The Divine Comedy Essays -- essays research papers

During the Middle Ages, the church was a powerful institution. It had its own government, courts, rangement of taxation, and laws. To cognize a good Christian life guaranteed access to promised land in the afterlife, and a life of sin was to be sentenced to hell. Dante Alighieri was an Italian poet, who had an admirable depth of spiritual vision and was known for his intelligence (Encarta, 1). Between the old age of 1308 and 1321, Dante wrote the epic poem, The Divine Comedy, which described a journey through the afterlife. It takes place during the three days of Good Friday, when Jesus died, and on Easter sunshine when he rose body and soul to heaven. It is a moral comedy, and was written to make readers evaluate their own morals. The journey was to show readers what could happen if they live a sinful life, or if they live a godlike life.In the shopping centre of the journey of our life I came to my senses in a dark forest, for I had lost the straight path. Ah How hard a thi ng it is to tell what this ill-considered and rough and difficult wood was, which in thought renews my fear (Alighieri, 1) This musical passage tells us that Dante is lost in the core of the woods, and he is in the middle of his life. The reason he gives for being lost is that he had become abstracted and was not paying attention to where he was going. This symbolizes how he has lost his betoken for salvation. His laziness, a sin, caused him to stray from the road of salvation. He cant go back the carriage he came because that is the way o...