{"id":4944,"date":"2026-06-19T09:41:39","date_gmt":"2026-06-19T09:41:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailypurgatory.com\/purgatory\/?p=4944"},"modified":"2026-06-20T05:07:00","modified_gmt":"2026-06-20T05:07:00","slug":"first-lesson-on-perception-and-receiving","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dailypurgatory.com\/purgatory\/2026\/06\/19\/first-lesson-on-perception-and-receiving\/","title":{"rendered":"First lesson on Perception and Receiving"},"content":{"rendered":"

Not directly in front, but receiving “from the side”.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

After the basic first moments in the entrance to the spiritual path, Dante gives a first lesson and moves miles beyond the first misunderstood impression<\/a> of “wall, path and void”. And the form here mimics the content: the lesson is there but not directly in front of the reader.<\/p>\n

The passage is this:<\/p>\n

L\u00e0 s\u00f9 non eran mossi i pi\u00e8 nostri anco, <\/em>
\nquand\u2019io conobbi quella ripa intorno <\/em>
\nche dritto di salita aveva manco,
\n<\/em>esser di marmo candido e addorno<\/em><\/p>\n

Roughly meaning: “Up there our feet had yet not moved, when I recognized that bank\/wall around, that the slope in front of us was missing, being of marble white and adorned<\/em>”<\/p>\n

This thus moves far beyond the first idea of the wall simply “rising up and up” and being insurmountable – as the perception of a misguided approach suggests – and establishes something new: this is a source of spiritual wisdom and truth, but it comes from the side<\/em> and not\u00a0straight in front<\/em>. So before any substance of spiritual wisdom, Dante states the correct approach and method: keep moving forward on the path, on the slope, but be receptive of the insights and received wisdom from the side, from the “mountain”, that will illuminate your soul. This bears repeating: move forward, and receive wisdom from the side, not right in front of you.<\/p>\n

Dante further then states how this received wisdom, in the sense of the beauty of the marble engravings, surpasses both human endeavors and that of physical nature itself. So here we are learning about received wisdom from the mountain walls, rather than the “appearances” with which the Pilgrim opened Canto X.<\/p>\n

Meaning: already Dante is reconfiguring the perception apparatus of the Reader. Showing us how our filters need to be examined, and purgated of misconceptions. The idea of a “hard focus” and “direct analysis” is removed in six small verse lines. It is not the approach. It will not work for spiritual wisdom, nor for fixing the distortions in one’s own apprehension of Reality.<\/p>\n

Move forward, but “listen”.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Not directly in front, but receiving “from the side”. After the basic first moments in the entrance to the spiritual path, Dante gives a first lesson and moves miles beyond the first misunderstood impression of “wall, path and void”. And … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4944","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-purgatory"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailypurgatory.com\/purgatory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4944","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailypurgatory.com\/purgatory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailypurgatory.com\/purgatory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailypurgatory.com\/purgatory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailypurgatory.com\/purgatory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4944"}],"version-history":[{"count":25,"href":"https:\/\/dailypurgatory.com\/purgatory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4944\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4982,"href":"https:\/\/dailypurgatory.com\/purgatory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4944\/revisions\/4982"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailypurgatory.com\/purgatory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4944"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailypurgatory.com\/purgatory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4944"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailypurgatory.com\/purgatory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4944"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}