We've come beyond Satan and are standing in a giant, empty, baronial hall, waiting to get out of hell.

But not before our pilgrim, Dante, gets some answers.

And from whom would he get those answers if not from Virgil--who remains true to himself to the end of INFERNO, despite all the ribbing and drubbing he's been through.

Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we explore the next to the last passage of INFERNO: Virgil's explanation time and the very formation of the universe.

Here are the segments of this episode of WALKING WITH DANTE:

 

[01:19] My English translation of the passage: INFERNO, Canto XXXIV, lines 94 - 126. If you'd like to read along, drop a comment, or print it off, just scroll down this page.

[04:00] The way out of hell is indeed long! But Virgil is still our guide.

[05:54] For the first time, Virgil tells the time by the sun's position.

[08:20] Dante and Virgil step into irony: an empty baronial hall at the middle of the universe.

[09:41] How does Dante "pull himself up by the roots" from hell?

[11:34] Dante gets close to a concept of gravity--and perhaps we can understand how Satan is held in hell.

[14:19] Virgil offers a geography lesson on the earth's hemispheres by indirectly mentioning Jesus Christ.

[17:19] Virgil names the final circle of Cocytus: Judecca, which may be an antisemitic slur.

[20:29] The clocks have been set back by twelve hours.

[21:55] Virgil tells the story of Satan's fall from heaven and crash into the earth.

[23:30] Which is absurd heresy. Who then is in the garden of Eden?

[26:06] Virgil's myth-making lets Virgil remain Virgil until the end of INFERNO.

My English translation of Inferno, Canto XXXIV, Lines 94 – 126

 

“Get up on your feet!” my master said.

“The way is long and the road is rough.

Meanwhile, the sun is already riding in the middle of the third hour.”

 

That place where we were? It was no palatial hall.

It was more like a natural cellar

With a rugged floor and very little light.

 

“My master, before I pull myself up by the roots

From this abyss,” I said when I got up,

“Do me a little favor by clearing up my doubts.

 

“Where’s the glacial sheet? And how did that one

Get stuck upside down right here? And how, in just a few hours,

Did the sun make its way so quickly through the day?”

 

And he to me: “You imagine that you’re still

On the other side of the center, where I took hold

Of the pelt of the worm that ruins the middle of the world.

 

“You were indeed on that side as long as I was descending.

But when I turned about, you passed the point

At which the weights bear down from every part.

 

“Now you’re beneath the hemisphere

That stands in opposition to the great land mass.

Under the zenith of that hemisphere,

 

“The man was born who lived without sin.

Your feet are standing on the little disk

That forms the other side of Judecca.

 

“Here it’s morning, when it’s evening there.

And that one, whose pelt became a ladder for us,

Is in exactly the same spot as he was before.

 

“On this part of the earth he fell down from heaven.

The land, that used to stand above us,

Veiled itself in water out of fear of him

 

“And came to our hemisphere. And perhaps

To flee from him, the land which rises above us

Rushed upwards and created this vast empty space.”