Inaugural letters: Inferno 3

Inferno 3 brings us to letters that inscribe the speaking threshold of hell. It foregrounds a curious fact: The first act of those taking up their abode here is the act of reading. What does it mean that the first non-eternal thing built by the Creator was a text?

Per me si va ne la citta` dolente,
   per me si va ne l'etterno dolore,
   per me si va tra la perduta gente.
Giustizia mosse il mio alto fattore:
   fecemi la divina podestate,
   la somma sapienza e 'l primo amore.
Dinanzi a me non fuor cose create
   se non etterne, e io etterno duro.
   Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate. 

Queste parole di colore oscuro
  vid'io scritte al sommo d'una porta;
  per ch'io: "Maestro, il senso lor m'e` duro."

Ed elli a me, come persona accorta:
  "Qui si convien lasciare ogne sospetto;
  ogne vilta` convien che qui sia morta." 

                                             Inferno 3: 1-15

Gustave Dore

Among other resonances, the reading evokes, via its poetics as well as its dense, enigmatic statement, a moment in 2 Corinthians:

3 Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Or do we need, like some people, letters of recommendation to you or from you? 2 You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everyone. 3 You show that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts. 

4 Such confidence we have through Christ before God. 5 Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence comes from God. 6 He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant—not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. 

7 Now if the ministry that brought death, which was engraved in letters on stone, came with glory, so that the Israelites could not look steadily at the face of Moses because of its glory, transitory though it was, 8 will not the ministry of the Spirit be even more glorious? 9 If the ministry that brought condemnation was glorious, how much more glorious is the ministry that brings righteousness! 10 For what was glorious has no glory now in comparison with the surpassing glory. 11 And if what was transitory came with glory, how much greater is the glory of that which lasts! 

12 Therefore, since we have such a hope, we are very bold. 13 We are not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face to prevent the Israelites from seeing the end of what was passing away. 14 But their minds were made dull,for to this day the same veil remains when the old covenant is read. It has not been removed, because only in Christ is it taken away. 15 Even to this day when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts. 16 But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. 17 Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. 18 And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate[a] the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. 

Paul pilpul

As we found yesterday with regard to I Corinthians 11, it's less easy to "follow" Paul, to read him, than it first might seem. 

Two footnotes: Paul's word for "follow" is the greek mimetai, the root of mimesis - to imitate, copy - the same word the Greeks used to speak of art, as when Aristotle says a plot is the "imitation of an action."

Paul's word for "glory" is doxa - this word seems to have undergone a curious transformation when the Bible was translated into Greek (the Septuagint, in Alexandria in the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC). For Aristotle and Plato, the word carried the sense of "opinion" in contrast with "knowledge," scientific certitude. The translators of the Old Testament used doxa to render the Hebrew kavod, "glory," according to this note. New Testament writers seem to have employed that acceptation.

Here's a modern English translation of Paul's passage, from the World English Bible.

The passage in question, I Corinthians 11 1-13, is sufficiently intractable as to have permitted radically incompatible readings, according to this note in Wikipedia:

Bushnell view

A minority translate the passage as commanding women to uncover their heads. This idea was pioneered by John Lightfoot and expanded by Katharine Bushnell. In their view, Paul commanded women to uncover because they were made in the image of God, Eve was created for Adam's incapacity to exist alone, all men are born from women, because of her angels, nature does not teach otherwise, and the churches have no such custom. The passage is not actually a repression of women but a herald for equality. However, no printed Bibles have accepted this translation.

Pilpul indeed!

Following Paul

After situating mankind vis a vis the other living creatures, Paradise Lost turns to the relation of the sexes in IV.300 ff:

Not equal, as thir sex not equal seemd;

For contemplation hee and valour formd,

For softness shee and sweet attractive Grace,

Hee for God only, shee for God in him

:His fair large Front and Eye sublime declar'd [ 300 ]

Absolute rule; and Hyacinthin Locks

Round from his parted forelock manly hung

Clustring, but not beneath his shoulders broad:

Shee as a vail down to the slender waste

Her unadorned golden tresses wore [ 305 ]

Disheveld, but in wanton ringlets wav'd

As the Vine curles her tendrils, which impli'd

Subjection, but requir'd with gentle sway,

And by her yielded, by him best receivd,

Yielded with coy submission, modest pride, [ 310 ]

And sweet reluctant amorous delay.

Nor those mysterious parts were then conceald,

Then was not guiltie shame, dishonest shame

Of natures works, honor dishonorable,

Sin-bred, how have ye troubl'd all mankind [ 315 ]

With shews instead, meer shews of seeming pure,

And banisht from mans life his happiest life,

Simplicitie and spotless innocence.

So passd they naked on, nor shund the sight

Of God or Angel, for they thought no ill: [ 320 ]

So hand in hand they passd, the lovliest pair

That ever since in loves imbraces met,

Adam the goodliest man of men since borne

His Sons, the fairest of her Daughters Eve.

As noted, Milton is largely following Paul, who begins the chapter from Paul's I Corinthians Ch. 11 by talking about following. Here it is in the KJV:

1 Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ.

2 Now I praise you, brethren, that ye remember me in all things, and keep the ordinances, as I delivered them to you. 

 ³ But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God.

 ⁴Every man praying or prophesying, having his head covered, dishonoureth his head.

 ⁵But every woman that prayeth or prophesieth with her head uncovered dishonoureth her head: for that is even all one as if she were shaven.

 ⁶For if the woman be not covered, let her also be shorn: but if it be a shame for a woman to be shorn or shaven, let her be covered.

 ⁷For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man.

 ⁸For the man is not of the woman: but the woman of the man.

 ⁹Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man.

 ¹⁰For this cause ought the woman to have power on her head because of the angels.

 ¹¹Nevertheless neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord.

 ¹²For as the woman is of the man, even so is the man also by the woman; but all things of God.

 ¹³Judge in yourselves: is it comely that a woman pray unto God uncovered?

 ¹⁴Doth not even nature itself teach you, that, if a man have long hair, it is a shame unto him?

 ¹⁵But if a woman have long hair, it is a glory to her: for her hair is given her for a covering.