Dante as an architect of the soul, not a keeper of the penal ledger, that is the strongest move in your text. The idea of reading lying as sabotage of the contact between mind and reality lands perfectly. Suddenly, the flatterer seems more dangerous than the tyrant, because he attacks not the body, but the map inside the head.
That is precisely why I stumble over the smooth phrase “Never lie.” In Dante’s inner geometry of hell, that may be true. In a hospital, in an interrogation room, at a deathbed, it becomes more complicated. The white lie, the polite half-truth, self-deception. All lies, yes, but not all the same circle. Anyone who presses everything into one formula risks believing their own moral system is clearer than the real world.
A second blind spot. If lying is so grave, where do we place fiction? Dante himself invents a hell that never existed in order to move us closer to the truth. The boundary between poetry and deception does not run along the sentence “This did not really happen,” but along the claim to have reality on one’s side. Flatterers and propagandists imitate precisely that claim.
Perhaps that is the real point after all. Not “Never lie,” but “Do not confuse your theology with reality, or you will become a flatterer yourself.”
Your dress example is a comfort zone. In a hospital, an interrogation room, or a violence context, “easy to avoid” is often just wrong.
And fiction is not a lie precisely when it makes no claim to be a factual report. The danger starts when that claim is imitated. Propaganda and flattery live off that.
And yes, even a flattering compliment can be a deepfake.
If I was going to push against too severe a critique of lying, I would highlight that lower hell, for Dante, is distinct from upper hell due to a malicious intent. The upper hell is sins of incontinence, but lower hell is marked by a malicious will - with violence and fraud. So, the question would be whether you can have a non-malicious lie and thus something distinct from what Dante describes in the 8th Circle. Thoughts?
Lies can be worse than outright murder. They can sever trust. This is traumatic. For myself, very likely worse than death.
As a general rule, lying to cause injury or some harm--no matter the scale, is wrong. Simultaneously, and apart from the lies, we are human. And humans fall short. We hesitate wondering if saying anything is right.
I think the ideal is just that, ideal. We should aspire, do our best, work hard, be humble, and if it's an effort to not lie, make this effort. In the end, our efforts are noted but we do not save ourselves. But this is a further discussion
For me, though the lie is egregious in the extreme, there is the possibility of curing it with truth. With murder, there can be no repair. The life is lost. Perhaps justice can only be applied when the full fruit of the lie appears. It may be just as bad as the murder or worse, or it may have been cut off before yielding its harvest. It would also depend upon who did the cutting off, the original liar or another party. Lots to think about.
I have told lies that literally kept people from being killed or badly injured because that was the only way to stop them from being killed or badly injured.
I am going to make apparently a bold statement here that lying is generally not worse than murder. At the very least, I think lying to protect another person from unjust harm is almost always justifiable. In the context of Christianity (which I reference because it is cited by this article), there is Biblical evidence that it is justifiable to lie under such circumstances. See Exodus 1:15-21.
I feel this so strongly—your writing resonates with me. I'm in Florence this week and just today was walking by where Dante lived and I was reading some beautiful versions of his works in a bookstore just today and seeing the art of the Inferno. The recent events of this year/last year—this chaotic time—seem riddled with tyrants and fraudster/liars and it disheartens me tremendously. Human history holds so much grief and suffering and while we live in a time that at least nods toward rational goodness, its hard and many are descended into their own hell realms. Even my own Mom remains hypnotized by the fraudulent Trump tyrant despite any rational pointing towards truth—she is deeply hoodwinked and her ego is invested. The truth indeed sets us free—if the will decides to acknowledge it—thanks for brightening my day with your intelligent heartfelt writing!
All evil proceeds from falsity. This is why Christ states that Satan is the father of lies. It is why Diogenes was obsessed with finding an honest man. The world (the false World) is saturated with dishonesty. It is the zeitgeist of the Modern World. How can one expect to succeed without lying? It is paramount in this Material World
Very grateful for this beautifully expressed and explained article. Clear, concise, and dare I say it truth-full. Thank you. On a personal note, this is exactly what I needed to read today and understand at this moment, God be praised for presenting it to me.
If you switch the word "lie" with "murder" we might have the same issue.... if we can differentiate between killing someone and murdering them, and it hinges primarily on whether the person dispatched is or is not an unjust aggressor in the act of unjustly aggressing against the innocent... then could we not differentiate between telling an unjust aggressor an untruth so as to dissuade him from unjustly aggression vs. telling a righteous person an untruth that is a sinful lie?
Put another way, if the proverbial Nazi, Hutu militia, ISIS goon... is at the door demanding to know if there's a Jew/Tutsi/believer hiding there, most of us would conclude (as good Americans) that we would have every right to blow a hole through our front door with a shotgun and then kicking the remains of the door aside, initiate full hostilities with all those unjust aggressors until we run out of ammo or are killed in the process and it would be a perfectly licit example of killing the unjust rather than murdering them.
But what if they say "yes or no, is the [ insert victim class/category] inside?" and we shake our heads "no" you're saying - nope, that's a mortal sin, these unjust aggressors about to commit an unjust aggression that will likely result in murder, have an ontological right to the truth, whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help us God.... and they also have the right to expect a blast of 00 buck"?
Seems like the whole game is to insist that killing the sinful is licit but fooling them is not because not all killing is murder but all fooling is sinful. And so no one misunderstands... I'm not justifying lying to the righteous and those merely sinful among us who aren't unjust aggressors. I'm talking about the situation of genuinely malevolent, sociopathic unjust aggressors whom we would absolutely be allowed to kill to protect the innocent if we so choose. Are we allowed to fool them (and so spare them instant execution at our hands) or not?
Reminds me of a discussion of a take on the X-men, where if you declared that you would rather die than do something, Magneto would kill you, and Professor X would reach into your mind and alter it so you agreed with him and thought you always had.
People discussed how they could respect Magneto for that.
Thank you for sharing our article! Dante is a master of the soul. He has many lessons for those willing to learn.
Dante as an architect of the soul, not a keeper of the penal ledger, that is the strongest move in your text. The idea of reading lying as sabotage of the contact between mind and reality lands perfectly. Suddenly, the flatterer seems more dangerous than the tyrant, because he attacks not the body, but the map inside the head.
That is precisely why I stumble over the smooth phrase “Never lie.” In Dante’s inner geometry of hell, that may be true. In a hospital, in an interrogation room, at a deathbed, it becomes more complicated. The white lie, the polite half-truth, self-deception. All lies, yes, but not all the same circle. Anyone who presses everything into one formula risks believing their own moral system is clearer than the real world.
A second blind spot. If lying is so grave, where do we place fiction? Dante himself invents a hell that never existed in order to move us closer to the truth. The boundary between poetry and deception does not run along the sentence “This did not really happen,” but along the claim to have reality on one’s side. Flatterers and propagandists imitate precisely that claim.
Perhaps that is the real point after all. Not “Never lie,” but “Do not confuse your theology with reality, or you will become a flatterer yourself.”
A white lie is still a lie and easily avoided. "Does this dress make me look fat?" "I think the dress you had on the other day is more flattering."
As for fiction, it's not a lie because it's made clear that it's not a factual account.
Your dress example is a comfort zone. In a hospital, an interrogation room, or a violence context, “easy to avoid” is often just wrong.
And fiction is not a lie precisely when it makes no claim to be a factual report. The danger starts when that claim is imitated. Propaganda and flattery live off that.
And yes, even a flattering compliment can be a deepfake.
If I was going to push against too severe a critique of lying, I would highlight that lower hell, for Dante, is distinct from upper hell due to a malicious intent. The upper hell is sins of incontinence, but lower hell is marked by a malicious will - with violence and fraud. So, the question would be whether you can have a non-malicious lie and thus something distinct from what Dante describes in the 8th Circle. Thoughts?
A harmless lie? Of course—it all depends on intent. Dante sorted things a bit… dramatically. We can sort finer.
And yes, you noticed. I know you know. 😏
yes. An example that comes to mind is the people who lied to the Gestapo during the Holocaust to save lives, often risking their own.
Lies can be worse than outright murder. They can sever trust. This is traumatic. For myself, very likely worse than death.
As a general rule, lying to cause injury or some harm--no matter the scale, is wrong. Simultaneously, and apart from the lies, we are human. And humans fall short. We hesitate wondering if saying anything is right.
I think the ideal is just that, ideal. We should aspire, do our best, work hard, be humble, and if it's an effort to not lie, make this effort. In the end, our efforts are noted but we do not save ourselves. But this is a further discussion
Peace all
Hold on. Panderers go to Hell? Politicians are soooooooo doomed...
For me, though the lie is egregious in the extreme, there is the possibility of curing it with truth. With murder, there can be no repair. The life is lost. Perhaps justice can only be applied when the full fruit of the lie appears. It may be just as bad as the murder or worse, or it may have been cut off before yielding its harvest. It would also depend upon who did the cutting off, the original liar or another party. Lots to think about.
I have told lies that literally kept people from being killed or badly injured because that was the only way to stop them from being killed or badly injured.
So, this is not just a black and white question.
I am going to make apparently a bold statement here that lying is generally not worse than murder. At the very least, I think lying to protect another person from unjust harm is almost always justifiable. In the context of Christianity (which I reference because it is cited by this article), there is Biblical evidence that it is justifiable to lie under such circumstances. See Exodus 1:15-21.
I believe bearing false witness is murder of another person’s character and reputation.
I feel this so strongly—your writing resonates with me. I'm in Florence this week and just today was walking by where Dante lived and I was reading some beautiful versions of his works in a bookstore just today and seeing the art of the Inferno. The recent events of this year/last year—this chaotic time—seem riddled with tyrants and fraudster/liars and it disheartens me tremendously. Human history holds so much grief and suffering and while we live in a time that at least nods toward rational goodness, its hard and many are descended into their own hell realms. Even my own Mom remains hypnotized by the fraudulent Trump tyrant despite any rational pointing towards truth—she is deeply hoodwinked and her ego is invested. The truth indeed sets us free—if the will decides to acknowledge it—thanks for brightening my day with your intelligent heartfelt writing!
All evil proceeds from falsity. This is why Christ states that Satan is the father of lies. It is why Diogenes was obsessed with finding an honest man. The world (the false World) is saturated with dishonesty. It is the zeitgeist of the Modern World. How can one expect to succeed without lying? It is paramount in this Material World
Very grateful for this beautifully expressed and explained article. Clear, concise, and dare I say it truth-full. Thank you. On a personal note, this is exactly what I needed to read today and understand at this moment, God be praised for presenting it to me.
Medieval Icelanders thought theft was worse than murder.
If you switch the word "lie" with "murder" we might have the same issue.... if we can differentiate between killing someone and murdering them, and it hinges primarily on whether the person dispatched is or is not an unjust aggressor in the act of unjustly aggressing against the innocent... then could we not differentiate between telling an unjust aggressor an untruth so as to dissuade him from unjustly aggression vs. telling a righteous person an untruth that is a sinful lie?
Put another way, if the proverbial Nazi, Hutu militia, ISIS goon... is at the door demanding to know if there's a Jew/Tutsi/believer hiding there, most of us would conclude (as good Americans) that we would have every right to blow a hole through our front door with a shotgun and then kicking the remains of the door aside, initiate full hostilities with all those unjust aggressors until we run out of ammo or are killed in the process and it would be a perfectly licit example of killing the unjust rather than murdering them.
But what if they say "yes or no, is the [ insert victim class/category] inside?" and we shake our heads "no" you're saying - nope, that's a mortal sin, these unjust aggressors about to commit an unjust aggression that will likely result in murder, have an ontological right to the truth, whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help us God.... and they also have the right to expect a blast of 00 buck"?
Seems like the whole game is to insist that killing the sinful is licit but fooling them is not because not all killing is murder but all fooling is sinful. And so no one misunderstands... I'm not justifying lying to the righteous and those merely sinful among us who aren't unjust aggressors. I'm talking about the situation of genuinely malevolent, sociopathic unjust aggressors whom we would absolutely be allowed to kill to protect the innocent if we so choose. Are we allowed to fool them (and so spare them instant execution at our hands) or not?
Yes, because the victim of the murder is dead and gone, but the betrayer’s lies linger to inflict harm time and again.
That’s why the sins of the 9th Circle are betrayal of kin, country, or patron.
Reminds me of a discussion of a take on the X-men, where if you declared that you would rather die than do something, Magneto would kill you, and Professor X would reach into your mind and alter it so you agreed with him and thought you always had.
People discussed how they could respect Magneto for that.
Outstanding. Especially during lent. Sharing with my prayer group. Thank you!