The Greatest of These

I am highly intrigued by the purpose and consequence of love in literature, and I suppose consequentially, in life. Interestingly enough, though love is presented to be “the greatest of these” in 1 Corinthians 13,  it is also included in the list of things that moved the “high maker of the gates of hell” in Dante’s Inferno. In light of Dido’s passionate suicide in the Aeneid, the erotic invocation of the Trojan War in the Iliad and the adultery of Francesca and Paolo in the Inferno, there appears to be a common thread: does love, whether directly or indirectly, lead to hell?

Francesca certainly thinks so in Canto V: “Love gave us both one death ... Alas-that sweet conception and passion so deep should bring them here!” It is the same erotic passion - er, love- that serves as the root of the sin that indeed leads them to hell. However, if Francesca could have avoided her eternal punishment had she remained in love for her husband. Similarly, passionate “love” led to death for Dido and in the Trojan War ... but is that really love?

Perhaps the literary references have a false definition of love. We know from 1 Corinthians 13 that love is “patient, kind, does not envy, does not boast,  is not proud, is not rude, not self-centered, easily angered and keeps no record of wrongs.” Perhaps it is selfish passion, not love, that in fact leads to hell. God is love, and God Himself certainly does not lead us to hell. But Love is what led the “Mighty One” to hell Himself to ransom the redeemed ... (Canto IV,  41-42). 

Ultimately, love comes from God. It is not of ourselves or about ourselves, but about Love Himself. Dido, the Trojans and Francesca are primary examples of the consequences “if I have not love ...” (1 Cor. 13:1).