The doctrine of Purgatory developed most significantly during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Jacques Le Goff describes Purgatory as “an intermediary other world in which some of the dead were subjected to a trial that could be shortened by the prayers, by the spiritual aid, of the living” (4). Purgatory has two specific purposes: first, Purgatory satisfies the wrath of God. Second, Purgatory closes the gap between man and God through the purification of the soul. Authoritative statements on Purgatory come as early as the Council of Trent (1545-1563), continually defined in The Catechism of the Catholic Church (1992).
During the Renaissance, Roman Catholics gathered to distinguish the Roman Church from the emerging Protestant denominations. Canon XXX considers the doctrine of Justification, which early Protestants vehemently argued sola fide (faith alone) brought. The Council of Trent determined:
Whoever shall affirm, that when the grace of justification is received, the offence of the penitent sinner is so forgiven, and the sentence of eternal punishment reversed, that there remains no temporal punishment to be endured, before his entrance into the kingdom of heaven, either in this world, or in the future state, in purgatory: let him be accursed. (53)
The doctrine of remission for sin was of such importance to late medieval Catholics that to believe otherwise would result in ex-communication. Regardless, this fiery statement only covers half of Purgatory’s truth; Purgatory is largely considered a process of purification. The Catechism defines the other world “the final purification for the elect, which is entirely different from the punishment of the damned” (Canon 1031). [AB1] This notion is significant for Dante, who depicts the blessedness of the soul’s experience in this state.
Debate continues today as to the reality of a purgatorial state. The biblical evidence is ambiguous, and both Catholics and Protestants continue to offer arguments either in favor or against one another. A piece of evidence that Roman Catholics cite appears in the Apocryphal texts, a series of books that Protestants have rejected as authoritative and inspired. In 2 Maccabees, reference is made to praying for the dead:
He also took up a collection, man by man, to the amount of two thousand drachmas of silver, and sent it to Jerusalem to provide for a sin offering. In doing this he acted very well and honorably, taking account of the resurrection. For if he were not expecting that those who had fallen would rise again, it would have been superfluous and foolish to pray for the dead. But if he was looking to the splendid reward that is laid up for those who fall asleep in godliness, it was a holy and pious thought. Therefore he made atonement for the dead, so that they might be delivered from their sin. (12:43-45)
This passage proves especially significant in defining the doctrine of Purgatory as it demonstrates that the living can work on behalf of the dead, and the dead can benefit from the work of the living. Likewise, it references those who died while in a state of grace, thus alluding to a state of believers between this life and the next. Despite the Protestant rejection of this scripture, this is not the only biblical evidence cited to establish a doctrine of Purgatory.
In the New Testament, many cite Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 3:12-15 as evidence of a purgatorial state. The text reads:
If anyone builds on this foundation using gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw, their work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each person’s work. If what has been built survives, the builder will receive a reward. If it is burned up, the builder will suffer loss but yet will be saved—even though only as one escaping through the flames.
Despite the allusion to a kind of suffering and a promised salvation, the nature of this is left open-ended, yet remains an important point of reference for the Catholic doctrine of Purgatory. Despite these contemporary arguments over biblical texts, medieval theology long attested to some purgatorial state. As Jeffrey T. Schnapp writes that they considered it “a logical necessity” (91), as evident by the promises of Heaven even for the late repentant. Although Purgatorio is primarily the imagination of its poet, there is obvious precedence in the medieval tradition for this imaginative exploration.
Dante’s originality in Purgatorio is heightened by the structure of the realm itself, being an invention of the thinker’s mind only. Dante opted to create a parallel structure to mock that of Hell. The structure of Purgatory “repeats and reverses that of Hell both on the literal and symbolic levels” (Schnapp 92). The literal reversal of descent to ascent suggests the Fall of Man and the process of redemption that Purgatory offers. This concept of moving upward is perhaps the most significant aspect of Purgatorio, distinguishing the souls from their neighbors in Hell and Heaven. Dante continually highlights the time in the poem, emphasizing the importance of change. The souls are not suspended as the souls in Hell; the souls in Purgatory are moving toward a goal as if undergoing a prison sentence. The temporal nature of their sentence is at the forefront of Dante’s poem.
Unlike Inferno’s nine circles, Dante bases Purgatory proper on the Seven Deadly Sins as opposed to Aristotelian categories of excess and deficiency. The act of cleaning is based, however, on balance, the moderation Aristotle describes in his Nichomachean Ethics: “Virtue… is a state of character concerned with choice, lying in a mean” (959). The Purgatorio is about earthly happiness, thus ending with the earthly paradise, the true Eden. This thematic emphasis is likewise derivative of Aristotle, for happiness, suggests the philosopher, is “the end of human nature” (1102). Dante accepts this end, concluding in Monarchy:
Ineffable providence has thus set before us two goals to aim at: i.e. happiness in this life, which consists in the exercise of our own powers and is figured in the earthly paradise; and happiness in the eternal life, which consists in the enjoyment of the vision of God… and which is signified by the heavenly paradise. (92)
Purgatorio is concerned with attaining earthly happiness or earthly paradise. The souls cannot move beyond this earthly paradise until they have been purged of all wrongdoing. Dante’s second Cantica is about the soul’s movement away from self and toward God. Dante’s insistence on the soul’s move toward God is at once also an insistence on the freedom of the will to move toward God. As Aquinas writes, “For the act of virtue is nothing else but the good use of free will” (SW 655). Purgatorio opens with Cato, a pagan figure Dante considers an arbiter of freedom. Dante values freedom: in this case, Dante values the freedom of penitence.
While Dante interacts with theology, both historic and contemporary, he also establishes a unique theological disposition. Robert Hollander suggests, “Dante has so evidently rooted his poem in the teachings of the Bible and the Church that none can rationally avoid the patent fact that its author intended to create a work which would be nichil nisi Christianum” (261). Hollander identifies the tension in Dante’s poetry between the pagan poetic past and Christian theology. This tension dates as early as Augustine, who implicity disparages the poet Virgil in The Confessions. In weeping for Dido, he cries to God, “I followed after your lowest creatures” (15), the implication being that this poetry did not lead him toward God. Significantly, however, is Dante maintaining a sense of authority throughout the Comedy while also seeming to claim plausible deniability. The act of poetry distinguishes him from his theological contemporaries. A.N. Williams observes, “Unlike a medieval summa, however, the Comedy can avoid giving definitive answers to every question it raises” (206). Throughout the Comedy, Dante is not necessarily clear on why certain souls are in certain places. He has left this to his interpreters. Regardless, merely raising the question provides evidence enough for his position as a great theological thinker who engulfs the reader into his world through its beauty and often its terror.