Close Encounter With Farinata

At the start of Canto X, the poets journey through the haunting sixth circle. In this Canto they reach the heretics, who lie in open graves. Farinata, calls out to Dante from his deep grave. He asks Dante to recount his ancestry, Farinta declares his separation from Dante, as Farinata has a more impressive family line. In this Canto, Dante the pilgrim, learns the punishment of the damned. They are clear about the history of the past and are able to prophecy the shifting future. However these heretics are unable to locate the events. Farinta attempts to once again show his supremacy over Dante by claiming the victory of his party over Dante's Guelf party. Yet Farinata's curse keeps him back from understanding the present, and Dante tells how the Guelfs have exiled Farinata's Ghibellines. The conversation is interrupted by another sinner, the father of Dnate's companion Guido. When their conversation renews, Farinata has had time to contemplate. He asks Dante why the Ghibellines have been outlawed. Dante tells him it was the carnage they brought upon Florence. Essentially the Ghibellines attack and division against their home city brought them exile. Farinata highlights the theme of division once again by declaring that he alone apposed the Ghibelline's plan to siege Florence. Then Farinata explains his curse to Dante, and he hints at Dante's gloomy future in exile. Farintata references some of the other sinners who lie with Him, and on this note... Dante departs.

The purpose of this conversation for Dante and the poem as a whole is twofold. Firstly, this passage highlights multiple divisions. Dante, the poet, stresses the divisions between Dante(the pilgrim) and Farinta in areas of ancestry, political standings, and knowledge of things past and future, Dante is able to showcase the problems with division in politics. Also he exposes the larger picture that heresy embodies and swears fidelity to division. In addition this passage's purpose is to dramatize Dante(the pilgim's) development. In his close encounters to this point Dante has responded incorrectly. He has either sided with the sinner in pity or he has enjoyed watching his enemies experiencing pain However he has not yet seen the righteousness of Divine Justice, he has failed to understand how each sinner experiencing ample punishment is the result of God's character and is therefore just. However after the conversation, the poem exposes Dante's thinking process. "My thoughts at work/ mulling over the words that bore such menace to me." Virgil explains to Dante "when you confront her radiance, whose eyes can see/ everything in their fair clarity, be assured  Then you shall learn what your life's journey will be" Though "the words" which Dante speaks of refer to the prophecy of his exile, still these lines tell that this close encounter deeply affected Dante and have lead to his development as a pilgrim.