A Divine Lent #36: Do not weep, not yet, that is, for you shall have to weep from yet another wound

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

As many horror movies promise that there will be blood, Canto 30 of Purgatory promises that there will be tears, and delivers on that promise.  The grand procession has stopped across from Dante, but the show is not over.  One hundred angels appear above the chariot, begin to sing, and drop a cascade of flowers, "a rain of flowers", in the air above the chariot.  Through this veil of flowers, Beatrice appears, emerging from the chariot.  Dante turns to express his excitement to Virgil, but Virgil is gone.  Beatrice represents the wisdom of God.  Virgil, as the keeper of human wisdom, is no longer relevant and is inferior.  Dante now only needs to look at divine wisdom.

The larger than life grand scale seems ridiculous; it continues the overkill from the previous canto.  Neither Hollywood nor Trump could have designed a grander entrance.  Yet as Beatrice represents God's revelation to the world, Dante represents all humanity.  The scene is a presentation of the audacity of God's grace, yelling to the observer, "Look at what God has done for all  humanity and for each person."  It is the same audacity of grace expressed in the incarnation and the cross, an inestimable gift to the whole population as well as to each individual.

For Dante, things get very personal very quickly.  Beatrice scolds Dante for mourning Virgil's exit.

"Dante, though Virgil leaves you, do not weep,

not yet, that is, for you shall have to weep

from yet another wound.  Do not weep yet."

The message from Beatrice is clear: you need to cry, but not for what you are currently crying.  Dante does not have to wait long.  Beatrice quickly begins scolding Dante as a parent to a child, ridiculing him for finally arriving.

"Yes, look at me! Yes, I am Beatrice!

So, you have at last deigned to climb the mount?

You learned at last that here lies human bliss?"

The promise to see Beatrice motivated Dante throughout his journey whenever fear paralyzed him.  He was likely not prepared for this type of reception.  

I was the guilty child facing his mother,

abject before her harshness...

Dante feels the wind knocked out of him, like going from a snowy mountain to a hot desert.  

...from my breast,

through mouth and eyes, anguish came pouring forth.

Beatrice explains her sternness to the accompanying host.

"...my purpose is

to make the one who weeps on that far bank

perceive the truth and match his guild with grief.

...

with this man so endowed, potentially,

in early youth--had he allowed his gifts

to bloom, he would have reaped abundantly."

Dante needs to express the grief that other souls in purgatory have already done on the various terraces.  The main sin Beatrice expresses though is one of lost or missed opportunity, not making the most of his life or of his talents.  She notes that while she inspired him to do good during her time on earth, he lost his way after her death.  In the first lines of the Comedy Dante notes that "I had wandered off from the straight path."  Here Beatrice makes the same observation, "he ... wandered from the path that leads to truth."  Her attempts to bring Dante back to the truth failed causing her to take drastic action.

I prayed that inspiration come to him

through dreams and other means: in vain I tried

to call him back, so little did he care.

To such depths did he sink that, finally,

there was no other way to save his soul

except to have him see the Damned in Hell.

Beatrice's claim that Dante had to see to believe reminds me of Jesus' words to Thomas in the gospel of John, "Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe."  Beatrice closes by explaining to all that Dante's acceptance of and expression of guilt is necessary for him to cross the stream Lethe; he has "to pay at least some scot of penitence poured forth in guilty tears."

In this closing, Dante the individual is once again the representative Everyman (and woman).  Drawing near to God requires an intense examination of actions, priorities, motivations, and short coming.  Rather than just chalking everything up to "that's what it means to be human," regret needs to be expressed.  Repentance is a change, both in what I do and how I feel about what I do, what I have done, and what I have not done.  Anything less maintains distance with the divine.

The Lent, may we all draw closer to God through examination and change.