World Historical Literature - Essay Example

World Literature- Answers to Questions Table of Contents 3. 5. Works Cited Dante’s ‘Inferno’ is littered with the souls of dead people who in general are in hell for not acknowledging their sins as the Roman Catholic Church defined them, but instead tried to justify their sins and to defend themselves. One person though, that seems to be in hell because of a personal grudge on the part of Dante, by way of settling that grudge and getting even with a person, is Filippo of Argenti. In ‘Inferno’ Filippo Argenti is depicted as being in the Fifth Circle, and in that circle are found those who were in life wrathful or sullen. Those relate to the one sin of anger, and Filippo’s sin was wrath. As such, the punishment for Filippo was to experience the wrath of others, in the Styx River where those who lived in anger were relegated as their proper place in hell. This relates to Cantos 7 and 8 of Circle 5 in the work (University of Texas; Brown University). The historical literature notes that the knowledge of Filippo Argenti’s real life stems mostly from Dante’s explicit mention of him in ‘Inferno’, from Canto VIII, as well as the commentaries on that work through time. Filippo’s family line is traced to the Adimari family, from the Cavicciuoili branch. The family traces its allegiance to the Black Guelphs. The records show that the family itself had no ties with the aristocracy, even as the family also was known for its wealth. Argenti, the sufix to the name Filippo, connoted wealth in the way his horses had silver shoes. The Adimari family, in general, commanded respect because of the power and wealth that it had managed to accumulate. In Dante’s ‘Inferno’, Filippo was shown to have become wrathful as he had been in life, and the fate that met him corresponded with the fate of those who are assigned that place in the Styx River among the other wrathful souls, and they go at each other by way of punishment for their uncontrolled wrath (Brown University; Alghieri). In the canto in particular, starting at 8.37, we get to understand that Dante recognized Filippo in death, even though the latter was in the river and had grown very ugly and dirty. Dante addressed the soul, saying that he wished Filippo to weep and grieve for a long time, and that he in fact knew who the accursed soul was. It was Filippo. from 8.58 onwards, after having spoken with Virgil, Dante sees Filippo being attacked and torn apart by other souls in the river, and Dante was full of praise and gratitude. He relished the sight of Filippo getting what he deserved, at least in the mind of Dante. Filippo deserved his punishment. In 8.61 Dante’s recognition is affirmed by the other wratfhul souls who shouted ‘At Filippo Argenti!’ while they attacked him in anger. From 8.64 onwards we see Dante narrating that he had heard the wild wailing, and instead of flinching he seemed to revel in the wailing and wished to move his body in the direction of the accursed, so he could see better. There is something very personal about his wanting to see Filippo suffer in the way that he did, and in the way he did not seem to have in his heart any reserve of mercy and compassion for the Filippo’s soul. In fact, in these passages, what stands out is Virgil even praising Dante for his sense of justice and for the refinement of his wrath against the sinner, and approving of his sentiments and actions wholeheartedly, with glee too, that Virgil even kissed Dante in approval. To Virgil it was a good sign that Dante was full of indignation against that particular man, who while alive was full of presumption, and who like many who were rich and powerful in their time surely ended up in hell for their various sins on earth. From 8.43 all the way to 8.57 we see that the exchange between the two journeymen to hell is filled with theological justification for Filippo’s damnation in hell, and this passage ends with Dante wishing to see Filippo suffer in the river, and Virgil affirming that Dante will be satisfied in his wish (Alghieri). That this is a kind of personal vengeance for Dante is affirmed in various commentaries too, on these passages. The anger that Dante felt towards the soul of Filippo is seen as out of character, and came all of a sudden, when before this he would be dominated by fear sometimes. In this passage he was even delighted to see Filippo suffer, an emotional state that reflects having a sense of vengeance satiated (Fowlie 64-65). On the other hand, in terms of those souls that the Catholic church would approve of because of the sins that they actually committed, Dante gives many good examples In the Second Circle of Hell, for instance, Dante places those who in life committed adultery and gave in to their lust (Alghieri (b)). 3. In the modern context, heroic can mean the distillation of traits that allow a person to transcend his own shortcomings, weaknesses, social restrictions, and seemingly insurmountable personal odds in order to pursue a vision of the truth, or of beauty, or to fight for something bigger than oneself, and emerge victorious and change the world. Heroic is also virtuous, and one that is also spiritual in its dimensions, rather than one that is merely based on ego, the cravings of ego for adventure, for conquest, for personal gain. There is an element in the heroic of something inherently likable, of the hero saving the world in a profound way, and not being caught up in the traps that cause the downfall of ordinary men- women, riches, power, petty vices, an immature personality, an affliction of the mind, the ego. The heroic is also the master of self and of his fate. The readings gave us a wide array of options for the heroic model, but among the accounts of Jesus in the New Testament, in the sermon at the mount, in the crucifying and in the resurrection of Jesus, one sees the perfect model or ideal of the hero. Jesus is the spiritual heroic ideal, in that he embodies all of the qualities of the hero described above. He is a good hero for modern times, and a reminder that spiritual and heroic ideals are eternal, and are not dependent on passing fads and what men call progress. It is a cerebral and spiritual kind of heroism and leadership, one that is founded beyond reason, the designs of men, the corruption of time, beyond the craving for anything temporary or earthly. His ideals are able to withstand the onslaught of time, and men rediscover him time and time again, and find him worthy of the highest place among heroes. For instance, in the sermon on the mount, the heroic ideal shines through in the way Jesus preaches about transcending the ordinary worries of people about their personal welfare. This emphasis on trusting God, and of going beyond the cares of the body, reflects an elevated hero consciousness, that allows him to later do the work that is intended or him. We know that Jesus would die for all men, and that this part of the sermon on the mount reflects the kind of thinking that allowed Jesus to do the ultimate heroic act of self-sacrifice, in order to save all men. Moreover, we understand from the sermon on the mount that the heroic virtues are spiritual virtues, and they completely go against the conventions of ordinary society and the natural physical impulses of men, which tend towards fear, self-preservation, revenge, hate, pettiness, self-seeking, the giving into the impulse to adultery, murdering others in thought and words. To this Jesus offers counter-paradigms of love for the enemy, praying in ways that are not really a kind of display, giving charity without making a boast of it to others, and what it means to live in accordance with the spiritual values to be had in heaven rather than the foolish material things to be had on earth. The beautitudes moreover also turn traditional notions of blessedness on its head, and the message here is that the true hero has spiritual vision. The true hero too does not really care for the approval of conventional society, and remains true to an eternal vision. In the end, as Jesus demonstrated, true heroism is surrendering to a greater will, and transcending oneself in order to fulfill a mandate. In his case the mandate is to die for all, to be a hero for God. This perspective of the hero is a satisfying alternative and a true alternative to the kinds of heroes that are presented to us in other pieces of literature. In Gilgamesh, Beowul, Hamlet and others, the heroes are operating within their own specific human natures, are flawed, are full of ego and of striving, lacking any transcendent vision or virtue. They are men, true, but in modern times we seem to need something more than humanity in our heroes. This is not to say that Jesus was not fully human too, which he was. It is that in our present age our heroes seem fixed on existing mostly on the level of personality, and can be very petty too. Beowulf was full of ego too, for instance, and lacked a spiritual vision of his role in the lives of people around him. For him things were about conquering and going to war, overpowering his enemies. In Shakespeare’s heroes too, in Hamlet, the heroes seem unable to gain a more complete vision of their lives, and seem compelled to act out tragic and doomed roles. Certainly we can do better than that in modern times, and strive to hold our heroes to higher standards. Jesus is this hero who can measure up to those higher standards in ways that other hero alternatives in the readings are unable to do (Matthew; Puchner). 5. In the story of Jesus one gets the version of fate as something that is the fulfillment of the prophesies and of Scriptures. It is alignment with the will of God. It is something that is imposed from without, and the role of Jesus is to surrender to that will. Fate then in this context is mostly about this surrender, of the life of the Messiah and the Savior being ordained from above. On the other hand, the role of man here is not to be a puppet, but to choose to live in accordance with the greater will. This is the vision of fate in the Biblical accounts in the New Testament, of man having the freedom to choose to be on the good side of God by following his will. For Jesus, who is the personification of the man who completely follows the will of God, this means dying for all men, and to living out a spiritual ideal rather than an earthly ideal whose language is self-preservation, fear, living according to the dictates of the body, the accumulation of wealth and power, the instincts, the natural appetites and desires. For Jesus this is not freedom, and in this sense too one can talk of fate as the fate of the body versus the fate of the spirit. The fate of the body is tied to the desires, the whims, the caprices, the vices, the lusts and passions, and therefore is also something that is conditioned, rather than chosen. Man is thrown into this body, and this body determines one’s fate. The mortal fate of the body is the final fate of it. On the other hand, the spiritual fate is the fate of Jesus Christ, as the savior of the world, and as someone with a vision of heaven and the will of the Father in his life and in the lives of all men. In the crucifixion of Jesus we see the two fates, the fate of the body and the fate of the spiritual man in Jesus, diverging. The spiritual man chooses to align himself with God’s will and to willingly die in fulfillment of that divine will. Fate here is surrender. For the physical body, fate is the fate of the body, prone to suffering, and the end of which is death (Puchner; Matthew). In Beowulf one is presented with a vision of fate that is almost wholly in the hands of the actor, the hero, even as the hero too is mortal and human, and the strengths and foibles of humanity are his fate too. Beowulf is proud and physically powerful, but that pride would be his undoing in the end. One can say that on the one hand, Beowulf had free will to pursue what he wanted and to live life as he wanted. On the other hand, his fate and his freedom are conditioned by his very human failings, flaws, and character defects. His pride overpowered his better senses in the end, and he would die because of that pride. He is not so free as to be free of his character flaws and his propensity to be blinded by his earlier successes and his immense physical powers (Puchner). The Hindu conception of fate on the other hand rests closely with the notion of the sacred duty, in the same manner that Jesus in Christianity depicts the notion of fate in terms of following the will of God. In Hinduism then fate is something that is aligned with the roles and duties that one has to fulfill in accordance with one’s nature, gifts, ordained job roles and social and economic roles, as the case may be. Fate is tied in this sense also to caste, to social standing, and where one is situated within the context of Hindu society (Pushner). In Buddhism on the other hand, fate is tied to karma, the workings of karmic destiny, where one is in this greater scheme of karma’’s universal application. One’s life and actions are not free at all, but are conditioned by past actions (Puchner). Works Cited Alghieri, Dante. “Inferno Canto 8”. University of Virginia Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities. n.d. Web. 7 December 2014. Alghieri, Dante (b). “Inferno Canto 5”. University of Virginia Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities. n.d. Web. 7 December 2014. Brown University. “Filippo Argenti (Filippo Adimari): Decameron IX.8”. Decameron Web. 2010. Web. 7 December 2014. Fowlie, Wallace. A Reading of Dante’s Inferno. University of Chicago Press/Google Books. 15 May 1981. Web. 7 December 2014. Matthew. “Matthew 5-7”. NIV Bible. 2014. Web. 7 December 2014. Puchner, Martin et al. (ed). The Norton Anthology of World Literature Third Edition. WW Norton & Company. March 2012. University of Texas. “Dante’s Inferno Circle 5 - Cantos 7-9”. Danteworlds. n.d. Web. 7 December 2014. Read More