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Chapter 13LDO.2.13

VISIO QUINTA, cap. XIII

The Outer Darknesses and the Infernal Pit

The vision describes the outer darknesses beyond the world, the gaping jaws of the infernal pit, and the deepest infernal places where the damned are tormented without consolation.

And yet toward the west, beyond the roundness of the earth already described, there appear darknesses that extend on both sides of that same roundness toward its middle, where the wings mentioned earlier curve downward in the shape of an arc; these are the outer darknesses in that region beyond the world, stretching from one side to the midpoint of the south and from the other to the midpoint of the north, and so through the wickedness of rebellion against the fullness of God's protection they rear up, where the ancient foe, who rules within them over souls handed over to oblivion, delights in having his tortures.✦12 Within these, between the western corner and the northern corner, there are other darknesses, denser and more severe, having as it were the shape of a horrible and devouring mouth's gaping jaws, which exist outside the world in those same regions with their own bitterness as the mouth of the infernal pit, and they devour the souls of the damned and torment them with dreadful afflictions, since those who do the works of damnation rather than love God follow the devil.3 The darknesses already described are joined, as it were, by a mouth and gaping throat of certain other darknesses, densest and worst and infinite, which lie beyond these, and which are the infernal places where every kind of punishment abounds without consolation, set apart from other punishments because they are more severe, and they devour all things that God judges to be cast into oblivion, through which the souls of those who hand over their Creator to oblivion through the faithlessness of unbelief and through acts of cursing are tormented.45

The Hiddenness of Hell and the Sovereignty of God

The visionary acknowledges that hell's torments are known but unseen by mortal eyes, then turns to God as the one life who sustains all creation and preserves the number of the saved despite the devil's efforts.

And so you know that these infinite darknesses exist, but you do not see them, since a person can know through knowledge and understanding that hell and its dire torments exist, but while in the body no mortal gaze perfectly sees them, nor can anyone discern what or how great the torments within them are, just as one does not know one's own soul, nor its merits, as long as one lives in this world.6 Because God is the one life, subsisting in himself, who didn't receive his being from anything, but gave being to all things — likewise concerning the creation of the angels and the downfall of the proud, and the confirmation of the blessed spirits — and that the devil, though he always labors at this, can't destroy the number of those to be saved.

Read the original Latin

Sed et versus occidentem extra praedictam terrae rotunditatem, tenebrae apparent, quae ab utraque parte ejusdem rotunditatis ad medietatem ipsius, quo et praefatae alae deorsum descendunt, in modum arcus se extendunt, quae in plaga illa extra mundum exteriores tenebrae sunt; ex altera parte usque ad mediam plagam austri, ex altera usque ad mediam plagam septentrionis se prolongantes, ac sic per nequitiam rebellionis contra plenitudinem protectionis Dei se erigentes, ubi antiquus praeliator, qui in ipsis dominatur super animas oblivioni traditas, cruciamenta se habere gaudet. In quibus inter angulum occidentalem et angulum septentrionalem aliae densiores et acriores tenebrae velut formam horribilis et devorantis hiatus oris habentes sunt, quae eisdem partibus extra mundum acerbitate sua os infernalis putei existentes, animas damnatorum devorant, dirisque afflictionibus cruciant, quoniam illae damnationis opera magis facientes quam Deum diligentes diabolum subsequuntur. Praedictae autem tenebrae aliis quibusdam densissimis et pessimis infinitisque tenebris, quae extra istas sunt, quasi os et rictus earum sint, adhaerent, quae infernalia loca sunt, in quibus omnia genera poenarum absque consolatione abundant, ab aliis poenis separata, quia illis acriora sunt, et cuncta devorant, quae Deus in oblivionem mitti dijudicat, per quae animae illorum cruciantur, qui per infidelitatem incredulitatis et per facta exsecrationis Creatorem suum oblivioni tradunt. Quapropter et has infinitas tenebras scis; sed eas non vides, quoniam infernum ejusque diros cruciatus homo per scientiam et intellectum esse quidem scire potest, sed eos, dum in corpore est, nullo mortalis intuitu perfecte videt, nec etiam quae et quanta tormenta in ipsis sint discernere valet, sicut nec animam suam, nec merita illius, quandiu in saeculo vivit cognoscit.

Quia Deus unica vita in semetipso subsistens a nullo esse acceperit, sed omnibus esse dederit; item de creatione angelorum et de ruina superborum, et de confirmatione beatorum spirituum, et quod diabolus, quamvis in hoc semper laboret, numerum salvandorum destruere non possit.

Scripture echoes

  1. ↩Matt.25.30;Matt.8.12 — And cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Matt.8.12 — But the sons of the kingdom will be thrown out into the outer darkness. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Notes

  1. 1 ↩The Latin is a single long periodic sentence describing a vision of exterior darknesses in spatial, cosmological terms; punctuation and clause breaks have been rendered to preserve sense without imposing doctrine not present in the source.
  2. 2 ↩cruciamenta rendered as 'tortures' to keep the sense of punitive suffering without importing a specific technical sense beyond what the Latin supports here.
  3. 3 ↩The clause 'illae damnationis opera magis facientes quam Deum diligentes' is rendered to preserve the contrast between doing the works of damnation and loving God, without resolving whether 'illae' refers to the darknesses or to the persons; the ambiguity is left as the Latin leaves it.
  4. 4 ↩The syntax linking the darknesses, the mouth/throat image, and the infernal places is complex; rendered to preserve the layered imagery without forcing a single doctrinal reading.
  5. 5 ↩dijudicat rendered as 'judges' to keep the sense of divine assessment without importing a technical predestinarian claim beyond the immediate clause.
  6. 6 ↩The final comparison extends from 'sicut nec animam suam, nec merita illius... cognoscit'; rendered to keep the parallel between not fully knowing one's soul or its merits and not fully seeing the torments, without resolving the precise metaphysical claim.

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