Purgatorio Canto 3 Summary & Analysis

As Dante and Virgil continue on their way, Dante is puzzled by Virgil’s lack of a shadow. Virgil tells Dante that it’s foolish to try to fully grasp God’s doings with one’s rational mind; Dante must content himself with the fact that something is the case, not why it is the case. If humanity had perfect understanding, he goes on, then it would not have been necessary for the Son of God to become Incarnate. Virgil reminds Dante that Plato and Aristotle must spend eternity in Hell with an unsatisfied thirst for knowledge.

In Purgatory, souls have spiritual bodies of a sort. With his distinction between “what” and “why,” Virgil follows Aristotle and the Scholastic theologians like Thomas Aquinas, claiming that human beings shouldn’t speculate about why things are but should instead be satisfied with examining things as they exist. If humanity had been content with this, they wouldn’t have fallen into sin (by doubtingly questioning God’s goodness) in the first place. Non-Christian philosophers long to know God, but, being in Hell, that knowledge remains eternally beyond them.

Active Themes

Quotes

Dante and Virgil arrive at the mountain’s base. The mountain is forbiddingly steep. A group of souls, looking like a wandering flock of lost sheep, slowly draws near, and Dante approaches them to ask for advice on the best way to proceed. Among this group, he recognizes a figure named Manfred, with the scar of a sword stroke across his forehead. Manfred asks Dante to find his daughter back on Earth and to let her know how he died. He explains that while it’s true he was excommunicated, there is still hope for his soul—repentant excommunicates must stay in Purgatory for 30 times the span of years that they separated themselves from the Church while living.

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Manfred was an Italian ruler and adherent of the Ghibelline faction who’d been excommunicated by the Pope as a heretic and was then killed by a rival. Being excommunicated from the Church was a dire situation because it cut a person off from the source of salvation. However, there was still hope of salvation if a person repented at the end of life, as Manfred apparently did—though he and other excommunicates now make up for their earthly sin through patient endurance and waiting. Those on earth can help these sinners through their prayers.

Active Themes

Purgatorio: Canto 3 Summary & Analysis