only crime, the only sin that Superto is being accused of is homosexuality. Yeah, he was a homosexual sexuality, but do you really really think Donnie cares that much about
116:58homosexuality?
Yes. just it was a boundary you couldn't cross and disagree with at the time and so just like if he would just mention that homosexuality was fine then his work would have been destroyed.
Do you think homosexuality was common at the time in history?
No, but it it occurred or in some text.
Okay, guys. Okay. I hate to say this. Okay. All right.
I'm sorry. Um this might get me banned on YouTube. Okay. But if you look at every society, okay, regardless if it's in China or Italy at this time, if you look at the elite, okay, I'm talking like like the nobility, the elite, okay? Homosexual homosexual was really really common, guys.
Really common. Okay. You were not finding a society where uh a welfare society where the elite did not practice homosexuality in some form. Yes. And especially during the Henistic period that it is actually a greater uh way to show your intellectual ability to have another male partner than to have a wife because a wife is uneducated.
You cannot have a soul to soul talk with her but you could with a younger boy. And so that's why uh yeah the writer of uh the picture of Dorian Gray um Oscar Wild really wanted that kind of Yeah. because he aspired to the Greek.
So yeah. So [laughter] right actually is very common among elite and uh so what sato did he did nothing wrong but just do what what all all the elite did. Um not all the elite but like it was pretty common man. It was really common. Okay.
Like like if you go to like Yale. Okay. No. Yeah. Like Yeah.
Okay. But yeah, it's a common thing. Okay. And among the elite it's not a big deal. So again, we have to figure out why this is happening.
All right. Okay. All right. So, uh, we'll do that after the break. Okay.
Thank you. [applause]
119:17Uh, I think so. Wait, wait. Do a lot of stupid one minute. Okay. Okay, welcome back.
So, to summarize what we learned um this morning, remember that Dante is a prophet. He's basically trying to create an allegory of hell um to represent Italy, right? That's why he's focused so much on the geography of um hell. He's describing a way that if you are Italian, you you just you just like recognize the geography right away. Um so hell as as a allegory for uh Italy.
And we know that ultimately as a prophet what Don is trying to convey to his um audience is that you either repent or you will be judged. Judge judgment judge God's judgment will
121:18be swift and harsh and no one listens. So 19 in 1357 came the came the black death to wipe out around a third of Europe uh even half of Europe at certain places. Um [snorts] and so what what what we're trying to do is we're trying to figure out how Dante perceived his period at this time. And um there's certain things about Florence that made it unredeemable. Okay.
And what we're trying to figure figure out as well is our time. Okay. Like today, do these things apply to today? So the first major characteristic about um hell is it's factionalism, right? So whereas you know Virgil is essentially the pope of hell he is the author a authority figure there are many factions who don't actually listen to him there always infighting going on so there's lot of factionism going on uh in Florence at this time and the same is happening today right where you have wars going on right second major characteristic of Florence is the intense economic pressure to succeed right all that matters is success and achieve achievement.
And today we call this the uh meritocracy. And in a meritocracy there are certain things that become common and yet at the same time there are inhumane. For example, the most obvious is just to apologize, right? So remember the scene where um Dante lies to Kavakante and says your son is dead and burning in hell. and he and it causes tremendous despair to the father and Don recognizes he did wrong and rather than apologize he runs away and tells someone else to tell him on his behalf.
Okay. So there
123:19is um almost incapacity to apologize. So let me ask you this question. Let's go back to the example where at Shinua in the 80s or 90s um there are two classmates who are good friends, one gets in, the other receives the envelope and rather than tell the friend just throws the envelope in the garbage. Um and do you think the other person ever apologize in her life? Probably not.
Okay, I'm guessing not. But why why why can't she just apologize?
Yes.
Cuz uh she probably has a huge ego and she feel like she's she's um superior. She she she should should be treated as equal to the other person and she justifies what what the her did. Yes.
Okay. Yes. Yes. Go ahead. I mean, if she apologized, then the other girl would know that she would have gotten into Princeton in the first place.
Well, well, eventually she found out, right? Because this I'm I'm like, you know, 20 years afterwards, 50 years afterwards, did she ever apologize? Probably not. But why?
Yes. Is like she she knows what she has done is not it's evil, it's not good. And it kind of like she's saying like, "Oh, I know it's bad,
but it was evil, right?"
Yeah. But if she doesn't apologize, it probably makes her feel better or like I don't know.
Well, go ahead. And then then Carol. Yeah.
Um maybe he can't maybe she can't forgive herself
so she can't uh forgive uh so she can't uh say sorry to her roommate.
Okay. Uh, Carol,
I think she feels she's wronged in the first place, so why does she have to
125:19apologize? She was wronged by the world.
Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So, the thing about um I mean the meritocracy is that first of all, you become the center of the world, right? But also like you're keeping score everywhere.
Does it make sense? So, not only do you care about that other person's grades, but you also care about hm does that person have a better house than I than I than I do? Does a person have better children than I do? You're always keeping score, right? And one way to keep score is how how much wrong did you do, right?
Everything is is a test. Everything is a scorec card, right? So, if I apologize, that means I I'm I'm now in this person's debt. I now owe him or her a favor, right? Rather than seeing an apology as rectifying a wrong, I see it as forcing myself to go into someone's debt.
Okay? It doesn't make sense. Okay? And that's why people don't apologize in a very um in a meritocracy. But the other thing that's even more troubling in a meritocracy is and um it's you delight in others pain.
Think about this where you know you are at school and for for the past year you delight in others pain. Okay. So, for the past for this entire year, there's one student in the class, usually a girl, but she scores 100 on every single math test, right? And you get like, I don't know, 80, 85. On the final test, on final exam, she gets an 70.
And she is distraught. She's crying. She She's going berserk. How do you feel? No, you don't.
[laughter]
I put it, you know, empathize.
Maybe she cheated on a previous test.
No, no, but I'm saying what is your emotion?
Oh,
what is your emotion at this time?
127:21Well, I mean, my emotion maybe depends um how it doesn't act.
No, it doesn't. Well, it does doesn't depend who you are. Does depend how you feel. What is your emotion?
I'll be like, finally, finally, finally. Okay. Do you understand? Finally. Okay.
She finally failed, right? But every single day the teacher is like, "Oh, she's the best in the world and like just be like her and then she's finally screwed up." Okay, so you delight in others pain. And we see this in Divine Comedy where Dant is crossing the river sticks, right? And this is the um circle of wrath where people are angry and they tear each other apart. Um one of Dante's enemies from real life, Filipio Argentina, he falls into this lake and and there and the other souls are tearing him apart.
Okay, literally tear him apart. And Dante is ecstatic, right? So rather than be like feel pity like great man. Okay. And you know it's not a good look.
But what Donn is doing is he's trying to reveal the problems and consequences of a meritocracy. What a meritocracy ultimately is. Imagine a race. Okay? Imagine a race and everyone's running as fast as they can.
the person next to you trips and falls and breaks his or her ankle, right? What you should do as a human being is stop and help that person get up. But you don't. You just smile and run on and you take in the light in that other other person falling falling down. And I mean, we live in China, we see this every single day, right?
unfortunately where if you have if you're a parent and you have kids, you put your kids through this incredibly harsh system, right? And you see your child unhappy and you see your child um under a lot of stress and quite honestly a lot of them will develop psychological issues but you keep on going because you f you think that if I fall behind I'm dead. Okay, so
129:22that is the first major issue. But now what Donn is going to do is he's also going to be another issue which is homosexuality. Okay, homosexuality. And this is really confusing for us, right? Because we've all seen Brock Mountain.
Brock Mountain, right? We all know that for the longest time homosexuals were persecuted in society. They had to hide. They their love was forbidden. So, isn't being a homosexual an act of faith, hope, and love?
What does DA have against homosexuals? And you can't be like, well, he's just a product of his times. Because, as we said in this class, we have to assume that Donn is perfect and that he is timeless. Okay? So, what what we need to figure out is what is the problem with homosexuality?
And also, we need to be careful because um if I say anything bad about homosexuality, I'm pretty sure next time I'm I'm at Yale, I'll get stoned to death. Yeah.
So, yes. Yes. You think I'm exaggerating, but I'm not. Yes.
So, I actually had this conversation with my husband about this because I have a lot of gay friends. I think they are the best in the world. And he's like, "Yeah, but there are problems with homosexuality." So, we had this debate. So, if anything I say, it's my husband. Okay?
Don't blame me. Don't stall me. But he said that the actual problem with it is kind of the same as greed and all that other things is that after you go through with all these acts or love or whatever, it brings to no futation of um because what essentially sex is at least the way God intended for Adam and Eve is that you are supposed to be fruitful and multiply and occupy the earth. But if you you are gay or homosexual, then you essentially cannot unless you adopt a kid, right? uh like in modern family uh but then he's saying then you go through all this act and love and you you don't appreciate the other gender which is a
131:23pers different perspective. So if you are gay you like you are man you like the other men then you don't actually understand the women's perspective in the world. So in that way you are in love with your own kind. You're in love with men's perspective and then that way.
Okay that's great. That's brilliant. Thank you so much for sharing that. But let me ask you this question. Okay.
It sounds the way your husband has defined homosexuality. It sounds like um homosexuality, sodomy, belongs in the upper circles like lust and gluttony and wrath because you're not hurting anyone. All you're doing is you are not fulfilling your true potential as a human being. But in this circle, which is a circle of violence, right? The circle of violence, you're hurt, you actually have to hurt someone, right?
So the question then is like how does homosexually actually go about hurting other people?
Uh yes.
Well, it hurts women because it denies femininity in the world in in on earth because
like all all the girls in this class are looking at you like what are you talking about?
Well well because well because it's normal normal.
Yes. in the Christian view
maybe because you know if men fall in for love is men there's no result because there's no no children
the problem with that argument is you're saying that essentially the only purpose of a relationship is reproduction
yeah exactly okay yeah Jay and then Edward
in Dante's time was there a lot of grooming going on like did he I'm just wondering from Dante's perspective what did he see that that made him structure it this way
exactly okay so there must be something about Dante's understanding of homosexuality that made him resent it. Okay. Exactly. And he'll tell us in the next two contours. Uh this is so important to him.
He'll spend the next two contos on it. Uh yes. [clears throat]
Maybe through the historical lens when
133:24it's a man and a woman do it, there's kind of like the ying and yang go together. Whereas when it's two men that uh the act is probably more graphic and more violent because you have two masculine energies,
right? Um okay. Yeah. So yes,
I wonder if it has to do with elite circles where they think two men are superior to women, so they refuse to. So it's kind of almost the same as ego or arrogance that women are inferior. So it's making Eve kind of um the sinful the corrupt weak.
Yes.
Yeah. Very good point. Uh because we see in Paradigio that the upper echelons of heaven were fully occupied by these women and now we're getting into kind of like the depths of hell and then we're seeing
um um think about all these gay men that you've met in your life. What what are they obsessed about?
Uh yes.
Maybe because soulmate because uh if men know more about men
like gay men in their life like what what obsessed about? Yes.
Could be pride.
Excuse me.
Pride. Like
what do you mean by pride?
Like they they want to show they're part of this tribe and they want to like they're proud of it.
Okay. They're proud of being homosexual. Okay. Uh no. Sorry.
Sorry. Let's go by one. Yes. sex.
They they want to have a lot of sex.
Yeah.
Okay. But but what do they do every day? Uh yes,
I'd say they're would they would be obsessed about finding other gay men.
Okay. Yes.
Yeah. Because it's difficult to
No, it's not. It's not to have sex. Okay. You're gay man.
Not in today today's world, but back then probably.
Uh not back then either. Okay. It was actually pretty simple.
Appearance.
Yeah. Yeah. If you meet a lot if you meet gay men, okay, the thing about them is like they're really obsessed with
135:25their parents much more so than women, right? I mean, is is that a general statement?
Have a joke that if you find a guy extremely hot and sexy, chances are he's gay because they they care about appearance more than straight men.
And and and so
this is like the same argument. Is he gay or is he just European? Like like caring about Caring about your appearance is not something that you can just define as inherently gay. I don't think there's a logical correlation between that.
When you hear too much about your parents
and all you care about your your parents, what word would we have to describe you?
Narcissist.
Yeah. Narcissist. You understand? Remember narcissist.
Narcissist, right? The Greek legend of this man so in love with himself, he looks at himself every single day. Okay, that gives you a clue as to what the issue of homosexuality is. You're just looking at yourself every single day. And so like when you actually meet someone like what are you looking for in that person?
Yourself, right? Okay. So, so that's Johnny's problem. Okay. But, but if that's by itself, then the question then is why is he in the circle of violence?
Because you're not actually hurting anyone. You're just you're just like being narcissistic, right? Okay. All right. No, no.
I Okay. Like like like that's a question we want to answer. Okay. But but yeah. Um Okay.
Let's keep on reading. Um
countto 15 line 34.
I I I don't where 31.
Oh 31.
Okay. So, so this is sir sir Brunetto who is the um teacher and father figure to Dante and again he is in the circle of violence because of his violence
137:25against God. He's a homosexuality. He's a homosexual which goes against God in nature. Okay.
Verse 31. And he, my son, do not mind if brunetto Latino lingers for a while with you and lets the file he's with pass on ahead. I said, with all my strength I pray you stay, and if you've have you'd have me rest a while with you, I shall that please him with whom I go. Oh son, he said, whoever of this flock stops but a moment stays a hundred years and cannot shield himself when fire strikes. Therefore, move on below, but close.
I'll follow and then I shall rejoin in company who go lamenting their eternal sorrows. I did not dare to leave my path for his own level. But I walked with head bent low as does a man who goes in reverence. And he began, what destiny or chance has led you here below before your last day came? And who is he who shows the way?
There and the sunlit life above, I answered. Before my years were full, I went astray within a valley. Only yesterday at dawn I turned my back upon it. that when I was newly lost, he here appeared to guide me home again along this path. And he to me, if you pursue your star, you cannot fail to reach a splendid harbor.
If in fair life I judged you properly, and if I had not died too soon for this on seeing heaven was so kind to you, I should have helped sustain you and your work. But that malicious that ungrateful people come down in ancient times from Fiesta, still keeping something of the rock and mountain. For your good deeds will be your enemy, and there is cause among the sour sorbs. The sweet fake is not meant to bear its fruit. The world has long since called them blind.
A people presumptuous, aious, envious. Be sure to cleanse yourself of their foul ways. Your fortune holds in store such honor for you, one party, and the other will be hungry for you, but keep the grass far from the goat. For let the beasts of fias find forge amongst themselves, and
139:26leave the plant alone, if still among their dung it rises up, in which there lives again the sacred seed of those few Romans who remain in thorns when such a nest of wickedness was built.
Okay, so this is this is a direct reference to the Iniad where Inas visits his father in the underworld to receive his prophecy and this mirrors that. Okay. So again, this is highlighting the fact that Subnetto really is a father figure to um Dante. Okay. Keep on going.
If my desire were answered totally, I said to Saraponto, "You'd still be among, not banished from humanity. Within my memory fa is fixed and now moves me, your dear, your kind paternal image when in the world above from time to time you taught me how man makes himself eternal. And while I lift, my gratitude for that must always be apparent in my words.
Okay, so he's being very explicit here, right? You're my father. You're my teacher. Everything I know is because of you, right? And and he's saying that if I could, I would have you still among us.
But he can because he wrote this thing. Okay? So this is a huge paradox for us. Keep on going.
Line 88. What do you have told me of my course? I write. I keep it with another text for comment by one who understand if I may reach her. One thing alone I'd have you plainly see so long as I am not rebuked by conscience I stand prepared for fortune come what may.
My years find no new pledge in that prediction. Therefore let fortune turn her wheel as she may please and let the peasant turn his medic. At this my master turned his head around and toward the right and looked at me and said, "He who takes note of this has listened well. But nonetheless, my talk with Sarah Brunetto continues. And I ask of him who are his comrades of repute and excellence.
And he to me to know of some is good, but for the rest silence is to be praised. The time we
141:26have is short for so much talk. In brief know that my company has clerics and men of letters and of fame, and all were stained by one same sin upon the earth.
Okay. All right. Okay. Okay, so this is again very problematic in that he's saying that with me are men who are clerics and men who are poets and men who are extremely successful. Okay, so this is a huge problem because regardless of your achievements, you're still stuck here just because you happen to like other men.
All right, this is this is very paradoxical. It is very it is very it isn't it is not something that we've ever seen from Dante before. Okay. This doesn't might not make any sense on the surface. Keep on going.
No nine. That sorry crowdo holds Precin and Franchesco Dorso and among them you can see if you have any longing for such scarf. the one the servant of his servant sent from the Arno to the B bakigle's banks and there he left his tendon strained by sin I would say more but both my walk and words must not be longer for beyond I see new spoke emerging from the sandy bed now people come with whom I must not be let my toorrow in which I so live be precious to you and I ask no more and then he turned and seemed like one of those who race across the fields to win the green cloth Verona of those runners he appeared to be the winner not the loser.
Okay. All right. So uh in next count 16 we will meet three really distinguished Florentines. Okay. These are aristocrats and they're extremely virtuous and back in Florence everyone praises them.
Uh but again just because of their homosexuality they're condemned to the circle of violence. Okay. Uh, let's read
KTO 16.
143:26No sooner had I reached the place where one could hear a murmur like a beehive's hum of waters as they fell to the next circle. When setting out together, three shades ran, leaving another company that passed beneath the rain of bitter punishment. They came toward us, and each of them cried out, "Stop you who by your clothing seem to be someone who comes from our indecent country." A me what once I saw upon their limbs once new and old once that the flames seared in. It pains me still as I remember it. When they cried out, my master paid attention.
He turned his face toward me. And then he said, "Now wait. To these one must to these one must show courtesy. And were it not the nature of this place for shafts of fire to fall, I'd say that haste was seem for you than for those three." As soon as we stood still, they started up their ancient whale again. And when they reached us, they formed a wheel of three of them together.
As champions, naked, oiled, will always do each studying the grip that serves him best before the blows and wounds begin to fall. While wheeling, so each one made sure his face was turned to me so that their necks opposed to their feet in one uninterrupted flow.
Okay, so these three individuals are the three most distinguished members of the Florentine nobility. Okay. They're so distinguished that even Virgil admires and respects them. Okay. Uh, can we go?
Line 28. And if the squalor of this shifting sand together with our baked and barren features makes us in our requests contemptable, one said, "Then may our fume incline, may our fame incline our mind to tell us who you are, whose living feet can make their way through hell with such assurance. He in whose steps you see me tread, although he now must wheel about both peeled and naked, was higher in degree than you believe." He was a grandson of the good Wrada, and Guido Guerrero was his name. In life, his sword and his good sense
145:26accomplished much. The other who behind me trampled sand. Tagayo albrandi, one whose voice should have been heeded in the world above. And I who share this punishment with them was Yakapo Rustikuchi. Certainly more than all else, my savage wife destroyed me.
If id had shield and shelter from the fire, I should have thrown myself down there among them. I think my master would have sanctioned that. But since that would have left me burned and baked, my fear went out against the good intention that made me so impatient to embrace them. Then I began. Your present state had fixed not scorn, but sorrow in me and so deeply that it will only disappear slowly.
As soon as my lord spoke to me with words that made me understand what kind of men were coming toward us, men of worth like yours. For I am your city, and with fondness I've always told and heard the others tell of both your actions and your honored names. I leave the gall and go for the sweet apples that I was promised by my truthful guide. But first I must ascended to the center. So may your soul long lead your limbs, and may your fame shine after you, he answered.
Then tell us if courtesy and valor still abide within our city as they did when we were there, or have they disappeared completely? For guelier, who only recently has come to share our torments and goes there with our companions, has caused us much affliction with his words. Newcomerish to the city and quick gains have brought excess and arrogance to yen. So you weep for it already. So I cried out.
Wait, wait. So So the words excess and arrogance. Okay. Access and arrogance also. Um access and arrogance.
These are this is the current state of Florence. Okay. Access and arrogance. Okay. Keep on going.
147:2876. So I cried out with face up race. The three looked at each other when they heard my answer. As men will stare when they have heard the truth. If you can always offer replies so readily to others, said all three, then happy you who speak at will so clearly.
So if you can escape these lands of darkness and see the lovely stars on your return when you repeat with pleasure I was there. Be sure that you remember us to men. At this they broke their wheel and as they fled their swift legs seemed to be no less than wings. The time it took for them to disappear more brief than time it takes to say amen. And so my master thought it right to leave.
I followed him. We'd only walked a little when roaring water grew so near to us we hardly could have heard each other speak. And even as the river that is first to take its own course eastward from Mount Viso along the left flank of the Epanines, which up above is called the Aquacetta before it spills into its valley bed and flows without that name beyond forly reverberates above Sunbed Benedetto delbe as it cascades in one leap where there is space enough to house a thousand. So did we hear that blackened water roar as it plunged down a steep and craggy bank enough to deafness in a few hours. Around my waist I had a cordis girdle and with it once I thought I should be able to catch the leopard with the painted hide and after I had loosened it completely just as my guide commanded me to do.
I handed it to him nodded and coiled. At this he wheeled around upon his right and cast it at some distance from the edge straight down into the depth of the ravine. And surely something strange must hear reply I said within myself to this strange sign the sign my master follows with his eye. Ah how much care men ought to exercise with those whose penetrating intellect can see our thoughts not just our outer act.
149:30He said to me, "Now there will soon emerge what I await and what your thought has conjured. It soon must be discovered to your sight." Faced with that truth which seems a lie, a man should always close his lips as soon as he can. To tell it shames him even though he's blameless. But here I can't be still. and by the lines of this my comedy reader I swear and may my verse find favor for long years that through the dense and darkened air I saw a figure swimming rising up enough to bring amazement to the firmst heart like one returning from the waves where he went down to loose an anchor snagged upon a reef or something else hid in the sea who stretches upward and jaws in his feet.
Okay. So, uh, now they will descend down to the circle of fraud. Now, okay. So, let's think about this. Um, Sir Bernetto was in the last Kanto and this creates a paradox, right?
Why would Dante put um such a man he loves in the circle of violence and that creates a paradox. And now in this cont is the pedock strengthens because these three individuals are the best Florence has to offer. Okay, they are the best of the nobility and they are also suffer with sir Baton. So clearly Dante wants us to think about what's going on here. Okay.
Why are these four individuals who commit no other sin other than homosexuality, why are they in uh the circle of violence? And in the worst in the worst part, right, because they they have committed violence against God. All right. Yes.
It could be seen as
Yeah. Go ahead. It's fine. Go ahead. I think it could be seen as violence because it could lead to the end of humanity.
And um I'm thinking of this
151:31because if we're a reflection of the universe and if we engage in homosexuality that mean the universe could engage in that and if we tended to the end of times then it's the end of humanity.
Okay. Yeah. Sure. That is the explanation that's offered, right? But again, does that make sense to you?
It has to make sense, right? Yes. Yeah. Uh actually, uh I don't think it makes sense. I'm not gay, of course, but uh you know, I still believe that if you have free will and you have love and why you can't just be a homosexual.
I mean,
yeah. So, so again, it's a problem for us, right? If why why is homosexuality so bad? Okay. All right.
So, let's figure this out. And again, to read Dante, you have to read with your imagination, right? You have to use your imagination. So let's use imagine imagine and ask ourselves if we were designing this circle right violence against God who would we put in this circle what is the worst thing in life you can do um and which would offend both God and nature what is it me that's violence against yourself right there are already three crimes violence against others violence against self against God and nature. I'm saying like what is probably the most unnatural act we could ever do?
Incest.
Exactly. Incest. Guys, you understand? There could be bestiality having sex with animals, but that's not as bad as having sex with your sister. Okay?
Do you understand this? Let me ask you this question. Besides homosexuality, what else is pretty common among the elite?
Incest.
Incest is pretty common among the elite, right? Because they want to maintain their bloodline. Because they want to maintain the purity. Do you understand?
153:31Okay. So, this is implicit here. If it is violence against God in nature, people commits incest have to be here in have to be here as well. But they're not mentioned, which forces us to imagine they're here. Okay.
Now let's think about this. Okay. Um let us use our imagination to figure out what is connection between homos homosexuality and incest. What is it? What's the problem?
What is a connection? Yes. In sex is having sex with your own kind. And so is homosexuality with your own kind like your own gender,
right? And so what are you doing in society?
What do you do with other people?
You exclude.
Exclusion. You understand? It's exclusion. The purpose of this is to exclude other people. The elite only want to um maintain their privileges and and block social mobility.
Okay. This the violence against God and nature. Okay. Social mobility. Um, okay.
And openness, right? Homosexuality. It's the expression of self-love and self-indulgence. It's the expression of excess and arrogance, right? We are so superior to you, we'll only have sex with our kind and over ourselves.
We refuse to associate with any of you, right? And then over time, what happens? If the elite engage in homosexuality and incest, what happens now?
Extinction. Because with incest your
155:33weaker gene gets combined and you have a lot of um Yeah.
Okay. Yes. Exactly. Okay. So this threat Yes.
Um I'm just just push just just uh kind of deducing just pushing this logic further. So yes, if the elite only engages in homosexuality then um they don't reproduce. They get to appoint you know who they who will inherit their power their wealth and then so on and so forth. So, so it's a much more kind of um controlled way of propagating power, wealth, and all that.
Oh, yes. Right. Okay. All right. So, let me now now let's do compare and contrast.
Okay. Let's think about a society in which the elite don't practice homosexuality. And let's think about a society in which they do practice homosexuality. Okay. All right.
So I mean again we can generalize and say that as society rises okay there is less homos homosexuality and as society declines there is more homosexuality. Does that make sense? Right? As if a society is poor there's less likely to be homosexuality and if society is rich and declining there's more likely to be homosexuality. All right.
And the example of this is now just western culture. If you just turn on TV, homosexuals are not persecuted, right? They are celebrated, right? Before um you know in America you had you had a gay politician Peter Buddhaj before it would it would blow the imagination that any politician would be like would say I'm gay. I'm proud of it and please vote for me.
Right? It it it blow the imagination. Now, but but you know, in 2020 when Pet ran for the um Democrat nomination, his
157:33homosexuality made him very popular. All right. So, my question to you is what's the difference? What's the difference between a society where homosexuality is persecuted and a society which celebrates homosexuality? Uh yes, you first.
Um because before uh homosexuality meant exclusion whereas now I think it's more way more inclusion where we see as they're way more open-minded and they're open to engage in any culture philosophy.
Yeah, but that's a good thing, right? But what I'm asking you why Donn would think this this represents a society in decline,
right? Because he clearly lamenting about Florence, right? He's clearly he says that Florence right now is a city of excess and arrogance, right? And homosexuality is a very important part of that. So I'm trying to figure out why that's the case.
Why is it that you embrace homosexuality, it makes society much more open, but it causes you to decline? That's a paradox, right? But it is historically true.
The fall of Rome. Yes.
I I think sir, I think at the time it didn't make your society more opened. I think it's only applicable today where so before it was exclusion whereas now the whole aspect of it changed. So I think
could you could you repeat that because I'm not sure I understood you.
I think at the time of Dante uh homosexuality was uh about exclusion. So it was uh more of a negative aspect whereas today it's more about open-minded. And so before it wasn't about openness, it was
So you think homosexuality is a good thing?
It's good for society.
I'm saying it it changed. So before it was like um against open-mindedness and now it's more open. So
right so so I'm I'm just asking you a question which is like
what D is saying is that homosexuality is a sign of social decline. There's
159:33lots of homosexuality today everywhere in China and United States. Is it a good thing or bad thing do you think?
But I I just think the definition changed. So if you think it's a bad thing and this this thing changed then it like you can't just say it's a bad thing today. You know the definition
the definition of homosexual has not changed right it's still sex between two guys. How's that changed? Uh so yeah go ahead.
So yeah I think I understand his question that he thinks that homosexuality today represents openness instead of closeness and exclusiveness. Uh so then shout outs be elevated because it's a good thing to embrace but I will argue that if we look at the France Olympics in a few past few years um the so homosexuality or like the elevation of this and transgender and everything as well uh that it actually deprivives of women or the other sex more because what happens with the French uh Olympics the other year that's why JK Rowling got into this huge thing too uh is that the man boxer who changed to be women and then he beat up all the female competitors. So no one won the box the women uh female champion for boxing was a man basically. So he excludes and actually you know deny the the actual the natural I understand but I'm still trying to figure out why homosexuality would cause society to decline. Yes.
Could it be that when societies arising, there's like a natural order and a natural law that everyone follows? But when the society is falling, it's like I can't remember who it was, but I remember hearing someone once say that like homosexuality is the ultimate act of contrarianism. And it's like when you start rejecting all of the sort of natural laws. So, it's not really just about the homosexuality. that if you adopt this mindset where there is no natural law, it will extend into basically the breakdown of morality.
161:33But so, so why is there this breakdown of natural law? Why do people not follow natural law? Uh yeah, go ahead.
Um actually, I don't think homosexuality means that they're embracing everything and openness. I think it's actually means u the opposite. There's a book called the closing of American ma mind uh which is basically saying uh if you o open and like embrace every culture uh in the end you're not not you're you're actually um like exclusion.
Okay. Yeah. Yes. I would like to say from Dan's perspective he regards like the homosexual is a bad thing for the society. I would say maybe uh it's I mean the uh homosexuality obey the law that god gave us.
So like for example initially when the world has been created why we have two genders like male and female that means there is naturally that there should be attraction between male and female to make sure we can alive and um this the civilization could be continued right. So if people are homosexual they are kind of prevent this natural law that given by the god to perse you know. Okay, let me ask you this question. Homosexuality today is celebrated. Homosexuality before was persecuted.
Did the percentage of homosexuals homosexuals in society did it go up or down?
Down.
I think it's pretty similar. Okay. Do you understand? There were lots of homosexualities before. It's Yes.
So I have a I have a few comments. First of all, I think uh metaph metaphorically homosexuality can be described as violence against love. It's physical uh in the sense that um
163:36it's uh not celestial, it's not emotional, but it's uh it's physical. That that's why and we need not only celestial love, but also fleshly love. And that's um that's a divine order. And in that sense uh homosexual homosexuality is a rejection of the uh female appeal and also the order of love on the on the flesh on the on the physical level. Uh but I agree with some of the comments that said um [clears throat] uh homosexuality is uh is as bad as is as bad as incest in ex in causing more inclus exclusion because uh from the genetic point of view although I do have some reservation uh about genetics uh from genetic point of view homosexual energy actually results in the uh in the uh in the distribution of the wealths from the elite more to the for the people who can procreate.
And if the elite choose not to uh engage in uh you know bisexual uh sex then it will cause more you know fair distribution. Whereas incest is a is an attempt for the elite to create uh you know to concentrate the wealth in uh in more homogeneous gene which is bad for society. Okay. All right. So, let me ask you this question.
Okay. How does Donnie feel about the elite? What does he think about the elite? This nobility? How how does he perceive the nobility?
Do you think
entitled?
Yeah, they're entitled. Are they a good thing or a bad thing?
Of of course they're bad.
They're a bad thing. So So what is So what do you do with them? Get rid of them?
What would you do? You you try to make them humble again like
you make but like how do you make them
165:36humble?
Okay. Okay guys like like like like like I I I don't want to spend too much time on this. Okay. So let's Okay. First of all, how does starting feel about no nobility?
Uh and then the question then is I want to focus on is why is it when societies are on the rise there's less homosexuality but when societies are in the are in decline there's more homosexuality when I mean what I mean by I mean like like there's more open outward homosexuality right the percentage probably say the same right but societies are on the rise the elite would not practice their homosexuality in open right they hide it they they would hide kid, they would still get married and have children. Now they're just practicing out in the open. What's the difference? Uh yes, you you then you
uh I think there's two things. First, it's about needs. Once you have like everything you need, then you try to seek something else. So when a society has access to food, protection and etc. You try to engage in something new that could be homosexuality.
And also it could be due to a dating aspect because it's if a society is very well constructed and becomes very competitive then you have a really low chance to access to the 1% 5% above and so you just engage in your own gender.
Okay. Yes. You
Yeah. I I agree. And I think it just refers to the aspect of hope in a declining society. If you like don't have kids as a homosexual, then you say that you don't have hope in the future.
Okay. Okay. All right.
For the future.
So, so, so, so I I want to change the question. Okay.
Okay. Imagine you're at Yale. Okay. You're a freshman at Yale. Okay.
And you know the answer. So, so, so you and I won't participate. Okay. But imagine you're at Yale or Harvard or Princeton. And in 1960s, you go into
167:37Yale and the president is addressing you, right? What is going to say to you? You're saying you're at Yale to do what in 1960s or 70s or 80s or 90s. Exactly. Right.
Change the world. Better humanity. Service humanity. Right. Today when you're at Yale, Harvard, or Princeton, the president says what to you.
If you're at university, you know the answer. What's the answer? Be yourself. It be yourself. Your identity is what matters.
Right? Am I wrong here? Be yourself. Celebrate yourself. That's why society declines.
You understand? That's why I'm from the elite. That's why homosexuality is a problem because it's not the act itself. It's the attitude. like be yourself, indulge yourself, love yourself, don't worry about other people, don't worry about your responsibility to society.
Don't try to change the world for better. Just celebrate yourself and be happy. And if you're And if you're not happy, complain about it. Celebrate yourself. Am I wrong?
Okay. Okay. That's what Don is saying here. He's saying that homosexuality like incest, it represents a like an inward turnurning, right? A narcissism that is extreme.
So, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Go ahead. Yes.
So, does he say that it's not real love?
No. No. You You can't love yourself like other other men.
Well, no. But but like what what he's saying is like when you love other men, what you're really doing is loving yourself. It's a narcissism, right? Because narcissist saw himself in the
169:39mirror. Um and he wanted to like have sex with him himself. That's what homosexuality is. It's narcissist having sex w with with himself. And I'm not saying that's right.
I'm just saying like like this is how Dante perceives this. Okay. All right. Yes. Why is Dante neglecting the narcissist aspect in heterosexuality?
Because like as we see today, there are people who focus on looks to attract women. Um, and so just pointing out the narcissistic narcissistic aspect in homosexuality would be ne neglecting the this aspect in the other side,
right? Yes. Okay, that's a really interesting question. Um, and unfortunately in hell we don't have narcissism as a sin. Why not?
Okay, the answer is um at this time in history, what Dante is trying to do is he's trying to he's trying to change um the idea of the ego, right? So, um the Catholic Church is teaches teaches you that ego is bad. Self self- loveve does is the worst sin with the worst evil, right? And what Don is saying is that if that's your attitude, you can't actually go and change the world for the better. You have to believe that you are so good, God loves you so much that you will have the power to change the world for the better.
Okay? And um and that's why the three um sins um sorry there two sins, envy and pride, he actually doesn't list in infernal. He will list them in purgatory but not infernal. Okay. So, so, so that, so that's what Donnie is trying to do.
He he's trying to tell us that self-love is
171:39a good thing, but self- loveve as expressed with other men is a bad thing. Okay? Because it's self-indulgent. Okay? So, homosexuality by itself is not bad.
The act isn't bad, but the attitude of it is bad, which is like like all I care about is myself. I'm loving myself. I'm celebrating myself. That's the issue. Okay?
Does that make sense? All right. All right. So, um I make this comment, right? And so what Don is saying is that nobility is not good or bad.
It's how the nobility behaves that's good or bad, right? Nobility is behaving towards betterment of society that they're good. But if they are behaving like narcissists, that's bad. Okay, that can only mean the destruction of society because at this point in history, it is not possible to imagine a sighting without the nobility. Right?
It's you can't have communism. No one's going to imagine communism at this point. And think about how how unfair that would be, right? This family has spent generations um putting all this wealth and you just take it from them. They So, so Donnie would never suggest that.
What he what he what he's suggesting is that nobility have a distinct responsibility to the rest of society to contribute. Okay? And when they engage in homosexuality, it just shows that they have abandoned society. Okay? They don't even care about hypocrisy anymore.
they can't even bother to uh demonstrate propriety and um uh leadership to everyone else. Okay, does that make sense? Okay. So, to confirm that what I'm saying is correct, what we're going to do is we're going to read Paradiso 16. Okay.
So, Dante has an amazing way of mirroring himself, creating symmetry. So, we are in we were inferno 16. We're now going to jump to Paradiso 16 where um Dante is going to talk to his great-grandfather and his great-grandfather is going to share the story of his family and the story of Florence. Okay. So this is the early
173:40days of Florence when the elite working hard to build a greater Florence and you can compare contrast these two contos. Okay. So so so let's read Paradosa 16. Paradiso Conto 16. If here below, where sentiment is far, too weak to withstand error, I should see men glorying in you, nobility of blood, a meager thing, I should not wonder, for even where desire is not arry, I mean in heaven I too felt such pride.
You're indeed a cloak that soon wears out, so that if day by day we add no patch, then circling time will trim you with its shears. My speech began again with you. The word that Rome was the first city to allow, although her people seldom speak it now. At this word, Beatatrice, somewhat apart, smiling, seemed like the woman who had coughed. So goes the tale at Guineaver's first fault.
So did my speech begin. You're my father. You heartened me to speak with confidence. You raised me so that I am more than I. So many streams have filled my mind with gladness.
So many and such gladness that mine must rejoice that it can bear this and not burst. Then tell me, founder of my family, who were your ancestors and in your boyhood, what were the years of records registered? And tell me of the sheepfold of St. John, how numerous it was, who in that flock were worthy of the highest offices. As at the breathing of the winds, a coal will quicken into flame.
So I saw that light glow at words that were affectionate. And as before, my eyes grew more fair, so with a voice more gentle and more sweet, not in our modern speech it said to me. Down from that day, when a was pronounced, until my mother, blessed now, by giving birth, eased the burden born and bearing me. This fire of Mars had come 550 and 30 more times to its lion, there to be rekindled underneath its paw. My ancestors and I were born just where the runner in your early games hers comes upon the boundary of the final ward.
That is enough concerning my
175:40forebears. What were their names from where they came of that silence not speech is more appropriate? All those who at that time between the Baptist and Mars were capable of bearing arms numbered one of those who live there now. But then the citizens now mixed with compi, with the chhatalo, and with the fig f figi were pure down to the humblest artisan. Oh, it would be far better if you had those whom I mention as your neighbors and your boundaries at Galuto and Trespiano than to have them within to bear the stench of a stretch and sa bridge whose sharp eyes now are embarrass.
If those who in the world go most astray had not seen Caesar with stepmother's eyes, but like a mother to her son been kind, the one who has become a Florentine trader and money changer would have stayed in Semonte where his father's pedal. The counts would still be lords of Monty Murlo. The Cherokee would be in Aone's parish. Perhaps the Bondanti in Vadig. The mingling of the populations led to evil in the city, even as food piled on food destroys the body's health.
The blind bull falls more quickly, more headlong than does the blind lamb, and the one blade can often cut more and better than five swords. Consider Looney Obisalia, how they went to ruin, ruin, sin Galileia follows, and Cuzy too will soon have vanished. Then if you should hear of families undone, you will find nothing strange or difficult in that. Since even cities meet their end, all things that you possess, possess their death, just as you do. But in some things that last long, death can hide from you whose life they're short.
And even as the heaven of the moon, revolving respitless, conceals, and then reveals the shores, so fortune does with Florence. Therefore, there's no cause for wonder in what I shall tell of noble
177:42Florentines, of those whose reputations time has hidden. I saw the Ugi, saw the Catalini, Filipe, Gretchi, Ormani of Alberiki, fame citizens already in decline, and saw as great as they were venerable, Elarka with Delisanella, and Aringi, Sodanari, and Bustiki. Nearby the gate that now is burdened with new treachery that weighs so heavily that it will bring the vessel to shipwreck. There were the Ravenani from whose line Count Buido comes. And all who since derived their name from the illustrious Bellachion, and Delressa knew already how to rule, and Galayo in his house already had the gilded hilt and pommel.
The stripe of Vier had mightiness already, as did the Joki, Gali, and Baruchi, Fantinet, and those who blush for the bushel. And the stock from which sprang from Kuchi was already mighty in Sitzi and Arguchi were already raised to high office. Oh, how great were those I saw whom pride laid low and the gold balls in all of her great actions flowered Florence. Such were the ancestors of those who now whenever Bishop sees are vacant grow fat as they sit in church consisties. The breed so arrogant and dragonlike and chasing him who flees, but lamblike, meek to him who shows his teeth, or else his purse was on the rise already, but of stock so mean that Uberin Donato, when his father-in-law made him kin to them, was scarcely pleased already.
Capons can had come from Fi down to the market. Already citizens of note were Judah and Infantato. I shall tell a thing incredible and true. The gateway through the inner walls were named for the deliper. All those whose arms bear part of the fair and sign of the great baron.
He
179:43whose memory and worth are honored on the feast of Thomas received knighthood and privilege from him. Those he whose co code of arms has fringed that enzyme has taken sides now with the populace. The Guarati and the importunity were there already, where the Borggo spared new neighbors, it would still be tranquil there. The house of Amade with which your sorrows began by reason of its just resentment which ruined you and ended years of gladness were honored then as were its close companions. A bonde through another's council.
You fled your wedding pledge and brought such evil. Many would now rejoice who still lament if when you first approached the city, God had given you unto the river Emma. But Florence in her final peace was faded to offer up unto that mutilated stone guardian upon her bridge a victim. These were the families and others with them the Florence that I saw in such repose that there was nothing to have caused her sorrow. These were the families.
With them I saw her people so acclaimed and just that on her staff the lily never was reversed nor was it made blood red by fractious hatred.
Okay. So um here uh Donniey's great-grandfather is recounting the glory of Florence and explaining why Florence ultimately declined. Okay. So for the greatgrandfather, what's the main reason why Florence declined? You talk to any old person, okay?
It's always this reason. What is it? What what led to decline of Florence?
Excess and arrogance.
Uh, no. No. Maybe maybe that's Dante. But here it's different. This This is a great grandfather and he's like, "This is why Florence went down." Yes.
People's greed towards materials and
181:43like money.
Yeah. But but where did that come from? Where did materialism come from?
Chase for power.
What caused? Yes.
Factious hatred.
No. What's causing this materialism? What's causing this hatred? Come on. I mean like you just talk to your grandparents, right?
And like your grandparents are like, "Yeah, before this was a great neighborhood, but then what happened? Before this was a lovely neighborhood and everyone got along great. But then
maybe something about the young people.
No. What happened guys?
Maybe people became selfish.
No, someone new came into the neighborhood.
Immigrants.
Goddamn immigrants. Again, this is not a political correct class. Okay. Why is immigration bad?
It puts into conflict people with different cultures.
Okay. Yes. It creates a cultural clash. Yes. What else?
Because the values you hold is different.
Exactly. Okay, your values change. Before these old families were dedicated to helping other people around them, helping their neighbors. But when you have people with so many values come in like that are different from yours, what's your only solution to this problem of immigration?
Like exclude them. So you have your own societ communities.
Okay. So exclusion but I'm saying how do you unite the entire city through what?
To be more conservative.
Uh no one no the old people. Yes.
183:44Assimilation maybe like
but how do you assimilate them?
Yeah. Oh your your stuff is cool too. We accept everything like everything is cool. We're solid.
So materialism
money. Do you understand? If you have immigrants come in everyone shares different values. The only value that you have to create to unify society is money, right? And money leads to the separation of selfishness, right?
That's why you can't no longer be change the world because that's western imperialism. It has to be be yourself, separate yourself. Okay? And how do you do that? Go make a lot of money.
So this is a pattern throughout human history. Okay? We you think that oh look isn't it great that if you work hard you can you can be a trillionaire. No it's not. I mean how about contributing to your community?
How about working hard to create families? How about um making a safe and moral society? Right? But you're not taught that. You're taught just go make a lot of money and be yourself and celebrate yourself.
And if you want to be gay, great. Okay. Does that make sense? All right. So again, again, um this is not politically correct.
Okay. But but again, we're trying to examine why societies decline. And so you have thought is saying you have immigrants, you have homosexuality, you have factionalism, you have economic pressure. Okay. And are they still are they true today?
Yeah, they're very much true today. So according to Dante, we are very much society in decline. Does anyone want to argue against this? Like I I don't want to be seen as brainwashing you. Okay.
Do you want to argue against this?
Yes. Thank you. Well, with immigration, I want to point out that for example
185:45with World War II in the in Europe when uh many people are persecuted, they came to see the United States as the promised land and where you won't be persecuted. So um a lot of the best scientists [snorts] and intellectuals and whoever it is went to America. So um you know immigration can create um kind of u more vibrancy in society.
Sure. Yeah. That that's a great um argument. Yes.
The population decline. So like you bring people because your culture doesn't makes enough children to finance your society.
Yeah. But why is your population declining?
I don't know. Yeah.
No, you do know why why why population is declining. It's because
it's too expensive. People make less kids.
Well, come on, man.
Lack of social mobility.
Yeah. Lack of social mobility, homosexuality, uh, Darcism. Okay. Do you understand? So, publish decline is a symptom of of society decline.
And immigration is just a short-term remedy. It's not a long-term solution. Uh, yes. um population could also decline because the cost of raising a child is increased.
Yeah, exactly. But that's also a sudden decline, right? Where you can't even where young people can can no longer afford to have families. Okay. Uh yes.
Maybe because the people just do not believe in God because they believe in money and money can help themselves, right?
Yeah. The lack of religion, right? Okay. Uh okay. But but I'm saying like argue against Dante.
Okay. And what Carol says is Yeah. But immigration allows for more vibrancy, allows for more creativity, right? And and also like if you don't let in immigrants, your society is going to is going to decline even further, even faster. Uh yes.
Anyone else to argue against this?
In more developed economies, immigrant workers are often a cheaper source of
187:45labor.
But is but is that a good thing? Like, you know, let's bring in poor people to exploit. I mean,
exploit them. I mean really
for the capitalists it's a good thing
right? I'm sure it is. Any other arguments against this?
Yes.
I think it helps with unity in the world cuz like if every culture is represented in every country then it creates unity and we all move together towards one path.
Exactly. So you look at the world cup right? Uh America right now is hosting a world cup. You go to every stadium, it's packed with different cultures and they're all celebrating uh together, right? So, multiculturalism.
Sure.
What else? Yes.
Yeah. Like multiculturalism kind of brings you different perspectives so that you can actually debate uh between values. You kind of examine truth from different lenses and perspectives. So, it gives you maybe it might get you closer to the truth. So that's why I think the pope actually last month met with the the Muslim leader.
So the two of them had a talk. So it's like be more embracing of a different religion, culture, perspective.
Right. Okay. So makes everyone much more tolerant, right? Much more open. That's great.
Okay. So um that's all great, but how to explain to Dante the lack of creativity in our world today? Why is it in today's world no one is able to write the divine comedy? I I I I actually can't remember the last good book I read or the last good movie I saw. I literally cannot.
Yes. For our needs and we stop suffering and so we don't need to engage in anything difficult. Also because of technology um everything is simple for us and so it's just we have nothing to talk about or no no energy that can make us create
189:47new stuff. Okay, you're absolutely right. Yes.
Uh I think people right now are too material and uh and not spiritual enough.
Yeah, but why would that lead to a decline in creativity? Right. Because in theory, if you can make a trillion dollars writing a divine comedy, why don't you go write it, right? Yes.
Uh people lost their love. Uh people are hopeless and they just care about a job, about money, but not about spiritual thing.
Yeah. Yeah. People have Yes. Go ahead. I
I think I want to add on to that because people are not only um too materialistic. They are also like we haven't been this spiritually away from oursel from our inner world. I mean this is the we've never been like this because you see all the religions and all the Buddhism all that thing dating back in thousands years ago but now like I don't it's a small portion of the society we still talk about this I think
right exactly okay so this is really interesting because if Dante were to come today look at our world he'd be like this is a lot worse than my world man because regardless of how bad things were back then at least they had roots right at least they family and community, a sense of of like each other. Whereas today, we are all rootless, right? We have no history. We have no culture. We have no tradition.
If you say these things, then they'll say you're racist or you're a bigot. Okay. I I mean, right. Okay. So, it makes you really think about what is really valuable in society.
Okay. So, let's go to Kel 17, please. Kanto 17. Behold the beast who bears the pointed tail, who crosses mountains, shatters weapons walls. Behold the one whose stench fills all the world.
So did my guide begin to speak to me. And then he signaled him to come ashore close to the end of those stone passageways. And he came on that filthy effigy of fraud and
191:49landed with his head and torsel, but did not draw his tail onto the bank. The face he wore was that of a just man. So gracious was his features outer semblance and all his trunk the body of a serpent. He had two paws with hair up to the armpits. His back and chest as well as both his flanks have been adorned with twining knots and cirlets.
No Turks or tartars ever fashioned fabrics more colorful in background and relief. nor Arachnne ever loomed such webs. As boats will sometimes lie along along the shore with part of them on land and part in water. And just as there among the guzzling Germans, the beaver sets himself when he means war, so did that squalid beast lie on the margin of stone that serves as bo border for the sand. And all his tail was c quivering in the void while twisting upward anenimmed fork which had a tip just like a scorpion's.
My guide said, "Now we'd better bend our path a little till we reach as far as that malicious beast which crouches over there." Thus we descended on the right hand side and moved tense paces on the stony brink in order to avoid the sand and fire. When we had reached the sprawling beast, I saw a little farther on on upon the sandome sinner sitting near the fissured rock. And here my master said to me, "So that you may experience this ring in full, go now and see the state in which they are. But keep your conversation with them brief. Till you return, I'll parlay with these beast to see if he can lend us his strong shoulders.
So I went on alone and even farther along the seven circles outer margin to where the melancholy people sat. Despondency was bursting from their eyes. The side that their hands kept fending off at times the flames, at times the burning soil. Not otherwise do dogs in summer, now with muzzle, now with paw, when they're bitten by fleas or gnats, or by the sharp gadfly. When I had set my eyes upon the faces of some on whom that painful fire falls, I
193:49recognized no one. But I did notice that from the neck of each a purse was hung that had a special color and an emblem, and their eyes seemed to feast upon these pouches. looking about when I had come among them, I saw a yellow purse with azure on it, that had the face and manner of a lion. Then, as I let my eyes move farther on, I saw another purse that was blood red, and in displaced a goose more whiter than butter, and one who had an azure pregnant so inscribed as emblem on his white pouch, said to me, "What are you doing in this pit? Now you be off, and since you're still alive, remember that my neighbor son know shall yet sit here upon my left hand side among these Florentines I'm Padu and I often hear them thunder in my ears shouting now let the sovereign cavalier the one who'll bring the purse with three goats come at this he soothed his mouth and then he stuck his tongue out like an ox that licks its nose and I afraid that any longer stay might anger him who warned me to be brief made me back from those exhausted souls I found my guide, who had already climbed upon the back of that brute animal, and he told me, "Be strong and daring now, for our descent is by this kind of stairs you mounted front, I want to be between, so that the tail can't do you any harm." As one who feels the cord and fever near and shivers with his nails already blue, the sight of shade enough to make him shudder, so I became when I had heard these words.
But then I felt the threat of shame which makes the servant in his kind lord's presence brave. I settled down on those enormous shoulders I wish to say and yet my voice did not come as I thought. See that you hold me tight but he who other times and other danger sustained me just as soon as I had mounted clasp me within his arms and propped me up and said, "Now gur, move
195:50on. Take care to keep your circles wide, your landing slow. remember the new weight you're carrying. Just like a boat that starting from its moorings moves backward backward so that beast took off and when he felt himself completely clear he turned his tail to where his chest had been and having stretched it moved it like an eel and with his paws he gathered in the air. I do not think that there was greater fear in fe than when he let his res go free for which the sky as one still sees was scorched or in poor Icaras when he could feel his sides unwinged because the wax was melting.
His father shouting to me that waste wrong than was in me when all on all sides I saw that I was in the air and everything had faded from my sight except the beast. Slowly slowly swimming he moves on. He wheels and he descends, but I feel only the wind upon my face and the wind rising. Already on our right, I heard the torrent resounding there beneath us horribly, so that I stretched my neck and looked below. Then I was more afraid of falling off, where I saw fires, and I heard laments at which I trembled, crouching and hold fast.
And now I saw what I had missed before. His wheeling and descent because great torments were drawing closer to us on all sides. Just as a falcon long upon the wing whose seeing neither lure nor bird compels the falconer to cry, "A me you fall desense exhausted in a hund circles where he had once been swift and sets himself embittered and enraged far from his master. Such at the bottom of the jagged rock was Gurion when he had set us down and once our weight was lifted from his back he vanished like an arrow from a bow.
Okay. So two points. The first point is that to descend from the circle of violence the circle of fraud. Okay. Uh and and quite honestly the circle of
197:50fraud will occupy about a third of the divine comedy. Okay. We're kind of 17. There's 34 contos in inferno. We're halfway through.
Uh so most of most of the time we will actually spend in the circle of fraud. Uh as well as the circle of treachery. Uh what takes them down to the circle is a beast called a Gerion. The Gerion uh has the face of an honest man, a very good-looking man that you trust, but has a but it has the tail of a scorpion. Okay?
So it can sting you at any time. So that's what fraud is. Okay, fraud seduces you into believing something and then uh stings you okay that's the first point. Uh second point is that while Virgil is taming the Gerion um Dante is uh looking around and he meets these money lenders who are buried in the sand. What what traps them in the ground are these purses of money, right?
So this is a fitting um punishment because in life they trapped or they enslave others with debt, right? With interest. So So they're getting a taste of their own medicine. And that that's what hell is. Um the pain that you cause onto others, you yourself will feel for all eternity.
Okay. All right. So let's uh any questions before we move on? Are are we clear? Okay.
So that circle of violence. Now we we descend to the circle of fraud which is the majority of the divine comedy. Okay. Uh inferno um 18.
Inferno KTO 18. There's a place in hell called Malibo.
So Malibboj is the name of the circle. Okay. The circle of fraud. Uh and there are different digits for different um frauds. Okay.
made all of stone the
199:51color of crude iron as is the wall that makes its way around it. Right in the middle of this evil fil field is an abyss, a broad and yawning pit whose structure I shall tell in its due place. The belt that extends between the pit and that heart's steep wall space is circular. Its bottom has been split into 10 valleys. Just as where mode on moat surrounds a castle in order to keep guard upon the walls, the ground they occupy will form a pattern so that the valleys here form a design.
And as such, fortresses have bridges running right from their thresholds toward the outer bank. So here across the banks and ditches, ridges ran from the base of that rock wall until the pit that cuts them short and joins them all. This was the p place in which we found oursel ourselves when Gurion had put us down. The poet held to the left and I walked at his back. Upon the right I saw new misery.
I saw new tortures and new torturers filling the first of Malib's moes. Along its bottom naked sinners moved to our side of the middle facing us beyond that they moved with us but more quickly. As in the year of Jubilee, the Romans, confronted by great crowds, contrived a plan that let the people pass across the bridge. For to one side went all who had their eyes upon the castle heading toward St. Peter's, and to the other those who faced the mount.
Both left and right along the somber rock, I saw horned demons with enormous whips who lashed those spirits cruy from behind. Ah, how their first strokes make those sinners lift their heels. Indeed, no sinner waited for a second stroke to fall or for a third. And as I moved ahead, my eyes met those of someone else, and suddenly I said, I was not spared the sight of him before. And so I stayed my steps to study him.
My gentle guide had stopped to gather with me and gave me leave to take a few steps back. That scourged soul thought
201:52that he could hide himself by lowering his face. It helped him little for I said, "You who cast your eyes upon the ground, if these your features are not false, must be Venadiko, Kacha, Namiko. But what brings you to sauces so pecan, and he to me? I speak unwillingly. But your plain speech that brings the memory of the old world to me is what compels me.
For it was I who led Golabella to do as the marquee would have her do. However, they retell that filthy tale. I'm not the Bolognese who weeps here. Indeed, this place is so crown full of us that no so not so many tongues have learned to say seepa between the svena reno. If you want faith and testament of that, just call to mind our aphericious hearts.
And as he spoke, a demon cudled him with his horse whoop and cried, "Be off, you pimp. There are no women here for you to trick. I joined."
Okay. So, so these are pimps, right? These are people who sold their sisters or others to wealthy men and Venitico is one of them. And for their punishment, they're being whipped around by demons. Okay?
Which is what they did in real life to their sisters or to their daughters or they're just pimps. Okay. Um, keep on going.
Line 67. I joined my escort once again, and then, with but few steps, we came upon a place where, from the bank a rocky ridge ran out. We climbed quite easily along that height, and turning right upon its jagged back, we took our leave of those eternal circlings. When we had reached the point where that ridge opens below to leave a passage for the lashed, my guide said, "Stay and make sure that the sight of still more illorn spirits strikes your eyes, for you have not yet seen their faces since they have been moving in our own direction." From the old bridge we looked down at
203:53the ranks of those approaching from the other side. They too were driven onward by the lash. And my good master, though I had not asked, urged me, "Look at that mighty one who comes and does not seem to shed a tear of pain. How he still keeps the image of a king, that shade of chase is Jason, who with heart and head deprived the men of Kulkas of their ram." He made a landfall on the aisle of Lemnos after its women, bold and pitilus, had given all their island males to death. With polished words and love signs he took in hips hipily the girl whose own deception had earlier deceived the other women and he abandoned her alone and pregnant.
Such guilt condemns him to such punishment. And for media too revenge is taken. With him go those who cheated. So this is enough for you to know of that first valley and of the souls it clamps within his jaws.
Does anyone know the story of Jason and Medadia? Jason and Medadia. Jason is of the Argonauts, right? And with Medadia's help, he is able to retrieve the golden fleece. So, he takes Media home to Greece.
They marry together. They have children together. But then, in order for Jason to um climb even higher, he marries a princess and betrays Media. So, what does media do? Do you guys know the story?
Can you guys guess what she does?
Did she kill her kids?
Yeah, she killed her kids. Yeah. I It's I mean, like Greek tragedy. It's such a Yeah, but but she killed her two young kids as to avenge her betrayal. Okay.
All right. So, Yeah. Okay. Giving way
205:54line 100. We were already where the narrow path reaches and intersects the second bank and serves as shoulder for another bridge. We heard the people whine in the next pouch and heard them as they snorted with their snouts. We heard them use their palms to beat themselves. An exhalations rising from above stuck to the banks encrusting them with mold.
And so waged war against both eyes and nose. The bottom is so deep we found no spot to see it from except by climbing up the arch until the bridge's highest point. This was the place we reached. The ditch beneath held people plunged in excrement that seemed as if it had been poured from human privies. And while my eyes searched that abysmal sight, I saw one with a head so smeared with I could not see if he were lay or cleric.
Okay. So So let's Okay. What do you do in real life that will warrant you uh basically a wash in for all eternity? You're just basically swimming in drowning in for all eternity. What did you do in in life?
What was your problem? Anyone? We have the punishment, right? Which is you just, you know, swimming You're what what what did you do in real in real life? to warrant this
like like on other people like like like put other people in like such a situation. So
no I mean sure um right?
Oh yeah
yeah right flattery Yes. You're just BSing other people all the time. Okay. So now you're just drowning it. All right.
Keep on keep on going.
118. He howled. Why do you stare more greedily at me than at the others who are filthy and I? Because if I remember right, I have seen you before with your hair dry, and so I eye you more than all. You're allesio intermina of Luca.
207:57Then he continued, pounding on his pate. I'm plunged here because of flatteries of which my tongue had such sufficiency at which my guide advised me. See you thrust your head a little farther to the front so that your eyes can clearly glimpse the face of that bismerged but draggled Herodan who scratched at herself with shitfilled nails. And now she crouches. Now she stands upright.
That is Tus Tus the harlot who returned her lover's question. Are you very grateful to me by saying yes enormously and now our site has had its fill of this.
Okay. All right. So another major characteristic um of a sighting in the client of course is fraud, right? Um fraud. It's just like you can't trust each other anymore, right?
Is fraud an issue today?
Yeah, it's a huge issue today. Okay. Yes. Um, did you know that 80% of all uh cases,
criminal cases in are um internet fraud.
Yes. Okay. The internet, right?
And now we have AI. We have deep fake. It's all It's all done.
Yeah. Exactly. A AI, right? So, we live in a world of fraud. Like it's literally now impossible to tell what is fake news, right?
It's it's really hard, okay? And it's really hard now to trust other people. And so this is also a symptom of a society in decline. Why is this a problem? Yes.
A lot of wasted energy.
Okay.
People wasting their imagination defrauding people and people wasting their imagination trying not to get the
209:57get cheated.
Yeah. It's impossible to work together. Do you understand? Right. It's impossible to make promises.
It's impossible to make contracts. It's impossible to cooperate anymore. Okay. Um Yeah. Okay.
Let's keep on going. KTO 19. As Simon Maggus, oh his sad disciples, rapacious ones who take the things of God that ought to be the brides of righteousness and make them fornicate for gold and silver. The time has come to let the trumpet sound for you. Your place is here and in this third pouch.
We had already reached the tomb beyond and climbed onto the ridge where its high point hangs just above the middle of the ditch. Oh highest wisdom, how much art you show in heaven, earth in this sad world below. How just your power is when it elots along the sides and down along the bottom. I saw that livid rock was perforated. The openings were all one width and round.
They did not seem to me less broad or more than those in my handsome San Joani where were made to serve as basins for baptizing. And one of these not so many not many years ago I broke for someone who was drowning in it. And let this be my seal to set men straight. Out from the mouth of each hole there emerged a sinner's feet and so much of his legs up to the thigh. The rest remained within.
Both souls of every sinner were on fire. Their joints were ripening with such violence. They would have severed wives and ropes of grass. As flame on oily things will only stir along the outer surface, so thereto that fire made its way from heels to toes. Master, I said, who's that shade who suffers and quivers more than all his other comrades?
That sinner who's licked by redder flames? And he to me, if you
211:58would have me lead you down along the steepest of the banks, from him you'll learn about his self and sins. And I, what pleases you will please me, too. You are my Lord. You know I do not swerve from what I what you will. You know what is unspoken.
At this we came upon the fourth embankment. We turned on keeping to the left, ascended into the narrow, perforated bottom. My good lord did not let me leave his side until he brought me to the hole that held that sinner who lamented with his legs. Whoever you may be, dejected soul whose head is downward planted like a pole. My words began, "Do speak of your able." I stood as does the frier who confesses the foul assassin who fixed fast head down calls back the frier and so delays his death.
And he cried out, "Are you already standing already standing there, O Bonafas? The book has lied to me by several years. Are you so quickly sad with the riches for which you do not fear to take by guile the lovely lady than to violate her?" And I became like those who stand as if they have been mocked, who cannot understand what has been said to them and can't respond. But Virgil said, "Tell this to him at once. I'm not he not who you think I am." and I replied as I was told to do.
At this the spirit twisted both his feet and sighing and with a desparing voice he said, "What is it then you want of me? If you have crossed the bank and climbed so far to find out who I am, then know that I was one of those who wore the mighty mantle and surely was the son of the she bear so eager to advance the cubs that I pursued wealth above. While here I purse myself. Below my head there is the place of those who took the way of Simony before me. And they are stuffed within the cliffs of stone.
I too shall yield my place and fall below when he arrives. The one for whom I had mistaken you when I was quick to question.
213:58But I have baked my feet a longer time has stood like this upon my head than he to stand planted here with scarlet feet. For after him when uglier indeeds will come, a lawless shepherd from the west, worthy to cover him and cover me. He'll be a second Jason of whom we read in Mcabes. And just as Jason's king was soft to him, so shall the king of France be soft to this one. And I do not know if I was too rash here.
I answered, "So then tell me now, how much gold did our Lord ask that St. Peter give to him before he placed the keys within his care? Surely the only thing he said was follow me. And Peter and the others never asked for gold or silver when they chose Mias to take the place of the transgressing soul. Stay as you are, for you're rightly punished and guard with care the money got by evil that made you so audacious against Charles.
And were it not that I am still prevented by reverence for those exalted keys that you had held within the happy life, I'd utter words much heavier than these. Because your avers tramples on the good, lifts up the wicked. You shepherds, the evangelist had noticed when he saw her, who sits upon the waters and realized she fornicates with kings. She who was born with seven heads and had the power and support of the ten horns as long as virtue was her husband's pleasure. You've made yourselves the god of gold and silver.
How are you different from the idoltors save that they worship one on you a hund? Ah Constantine, what wickedness was born and not from your conversion from the daer that you bestowed upon the first rich father? And while I sang such notes to him, whether it was his indignation or his conscience that bit him, he kicked hard with both his souls. I do indeed believe it pleased my guide, he listened always with such satisfied expression to the sound of those true words. And then he gathered me in both
216:00his arms, and when he had me fast against his chest, where he climbed down before, climbed upward now, nor did he tire of clasping me until he brought me to the summit of the arch that crosses from the fourth to the fifth rampart. And he and here he gently set his burdens down gently, because the ridge was rough and steep, and would have been a rugged path for goats. For there another valley lay before me. Okay. So this is um another one of Donny's um pirates against the church against church corruption.
Okay. So the crime the sin that is being punished here is simony. Okay. What simony is is it's very common at this time for the church to sell holy relics to people. And this was very profitable, right?
Because think about it, right? It's the church. So and a lot of this a lot of these relics were fake. But even if they weren't fake, you shouldn't do that, right? You shouldn't sell holy relics to the highest bidder.
What is the modern equivalent of simony?
Excuse me.
Selling offices.
Selling offices. Well, they did do that um back then as well. Okay. So, that's not the same. But someone else selling simony.
Yes.
Maybe taxes.
Taxes. Can you explain?
Well, um, you pay taxes and in return the state promise you that you're safe and yeah, you have a better life.
Okay. So, um, simony is a crime. The church, even the church condones simony, right? Because sim is named after Simon Simon Maggus, who is the first heretic in the Catholic Church. So, sim is a bad thing.
Everyone knows it's a bad thing. They kept on doing it. So I'm saying so in a in our modern world what would the equivalent be of simony?
Selling credentials.
Excuse me.
Credentials. Selling credentials.
218:01Yeah, that's a really good example, right? Selling diplomas, right? And do universities engage in selling diplomas?
Oh, legacies.
No, no, no, no. It's actually
not just that. How do universities engage in selling u credentials? Do you guys know
increase the tuition every year?
No,
they receive.
Yeah, they receive donations.
Yes. Okay. Yeah. Right. Okay.
Okay. So, donations um but also like um summer school, continue education like there are lots of ways in which universities sell uh their credentials. Okay. Uh any other examples? Yes.
Luxury items. So like very expensive bags or like symbolic items which don't hold value truly.
Right. But so the idea of sim is corruption, right? You're just abusing your power and profiting from it. So if you're a luxury goods uh retailer, I mean that that's not corruption, right? So it has to be like a trusted authority.
It could be university, could it could be government, uh it could be the church. Okay. Anyone? Any other examples? All right.
Uh that's fine. Let's Yes. Cryptocurrency.
Excuse me.
Cryptocurrency.
Can you explain?
Well, right. A holy relic is itself. Well, if if C, you know, if the richest people on the in the world agree that something is of value and you assign value to it. You give it an authority, the rest of society will follow. Similar to the holy relic, right?
I assign this relic. I don't know. I don't know if that makes sense.
220:01Right. Yeah. So, I I I think your example is the very best. Okay, because uh what's equivalent of the church today? It's a universities, right?
They have the most authority. They're the people who they they are the most trusted institution. And the fact that, you know, if you just you just give them a donation, they're going to uh fasttrack your child. Um if you've been following the news, Stanford, there's a huge case in Stanford about this, right? Um there there are lot lots of examples.
Okay. But again, yeah would never do this. So okay, let's let's go to uh Inferno 20. Okay. Inferno Kanto 20.
I must make verses of new punishment and offer matter now for Kanto 20 of this first canacle of the submerged. I was already well prepared to stare below into the depth that was disclosed where tears of anguish sorrow bathed the ground. In the valley circle I saw souls advancing mute and weeping at the pace that in our world holy processions take. As I declined my head still more I saw that each amazingly appeared contorted between the chin and where the chest begins. They had their faces twisted toward their honches and found it necessary to walk backward because they could not see ahead of them.
Okay. All right. So this is funnier. Okay. But like the punishment is that the people walk around and their heads are twisted backwards.
So they they only see behind them. They can never see in front of them. What was their crime in life? What was their sin? What what what what do they do?
This is ironic, right? These are people who going to look behind them.
Fortune teller.
Exactly. Right. These are fortune tellers. These are people who lie to you, who defraud you and tell you that you that they could see into the future and they will give you their future and um as punishment they can only look backwards. Um okay,
222:04keep on going.
Line 16. Perhaps the force of policy has so fully distorted some, but that I've yet to see and I do not believe that that can be. May God so let you reader gather fruit from what you read. And now think for yourself how how I could ever keep my own face dry. When I beheld my image so nearby and so arrive that tears down from the eyes bathed the buttocks running down the clft.
Of course I wept leaning against the rock along that rugged ridge so that my guide told me. Are you as foolish foolish as the rest? Here pity only lives when it is dead. For who can be more imp impious than he who links God's judgment to pacivity? Lift lift your head and see the one for whom the earth was opened while the thie watched so that they all cried.
And Fieros, where are you rushing? Have you quit the fight? Nor did he interrupt his downward plunge to Minos who lays hands on every sinner. See how he's made a chest out of his shoulders. And since he wanted so to see ahead, he looks behind and walks a backward path.
And so Terriciss who changed his mean went from a man he turned into a woman, so totally transforming all his limbs, that then he had to strike once more upon the two entwining serpents with his wand before he had his manly plumes again. And Arens is the one who backs against the belly of Teresus. Arens who in Looney's hills tilled by the car who lived below had as his home a cave among white marbles from which he could gaze at stars and see with unimpeded view. And she who covers up her breasts which you can't see with her disheveled locks who keeps all of her hairy parts to the far side was MTO who had searched through many lands then settled in the place where I was born. On this I'd have you hear me now a while.
224:05When Mentos's father took his leaf of life and Bakasa's city found itself enslaved, she wandered through the world for many years. High up in lovely Italy beneath the elves that shut in Germany above Terolo lies a lake known as Bonakco. A thousand springs and more I think must flow out of the waters of that lake to bathe Panino Gardo Valkam Monica. And in its middle is a place where three the bishops of Verona breasto may bless if they should chance to come that way. Besierra strong and handsome fortress built to face the breastians and the burgamas stands when the circling shore is at its lowest.
There all the waters that cannot be held within the bosom of binoco to form a river running through green meadows. No sooner has that stream begun to flow than it is called the Mincchio, not Bakaco, until Ganolo, where it joins the Poe. It's not flowed far before it finds flat land, and there it stretches out to form a fen that in the summer can at times be fed. And when she passed that way, the savage virgin saw land along the middle of the swamp until stripped of its inhabitants. And there to flee all human intercourse.
She halted with her slaves to ply her arts. And there she lived. There left her empty body. And afterward the people of those parts collected at that place because the marsh surrounding it on all sides made it strong. They built a city over her dead bones.
And after her who first had picked that spot, they called it Manua. They cast no lots. There once were far more people in its walls before the foolishness of Casalodi was tricked by the deceit of Pinamonte. Therefore, I charge you, if you ever hear a different tale of my town's origin, do not let any falsehood gull the truth. And I, oh master, that which you have
226:05spoken convinces me and so compels my trust that others words would only be spent coals. But tell me if among the passing souls you see some spirits worthy of our notice because my mind is bent on that alone. Then he to me that shade who spreads his beard down from his cheeks across his worthy shoulders when grease had been so emptied of its males that hardly any cradle held the sun. He was an augur and at all he and Calcus at the time to cut the cables. His name's Uripololis.
A certain passage of my high tragedy has sung it so you know that well enough who know the whole. The other there his flanks extremely spare was Michael Scott a man who certainly knew how the game of magic fraud was played. See there Guido Bonati. See Estente who now would wish he had attended to his court and leather but repents too late. See those sad women who had left their needle, shuttle and spindle to become divveners.
They cast their spells with herbs and effiges, but let us go. Cain with his thorns already is at the border of both hemispheres and there below sevier torches touches the sea. Last night the moon was at its full. You should be a well well aware of this for there were times when it did you no harm in the deep wood. These were his words to me.
Meanwhile, we journeyed.
Okay, so this is about the fortune tellers. Okay, they are condemned to always walk with their uh head turned backwards. So they they can never see in front of them. They going to see behind them. And Dante spends a lot of time talking about all these uh fortune tellers and sages of integrity.
Okay, Teresus is a really famous um fortune teller fortune teller the most famous oracle in Greek
228:05mythology. Uh the man who told or uh um uh Edypus that uh he in fact did kill his father and slept with his mother. Okay, Terissus. Why is Donnie spending so much time on the fortune tellers? What is his what is his problem with fortune tellers or oracles?
I mean, isn't he an oracle? Sorry. Go ahead.
Yeah. I think that's why the Bible speaks against uh this kind of fortune telling is one of the biggest sins. It's because you denied yourself of free will
because once you have been given, oh, tomorrow you will die or whatever and you're like, oh, you're going to self-fulfill that prophecy. So like whatever the fortune teller tells you kind of sets your path and you don't have the free will to live out your life anymore.
Okay, that's one possibility, right? Um just to deny you free will, right? Because if if you remember the story of um Edypus Rex, right? He was told uh his father was told uh your your son will kill you and marry your wife. He became so afraid that he abandoned his son or had his he tried to have his son killed which then set in motion this prophecy.
Okay. And then when um uh Edypus was adopted by another royal family in his uh teenage years, he he heard this prophecy and he ran away from his father which then completed the prophecy because on the in on the on his way to uh thieves, he would get in conflict with with his father with the king, his father, and kill him and then he'd go and solve the riddle of the spin and then which would allow him to marry his mother. Okay. and become king of thieves. So this um so the idea of free
230:05will, right? You can choose whatever you want. It's hampered by these prophecies because then you're just a great a pawn in the game of the gods, right? Okay. Like this prophecy is the idea like the gods want things a certain way and that's why they give you this prophecy in order to manipulate you into behaving the way that they want.
Okay. Yes. Any other explanations for why he really Donn really really doesn't like these fortune tellers? He doesn't really like like the idea of fortune telling.
Uh yes,
if you're a big fortune teller, if you become a famous fortune teller, the net effect is you using the total amount of imagination that that you know your your population or your the people that you preach to have. So really is restricting the level of creativity, imagination that God ultimately wants to grow, not shrink.
Sure. Yes. Exactly. And also a lot of these fortune tellers are doing for profit, right? They they often do it to make money.
Yes.
Yeah. Because fortune tellers just keep telling you that everything is fake. It's fixed. You can't change. So it means that there's no free will and uh you can just choose what you want and you just listen.
So some people may be against this and some people agree with that but whatever you agree or disagree uh the fraging just try to uh you know disturb you and change you change your your your original will. Okay. Yes. Uh, anyone else? Have you guys did do you remember um the book of um Exodus when Moses gets in a fight with the uh with the um priests of the Pharaoh and they have they have like this magic contest?
C can you can you talk about that Carol or
is it when they were leaving and so they had to against the 10 gods of the barrel. Is that what it is before they leave? Oh yes.
Of the gods. Yes. Okay. So basically
232:05Moses was like, "Yeah, Israelites have to go out of Egypt." And the king of Egypt was like, "No, we want to enslave you. Free labor." So then they put up the contest between the gods. So there were the 10 plagues. So each plague was against each god of the the Egyptians.
Yes. Okay. So there there's actually quite a few of these contests in the Bible. Okay. the the prophet to pro prove himself he must go to war with other fortune tellers with other de divinators to prove that I am truly the messenger from heaven okay and to do that I'm going to show that every one of you is fake and false does that make sense so Dante I mean there there are many motivations but one m major motivation is that Dante is trying to prove that he is the ultimate prophet by showing that every other fortune teller is just a fraud okay doesn't Make sense?
Okay. So then let me ask Yes.
There's a part in the passage where Dante actually has a for me he has a kind of an unusual reaction. He feels kind of sad looking at the the the creatures with the their head backwards, right?
Yes. But but that's but that's Dante's reaction to everyone, right? He's like, I pity this.
Okay.
And and it goes back to the idea of Aristotle, like why is it important to watch theater? Like why is it important to go to theater and why is theater? Yes.
You see the tragedy of yourself in them?
Yes. Exactly. Right. This is part of something called the ctharsis process. He is in hell to purge himself of his fear and his pride and his anger.
And the way you do that is by pitying other people. And this this is what creates the ctharsis and allows you to be a new person.
I mean back to the luck media, right? Like initially Dante called this luck media. was only afterwards that he was proven to be divine.
Right.
So, I'm wondering if he's kind of worried too like if if this is I'm only doing like you know am I if I'm not fully channeling channeling the divine here will will I end up in the same situation?
234:05Sure. Sure. But but he's pretty confident that that he is the true prophet. Okay. Otherwise, he would not be writing uh the divine comedy.
Um, what proves that he is the true prophet to Dante? If you're a fortune teller and you predict some predict something, right, then that shows you are the true prophet. But D doesn't do that. So, how does starting prove he's the true prophet? And he he's able to convince a lot of people he's the true prophet.
How before the plague came.
Well, yeah. Well, he died before the plague, right? The beauty of his poetry, right? Does that make sense? It's so beautiful that you're moved to tears and you are convinced that he must be the prophet, right?
Because otherwise, how else could he have conjured up such beautiful poetry? Okay. Um, let me ask you this question. Uh, and and we'll end because we we we've been going a long time. Um, and we'll sort of finish Divine Comedy uh over the next two days.
If so, in our present day, what kind of people would be condemned to hell with their heads um turned backwards? And like I don't know the answer, but I'm just curious as what who you might think would be condemned to hell with this sort of punishment. And again, I don't know the answer. I'm just asking you guys, well, who you think might deserve such a punishment? We don't have fortune tellers today, right?
But who what kind of people?
There are a lot of force and tellers today actually fortelling is quite invogue now
in Asia and in China. Yeah.
Yes.
I think fake news. So like media newspaper like in a way to move public opinion so that it fulfills the prophecy
236:06that the media wants or the yes
people with an agenda pick I guess you can call it fake news u people within it the the larger agenda trying to make something happen and then they using all these channels for communication they're restricting imagination going back to concept of restricting people's imagination
trying to capture them into
one reality that you want to have.
No, no, no. I happen to agree. I think uh very influential journalists today that clearly have an agenda. Um they are the modern day modern day equivalent of fortune tellers, right? Because the way that you would influence a king is you would bribe a fortune teller to tell him what he wants to hear and that would cause him to do what what you wanted.
and and that's what um journalists, podcasters, YouTube celebrities, but not me, of course. Um [laughter] that's what they do, right? Um so uh yes,
it goes back to imagination. If if your act of broadcast, whatever that content that you put out, if if that is, is it a net positive or a net negative on on on imagination on people's ability to think for themselves? Right.
Right. And how and how would you differentiate between good and bad?
No, no. People's ability to think for themselves, not necessarily good or bad, right? Um, right. If if I I I I I inject something with emotion and I try to push it, push it, push it, force feed it to to to the larger population, that's going to be similar to fortune telling, right?
Yes. I think people are um people that are bad are those who trying to coni trying to convince you into believing something without letting you even question it or um just letting just just without letting you know that you're being influenced by them um and your imagination is influenced or even narrowed down by them into believing something fixed that they want you to believe. But um like you said uh I that's why I think you are not this kind of person cuz you never um you never
238:07like uh don't let us to to to um imagine for ourselves and and um propose our own um arguments against or not against you.
Okay. Thank you for that. Any more comments? Yeah, because I think Hollywood always make a lot of films and all of the blockbusters just try to keep telling you some kind of the you know uh to predict the future for example like Terminator or some kind of films like the Avatar or you know maybe Yeah.
Okay.
Again that that that gives you a possible um explanation, right? Not the not they're like trying to convince you this is what going to happen. They they give you a possibility. So, do you think that's also a fortune teller in a way that it
Okay. All right. So, something So, so I don't want to spend too much time on on this on this idea and also I'll I'll get into trouble because you guys will name names and then he'll interview me and he'll he'll like shout at me for an hour. Okay. But like um we have looked at a list of society decline.
Okay. Are there any major things that are missing from this list that that that you want to point out? So for example, the idea of a meritocracy which is an intense competition for fewer and fewer uh uh resources. You have access and arrogance, pride, fraud. You have the lack of social mobility, lack of openness, uh uh homosexuality, incest among the elite because they want to exclude everyone else, right?
Uh too much self-love, too much self-indulgence, too much individuality, too much immigration. Yes. I feel like extreme wealth inequality.
Yes, exactly. Great. Extreme wealth in equality. Yes.
Self-indulgence.
Self-indulgence. Yes.
Um not being able to express um one's own opinions.
Yes. Censorship.
Exactly. Exactly. That that's very important. Yes. I I I want to write this
240:07down. Okay. Um
sorry. I mean, the fact that when we talked about homosexuality, um, like, you know, I'm nervous about being cancelled on YouTube, right? And being stoned to death at Yale. Yes. Yes.
Um, increased.
Yes.
Um, I think censorship is a problem, but um, like in some Well, you can you can actually Say whatever you want, like think whatever you want. But the fact that you cannot change it.
No, you can't. No, you cannot. No, you cannot. If if you if this were were at Yale and I said, you know, homosexuality could be bad, I'd be in a lot of trouble.
Same with other
I would get fired. I'm not I'm I'm not joking here. Okay. You cannot say whatever you want. You just can't.
Yes.
Decrease trust in social institutions, including the media, the government.
Yes. That's really important. The breakdown of authority. Yes, exactly. The breakdown of authority.
This is really important.
The reality is that today there are no institutions that can be trusted anymore. Right. Um before in the United States, you had Congress, you had science, you had the military, you had universities. Now none of these institutions are trusted. Uh yes.
to that point also um increased bureaucracy or power like bureaucrats having a lot of power.
Yes. Yes.
Maybe postmodernism. So like the annalation of all the trusted authorities before like the cancel culture movement building up we call postruuth.
Yeah. Post truth era.
Post truth.
Yeah.
Right.
You can't even talk about what's true or not. Uh yes.
Uh I would say directed education. So
242:09giving one definition of what it means to be successful.
Exactly. Yes. Um a narrow definition of success. Yes.
Uh yes.
Degradation in the aesthetic standards.
Okay. Great. So I'm convinced we are totally screwed. Okay. All right.
So that's it for today. I'll see everyone tomorrow.