Dante on Lust: The Least of Transgressions?

Dante’s Divine Comedy is arguably one of the most thorough and elaborate fictional illustrations of the nature of the universe and God’s plan for our salvation. However, Dante’s cosmology, though beautiful and articulate, is an entirely human creation and therefore cannot be without error. If Dante were a secular author, then we shouldn't be concerned if he were to make an error concerning biblical doctrine. However, since Dante is a Christian author writing a Christian allegory, it would be advisable to examine Dante’s commentary on biblical teachings, such as the gravity of different sins, with more scrutiny. I believe that  one of the ways in which Dante might have erred is in his treatment of the sin of lust. Dante, throughout his Divine Comedy, consistently minimizes the severity of lust, depicting it as the least offensive sin a person can commit. Dante professes that some of the lustful were led to their sin by “sweet and tender thoughts” (Inferno, Canto 5.113). The only souls more innocent than the lustful in Dante’s hell are the virtuous pagans, those who lived lives which were pleasing to God yet who were denied knowledge of God while on earth simply because of the time or place in which they lived. In Dante’s Divine Comedy, the souls of the lustful receive a punishment that is both lesser than and intrinsically different from other punishments. Not only are the tortures of the lustful in both Inferno and Purgatory rather lenient, but Dante also adds little bonuses for these souls to further lessen their pain.

Inside the “broad and easy gate” (Inferno, Canto 5.20) of the lustful, the souls are spun about in a “hellish cyclone that can never rest” (Inferno, Canto 5.31). Yet some lucky shades seem to be allowed to travel through this whirlwind together, such as Paolo and Francesca, who “fly as one and seem so lightly carried on the wind” (Inferno, Canto 5.74-75). Details such as this make the torture of the lustful pale in comparison to that of other sinners in hell. Just one circle down, the gluttonous are forced to lie in a freezing “polluted mix of soul and slush” (Inferno, Canto 6.100-101). One more circle deeper into hell, we find the avaricious souls “howling … popping their chests to roll enormous weights” (Inferno, Canto 7.26-27) with “half the hair ripped from their scalps” (Inferno, Canto 7.57). Dante’s light treatment of the lustful is continued in his Purgatory, as those souls in the highest level of purgatory “greet others with a kiss” (Purgatory, Canto 26.32) and even enjoy “brief festivities” (Purgatory, Canto 26.33), their only punishment being to stand in a ring of purifying fire, which Dante likens to a “friendly gathering” (Purgatory, Canto 26.37). Meanwhile, just one ring down, the gluttonous march “famished...down to the dreary scales” (Purgatory, Canto 23.39), “so wasted dry with hunger” (Purgatory, Canto 26.27) that they gnaw their own limbs. A little farther down the mountain of Purgatory, we come across the envious, with their eyelids “all sutured through and sewn shut with an iron wire” (Purgatory, Canto 13.70-71). The lustful seem to fare the best out of all souls whether they are condemned to eternal separation from God in Hell or on their way to Heaven in Purgatory.

The punishment of the lustful in Hell and Purgatory is not only somewhat laid-back and complete with compensation prizes but is also fundamentally different from the tortures that souls receive for every other kind of sin. In every circle in Hell and ring in Purgatory, souls have their bodies mutilated or violated in some way, whether it be the emaciated, autophagous gluttons in Purgatory or the chest-popped, hair-ripped avaricious in Hell. Every shade in Dante’s afterlife suffers, among the other punishments they receive, the greatest torment men can ever know, the mutilation of their bodies. In contrast, in both Purgatory and Hell, the lustful seem to enjoy complete and healthy bodies throughout eternity. This narrative seems to run directly contrary to the teachings of the Bible. The Apostle Paul writes, “Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body” (1 Corinthians 6:18, NIV). The Apostle Paul tells us not only that lust defiles our bodies, but also in a way that every other sin does not. This scripture teaches in opposition to the way things seem to work in Dante’s cosmology, where every sin except lust is punished by mutilation of the body.

Is lust as trivial a sin as Dante portrays it in his Divine Comedy? Jesus said, “I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matthew 5:28, NIV). Proverbs 6:32 says, “A man who commits adultery… destroys himself” (NIV). The Bible makes it clear that lust is a grave matter, and there are no verses to support Dante’s belief that lust is the least consequential of all sins. If Dante was a devout Christian, why would he seemingly deny Jesus’ and the Apostle Paul’s teaching and make so much effort to underplay the severity of this particular sin in his works? We might be able to get an idea of Dante’s reasons by looking at his love poem, La Vita Nuova. In La Vita Nuova, Dante reveals that his fictional representation of divine revelation, Beatrice, is, in fact, a real person with whom Dante was infatuated. According to S. A. Chimenz’ biography, Alighieri, Dante, Dante was promised in marriage to, and eventually married, Gemma di Manetto Donati. If Dante was in love with Beatrice while being married to another woman, then perhaps his light treatment of the lustful is really a light treatment of himself. Maybe while Dante was writing the Divine Comedy, he knew exactly where he would go when he died and was hoping for as gentle an eternity as possible.