When thinking of someone having a purpose, what comes to mind? Is it a teacher helping her students graduate high school, or is it a member of a basketball team knowing her role on the team in order to win? In Dante’s Inferno, the idea of purpose can be seen in the selected number of cantos with the interaction of the keepers of the different circles of hell and the souls in the indifference circle. Dante raises the question in the reader's mind of whether or not it is better to have a purpose even if you are condemned to hell. Although in many scenarios people would say that being in hell is not the best for an individual or being, Dante argues that with these individuals having a purpose, it brings their predicament to the best it can possibly be.
In Dante’s Inferno, Virgil and Dante travel through the different circles of Hell. Yet, before they get to the first circle of hell, they travel to an area filled with the indifferent. Virgil states, “This state of misery is clutched by those sad souls whose works in life merited neither praise nor infamy” ( 3.34-37). Virgil says this in order to show Dante that these individuals did nothing with their lives. They sat back and allowed life to just pass by them. This also allows for the reader to see that there is pain and misery for those who do not possess a purpose in life. Without having a purpose, an individual might as well not exist at all because he is not making any impact in the world and is wasting the limited time he has on the earth by simply going with the flow of the world. Having a purpose is like a car working on the best fuel imaginable. If the car no longer has fuel, than it is in a sense useless and no longer serves the purpose of being able to transport an individual from point a to point b. Unless fuel is placed back in the car, it will not be able to benefit the individual and it hinders its ability to perform its purpose efficiently.
The scenario Dante depicts of having a purpose is better than not existing can also be seen in the creatures and beings that guard the different circles of hell. The centaurs are the keepers of the seventh circle of hell, where they “shoot arrows at murders standing in the river Phlegethon” (Dante 117). These centaurs are half-horse and half-man, which means they possess some human reason and some animal instincts . They are not fully human, so their animalistic side provides their purpose. With them being created in this way, in some ways it can be articulated that these creatures had no choice as to what their purpose is. They were created for the specific purpose to guard hell, nothing more. Even without knowing why these creatures are in hell, making them guardians of these souls gives them a purpose, which will in turn allows for their lives, whether good or bad, to be fulfilled in some aspect or another. With giving these creatures a specific purpose, Dante is allowing for them to experience the feeling of being wanted. Without this sinsation, the centaurs would just be in a sense of limbo as the other souls that never truly believed in God or against God.
An example of Dante’s argument about an individual needing a purpose in life, whether good or bad, can be found in the Bible as well. God is seen throughout the Bible detesting people who do not pick a side in the battle against good and evil. In Revelation 3:15-16, it states that “I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth.”The scripture allows for the readers to see that God does not want people to show indifference to the world around them and especially towards Him. In many ways, these two passages in scripture shows exactly what Dante advocates, that purpose proves one of the most important aspects of an individual's life. God understands that because humans are beings of free will, that there will be some individuals who will choose evil over good. Yet, if they choose to be on the fence about whether they have faith in God than not, then God will want nothing to do with them. This will then in turn cause the people on the fence to have no purpose in life due to their actions not advocating for a particular side of the spectrum of good and evil. Even with the people that are on the side of evil, their purpose is to warn everyone else how if they do not live their life for God, this is where they will end up. Although in this sense, individuals would see this purpose as awful; it still gives the individual their purpose. Regardless if it is for the best or the worst.
For the most part, an individual will desperately search for a purpose throughout his life. Many people find their purpose, and once they grab a hold of it, they are very reluctant to let it go. It gives them a life worth living. However, some individuals either do not find their purpose or or choose to reject it. These are the people who should be worried, for whether they believe in an afterlife or not, their lives will be dull and full of misery either in this life or the next. Individuals need to pursue a purpose because it allows for them to feel as if they are a part of something bigger than themselves. Without it they are just inanimate objects, and they are allowing their precious time to slip away. Once your time is up, there is no way to ever fully know what your purpose truly is.
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