A Divine Lent #27: Who let you climb His stairway this far up?


A daily reflection during Lent on Dante's The Divine Comedy.

Canto 21 of Purgatory opens with some drama.  At then end of Canto 20, Dante and Virgil feel the mount tremble and hear a tremendous but joyous shout.  Now Dante is still wondering what has happened "when suddenly ... a shade appeared!"  Dante couches the experience in two scenes with Christ.  He expresses his desire to know what was going on as analogous to the woman at the well with Jesus.

The natural thirst which nothing satisfies
except that water begged for long ago
by the poor woman of Samaria
tormented me...

Dante likens the appearance of the shade the the appearance of Jesus to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus.  As Jesus provided guidance and instruction to the woman and the two travelers, so will the shade with Dante and Virgil, not revealing his identity until later: the Latin poet Statius.

Statius, though, gets off on a rocky foot.  When Virgil introduces himself as not a member of the "Congregation of the Blest", Statius exclaims,

"What's that?' he said as we kept forging on,
"If you are souls whom God will not receive,
who let you climb His stairway this far up?"

Statius echoes the concerns of Cato in the first canto when the travelers arrived on the shores of purgatory.  What on earth (or in heaven) is going on?  Statius' remark "this far up" is interesting.  Of course those people on the lower terraces may put up with this kind of thing, but up here?  There's a bit of self-righteousness within the shade who just completed his purgation.  Statius' dogmatism continues as he explains that the tremor and shouting the travelers experienced.

The shade said: "Sacred laws that rule this mount
will not let anything take place this is
uncustomary or irregular.
This place is not subject to any change..."

Statius is telling two uncustomary visitors than nothing uncustomary can occur in this place.  Does my desire to hold onto those things than give security and predictability blind me to obvious changes?

Statius redeems himself explaining some of the mechanics of purgatory: the soul wishes to suffer, similar to its earthly desire to sin, and only when the soul senses sufficient penance does it have the will to climb to the next level.  While this almost-masochistic process was left behind with the Reformation, it does remind me that repentance and the acceptance of grace includes personal responsibility for my actions and inaction.  Grace brings me into communion with God, but it does not absolve me from righting any wrong.

The final impression of this canto is the humanness of Statius even after his purgation.  Sometimes, the process of purification, of making oneself holy, can be seen as a stripping of self, of personality.  Statius' colorful reactions to Virgil are reminders that grace to does not strip us down to the least common denominator of humanity.  It does not turn us all into identical chanting monks.  Rather, grace strips away the falsehoods to show our revealed-self, our full self, still imperfect, still human, and still unique.

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