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Purgatory and Dante's Divine Comedy

STORY PREFACE

Story Summary

Purgatory - what a grand thing!
Saint Catherine of Genoa

Thoughtful people have long disputed whether Purgatory - a place, it is said, where a person’s soul is purified after death - actually exists.

Far from viewing it as “a grand thing,” Protestant reformers, like Martin Luther, thought Purgatory (and the economy which supported it) was nothing more than a Church scheme to separate people from their money. The soul of a dead person, reformers declared, either went straight to heaven, or straight to hell. Souls didn’t make an intermediate stop at a place called Purgatory.

Where did the idea of Purgatory originate? Does it have ancient roots? Modern acceptance? Do scholars believe Dante’s Divine Comedy - which devotes an entire section to Purgatory - is merely a lyrical poem, to be studied and enjoyed as great literature, or do they think it is a theological masterpiece, to be taken as absolute truth?

 

 

To cite this story, using MLA Guidelines:

Bos, Carole D. "Purgatory and Dante's Divine Comedy" AwesomeStories.com. Date of access
       <http://awesomestories.com/religion/purgatory>.

IN OTHER WORDS: Author. Title of story. Name of web site. Date of access <URL>.

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