PURGATORIO, Episode 175. Statius, The Closeted Christian: PURGATORIO, Canto XXII, Lines 76 - 93

Statius finally tells Virgil what we all want to know: the story of his conversion. How did this Latin poet who dedicated his great epic to a Roman emperor become a Christian.

Through a long process and by subterfuge. Statius was a closeted or hidden (or to use the medieval Florentine term, "closed") Christian.

Let’s look carefully through this passage in which Dante the poet attempts to justify putting this pagan Roman poet in Purgatory and on his way to Paradise.

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

[01:20] My English translation of the passage: PURGATORIO, Canto XXII, lines 76 - 93. If you'd like to read along or continue the conversation with me, please scroll down this page.

[03:27] Two minor issues: Who converted Statius? And was Dante the poet rethinking his position toward the neutrals in INFERNO?

[08:08] Statius' journey in the afterlife to the fourth circle of Mount Purgatory . . . and where else?

[08:40] Statius' improvised backstory and the inclusion of a historical figure: Emperor Domitian.

[13:13] Dante's concept of conversion (v. modern conceptions).

[16:36] Statius' words and the problem of the "above" text.

[20:01] Texts in texts and the inevitable overlay of irony.

[24:50] Rereading this passage: PURGATORIO, Canto XXII, lines 76 - 93.

And here’s my translation of PURGATORIO, Canto XXII, Lines 76 – 93

“The whole entire world was already pregnant

With the true beliefs, [which had been] sown

By the messengers of the eternal kingdom.

“Your words, which I mentioned above,

Were ever so consonant with the new preachers

When I decided to routinely visit them.

“They came to seem more and more holy to me,

So that when Domitian persecuted them,

My tears were not missing among their own weeping.

“Meanwhile, I stuck around in that situation down there

To help them. Their righteous actions

Made me lose respect for all the other sects.

“So before I led the Greeks to the rivers of

Thebes in my poetry, I was baptized.

But because of fear, I was a hidden Christian,

“Even going so far as to pretend to be a pagan for a long time.

Such lukewarmness made me circle

The fourth circle for more than four centuries. . . .”