I think it is very interesting to look at the different sins and how they are “graded” according to their severity. As we know and have talked about, there are two different “Dantes” in this story, Dante the poet who is the creator of this world and Dante the pilgrim who is the Hero of this comedy. Even if you may think these two persons think and feel the same, that is not true. There are cases where Dante the Pilgrim feels that the punishment is not fair and perhaps not suitable for the sin.
My main reference was of the lustful, who was sent to Inferno by simply loving someone (Pretty far from my personal view on a righteous contrapasso to “love”). And we read that Dante the pilgrim feels sorry for these sinners while Dante the Poet obviously cannot, as he put them in hell/inferno. What I can conclude from this is the idea that what is being fair and just by human law is not the same as what is being fair and just by divine law. And by human law, I mean the human morals, and what is considered right and wrong.
Not only does Dante the Poet tell us about these divine laws that are separate from the human morals, but he also ranks them. From least severe to most severe.
My previous experience and previous thoughts have always been that the divine morality is that of the human morality, just slightly more extreme. But Dante the poet has taken on the responsibility to tell the 14th century-christian-world about the divine rules and contrapasso for their potential sins. Do you think Dante the poet was correct when he ranked the sins? Is betrayal the worst sin, and do they all sinner we meet in the text deserve to be there?
I think Dante is gauging how much the Italian’s ranked the sins in their Christian culture. I do not think this is the global view of the severity of these sins. I personally believe that Lying is the worst sin because lying leads to betrayal, fraud; it is essentially the source of all sin. Lying is also how many animals live day to day, by tricking other animals. Lying is not closed off to humans alone, which makes it so great of a sin. Sins are subjective to everyone and every reader is subjective to their own opinion of Dante’s work.