Lust and Law Were One

One of the joys of my life (maybe for my students, too!) is teaching Dante's Commedia. We focus most of our time on Inferno, the famous hell section, but are trying to give more time and weight to the succeeding sections, Purgatorio and Paradiso. 

Dante is unbelievable to me. That he existed. That he wrote this amazing poem. That he still speaks to us thundering down through the ages. I read an article David Foster Wallace wrote on Dostoevsky this week and it spoke about his power as a novelist to be inhabit time and transcend time: "a comprehensive reading of Dostoevsky's fiction is impossible without a detailed understanding of the cultural circumstances in which the books were conceived and to which they were meant to contribute." Despite this temporal concern, Dostoevsky's fiction is animated at its core by a "concern" with "what it is to be a human being--that is, how to be an actual person, someone whose life is informed by values and principles, instead of just an especially shrewd kind of self-preserving animal." This human-centric focus goes beyond the parochial concerns of nineteenth century Russia. Dante has that same power: to be totally of his moment--mired in the grit and grime of thirteenth century Italy--and yet totally transcend it.

I'll probably be writing about the poem with some frequency as I teach my way through it this fall, but the first moment I want to slow down on comes early in Inferno, in Canto 5 (of 34). Canto 5 is the second circle of hell, reserved for the Carnal--those whose intemperance in the flesh led to their deaths. This circle is a maelstrom as the damned wing about in "hellish flight. . . here, there, up, down, they whirl and, whirling strain/ with never a hope of hope to comfort them,/ not of release, but even of less pain." It's a bleak punishment, no doubt, but fitting for souls "who betrayed reason to appetite." 

Where I want to pause, though, is over the first soul Dante meets at this level--Semiramis, a legendary queen of Assyria. Here is how Virgil, Dante's guide, introduces her crimes in stunning lines: 

Mad sensuality corrupted her so  

that to hide the guilt of her debauchery 

she licensed all depravity alike, 

and lust and law were one in her decree.

The indictment here is worth unpacking. Her corruption stems from a rampant and perverted sensuality. She feels guilty for this. But since she has power, she has the power to hide her guilt. Which is exactly what she does. In order to cover the genuine (and appropriate) guilt she felt, she changes the law to make her sins legal.

I do not want to draw too many immediate connections to our contemporary moral culture. I don't know what Semiramis's besetting sins were and how they played out in her life. But I do think it is worth thinking through what Dante the poet is saying here through Virgil. Which, as I read it, is this: if it becomes a matter of changing our desires or changing the law to accommodate our desires, many of us would prefer to do the latter. We are not ready to sacrifice our sensuality so we sacrifice the sense of decorum given by the law. And then we pretend, blithely, that now that the legal question has been answered we can move on with our lives, into a brave new and guilt-free world.

Dante's problem with this is obvious. It might work for awhile. But Semiramis is in hell.