Through me you pass into eternal pain:
Through me among the people lost for aye.
To rear me was the task of power divine,
Supremest wisdom, and primeval love.
Eternal, and eternal I endure.
Abandon hope all ye who enter here
Over a portal’s lofty arch inscrib’d:
Whereat I thus: Master, these words import.
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| Engraving from Dante’s Inferno |
In light of the recent rigmarole about the end of the world we turn our sights this week to a more religious topic. People have always been curious about what death and what lies after it. In fact in what might be the oldest written story on Earth, the Epic of Gilgamesh, the main character is so distressed by the idea that he might die that he travels the world in search of a way to live forever.
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| Those Sumerians were really serious about their hardcover editions |
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| Lough Derg |
According to an 1843 essay on the legends of “Purgatory, Hell, and Paradise” entitled St. Patrick’s Purgatory, getting to the cave was difficult for pilgrims.** A pilgrim had to go through no less than his bishop just to get a recommendation to the prior of the island, who then did his best to dissuade him. If the pilgrim remained steadfast he then undertook fifteen days of fasting and praying, after which he took communion and was blessed and led to the entrance of the cave (likely sleep deprived and weak with hunger) accompanied by prayers. At the entrance he was given one more chance to turn back. If he persisted he was allowed to walk down the steps.
The door was closed and locked behind him and he was left in darkness for the next 24 hours.
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| Wait, on second thought… |
Part of the reason for all of this preparation and care was because the monks in charge of the purgatory did not expect the pilgrim to be there the next morning when the door was opened. It was believed that the purgatory actually had the ability to take pilgrims on a journey through the afterlife, both hell and paradise, and not everyone was strong enough to survive the torments that they would undergo in the first part of their journey.
The story of the Owain, a wicked knight who wished to repent his sins, shows some of the dangers that awaited the pilgrims. Warned that he must not turn back lest he be lost forever, he is beset by demons that first try to trick him into turning around.
When that fails he’s then thrown into a pit of fire, is later frozen, burned, faced with throngs of souls in torment, and eventually forced onto a narrow bridge lying across a sea of flame that he has to somehow traverse. The only way he gets through the journey at all is by calling out Jesus’ name whenever he feels threatened.
Those who, like Owain, made it till morning were brought back to the church in joy and asked to recount their adventures. It was believed that these fortunate souls had all of their sins forgiven, because they had already undergone the tortures of the afterlife. When the morning sun shone instead on an empty cave the door was shut again and the pilgrim was never spoken of again.
Whether it was to really give them a chance to repent their sins, or because church leaders approved of this unique method of ridding the world of bad people, criminals were routinely sent on pilgrimage to St. Patrick’s Purgatory. It became normal for people suspected of wrongdoing to make a pilgrimage to the island to prove their innocence. People like Ramon de Perillos, a Spanish lord who undertook a pilgrimage to the sacred site after he was questioned regarding the death of King John I of Aragon, and who wrote the Voyage to St. Patrick’s Purgatory to commemorate his journeys.
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| Map of the Island from Voyage to St. Patrick’s Purgatory |
However they heard about the purgatory thousands of pilgrims from all over came to Lough Derg to visit the cave. And even once the cave was filled in pilgrims continued to come, several thousands of which still come today, and if they no longer have the experiences of the afterlife to look forward to they also don’t need to get permission from their bishops and spend 15 days in fasting.
With the cave filled in and never excavated its hard to tell exactly how true the stories may be. There are records of the doors of the cave being opened on nothing, but who’s to say that’s because the pilgrims were actually unable to resist their tormenters in hell? It’s also possible that the fifteen days of fasting and praying put pilgrims into a state very susceptible to suggestion.
But one thing we do know is that people will go very far and do a great many unpleasant things in the hopes that they will no longer be unsure about what awaits them when they depart from this world. So that when their time comes they will not wonder. They will know.
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| Yay! |
*the island’s website suggests 1789 is more likely
**to read the complete text in all its anti-catholic 1843 glory go here