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02-20-2006, 09:51 AM | #1 |
Elven Maiden
Join Date: Aug 2002
Posts: 3,309
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Dante`s Inferno- what level are you in?
I, suffering once again from insomnia, decided to look for a website where I could read Dante`s Divine Comedy online. I had started it in America and made it almost all the way through Inferno, so I had an idea what it was. Anyway, in my search, I came across this quiz: http://www.4degreez.com/misc/dante-inferno-test.mv It`s a quiz about what level of Dante`s Hell you would end up in, supposing things were as he says. I thought hey, why not? Well, I answered all the questions honestly (and a lot of the questions were objective, clearly yes or no, thus making the results a little less relative), and halfway through the quiz I realized about in what direction I was headed... Turns out I ended up on the 8th level, out of 9 levels of Hell and one for Purgatory. Shock!
I was curious to see how my fellow mooters would fare. But really, it got me thinking about it. At first it seemed a little harsh, throwing me down there like that. The thinking seemed almost old fashioned. Well, some of the things I don`t really think are bad, like homosexuality and atheism, but some of you might disagree with me there and that`s fine. But there are a lot of sins that`ll put you down into a deeper level of Hell that I think really are something that maybe should be avoided, regardless of religious beliefs. For example gluttony, greed, malice. What do you think? Do you think Dante is behind the times or timeless? And does this thread already exist or maybe should be placed in the General Lit. thread? Because I don`t mean it to be about Dante or the Divine Inferno exactly, but just the ideas presented within (which is kind of the same?). Read: The question I am asking is (1) what score did you get and (2) do you think the world (or your life) would be better if people (or just yourself) avoided such sins as gluttony, greed, lust, malice, etc.? Or do you think we should enjoy the world, food, possessions, sex, violence, etc.? Regardless of any religious beliefs (i.e. "Because God said so"). Do you think it`s worth trying to live a pure and virtuous life? |
02-20-2006, 11:59 AM | #2 | ||||
Elf Lord
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: In me taters
Posts: 3,288
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I'm in Limbo:
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But the question is kind of an oxymoron without some sort of religious belief: I believe that we are all moral beings, and the vast majority of us live our lives in a way that we think of as being decent. By definition, since what we think of as decent could be defined as what we think is acceptable behaviour. Whether that matches up to some sort of God-bothersome yardstick, or even a Leftie, Knit-your-own-free-range-sandals yardstick, is a different question. |
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02-20-2006, 12:20 PM | #3 |
An enigma in a conundrum
Join Date: Oct 1999
Posts: 6,476
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D.I. is literature; abracadabra, it's there.
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Vizzini: "HE DIDN'T FALL?! INCONCEIVABLE!!" Inigo: "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means." |
02-20-2006, 12:30 PM | #4 |
Elf Lord
Join Date: Dec 2000
Location: Fountain Valley, CA
Posts: 6,343
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I'll keep you company, Katya, among the others who are tearing their own skin off . I'm in the 8th level of hell too .
Though some of the things I marked down aren't really sins, I think. For example, "do you "hate" everyone?" I answered yes to, because Jesus said, "whoever does not hate his mother, brother and sisters for my sake is not worthy of me." Jesus, of course, was merely saying that nothing must come higher in a person's life than God. I don't know if I succeed in that completely yet, but their question was open to my devious, twisting interpretations! It was a very fun quiz.
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If the world has indeed, as I have said, been built of sorrow, it has been built by the hands of love, because in no other way could the soul of man, for whom the world was made, reach the full stature of its perfection. ~Oscar Wilde, written from prison Oscar Wilde's last words: "Either the wallpaper goes, or I do." Last edited by Lief Erikson : 02-20-2006 at 12:40 PM. |
02-20-2006, 12:38 PM | #5 |
Elf Lord
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: sikeston, MO, usa, earth, sol
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For the attentive reader, one will see in Dante's Inferno the application of the moral code by which they professed to live. Stoics and Cynics and Aristotleans etc are present, as well as followers of Nietsche before their current designations. Those without a professed code of ethics or morals are judged by natural law.
Contrary to the popular assumption that Dante just put his enemies there, you'll find many friends and acquaintances and persons of stature. I, not surprisingly, think moral behaviours very important.
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Inked "Aslan is not a tame lion." CSL/LWW "The new school [acts] as if it required...courage to say a blasphemy. There is only one thing that requires real courage to say, and that is a truism." GK Chesterton "And there is always the danger of allowing people to suppose that our modern times are so wholly unlike any other times that the fundamental facts about man's nature have wholly changed with changing circumstances." Dorothy L. Sayers, 1 Sept. 1941 |
02-20-2006, 12:42 PM | #6 | |
Elf Lord
Join Date: Dec 2000
Location: Fountain Valley, CA
Posts: 6,343
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Quote:
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If the world has indeed, as I have said, been built of sorrow, it has been built by the hands of love, because in no other way could the soul of man, for whom the world was made, reach the full stature of its perfection. ~Oscar Wilde, written from prison Oscar Wilde's last words: "Either the wallpaper goes, or I do." |
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02-20-2006, 01:58 PM | #7 | |
Elf Lord
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: sikeston, MO, usa, earth, sol
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http://danteworlds.laits.utexas.edu/index2.html As to friends: Virgil (Limbo by his own admission) Ciacco (Circle 3, Canto 6) gluttony; nickname ="pig" Guido Cavalcanti's father, Cavalcanti de Cavalcanti (Circle 6, Canto 10) who speaks of Dante's best friend, Guido Cavalcanti, and his impending death and displacement to ?hell? Brunetto Latini (Circle 7, Canto 15) Dante's mentor and friend As to the admired by Dante: Limbo and the Classical Greats there besides Virgil the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick (Circle 6, Canto 10) etc. That should get you going.
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Inked "Aslan is not a tame lion." CSL/LWW "The new school [acts] as if it required...courage to say a blasphemy. There is only one thing that requires real courage to say, and that is a truism." GK Chesterton "And there is always the danger of allowing people to suppose that our modern times are so wholly unlike any other times that the fundamental facts about man's nature have wholly changed with changing circumstances." Dorothy L. Sayers, 1 Sept. 1941 |
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02-20-2006, 12:55 PM | #8 | ||
Elf Lord
Join Date: Dec 2002
Location: followed by a moonshadow...
Posts: 738
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Cute thread
I expected to end up somewhere around level 9...but in fact I'm a Virtuous Non-Believer (Level 1), and get to spend eternity in "a place of sorrow without torment...upon the brink of grief's abysmal valley." I'm also highly lustful, moderately heretical and moderately fraudulent Quote:
Of course, what "excess" is is relative Like Gaffer said, we live our lives according to personal sets of morals (whether these morals are determined/influenced by religion or not); therefore different people will consider different kinds of behaviour to be acceptable/unacceptable. Quote:
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02-20-2006, 01:08 PM | #9 |
The Supreme Lord of The Northern Eagles
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: trondheim, norway
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I got into 6. level of hell, where the heretics goes.
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Don't Panic! |
03-03-2006, 03:52 AM | #10 | |
Spaceman Spiff
Join Date: Nov 2005
Location: In the belly of a Firefly, living in Serenity is where you'll find me
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Quote:
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Do you hear that? |
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02-20-2006, 03:26 PM | #11 | ||
Lady of Letters
Join Date: Jan 2002
Location: Either Oxford or Kent, England
Posts: 2,476
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I got Purgatory. If I start to feel smug about it, do I plummet down a couple of levels?
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And all the time the waves, the waves, the waves Chase, intersect and flatten on the sand As they have done for centuries, as they will For centuries to come, when not a soul Is left to picnic on the blazing rocks, When England is not England, when mankind Has blown himself to pieces. Still the sea, Consolingly disastrous, will return While the strange starfish, hugely magnified, Waits in the jewelled basin of a pool. |
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02-20-2006, 03:41 PM | #12 |
Elf Lord
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: sikeston, MO, usa, earth, sol
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Sun-star,
Pride is THE capital sin, the font from which all the others flow. Betrayal is the ultimate state of pride: "My way or the highway" - which Brutus. Cassius, and Judas all succumb. This is pictured and written in the Inferno. "Lucifer, Satan, Dis, Beelzebub--Dante throws every name in the book at the Devil, once the most beautiful angel (Lucifer means "light-bearer") then--following his rebellion against God--the source of evil and sorrow in the world, beginning with his corruption of Eve and Adam in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3). Dante's Lucifer is a parodic composite of his wickedness and the divine powers that punish him in hell. As ugly as he once was beautiful, Lucifer is the wretched emperor of hell, whose tremendous size (he dwarfs even the Giants) stands in contrast with his limited powers: his flapping wings generate the wind that keeps the lake frozen and his three mouths chew on the shade-bodies of three arch-traitors, the gore mixing with tears gushing from Lucifer's three sets of eyes (Inf. 34.53-7). Lucifer's three faces--each a different color (red, whitish-yellow, black)--parody the doctrine of the Trinity: three complete persons (Father, Son, Holy Spirit) in one divine nature--the Divine Power, Highest Wisdom, and Primal Love that created the Gate of Hell and, by extension, the entire realm of eternal damnation. With the top half of his body towering over the ice, Lucifer resembles the Giants and other half-visible figures; after Dante and Virgil have passed through the center of the earth, their perspective changes and Lucifer appears upside-down, with his legs sticking up in the air. Consider the implications of visual parallels between Lucifer and other inhabitants of hell. Eternally eaten by Lucifer's three mouths are--from left to right-- Brutus, Judas, and Cassius (Inf. 34.61-7). Brutus and Cassius, stuffed feet first in the jaws of Lucifer's black and whitish-yellow faces respectively, are punished in this lowest region for their assassination of Julius Caesar (44 B.C.E.), the founder of the Roman Empire that Dante viewed as an essential part of God's plan for human happiness. Both Brutus and Cassius fought on the side of Pompey in the civil war. However, following Pompey's defeat at Pharsalia in 48 B.C.E., Caesar pardoned them and invested them with high civic offices. Still, Cassius continued to harbor resentment against Caesar's dictatorship and enlisted the aid of Brutus in a conspiracy to kill Caesar and re-establish the republic. They succeeded in assassinating Caesar but their political-military ambitions were soon thwarted by Octavian (later Augustus) and Antony at Philippi (42 B.C.E.): Cassius, defeated by Antony and thinking (wrongly) that Brutus had been defeated by Octavian, had himself killed by a servant; Brutus indeed lost a subsequent battle and took his life as well. For Dante, Brutus and Cassius' betrayal of Julius Caesar, their benefactor and the world's supreme secular ruler, complements Judas Iscariot's betrayal of Jesus, the Christian man-god, in the Bible. Judas, one of the twelve apostles, strikes a deal to betray Jesus for thirty pieces of silver; he fulfills his treacherous role--foreseen by Jesus at the Last Supper--when he later identifies Jesus to the authorities with a kiss; regretting this betrayal that will lead to Jesus' death, Judas returns the silver and hangs himself (Matthew 26:14-16; 26:21-5; 26:47-9; 27:3-5). Suffering even more than Brutus and Cassius, Dante's Judas is placed head-first inside Lucifer's central mouth, with his back skinned by the devil's claws (Inf. 34.58-63). " (Danteworlds, op cit)
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Inked "Aslan is not a tame lion." CSL/LWW "The new school [acts] as if it required...courage to say a blasphemy. There is only one thing that requires real courage to say, and that is a truism." GK Chesterton "And there is always the danger of allowing people to suppose that our modern times are so wholly unlike any other times that the fundamental facts about man's nature have wholly changed with changing circumstances." Dorothy L. Sayers, 1 Sept. 1941 |
02-20-2006, 05:52 PM | #13 |
Death of Mooters and [Entmoot] Internal Affairs
Join Date: Oct 2002
Location: Oslo, Norway
Posts: 2,870
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Being a great admirer of Dante (though I haven't even finished Inferno yet) I'm happy to say I managed Limbo. Though, by only altering two-three questions (not such a big leap, I'd consider them minor), I ended up in the 6th.
In other words, still some things to take care of before I get to see the man himself down there in the 9th.
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Fëanor - Innocence incarnated Still, Aikanáro 'till the Last battle. Last edited by Falagar : 02-20-2006 at 05:55 PM. |
02-20-2006, 06:58 PM | #14 |
Elven Maiden
Join Date: Aug 2002
Posts: 3,309
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Nice replies so far everyone. ^_^ I figured you`d probably say it was about a balance. But the thing is, I have been going through life doing just that- trying to avoid excess while still enjoying life. But I wonder, maybe it just might be better to try even harder- I think I am tempted to say "it`s ok in moderation" just because I want to do something. I wonder if it would be better if people did think about it more like "this is bad, period". Does anyone think there could be something gained from it? Or avoided, for that matter? I`ve seen people unhappy because of their excess- maybe they thought they had a balance too. What do you think?
That`s interesting, Falagar- which level is limbo again? |
02-21-2006, 05:26 AM | #15 |
Elf Lord
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: In me taters
Posts: 3,288
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IIRC, Limbo is for "virtuous unbelievers". Which is a bit annoying, having spent one's life being virtuous because you chose to rather than because you were afraid of going to Hell.
Sun-star makes some very sensible comments, as ever. A good example might be sex: I don't see any problem with being "virtuous" and going at it like rabbits. Clearly, an older conception of "virtue" is involved here. Katya, I assume you are referring to the less black-and-white areas, such as getting rat-arsed on booze and drugs and waking up in a pool of your own puke. In which case, excess is good in moderation. |
01-13-2008, 03:33 PM | #16 |
Elf Lady
Join Date: Nov 2006
Location: In the lands where mountains are but a fairytale
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The third hell...
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Love always, deeply and true ★ Friends are those rare people who ask how we are and then wait to hear the answer. ★ Friendship is sharing openly, laughing often, trusting always, caring deeply.
...The Earth laughs in flowers ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Hamatreya"... |
01-16-2008, 09:40 PM | #17 |
The Black Númenórean
Join Date: Feb 2003
Posts: 6,773
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The Dante's Inferno Test has sent you to Purgatory!
How did I manage purgatory?
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Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself. They come through you but not from you, And though they are with you yet they belong not to you. You may give them your love but not your thoughts, For they have their own thoughts. You may house their bodies but not their souls, For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams. |
01-16-2008, 10:17 PM | #18 |
Kraken King
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Under the sea
Posts: 2,714
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Hey! Your here, too? Coolio...
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One of my top ten favorite movies. "You ever try to flick a fly? "No." "It's a waste of time." "Can you see it?" "No." "It's right there!" "Where? "There!" "What is it?" "A crab." "A crab? I dont see any crab." "How?! It's right there!!" "Where?" "There!!!!" "Oh." -Excerpts from A Tale of Two Morons |
01-17-2008, 03:05 AM | #19 |
The Black Númenórean
Join Date: Feb 2003
Posts: 6,773
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Yes, not sure how I managed it. Guess I must have toned down in the past few years.
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Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself. They come through you but not from you, And though they are with you yet they belong not to you. You may give them your love but not your thoughts, For they have their own thoughts. You may house their bodies but not their souls, For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams. |
09-25-2008, 08:14 PM | #20 |
Faithful Gardener
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: I walk here and there, they say...
Posts: 3,603
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I got into Purgatory...
As to the living thing... I like trying to live a virtuous life. It gives me an excuse to be good.
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In God I trust, I will not be afraid. What can man do to me? Psalm 56:11 "Starbuck, what do you hear?" "Nothin' but the rain, sir!" "Then grab your gun and bring in the cat." Make sure to check out the C.S. Lewis forum. Game threads, movie and book discussions and more! |
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