Finally, we made it to the bottom and it is only uphill from here. Interestingly enough, hell is frozen rather than flame filled. I suppose to me, it is fitting. I find cold to be worse than heat any day. Especially when we are talking true pain, cold is much more painful. Heat makes me lethargic and maybe even moody, but not painful like cold.

Deadliest catch is on right now. They talk about -30 degrees with the wind blowing and all wet. I honestly don’t think I can do that. I remember taking shifts at the Christmas tree lot. I was bundled up and sitting in front of a space heater to have my feet numb from the cold. I guess that is why I work in front of a computer all day.

It turns out that the worst level of hell is the compound fraudsters. To be one hundred percent honest I didn’t see a lot of difference between what happened on other levels and this one. Dante talks about several occurrences of a character that lures a group of individuals to dinner and then kills them all.

I guess to me, luring them to death and killing them isn’t any different than stabbing them in the back when they aren’t looking. I guess you had to be there. In the three levels of circle nine, each of the characters were a bit more frozen. In level one, the characters are frozen up to the neck. In the second level, their heads are frozen face down. I the third level, they are completely encased into the ice.

On the second level, there was a long story about a man and his sons who were imprisoned and ultimately starved to death. The father and the captor were frozen close enough whereby the father could bite the captor, a nod to his starvation. I am not sure the sins of the father to be honest but for some reason this situation drew a lot of condemnation from Dante.

Satan is where you would expect, at the very bottom. Here is out look at him. Satan is frozen solid. He has three faces, Judas, Brutus and Cassius (more on that in a minute). He has wings and is hairy.

I find the three faces of Satan very interesting. Judas’ face is flanked on either side by Cassius and Brutus. These were two senators involved in the plot to assassinate Julius Caesar. As an Italian, I suppose Dante’s Roman history was in his blood so to speak. That being said, In this era of city states I wonder about Dante’s affinity for Rome. It would be like us Americans reminiscing about King George III or something.

I think that I have to take issue with Judas. First of all, I understand that Judas betrayed Jesus. That being said, without the crucifixion of Jesus, we would not have redemption. I would say his actions were fundamental to Christianity. Second, Jesus know he was going to be betrayed by Judas, it was all part of the plan.

Allegedly, the devil was a fallen angel that fell into disfavor with god. As a matter of fact, the original serpent from Genesis was the devil. Therefore, I say Satan predates the beginning of man and earth. So, I guess that I am going to disagree with Dante on the theology of the devil.

In order to leave hell, Dante and Virgil have to crawl over and down the Devil. Apparently, there is a hole underneath him that straddles Hell and Purgatory. When they cross over, it is described as going from night to day. The hole apparently goes through the center of the earth hence the difference in daylight.

End Your Programming Routine: I am happy to to be moving on. It is depressing to spend life in Hell. I appreciate the ice setting and the gruesome torture. I have no idea what to expect in purgatory. I am definitely going to have words to say when I wrap up next week. So, I will save it for then.