Cosmological and Philosophical World of Dante Alighieri: «The Divine Comedy» as a Medieval Vision of the Universe 9783631655320, 9783653049596, 3631655320

Table of contents :
Cover
Contents
Florence – the city of faith, art and politics
I. Dante Alighieri – science, politics and art
1) Europe in the Middle Ages
2) Florence – the city and its history
3) Social conflicts and clashes
4) Dante, Guelphs and Ghibellines
5) Political desires of the poet
6) The scientific way of Dante
7) Dante’s works
II. The Convivio – theology and cosmology
1) Aristotelianism in medieval Europe
2) The power of philosophy
3) The Noble Lady
4) Cosmological models of the universe
5) The medieval universe of knowledge
6) The hierarchy of sciences in the model of the cosmos
7) The consequences of the division of science into the spheres of space
8) The meeting of philosophy, faith and love
9) Philosophy as a preparatio fidei
10) The Banquet – the struggle of poetry, reason and faith
III. The Divine Comedy – major themes
1) Alone in the the dark woods
2) Inferno
3) Purgatorium
4) Paradise
IV. In the Dantesque theatrum mundi
1) Journey to the afterlife – sources and inspirations
2) Cosmology and geography in the world of Dante
3) The Prime Unmoved Mover
4) Dante’s spherical geometry
5) The spiritual nature of the cosmos
6) The world endowed with inherent sense
7) Travel as an act of purification
8) The scandal of existence of the Hell
9) The Gentiles and children – the issue of limbo
10) Cato as a model of heroism?
11) Dante and Ulysses – a pilgrim and an explorer
12) Aristotelianism, Thomism and Averroism
of Dante Alighieri
13) The difference of Dante’s world
Conclusion
Bibliography

Citation preview

Jacek Grzybowski is Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Philosophy at the Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski University in Warsaw and a lecturer at the Pontifical Faculty of Theology in Warsaw.

Jacek Grzybowski · Cosmological and Philosophical World of Dante Alighieri

The book analyses the medieval vision of the world as depicted in Dante Alighieri’s poetic works. In detail it discusses two works, The Banquet and The Divine Comedy, and offers a view on politics, faith and the universe of the medieval period. For modern people that period with its debates, polemics and visions represents something exceedingly remote, obscure and unknown. While admiring Dante’s poetic artistry, we often fail to recognize the inspirations that permeated the works of medieval scholars and poets. Although times are constantly changing, every generation has to face the same fundamental questions of meaning, purpose and value of human existence: Dante’s cosmological and poetical picture turns out to be surprisingly universal.

9

Jacek Grzybowski

Cosmological and Philosophical World of Dante Alighieri The Divine Comedy as a Medieval Vision of the Universe

European Studies in T heolog y, Philosophy and Histor y of Relig ions Edited by Bartosz Adamczewski

ISBN 978-3-631-65532-0

EST 09_265532_Grzybowski_AM_A5HCk PLE.indd 1

23.03.15 15:38

Jacek Grzybowski is Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Philosophy at the Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski University in Warsaw and a lecturer at the Pontifical Faculty of Theology in Warsaw.

EST 09_265532_Grzybowski_AM_A5HCk PLE.indd 1

Jacek Grzybowski · Cosmological and Philosophical World of Dante Alighieri

The book analyses the medieval vision of the world as depicted in Dante Alighieri’s poetic works. In detail it discusses two works, The Banquet and The Divine Comedy, and offers a view on politics, faith and the universe of the medieval period. For modern people that period with its debates, polemics and visions represents something exceedingly remote, obscure and unknown. While admiring Dante’s poetic artistry, we often fail to recognize the inspirations that permeated the works of medieval scholars and poets. Although times are constantly changing, every generation has to face the same fundamental questions of meaning, purpose and value of human existence: Dante’s cosmological and poetical picture turns out to be surprisingly universal.

9

Jacek Grzybowski

Cosmological and Philosophical World of Dante Alighieri The Divine Comedy as a Medieval Vision of the Universe

European Studies in T heolog y, Philosophy and Histor y of Relig ions Edited by Bartosz Adamczewski

23.03.15 15:38

Cosmological and Philosophical World of Dante Alighieri

EUROPEAN STUDIES IN THEOLOGY, PHILOSOPHY AND HISTORY OF RELIGIONS Edited by Bartosz Adamczewski

VOL. 9

Jacek Grzybowski

Cosmological and Philosophical World of Dante Alighieri The Divine Comedy as a Medieval Vision of the Universe

Bibliographic Information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data is available in the internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Grzybowski, Jacek, 1973Cosmological and philosophical world of Dante Alighieri : the Divine comedy as a Medieval vision of the universe / Jacek Grzybowski. pages cm Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 978-3-631-65532-0 1. Dante Alighieri, 1265-1321. Divina commedia. 2. Cosmography in literature. 3. Dante Alighieri, 1265-1321. Convivio. 4. Dante Alighieri, 1265-1321– Philosophy. 5. Astronomy, Medieval, in literature. 6. Cosmology in literature. I. Title. PQ4401.G79 2015 851'.1–dc23 2015012297 This publication was financially supported by Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski University in Warsaw. ISSN 21921857 ISBN 978-3-631-65532-0 (Print) E-ISBN 978-3-653-04959-6 (E-Book) DOI 10.3726/978-3-653-04959-6 © Peter Lang GmbH Internationaler Verlag der Wissenschaften Frankfurt am Main 2015 All rights reserved. Peter Lang Edition is an Imprint of Peter Lang GmbH. Peter Lang – Frankfurt am Main ∙ Bern ∙ Bruxelles ∙ New York ∙ Oxford ∙ Warszawa ∙ Wien All parts of this publication are protected by copyright. Any utilisation outside the strict limits of the copyright law, without the permission of the publisher, is forbidden and liable to prosecution. This applies in particular to reproductions, translations, microfilming, and storage and processing in electronic retrieval systems. This publication has been peer reviewed. www.peterlang.com

Who vers’d in geometric lore, would fain Measure the circle; and, though pondering long And deeply, that beginning, which he needs, Finds not; e’en such was I, intent to scan The novel wonder, and trace out the form, How to the circle fitted, and therein. Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy: Paradise The Moon was still high; the sky’s transformation were unending, the metamorphoses, of its multitudinous vaults in ever more masterfully described configurations. The sky had opened up that night, like a silver astrolabe, its bewitching internal mechanism, exhibiting in endless cycles the gilded mathematics of its cogs and wheels. Bruno Schulz, Cinnamon Shops

Contents Florence – the city of faith, art and politics���������������������������������������������������9 I.

Dante Alighieri – science, politics and art������������������������������������������13

1) 2) 3) 4) 5) 6) 7)

Europe in the Middle Ages������������������������������������������������������������������������������13 Florence – the city and its history�������������������������������������������������������������������14 Social conflicts and clashes������������������������������������������������������������������������������15 Dante, Guelphs and Ghibellines����������������������������������������������������������������������17 Political desires of the poet������������������������������������������������������������������������������19 The Scientific way of Dante�����������������������������������������������������������������������������22 Dante’s works�����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������24

II. The Convivio – theology and cosmology.............................................27 1) Aristotelianism in medieval Europe���������������������������������������������������������������27 2) The power of philosophy���������������������������������������������������������������������������������30 3) The Noble Lady�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������32 4) Cosmological models of the universe�������������������������������������������������������������36 5) The medieval universe of knowledge�������������������������������������������������������������41 6) The hierarchy of sciences in the model of the cosmos���������������������������������45 7) The consequences of the division of science into the spheres of space���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������48 8) The meeting of philosophy, faith and love�����������������������������������������������������52 9) Philosophy as a preparatio fidei�����������������������������������������������������������������������54 10) The Banquet – the struggle of poetry, reason and faith�������������������������������59

III. The Divine Comedy – major themes.......................................................61 1) Alone in the the dark woods����������������������������������������������������������������������������62 2) Inferno����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������67 3) Purgatorium�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������76 4) Paradise��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������80

IV. In the Dantesque theatrum mundi���������������������������������������������������������85 1) 2) 3) 4)

Journey to the afterlife – sources and inspirations���������������������������������������85 Cosmology and geography in the world of Dante����������������������������������������87 The Prime Unmoved Mover����������������������������������������������������������������������������89 Dante’s spherical geometry������������������������������������������������������������������������������93

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5) 6) 7) 8) 9) 10) 11) 12) 13)

The spiritual nature of the cosmos�����������������������������������������������������������������97 The world endowed with inherent sense���������������������������������������������������� 101 Travel as an act of purification��������������������������������������������������������������������� 104 The scandal of existence of the Hell������������������������������������������������������������ 105 The Gentiles and children – the issue of limbo������������������������������������������ 111 Cato as a model of heroism?������������������������������������������������������������������������� 119 Dante and Ulysses – a pilgrim and an explorer����������������������������������������� 125 Aristotelianism, Thomism and Averroism of Dante Alighieri���������������� 129 The difference of Dante’s world�������������������������������������������������������������������� 138

Conclusion������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 145 Bibliography���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 147

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Florence – the city of faith, art and politics Florence is full of life. Eight million tourists from all over the world – Japan, Canada, the United States, Korea, India and Poland – traipse through the small and narrow streets of the old town of Florence. Wandering along Via della Condotta or Trebbio, they finally reach a sun-drenched Piazza – della Signoria or Antinori. Among the signs marking various streets and squares there are also names closely associated with the turbulent history of this town, full of violent and bloody turns – Via Guelfa and Via Ghibellina. There is also the small street named after one of the most famous Florentines and one of the greatest poets ever known – Dante Alighieri. The street is squeezed in amongst tall apartment buildings and houses, one of which – Casa di Dante – belonged, according to the legend, to the poet’s family. Everything in this town is imbued with history. The history attracts people to it, pervading the walls, streets and squares, even if it is only an illustrated traveling gadget for global nomads’ recreation. Florence is not just one of many, not only Italian towns where wandering along the streets, gates and squares is a journey through the European culture, art and history. Florence, the hometown of Dante Alighieri, the town of merchants, knights, princes, monks and brilliant artists, is in itself a work of art, a great museum and a space of artistic ecstasy. A walk around Florence resembles a journey through the history of human creativity and immortal glory. Behind the medieval walls surrounded by the picturesque Tuscan hills the history had often taken sharp turns as the love of freedom clashed with tyrannical inclinations, bloody feuds mingled with the sounds of church bells, and bold, although heretical, ideas were burned at the stake. This is the place where the forms of the medieval organization of guilds, trading, banking and arts patronage, always in need of financial support, originated and took shape. When the fortunes perished and their owners were forgotten, what was left was something more valuable than gold – the art. A walk around Florence is at the same time a journey through the history of Christianity which left its distinct mark on the architecture and the whole area of this city, where tradition meets modernity. Christianity is inherently present here, it can be felt emanating from the inside. Actually, there is no street, square or building where you could not recognise the impact of outstanding artists imprinting on the medieval Christianitas the signs of faith. It is a city of churches and museums, where you can feel a tangible expression of Christian symbols. Biblical, ancient, church, historical contents penetrate walls and streets. Everything here wants to speak about God and the history of His redemptive love. 9

However, Florence is primarily a tourist city: there are thousands and millions of people who come here from all over the globe to see and admire the artistic beauty of those who lived and worked here. A self-guided walking tour in Florence, on a warm day in July, in the midst of dozens of passers-by and the multiplicity of languages, has for me yet another meaning, apart from its aesthetic dimension. I have the impression that something marvelous is going on. Here millions of people behold and admire the greatest works accomplished in the spirit of Christian faith. But even though the tourists are impressed by the cathedrals’ enormity, the sculptures’ genius, by frescoes and beautiful craftsmanship of shaded temples, they did not belong to this wonderful world any more. They live in the post-Christian era. The bizarre paradox manifests itself in the fact that these global tourists, who come from the farthest corners of the world to see the kaleidoscope of beauty and marvel at the artistic phenomenon resulting from the spirit of the Christian faith, do not see and do not understand its real meaning. The artist, who expressed his creed in his work, cannot “meet” in the Florentine churches and museum halls with the recipient, who would share with him the community of faith. Tourists – passers-by – do not understand and, more importantly, do not get hold of the depth of content, because they already belong to the world in which Christianity is basically regarded as one of the stages in the history of art, a period of time somewhere in the past, which is remained of solely by the museum exhibits. Hence, I agree with Giorgio Agamben: the city where issues of faith and of the Church, the Pope and the Emperor, sin and repentance were so much valued and fought for, has become a “museum” in which Christian symbols and contents appear to be mere props in a “presentation of history” which ended a long time ago. The city was turned into the museum – the spiritual power of faith that defined and consolidated the once existing city residents’ lives has withdrawn into the quiet and shadowy museum halls1. The tourists of the post-Christian era who are strolling through this “museum” often do not understand what fundamental issues, cases and events the characters and symbols preserved in paintings, sculptures, and frescoes refer to. Those passers-by, who after leaving the museum immediately plunge back into their own affairs and problems, lead a life very distant from that reflected in the Bible and the Christian message. They take pictures, record videos, browse through albums and guidebooks, but are utterly unable to see the ongoing enthronement of Christianity. Despite the admiration for the excellent masterpieces and artistic ability, the spirit of faith which gave inspiration and guided the artist’s hand is 1 Cf. G. Agamben, Profanations, transl. J. Fort, New York 2007, p. 84

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not revealed to them. The world of Christian values is for those tourists locked in paintings and sculptures – forever, as it appears to be. They are “outside” – they have left this half-forgotten world, following the media and popular culture, and do not belong to it anymore. Therefore, it is difficult to understand the world described in the texts of the famous son of this city – Dante Alighieri. He lived in a culture in which Christian truths marked the day, week, year and all the stages of life, revealing the meaning and purpose of human existence. He was rooted in a world in which not only the Church disputes, but also philosophical discourse, economic controversies and political conflicts were Christian in nature. It is difficult to read Dante’s verses not only due to translation misunderstandings but also, and perhaps more importantly, because Dante wrote for the reader perfectly acquainted with the Bible, mythology, Aristotelian and Thomistic philosophical concepts, medieval legends and 14th-century Florentine and Tuscan “news”2. Preparing a book about the world view unfolded in the texts of the Italian poet, I have to honestly admit, as Jorge Luis Borges did, “that I have not read all the comments to the works of Dante Alighieri”, but again, as the Argentinian writer observed, nobody has! There is an immeasurable amount and, if put together, they would probably create a huge library. Over the centuries Dante scholars have written countless comments, interpretations and questions for almost every word recorded by the Florentine, especially for his incomparable work – the Commedia. Every verse, each triplet of the poem, are faced by religious, mythological, historical and astronomical references. Dante’s poem is a universal footnotes, there are no words which would be unjustified3. One of the major contributors to Dante studies was the Italian philologist and politician Michele Barbi (1867–1941). In his study of Dante’s works he explicitly warned against methodological fanaticism and risky hypotheses as having no sound basis. According to him, Dante cannot be regarded as a philosopher or politician only, there being the need for the synthesis of ideological elements with the message conveyed through his poetry. A multilateral study of the mentality and history of the Middle Ages is indispensable for a proper assessment of Dante’s works. Focusing on the aesthetic and poetic aspects of the poet’s works without proper historical, philosophical and theological background leads to a considerable misunderstanding. Without trying to grasp the image and vision of

2 Cf. P. Salwa, Dante uwspółcześniony, “Literatura na Świecie”, no. 7/8 (2004), p. 408. 3 Cf. J. L. Borges, Prolog, transl. A. Sobol-Jurczykowski, “Literatura na świecie”, no. 4 (1995), p. 68.

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the world that imbued the minds of contemporaneous generations we will not understand the work of the great Italian author. The strangeness of medieval world can darken our perception and discourage reading while reinforcing Polish writer Witold Gombrowicz’s impression of great distance – separates these texts from us and our world about six hundred years4. Thus, the multiplicity of various interpretations and possible meanings surrounds Dante. In this book I propose my own modest comment, which is rather an attempt of bringing closer to the reader the cosmological picture of the universe along with all the impact the geocentric model had on the mentality of the medieval Europeans, based on Dante’s two most famous works – The Banquet and The Divine Comedy. It is also an attempt to identify the sources and themes, both philosophical and theological, which permeate Dante’s vision of the cosmos and space. I also seek to demonstrate and clarify the specific character of this model of the universe and in particular the places inhabited by people, countless souls of the dead, demons, angels and God himself. This book is a revised and supplemented version of the work which appeared in a Polish edition in 2009 under the title: “Theatrum Mundi. Cosmology and theology of Dante Alighieri”. Fr. dr hab. Jacek Grzybowski Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw

4 Cf. W. Gombrowicz, Diary: Volume 3, Northwestern University Press, 1966, p. 186.

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I.  Dante Alighieri – science, politics and art On the eve of the tenth century, the first outlines of the great “national” monarchies on the political map of Europe, which were to perpetuate the image of the continent for many centuries ahead, could already be seen. The political communities organized after the great migration, Hun invasions, Asian nomadic tribes and the Arab expansion had already developed durable and strong structures. Undoubtedly, in Central and Eastern Europe the process of transition from tribes to states was still ongoing, but in the western part of the continent the transition from a region to the nation had already occurred.

1)  Europe in the Middle Ages The main feature of constitutional structures since the year 1000 was, as Henryk Samsonowicz writes, their duality. It resulted from the formation of universal communities referring to the idea of the Roman Empire which encompassed different countries and different language groups, as well as from the transformation of the tribal groups and clans into early-state organizations. The intellectual, ecclesiastical and secular elites of that time started to cherish the idea of building a community that would be the implementation of ideal Christian state which would guarantee the unity of faith, peace and security5. This idea resulted from the fact that within a century world territories where Christianity prevailed had doubled their size. Apostolic and missionary activities were going on at a very dynamic pace. The tenth century is the time when a new civilization was being called to life as a result of Charlemagne’s adopting the universal value system of Christianity, which shaped social structures along with a new elite, while preserving the Roman law, culture, science and the art of antiquity6. This Europe, ascending after a period of “dark ages” regression into the new economic and political dimension, Europe which was par excellence monarchical and state-like, ruled by two emperors – of the East and of the West – both of whom called themselves “Roman”, became a space of development and controversy of many philosophical, theological and political ideas. The medieval world had its heyday after the year 1000: the population became more numerous, the land area under cultivation increased, soil fertility grew, life became more peaceful and 5 Cf. H. Samsonowicz, Długi wiek X. Z dziejów powstawania Europy, Poznań 2002, p. 104. 6 Cf. J. Le Goff, Time, Work, and Culture in the Middle Ages, transl. A. Goldhammer, University of Chicago Press, 1980, p. 74.

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prosperous. Major urban centers appeared, machines were invented to alleviate human labor, the use of money became more widespread, but the most important thing was the growing number of urban schools, attached to the abbeys, monasteries, parishes, and creating academic corporations. Looking at the twelfth- and thirteenth-century Europe, its maturity and development, we are faced with the world of extremely rich culture and extensive reflection. Medieval society tried to reassess the aims and objectives, both in temporal and eschatological perspective, that generations to come were to be confronted with. Reflection, theological as well as philosophical and political, shaped a particular world view and the place which a Christian occupies in it. Italian cities with their both political and economic dynamics constituted possibly the most important European area in which all the medieval hopes and longings, aspirations and ambitions were reflected.

2)  Florence – the city and its history Although Florence is the city of Etruscan descent, it owes its proper origin and subsequent history to the Romans, who in 59 BC created a village for retired Roman soldiers to settle down. The city’s name – Florentia, literally: “a flourishing place” – refers to the wild flowers growing on the Arno valley and the surrounding hills. Romans, who settled in the city, adopted Horace’s and Virgil’s idea of rus in urbe – “idyll in the city”7. The city made a prominent contribution into paving the way for trade routes and the development of the idea of political independence. The first mention of the autonomy of Florence can be traced back to 1138, when the existence of an independent self-governing Commune was sanctioned by a formal act. In the eleventh century wool and woolen textiles from Sardinia, Portugal, Spain and northern Europe, as well as rare dyes from the Mediterranean and the East began to be imported to Florence. This resulted in the development of weaving and dyeing, the wool trade became a major source of income for the city which found markets for the beautiful but expensive articles throughout Europe. The development of trade made Florentine merchants to start to form guilds (arti) – occupational associations based on their trade. In 1206 the bankers guild was established, then 7 The origin of the city’s name is ambiguous and has been variously explained. The theory referring to the beauty of flowers covering the banks of Arno river is charming, but hardly the only one. Renaissance scholars argued that the name originated from the Latin verb fluit – “flows”, referring to a river flowing through the city, or that it was derived from Florinus, a Roman commander, who encamped there with Julius Caesar’s army.

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in 1212 the guild of merchants of wool, in 1218 the guild of merchants of silk, and later on the guild of pharmacy and judges. Arti, being the corporate bodies, became the basis of economic and political stability and continuity in the thirteenthcentury Florence. The guilds had established administrative function that bound community together and fostered its economic development. Florence’s flourishing economy was based mainly on banking and foreign trade in luxury goods. The Florentine merchants invented credit banks and bills of exchange, while the florin became the first common currency in Europe, extremely popular due to the purity of silver and gold contained in the coins. Due to their superior ingenuity and entrepreneurship Florentine money-changers made quick fortunes and prosperity of the city grew significantly8.

3)  Social conflicts and clashes It was not the economy only that made the city flourish, though its role was probably a crucial one. When in 1183 Florence proclaimed itself the urban commune, though practically it could benefit from that status for many years, the first conflicts between the two urban and gentry of the trades factions – Guelphs and Ghibellines bigan in the city. The former declared their allegiance to the Pope, while others were in favor of the imperial power. Clashes between them led to tear the unity of urban communities not only in Tuscany. Guelphs and Ghibellines – both these names were derived from the German words “Welf ” and “Weiblingen” that originally (namely, in the 11th century) referred to the militant German noble families from Bavaria and Swabia respectively9. When at the beginning of the twelfth century their conflict spread from Italy across western Europe, Ghibellines, the old nobility, became the party supporting imperial claims of the Holy Roman Emperor in Europe, while the Guelphs, merchant-andbanking middle class, adopted pro-papal attitude and supported his rival claims to supremacy. The supporters of the Emperor were called Ghibellines in Italy, while Welfs corrupted in Italian to Guelphs. The original names have lost their primary dynasty-related meaning in time and became synonymous with the two rival political groups of the supporters (Ghibellines) and opponents (Guelphs) of the imperial rule in Italy. 8 See: C. Marchi, Dante. Il poeta, il politico, l’esule, il querrigliero, il cortigiano, il reazionario, Milano 1983, p. 10. 9 The supporters of Frederick II took their name “Ghibellines” from the German Hohenstaufen dynasty castle called Waiblingen, while Otto IV and his allies were called Guelphs, because he came from the Saxon noble family Welf.

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In the twelfth and thirteenth century in central Italy the interests of local factions and social classes began to dominate. It could be clearly seen in Florence. Traditionally, the year 1216, when the cruel murder of the nobleman is said to have taken place, is regarded as the date of the internal disruption. Bloody revenge for a breach of promise of marriage became a hotbed of fighting between the Florentine families of Buondelmonti and Amidei10. Family disputes were transformed into political and economic rivalries, complicating the already tense situation in the city, which by that time suffered from the confrontation between the three opposing factions – nobility, rich bourgeoisie (popolo grasso) and lower middle class (popolo minuto). The nobility, ultimately defeated in the twelfth century and banished from their castles and estates, settled up in the city. Still aware if its uniqueness, it nevertheless tried to establish contacts with the bourgeoisie of Florence, trying to regain some influence11. The conflict between the Pope and the Emperor further deepened these divisions, and in Italy it was reflected in the Guelphs and Ghibellines groups existing in almost every city. Initially, the Guelphs represented the popular movement fighting the feudal-aristocratic party with the aim of democratization of power in the cities, but in the thirteenth century this division has lost its importance and the struggle between both parties came to reflect rivalry between the richest clans and families in their quest for hegemony. Ghibellines gained influence and power in most cities of northern Italy – Florence, Bologna, Novara, Padua, Mantua and Ferrara, while Ghibellines ruled in Cremona, Pavia, Asti, Siena, Lucca and Pisa. The disruption became the basis of permanent political coalitions, where the attitude towards the monarchical and theocratic ideas was of crucial 10 The factional conflicts are believed to have originated due to the single incident on Easter Monday morning 1215 (according to other sources it was 1216), when the cruel murder took place on one of the bridges of the city. The victim was a young and handsome nobleman Buondelmonte and the assailants were the members of Florentine families of Uberti, Amidei, Lamberti and Fifanti. That was the beginning of lasting conflict between the Guelphs and Ghibellines. However, despite the unstable socio-political situation during the entire Middle Ages, the city lively responded to the new trends in art and literature: these were the years when Dante’s works appeared, as well as the dolce stil nuovo of Giotto and Arnolfo di Cambio. In the fifteenth century Florence thrived: it was a city-state of trade, but also a new cradle of Italian as well as European art. The most significant role played the powerful Medici family who were the major promoteurs and patrons of the arts. See: M. Barbi, Dante. Vita, opere, fortuna, Firenze 1933, p. 32; U. Cosmo, Vita di Dante, Bari 1949, p. 21; L. Dami, Firenze di Dante, Firenze 1966, p. 19. 11 Cf. N. Zingarelli, La vita, i tempi e le opere di Dante, vol. II, Milano 1948.

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importance. Ghibellines cultivated the ethos of a strong empire and its key role in Europe, while the Guelphs saw the rescue for the country and the whole continent in the spiritual leadership of the Pope. Hence, the Guelphs and Ghibellines took part in the battles of the noble families in such cities as Florence and Bologna. Florence itself traditionally remained Guelphic practically all the time12. The hometown of Dante, lies, therefore – as Norman Davies says – “right in the middle of political and social storms of the era of the late Middle Ages, as a greatly developed community of a hundred thousand restless souls”13. And at the center of this political dispute was Dante Alighieri, who expected further strengthening of the position of the Emperor regarded as a political and ideological leader of the whole Christian continent.

4)  Dante, Guelphs and Ghibellines Dante Alighieri was a Florentine of flesh and blood, aware of and interested in what was happening in his city until the end of his life14. His Comedy is in a sense, as Richard Lewis writes, an expression of Dante’s feelings and passion for his city, as well as his regret toward its rulers and citizens. His whole life is intertwined with the history of Florence and its history with the events in the contemporary medieval Europe15. For Dante Florence always remained the ideal city-state, ideal residence for the human community. In his eyes, such a city – città – is a place where men and women can live and develop in an orderly and lawful way. Città, in its broadest sense, is a term of extraordinary importance for Dante. In “Hell”, as we shall see, there is a city – degraded and hypocritical commune of souls and demons – while the essence of Paradise the poet expressed in the metaphor of heavenly city. In this way he poetically pictured Cicero’s thought expressed in De natura Deorum, that even the gods are “united in a kind of society”. The whole universe is thus conceived as a city of people remaining under the ideal sovereignty of God.

12 Cf. W. Czapliński, A. Galos, W. Korta, Historia Niemiec, Wrocław 1981, p. 196. The adopted in Florence statutory laws Ordinances of Justice (1293) excluded Ghibellines from holding a public office by stating that the office could be trusted only to a “good Guelph, a member of the guild”. For further information on the political situation in the medieval Florence see more: W. Karpiński, Pamięć Włoch, Gdańsk 2002, p. 61. 13 N. Davies, Europa – rozprawa historyka z historią, transl. E. Tabakowska, Cracow 1998, p. 434. 14 See: Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. I, Roma 1970, p. 125–131. 15 Cf. R. W. B. Lewis, Dante: A Life, Penguin, New York 2009, p. 7.

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The times Alighieri lived in were far from peaceful. The Guelphs, after having ruled Florence for a long period, plunged into internal strife. In autumn 1301, the coalition represented by Vieri de Cerchi, now called White Guelphs and associated with the merchant class, and the Black Guelphs led by Corso Donati and supporting the noble class, unleashed a real war. The Whites wanted to preserve the independence of Florence and therefore rejected the intervention of the then Pope Boniface VIII in the internal affairs of the city. The Blacks were more expansive, they hoped that with the help of Rome they would get new markets for the rapidly growing economy of the city. At the time of the conflict Dante sided with the party which seemed to him more human, prone to agreement, more tolerant and open, but at the same time weaker and less devious. In this way the poet joined Cerchichs – the White party and supported the political decision to ban from the city the leaders of the Blacks’ party. It was, therefore, natural that Dante, in order to liberate his hometown from the papal rule and influence, reaffirmed the intention to oppose the plans of a Bishop of Rome Boniface VIII, as well as the radical efforts of the guild of the Black Guelphs. Boniface VIII – a brilliant strategist, thirsting for power both spiritual and secular – was for Dante a symbol of a corrupted and false papal policy. It was also Boniface VIII who finally accepted the lifetime Dante’s exile from Florence16. Therefore, in The Divine Comedy, the poet called him “the prince of the new Pharisees”17. During the conflict between the both parties the poet, having been in Rome with the mediation mission as an ambassador for the city, was not there to witness indecisive, impotent and futile policy of the Whites in the last months of their rule in Florence. That policy, in combination with the cowardly attitude of Cerchich when action was required, led to the victory of the Black Guelphs. They quickly began to take revenge on their political opponents. It seems that the house of Dante (the poet was one of the urban priori in the Whites’ signoria that governed Florence) was one of the first that were robbed by the Blacks when they finally won. Florence was entirely in the hands of priori from the Blacks’ faction. When news of the Whites’ defeat reached Dante, he stopped first in Rome, then in Siena. Here, in January 27th 1302, the poet was reached by his first sentence: together with four other citizens of Florence, he was sentenced to a fine of 5000 florins, a two-years exile and life deprivation of privileges. All 16 Cf. C. Marchi, Dante … op. cit., p. 33. 17 “The chief of the new Pharisees meantime, Waging his warfare near the Lateran”. Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy, Hell, XXVII, 85–86, transl. H. F. Cary, M. A., Cassell and Company, London, Paris, Meulbourne 1892.

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this under the common charges of bribery, illicit profits, opposition to the Pope and the king Charles de Valois, disturbing the peace in Florence and making Pistoia to opt for the Whites and banish the Blacks – faithful and devoted sons of the Church. When in a given period the poet did not show up to pay the fine and justify his stance, on March 10th the second sentence was issued, which announced that if Dante fell into the hands of the municipality of Florence, he was to be burned alive (igne comburatur sic quod moriatur)18. Why was Dante accused and sentenced so radically? There are several reasons: it was not hard to present him as an enemy of Florence – opposition to the policies of the Roman Curia, the sentence, which always suggests the guilt and, finally, the fact that real Ghibellines banished from Florence previously joined with the outcasts of the White party in attempts to regain influence in their native city. White immigrants’ activities, which Dante initially joined, were marked by efforts to acquire allies and preparations for possible military action. A part of the Whites settled in Ghibellian Pisa. Dante also had to seek the refuge and assistance in the cities of Tuscany and Romagna, hostile for the party of Guelphs. All this meant that gradually he began, along with his exiled fellows, to be associated with the party of Ghibellines19.

5)  Political desires of the poet When in the described circumstances Henry VII, Duke of Carinthia, appeared on the political scene of then Europe, for the supporters of the “Great Empire” (Dante included) it was a hopeful sign. Henry, in contrast to his predecessor 18 Cf. G. Papini, Dante żywy, transl. E. Boyé, Warsaw 1958, p. 80. 19 The question arises as to whether Dante Alighieri was a Ghibelline. As we follow his life adventures and political choices, it seems probable that like all Florentines he was Guelphic in his beliefs, but when the Guelphs split into the Blacks and the Whites he sided with the less radical Whites who, while looking for allies to oppose papal claims, quickly became identified as Ghibellines. This misunderstanding might have resulted in calling Dante the main ideologue of Ghibellines. See: W. Czapliński, A. Galos, W. Korta, Historia Niemiec, op. cit., p. 196. Presumably, the poet had been thus associated because of his views, though being from the Guelphic family (his relatives were not exiled from the city in 1260, after the victory of this faction), and being personally connected with Florence as traditionally Guelphic he would not call himself a Ghibelline. However, Papini believes that Dante at the time of his exile and wandering no longer was neither a White Guelph nor a fugitive Ghibelline. By the time of writing the Monarchy he was already beyond both Guelphism and Ghibellinism. Cf. C. Marchi, Dante … op. cit., p. 63; K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, Warsaw 1961, p. 63; G. Papini, Dante żywy … op. cit., p. 177.

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(Albrecht I of Habsburg dynasty), avoided conflicts with the German princes and complied with the promises given during the election. After he was elected king of Bohemia, all his attention was directed towards Italy, which relations with the kingdom of Germany since the mid-thirteenth century were actually broken. Referring to the old concept of empire, he wanted to not only regain his insignia, but also to control Italy. With the support of Ghibellines, awaiting from the German king support in the fight against democratic and national movements within the Italian cities, Henry VII began his descent into northern Italy in 1310 at the head of a small group of 300 knights20. The road to Rome led through Lombardy’s cities – republics, whose attitude towards the German king varied. Milan, where Henry at the end of December 1310 was crowned the king of Lombardy, greeted him grandly, but other cities, including Florence, showed active resistance which he was not able to break. All this caused a delay, so that only in the beginning of 1312 Henry VII came to Rome. Despite the resistance of his political opponents, in June 1312, with the permission of Pope Clement V, Henry was crowned Emperor of Rome. As the Emperor, he was preparing to attack Naples, but these efforts were cut short by his unexpected death in the summer of 1313 near Siena21. When in 1310 Henry arrived in Italy, Dante for three years had been anxiously following the journey of the monarch. There was a rumor that rex pacificus came to Italy to bring peace between the cities and the political parties, return the exiles to their native cities, overthrow the usurpers and restore good relations between the Church and the Empire. However, Henry made a tactical error of appointing for his viceroy a Ghibelin, which, of course, immediately enraged the Black Guelphs in Florence. They reacted by refusing to recognize Henry’s authority and even to meet him. Florence felt a deep aversion to the emperor, as he was seen as the hypocritical ruler and the enemy of privileges painstakingly acquired by municipalities, ready to impose taxes and contributions. That was the reason why the city not only resisted fearlessly, but also spared no expense to spread the rebellion against the invader in almost all Italian regions. This resulted in an inevitable clash between Dante, who regarded Henry as a saviour, and the political rulers of the city22. In this situation, the poet residing outside the city did not obtain permission to return. He never saw his beloved Florence again23. 20 21 22 23

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Cf. M. Barbi, Vita … op. cit., p. 28. Cf. W. Czapliński, A. Galos, W. Korta, Historia Niemiec … op. cit., p. 196. Cf. M. Barbi, Dante, transl. J. Gałuszka, Warsaw 1965, p. 30. In August 1315 the opportunity for the exiled to return to Florence arose, but under the condition of paying a fine and submitting to a humiliating ceremony in the

However hard was Dante’s predicament caused by severe and unjust attitude of Florentines, it should be noted for the sake of biographical accuracy that it was during the exile when Alighieri became fully creative and prolific writer. His most important works: De vulgari Eloquentia, Convivio, De monarchia and, finally, Commedia – the most famous song, poetic masterpiece with a tragic beginning and triumphal ending – from the souls suffering in hell to the souls enjoying the blessings of Paradise, were written in that period. Although the exile caused him so much pain, it had never extinguished his affectionate love to his home city. Despite his wandering far from home, his creative and scientific work as well as political commitments, all the time the voice of the Florentine in exile can be heard clearly in his texts. Dante died in Ravenna, on the night of September 13–14th, 1321, aged fifty-six24. Dante’s conflict with his compatriots, subsequent wandering and death in exile, political stubbornness of his enemies and, finally, his pride and dignity that made him invincible and prevented him from being humiliated by dire adversities that came his way. This particular weave of politics and emotions, of hope and rejection created in brilliant poetic stanzas a special, one-of-a-kind picture – a world of people, universe and God. Everything began in Florence…

Baptistery of St. John the Baptist. As a result, they could be forgiven and given the right to return to their family homes. Dante rejected the offer. In a letter to an unknown Florentine close friend he expressed his indignation. He was unjustly wronged, endured various sufferings and humiliation for almost fifteen years. In return, he is offered the forgiveness under humiliating conditions. “If by no honourable way an entrance can be found into Florence, therein I will never enter” – the poet wrote, adding – “Can I not from any corner of the earth enjoy the sight of the sun and the stars, and contemplate consoling and delightful truth?” At the end of the letter he expressed his belief that bread will not fail him. See: Dante Alighieri, Epistole IX, in: Tutte le opere di Dante, ed. F. Chiappelli, Milano 1965, p. 855. See: K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 92. 24 In the light of the documents and uncontested facts it must be concluded that many important moments in Dante’s biography are enveloped in mystery. A fair number of legends are the product of later imagination and rather obscure the true picture of the poet’s life. Not much can be said about Dante’s way of life and his outward appearance. The main source of information are the chronicles and biographies, especially that of Giovanni Villani and Boccaccio, as well as Dante’s own remarks that can be found in his works. See: C. Marchi, Dante … op. cit., p. 200.

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6)  The scientific way of Dante Ever since his youth Dante revealed a remarkable passion for study. Undoubtedly, he read Boethius and Cicero, who opened before him broad horizons of classical knowledge. He devoted himself to the study of the Latin poets, particularly Virgil, who became his master and beloved author so much so that the poet claimed later that he owed the beauty of his style to Virgil25. The extremely significant factor for the young Florentine’s education was the revival of interest in philosophy, influenced by the prevalence at that time in Europe of new translations of Aristotle’s works. This revival concerned physics and metaphysics in particularly, as well as then appearing the need to reconcile the thought of Aristotle with the truths of faith. Undoubtedly, the emergence of numerous research centers was essential, including the most important ones – universities. They were resilient and innovative, mainly due to new forms of religious life created by the Dominicans and Franciscans26. Following the poet’s biography we come to know that in Santa Maria Novella, the Dominican church as well as the scientific center of Florence, Dante probably met a Dominican Remigio dei Girolami, who was a disciple of St. Thomas Aquinas. He introduced Dante to the theological and philosophical thought of the Dominican monk27. Girolami was one of the famous Italian preachers, a man of intellectual brilliance and broad knowledge. He was probably instrumental for shaping the Dominican school in Florence in accordance with the new trends of scholastic philosophy. It can be, therefore, safely assumed that Dante as a student learned in a systematic way all the then philosophical, theological and ideological beliefs28. Later on, Dante spent some time in the Franciscan monastery of Santa Croce, on the opposite side of the town, where he became acquainted with the mystical 25 Cf. M. Barbi, Vite … op. cit., p. 8. 26 Cf. Czasy katedr – czasy uniwersytetów. Źródła jedności narodów Europy, ed. W. Sajdek, Lublin 2005, p. 24. 27 Cf. Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. V, Roma 1976, p. 632. 28 Cf. M. Grabmann, Die italienische Thomistenschule des XIII. und beginnenden XIV. Jahrhunderts, in: Mittelalterliches Geistesleben, vol. 1, München 1926, p. 332–391; P. Mandonnet, Dante le théologien, Paris 1935; F. Van Steenberghen, La philosophie au XIIIe siècle, Institut supérieur de philosophie, Louvain-la-Neuve 1991, p. 389; G. Papini, Dante żywy … op. cit., p. 66. Remigio dei Girolami’s influence upon Dante can be recognized in the first part of the Convivio, and, as argued by Papini, in St. Peter’s speech in Paradise. However, it is no universal agreement on the fact that Dante actually met Remigio, much less became his disciple. See: J. P. Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas: the person and his work, transl. R. Royal, CUA Press, 2005, p. 368.

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thought of St. Bonaventure, including his idea “the soul’s journey into God”. Dante named the prominent scholar and politician Brunetto Latini as his master. He was a renown encyclopedist, the author of a compendium of contemporary knowledge Li livres dou Tresor (The Books of the Treasure) written in French and the allegorical didactic poem in Italian Tesoretto (Jewel box). The influence of the master on his student is assessed differently, but it is agreed there was a convergence of views and ideas between the two authors. It can be assumed that the meeting with Latini resulted in Dante’s further interest in a number of subjects that later assumed artistic form29. As Papini argues, in Santa Croce Dante learned also about the theories of Joachim of Fiore, as well as the ideas of “Franciscan spiritualists”, since we was taught at the time by Pier-Giovanni Olivi, who believed in Joachim’s prophecies. He was a proponent of radical poverty movement in the Church that proclaimed the use of goods limited to satisfying the most basic needs. He even argued with Thomas Aquinas in response to his claim that evangelical poverty does not mean yet the achievement of perfection30. Due to this educational way in Florence, Dante was familiar with a wide range of views and theories stimulating a medieval intellectuality. During his studies the poet probably saw the peripatetism of Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas to wrestle with Augustinism, Averroism and Neo-Platonism31. Undoubtedly, the writings of Arab and Jewish scholars reached Florence at that time, giving impetus to the study not only to the monastic schools, but first of all to the great foci of education, the most awesome product of the medieval genius and creativeness – the universities32. 29 It is interesting to note that in his travel to the afterlife Dante imagines his mentor in the seventh circle of hell, where those who have sinned against nature are being punished. Dante scholars elaborated a vast number of theories as to the reason of the poet’s decision, including the hypothesis that by doing so he may have hinted at Brunetto’s homosexual inclinations. See: K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 42, 310. 30 See: J. Ptaśnik, Kultura wieków średnich. Życie religijne i społeczne, Warsaw 1959, p. 186. 31 N. Zingarelli, La vita, i tempi … op. cit., p. 34. 32 Among Dante scholars there is a hypothesis that that during his exile Dante came to Paris where he studied at the university, the most famous in the medieval Europe. The poet’s stay in France is widely discussed by contemporary scholars. Most of them reject Boccaccio’s statement, which clearly says that Dante continued his studies abroad, namely in Paris, Bologna and Oxford. But did Dante ever cross the Alps? In the Divine Comedy Arles and Paris are mentioned with an air of immediacy. Also a chronicler Giovanni Villani corroborated the claim about Dante’s studying philosophy and theology in

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When we speaking of Florence and the poet’s youth it is impossible, of course, not to mention a great impact made on the soul of an Italian boy by the charm of one of the noble inhabitants of the city (everything speaks for the fact that it was Bice, a daughter of Folco Portinari, then a spouse of Simon dei Bardi), whom Dante called by her full name “Beatrice”. Although Beatrice herself did not respond to the poet’s love signals, laughed at and rejected his fascination and, consequently, married a wealthy Florentine nobleman, nevertheless it is her who became Dante’s greatest inspiration and, as we will see, her image is given in his works a rich spiritual content, becoming the symbol of the greatest sapiential virtues and ideals, the image of a human being sent down by God to indicate the mortals the ways of grace. Beatrice Portinari died prematurely in 1290. Five years later, the poet wrote in praise of Beatrice his first important work – Vita nuova (The new life) – describing there his, starting from the ninth year of life, love and affection for this woman33.

7)  Dante’s works In all probability, Dante began his first exercises in writing very early and wrote either in Italian (Florentine dialect) or in Latin. One of his earliest texts were Rhymes, the collection of verses he actually had been writing over the years. His first known consistent text is Detto d’Amore (The tale of love), written probably near 1287, then the poem Il Fiore (The flower), and written in his younger years Vita Nuova (The new life). It is a combination of poetry and narrative, influenced by a tragic love that lasted from his early childhood – the love passionate, subtle and idealized – toward Beatrice Portinari. This was the first Dante’s major work. Morawski argues that the Vita nuova is the result of genuine desires of the poet, but it is also interrelated, more or less strongly, with the religious, philosophical, and artistic trends characteristic of the thirteenth century. Dante’s early works are characterized by conciseness and logical development. Lyrical mood dominates strongly over dry commentaries and erudite digressions. Personal experiences are prevailing in the song, which brings to mind St. Augustine’s Confessions. Love, repentance, hope and expectation, pain and ecstasy are personal and authentic poet’s feelings and thoughts, not allegorical or abstract generalizations. In the last chapter Dante gives a promise to keep improving his talent. His ultimate goal is Paris. Although lack of data regarding the whereabouts of Dante between 1307 and 1309 can reinforce this hypothesis, there is no direct bibliographic evidence. See: Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. IV, Roma 1973, p. 305–306. 33 Cf. C. Marchi, Dante … op. cit., p. 17; M. Barbi, Dante. Vita … op. cit., p. 30.

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to create a monument of love and worship for Beatrice. This little book certainly foretells a great future for the poet, for it is the beginning of his writing career34. After the tragic death of the woman he loved and a painful period of feeling lost, Dante undertook to write a text in Latin, but in order to show the value and importance of vernacular Italian as a full-fledged literary language – De Vulgari Eloquentia. Why did Dante decide to write in Latin about his native language? Because the book was addressed to scholars, and therefore should have been written in Latin, then academic language. This work, in which the poet seeks to historically and linguistically justify the situation of the Italian language and the need for its literary use, remained unfinished35. By pointing to the role of the Italian literary language, Dante overcame the local divisions of Italy (that is various dialects, such as Tuscan, Florentine and others)36. In 1304 Dante had already been working on a major philosophical work, and by 1307 Il Convivio (The Banquet) was ready. But at that time the poet started his most important work, which he continued writing until his death – the poem Commedia37. Under the influence of the political events in Italy in 1310 a strictly political treatise De Monarchia (The Monarchy) emerged, while the author still continued to work on the description of the poet’s extraterrestrial journey. In the last phase of his life, in addition to his work on the Commedia, he produced two little books: Eclogae and Quaestio de aqua et de terra. The collection of all Dante’s works includes also letters to his friends, statesmen and clergy38. When following the chronology of the composition of the poet’s individual works it turns out that Vita Nuova, Convivio and Commedia do not form kind of a trilogy describing and depicting the three stages of the poet’s life, as some Dante scholars (e.g. Karl Witte) wrongly assume. According to this theory, the first work would describe the condition of faith naive, innocent and simple, while the Convivio was written at the time of doubt and apostasy (hence the turn

34 See: K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 131; Storia della letteratura Italiana, ed. E. Malato, vol. I, Delle origini a Dante, Roma 1995, p. 807. 35 See: Dante Alighieri, De Vulgari Eloquentia, transl. and ed. Steven Botterill, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2005, p. 8. 36 Cf. De vulgari eloquentia (Vulgar eloquence) was created at the same time as The Banquet (Convivio) – according to some historians in a break between the editing of the third and fourth parts of the treaty. See: Antiquity and the Middle Ages. From Ancient Greece to the 15th century, ed. J. McKinnon, Macmillan 1990, p. 246. 37 Cf. K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 280. 38 Cf. M. Barbi, Vita … op. cit., p. 46ff.

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towards philosophy), and finally the Commedia marks the return to the deep and strong faith, revealment of the highest divine truths. This interpretation, however, completely disagree with the biographical facts which make clear that the poet still worked on the Convivio as late as in 1308, when already written part of the Comedy encompassed a coherent vision of the afterlife.

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II. The Convivio – theology and cosmology 1)  Aristotelianism in medieval Europe At the end of the twelfth century, the papacy reached the peak of its political and social power in the European medieval feudal world. This happened primarily due to the earlier actions of Pope Gregory VII and the institutions established by the legates, that provided significant help in exemption of individual bishops from secular jurisdiction and keeping them united with Papacy39. The thirteenth century was, therefore, the period of stabilization in certain ecclesiastical, political and social structures of the Middle Ages. The emerging communities – whether a city or a state – prompt reflection on coexistence between people and their mutual relationship, as well as that to power – both secular and spiritual. In a natural way the opportunities for scholars (clergy and lay) to undertake various analyzes of theological philosophical, political and social issues presented themselves40. In this situation universities become a place where important theological, philosophical, and political-legal disputes occurred, invigorating the greatest minds of the Middle Ages. At the meeting point between Arab and Christian culture, in medieval Iberia (especially in Toledo), as well as in Venice, Naples and Bari – the centers of trade and shipping, where merchants established their regular contacts – the rediscovery of Aristotle’s writings and thought took place in the twelfth century, when a vast body of philosophical and scientific literature by Greek and Arabic authors was translated from Arabic into Latin. Arab scholars had almost the entire body of Aristotle’s writings already translated before the year 1000, while Christian scholars knew then only a few texts of the Philosopher. It was the influence of Arab culture in the eleventh and twelfth centuries that opened Europe to the Greek thought. The great patron of Greco-Arab texts’ translation was, among others, Raymond de Sauvetât, the archbishop of Toledo, who engaged scholars to translate the texts of Avicenna, Averroes, Algazel and Avicebron (Gabirol), as well as ancient authors into Latin. Dominic Gundisalvi (Dominicus Gundissalinus)

39 See: Das Register Gregoros VII, II, 31, ed. E. Caspar, in: Epistole selectae in usum scholarum ex Monumentis Germaniae Historicis, vol. II, Berlin 1920, p. 165; Historia chrześcijaństwa. Religia, kultura, polityka, vol. V, Ekspansja kościoła rzymskiego 1054–1274, ed. A. Paravicini Bagliali, J. Kłoczowski, A. Vauchez, transl. M. Żurowska, G. Majcher, A. Kuryś, J. M. Kłoczowski, A. Romaniuk, Warsaw 2001, p. 62. 40 Cf. T. Borawska, K. Górski, Umysłowość średniowiecza, Warsaw 1993, p. 98.

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and (reportedly) John of Seville (Johannes Hispalensis) undertook this task. The works of Aristotle and his commentator, Alexander of Aphrodisias, were translated by Gerard of Cremona (Gerardus Cremonensis). His most popular in that times was the translation of a compilation of extracts from the treaty written in Arabic by the Jewish author Abraham ibn Daud and inspired by Elementa theologica of Proclus – Liber Aristotelis de Expositione bonitatis pura, widely known as Liber de causis41. The number of texts translated at the time from Arabic into Latin was quite impressive. As a result of such initiatives, there also appeared translations of Aristotle directly from Greek into Latin – among others, in Sicily, due to Henry Aristippus, and William of Moerbecke, for the papal court in Rome. In England Robert Grosseteste, the brilliant thinker open to new ideas, played a pivotal role in introducing Aristotle to scholastic thought, translating in the years 1242–1247 the entire Nicomachean Ethics, along with the numerous Greek commentaries. All this substantial effort undertaken between 1150 and 1250 brought European thinkers and their research into closer contact with Aristotle. However, it should be borne in mind that the medieval Aristotle entered the circle of Western Christianity mostly in the Arab commentary, namely along with accompanying specific, already systematically formulated and defined interpretation. Europe adopted the Greek philosophy not directly but in a roundabout way, through the Syrian, Persian and Arab scholars, naturalists and philosophers. The extraordinary effort was needed for medieval scholars to “discover” the Philosopher in his true ancient version. The works of Aristotle, when reached Western Europe, reformed scientific ideas of medieval universities, but his writings soon became a canon applicable in all types of schools42. 41 See: F. Van Steenberghen, La philosophie au XIIIe siècle, op. cit., p. 64. See: more: M. Gogacz, Stań badań nad „Księgą o przyczynach“ i ważniejsze w niej problemy filozoficzne, Warsaw 1970. 42 The reception of Aristotle’s writings in ecclesiastical circles caused quite a confusion. Non-Christian considerations introduced by non-Christian scholars began to compete with faith-based thought consistent with Christian theology. At the University of Paris – the Church institution, where priests were teaching in conformity with the Church doctrine – the adoption of Aristotelian thought along with lecturing and commenting on it created an entirely new situation. The Philosopher’s writings together with Muslim and Jewish comments differed significantly from the Christian doctrine and contradicted the orthodox teaching. The inevitable conflict between the Muslim philosophy with its assimilation through Aristotle’s writings and Christian theology actually began in Paris, where the Philosopher’s influence was the strongest. As early as in 1210 the provincial synod at Paris ruled that Aristotle’s works on natural philosophy, especially

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The reception of Aristotelianism in medieval Europe was largely due to the efforts of the Dominican friars, who commented extensively on the discovered writings of the Philosopher. In the heat of twelfth- and thirteenth-century polemics with Averroism, St. Thomas reconceived and adapted Aristotelian ideas to Christian belief, incorporating them into the edifice of theology with a masterful synthesis “of the divine and of the human”43. Aquinas, who was familiar with

Libri de naturali philosophia, could not be read and commented on. Five years later the prohibition was repeated, and this time the Metaphysics was explicitly mentioned. In 1231 the Pope Gregory IX maintained the interdict, but in the meantime the works on the integration of Philosopher’s thought into Christian orthodoxy were advancing in medieval universities. In 1240, however, the study of Aristotle in Paris ceased altogether, except for the private one. Consequently, the late twelfth century witnessed the dissemination of Neoplatonic patterns of thought in theology, closely related to Augustine’s doctrine. Intellectual movement, triggered by the new reception of ancient philosophy, gave rise to different solutions in philosophy and theology, the most controversial of which were the works of Siger of Brabant and Boethius of Dacia. The reaction of the Church was inevitable and on January 18th, 1277 Pope John XXI instructed Bishop Stephen Tempier to determine who and where taught erroneous propositions. The bishop condemned 219 errors, a number of which concerned not only Averroes and his followers but also Thomas Aquinas. The condemnation initiated substantial changes in the medieval schools. Scholars, instead of continuing their efforts to develop independent philosophical thought, went on the defensive and, in a sense, were locked in the “bastion of theology”. Therefore, Gilson believes that the condemnation of 1277 was a landmark date for the medieval science, ending the “golden age of scholasticism”, for it was then when the spirit of friendship and trustful cooperation between philosophy and theology, which had so far dominated in the universities of medieval Europe, began to give way to a spirit of suspicion towards the philosophy. It was only in 1366, due to Pope Nicholas V, when Aristotelianism was restored and officially adopted by the Church, but the decree turned out to have quite the opposite effect. The “prescribed Aristotle” no longer excited minds of philosophers and theologians, who were returning to the Neoplatonic interpretations. The thirteenth century was undoubtedly a great victory of Aristotle: Europe assimilated and commented on his work, that became research material for many subsequent generations of researchers and philosophers. See: É. Gilson, A History of Philosophy, vol. 2, Random House 1961; F. van Steenberghen, Aristotle in the West. The origins of Latin Aristotelianism, Nauwelaerts Publishing House, Louvain 1970; J. Pieper, Introducción a Tomás de Aquino: doce lecciones, Ediciones Rialp, Madrid 2005; J. Pieper, Guide to Thomas Aquinas, Ignatius Press, San Francisco 1991; Mediewal Philosophy, ed. A. P. McGrade, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2003, p. 97; M. D. Chenu, Aquinas and His Role in Theology, transl. P. Philibert, Liturgical Press, Minnesota 2002. 43 Cf. Medieval Philosophy, I, ed. A. A. Maurer, É. Gilson, Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, The Étienne Gilson series, Toronto 1982, p. 187.

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various traditions and philosophical comments, gave priority to Aristotelian thought, revealing its universality when associated with faith. Though St. Thomas preserved the Aristotelian conceptual apparatus, he formulated completely original conclusions and presented his own conception of metaphysics based on the specific role of esse. He always remained faithful to the motto of the Order of Preachers (Ordo Praedicatorum): “the purpose of the studies is teaching, and the purpose of teaching is the salvation of souls”.

2)  The power of philosophy This introduction seems to be of some importance, since in analyzing Dante’s work one cannot ignore the influence of Aristotelianism, Thomism and the Arabic thought on the intellectual and creative life of Europe, and thus also on the scientific, philosophical and political solutions the Italian poet proposed in his works. However, I will focus particularly on the impact these approaches had on the poet’s cosmological vision which he left us in his two works – The Banquet and The Comedy. Alighieri had undertaken a philosophical approach, consistent and systematic for the first time, with a description of the image of the universe in Il Convivio – a mature work written in the early fourteenth century. The continuation of his imago mundi will be an allegorical and poetic vision presented in The Divine Comedy, where a hierarchical model of the world through the eyes of a man seeking the deepest meaning of life and salvation for the lost humanity will be presented. The Banquet44, intended by Dante as his next, after De vulgari eloquentia, epic-theoretical work, was to be a comprehensive scientific and philosophical treatise, an attempt to create Summa Philosophiae modelled upon the great medieval works that would express various views and arguments. It was, however, as Vasoli asserts, the first philosophical experience of the Italian poet, the experience of an amateur not associated with any philosophical and theological school, but a genuine lover of wisdom and knowledge45. The author uses in his work the classical medieval scholastic method that can be reduced to the basic schema: firstly an introduction to the question to 44 Dante Alighieri, Il Convivio, in: Dante Alighieri, Tutte le opere di Dante, ed. F. Chiappelli, Milano 1965. 45 Cf. C. Vasoli, Myśl Dantego. Cztery studia, transl. P. Salwa, Warsaw 1998, p. 14. Dante himself affirms his not being a follower of any particular philosophical or theological school in the first paragraphs of the work. Cf. The Banquet, I, I, 10–12.

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be discussed, then raising the difficulties, contra-arguments, the articulation of the main thesis and replies to the objections. However, some variations can be observed. Dante, although akin to Aristotelians ideas and, to some extent, that of Thomas Aquinas, did not represent their views exclusively. In the text the influences of Plato, Proclus, Seneca, Juan Ruiz, Boethius, Albert the Great, St. Bernard of Clairvaux, Bonaventure, Richard and Hugh of St. Victor can be seen, as well as that of the entire tradition of biblical interpretation, which shows undoubtedly Dante’s excellent erudition and his strong adherence to medieval tradition. Perhaps this is the reason of the various roles the poet can be seen to assume: in some parts he shows himself as an eclectic while in others he demonstrates strong individualism which makes him independent of contemporaneous trends and schools of thought. He did not accept any system as his own. Alighieri often stressed the great authority of Aristotle, calling him the “master and leader of human reason”, but was looking for his own solutions and trying to give his own answers to the basic questions about the nature and meaning of philosophy46. In The Banquet there is much space devoted to reflection on the relationship of philosophy as a science connatural to human intelligence, to the truths of faith. This thread runs throughout almost entire (yet unfinished) work as an attempt to outline the border between areas of knowledge, or rather an attempt to establish a hierarchy of sciences47. Therefore, Dante’s desire to describe in The Banquet the relationship between philosophy and faith, between human thought relying on ancient authorities, especially Aristotle, and Revelation is perfectly understandable. Against this background the complete body of medieval knowledge about universe is being presented the way Dante saw it. 46 Cf. Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. I, Roma 1970, p. 373–375. 47 The Convivio remained unfinished for unknown reasons. There is no doubt that Dante had a more or less accurate idea of the whole work. In the text the planned chapters are mentioned, but they were never written. Four treatises of the Convivio, however, form a whole in which Dante discussed the most important moral, cosmological and theological-philosophical issues. As a poet, he could have become weary with the necessity of confining his thoughts and feelings within the framework of a scholastic treatise. It is possible he came to the conclusion that in his further arguments he would be redundant, having already given the sufficient scientific information. It should be also noted that Dante had been already working on the first part of the Commedia – the major work undertaken in the form more suited to his desire to unveil the vision and sense of the universe. See: K. Michalski, Filozofia wieków średnich, Cracow 1997, p. 303; Dante Encyclopedia, ed. R. Lansing, Routledge, New York 2010, p. 227–231; B. Reynolds, Dante: The Poet, the Political Thinker, the Man, I. B. Tauris, London-New York 2007, p. 64–73.

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3)  The Noble Lady The praise of philosophy at the beginning of Dante’s Convivio refers to the most beautiful allegorical symbol of medieval thought – philosophy is here presented, similarly as in Boethius’ De consolatione, as the Noble Lady48. This symbol is precious for Dante, as the commentators explain, not only because of the Boethian tradition of De consolatione philosophiae, but also because of the person of Beatrice. The poet reveals the fact that from the earthly love, the model and the sign of which was his beloved Beatrice, he turned to the love of wisdom, to philosophy, which appears to him as a Noble Lady. When looking for solace after the death of his beloved, Dante, under the influence of Boethius and other scholars, found consolation and a remedy for his tears. “And just as it often happens that a man goes looking for silver and apart from his intention finds gold, which some hidden cause presents, perhaps not without divine ordinance, so I who sought to console myself found not only a remedy for my tears but also the words of authors, sciences, and books. Pondering these, I quickly determined that Philosophy, who was the lady of these authors, sciences, and books, was a great thing. I imagined her fashioned as a gentle lady, and I could not imagine her in any attitude except one of compassion, so that the part of my mind that perceives truth gazed on her so willingly that I could barely turn it away from her. I began to go where she was truly revealed, namely to the schools of the religious orders and to the disputations held by the philosophers, so that in a short period of time, perhaps some thirty months, I began

48 In De consolatione philosophiae the figure of the Women-Philosophy is of key importance. This is, undoubtedly, a symbol and embodiment of the highest wisdom, as well as the traditional Hellenistic metaphor of its impersonation. Being a Platonist, Boethius alluded primarily to the Platonic dialogue in a prison cell, where Socrates awaited judgment. Crito comes and with a heavy heart tells the prisoner, that the ship from Delos will arrive soon – which means for Socrates the end of waiting and the execution. Then Socrates confides in Crito: “In the dream, I thought a woman came to me, handsome and well grown, and dressed in white; she called to me and said: O Socrates: The third day hence, to Phthia shalt thou go.” Plato, Crito 44 A–B. Just as in Plato’s dialogue, a mysterious woman-philosophy – the embodiment of wisdom – appears in the cell of troubled Boethius and undertakes a special treatment to “heal” him, troubled and oppressed by suffering, from the disease of sadness: “While I was pondering thus in silence, and using my pen to set down so tearful a complaint, there appeared standing over my head a woman’s form, whose countenance was full of majesty, whose eyes shone as with fire and in power of insight surpassed the eyes of men, whose colour was full of life, whose strength was yet intact though she was so full of years that none would ever think that she was subject to such age as ourp.” Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy, I, I, transl. W. V. Cooper.

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to feel her sweetness so much that the love of her dispelled and destroyed every other thought.”49

Crystallizing philosophical and epistemological opinions of Dante are first expressed in a primary love movement, dramatic struggle between earthly and sensual attachment and memories, and the pure love of the Truth and Philosophy. The victory of love of wisdom is to Dante a moment of entering the path of scientific considerations. The symbol of the Gentle Lady is a picture of philosophy, which becomes the lady of the intellect. “The lady of whom I was enamored after my first love was the most beautiful and honorable daughter of the Emperor of the universe, to whom Pythagoras gave the name of Philosophy.”50

Dante does not confine himself exclusively to this poetic and lyrical definition. He reminds us of the origin and etymology of the Greek word philosophia, recalling the basic facts: “When Pythagoras was asked whether he considered himself a wise man, refused to accept the appellation for himself and said that he was not a wise man but a lover of wisdom. So it came to pass after this that everyone dedicated to wisdom was called a “lover of wisdom” that is, a “philosopher,” for philos in Greek means the same as “love” in Latin, and so we say philos for lover and sophos for wisdom, from which we can perceive that these two words make up the name of “philosopher” meaning “lover of wisdom” which, we might note, is not a term of arrogance but of humility. From this word was derived the name of the act proper to it, “philosophy” just as from “friend” was derived the name of the act proper to it, namely “friendship” Thus we may see, considering the meaning of the first and second words, that philosophy is nothing but “friendship for wisdom” or “for knowledge”; consequently in a certain sense everyone can be called a “philosopher” according to the natural love which engenders in everyone the desire to know.”51

However, the word philosophy did not derive, according to Dante, from arrogance and putative knowledge, but from humility in recognizing one’s own deficiencies and never-ceasing questions. Therefore Philosophy (this word is sometimes capitalized in order to show its importance, or else to highlight the extended personification) is nothing other than a “friendship to wisdom”, friendship to knowledge, a relation to what is most important, what we want to know while motivated by an innate curiosity. The poet asserts that philosophy thus understood makes it

49 The Banquet, II, XII, 4–8, transl. R. Lansing. 50 The Banquet, II, XV, 12, transl. R. Lansing. 51 The Banquet, III, XI, 5–7, transl. R. Lansing.

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possible “to a certain degree to call every man a philosopher”, because a natural love begets in everyone the longing to know52. This friendship, however, to be rightly called the true philosophy, needs – like all human relationships do – a mutual attachment. Common to all people love of knowledge, as Dante puts it, is not enough. The attachment should be mutual, and should not stem from pleasure or desired profit but from worthiness. “And just as friendship founded on pleasure or utility is not true friendship but friendship by accident, as the Ethics demonstrates, so philosophy founded on pleasure or utility is not true philosophy but philosophy by accident. We must therefore not give the name of philosopher to anyone who for the sake of pleasure is a friend of wisdom with respect to only one of its parts, as are many who take pleasure in listening to canzoni and in devoting their time to them, and who take pleasure in studying Rhetoric or Music but shun and abandon the other sciences, all of which are branches of wisdom. Nor should we give the name of true philosopher to anyone who is a friend of wisdom for the sake of utility, as are jurists, physicians, and almost all those belonging to religious orders, who study not in order to gain knowledge but to secure financial rewards or high office; and if anyone were to give them what they seek to gain, they would not persevere in their study. And just as among the kinds of friendship that which exists for the sake of utility can least of all be called friendship, so these I have mentioned share the name of philosopher less than any of the others. Consequently just as friendship founded on worthiness is true, perfect, and lasting, so true and perfect philosophy is that which is engendered by worthiness alone, without ulterior motives, and by the goodness of the friendly soul, which is to say, by right desire and right reason.”53

In the third book Dante meticulously emphasizes this idea referring to Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics54. I want to point out that the true love of wisdom is absolutely selfless. A true philosopher does not study philosophy for profit, for other people, or for titles, not even for his own pleasure, but solely and exclusively for the sake of love of the truth. “And just as true friendship, conceived abstractly apart from the mind and considered solely in itself, has as its subject the knowledge of virtuous action and as its form the desire for it, so philosophy, apart from the soul, considered in itself, has as its subject understanding, and as its form an almost divine love for what is to be understood. And

52 Cf. The Banquet, III, XI, 9–11. 53 The Banquet, III, XI, 11–15, transl. R. Lansing. 54 “The kinds of friendship may perhaps be cleared up if we first come to know the object of love. For not everything seems to be loved but only the lovable, and this is good, pleasant, or useful; but it would seem to be that by which some good or pleasure is produced that is useful, so that it is the good and the useful that are lovable as end.” Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, VIII, 2, 1155b, transl. W. D. Rosp.

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just as the efficient cause of true love is virtue, so the efficient cause of philosophy is truth; and just as the end of true friendship is delight in what is good, which proceeds from living together according to what is proper to humanity, so the end of philosophy is that most excellent delight which suffers no cessation or imperfection, namely true happiness, which is acquired through the contemplation of truth.”55

This definition is, so to speak, thoroughly a classic one, referring to the best traditions – both early Christian and medieval – of understanding of what philosophy really is as well as what are the role and responsibilities of the person who wants to be called a philosopher or a friend of wisdom. Using the Aristotelian distinction between the formal and material cause, Dante advocates that philosophy has understanding for its subject, while for its form an almost divine love for what is to be understood56. It should be noted, however, that Dante, in his attempt to characterize the philosophy and the philosopher, points out that the true philosopher is the one who loves each part of wisdom, and wisdom each part of the philosopher. He further quotes the Book of Proverbs: I love them that love me57. Wisdom then, the love of which plays a crucial role in the definition of philosophy, is not a purely speculative issue to him. Referring to the Bible, he indicates yet another, broader religious meaning of wisdom. In the passage of Scripture which speak of God’s wisdom, the biblical author describes it as a personified attribute of Yahweh that exceeds our natural cognitive abilities. A few verses later the Scripture describes this wisdom utilizing an obvious personification: The Lord possessed me in the beginning of his way, before his works of old. I was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was. […] Then I was by him, as one brought up with him: and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him58. For Dante, therefore, the wisdom is not some purely speculative concept (scholastic science) but the Wisdom of God, God’s intellect, the Word through which God created the world, giving meaning and order to the mankind59. Wisdom has here a mystical dimension deriving from divine revelation, God being its true and the only source. Therefore, at the end of Chapter XI of Book Three, the Italian poet specifies that the name of philosophy is attributed to the 55 The Banquet, III, XI, 9–11, transl. R. Lansing. 56 Cf. The Banquet, III, XI, 13; F. Cheneval, La philosophie et le bonheur de Dante Alighieri, “Studia Miediewistyczne”, fasc. 33 (1998), p. 88. 57 Prov 8:17. See: The Midrash on Proverbs, ed. B. L. Visotzky, London 1992, p. 46. 58 Prov 8:22–23, 30. 59 The Banquet, III, XI, 12–13. See: É. Gilson, Dante and philosophy, P. Smith, New YorkLondon 1949, p. 92.

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basic, traditional branches of philosophy – the natural science, the moral science, and the metaphysic – by longstanding custom only, since the first and true Philosophy, goes far beyond the capabilities of individual sciences. Thus Wisdom, which is represented by philosophy, is not reduced to scholastic quest for metaphysical rationality, but is given by Dante a much broader meaning. To have this thought accurately interpreted, the reader has to analyze Dante’s division of sciences, such as described in the Convivio, based on the medieval cosmological conceptions.

4)  Cosmological models of the universe Dante wanted to explain the Medieval division of sciences on the grounds of cosmological speculation – the description and distribution of the various celestial spheres. Like most medieval scholars, he used Aristotelian and Ptolemean physics. Aristotelian and Ptolemean cosmology is the result of the ancient Greeks’ mature reflection on the image of the universe a man lives in. Already Ionians saw the underlying order of the cosmos, constructing geometrical models to organize the universe, including the location, distance, size and movement of the stars. When they drew the pinax – the map of the whole world – they revealed their ideas about the shape of the inhabited world with its lands, seas and rivers, or, similarly, building mechanical models of the universe in the form of the heavenly spheres. Anaximander is credited with having been the first to depict the inhabited earth on the chart. It was Anaximander who poised a stationary earth at the center of the universe. The reason why the earth remains motionless in this place, though having no support, is its equidistance from all the points of the celestial sphere, which accounts for its not moving either way. Anaximander, therefore, was the first to locate universe in a mathematical space of purely geometric arrangement. The Earth does not need any visible support. It does not need to be supported by water, as Thales claimed, or – as Anaximenes thought – supported by air. Once the first theoretical spatial model of the universe was created, all seemed to become more understandable and easier to grasp. To understand why people can safely walk on the Earth, and why it is not falling, it was enough to know that all the radii of a circle are exactly the same length. According to Anaximander, the earth may remain permanently immobile due to its central position, symmetry and balance. Being situated in the middle of the universe – Anaximander adds – prevents Earth from being subject to any domination60. 60 Karl Popper, commenting on Anaximander’s discovery, argues that his concept is one of the boldest, most revolutionary and prolific ideas in the history of human thought,

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The next step in the description and understanding of the universe was, undoubtedly, made by Parmenides: within his cosmology the Earth, poised in the center of universe, was surrounded by the spheres of ether, the sun and the stars enclosed in what the philosopher called “the outermost Olympus” that embraced the whole world61. Plato in Timaeus also expressed his concept of the universe by placing the Earth in its center62. In Aristotle’s cosmology the universe encompassed everything corporeal. It was spherical, finite and solid, with the Earth at the center and the orb of fixed stars as its outer boundary, beyond which nothing existed. Within such a spherical universe there was unceasing uniform circular motion around a fixed center63. This universe, however, was not homogenous – it consisted of two realms fully separated from one another and diverse in composition: top and bottom, or earth and heaven. In this division the sphere of the Moon marked the border. The world was, therefore, divided into two regions, called the sublunar world and the superlunar world spheres. The sublunar world was composed of bodies made up of the four terrestrial elements: water, air, earth and fire, each of these elements having its own place and located in the appropriate sphere in accordance with its nature. Superlunar sphere in the Aristotelian cosmology is regarded as an area of divine action64. Movement

61 62 63

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which made other cosmological theories possible. Cf. K. R. Popper, Conjectures and Refutations: The Growth of Scientific Knowledge, Psychology Press 2002, p. 237; J.-P. Vernant, The Origins of Greek Thought, Cornell University Press 1984, p. 119–128. 141; Ch. H. Kahn, Anaximander and the Orisins of Greek Cosmology, New York 1960. Cf. K. R. Popper, The World of Parmenides: Essays on the Presocratic Enlightenment, ed. J. Mejer, A. Petersen, Routledge, New York 1998. See: Plato, Timaeus, 40 C. “That both should be at rest is impossible; for, if the earth is at rest, the hypothesis does not account for the observations; and we take it as granted that the earth is at rest. It remains either that both are moved, or that the one is moved and the other at rest. On the view, first, that both are in motion, we have the absurdity that the stars and the circles move with the same speed, i.e. that the arc of every star is that of the circle in it moves. For star and circle are seen to come back to the same place at the same moment; from which it follows that the star has traversed the circle and the circle has completed its own movement, i.e. traversed its own circumference, at one and the same moment. But it is difficult to conceive that the pace of each star should be exactly proportioned to the size of its circle.” Aristotle, On the Heavens, II, 8, 289b, transl. J. L. Stocks. In the first book of his treatise On the Heavens Aristotle demonstrates the division of the world into sublunar and supralunar regions, and then ponders in detail why the universe cannot be infinite, arguing that it is spherical and finite. See: Aristotle, On the Heavens, I, 3, 269b–270b; 5–9, 271b–279b; Cf. G. Reale, A History of Ancient Philosophy, II: Plato and Aristotle, ed. and transl. J. R. Catan, State University of New York Press 1990, p. 293–302.

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in the universe so understood is unchanging and its ultimate source is the first “Unmoved Mover” (that which moves without being moved). To its immediate impulse, according to Stagirite, only the outmost sphere of fixed stars – the so-called “first heaven” – is subject, being also the driving force behind the movement (primum movens) of the other spheres, while its own motion comes directly from God. “That there must be some substance which is eternal and immutable. Substances are the primary reality, and if they are all perishable, everything is perishable. But motion cannot be either generated or destroyed, for it always existed; nor can time, because there can be no priority or posteriority if there is no time. Hence as time is continuous, so too is motion; for time is either identical with motion or an affection of it. But there is no continuous motion except that which is spatial, of spatial motion only that which is circular.”65

The Prime Mover acts permanently and directly only on this outermost sphere of the world. However, since the dynamics of the other spheres is similar to the movement of the first heaven, Aristotle assumed that they are put in motion by the created beings similar to the first reason, though less perfect – the intelligences. “The first principle and primary reality is immovable, both essentially and accidentally, but it excites the primary form of motion, which is one and eternal. Now since that which is moved must be moved by something, and the prime mover must be essentially immovable, and eternal motion must be excited by something eternal, and one motion by some one thing; and since we can see that besides the simple spatial motion of the universe4(which we hold to be excited by the primary immovable substance) there are other spatial motions—those of the planets—which are eternal (because a body which moves in a circle is eternal and is never at rest—this has been proved in our physical treatises, Physics VIII, 8–9; De Caelo I, 2, II, 3–8); then each of these spatial motions must also be excited by a substance which is essentially immovable and eternal. For the nature of the heavenly bodies is eternal, being a kind of substance; and that which moves is eternal and prior to the moved; and that which is prior to a substance must be a substance. It is therefore clear that there must be an equal number of substances, in nature eternal, essentially immovable, and without magnitude; for the reason already stated.”66

Claudius Ptolemy (Claudius Ptolemaeus) of Alexandria (ca. 100 – ca. 165), a Greek philosopher from Thebaid, who studied and worked in Alexandria, presented the continuation of the cosmology thus understood. He wrote many works on mathematics, astronomy, geography, and music, however, he is best known for his model of the universe that strengthened for many centuries a geocentric view of the world. His cosmological system is described in the Almagest. The Almagest is Ptolemy’s largest and most famous treatise, its title originally being: Μαθηματική σύνταξις – Syntaxis mathematica. The work became known 65 Aristotle, Metaphysics, XII, 1071b, transl. H. Tredennick. 66 Aristotle, Metaphysics, XII, 1073a, transl. H. Tredennick.

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in Late Antiquity as Megale syntaxis (The Great Treatise), and subsequently turned into the Almagest, meaning “the greatest”, since with the medieval translation into Arabic the title changed to Al-Kitabu al-Majisti (The Great Book), rendered into Latin by Almagestum. The Almagest is a systematic exposition of the mathematical theory of planetary motion in a geocentric system. Ptolemy also proposed the model of the movement of celestial bodies by combining two basic models of planetary motion given by Hipparchus: the eccentric and the deferent with the epicycle. The astronomer’s innovation was to broaden this model with the concept of equant. In his work Geography (Greek: Γεωγραφική υφήγησις – Geographike Hyphegesis, Latin: Explicatio geographica), also known as Geographical Science or Introduction to geography, he termed geography as a science aimed at accurately representing the surface of the inhabited world. He knew of the Earth’s sphericity and applied three different methods for projecting the Earth’s surface on a map. Referring to Aristotle and the foundations on which he based his assumption of the circularity and uniformity of the planetary motion, Ptolemy, however, gave his own interpretation of trigonometry and astronomy. Almagest contained not only the mathematical models, but also the resulting figures presented in a tabular format. Using tabular method allowed to compute the position of the Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn in any given time67. Medieval astronomy was, therefore, based both on Aristotle’s ideas and, in large part, on the astronomical treatise of Ptolemy. Ptolemaic model was based on epicycles and deferents. Being from the very beginning a fairly complicated system, it got complicated even more: the idea of the equant point was introduced and the theory was further modified by adding more and more new hypotheses. Ptolemy’s treatise reached medieval Europe, as Walter Berschin asserts, with Henry Aristippus, Archdeacon of Catania and a renowned translator of the

67 Ptolemy also presented the hypothesis of the existence of the unknown southern continent named Terra Australis. His astronomical theories survived as the basis of mathematical astronomy and geocentric cosmology until the sixteenth century, which brought De revolutionibus by Copernicus. The complete system of the planets’ sizes – that is, the whole cosmos as then understood – Ptolemy introduced in his theory of the planets, written after the Almagest. Ptolemy’s work of is the crowning achievements of ancient astronomy and medieval scholars largely relied on it in their cosmological considerations. See: more: A. C. Cameron, Medieval and Early Modern Science, vol. I: Medieval and Early Modern Science, Harvard University Press 1967, p. 82–86; L. Russo, The Forgotten Revolution: How Science Was Born in 300 BC and Why It Had to Be Reborn, Springer Berlin Heidelberg 2004, p. 256–300; Mediewal Philosophy, op. cit., p. 176.

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Arabic texts, who was active in the twelfth century in Sicily, where three languages (Latin, Greek, and Arabic) were in use and multicolored culture of the Latin world and the Caliphate Arabic dominated. Aristippus brought a copy of the Greek text of Almagest to Sicily from Constantinople as a gift from the Emperor Manuel I to William I, however, he did not translate the work himself: he entrusted the job to some anonymous scholar whom he called enigmatically “Almagest translator”. The translation, made directly from Greek, is the earliest known Latin version of this work68. When it comes to Arabic text of Almagest, it was Gerard of Cremona, the most industrious of all 12th century translators who lived and worked in Toledo, who was responsible for its translation. However, Ptolemy’s major geocentric-astronomical work became widespread in medieval Europe through Johannes de Sacrobosco’s Tractatus de Sphaera which is based on Arabic sources, particularly the treatise Liber aggregationis scientiae stellarum written by the Arab astronomer and mathematician al-Farghani, known in the West as Alfraganus. The twenty-fourth chapter of Alfraganus’ work was also published with Johannes de Sacrobosco’s work De sphaera mundi in 1233. Sacrobosco’s work is a synthesis of Ptolemy and his Arabic commentators, presenting an accessible Ptolemaic cosmology, and for this reason it was adopted as the most authoritative astronomical textbook of its time69. Actually, his understanding of astronomy influenced considerably the medieval conception of the universe and its structure70. Sacrobosco’s treatise was extremely popular and became a standard textbook for many universities, including the Academy of Cracow. His works were on the mandatory reading list for students until the sixteenth century. Knowledge of this manual of astronomy 68 The translator of Almagest remains anonymous. Berschin gives the examples of the research that took place in Latin paleology with the aim of determining the identity of the translator who is considered to be responsible for translation not only of Ptolemy’s works, but also of Elementatio physica of Proclus, De curvis superficiebus by Archimedes, or the writings of Euclid. If one person actually translated all these important and difficult texts, it had to be someone endowed with great knowledge, a really illustrious personality among the translators in the twelfth-century Europe. See: W. Berschin, Greek letters and the Latin Middle Ages: from Jerome to Nicholas of Cusa, Catholic University of America Press 1988, p. 232–236. 69 See: M. A. Orr, Dante and the Early Astronomers, Gall and Inglis, London and Edinburgh 1913, p. 200–209; B. Oliva, The Perfection of the Universe According to Aquinas. A Teleological Cosmology, University Park, Pennsylvania State University 1992. 70 Yavuz Unat, Alfraganus and the Elements of Astronomy, Manchester 2007, in: http:// www.muslimheritage.com/uploads/Alfraganus2.pdf (2009).

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was required at the University of Paris for obtaining a degree in Liberal Arts. This book on cosmology was, therefore, exceptionally influential71. From this brief description it transpires that the geocentric theory of the universe, as well as that of the sphericity of the Earth, was widely known (since the times of Parmenides, Aristotle, Eudoxus of Cnidus). Unfortunately, today the vast majority of people, who consider themselves educated, is convinced that in medieval astronomy there was an established belief that the Earth was flat. In the light of the medieval research this thesis turns out to be entirely ungrounded and not supported by any facts – actually, there was no serious medieval scholar who thought that the Earth was a flat disk. The Earth’s sphericity and its suspension in empty space was regarded as an obvious and an integral part of academic education in the Middle Ages, at least since the time of the Carolingian Renaissance. Who, therefore, can be held responsible for representing of flat-Earth belief as the integral part of medieval cosmology? It myth of such medieval beliefs was popularized by the nineteenth-century American writer Washington Irving. Medieval cosmology is, therefore, very abundant. Although at the end of the thirteenth century Aristotelian system of homocentric spheres was rejected in Paris as a result of experimental evidence, while the system of Ptolemy became widely accepted, Dante’s heaven can be, undoubtedly, termed as AristotelianPtolemaic and, as we shall see, in its comprehensive structure it corresponds to the contemporary ideas of the hierarchically ordered universe72. Dante himself does not recognize those concepts as entirely accurate and justifiable, hence, in Book II of The Banquet, he describes his own understanding of the universe.

5)  The medieval universe of knowledge Consequently, in the center of Dante’s universe – in consonance of the traditional medieval belief – there is the Earth. The first celestial sphere, closest to the Earth, is created by the Moon orbiting the Earth, the second is created by Mercury, the third – by Venus, the fourth is created by the Sun, the fifth sphere – by Mars,

71 Cf. Sphaera mundi, Strassburg, M. Jacob Cammerlander 1539; Textus de Sphaera Joannis de Sacrobosco: introductoria additione (quantum necessarium est) commentario atque, … Cum compositione annuli astronomici Boneti latensis: Et geometria Euclidis Megarensis, Parisiis Simonem Colinum 1527; Jan Sacrobosco, De sphera, London 1985; Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. I, Roma 1970, p. 122–123. 72 E. Grant, Celestial Incorruptibility in Medieval Cosmology 1200–1687, in: Physics, Cosmology and Astronomy, 1300–1700. Tension and Accommodation, Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science Volume 126, Dordrecht 1991, p. 101–127.

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sixth spherical Heaven is created by Jupiter, and the seventh by Saturn. The eighth ecliptic is, according to Dante a Starry Heaven. The ninth is invisible to the senses and it is a Crystalline Heaven (Cielo Cristallino), wholly transparent. The tenth heaven, as Alighieri asserts, the Catholics place beyond all spheres: the Empyrean Heaven, also called the heaven of flame or luminous heaven. This Heaven, contrary to other spheres, is fixed. The tenth Heaven is quiet and peaceful, being a place where God dwells with blessed saints, the highest building of the world, where everything is enclosed and beyond which there is nothing else73. Crystalline Heaven – Primum Mobile

Empyrean Heaven where God resides

Starry Heaven Saturn Jupiter

Mars

Sun

Venus Mercury

Moon Earth

73 Cf. The Banquet, II, III, 5–12. Some medieval authors, such as William of Auvergne, placed above the primum movens yet another sphere – the highest heaven, which is the seat and habitation of the saints. Cf. A. C. Crombie, Medieval and Early Modern Science, vol. I: Medieval and Early Modern Science, Harvard University Press 1967, p. 105.

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Ptolemy, whom Dante refers to in The Banquet, is credited with discovery of precession and adding the ninth sphere to the eighth in order to account for a double movement of the stellar heaven – diurnal movement from East to West of the ninth sphere in the equator, and almost imperceptible movement of precession of the eighth sphere from West to East in the ecliptic, about one degree in a hundred years. “Moreover, by its two movements it signifies these two sciences. For by the movement with which each day it revolves and completes a new circuit from point to point, it signifies the corruptible things of nature, which day by day complete their course, their matter changing from form to form; and these Physics treats. By the almost imperceptible movement which it makes from west to east at the rate of one degree in a hundred years, it signifies the incorruptible things which had their beginning through creation by God and shall have no end”74

Not only was the eighth heaven simultaneously rotating in the opposite direction, but also around two different poles. Therefore, Ptolemy had to assume that the source of the daily motion is the ninth sphere, located above the sphere of the fixed stars, which in turn became a source of the remaining spheres’ dynamics. The Primum Mobile, “therefore the circle, whose swift course enwheels; The universal frame answers to that, which is supreme in knowledge and in love” (Commedia, Paradise, XXVIII, 70–72), causes the movement of the entire world. “Later Ptolemy, perceiving that the eighth sphere moved with several movements (since he saw that its circle deviated from the true circle which turns everything from east to west) and constrained by the principles of philosophy, which necessitated the simplest primum mobile, supposed that another heaven existed beyond that of the Fixed Stars which made this revolution from East to West.”75

In his work Dante justifies the existence of the ninth heaven on philosophical grounds, while Ptolemy in his treatise, which was known in the Middle Ages only in its Arabic version, uses mathematical arguments to demonstrate the necessity of the existence and motion of this sphere. It is highly probable, as Vasoli claims, that the influence of Arabic commentary on Ptolemy’s works can be spotted here, which the poet might have been already familiar through the above mentioned work Liber aggregationis stellarum, known at that time in the Latin translation by John of Seville made about the year 1137 under the title Differentia Scientiae Astrorum, and also Gerard’s of Cremona translation (1175)

74 The Banquet, II, XIV, 10–11, transl. R. Lansing. 75 The Banquet, II, III, 5–6, transl. R. Lansing.

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entitled Liber de aggregationibus stellarum et principiis celestium motuum76. Alfraganus’ work presented heaven and space viewed from the perspective of the Arab world – the vision which was largely taken over by medieval astronomers and cosmologists. These texts in their Latin translation were presumably known to Dante, who made use of them in his cosmological and poetic composition77. Bruno Nardi draws attention to the fact that Dante’s concept of the harmony of the spheres may have derived from a comment made by Albert the Great to Aristotle’s De coelo et mundo, especially his summary of the treatise De motibus celorum written by an Arab astronomer Alpetragius, where philosophical arguments for the existence of the ninth sphere outweighed the mathematical and astronomical ones. It is the ninth sphere – a simple, uniform, devoid of celestial bodies, and moving while not being moved – sets in motion all the lower space78. There is also a theory that Alighieri in his assumptions was inspired by Thomas Aquinas’ comment to De consolatione philosphiae, mistakenly attributed in the Middle Ages to the Angelic Doctor79. Now this little work in the editions of Aquinas’ works is listed among the opera aliqua false adscripta. It is difficult to identify the specific source from which Dante’s cosmological concept – the division of Heaven, and the resulting hierarchy of sciences – originated. His cosmology is not the accurate reconstruction of Aristotelian and Ptolemaic system. Studies of Dante’s texts reveal that the cosmological model presented in the Convivio, and later also in a beautiful poetic version in the Commedia, underwent clear Arabic influences that reached the poet through the Latin works of commentators and scholars80.

76 See: Alfragano (Al-Fagānī), Il „libro dell’aggregazione delle Stelle“… secondo il condice mediceo-laurenziano, Pl. 29, cod. 9, ed. R. Campani, Citta di Castelo 1910, p. 109–116; Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. I, Roma 1970, p. 431–434. 77 Y. Unat, Alfraganus … op. cit.; P. Duhem, Le systéme du monde. Historie des doctrines cosmologiques de Platon a Copernic, vol. 4, Paris 1958, p. 222. 78 Alpetragius (correctly al-Biturgi Nữr al-Dĩn Abữ Ishak), Liber de motibus coelorum, in 1217 translated into Latin by Michael Scot. Cf. B. Nardi, Saggi e note di critica dantesca, Milano-Napoli 1966, p. 150ff. 79 See: Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. V, Roma 1976, p. 640. 80 See: Expositio in Boethii, De consolatione Philosophiae, Prooemium, Textum Parmae editum, 1869. See: more: P. A. Source, La misericordia in Remigio de’ Girolami e in Dante nel passaggio tra la teologia patristico-monastica e la scolastica, “Analecta Pomposiana” no. 2 (1966), p. 139; E. R. Curtius, European Literature … op. cit., 339.

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6)  The hierarchy of sciences in the model of the cosmos However, the description of cosmology in itself is not of the utmost importance for the poet, since he uses this image as an allegorical symbol to present in The Banquet his understanding of division and hierarchy of sciences. “I say that by heaven I mean “science” and by heavens “the sciences”, because of three kinds of similarity that the heavens have above all with the sciences, and by the order and number in which they seem to agree, as will be seen in speaking of the word “third”. The first kind of similarity consists of the revolution of the one and the other around something that is motionless with respect to it. For each moving heaven turns on its center, which is not moved by the motion of the heaven; and likewise each science moves around its subject, without moving it, because no science demonstrates its own subject, but presupposes it. The second similarity is the illuminating power of the one and the other; for each heaven illuminates visible things, and likewise each science illuminates things that are intelligible. The third similarity consists of bringing about perfection in those things disposed thereto. […] Because of these as well as many other kinds of similarity, science may be called “heaven”. ”81

Each sphere is associated allegorically with one of the scientific disciplines, the orbital movement of celestial bodies is a symbol of study, and the fixed center of the planetary orbit is a metaphor of the subject of each science, as well as its principles and purpose82. For Dante the seven heavenly spheres closest to the Earth correspond to the seven liberal arts education of trivium and quadrivium83. The Heaven of the 81 The Banquet, II, XIII, 2–5, 7, transl. R. Lansing. 82 Cf. A. Pezard, La rotta gonna. Gloses et corrections aux textes mineurs de Dante, vol. I, Vita nuova, Rime, Convivio, Florence 1967, p. 27; A. Pezard, Da ‘La rotta ­gonna, vol. III, Riflessioni di critica testuale, in: Atti del convegno internazionale di studi danteschi, Ravenna, 1979, p. 346; C. P. Lewis, The Discarded Image: An Introduction to Medieval and Renaissance Literature, Cambridge University Press 2012, p. 92–98. 83 The liberal arts (Latin: septem artes liberales) are those subjects or skills that in classical antiquity were considered essential for a person to know in order to take an active part in civic life, something that (for Ancient Greece) included participating in public debate, defending oneself in court, serving on juries, and most importantly, military service. Grammar, rhetoric, and logic were the core liberal arts, while arithmetic, geometry, the theory of music, and astronomy also played a (somewhat lesser) part in education. Dante refers to the common in the Middle Ages division of sciences into septem ­artes liberales deriving from ancient tradition. In ancient Greece, in the fifth century B.C., grammar, dialectic and rhetoric constituted the primary form of education. The sophists, who popularized these disciplines had not combined yet these three formal skills with arithmetic, geometry, astronomy and music: the subjects which the ancients defined with a single concept – mathemata, meaning practical, real science – and they did

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Moon is associated with Grammar, the Heavens of Mercury and Venus correspond respectively to Dialectic and Rhetoric, the sphere the Sun Alighieri compared with Arithmetic, the Heaven of Mars symbolizes Music, Jupiter’s sphere is associated with Geometry, while the Heaven of Saturn corresponds to Astrology. In chapter XIII of the second book of the Convivio Dante briefly justifies such assignment of the planets to the seven sciences of the medieval educational system, those his are rather cosmological-mathematical and lyrical arguments84. The eighth celestial sphere – the Starry sphere – corresponds to the natural sciences (Physics) and the first science – Metaphysics. The ninth sphere – the not introduce the seven liberal arts. However, already in late antiquity the twofold canon of education was already twofold-shaped as trivium and quadrivium, making together the septem artes liberales which were to introduce harmony into general principles of learning. St. Augustine tried to create a similar canon for Christianity. However, the essential scheme was developed in the fifth century by Martianus Capella – the African pagan writer, who composed a fundamental textbook on the liberal arts De nuptiis Philologiae et Mercuria et de septem Artibus liberalibus aimed at maintaining the contemporaneous intellectual culture on some level. Capella’s treatise in the early Middle Ages was available literally in every library in Europe. Thanks to his work the essential object of medieval study was described as the seven liberal arts – trivium (initial level – humanities) and the quadrivium (higher level – mathematics). This division owed its popularity in the Middle Ages to Boethius who maintained the ancient scheme and listed trivium as grammar, rhetoric and dialectic, and quadrivium as arithmetic, geometry, music and astronomy. Such a division is also used by Alighieri. In turn, Cassiodorus mentions it in his greatest work Institutiones divinarum et humanorum artium, a compendium of ancient knowledge and an inspiration for scholastic educational structures. The second part of this work on the humanities describes in details the septem artes liberales, establishing trivium and quadrivium as a canon of teaching for all medieval schools. Thus, already at Charlemagne’s court, through Alcuin, artes liberales regained their importance as a complete educational program that had a significant impact on teaching in schools, churches and monasteries, becoming the basic factor defining educational patterns in Western Europe for many centuries. Trivium gained the propaedeutical significance, preparing the human intellect to master the true and real knowledge governed by numbers and harmony and making it able to progress in the quadrivium to the contemplation of the universal and divine forms. This long tradition of European canon of education survived in residual forms till today, the German and other modern educational reforms notwithstanding, in various kinds of ordo studiorum or even in nomenclature, for example “liberal art college”. See more: Alcuin of York (Latin: Alcuinus), De grammaria, PL ed. Migne, vol. 101, 853D–854A; W. Jaeger, Paideia. The Ideals of Greek Culture, transl. G. Highet, B. Blackwell, 1946, p. 405; W. P. Ker, Essais on Medieval Literature, Dover 1957, p. 96; Mediewal Philosophy, op. cit., p. 17. 84 Cf. The Banquet, II, XIII, 8–30.

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Crystalline Heaven – symbolizes the moral science (Ethics), and the Empyrean heaven, the immobile one, corresponds to the divine science – Theology. Such is the Italian poet’s image of the universe and the symbolic assignment of individual celestial spheres to sciences on which the whole edifice of human knowledge is founded85. The order of cognition is thus identified with the order of the sciences. Ptolemaic machina mundi, its movement and the principles of operation are treated as a metaphor, so that the consistent cosmological system could be regarded as a symbol of unity of knowledge, its diversity and harmonic subordination to the eternal Wisdom86. Theology

Ethics

Astrology Geometry

Music

Arithmetic

Dialectic

Physics and Metaphysics

Rhetoric Grammar

Subject purpose and tasks of science

85 Dante will repeat this division in Paradise when describing the seven sages as an image of scientia, thus expressing his respect for school education, similarly as he did earlier for metaphysics and theology. It should be noted that although the septem artes liberales constituted the canon of medieval sciences, in the thirteenth century the division into theoretical (physics, mathematics and metaphysics) and practical sciences (policy and ethics) was also popular thanks to Dominic Gundissalvi and his work De Divisione Philosophiae. See more: A. C. Crombie, Medieval and Early … op. cit., p. 218. 86 C. Vasoli, Myśl Dantego … op. cit., p. 113.

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7) The consequences of the division of science into the spheres of space Étienne Gilson notes that in allegorically associating various disciplines of the medieval knowledge with the celestial spheres Dante invented a clever device to ensure that prima facie everything made perfect sense. There are eleven Sciences: seven liberal arts, Physics, Metaphysics, Ethics and Theology, and there are ten celestial spheres in his description of the universe. Alighieri places Physics and Metaphysics together in the realm of Starry Heaven, thus breaking the symmetry of the whole argument87. Dante explains his reasons, but he does not sound convincing when he makes use of the then mathematical-astrological calculations and allegorical comparison. “I say that the Starry Heaven may be compared to Physics because of three properties, and to Metaphysics because of three others: for it displays to us two visible objects, namely the multitude of stars and the Galaxy, that is, that white circle which the common people call Saint Jacob’s Way; and it discloses one of its poles to us and keeps the other hidden; and it discloses one of its movements to us, from east to west, and keeps the other, which it makes from west to east, almost hidden from us.”88

Dante argues, therefore, that according to the calculations of Egyptian scholars, there are 1022 stars visible on the firmament and this is where a great similarity between the Starry Heaven and Physics manifests itself 89. “In this respect it has a very great resemblance with Physics, if we consider very closely these three numbers: namely two, twenty, and a thousand. For by two we understand local movement, which is necessarily from one point to another. By twenty is signified the movement by alteration, for since we cannot proceed beyond ten without altering ten itself by means of the other nine or itself, and since the most beautiful alteration which it receives is its own alteration by itself; and since the first alteration occurs at twenty, it

87 See: É. Gilson, Dante …, op. cit., p. 103, 167. Curtius observes that this may derive from the fact that Dante’s poetry is governed by a symmetrical tectonics, in which the number ten is of particular importance as a perfect number. In one of his epistles about writing treatises Dante also mentions the ten basic modi tractandi (or literary forms of treatise) indispensable for a good literary work. These modi are divided into two groups of five, the first of which refers to the poetico-rhetorical aspect of the work (poetical, fictional, descriptive, digressive, metaphorical) and the second refers to its scientific aspect (defining, dividing, giving proofs and refutations and citing examples). See: E. R. Curtius, European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages, transl. Willard R. Trask, Routledge & Kegan Paul 1979, p. 231. 88 The Banquet, II, XIV, 1, transl. R. Lansing. 89 This number of the stars in the universe is also given by Ptolemy.

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is reasonable that the above-mentioned movement should be signified by this number. By a thousand is signified the movement of growth; for this “thousand” is the largest number that has a name, and there can be no further growth except by multiplying it. And Physics manifests only these three movements, as is proved in the fifth book of the first group of books.”90

The galaxy visible from the Earth is somehow a resulting product of these stars, which the human senses are not able to see and understand, and which the human intellect is able to grasp by observing the effect and inferring the underlying reasons from it. Metaphysics deals with first substances which are not perceived in course of empirical experience but only through their effects, hence its resemblance to the Galaxy and Starry Heaven. Also the movement of the stars allegorically represents both fields of knowledge. The daily revolution of the eighth sphere symbolize temporal things that constantly arise and die, and pertain to the domain of Physics, while the galaxy’s movement, extremely slow and almost imperceptible (according to Dante, it is about one degree every century), illustrates the indestructible, imperishable, eternal things, which are explored by Metaphysics91. Dante offers here some arguments to justify his decision to place Physics and Metaphysics within one celestial sphere, under Ethics. The higher Crystalline Heaven symbolizes for Dante the whole realm of morality. As Gilson emphasizes, the poet’s belief about the superiority of Ethics over Metaphysics leads to the conclusion that Dante in his understanding of the very concept of philosophy moves away from the Thomistic approach, drifting in voluntarist, or even fideistic direction92. This ecliptic is precisely the Primum Mobile, meaning Moral Philosophy, which, as the Italian poet observed, according to both Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas organizes all other areas93.

90 The Banquet, II, XIV, 2–4, transl. R. Lansing. 91 Cf. The Banquet, II, XIV, 8–13. 92 Cf. É. Gilson, Dante … op. cit., p. 158. Dante probably borrowed the idea of Crystalline Heaven from the Persian Zoroastrianism disseminated in Europe in the thirteenth century, thanks to the Arabic writings of Abenragel translated into Latin. 93 However it does not result directly from Aristotle’s text (and the comment by Thomas). “In Justice is all Virtue found in sum. And Justice is perfect virtue because it is the practice of perfect virtue; and perfect in a special degree, because its possessor can practise his virtue towards others and not merely by himself; for there are many who can practise virtue in their own private affairs but cannot do so in their relations with another.” Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 1129b, transl. H. Rackham.

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“So with its movement the aforesaid heaven governs the daily revolution of all the others, by which every day they all receive and transmit here below the virtue of all their parts; for if the revolution of this heaven did not govern in this way, little of their virtue would reach here below, and little sight of them as well. […] In truth there would be no generation here below, either of animal or of plant life; there would be no night or day, or week or month or year, but rather all the universe would be disordered, and the movement of the other heavens would be in vain. Likewise if Moral Philosophy ceased to exist, the other sciences would be hidden for some time, and there would be no generation or happiness in life, and in vain would these bodies of knowledge have been discovered and written down long ago. Consequently it is quite evident that this heaven may be compared to Moral Philosophy.”94

The movement of the ninth sphere illustrates the influence morality has on human existence. If this movement stopped, a degradation of the human species would occur, resulting in the collapse of moral goals and aspirations that animate human life and make it meaningful. However, the conception of Ethics, which is here reflected upon by Dante, seems to be – as Martin Grabmann indicated – the outcome of reading Thomas Aquinas’ commentary on the Nicomachean Ethics and his Summa contra gentiles rather than Aristotle’s works. Nevertheless, Alighieri makes distinctions in the described fields and comes to conclusions, as we shall see, relatively distinct from the Thomistic doctrine95. The last and the most important celestial sphere in Dante’s cosmology is an motionless Empyrean Heaven that symbolizes the divine science: Theology. This Heaven is the mainstay of peace in the universe, it cannot tolerate any contradiction, any dialectic or sophistic discussions. It is imbued with the most perfect confidence resulting from the fact that the subject of theology as a science is God. The “immobility” of the last sphere Dante explains with the divine peace which characterizes the doctrine of Revelation. It remains, according to him, beyond all dispute, as its foundation is faith. Just like the last sphere is not involved in the movement of the lower ecliptics, theology is not involved in the continuous discourse of sciences, it is not subject to provability and scholastic argumentation. Just as the highest Heaven of the universe rises majestically over all the spheres, so theology reigns over the other sciences. 94 The Banquet, II, XIV, 15–18, transl. R. Lansing. Following Aristotle, Dante believes that the movement of the celestial bodies is responsible for the coming into being and dying of species on the earth, as well as natural phenomena such as rise and fall of the tide. 95 See: M. Grabmann, Thomas von Aquin und die Dante Auslegung, Weimar 1943, p. 12, in: „Deutsches Dante-Jahrbuch“, vol. XXV; É. Gilson, Dante … op. cit., p. 110; F. Cheneval, La philosophie … op. cit., p. 80; Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. I, Roma 1970, p. 375.

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“Solomon, speaking of this science [about Theology], says: “The queens number sixty, and the concubines eighty; and of the young handmaids there is no number: one is my dove and my perfect one.” (Song of Solomon, 6:8–9) He calls all sciences queens and friends and handmaids, but this one he calls perfect because it makes us see truth perfectly, in which our souls find rest.”96

By identifying the Empyrean Heaven with the abode of God and the saints, as well as the symbol of Theology (sacred science), Dante introduces to cosmology a new topic, alien to Greco-Arabic inspirations. He did not borrow this idea from Aristotle, nor form his Arab commentators, but introduced a completely different tradition thus modifying the cosmological model. Obviously, the poet uses in his description of this Heaven the then popular theological notions: changeless and serene, composed of luminous matter, it is the origin and the source of all other celestial spheres. Vasoli clearly sees the influence of St. Bonaventure’s metaphysics of light and its neo-platonic inclinations97. The biblical and poetic comparison of all the sciences to handmaids appears in this description. Undoubtedly, it corresponds with the medieval belief that philosophy and other sciences are subservient to theology. As once philosophy in the Middle Ages was assigned only the propaedeutic role for understanding and handling theological terms, the formula: philosophia ancilla theologiae became widespread. Thus, it seems that Dante consciously used this comparison to describe the relationship of the highest science to other fields of knowledge, there position being justified by the existing hierarchy of the spheres of the cosmos. In my opinion, Dante is close to Thomas’ approach expressed in the first part of Summa Theologiae, where Aquinas poses the question: Whether sacred doctrine (sacra doctrina) is nobler than other sciences? Responding to it, he says: “Since this science is partly speculative and partly practical, it transcends all others speculative and practical. Now one speculative science is said to be nobler than another, either by reason of its greater certitude, or by reason of the higher worth of its subjectmatter. In both these respects this science surpasses other speculative sciences; in point of greater certitude, because other sciences derive their certitude from the natural light of human reason, which can err; whereas this derives its certitude from the light of divine knowledge, which cannot be misled: in point of the higher worth of its subjectmatter because this science treats chiefly of those things which by their sublimity transcend human reason; while other sciences consider only those things which are within reason’s grasp.”98

96 The Banquet, II, XV, 180, transl. R. Lansing. 97 Cf. C. Vasoli, Myśl Dantego… op. cit., p. 130. 98 St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, I, q. 1, 5 respondeo.

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8)  The meeting of philosophy, faith and love As can be seen from this quite lengthy, full of poetic and figurative metaphors description, the poet based his universe on Aristotelian physics and Ptolemaic astronomy. However, in his work the spheres have some features assigned and functions deriving both from the medieval hierarchy of sciences and from Christian Revelation. The cosmological dimension is here intertwined with the description of celestial hierarchy, each science assigned to its own sphere. The highest peak of the architectural design of space and knowledge is the Empyrean Heaven, where God dwells – the First Cause of all existing things, the Prime Mover. In the further part of Dante’s work an attempt to justify such a division can be seen, as well as an attempt to describe the relationship between philosophy and faith, resulting from such a hierarchical vision of medieval sciences. In Book III of The Banquet the author examines the Aristotelian idea of philosophical happiness and speculative perfection, which the human mind can achieve using the light of reason. The medieval poet appreciates the importance of innate human reason in the cognitive domain, but also clearly indicates God as the source and guarantor of supernatural knowledge. In various places Dante attempts to justify his understanding of hierarchical order of sciences, which are dominated by theology as divine knowledge. Although at the beginning he speaks earnestly of philosophy as the Gentle Lady and life-guide, later he indicates that this guidance and patronage of philosophy leads to the concept and love of higher science99. “I relate how she is of benefit to all people, saying that her countenance aids our faith, which more than any other thing is of benefit to the human race, since it is that by which we escape eternal death and gain eternal life. […] This lady is visibly a miraculous thing, of which the eyes of men may have daily proof, and which makes it possible for us to believe in the other miracles, it is evident that this lady, with her wonderful countenance, aids our faith. Therefore I say, lastly, that by eternity (that is, eternally), she was ordained in the mind of God in testimony of the faith to those who live in these times.”100

The miracle of philosophy as a guide of life and faith is for Dante a divine plan, philosophy is for the poet the biblical personification of Wisdom appointed by God to serve the matters of faith. “I say, then, that God, whose understanding embraces everything (for his “circling” is his “understanding”), sees nothing so noble as he sees when he gazes upon the place where this Philosophy dwells. For although God, gazing upon himself, sees all things

99 Cf. C. Vasoli, Myśl Dantego … op. cit., p. 87. 100 The Banquet, III, VII, 15–17, transl. R. Lansing.

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collectively, yet he sees them discretely insofar as the discreteness of things exists in him in such manner that the effect exists within the cause. He sees then this most noble of things absolutely, insofar as he sees her perfectly in himself and in his essence.”101

In this perspective Philosophy receives its existence from God, being not his bride only, but also his sister and the most beloved daughter at the same time: “For if we recall what has been said above, Philosophy is a loving use of the wisdom which exists in the greatest measure in God, since supreme wisdom, supreme love, and supreme actuality are found in him; for it could not exist elsewhere, except insofar as it proceeds from him. Divine Philosophy is therefore of the divine essence because in him nothing can be added to his essence; and she is most noble because the divine essence is most noble; and she exists in him in a true and perfect manner, as if by eternal marriage. In the other intelligences she exists in a less perfect manner, like a mistress of whom no lover has complete enjoyment; but on her countenance they satisfy their longing. Thus it may be said that God sees (that is, understands) nothing so noble as she is. I say “nothing” since he sees and distinguishes all other things, as said above, by seeing himself as the cause of being in all things. O most noble and excellent is that heart which directs its love toward the bride of the Emperor of heaven, and not the bride alone but the sister and the most beloved daughter!”102

Bruno Nardi asserts that Dante by claiming in the Convivio that the love of wisdom is enkindled and fuelled in the soul by God’s light, which influences the act of human cognition, is more prone to mysticism than scholastic rationalism103. Dante himself seems to confirm this by declaring that fallen intelligences (demons) cannot philosophize, since love that is the necessary condition of philosophical reflection expired in them completely. The ability of philosophical thought derives from love given by God as a supernatural gift. The philosophy finds its fulfilment when the soul and wisdom become friends, so that the one is loved by the other104. Using the Aristotelian notions once more, Dante points out that philosophy has wisdom for its material subject and love for its form, both wisdom and love united by contemplation. Although this distinction is consistent with the etymology of the concept of philosophy as a lover of wisdom, it is clear from the context that Dante meant supernatural love. God causes this love to take on His

101 The Banquet, III, XII, 11–12, transl. R. Lansing. 102 The Banquet, III, XII, 90–115, transl. R. Lansing. 103 Cf. B. Nardi, Dante e la filosofia, in: „Studi danteschi“, vol. XXV, Firenze 1940, p. 13; B. Nardi, Dal Convivio alla Commedia. Sei saggi danteschi, Roma 1960, p. 146. 104 Cf. The Banquet, III, XII, 4; XIII, 2.

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own likeness by giving it His power and His light, to the extent that it is possible for it to resemble Him105. “It is therefore evident that the divine power descends by this love into men just as it does into the angels. […] Where Philosophy is in act, a celestial thought comes down which claims that she is more than human activity; and it says “from heaven,” to indicate that not only she but the thoughts friendly to her are remote from base and earthly things. […] Here we must observe that the sight of this lady [philosophy] was so generously granted to us in order not only that we might see her face, which she reveals to us, but that we might desire to acquire those things which she keeps hidden from us.”106

In the final part of the work, while reflecting on the difference between the active and contemplative life, the poet reaffirms his understanding of the inherent limitations of natural cognition, completed with love bestowed by grace and accepting the light of Revelation. For Dante philosophy ends where the supernatural light begins, but the demarcation line is extremely difficult to grasp. The three women, who according to the Gospel of St. Mark came to the empty tomb of Christ, can be compared to the three types of active life symbolized by the Epicureans, Stoics and Peripatetics. They go to the tomb, that is to say, to the present world, and seek for the Saviour, but meet an Angel of God, whom Dante associated “nobility which comes from God, as has been said, and speaks within our faculty of reason and says”. It can be concluded, therefore, that the true light of knowledge can only result from a special blessing107.

9)  Philosophy as a preparatio fidei Reading The Banquet it can be perceived that philosophy is not regarded here independently of God’s love, it depends on this love and it has its source in it. In Dante’s understanding philosophy loses its inherent autonomy and becomes “embroiled” in dependency on God. Presumably, it is perceived as a kind of grace, the gift which God bestows upon those He chose. It is not a natural knowledge of the world any more, since it assumes the characteristics of the religious-mystical, dependent on the supernatural dimension. “[Philosophy] it helps our faith, for since the principal foundation of our faith consists of the miracles performed by him who was crucified who created our reason and willed it to be less than his power. […] This lady is visibly a miraculous thing, of which the eyes of men may have daily proof, and which makes it possible for us to believe in the other

105 Cf. The Banquet, III, XIV, 3. 106 The Banquet, III, XIV, 9, 11, 13, transl. R. Lansing. 107 Cf. The Banquet, IV, XXII, 14–18, transl. R. Lansing.

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miracles, it is evident that this lady, with her wonderful countenance, aids our faith. Therefore I say, lastly, that by eternity (that is, eternally), she was ordained in the mind of God in testimony of the faith to those who live in these times.”108

In the poet’s line of reasoning, a speculative-rationalist distinction between scientia and theologia, so apparent in the Aristotelian and Thomistic tradition, disappears. Philosophy becomes something more than a mere tool of sciences that benefit from the gift of Revelation – it is also a light that induces the intellect to acquire and know the things concealed. The image of the Lady representing philosophy supports our faith, which it is more useful to us than anything else – as the poet argues – because it saves us from eternal death, and through it we gain salvation. Maybe that is why the author does not hesitate to express the belief that the Stoics, together with Peripatetics and Epicureans, are united harmoniously forever by the light of the eternal truth in celestial Athens109. The miracle of philosophy is made by divine design and it has a propaedeutic function in the history of salvation – it is the teacher and the guide, who leads us to the true and the only knowledge – study of Revelation, the light of faith. Curtius asserts that in these poetic and allegorical reflections Dante (wanting to highlight the need of reason to reach the transcendental truths) mimics the medieval philosopher and poet Alan of Lille. In Alan’s noetic journey a man ascends through all spheres to the Empyrean and when he meets Theology he has to abandon Reason (Ratio), but it enables him to penetrate the realm of Heaven where philosophic wisdom fails in the face of supernatural truths110. 108 The Banquet, III, VII, 16–17, transl. R. Lansing. 109 Cf. The Banquet, III, XIV, 15, transl. R. Lansing. It can be inferred that such beliefs expressed in the Convivio resulted in the fact that in The Divine Comedy so called Magnanimi – the great-hearted pagans, philosophers, statesmen and heroes of antiquity: Aristotle, Plato, Socrates, Zeno, and many others – are put by Dante in Pre-Inferno. See: The Divine Comedy, Purgatory, IV, 133–157; M. Maślanka-Soro, Tragizm w Komedii Dantego, Cracow 2005, p. 120. 110 See: more: Alani de Insulis, Anticlaudianus sive de officio viri boni et perfecti libri novem, PL ed. Migne, vol. 210, 534A–B; E. R. Curtis, European Literature … op. cit., p. 370; K. Michalski, Filozofia … op. cit., p. 468. In The Divine Comedy it is described in a scene in which Virgil, who symbolizes innate wisdom, the wisdom of the ancients, must leave when the poet enters Paradise. During his subsequent journey Dante is guided by Beatrice, subsequently substituted by St. Bernard of Clairvaux. The work is so constructed that it seems to reflect in a poetic form what Dante previously indicated in the Convivio – mercy joins faith and crowns it, like faith joins reason and enlightens it. See: more: É. Gilson, Dante… op. cit., p. 238; B. Nardi, Dal Convivio … op. cit., p. 154; Ch. Williams, The Figure of Beatrice: A Study in Dante, Boydell & Brewer Ltd, Cambridge 1943, p. 165.

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Dante’s thesis of unprovability or indisputability of knowledge resulting from Revelation is not entirely convincing. Silence and immobility of the last sphere of Dante’s universe are not backed up by the historical experience of the Middle Ages. In Dante’s vision of the cosmos the placement of moral philosophy in the “crystalline” sphere, which is higher than the “starry” sphere where physics and metaphysics are situated together, has a special meaning. It is a symbol of opposition to a strong medieval tradition, which is dominated by the indisputable superiority of metaphysics (first philosophy) over morality and ethics, which are a part of practical philosophy111. The undeniable power of medieval science was based on the courage its practictioners exhibited to discuss, debate, and construct proofs of the rationality of faith and the intelligibility of God’s message in Revelation. Dante’s last motionless Heaven based on faith does not agree with the Anselmian fides quaerens intellectum which, after all, contributed significantly to the development of the mature form of scholasticism in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. Undoubtedly, Alighieri – in his cosmological structure – does not prove himself a faithful disciple of St. Thomas, who in all his works proclaimed clarity and intelligibility of concepts and truths of faith to the human intellect.112 Due to the intellectual effort of the Middle Ages, in the speculative thought there was a place for purely philosophical reflection on the revealed truths, transcending the limits of natural cognition. Even in the case of truths inaccessible

111 Cf. F. Cheneval, La philosophie … op. cit., p. 85; W. Paluchowski, Dante jako filozof, polityk i moralista, Cracow 2005, p. 15. 112 “Now, although the truth of the Christian faith which we have discussed surpasses the capacity of the reason, nevertheless that truth that the human reason is naturally endowed to know cannot be opposed to the truth of the Christian faith. For that with which the human reason is naturally endowed is clearly most true; so much so, that it is impossible for us to think of such truths as false. Nor is it permissible to believe as false that which we hold by faith, since this is confirmed in a way that is so clearly divine. Since, therefore, only the false is opposed to the true, as is clearly evident from an examination of their definitions, it is impossible that the truth of faith should be opposed to those principles that the human reason knows naturally.” St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra gentiles, I, chapter 7, 1, transl. Anton C. Pegip. Curious in this context is that what is included in the book about the Commedia, based on the interpretation of Dante’s work of Dan Brown’s Inferno, finding that “religious teaching were subject to in the Middle Ages a relatively narrow interpretation” and the time in which Dante created it “dark ages” (seculum obscurum). See: D. Burstein, A. de Keijzer, Secrets of Inferno. In the Footsteps of Dante and Dan Brown, Squibnocket Partners LLC 2013, p. 43.

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to intellect, as Gilson observes, arguments and proofs were constructed, as the truth cannot contradict itself, reason cannot be contrary to faith113. This domain of intellectual culture, which the thirteenth century scholasticism undoubtedly was, constituted a continuation and modification of the Patristic program created within the framework of preparation for the Gospel. Philosophy, with all its theoretical options, is introductory to what came with the gift and intellectually insurmountable mystery of Revelation. Therefore, for Dante the gift of Revelation was brought into the existence by the act of Divine Providence to teach the soul the truths of the salvation. God’s wisdom goes beyond human wisdom, transcends it similarly as the supernatural transcends the present world. This is a step towards philosophy that would be a “knowledge of a human person as such”, being some form of nascent humanism. It is ethics that gives true knowledge of a person and her deeds, becoming a guide that leads her through life114. On the one hand, the poet describes philosophy as the gift of grace, God being its depositary, on the other he confesses that there are concepts and issues which surpass our inherent cognitive ability and somehow dazzle our intellect. “Here we must observe that in a certain way these things dazzle our intellect, insofar as certain things are affirmed to exist which our intellect cannot perceive (namely God, eternity, and primal matter), things which most certainly are known to exist and are with full faith believed to exist. But given the nature of their essence we cannot understand them: only by negative reasoning can we approach an understanding of these things, and not otherwise.”115

Dante seems to break up with the whole scholastic tradition, which took the effort of providing the evidence and rational support for a whole range of issues arising from the truths of faith, such as existence of God and soul, infinitness or finiteness of the world, potentiality of the first matter. It seems that the poet’s understanding of tasks and functions of philosophy is tinged with some kind of fideism (of Augustinian origin), so that philosophy is deprived of the autonomy associated with the inborn cognitive ability and forms a kind of Christian gnosis. In some way Dante does not so much refer to scholastic tradition but rather to theological considerations of the early Church Fathers who, in their speculation at the meeting point of Revelation and pagan philosophy, saw in Christ the great Teacher of humankind who could help in understanding such truths as

113 Cf. É. Gilson, Thomism: The Philosophy of Thomas Aquinas, transl. A. A. Maurer, L. K. Shook, Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, Toronto 2002, p. 32. 114 Cf. É. Gilson, Dante … op. cit., p. 126; F. Cheneval, La philosophie … op. cit., p. 90. 115 The Banquet, III, XV, 6, transl. R. Lansing.

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the existence of God, the creation of the world, the nature of celestial bodies, the existence of the soul. In the Middle Ages Christ was termed as philosophiae parens, while the Holy Bible was deemed the supreme authority for scholars, since the Son of God, being the supreme Wisdom, brought the mankind the only true doctrine. Philosophy of Christ surpasses all philosophical doctrines116. “The Emperor of the Universe, who is Christ, son of the sovereign God and son of the Virgin Mary, the true woman and daughter of Joachim and of Adam, the true man who was slain by us, by which he brought us to life. “He was the light that shines for us in the darkness,” as John the Evangelist says; and he told us the truth concerning those things which without him we could not know nor truly perceive.”117

Dante expresses in The Banquet his cognitive agnosticism, which he regarded as deriving from nature emphatically saying: “This is why, since it is not within the power of our nature to know what God is (and what certain other things are), we do not by nature desire to have this knowledge. And in this way our doubts are dispelled.”118

Although the Convivio does not contain so characteristic of scholasticism definition of theology as “the queen” of all sciences, it nevertheless manifests its superiority over other disciplines. For Dante Theology presides over the metaphorical edifice of cosmological knowledge in Empyrean Heaven, establishing its sovereignty in this particular “place”, the highest and the unique119. Dante, in his using Aristotle’s cosmological model completed with Ptolemaic theory to illustrate the hierarchy of sciences goes even further, offering a theological inspiration and making the Empyrean sphere the highest peak of the universe. Unchangeable luminous Heaven is the cause of movement of the Prime Mover sphere, according to Aristotelian principle that the movement is born from the excitation of the feelings. Empyrean “dominates and reigns” because it 116 Erasmus of Rotterdam was one of the proponents of the concept of Christ as a philosopher, introducing the idea of philosophia Christi. This intertwining of heterogeneous domains of philosophy and theology, reason and faith, as well as doctrinal speculation and implemented morality, is not – as J. Domański points out – merely a phenomenon characteristic of the Middle Ages, as Gilson maintains, but it was already widespread in ancient Christian thought. See: Cf. J. Domański, Erazm i filozofia. Studium o koncepcji filozofii Erazma z Rotterdamu, Warsaw 2001, p. 46. Arnobius Afer, In septem Arnobii disputationum. Adversus gentes libros, PL ed. Migne, vol. 5, 910B. 117 The Banquet, II, V, 2–4, transl. R. Lansing. 118 The Banquet, III, XV, 10, transl. R. Lansing. 119 Cf. W. Paluchowski, Dante … op. cit., p. 25.

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expresses the highest perfection, which Scholastic metaphysicians and theologians deemed necessary for non-contradiction of the picture of the world120.

10)  The Banquet – the struggle of poetry, reason and faith The reading of The Banquet suggests that mysticism and rationalism collide somehow in this literary work and even Dante himself could not clearly define his position on the supernatural and the mundane order. The form of the treatise also deviates significantly from a dry scholastic discourse. The author’s struggles, on the one hand, with poetic aspirations in creating the introductory canzoni, and on the other with his awareness of the need of a clear and concise discourse which, however, is lost in allegories and metaphors. Poetry is struggling with ontology in an attempt to overcome the dry scholastic intellectualism at the expense, however, of defining the author’s beliefs as clearly as possible. Undoubtedly, the essence of The Banquet is to provide, in an almost encyclopedic formula, the achievements of medieval science, both in the fields of theoretical disciplines and natural cosmology, which become for the author an important symbol expressing the power of human reason. Intellect, endowed with nobility of wisdom, is to liberate people from ignorance. Philosophy becomes the light and the teacher of humankind, which ratio should play, according to Dante, rather a preparatory role for the content of faith, where, as he claims, the intellect loses its way121. In his work, while crystallizing his poetic and philosophical ideas – Dante mimics – Boethius in his use of the personification of philosophy as the Gentle Lady. The author identifies her not so much with scholasticism as with God’s Wisdom, God’s Intellect – the Word through which God created the world and gave meaning and order to the mankind. Assuredly, Dante is seeking in The Banquet opportunities to outline his worldview that would soon become the essence of cosmological and theological imago mundi revealed in the Commedia. A world in which everything – life, study, knowledge and salvation – find their proper meaning and ultimate sanctification. In Dante’s poem the world becomes a book revealing the structure of the world and its deepest meaning122. Dante, as Gilson pointed out, never assumed in his works the role of an expert on theological and philosophical concepts. He is, sensu stricto, neither a philosopher nor a theologian, but rather a promoter of knowledge intended for a circle of educated people not related to a specific philosophical school. What 120 Cf. C. Vasoli, Myśl Dantego … op. cit., p. 131. 121 Cf. The Banquet, III, III, 13. 122 Cf. C. Vasoli, Myśl Dantego … op. cit., p. 112.

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is more, Gilson rejects the easy temptation to seek in the Convivio the evidence for Dante’s Thomism or Averroism, or belonging to some other faction of the scholastic tradition. He tries to extract some global doctrinal elements prevailing in the Italian poet’s reflection in this work: the allegorical description of philosophy as the Gentle Lady, knowledge of the specific subject of philosophy and its branches; description of the effects of philosopher’s commitment to wisdom and superiority of dogmatic mysteries over natural cognition which, though necessary on the way to the “Empyrean Heaven”, must at some point give way to the divine science – Theology123. The Banquet, intended as an encyclopedia of medieval philosophical knowledge encompassed in the concept of the identity of celestial spheres order with hierarchy of knowledge, allows, according to Vasoli, to recognize the “scenario” on which the ingenious poetic work will be based. In fact, in the Commedia Dante’s journey through the cosmos becomes a pilgrimage aimed at, science transcended, the ineffable contemplation of God as the ultimate source and destination of all things.

123 Cf. É. Gilson, Dante…, op. cit., p. 85ff.

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III.  The Divine Comedy – major themes The Commedia, to which two centuries later the adjective Divina (Divine) was added, is the major poem created by the Italian poet124. The main theme of the work (as Dante himself admits) is an attempt to show to a sinful and lost humankind the way towards happiness. But in many ways it is his autobiographical poem – a journey of a man trying to find fulfilment in his life after being treated unfairly on his homeland. It is also a study of the all cultural heritage available to Dante: classical, pre-Christian, Christian, medieval, Tuscan, and especially Florentine. It is also, undoubtedly, a wonderful poetic tribute to the beloved – Beatrice 124 The adjective Divina was first introduced to describe the Commedia by Giovanni Boccaccio, who used it to indicate the surpassing excellence of Dante’s work in terms of its content and poetic value. See more: G. Boccaccio, Il trattatello in laude di Dante Livorno Raffaello Giusti 1908; Tutte le opere di Giovanni Boccaccio Milano Arnoldo Mondadori 1964–2000; Opere in versi Corbaccio. Trattatello in laude di Dante. Prose latine Epistole, Milano Ricciardi 1965; G. Boccaccio, Il commento sopra la Commedia, preceduto della Vita di Dante Alighieri, G. Milanesi, vol. I, Firenze 1863. About 1325, a short time after Dante’s death, one of the earliest commentaries was written by Graziolo de’ Bambaglioli from Bologna, who praised Dante abundantly and concentrated on explaining the moral and poetic values of the Hell. At approximately the same time (ca. 1328) another commentary appeared, written also in Bologna by Jacopo della Lana, who interpreted the Comedy as a philosophical and theological work in an allegorical form. In the 1330s an anonymous Florentine commentary that later became known as Ottimo Commento made its appearance. It takes into account also Dante’s minor works. In the second half of 14th century the commentaries written by Dante’s two sons, Jacopo and Pietro Alighieri, and the already mentioned one by Boccaccio, who also wrote the poet’s biography, are of special importance. Jacopo treats his father as an outstanding poet and philosopher, while Pietro seeks to reveal the hidden meaning of the poem. Giovanni Boccaccio is the author of the poet’s biography – La vita di Dante – that apart from the precious facts contains a considerable amount of fictitious stories. Amongst other early commentators of the Commedia Guido da Pisa (ca. 1340) and Benvenuto da Imola should be mentioned. Same as Boccaccio in Florence, Benvenuto was a lecturer on Dante’s Comedy at Bologna. His commentary was written ca. 1373. Giambattista Vico (1668–1744) marked a turning point in the assessment of Dante, pointing out the poet’s connection with his epoch, ethical and cultural ideals of Dante’s masterpiece, and comparing the poem with Homeric poetics. See: K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 15; Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Inferno, letture e commento di Vittorio Sermonti, Edizioni Scolastiche Bruno Mondadori, Collana di classici italiani commentri diretta da cesare Segre 2000, p. XI.

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Portinari, who became the poet’s ideal of the spiritual perfection and supernatural wisdom125. However, the main idea of the literary work is to help the mankind that, as the poet clearly realised, wandered astray from righteousness to all kinds of corruption so far that the world faced a total disaster. Hence the very essence and the ultimate purpose of the work can be summarized as moral, intellectual and spiritual renewal of life. To succeed at this task the wisdom of Aristotle (which dominated in the Convivio) or allegorical symbolism of classical and ancient knowledge was no longer sufficient, but there arose a need for return to religious depth in all its complexity126. Therefore, the journey through the afterlife should not be seen as an escapist journey into the unknown, but as an attempt to show the way of conversion and transformation. And strange as it may sound today, it is also a journey into space – not the cold and dark one, which we know from the modern physics, but inhabited and animated by the creative power of God, full of sounds, colors, symbols, luminous beings, angels and saints127.

1)  Alone in the the dark woods In the midway of this our mortal life, I found me in a gloomy wood, astray Gone from the path direct: and e’en to tell128

At the beginning of the poem we meet Dante lost in a dark forest near Jerusalem on the vernal equinox, most likely on the evening of Good Friday, March 25th, 1300, proclaimed by Pope Boniface VIII the first Jubilee year129. The poet could have regarded that year as a turning point in his life. He reached the highest office in 125 To Fr. Mandonnet, the French theologian and Dante scholar, Beatrice was the symbol of Christian Revelation and the supernatural order. In the 19th century Gabriele Rossetti identified Beatrice with the Roman Empire, Gerhard Gietmann with the Catholic Church, Francesco Perez with the active intellect, while Leone Tondelli, following Franz Xaver Kraus, saw in Beatrice the symbol of the Church. See more: P.  Mandonnet, Dante le théologien, Paris 1935; M. Barbi, Problemi di critica dantesca, Firenze 1941, P. II, p. 48; H. Urs von Balthasar, Glory of the Lord, vol. 2: Studies In Theological Style: Clerical Styles, transl. E. Leiva-Merikakised, ed. J. Riches, Bloomsbury Academic, 1985, p. 30; Ch. Williams, The Figure of Beatrice … op. cit., p. 133; Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. I, Roma 1970, p. 542–551; R. W. B. Lewis, Dante, op. cit., p. 14. 126 Cf. K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 238. 127 P. Vincenz, Eseje i szkice zebrane, vol. I, Wrocław 1997, p. 267. 128 Hell, I, 1–3, transl. H. F. Cary. 129 On the analysis of the first tercets in The Divine Comedy, see: Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Inferno, letture e commento … op. cit., p. 4.

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the country, he was mature, had various experiences and had entered the world of high politics – was entangled in the infighting between the pope and the emperor. The date was not unintentional. Dante begins his journey through the afterlife, to another dimension, on Pesach – a special day for the Hebrew-Christian tradition. This is the day of the world creation and its redemption. Within this tradition Jesus Christ suffered death on the same day in which the world was created. This coincidence allowed to emphasize that his passion is the renewal of creation, and Easter time every year launches a new era. Such interpretations strengthen the theological and chronological relationship between the Annunciation and Pesach, emphasizing that the Son of God became a man at the time of the spring equinox, since on this symbolic day Adam, the first man, was supposed to be created. It was therefore not a random date – the first day of creation and rebirth, when it all began130. 130 The celebration of Pesach (Passover) is one of the most important festivals in Jewish tradition, first described in the Book of Exodus (12:1–14). The time of celebration was appointed by God in the lunar month of spring (a month defined by lunar phases). The first day of the month is the day when a new moon occurs, while on the 14th day there is the full moon, and its light illuminates the obscurity of night. Every year, on the first full moon after the vernal equinox, Jews celebrated the Passover. In the old Jewish tradition it was also the day when the world was created. At the beginning of creation there had to be a full moon – if, as the Book of Genesis has it, everything God created was good, He must have created a bright moon. At the beginning day and night had an equal length, as God divided the light from the darkness into two equal parts, setting in motion the cycle of day and night. Moreover, it had to be spring, since God ordered land to produce green plants. This biblical tradition is responsible for a special importance of the first full moon after the spring equinox. In this manner the day of creation is described in the letter concerning celebration of Easter, supposedly written by Theophilus, Bishop of Caesarea. Spring, a special season which was at the beginning of creation and on which the Easter falls, is poetically depicted in Pseudo-Hippolytus’ paschal homily. Lunar significance of this day is also important – spring equinox marked the time when, after the dark winter, days gradually grew longer, and the daylight grew stronger than night’s obscurity, which symbolized the victory of light over darkness. This date constituted the essential point of reference in settling the date of Passover. In Israel it was celebrated on the first full moon after the calendar winter was over. Similarly, the date of Christian Easter was established: the first Sunday after the full moon following the spring equinox. According to Ptolemy, spring equinox occur on March 22th, while the Roman calendar designated March 25th as the day of equinox (of course the Julian calendar). In Christian tradition it is the latter date that gained crucial importance, not only due to determining a particularly important point in the astronomical year but also because of its singular significance for Jewish and Christian religious customs as the day of creation of the world and the man. The beginning of the world was associated with spring, when day and night, i.e. light and darkness, were of

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In the middle of a dark deserted wood (which represents countless sins of humankind) there are three wild beasts on the poet’s road: a leopard, a lion and a she-wolf131. The beasts are the allegorical image of the three forces that inflicted a equal length. Time was created together with the cosmos, therefore this date became a starting point for various chronological systems – e.g. that of Annianus of Alexandria or byzantine historians George Synkellos or Theophanes. Early Christian authors establish March 25th as the date of Jesus’ death or resurrection. Tertullian, followed later by Hippolytus of Rome, is the first to mention this date as the day of passion of Christ. However, this date owes its wide popularity to the well-known apocryphal writing Acta Pilati (also known as a Gospel of Nicodemus), regarded as an authentic report concerning crucifixion, composed by Pontius Pilate or his contemporaries, where it was clearly stated that Christ died “on the eighth day before the calends of April, i.e. March 25”. Since the fifth century, a great number of western liturgical calendars adopted this date as the day of Jesus’ death. Dionysius Exiguus, who invented the ad calendar system, also accepted that date. The earliest patristic writings from the second and third century recognized the date of Jesus’ incarnation (March 25th) as that of His death some 30 years later. Clement of Alexandria, Hippolytus of Rome and PseudoCyprian are in agreement on this issue. This special day, March 25th, unifies creation and salvation, beginning and end, starting point and destination, commemorating both the creation of Adam and the assuming of human nature by the Son of God. Dionysius’ dating system was based on this date: if the new paschal cycle was to begin with Jesus’ arrival into this world, it had to be March 25th of the first year before the Christian era. The Venerable Bede in his analysis of liturgical calendar assumed that Jesus died on Friday, March 25th, and resurrected on Sunday, March 27th. Therefore, in my opinion, we meet Dante at the beginning of his journey on March 25th, 1300, and not, as Morawski indicates, on April 7th (K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 284). Similarly, Vittorio Sermonti argues that the date in question falls somewhere between March 25th and April 8th, 1300. See more: J. Naumowicz, La date de naissance du Christ d’après Denys le Petit et les auteurs chrétiens antérieurs, “Studia Patristica”, no. 35 (2001), p. 292–296; Theophilus of Alexandria, Prologus, ed. B. Krusch, Studien, vol. I, 1880, p. 303–310; St. Augustine, On the Holy Trinity IV, 9; Dionysius Exiguus, Liber de Paschate, PL ed. Migne vol. 67, 483–508; Venerable Bede, De temporum ratione, ch. 47, in: ed. Th. Mommsen, Ch. W. Jones, Bedae Venerabilis Opera VI, 2, CCL 123B, 1977; Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Inferno, letture e commento … op. cit., p. 4. 131 There is an uncertainty as to how lonza should be translated: does it signify a lynx or a leopard (panther), as numerous commentaries indicate? If depicting the three beasts that blocked his way Dante had in mind the fragment from Jeremiah, then he undoubtedly meant a leopard. The beasts described in the Comedy correspond perfectly to the image of corruption and anarchy we find in the book of the Prophet Jeremiah: “Therefore a lion from the forest shall kill them, a wolf from the desert shall destroy them. A leopard is watching against their cities; everyone who goes out of them shall be torn in pieces – because their transgressions are many, their apostasies are great.” (Jer 5:6).

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defeat upon Florence and the entire Italy, leading to Dante’s exile: leopard as a symbol of lust, the main sin of Florence, the lion as a symbol of pride and ambition – the fatal flaw of papacy, and the she-wolf as a symbol of avarice or greed, which are, according to Dante, most heinous and the most common of human frailties. Dante is ready to step back from this path, but then the souls of Beatrice and Virgil arrive. The classical Roman poet Virgil, who wants to help the poet, shows him a different way – through Hell, Purgatory and Paradise – a spiritual pilgrimage, which also becomes a way of Dante’s inner change. Thus, the Roman poet becomes a guide of the Florentine. The journey, the literal meaning of which Dante reveals in the Letter XIII, should be understood as “a state of the soul after death”, allegorically signifying the ascent of human spirit to God132. In Dante’s poem Virgil represents human wisdom – the inherent virtue, which is capable to lead an individual to a virtuous life and make him worth redemption133. The ancient poet, therefore, represents allegorically rationality, wisdom and poetry of the ancient world. The author of the Aeneid was very appreciated in the Middle Ages as a sage and wizard. There was a widespread belief that Virgil was the highest achievement of the ancient world’s culture. What is more, the gift of prophecy was attributed to him: he was given credit for predicting the coming of Christ into the world. He was thus seen as a person inspired by God (this kind of view was expressed in the fifth century, among others, by Bishop Fulgentius). Dante’s approach to Virgil has certain features that are in common with the popular views of his times, but generally it is original and has its source in poet’s personal experience. It is the relation of a student to the master, the relation of an admirer of antiquity to its most prominent representative134. For Dante Aeneid was a history in the strict sense of the word and Virgil became in Dante’s poem a spokesman for all the noble moral, cultural, religious and political aspirations, which have their source in the human intellect. It can stated that Virgil takes in The Divine Comedy the same place Aristotle held in the Convivio, as a model of excellence a man is able to achieve. Beatrice, who in Dante’s Paradise leads him all the way to God, is an allegory of the divine wisdom manifesting the truth of salvation and eternal life135. It should be borne in mind that meeting the challenge of venturing into unknown extraterrestrial world is set against the background of a specific cosmological vision, 132 See: Dante Alighieri, Epistole XIII, 8, in: Tutte le opere di Dante… op. cit., p. 862. 133 Z. Kubiak, Początek i koniec „Boskiej Komedii“, „Znak“ no. 9 (1992) 448, p. 83; J. Klaczko, Wieczory florenckie. Juliusz II, Warsaw 1965, p. 98. 134 Cf. Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. V, Roma 1976, p. 1031–1032. 135 Cf. K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 279; Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Inferno, letture e commento … op. cit., p. 21.

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which the poet already expressed in the Convivio. Now the same model is used, though not to communicate its scientific content but to convey the salutary truth to all mankind. Therefore, to understand the geographical images and phrases used in The Divine Comedy, the reader has to be aware of contemporary notions about the Earth and the space. Within existing biblical-geographical conceptual framework, after the angels’ rebellion and the battle in Heaven, Lucifer was expulsed and precipitated from Empyrean Heaven ending up in the Earth at high velocity and forming a huge crater, a funnel-shaped indentation leading to the center of the Earth, which became a hellish abyss. The medieval Hell is located underground and therefore has a shape downwardly tapering cone, dividing Hell into Upper and Lower surfaces and forming nine circles (cerchi). Of the soil pushed on the other side of the globe as a result of thunderous impact of Satan’s fall the Purgatory Mount emerged in the form of a cone on the top of which is located Eden – the earthly paradise.

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2)  Inferno Dante and Virgil begin their journey entering a giant hellish funnel. In front of the Gates of the Hell and read the ominous inscription: Through me you pass into the city of woe: Through me you pass into eternal pain: Through me among the people lost for aye. Justice the founder of my fabric mov’d: To rear me was the task of power divine, Supremest wisdom, and primeval love. Before me things create were none, save things Eternal, and eternal I endure. All hope abandon ye who enter here…136

The vestibule of Hell slope down to the river Acheron that separates it from the first circle of Hell proper and marks the border between the kingdom of living and that of dead. The two poets cross the river on the boat ferried by Charon, a person from the Greek mythology. Here Dante first sees countless crowds going into the abyss of Hell. Here sighs with lamentations and loud moans Resounded through the air pierc’d by no star, That e’en I wept at entering. Various tongues, Horrible languages, outcries of woe, Accents of anger, voices deep and hoarse, With hands together smote that swell’d the sounds, Made up a tumult, that for ever whirls Round through that air with solid darkness stain’d […] I understood for certain this the tribe Of those ill spirits both to God displeasing And to his foes. […] Then all together sorely wailing drew

136 Hell, III, 1–9, transl. H. F. Cary. By inscribing on the hell-gates the words Power, Wisdom and Love Dante admits that the hell was created as the attribute of the Holy Trinity – its Power, Wisdom and Love, as the act of perfect harmony that requires justice. According to Węcławski, the inscription has a profound hidden meaning. In fact, it can be regarded as a bold theological treatise, containing encrypted symbolism of the Holy Trinity. See: T. Węcławski, Boska Komedia. Komentarz teologa, in: www.verbasacra.pl/boskompoz-t.htm. See more: Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Inferno, letture e commento … op. cit., p. 33; K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 295. Gombrowicz proposed a critical comment and an attempt to improve the hellish inscriptions: W. Gombrowicz, Su Dante, Milano 1969.

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To the curs’d strand, that every man must pass Who fears not God137.

The first circle of Hell – Limbo (Ante-Inferno) – is the place where, apart from unbaptised children, two categories of souls reside – the virtuous pagans (magnanimi) and the slothful (ignavi). Great poets, philosophers, ancient heroes and sages of antiquity, who lived before Christ – Homer, Horace, Ovid, Lucan, Electra, Hector, Aeneas, Caesar, Camille, Socrates and Plato, and many others, along with “those ill spirits both to God displeasing and to his foes”. Among the noble pagans the poet sees the “the master of the sapient throng” – Aristotle. All of them dwell after their death in a place that bears a strong resemblance to the Elysian Fields or Asphodel Meadows from the Aeneid of Virgil, living in Castello Nobile. Their punishment is entirely spiritual: their desire to see God is deprived of hope as their separation from God will last forever138. The second group are those who in life avoided making bold decisions, were passive, willing to compromise, indifferent to good and evil, in fact they were really non-involved – the slothful (ignavi)139. The second circle is the place where proper hellish tortures begin, and where people suffer for their incontinence tormented by the black whirlwind without rest. They are judged by Minos, who sits at the entrance and decides to what circle each of sinners is to be sentenced to suffer eternal

137 Hell, III, 22–26, 61–63, 106–108, transl. H. F. Cary. 138 Scholastic theologians differentiated between limbus Patrum, where Christ descended after His death to release the souls of the ancient Fathers, liberated by His sacrifice from the original sin, and limbus puerorum, reserved for the souls of infants who died unbaptised. Traditional Christian doctrine referred to the theory of limbo regarded as a state in which souls of infants who died without baptism do not deserve the reward of beatific vision due to original sin, but neither do they suffer any punishment since they did not commit any actual sin. The very term limbus (meaning outer edge, hem, margin, edge of abyss) emerged in the late 1100s and the early 1200s to designate the place of repose for unbaptised infants. Dante, when depicting Ante-Inferno, does not mention unbaptised children at all, although this problem had been vividly discussed in Christian salvation theology since the times of St. Augustine. This issue will be addressed in more detail in the subsequent section, devoted to summarising Dante’s theological thought. 139 Especially for Dante, who was remarkably courageous and active in political and social life, as well as in his personal choices and decisions, such an attitude was highly contemptible. Cf. M. Maślanka-Soro, Tragizm … op. cit., p. 112.

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punishment140. There Dante meets Francesca da Polenta of Ravenna and her husband’s younger brother Paolo, who were carried away by mutual passion while reading together a court romance. Francesca’s husband found them both together and stabbed to death. The third circle is filled with the souls of gluttons, who are forced to lie in a mud, slushed by ceaseless disgusting snow and wind. In the fourth circle the greedy and the squanderers are rolling great weights against each other, which symbolizes their pointless efforts devoted to hoarding possessions. Among the countless souls Dante sees many clergymen, recognizing them by the tonsure – they are those that with no hairy cowls are crown’d, both Popes and Cardinals141. In the fifth circle, in a swamp-like water of the river Styx, there are the wrathful and the sullen. The former sinned by unbridled anger, the latter by the sin of acedia. Acedia is already known from ancient times, and well described by the Fathers of the Desert: lack of concern for own existence and indifference, a religious burn-out, apathy – Sad once were we in the sweet air made gladsome by the sun, carrying a foul and lazy mist within: Now in these murky settlings are we sad142. In the early-Christian period acedia in eremitic life was described as “monks’ disease”, spiritual depression, sometimes also equated with laziness or spiritual sloth143. 140 It must be noted that the guardians of the various circles of Hell are mythological figures, considered by medieval Christians as demonic form. See: K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 285. 141 Hell, VII, 46–48, transl. H. F. Cary. 142 Hell, VII, 121–124, transl. H. F. Cary. 143 Acedia is a mental state characterised by impossibility of finding inner peace, distraction, boredom, ennui, apathy, listlessness, lack of motivation, lack of involvement and hope, despondency, exhaustion, indifference and feeling of emptiness. A person who experiences acedia is unable to be “here and now”, to do what is required to be done at the moment. St. John Cassian indicated the distinctive characteristics of acedia known as “horror loci” – a restless dissatisfaction with the actual occupation, a revulsion toward where one is and what one is doing. There has been as ongoing discussion over the years concerning whether acedia should be regarded as a sin or is it some kind of depression? Is it a spiritual or psychological condition? St Thomas, who treated this problem extensively in Suma Theologica II–II, q. 35, a. 1–4, listed acedia among capital vices. “I answer that, Sloth, according to Damascene (De Fide Orth. II, 14) is an oppressive sorrow, which, to wit, so weighs upon man’s mind, that he wants to do nothing; thus acid things are also cold. Hence sloth implies a certain weariness

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The poets arrive into the sixth circle across the river-marsh Styx. Here the Lower (nether) Hell begins – the City of Dis (City of Satan), guarded by fallen angels. In this circle the heretics suffer in flaming tombs. The river of blood is flowing in the seventh circle, divided into three rings. Here are severely punished all violent, their violence being threefold: against fellow people (tyrants, murderers, warmongers, looters and psychopaths), against themselves (suicides) and against God (blasphemous). Suicides, who direct violence against themselves, are in the second ring and deeper still in the seventh circle, in its third ring, Dante encounters those who have sinned by blasphemy against God and against nature created by Him (sodomites and usurers). Dante notes that moneylenders engaged in usury: the usurer walks; and Nature in herself and in her follower thus he sets at nought, placing elsewhere his hope144. Since all actions which are condemned here mean violence committed against the existence of God (unbelief) and the nature as created by Him (murder, sodomy and usury), guard and patronage over the whole seventh circle are exercised by the mythical creature Minotaur – half-bull, half-man as a symbol of perversion – a sin against nature145.

of work, as appears from a gloss on Ps 106:18, “Their soul abhorred all manner of meat,” and from the definition of some who say that sloth is a “sluggishness of the mind which neglects to begin good.” Now this sorrow is always evil, sometimes in itself, sometimes in its effect. For sorrow is evil in itself when it is about that which is apparently evil but good in reality, even as, on the other hand, pleasure is evil if it is about that which seems to be good but is, in truth, evil. Since, then, spiritual good is a good in very truth, sorrow about spiritual good is evil in itself. And yet that sorrow also which is about a real evil, is evil in its effect, if it so oppresses man as to draw him away entirely from good deedp. Hence the Apostle (2 Cor. 2:7) did not wish those who repented to be “swallowed up with overmuch sorrow.” Accordingly, since sloth, as we understand it here, denotes sorrow for spiritual good, it is evil on two counts, both in itself and in point of its effect. Consequently it is a sin, for by sin we mean an evil movement of the appetite, as appears from what has been said above.” Sum. Theol., II–II, q. 35, a. 1 resp.; a. 3 resp. and so: Sum. Theol., I–II, q. 35, a. 8. 144 Virgil has in mind the text from the Book of Genesis (2:15; 3:17–19) and the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians (3:10) which orders all people to work hard and sweat to earn their living, while usurer despises work and nature, that are the only sources of creativity and wellbeing. Usury is profit-oriented lending money at interest. Usurer violates both nature and art that imitates nature, thus doing violence, indirectly, to God himself. 145 Minotauros, as described in mithology, is the offspring of sexual intercourse of Pasiphae, king’s Minos wife, with the bull. Pasiphae confided her distasteful desire to

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The violent are placed in the three rings (ravines) according to the criterion of more or less strong bonds that unite them with other people: love of neighbor is weaker than self-love, and love of God, if our being is founded on reason, is the strongest of all. Therefore, the greater the damage done to the emotional bond deeply rooted in human soul accordingly to the natural order of things, the more sinful the violent action. From the seventh to the eighth circle Dante and Virgil are transferred by a winged monster Geryon146. It symbolizes deception and hypocrisy hidden under the mask of honesty. In this way Geryon expresses the essence of the whole Hell – lie and falsehood147. The eighth circle is called Malebolge – Evil Pouches – huge funnel-shaped rock amphitheater divided into ten concentric circular trenches, forming ten separate zones of punishment. Here suffer all those whose sins involved conscious fraud and abuse of other people’s trust and hope. Such sin is extremely grave because whoever committed it used the gift of reason for evil purposes. The description of evil pouches covers the songs from the eighteenth to the thirtieth, which makes more than one-third of the entire Inferno. Dante sees here another kind of damned – the souls of seducers and panderers constantly harassed by horned demons. There are also sycophants sinking in excrements. Dante observes with a visible approval that the simonists – guilty of selling ecclesiastical offices – have their heads down in tight holes, while the soles of their the Athenian craftsman Daedalus, who constructed a wooden cow for Pasiphae to hide inside. Through this appalling union a monster was conceived – a man with a head of a bull – called Minotauros, or Minos’ bull. Later on Daedalus built an extremely complicated labyrinth to hide the monster. See: A Companion to Greek Mythology. Blackwell Companions to the Ancient World, ed. K. Dowden, N. Livingstone, John Wiley & Sons 2011; G. Savarese, Una proposta per forese. E altri studi su Dante, Roma 1992, p. 65; W. R. Scott, L. Bowman, Theseus and the Minotaur. World mythology, Capstone 2004. 146 Geryon in classical mythology is a cruel and treacherous king slain by Heracles. Dante describes him as a creature possessing the triple nature – human face, lion claws and serpent’s body – a false and insidious hybrid. 147 Some commentators argue that the Geryon episode occupies a central place in the literary structure of Inferno, and that the description of this character represents all aspects of the Upper and Lower Hell, encompassing the entire multi-level depiction of hell. See: J. C. Nohrnberg, The Descent of Geryon: The Moral System of „Inferno“, XVI–XXXI, “Dante Studies” CXIV (1996); F. Salsano, La coda di Minosse e altri saggi danteschi, Milano 1968; Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Inferno, letture e commento … op. cit., p. 231; Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. III, Roma 1971, p. 124–126.

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feet are being scorched by fire148. Here the poet meets Pope Nicholas III, who is waiting for Boniface VIII (the pope was to die in the year 1303), the pope at the time when Dante wrote his poem149. Alighieri also meets a silent procession of sorcerers, astrologers and diviners, whose heads are unnaturally twisted around on their bodies backward (they go ahead and have all the time to look back); they are crying and their tears are streaming down their buttocks. Once they used to talk to much about things that no man is given the right to know, so now they must remain silent. They ran to cross all the boundaries set for a human mind, so now they go slowly and are tied up. Dante’s contrapasso is here the easiest to grasp, however, in the most important element of the punishment invented by the poet, namely in the fact that while once they ran forward with their eyes directed on an illusion of discovery of the future, now they are forced to have their faces turned backward forever. The poets stop at the edge of the fifth ditch and look down into the darkness where they see shadows immersed in a boiling pitch and plucked by demons every time when they start to rise some part of the body. They are those who used public funds for private benefit. Here, the itinerants can see the procession of ghosts wearing heavy gilded lead cloaks – they are hypocrites. Their outside was overlaid with gold, dazzling to view, But leaden all within, and of such weight, That Frederick’s compar’d to these were straw…150

148 A symonist had his soul turned toward the things of earth instead of the things of heaven, so he is stuck in a hole in the ground. As he had turned upside down his office, making profit out of spiritual things, so now his body is placed in an inverted position and the aureole that should have shone around his head is a cruel fire roasting at his feet. 149 Being buried alive in the earth in the poet’s time was reserved for people who committed particularly heinous crimes – e.g. paid killers and the worst evildoers (such as mother-killers), while in Dante’s masterpiece this punishment is inflicted on the popes simonists, the reason probably being that in selling ecclesiastical offices they were wounding and slowly killing the Church – their Mother. See: M. Maślanka-Soro, Tragizm … op. cit., p. 106. Dan Brown in Inferno – in his sensational book, based on Dante’s Divine Comedy – describing the Map of the Hell (La mappa dell’inferno), a painting by Sandro Botticelli, writes that buried upside down are “clerical profiteers”, but is not so much about the sin of greed, but sin simony – ecclesiastical offices sin buying, selling and acquisition of ecclesiastical dignity, that they should be the result of holiness, merit, work, and shall be traded. It’s more serious sin than greed. The greed as a sin is milder than simony, therefore Dante condemn greed is not so much how many simony. See Dan Brown, Inferno, chapter 20, London 2013, Transworld Publishers. 150 Hell, XXIII, 64–67, transl. H. F. Cary. Leaden cloaks were used by Frederick II to punish those who were guilty of high treason. He had them naked, clothed in leaden

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The golden habits represent hypocrisy of someone who shines outside with a virtue while underneath being treacherous and sinful. Here Dante placed Caiaphas, whose punishment is especially severe: he is crucified on the ground and the other hypocrites constantly walk over him pressing him further down. This punishment is meant to make him feel all the hypocrisy of the world. In the next pouch the travelers see cunning thieves and those who gave others bad advice. Here the poets behold Odysseus among “living flames”. Although Odysseus, due to the Homeric and mythological stories, was very popular in the Middle Ages and widely respected as a heroic character, Dante puts him in Hell and, what is more, in the penultimate circle. Odysseus is continually devoured by flames as the one who is guilty of deception and giving bad advice. His greatest fault is the ambush of the horse, that open’d wide (Hell, XXVI, 58–59). In the ninth ravine of the eighth circle there is a crowd of the sowers of discord and schismatics (Mohammed and Ali being symbols of a bloody schism and discord between people) and sowers of scandal. The last pouch is reserved for Falsifiers who are subdivided in their turn into four groups: falsifiers of metals, falsifiers of persons, falsifiers of coins and falsifiers of words (alchemists), each group subject to a different punishment. The Giants help Dante and Virgil to get to the last circle – the ninth – at the very bottom of the Universe. Could I command rough rhimes and hoarse, to suit That hole of sorrow, o’er which ev’ry rock His firm abutment rears, then might the vein Of fancy rise full springing: but not mine Such measures, and with falt’ring awe I touch The mighty theme; for to describe the depth Of all the universe, is no emprize151

The ninth circle is a frozen lake Cocytus – the bottom of the universe, the central point of the entire Ptolemaic cosmological model, while geographically the very farthest point from God and His Kingdom (Empyrean ­Heaven). The frozen lake symbolizes cessation the of all relationships and ties of love, spiritual death, the absolute termination of life. The bottom of Hell is cold and frozen. In this metaphor aptly expresses the very essence of this place – nothing can happen here, everything is motionless since there is no love, which (according to the ancient thinkers, as well as the Augustinian capes and placed in a cauldron over a fire. The heat melted the lead until the condemned man boiled and died amidst great torments. Cf. Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Inferno, letture e commento … op. cit., p. 318. 151 Hell, XXXII, 7–8, transl. H. F. Cary.

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and Thomistic doctrine) gives life to all things152. The poets walk across a vast frozen land. Trapped in it, with only their heads protruding from the ice, are those who committed the sin of betrayal. For treacherous there are three rings – in Cania (named for biblical Cain brother of Abel), are those who betrayed their kin, Antenora holds the sinners that betrayed their country, while Ptolemea contains traitors of guests. In this icy landscape the travelers can see two heads joined together. As in the second circle where the two lovers have their heads united by passion, so here two heads (of Ugolino della Gherardesca, Count di Donoratico of Pisa and the Archbishop Ruggieri degli Ubaldini) are melt together by hatred, one of them eating the back of another in the everlasting act of revenge. The last (central) part of the lake is Giudecca. Completely hidden under the ice are those who betrayed their benefactors, the Church or the Empire, while Devil betrayed God himself – the biggest benefactor of the world. In the very center of Hell there is Satan, the ruler of the kingdom of pain and despair – emperor, who sways the realm of sorrow. At the sight of huge bat-like wings of devil Virgil chants: Vexilla regis prodeunt inferni! – the banners of Hell’s Monarch do come forth! – which is a paraphrase of the Christian hymn of the Liturgy of Good Friday153. In this way, the poet shows that the devil is merely, for all his arrogance born of rebellion, a pathetic reversal of perfection of the Creator, is a simia Dei – the monkey of God. Lucifer – If he were beautiful, as he is hideous now, and yet did dare to scowl upon his Maker, well from him, may all our mis’ry flow – is trapped mid-breast in ice, so huge that the Giants seem small compared to him. When he was expelled from Heaven, he plunged headfirst into the Earth and his body stuck in its center. Dante evokes here the ideas based on biblical texts: I will ascend to the tops of the clouds, I will make myself like the Most High. But you are brought down to Sheol, to the depths of the Pit154. The devil is in the center of the Earth’s gravity, and therefore bears the weight of the world. Satan has three horrible faces allegorically symbolizing the qualities opposite to that of God – impotence, ignorance and hatred – and six eyes constantly weeping, and the falling tears created the lake and the four rivers of Hell. From each mouth emerges a sinner: Judas Iscariot, 152 Cf. Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Inferno, letture e commento … op. cit., p. 442, 472. 153 Vexilla Regis prodeunt fulget Crucis mysterium – The banners of the king issue forth, the mystery of the cross does gleam. 154 Is 14:15.

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the greatest traitor in history of mankind, from the first, Brutus, the betrayer of Julius Caesar, from the second and Cassius, a traitor of Rome, out of the third155. All three are “eternally chewed” by Lucifer in unceasing act of absolute hatred. This endless devouring of those who have committed treason to the highest authorities and guides of mankind symbolizes the reversal of the natural act of nourishing – the antithesis of God feeding His people in the Eucharist is depicted as continuous chewing people out of hatred and without saturation156. The poets leave the Hell by climbing Lucifer’s legs and tail. They pass through the center of the Earth, leave the northern hemisphere behind and reach the south157. In the poem we find a striking fragment, when (in Dante’s imagination) the poets begin to climb: My leader there with pain and struggling hard Turn’d round his head, where his feet stood before, And grappled at the fell, as one who mounts, That into hell methought we turn’d again. “Expect that by such stairs as these…”158

I will make some attempts to explain this phenomenon while describing Dante’s geometry and cosmological topography. The poets enter the southern hemisphere, which, according to medieval beliefs, was completely covered with sea, where they perceive the Mount of Purgatory159. 155 The order traitors are placed in is obviously not an accidental one – it is a representation of those who opposed the two leaders designed by God to guide the mankind, the greatest authorities whose task was to lead people towards the earthly and eternal happiness. Judas betrayed Jesus Christ, from whom the papal authority came, Brutus and Cassius betrayed Caesar, “the first supreme ruler” and the founder of the imperial power. The punishment inflicted on the first one is the hardest, because spiritual power the purpose of which is eternal salvation, took precedence in medieval political theory over the temporal power and earthly happiness. 156 Turner argues that the image of a three-headed dragon could have arised in the poet’s imagination as a result of seeing the Last Judgment ceiling mosaics in the Baptistry of Saint John completed in 1300 and the frescoes in the Scrovegni Chapel in Padua by Giotto – Dante was familiar with these images. See: A. K. Turner, The History of Hell, Harcourt Brace & Company 1993, p. 117. 157 “Thou art now arriv’d under the hemisphere opposed to that, which the great continent doth overspread, and underneath whose canopy expir’d the Man, that was born sinless, and so liv’d. Thy feet are planted on the smallest sphere, whose other aspect is Judecca.” Hell, XXXIV, 110–115, transl. H. F. Cary. 158 Hell, XXXIV, 78–81, transl. H. F. Cary. 159 See: The Banquet, III, V, 11–12.

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By that hidden way My guide and I did enter, to return To the fair world: and heedless of repose We climbed, he first, I following his steps, Till on our view the beautiful lights of heav’n Dawn’d through a circular opening in the cave: Thus issuing we again beheld the stars.160

3)  Purgatorium Purgatory is exactly on the opposite side of the Earth, in the Antipodes, on the slopes of a huge mountain formed after the fall of Satan from heaven to Earth161. The poets’ itinerary through the supernatural realm lasts three days and three nights, and it is the story of wrongly directed love, its excess or weakness. After getting onto the surface on the other side of the globe the pilgrims meet the Lonely Old Man – it is Marcus Porcius Cato, the Roman commander and statesman, who committed suicide in Utica in 46 BC because he did not want to fall alive into the hands of Julius Caesar. The act of suicide of that Roman citizen was a protest against tyranny and decline of republican virtues. Dante makes him the guardian to the entrance of Purgatory because he was greatly admired in the Middle Ages as the “true father of the fatherland, worthy of the altar of Rome”162. When the poets at the dawn go out onto the opposite side of the Earth, they recognize over the horizon Venus – a planet known as a symbol of love – and see also four mysterious stars. The radiant planet, that to love invites, Made all the orient laugh, and veil’d beneath The Pisces’ light, that in his escort came. To the right hand I turn’d, and fix’d my mind

160 Hell, XXXIV, 133–139, transl. H. F. Cary. 161 Already in the Convivio Dante mentions the Antipodes and quoting Albert the Great – the great contemporaneous authority on every subject, including the issues related to geography. See: Albertus Magnus, De natura loci, I, 9, in: Opera omnia Alberti Magni, vol. V, 2, ed. P. Hoßfeld 1980, Editio Coloniensis; Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. I, Roma 1970, p. 303; Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Inferno, letture e commento … op. cit., p. 477. 162 “Ecce parens uerus patriae, dignissimus aris, Roma”. Lukan, De bello civili sive pharsalia, IX, 601–602. See more: Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. I, Roma 1970, p. 875ff; Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Purgatorio, letture e commento di Vittorio Sermonti, Edizioni Scolastiche Bruno Mondadori, Collana di classici italiani commentri diretta da cesare Segre 2000, p. 8.

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On the’ other pole attentive, where I saw Four stars ne’er seen before save by the ken Of our first parents. Heaven of their rays Seem’d joyous. O thou northern site, bereft Indeed, and widow’d, since of these depriv’d!163

The planet Venus and four stars seen only in the southern hemisphere are the symbol of love and the cardinal virtues governing the relationships which the souls in purgatory learn on their way to the top. The poets cross the river on the boat guided by an angel steersman. Ante-Purgatory is a space for spirits waiting for their turn to climb to the top of the Purgatory Mount. Here are those who died violently and did not have time to confess, but who in the hour of death repented their sins, and lazy who put of their repentance through negligence. On the threshold of The Purgatory there is a gate: A portal, and three steps beneath, that led For inlet there, of different colour each, And one who watch’d, but spake not yet a word. As more and more mine eye did stretch its view, I mark’d him seated on the highest step, In visage such, as past my power to bear. Grasp’d in his hand a naked sword, glanc’d back The rays so toward me, that I oft in vain.164

An angel-guard stands there with a sword in his hand – a sign of God’s justice. The gate of Purgatory itself symbolizes the sacrament of confession, and the angel and his sword is a figure of priest who by power of the word of God gives absolution, and three steps are repentance, confession and restitution – the main elements of confession165. Before Dante himself will come to the top, the angel cut on his forehead seven “P” with the sword – it means the words peccati mortali (seven deadly sins), which will be gradually purified while the poet is climbing up the slope. In this symbolism we can find reference to medieval mysticism, particularly that of St. Bonaventure, seeing in Dante’s way the via purgativa. The angel opens the door with the keys entrusted to him by St. Peter and the pilgrims can enter. This symbolic gesture and the sign – Peter’s keys – is an 163 Purgatory, I, 19–27, transl. H. F. Cary. 164 Purgatory, IX, 76–78, transl. H. F. Cary. 165 J. Le Goff, The Birth of Purgatory, transl. A. Goldhammer, University of Chicago Press, Chicago 1986, p. 387.

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indication that Purgatory is on the side of salvation. It is a way of suffering that leads to salvation. Purgatory is a place where a soul learns the true love. Virgil explains to Dante that love, as a natural desire, by its nature animates all living things. Therefore, the basis for the classification of sins are not deeds themselves but the evil dispositions of a soul (noble inclinations are, of course, a virtue, and evil ones are demerits). Souls repent on the mountain of purification of selecting the wrong object of love. They loved, but in a disordered manner. That false choice, the source of which is always intelligence and free will, manifests itself in three ways: a. love of the wrong object – pride, envy and wrath b. too weak and passive love – sloth, laziness or tardiness in doing good c. excessive of love of worldly goods – greed, gluttony, lust. In this order, therefore, the process of purification is conceived, and it is accomplished by climbing to the top of the mountain. On the first terrace of Purgatory sinners are purified from the sin of pride. On the second terrace there are the envious – they have their eyelids sewed with iron threads, so that would be unable to cast bitter glances at beauty or good fortune of other people. They are surrounded by fog, so they learn friendship leaning against one another. The third terrace is designed for the wrathful – this sin is described as blinding (the sinners suffer in a very dark and thick smoke) and destructive. Here the important observance is made. One of the souls says to Dante that individuals cannot live a truly good life if they do not belong to the good society and so the system of rights and a fair ruler who knows how to create and implement them is needed. The fourth terrace is occupied by the slothful: the souls of those who in their earthly life have committed a sin of deficient love (lento amore, as Virgil puts it), lazy love. The slothful, and there are many of them, are forced to run “head over heels” without stopping. From time to time they shout the names of those who are an example of zealous haste: “Blessed Mary sought with haste the hilly region” (Purgatory, XVIII, 100). Higher still, on the fifth terrace, there are covetous with tied arms and legs, lying on the ground face-downward without moving. Lying so they are unable to look up, because in their life they had in mind only what was tangible. On the sixth terrace the poets meet a crowd of ghosts with blind eyes, gaunt faces and horribly starved bodies. They are gluttonous, whose punishment, similarly as in the case of the indolent, involves the inverted effects of their sin. The seventh terrace is engulfed in roaring flames where lustful are repenting for the burning passions absorbing them in their earthly life. Dante hears the 78

contrasting names cried out: Virgin Mary and Diana (the Roman goddess), as examples of purity, while cities Sodom and Gomorrah, Minos’ wife Pasiphae and a bull are examples of uncontrolled and sinful lust. At this stage of the journey Virgil leaves Dante – human wisdom can no longer lead the Florentine. Everything that Virgil represents – classical poetry, ancient and medieval humanistic tradition – cannot support him any longer. Christian revelation and the wisdom of God are necessary. Dante heads toward the Earthly Paradise – Eden, the Garden created by God at the beginning of time for the first people, where there is a tree of knowledge of good and evil. Eden, being a vestibule of proper Paradise, is located on the top of the Purgatory Mount. Here the poet experiences an allegorical vision of the symbols of the Old and New Testament, the prophets, the Evangelists, the Incarnation of the Son of God, the Church chariot drawn by the Griffin. The duality of this creature represents the divine and human nature of Christ. Three women dancing on the right side of the chariot are the theological virtues: faith, hope and love. By the left wheel four other women are dancing, clad in red: these are cardinal virtues – temperance, prudence, fortitude and justice. The whole procession is created by Dante allegorical image of the main principles of Christianity and Christian Church itself in its splendour. In such a setting, Dante meets Beatrice, his earthly love, who appears here as the personification of Divine Wisdom illuminating the human mind, and leads him to God. From this point on she becomes the poet’s guide. This is an important scene in The Divine Comedy, it tells us that Virgil, who symbolized the ancient knowledge and inherent wisdom, must be left behind when Beatrice takes care of Dante and guides him all way until, in the last stage of his journey, the poet will be led by St. Bernard of Clairvaux. This poetic and symbolic device seems to correspond to what Dante says in the Convivio: faith is joined by mercy and crowned by it just like faith joins the reason and enlightens it166.

166 See more: É. Gilson, Dante … op. cit., p. 238; G. Reguzzoni, Beatrice … op. cit., p. 140; F. Mazzoni, Il canto XXXI del „Purgatio“, Firenze 1965, p. 32; Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Purgatorio, letture e commento … op. cit., p. 459. For Dante there was no doubt that Beatrice enjoyed eternal happiness in Paradise. He believed that his beloved after her death took care of him. At the critical moment, when the poet found himself in a hopeless situation, entangled in the snare of sin symbolized at the beginning of the Inferno with the dark woods, she aids him. It was she who summoned Virgil to look after Dante during the first stage of his journey through the land of the dead. According to the assumptions and logic of the poem the character of Beatrice is submitted to the necessary changes. At the starting point she is a real person, represented according to the rules of the literature concept of dolce stil nuovo, while in the

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From the garden of Eden, where the tops of the trees are rustling in anticipation of the imminent movement of the celestial spheres, the poet along with Beatrice ascends to the Heaven.

4) Paradise In The Paradise Dante ascends (and not climbs as he did in Purgatory) flying with his muse to the celestial spheres. Moon – Dante and Beatrice meet there a woman (Piccarda Donati), who was an innocent victim of her cruel husband; she tells them the place is ­allotted to those who had been compelled to violate their vows. Mercury – Emperor Justinian is dwelling here, who established a code of good laws and tried to reconquer parts of the Roman Empire, and also those who had led active life. Venus: in Dante’s cosmological description of the universe this is the last of the planets subject to the Earth’s shadow (umbra terrae), which means, in the symbolic structure of the poem, that the planet is inhabited by the spirits of people who have in some way failed to fulfill their moral duties167. Beatrice and Dante meet on the sphere of the Sun processions of scholastic scholars – the brightest minds of the medieval world. Dante hears there – “I then was of the lambs, that Dominic Leads”. A spirit presents his companion on the right: “He, nearest on my right hand, brother was, And master to me: Albert of Cologne Is this: and of Aquinum, Thomas I” (Paradise, X, 94–99). In a conversation with Aquinas the poet hears: “the grace, whence true love lighteth first his flame”. Regarding the work of salvation, last part of the work she loses her physical characteristics, becoming a spiritual being and a symbol of all that is good, beautiful and pure. Urs von Balthasar points out that Dante’s being lost in the dark woods of sin at the beginning of his poetic journey would be fatal for him but for the help of grace, since he could not be saved by any philosophy he ever adhered to. In the meeting in the dark woods this grace is symbolized by Beatrice who holds the keys with which she opens the passage to the unusual expedition. See: H. Urs von Balthasar, Glory of the Lord … … op. cit., p. 51. 167 The belief that the shadow of Earth illuminated by the sun reaches the third heaven was probably borrowed by Dante from the aforementioned work of the Muslim scholar Alfraganus – Liber de aggregationibus stellerum. See: H. Urs von Balthasar, Glory of the Lord … op. cit., p. 79; B. Obrist, La cosmologie médièwale: tertes et immages, vol. I, Les fondements antiques, Firenze 2004.

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which is the ultimate subject of Comedy, Dante’s and Thomistic ideas can be summarized in the statement that grace does not destroy nature but perfects it. Grace builds on nature improving it. On the Sun Dante also meets King Solomon, Dionysius the Areopagite, Siger of Brabant with Boethius, and then St. Bonaventure and St. Dominic168. Mars. There Dante sees the cross made of sparkling and moving lights singing a hymn that deeply moves him, even though the poet does not understand a word of it. The lights are the martyrs who shed their blood for the faith in Christ. Jupiter is the land of just and merciful kings, and twinkling lights are arranged in the successive letters of the motto. Dante finally recognizes the words Diligite justitiam qui iudicatis terram (“Love justice, you that are the judges of the earth”: Wisd 1:1). There he beholds the great imperial eagle symbolizing the Roman Empire. Saturn – the “Seventh Star”, where contemplation reigns. Its representative is St. Benedict of Nursia. Heaven of the Fixed Stars (Stellatum) – is a sphere hovering over ecliptics where the saved dwell – contemplatives, legislators, righteous warriors, politicians, theologians and philosophers. Here Dante beholds the SunChrist and the Virgin Mary. Primum Mobile – the source of all space and time – Therefore the circle, whose swift course enwheels the universal frame answers to that, which is supreme in knowledge and in love169. As Beatrice says, it sets the world in motion. Here is the goal, whence motion on his race Starts; motionless the centre, and the rest All mov’d around. Except the soul divine, Place in this heav’n is none, the soul divine, Wherein the love, which ruleth o’er its orb, Is kindled, and the virtue that it sheds; One circle, light and love, enclasping it, As this doth clasp the others170.

168 See: Paradise, X, 83–100; Cf. Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Paradiso, letture e commento di Vittorio Sermonti, Edizioni Scolastiche Bruno Mondadori, Collana di classici italiani commentri diretta da cesare Segre 2001, p. 147–150. 169 Paradise, XXVIII, 70–72, transl. H. F. Cary. 170 Paradise, XXVII, 106–108, transl. H. F. Cary.

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Primum Mobile (Cielo Cristallino) rotates from East to West, while the other spheres revolve slowly in the opposite direction – from West to East. Dante becomes aware of a light behind him and, turning, beholds nine fiery rings whirling about a central point of light so intense it nearly blinds him. The poet is faced with the light of God, surrounded by the nine choirs of angels. It is the Primum Mobile, as Dante calls this place (if it can be called a place), where each “when” is “now” and every “where” is “here”. Empyrean – the heaven of pure light. In the Empyrean, the tenth and final kingdom, Dante beholds blessed hosts – the saved in their eternal home. This vision is the lumen gloriae – the culmination of knowledge, pure brilliance of the intellectual light that is full of love of true good. The saved are like the petals of an immense rose. Angels, like a swarm of bees, are flying back and forth between them and God, bringing peace and love. Here comes the last guide of the poet, St. Bernard of Clairvaux. Here Dante expressed at its utmost the feeling that accompanies him all the time while travelling through the heavens of Paradise: the inability of even the sublime poetic language to convey what the poet experienced and what he saw. Dante faces the problem of apophaticism – total ineffability of God’s essence and His glory. He enters the last path designated by considerations of Bonaventure via unitiva – the way of absolute union with God. All the harmony and perfection of the cosmos, in all spheres and kingdoms, is united and encompassed by love that God gives to His creation171. On th’ everlasting splendour, that I look’d, While sight was unconsum’d, and, in that depth, Saw in one volume clasp’d of love, whatever The universe unfolds; all properties Of substance and of accident, beheld172

171 Many commentators argue that in the description of Paradise we find numerous echoes of Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite’s apophatic thought. Images of the majesty of God and of the happiness of the saved difficult to describe in words may be based on the apophatic symbolism of Dionysius. See: G. Fallani, Dante e la cultura figurativa medioevale, Bergamo 1971, p. 34; Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Paradiso, letture e commento … op. cit., p. 523; The Cambridge Companion to Dante, Cambridge Companions to Literature, ed. Rachel Jacoff, Cambridge University Press 2007, p. 121–125; M. A. Orr, Dante and the Early Astronomers, op. cit., p. 231–253. 172 Paradise, XXXIII, 85–87, transl. H. F. Cary.

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What Dante saw in a mystical ecstasy cannot be expressed and depicted by human means: intellect, poetry, theology capitulate when faced with the enormity of power of the Creator. Human means of expression fail, therefore a metaphor, intuition and mystery take their place.

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IV.  In the Dantesque theatrum mundi Undoubtedly, Dante Alighieri was one of the greatest poets in human history. However, it should be borne in mind that, at the same time, he was also a philosopher, theologian and politician. In all his works these areas of knowledge can be traced, but it is in poetry he excelled as a genius of the word. In his masterpieces philosophy and theology, the cosmological vision of the world and of course politics can be found.

1)  Journey to the afterlife – sources and inspirations When we read and reflect on Dante’s texts, we should keep in mind that the world which he describes revolves according to Ptolemy’s system, were the earth is in its center, with the Sun, planets and stars revolving around it. Printing was not yet invented, people lived in anticipation of the imminent end of the world, and penitential pilgrimages slowly made their way while praying and singing. The most powerful minds were humble when facing the Christian dogma. We are in the midst of the Middle Ages. All theses of the great Italian poet should be looked at precisely from this historical perspective. And although we find philosophy and politics in Dante’s texts, it must be distinctly articulated that the subject of his greatest work, The Divine Comedy, is the status of the soul after death the contemporaneous cosmological notions. That is why the vision of the universe is so important in Dante’s poetry. The way a man organizes his space and regards himself in relation to other things is equivalent to his way of thinking and understanding the world173. The medieval universe, while unimaginably large, was also definitely finite. This world had perfectly spherical shape and contained within itself an ordered variety, having on its top a motionless Prime Mover – the origin of other spheres towards which they all strived. This is a “Model”, as Lewis argues, that has in itself everything – multiplicity and finely ordered variety174. 173 Cf. P. Priest, Dante’s Hidden God, Author House 2013, p. 376–378; Cosmology. Historical, Literary, Philosophical, Religous and Scientific Perspectives, ed. N. P. Hetherington, CRC Press 1993, p. 212–214; The Cambridge Companion to Dante…. op. cit., p. 9–11; R. Osserman, Poetry of the Universe, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group 2011, p. 54. 174 Cf. C. P. Lewis, The Discarded Image … op. cit., p. 20, 70. St. Thomas Aquinas shares the Aristotelian and Ptolemaic belief that the universe is very big in terms of space, but finished. (St. Thomas Aquinas, In libros De caelo et mundo, I, lec. 10; Sum. Theol. I, q. 7, a. 3).

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Dante’s works try to reveal this model, demonstrating to the reader the proper order of cosmic space. Already in the Convivio Dante spoke after Strabo, Albert the Great or Saint Thomas, that there were four senses in the Bible or any literary work: literal, allegorical, moral, and anagogical which is the one that transfers the human mind to the afterlife and is a spiritual commentary on the ultimate issues. All of these meanings can be found in The Divine Comedy, which is why this work is an example of total poetry, wishing to embrace with its inspiration the whole universe. This work is didactic175. All episodes are arranged in a collage, as a collection of hundreds of images, characters, symbols, events, scenes where dramas and tragedies are played out, but also there are joy, hope and victory. The whole piece is unified by the rhythm of Dante’s poetry, opening to the reader an insight into the inaccessible, invisible, and concealed though perfectly real world176. Dante makes his voyage and vision of the supernatural world the general framework of the whole poem. It should be noted that this subject is frequently encountered in literature and medieval beliefs. The best known are the visions of Alberic, Tundale, Andral, St. Raduin, a journey into the afterlife of St. Brendan, Purgatory of St. Patrick, Dialogue of St. Gregory, Voye du Paradis (Paradise Travel) of Baudouin de Conde. This theme is also present in Alain de Lille (Anticlaudianus), Bonvesin della Riva (Libro delle tre scritture, The book of the three writings, written about 1274) and Giacomino da Verona (De Jerusalem Coelesti – Heavenly Jerusalem, and De Babylonia civitate infernali – Hellish Babilonia). Dante was most certainly influenced by the story of Aeneas’ descent to the underworld, described in the book VI of Virgil’s Aeneid, which echoes, images and symbols can be found in the entire Comedy. Among the possible sources of Dante’s poetic vision there also appears an Arab hypothesis. Spanish Arabist Miguel Asin Palacios put forth the idea of Dante’s possible dependence on Arab sources. Miraj, i.e. the collection of Muslim legends depicting Muhammad’s miraculous ascension to the heavens, would be of key importance here. The starting point of this work is the seventeenth surah of the Koran, in which Archangel Gabriel carries the Prophet from Mecca to Jerusalem in the air. The fantasy of the Muslim faithful extended this brief mention of the Koran, and Muhammad’s air travel evolved into a vision of Hell and Heaven. The Spanish scholar reveals numerous analogies, especially situational, between The Divine Comedy and the Muslim legend. Indeed, there are

175 Cf. P. Vincenz, Po stronie dialogu, vol. II, Warsaw 1983, p. 54. 176 Cf. P. Vincenz, Eseje i szkice zebrane, vol. I, Wrocław 1997, p. 201.

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undeniable similarities in the description of some of hellish punishments, the topography of the underworld or silhouettes of the hell guardians. Also in the acoustic and optical effects the analogy is visible. Both Muhammad and Dante are dazzled by brightness while passing to the higher region of Paradise. Both emphasize that the human tongue is unable to describe what is they experienced in Heaven. The thesis of Asin Palacios became more believable when Enrico Cerulli stated that some version of Miraj was known in Italian translation in the thirteenth century in Italy under the name Il libro della Scala (The Book of the Ladder). However, analogies with Miraj do not have to be decisive. Similar allegories and metaphors can be found in the Bible, medieval legends and ancient literature. Dante scholars, however, do not completely deny the possibility of some suggestions and influences coming directly from Muslim sources and having an impact on Dante’s imagination and ideas. Could Dante know Arab writers and Arab legends? It is possible, but if he did he read them in Latin translation. There was a significant number of translations, since the Middle East culture infiltrated Italy, particularly through Spain. Therefore, the possibility of Muslim texts as the source of Dante’s poetic inspiration cannot be completely excluded, however, many analogies could also have come through abundant at that time ancient and medieval literature. Michalski expresses similar views, indicating that it is difficult to assess whether Dante became acquainted with the Arab legends directly or through texts of Brunetto Latini. Michalski also suggests strong averroian and avicennian influences on the cosmological views of the poet, while Vasoli argues that Dante’s imago mundi is not purely Aristotelian vision. In Alighieri’s works Greco-Arab influence can be clearly seen, especially the foundations of astronomy contained in the above-mentioned Liber aggregationis stellarum. Referring to Toynbee, Schiaparelle and Nardi, Vasoli points out that this compendium was used by Dante as a manual177.

2)  Cosmology and geography in the world of Dante Dante’s visualization of the world is remarkably artistic – it resembles an architectural structure of a hierarchic and vertically oriented order of the cosmos 177 See: Miguel Asin Palacios, La escatologia musulmana en la „Divina Commedia“ seguida de la historia y critica de una polemica, Madrid 1943; Enrico Cerulli, Il “Libro della scala” e la question delle fonti arabo-spagnole della Divina commedia, Citta del Vaticano, Studi e testi, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1949, p. 524–530; L. Gillet, Dante, Paris 1941, p. 78, 83; K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 266; C. Vasoli, Myśl Dantego… op. cit., p. 117; K. Michalski, Filozofia … op. cit., p. 470, 489.

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created by God. It is a vision in which every being, every situation preserves a specific relationship with its Creator and its ultimate goal. Therefore, the cosmos in Dante’s description everything is situated and located with extreme precision. Hell, Purgatory and Paradise are subject to the divine and cosmic order, which accurately defines the location of every soul and every phenomenon. It is a world of order and justice, while entirely imbued with the logic of love and grace. The afterlife is a region where everything is in its place178. Dante’s universe is a beautiful poetic combination of Ptolemaic cosmology with Christian theology. The Earth in the heart of the spherical universe, in the center of the habitable northern hemisphere there is Mount Zion, ninety degrees to the East there is the “dying river Ganges”, and ninety degrees to the West, the river Ebro rises in the Iberian Peninsula. On the antipodes of Zion, the Mount of Purgatory rises. Both rivers and both mountains inscribe a cross within the sphere of the Earth179. The northern hemisphere is inhabited by people and given in their possession. The focal point of the hemisphere is, of course, Jerusalem located exactly in the middle of the inhabited parts of the Earth – in medio gentium. As Virgil explains to the poet: Thou art now arriv’d Under the hemisphere opposed to that, Which the great continent doth overspread, And underneath whose canopy expir’d The Man, that was born sinless, and so liv’d. Thy feet are planted on the smallest sphere, Whose other aspect is Judecca. Morn Here rises, when there evening sets.180

Southern hemisphere under the ocean, and its only mainland is Purgatory Mount. The Divine Comedy is richly detailed: Dante is always painstakingly exact in describing astronomical constellation, the subsequent position of the Sun, Moon, starts and planets. In this way Dante is concerned with demonstrating the importance of the present, of “now” which marks what is happening, and what we, as free people, have influence on181. Dante’s journey is, therefore, strictly astronomically defined – it starts on Good Friday 1300 (in my opinion, on March 25th), the 178 Cf. Mediewal Philosophy, op. cit., p. 244. 179 Purgatory, II, 7–9; IV, 67–75; XXVII, 1–6; Cosmology. Historical, Literary … op. cit., p. 192–210; Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. I, Roma 1970, p. 303. 180 Hell, XXXIV, 114–115, transl. H. F. Cary. 181 Cf. H. Urs von Balthasar, Glory of the Lord … … op. cit., p. 18.

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poet spends a day in the woods, his journey through the circles of Hell takes a second day, the third day makes the transition from the center of the Earth to the Antipodes, on which the poets go out at dawn, three and a half day are taken by the climbing the Mount of Purgatory, and the ascent to the spheres of Paradise takes a day. Thus, the whole voyage, as Morawski suggests, lasted roughly seven days and a half, or about one hundred and eighty hours182.

3)  The Prime Unmoved Mover Dante’s cosmos is perfectly spherical. The Earth, as the most important and at the same time the heaviest, is situated precisely in the middle. It is not just the geocentric model, but also homocentric – a man and his story on the Earth are actually the very essence of theatrum mundi, whose scenario was written by God and involves men and angels. Around the stationary center, the spheres of all the elements of the universe revolve invariably. On the Earth there is water which is lighter, and above it is even lighter air. Fire, being the lightest of all, forms a circle just below the orbit of the Moon. In this cosmological vision the central spherical Earth is surrounded by concentric hollow and transparent spheres, covering one another, each subsequent sphere being, obviously, bigger than the previous one183. In this way in the Middle Ages the cosmic spheres were described, each of which is moved and governed by one of the celestial bodies. While planets and stars can be seen empirically and their movement along the ecliptic implicated mobility of individual spheres, the ancient and medieval scholars invented the speculative notion of Primum Mobile – the sphere of the first movement – to 182 Cf. K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 288. 183 Medieval scholars imagined that this “cosmic globe” is finite in terms of space, although enormous in size. “The whole of this earth’s globe, as thou hast learnt from the demonstration of astronomy, compared with the expanse of heaven, is found no bigger than a point; that is to say, if measured by the vastness of heaven’s sphere, it is held to occupy absolutely no space at all.” Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy, 2, 7, transl. H. R. James. “The distance of the firmament from the Earth is 10 066 times as long as the Earth’s diameter. Heaven being so remote, it is no wonder that stars seem so small to us. Although from the firmament up to the sun there is not a single star that would be smaller than the Earth.” Brunetto Latini, Li livres dou trésor, Tempe (Ariz), p. 128. The similar belief is also expressed in Thomas’ comments to the physical treatises of Aristotle: Sentencia super Meteora I, 3, in: Opera omnia iussu impensaque Leonis XIII P. M. Edita, vol. 3, Commentaria in libros Aristotelis De caelo et mundo, De generatione et corruptione, et Meteorologicorum, Romae 1886. See more: Cosmology. Historical, Literary … op. cit., 203–209.

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avoid contradictions about the harmonious movement of the other components of the universe. Therefore the circle, whose swift course enwheels The universal frame answers to that, Which is supreme in knowledge and in love.184

Such an approach has its origin in the ancient physics. The Aristotelian idea that Primum Mobile in logical reasoning should be recognized as something moved first by the Prime Mover, thus imparting motion to everything else, lasted in cosmology until the findings of modern physics. “Now nothing is moved at random, but there must always be something present to move it; e.g. as a matter of fact a thing moves in one way by nature, and in another by force or through the influence of reason or something else. Further, what sort of movement is primary? […] There is, then, something which is always moved with an unceasing motion, which is motion in a circle; and this is plain not in theory only but in fact. Therefore the first heaven must be eternal. There is therefore also something which moves it. And since that which moves and is moved is intermediate, there is something which moves without being moved, being eternal, substance, and actuality. And the object of desire and the object of thought move in this way; they move without being moved. […] The final cause, then, produces motion as being loved, but all other things move by being moved. […] But since there is something which moves while itself unmoved, existing actually, this can in no way be otherwise than as it is. For motion in space is the first of the kinds of change, and motion in a circle the first kind of spatial motion; and this the first mover produces. The first mover, then, exists of necessity; and in so far as it exists by necessity, its mode of being is good, and it is in this sense a first principle. For the necessary has all these senses-that which is necessary perforce because it is contrary to the natural impulse, that without which the good is impossible, and that which cannot be otherwise but can exist only in a single way. On such a principle, then, depend the heavens and the world of nature. […] For that which is capable of receiving the object of thought, i.e. the essence, is thought. But it is active when it possesses this object. Therefore the possession rather than the receptivity is the divine element which thought seems to contain, and the act of contemplation is what is most pleasant and best. If, then, God is always in that good state in which we sometimes are, this compels our wonder; and if in a better this compels it yet more. And God is in a better state. And life also belongs to God; for the actuality of thought is life, and God is that actuality; and God’s self-dependent actuality is life most good and eternal. We say therefore that God is a living being, eternal, most good, so that life and duration continuous and eternal belong to God; for this is God.”185

184 Paradise, XXVIII, 70–72, transl. H. F. Cary. 185 Aristotle, Metaphysics, XII 6–7, 1071b–1073a, transl. W. D. Ross.

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This Aristotelian depiction is obviously present in Dante’s work – the universe is a globe in which the outermost celestial sphere moved by the Unmoved Mover sets everything in circular motion, giving dynamic to cosmos. What is beyond it? Aristotle replied that outside cosmos there was absolutely nothing – neither place, nor void, nor time. Hence, whatever is there, is of such a nature as not to occupy any place, nor does time age it. “Now the whole included within the extreme circumference must be composed of all physical and sensible body, because there neither is, nor can come into being, any body outside the heaven. For if there is a natural body outside the extreme circumference it must be either a simple or a composite body, and its position must be either natural or unnatural. But it cannot be any of the simple bodies. […] Further neither can any body come into that place: for it will do so either naturally or unnaturally, and will be either simple or composite; so that the same argument will apply, since it makes no difference whether the question is “does A exist?” or “could A come to exist?” From our arguments then it is evident not only that there is not, but also that there could never come to be, any bodily mass whatever outside the circumference. The world as a whole, therefore, includes all its appropriate matter, which is, as we saw, natural perceptible body. So that neither are there now, nor have there ever been, nor can there ever be formed more heavens than one, but this heaven of ours is one and unique and complete. It is therefore evident that there is also no place or void or time outside the heaven. For in every place body can be present; and void is said to be that in which the presence of body, though not actual, is possible; and time is the number of movement. But in the absence of natural body there is no movement, and outside the heaven, as we have shown, body neither exists nor can come to exist. It is clear then that there is neither place, nor void, nor time, outside the heaven. Hence whatever is there, is of such a nature as not to occupy any place, nor does time age it.”186

In Dante’s eyes, what for the philosopher is “outside” the material heaven is Heaven itself – Empyrean – the abode of God (Paradise, XXX, 38–40). Dante – a philosopher and a poet, but also a deeply religious Christian – introduces this sphere into Greco-Arabic cosmological model, thus revealing the supernatural dimension of the world. In the Aristotelian cosmos, the world was regarded as an absolute being that could be identified with a specific limited universe enclosed in an enormous sphere. The universe was, therefore, the only point of reference – outside it there was nothing, no being, where absolutely nothing – imagined or thought of non-being (nothingness). There is no point in assigning to a world some separate “place” – something, what would contain that world inside it. “Outside” there is nothing. The Empyrean is an absolute, independent and necessary sphere, owing this necessity solely to itself. It does not exist in 186 Aristotle, On the Heavens, I, 9, 278b–279a, transl. by J. L. Stocks.

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“some place”, since beyond it there is nothing to encompass it. This is the reason why in the case of Empyreum the notion of “place” could be only imaginary, not corresponding to any physical (spatial) being. Since the universe as a whole, for both Aristotle and Dante, does not exist in any specific place, it is not subject to local movement. As Aristotle argues in the Book of Physics: “But other things are in place indirectly, through something conjoined with them, as the soul and the heaven. The latter is, in a way, in place, for all its parts are: for on the orb one part contains another. That is why the upper part is moved in a circle, while the All is not anywhere. For what is somewhere is itself something, and there must be alongside it some other thing wherein it is and which contains it. But alongside the All or the Whole there is nothing outside the All, and for this reason all things are in the heaven; for the heaven, we may say, is the All. Yet their place is not the same as the heaven. It is part of it, the innermost part of it, which is in contact with the movable body; and for this reason the earth is in water, and this in the air, and the air in the aether, and the aether in heaven, but we cannot go on and say that the heaven is in anything else.”187

Therefore, the radical Aristotelians could not accept the existence of the Empyrean sphere, since it would be in contrary to the unequivocal distinction between mathematical or philosophical speculation and auctoritas of theology, and would not correspond to the arguments de puris naturalibus. Even Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas did not mention it while commenting on Aristotle’s Physics and On the Heavens. However, in the theological writings of both scholars this problem was discussed. Thomas writes that Empyrean Heaven is generally considered to be one of the first things created (along with angelic nature, formless matter and time). It has physical effects on the moving bodies, but still remains motionless. Therefore, it has an impact upon the first moving heaven (Primum Mobile), and this influence: “For this reason it may be said that the influence of the empyrean upon that which is called the first heaven, and is moved, produces therein not something that comes and goes as a result of movement, but something of a

187 Aristotle, Physics IV, 5, 212b, transl. R. P. Hardie, R. K. Gaye. Assuredly, Aristotelian belief had its weak point – the last, eighth sphere, due to its very movement while performing the rotation, seems to occupy a kind of “place” in which the movement occurs. A significant number of ancient, Muslim and scholastic commentators had to confront this problem. The question concerning the emergence of the empyreal sphere in the comments to peripatetic cosmology was considered by Bruno Nardi who pointed out the Egyptian, Gnostic, neo-Platonic and early Christian influences. See: B. Nardi, La docttrina dell’Empireo nella sua genesi storica e nel pensiero dantesco, in: Id., Saggi e note di critica dantesca … op. cit., p. 167ff.

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fixed and stable nature, as the power of conservation or causation, or something of the kind pertaining to dignity”188. It is obvious for Dante that the Empyrean Heaven is the highest construction of the world, within which the whole world is encompassed, and beyond which there is nothing. This is the divine peak of the edifice of the universe, from which originates the universal system of causes and the regular unchanging rhythm of the cosmos. It is the power and the principle which sustains and unites it. Aristotelian-Ptolemaic cosmological model used by Dante is naively realistic in the sense that all of the described properties of the world are based on the sensory perception and an attempt to understand things subject to sensory experience. Cosmologists of that time imagined the universe in the same way they saw the world and celestial bodies that revolve around the Earth. Thus, despite the fact that in this vision every being has its hierarchically allocated space and the spheres are rotating, this model is uniform and static. This immobility makes such vision of the universe majestic, stable and secure. In the medieval cosmological structure the sphere of the Moon occupies an important place. The satellite of the Earth, according to Aristotle, divides the entire cosmos into the sublunar world, meaning Nature (physis), and the superlunar world, i.e. Heaven (ouranós). These are two separate spheres: Nature is irregular and undetermined, while Heaven is a world of harmony, order and necessity. The sphere of the Earth is the sphere of elements, the celestial sphere forms the world of eternal and indestructible substances. The bodies within the sublunary sphere are contingent beings, because this sphere, the most distant from the spheres that include and preserve the nature of everything, is made up of variable and unstable elements subject to corruption. Ascending upwards from the Moon sphere one passes through the layer of ether into the air. So Dante sees it while rising above the Moon leaves the Earth subject to changes and ascends to the world of absolute law, order and necessity189.

4)  Dante’s spherical geometry As Yuri Lotman as well as Robert Osserman shrewdly observed, Dante’s world is immersed in a specific semiotic space. The axis of the world organizes the whole semantic architecture of the poem and of the universe described in it. This is an 188 St. Thomas Aquinas, Sum. Theol., I, q. 66, a. 3, ad. 2; a. 4 resp; Scriptum super sententiis magistri Petri Lombardi, lib. 2, d. 2, q. 2, a. 3, ad. 3. 189 See: Paradise, XXVIII, 42. See: M. Karas, Natura i struktura wszechświata w kosmologii św. Tomasza z Akwinu, Cracow 2007, p. 255–258.

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equivocally oriented world – along the top-bottom axis, with the center in the middle of Hell with is also the center of the Earth. What is more, it is the very axis down which Lucifer precipitated from Heaven. In the center of the whole world, in the point most distant from Heaven and God, founds his place the one who committed the greatest sin: intellectual pride, by wanting to be like God. However, if we look carefully at the geometric and spatial direction of Dante’s journey, the “bottom” is actually designated through the center of the Earth (and thus Hell), but the “top” does not mean any direction of the radius from this center, as it would be the case of every sphere. The poet has adopted an absolute vertical axis. This absolute axis that gives direction to everything in the universe is the axis down which the rebellious angel was cast from the Empyrean Heaven190. If one reads the text of The Divine Comedy carefully, he can see that, having climbed the Mount of Purgatory, the poets reach the other side of the Earth, facing Jerusalem. If, therefore, Dante accompanied by Beatrice ascends to Heaven from the peak of the Mount of Purgatory, he must have been moving away from the absolute axis and move in the opposite direction. It turns out that there is nothing more deceptive. The poet heads to the Empyrean in this very direction he appears to be unable to take. He is not moving away and, though descending, he still moves upwards! The commonsense approach suggests that in passing through the center of the Earth to the other hemisphere, and then rising to the Heaven the poet is moving away from Jerusalem and the northern hemisphere. The text of the poem suggests, however, that in this heavenly journey Dante is looking down on the northern hemisphere. He follows, in fact, the same axis, along which Lucifer fell from the Heaven – only in a reverse motion. He rises upwards to Heaven – to the abode of God and the saints – full of admiration and humility191. This paradox, of course, did not escape the attention of many readers and commentators of Dante. Russian philosopher and mathematician Paul Florenski tried to solve with the help of non-Euclidean geometry and relativistic physics. “Having crossed the boundary that runs through the center of the Earth, the poets find themselves beneath the hemisphere and they now climb the Mount Purgatory and ascend to the celestial spheres. The question is, in which direction? The underground way

190 See: R. Osserman, Poetry … op. cit., p. 76; J. M. Lotman, Wędrówka Ulissesa w „Boskiej Komedii“ Dantego, transl. J. Faryno, “Pamiętnik Literacki” LXXI (1980) fasc. 4, p. 127. 191 E. Sanesi, G. Boffito, La geografia di Dante secondo E. Moore, Firenze 1905, p. 14; La struttura del cosmo dantesco, in: Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Inferno, letture e commento … op. cit., p. XXXVIII; Cosmology. Historical, Literary … op. cit., p. 211–213.

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by which they came up was formed by Lucifer’s fall, when he precipitated headlong from heaven. Therefore, the place he was thrown down from is exactly on the side of the hemisphere reached by the poets. The two diametrically opposite to one another mountains – Purgatory and Zion – emerged as a result of the same fall, which means that the road to heaven runs along the trajectory of Lucifer’s fall, but has a reverse meaning. Dante continually moves forward along a straight line, and comes to stand in heaven, with his feet turned in the direction of his descend. But after having looked out from the Empyrean at God’s Glory, he finds himself, without any travelling, in Florence – the exact place from which he departed. Therefore, moving forward in a straight line, and having turned only once in a vertical position while travelling, the poet arrives at the same place where he started, in the same position in which he left. If he had not turned en route, he would come back in a straight line to the place he set out from, but upside down. This means that the surface along which Dante moves is such, that movement forward in a straight line along it, with one turn, brings one back to the previous spot in an upright position, while moving forward in a straight line without turning results in arriving to the point of departure in a reversed position. Obviously, such a surface 1) contains closed straight lines, and as such is a Riemannian, and 2) is a single-sided surface, since it turns over when moving along it perpendicularly. These two circumstances are sufficient to describe Dante’s space as constructed according to the type of elliptical geometry. […] In 1871 Felix Klein proved that a spherical surface is like a two-sided surface, while an elliptic one is one-sided. Dante’s space is very much akin to elliptical space.”192

192 P. Florienskij, Mnimosti w gieomietrii. Rasszyrienije w obłasti dwuchmiernych obrazow gieomietrii. (Opyt nowego istołkowanija mnimostiej), Moscow 1922, p. 43–44; J. M. Lotman, Wędrówka Ulissesa … op. cit., p. 129. Georg Friedrich Riemann (1826–1866) – the German mathematician, who is well known for his multidimensional geometry. His doctoral dissertation studied the theory of functions of a complex variable [u + iv = f (x + y)]. He investigated conformal transformations of space, developing the concept of surface which was later called the Riemann surface and introduced topological methods into complex function theory. He also introduced the concept of topological space as an n-dimensional manifold. Riemann’s geometry is spherical geometry extended to three dimensions. To construct it, the German mathematician had first of all to reject not only Euclid’s postulate, but also the first axiom that only one straight line can be drawn through two points. Riemannian geometry, also called elliptic geometry or spherical geometry, set the scene for the general theory of relativity in the twentieth century. Felix Christian Klein (1849–1925) was a German mathematician, professor at the universities of Erlangen, Leipzig and Göttingen, known for his work in non-Euclidean geometry, algebraic equations, group theory, function theory, and the history of mathematics. In 1872, upon his appointment to a professorship at Erlangen, Klein delivered the inaugural lecture on recent research in geometry, which later became famous as the Erlangen program. Setting forth a unified conception of geometry, he gave a systematic overview of geometry,

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It seems, therefore, that the poets do not move in the Euclidean three-dimensional space, but in spherical space. This results in the fact that, nevertheless they go along the straight line, their way cannot be described by a straight line, but the sphere. Hence the “vector transformation” that took place in the middle of the Earth is logical and – so enigmatically described by Dante: turned round his head where he had had his legs – appears to be necessary. The direction is the same, changed only the position on the spherical curve along which the poets are going. This, in turn, means that the traveler going straight all the time returns to the place from which he set off in the proper position. And although the comprehension of the poet’s spatial return to the Earth is rather difficult, and was included in the poem as an allusion, this spatial paradox is important for the cosmological vision of Dante. Why? For he remains faithful to the cosmological vision of Aristotle, for whom the northern hemisphere is situated at the bottom of the globe and the southern hemisphere is at the top of it193. Therefore, Lotman and Osserman argue, the poets who are delving into the center of the Earth, in fact climb up. The descent through the circles of hell is also the ascent towards the Heaven, both in spatial-geographical, and moral meaning194.

recognizing the existence of various geometries each of which explores only those properties of solids and figures, which do not change (are invariant) under projective space transformations that belong to a certain group of transformations. See: more: R. Osserman, Poetry … op. cit., p. 78; Cosmology. Historical, Literary … op. cit., p. 211–213; B. A. Rozenfeld, A history of non-Euclidean geometry: evolution of the concept of a geometric space, New York 1988; Takashi Sakai, ­Riemannian Geometry, American Mathematical Soc. 1996. 193 “Of the poles, that which we see above us is the lower region, and that which we do not see is the upper. For right in anything is, as we say, the region in which locomotion originates, and the rotation of the heaven originates in the region from which the stars rise. So this will be the right, and the region where they set the left. If then they begin from the right and move round to the right, the upper must be the unseen pole. For if it is the pole we see, the movement will be leftward, which we deny to be the fact. Clearly then the invisible pole is above. And those who live in the other hemisphere are above and to the right, while we are below and to the left.” Aristotle, On the Heavens, II, 2, 285b, transl. J. L. Stockp. St. Thomas Aquinas thought similarly, see: Scriptum super sententiis magistri Petri Lombardi, lib. 2, d. 14, q. 1, a. 3, ad. 4; M. Karas, Natura i struktura ... op. cit., p. 153–154. 194 Cf. J. M. Lotman, Wędrówka Ulissesa … op. cit., p. 130; R. Osserman, Poetry… op. cit., p. 78.

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5)  The spiritual nature of the cosmos The cosmological description which we find in Dante’s story does mean that Dante was concerned with creating a physical-natural image. The intention of the poet is to reveal the spiritual sense of the world, which he traverses. The descent (or we can say – the entry) to the nine circles of Hell symbolizes the irreversible degradation of nature and is the exact turnaround of the cosmological scheme – the scientific way “up”, which Dante first introduced in The Banquet, and later – in a poetic way – manifested in the Commedia. In each of the nine circles of Hell there is a specific punishment for various kinds of sin: in the first five circles we meet the intemperate and self-indulgent – people who were not able to make a proper use of what is naturally good. There are, therefore, the immoral, lecherous, gluttons, avaricious, wrathful and covetous. The sixth circle contains heretics, the seventh houses the violent against their neighbors, themselves and God. The worst punishment is inflicted on those who are guilty of conscious fraud and treachery, led by the shameful trinity: Judas, Brutus and Cassius. Their culpability is the greatest, because they humiliated the most sacred gift of reason given to people so that they would be able to recognize the truth about the world and other people195. In this infernal hierarchy Dante in some way refers to the teaching of St. Thomas, who claimed that the inhabitants of hell incur various punishments depending on their fault. Therefore, both the demons and the damned, accordingly to the importance of the sin they committed, occupy in hell “more or less dark and low places”196. Thus, Dante’s Inferno while narrowing is also constantly shortening until, as Morawski puts it, “the great frozen pit to the great frozen wells of the ninth circle” is reached197. Therefore, Hell presents a peculiar topography of death, showing the scholastic concept of eschatology. What is important, while descending lower and lower into the circles of hell, we observe that the depraved and perverted becomes a universal norm, followed by more and more deformed and bestial human souls. Specific accumulation of animal comparisons takes place in the Song XXXII of Inferno, where Dante describes the condemned traitors. They are a cursed people for whom it would be better if they were born as irrational animals. The Hell in these poetic and extremely vivid descriptions – the colors, smells, voices and landscapes – is full of people who are desperate but still stubbornly 195 Cf. La struttura del cosmo dantesco, w : Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Inferno, letture e commento … op. cit., p. XXXIX. 196 St. Thomas Aquinas, Sum. Theol., III Suppl. q. 5, resp. 197 Cf. K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 285.

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attached to their nefarious deeds. It is a tragic theater of human passions and sins that continues unceasingly after death198. The Purgatory is described hierarchically and according to the order of spiritual expiation. The mountain is divided into nine parts. On the seven terraces, which correspond to seven deadly sins, one of the seven deadly sins is being purged – the proud learn humility, the envious learn magnanimity, the wrathful learn to be gentle, the slothful learn to be zealous, the covetous – generosity, the gluttonous – abstinence and the lustful – purity. When the soul regains its freedom from the sin itself and the consequences of sin, it may enter the earthly paradise – the last two terraces. The moral scheme of Purgatory is designed to restore the order of love, which is the first cause of all activity. The purification is aimed at restoring the innate, and therefore every creature’s inherent love of God. It is a place for the people who make proper use of their reason, trying to find the right intensity and the subject of love they lost in their earthly life199. And finally, the Heaven with its nine concentric spheres – in the center of each is one planet – revolving around the stationary Earth, located in the center. There are Moon, Mercury, Venus, Sun, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn and the sphere of the fixed stars. Above it the Primum Mobile rises, the first thing set in motion, the sphere, which imparts to other its movement and, finally, the Empyrean, the immobile abode of God and the saints, unimaginable and unlimited space. Undoubtedly, the idea of associating cosmic spheres with spiritual order in such a beautiful poetic way has its medieval background. Dante, as the main character, presents himself not so much as a “traveler-Argonaut” as a “scholar-student” who travels through the cosmos of history and people, guided by the great teachers – Virgil and Beatrice, the personifications of Reason, Knowledge, Grace and Love. His journey eventually transforms into a spiritual mission. The culmination of this meeting of knowledge and mysticism, reason and love is a dazzling vision of Dante’s Paradise. The poet beholds the spiritual cosmos held together by the bond of love in an unimaginable wealth of ideas, forms and beings200.

198 M. Baladini, La construzione morale dell’ Inferno di Dante, Citta di Castello 1914, p. 45. 199 Dante thus conveys and confirms the belief of the ancient and medieval thinkers, that every action is based on love and animated by love. This view can be found in Aristotle’s (Metaphysics 1072 a–b) and Aquinas’ (Sum. Theol., I–II, q. 28) works. 200 Cf. La struttura del cosmo dantesco, in: Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Inferno, letture e commento … op. cit., p. XLII. It is not true that the unfulfilled love for Beatrice is the main theme of the Divine Comedy, as Dan Brown suggests in his popular book. See Dan Brown, Inferno, chapter 39, op. cit.

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The supernatural character of the world is of crucial importance here. Therefore, it must be borne in mind that within the ancient conceptions the individual spheres of the cosmos were highly personalized. Dante shares the contemporaneous belief that various heavens have their individual movers (Hell, VII, 73–87). This theory refers to the common in the Middle Ages comments to the Platonic Timaeus. In that dialogue the Greek philosopher made an impersonation of space objects. “He wrought for the most part out of fire, that this kind might be as bright as possible to behold and as fair; and likening it to the All He made it truly spherical; and He placed it in the intelligence of the Supreme to follow therewith, distributing it round about over all the Heaven, to be unto it a veritable adornment cunningly traced over the whole. And each member of this class He endowed with two motions, whereof the one is uniform motion in the same spot, whereby it conceives always identical thoughts about the same objects, and the other is a forward motion due to its being dominated by the revolution of the Same and Similar; but in respect of the other five motions1 they are at rest and move not, so that each of them may attain the greatest possible perfection. From this cause, then, came into existence all those unwandering stars which are living creatures divine and eternal and abide for ever revolving uniformly in the same spot; and those which keep swerving and wandering have been generated in the fashion previously described.”201

Aristotle also assumed that each celestial sphere has a soul, bestowing in this way on cosmic spheres a kind of hierarchy in which intelligences were substantial forms (movers) of the spheres. The belief about the impact of intelligence on the cosmological-astrological world Dante owes to Pythagorean-Platonic and Aristotelian-Arabic tradition of explaining the movement of celestial bodies, in which the planets and stars have a psychic nature. There existed then unquestionable belief that celestial spheres are fundamental qualities of the cosmological reality, each of which is governed by some separate intelligence. In Dante’s work each intelligence marks its constellation as well as some aspect of the cosmos and history of the world. Both Plato and Aristotle thought that the celestial bodies are guided by Intelligences as sources of their continuous motion. Obviously, these spiritual movers were identified the Middle Ages with the angels. The spheres are moved by the intellectual love of God. In the Platonic vision the Intelligences reside in the celestial sphere same as the soul in the body. Medieval scholars cosmologists, however, were not so radical in their views and claimed: 201 Plato, Timaeus, 40a–b, transl. W. R. M. Lamb, Cambridge, Harvard University Press, William Heinemann Ltd., London 1925.

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“We recognize along with the holy writers that celestial orbs possess no souls and are not creatures like animals. But if we want to reconcile the sages (Philosophos) with the holy writers, it can be said that there are Intelligences that preside over the orbs in a certain way and they are called the souls of orbs”.202

Thomas also mentioned this issue and he basically agreed with the cosmological Platonic-Atistotelian beliefs, but he incorporated them into the theological doctrine of Christianity. “The Platonists explain the union of soul and body in the same way, as a contact of a moving power with the object moved, and since Plato holds the heavenly bodies to be living beings, this means nothing else but that substances of spiritual nature are united to them, and act as their moving power. A proof that the heavenly bodies are moved by the direct influence and contact of some spiritual substance, and not, like bodies of specific gravity, by nature, lies in the fact that whereas nature moves to one fixed end which having attained, it rests; this does not appear in the movement of heavenly bodies. Hence it follows that they are moved by some intellectual substances. Augustine appears to be of the same opinion when he expresses his belief that all corporeal things are ruled by God through the spirit of life (De Trinitate III, 4.).”203

Dante, however, exactly distinguishes between the movers and their tasks, and the place of saints and angels, which is located in the Empyrean – non-spatial heaven that is the kingdom of God. The stars and spheres of the planets are solely the place where the angels and saints fulfill their tasks and mission204. Keeping in mind, therefore, the medieval conceptions of the universe, it becomes obvious to us that Dante is not only a poet, even though this is the highest title which he deserves. In the poetics of Dante’s Divine Comedy he is a geometer, as he speaks of himself in the last Book of The Paradise, a cosmologist and an architect building with his poetic stanzas the edifice of the whole universe205. 202 St. Albertus Magnus, Summa de creaturis, I a, Tractatus III, questio 16, art. 2, in: Prima pars Summe Alberti Magni de quatuor coequeuis una cum secunda eius que est De homine, Venice, Simon de Luere for Andreas Torresanus, 1498/99; St. Albertus Magnus, Alberti Magni Ordinis Fratrum Praedicatorum: De causis et processu universitatis a prima causa, ed. Winfridus Fauser. Westfalorum, Aedibus Aschendorff, 1993; De caelo et mundo, ed. Paulus Hossfeld Aschendorff, Monasterii Westfalorum, 1971. 203 St. Thomas Aquinas, Sum. Theol., I, q. 70, art. 3 resp. Identifying intelligences with angels in Hebrew-Christian theology resulted in combining the ancient astrological doctrines with the theory of cosmic intermediaries between God and multiplicity of things in the universe and on the earth. See: C. S. Lewis, The Discarded Image … op. cit., p. 84; C. Vasoli, Myśl Dantego … op. cit., p. 117. 204 Cf. H. Urs von Balthasar, Glory of the Lord … op. cit., p. 71. 205 Cf. G. Savarese, Una proposta per forese. E altri studi su Dante, Roma 1992, p. 94.

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6)  The world endowed with inherent sense This medieval model of the universe had a deep meaning within its cosmological structure. The meaning is twofold: a substantial form of its entire geographic and spiritual structure, and a manifestation of wisdom and goodness which created it. The only thing this world demanded was the right answer. Dante was primarily a poet who admires and celebrates the rational order pervading the entire creation and delighting both with order and aesthetics. In this vision, animated by the medieval mentality, the whole universe comes out of the mind of God, from the form which was in his mind. As Aquinas argued: “there must exist in the divine mind a form to the likeness of which the world was made”206. If this form did not exist, the assumption would have to be made that the world is no longer the work of Providence, but a random outcome of the equally accidental causes. If there was no right idea of all things in the mind of God, the universe would be the unintentional result of unpredictable consequences of moving factors, as the Angelic Doctor expostulated207. Therefore Dante, with such an emphasis, points out: From this realm Excluded, chalice no entrance here may find, No more shall hunger, thirst, or sorrow can. A law immutable hath establish’d all; Nor is there aught thou seest, that doth not fit, Exactly, as the finger to the ring.208

The world depicted here is the story of guilt and punishment, good and evil, and all is subjected to the judgment of the justice of God. In The Divine Comedy, the virtue of justice appears as the most precious virtue, the most divine and most human. Due to the order makes each of Dante’s characters preserve their humanity, their value and dignity, and yet they are punished. The characters of Dante’s journey do not lose their individuality, remain themselves, whether it is in the depths of Hell, deformed by hatred and sin, or on the Mount of Purgatory and in Paradise209. Unfulfilled human desires and longings are the worst possible torture. Francesca is not able to overcome her desire, the only way of repentance – renouncing pleasures and voluntary acceptance of punishment – is closed for her. 206 St. Thomas Aquinas, Sum. Theol. I, q. 15, a. 1 resp. 207 Cf. St. Thomas Aquinas, Sum. Theol. I, q. 22, a. 2, resp. See more: G. Warren, Dante’s Aesthetics of Being, University of Michigan Press 1999, p. 102. 208 Paradise, XXXII, 52–56, transl. H. F. Cary. 209 See: P. Vincenz, Eseje i szkice zebrane, vol. I, op. cit., p. 207.

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No greater grief than to remember days Of joy, when mis’ry is at hand!210

When one recalls happiness that once existed but came to the end and does not have any hope to experience it once more, the memory itself becomes the cruelest torture. The heads of lovers united in an unfulfilled kiss, correspond to the heads which the poet encountered walking on the frozen lake at the bottom of Hell. The former, once and for all in love with each other, the latter always bound together in the act of revenge. They have what they most wanted, yet forever remain insatiable. They have it, but not entirely. The love of Francesca and Paolo does not give them happiness any more, their mutual presence does not satiate them, they are, in fact, forever separated. Similarly, and at the bottom of Hell, Ugolino is in the eternal process of taking his revenge, but he will never be able to achieve a satisfying act of justice. The characters met in Cocytus and the story heard by Dante from Ugolino is an echo of a true story that happened in Pisa and concerned Ugolino della Gherardesca. He starved to death along with his sons in the tower, where they were incarcerated by Archbishop Ruggiero Ubaldini. One of the threads of this gruesome story, which found its way to the poem, is the treason Ugolino was guilty of, first regarding the Ghibellines, and later the Guelphs (this is why he inhabits the traitor’s circle in Hell), and the other is the suggestion that, when locked in the tower (it was the tower of Gualandi called Muda) he ate the bodies of his sons. Now the act of cruel revenge is carried out by the animal biting in the back of head of the Archbishop: eternal damnation to such act of cannibalism is an expression of unsaturated hatred and insatiable hunger, thus distorting the meaning of feeding211.

210 Hell V, 121–122, transl. H. F. Cary. The lines: “There is no greater sorrow than to recall our times of joy in wretchedness” are an almost literal quotation from Boethius’ De Consolatione philosophiae: “Among fortune’s many adversities the most unhappy kind is once to have been happy” (De consolatione II, IV, 4–6). However, in Francesca’s mouth these words are particularly heartbreaking – she no longer has any hope as she cannot relive her earthly life nor change eternity. 211 Cf. Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. V, Roma 1976, p. 796–797; Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Inferno, letture e commento … op. cit., p. 457; K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 322. Borges tackles the problem of interpretation of the controversial verse in which Ugolino says: “Then fasting got the mastery of grief.” (Hell, XXXIII, 75) and argues that the notion that Ugolino actually ate the bodies of his sons is contrary both to nature and history. He acknowledges, however, that the dilemma whether Ugolino in the first days of February, 1289 committed cannibalism, is essentially

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In the Hell there are no stones, nor trees or animals, only humans and demons, because only they was able to choose and only they may suffer remorse. Conscience becomes the ultimate inflictor of punishment. Conscience, which “celestial Justice spurs on”, forces the condemned to take place in Hell according to their guilt. And although the Catholic doctrine teaches that the most tragic aspect of suffering in hell is deprivation of the sight of God, it also adds that there will be pain of sense as a result of this principal torment. In Dante’s poem the soul separates from its body after death, but retains the opportunity to create a replacement body of air, visible to others and able to reproduce its earthly behavior, feelings and thoughts. In Hell this new “body” resembles in its behavior the true one, allowing the spirits in Hell to behave like people living on earth. In Purgatory the behavior of spirits along with their substitute form, visible to an outside observer, is dictated to a large extent by the fact that there is also an allegorical meaning to it – the proud walk bent toward the ground, the lustful, who burned with passions in earthly life, must repent in the flames of fire. This device allowed Dante to give the spirits of dead the characteristics of material life. Hence the importance of Dante’s attempt to grasp and describe the contrappasso (retribution), engulfing the sinner from the inside as the perfect expression of his guilt and punishment. The content and form of eternal torment are so intractable. How did Dante himself perceive this story? Did he want the reader to accept the possibility of cannibalism, retelling a terrifying tale of Ugolino in the thirty-third song of Inferno? The very hinting at the crime of cannibalism, as Borges maintains, impels us to suspect it with fear and uncertainty. See: J. L. Borges, Fałszywy problem Ugolina, transl. M. Ziętara, “Literatura na świecie” no. 4 (1995) 285, p. 82. The common interpretation of the verse in question is that Ugolino died of hunger, but that he did not commit cannibalism. The notion of eating the children’s bodies appeared late, according to Natalino Sapegno, as a marginal note on some old chronicle describing the authentic events in Pisa at the end of the thirteenth century. See: Storia letteraria, d’italia. Storia della critica dantesca dal XIV al XX secolo, vol. 3, ed. F. ­Vallardi, Milano 1981; N. Sapegno, Introduzione alla lettura di Dante, Roma 1970; M. Corti, Il dante di Sapegno nella critica del novecento: lezioni Sapegno 2001, Torino 2002; N. Sapegno, Historia literatury wołoskiej w zarysie, p. 65; P. Villari, Dante e l’Italia, Firenze 1914; P. Villari, The two first centuries of Florentine history: The republic and parties at the time of Dante, transl. L. Villari, London 1908; P. Villari, La Dante Alighieri ad Udine. Discorso pronunziato in occasione del XIV congresso il 24 settembre 1903, Roma 1903. It does not seem correct interpretation of conviction, that the description contained in the ice of lake of the Hell, the image of cannibalism, is a metaphor for the attitude of those who “consume” the common good of Florence. See: D. Burstein, A. de Keijzer, Secrets of Inferno. In the Footsteps of Dante and Dan Brown, Squibnocket Partners LLC 2013, p. 108.

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closely interrelated with each other that the sinner himself heads towards location and type of his punishment – for so heaven’s justice goads them on, that fear is turn’d into desire212. Discussing the descriptions of hell contained in Dante’s masterpiece we observes that illustrating the punishment of the damned by contrapasso had, perhaps, its source in St. Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Theologiae. Considering the virtue of justice, Aquinas defines punishment as strictly corresponding to sins committed: “retaliation [contrapassum] denotes equal passion repaid for previous action; and the expression applies most properly to injurious passions and actions, whereby a man harms the person of his neighbor”213. The commutative justice requires that repayment should be made on a basis of equality, namely that the compensation of passion be equal to the action214.

7)  Travel as an act of purification The poem is thus the history of the human soul, which achieves the highest degree of spirituality through an extraordinary journey to the afterlife. Dante’s voyage is cognitive in its nature – the poet sees the mechanisms that govern the condition and fate of human souls after death in accordance with God’s design of justice and love. In the Middle Ages, according to Michalski, a series of works appeared in which some attempts were made to reproduce in the theoretical schemes the morally purifying pilgrimage of the soul to God. The contemporaneous masterpieces of Christian mysticism are St. Bernard’s Commentary for the Song of Songs, Itinerarium mentis in Deum by St. Bonaventure, and Benjamin Major and Benjamin Minor by Richard of St. Victor215. Morawski confirms this by showing many similarities between the mystical allusions and images of Dante and the considerations which arose in the environment of Victorines216. Dante’s vision of climbing up through various stages of spiritual purification and enlightenment undoubtedly draws inspiration from these works. A journey through the spheres of Paradise is in fact undertaking a mystical challenge to understand the judgments of God upon the world and ultimately standing before the ineffable mystery of the One Who Is.

212 Cf. Hell, III, 129; H. Urs von Balthasar, Glory of the Lord … op. cit., p. 92. 213 St. Thomas Aquinas, Sum. Theol., II–II, q. 61, a. 4 resp. 214 Cf. Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. II, Roma 1970, p. 181. 215 Cf. K. Michalski, Filozofia … op. cit., p. 25. 216 See: K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 242.

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Apprehending the mystical stages of the poets’s transformation in The Comedy becomes possible on the basis of St. Bonaventure’s considerations on the nature and various degrees of contemplation. Dante encounters four main stages – via purgativa – through Hell and Purgatory, where the process of liberation of the human spirit longing for freedom, perfection and infinity is occurring. This stage of the mystical journey finally ends up by Dante’s washing in Purgatory rivers. As a result, he is prepared to ascend to Heaven and start the next part of his journey – via illuminativa – which in turn would lead him to visio beatifica – supernatural path towards enlightenment bestowed by grace, until via unitiva, the ultimate gift of contemplative union with God217. As was alredy noted, Dante writing the Convivio undoubtedly remained under a great influence of Aristotelian and the resulting peripatetic scholastic systems, but reading The Divine Comedy we can observe that the center of gravity has been shifted from philosophy to theological and mystical theories. A poetic story about the journey to the afterlife includes the allusions and references to the mystical concepts of Victor and Richard of St. Victor, St. Bonaventure, Franciscan spirituality, bold ideas of Joachim of Fiore218. This knowledge should serve as an advice and warning. Therefore, it can be safely assumed that The Divine Comedy cannot be understood properly without knowing the spirit and character of medieval mysticism presented, inter alia, in these works219.

8)  The scandal of existence of the Hell Undoubtedly, Dante’s so vividly described images of hellish torments terrified readers with their artistic and detailed expression, and even today cause strong opposition to such an understanding of the cold justice of God, a scandal of hell regarded as a reproach to God’s love. The allegation of cruelty was put to Dante by Friedrich Nietzsche, who in his Twilight of the Idols called “the hyena who writes poetry in tombs”220. Witold Gombrowicz, in turn, violently expressed the same idea by so commenting in his Diaries the reading of Dante’s work. “I have just now realized it: this is the most monstrous poem in world literature. It is, page after page, a litany of agonies, a register of torments. “Supreme Love…” It is exactly these words. “Supreme love”, that points out the complete monstrousness of this work. And its vileness. I have nothing against Purgatory… if those sins called for such satanic punishment then, fine, at least the light of Salvation gleams in the distance. But Hell?

217 218 219 220

Cf. K. Michalski, Filozofia … op. cit., p. 479. Cf. K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 235. Cf. K. Michalski, Mistyka i scholastyka u Dantego, Cracow 1921, p. 35. F. Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols, transl. R. Polt, Hackett Publishing 1997, p. 50.

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Hell is no mere punishment. Punishment leads to purification, it has an end. But Hell is eternal torment and ten million years from now the damned will be wailing just as loudly as they do now, nothing will have changed. One cannot consent to this. Our sense of justice cannot bear it. Yet he inscribes on the infernal gate “I was made by… Supreme Love”. How can one explain this except to say that Dante must have done it out of fear and baseness, to ingratiate himself! … Terrified and quaking with fright, he pulls himself together and pays the highest tribute to the highest terror and calls the highest cruelty the highest love. Never has the word love been used in such a brazenly paradoxical way. No other word in the human language has been applied in such a shamelessly perverse manner. And it is this word that is the most holy, the most sacred. This disgraceful book falls out of our hands, and our wounded lips whisper: he had no right… But how is it… how it could have happened that a work so depraved by the wildest fear and so servile, a work so contrary to man’s most fundamental sense of justice, how could this have transformed itself in the course of centuries into a Book of Edification, into the most eminent of poems?”221

Gombrowicz regarded Dante’s vision as the ultimate expression of confusion and profanity of a pious man, who had the impudence of giving to cruelty the name of a righteous dimension of love. However, he noticed in it primarily a sign of the era to which Dante belong – “but now, listening better, I can see that it is not him but the Middle Ages singing”222. Stanisław Vincenz even spoke of Dante’s ethical fundamentalism which comes to savagery in his portrayal of hell, when the history of hell appears only as an instrument of torture, a cruel mechanism of endless punishment223. Hans Urs von Balthasar, in turn, points out that if hell is a masterpiece of love, this love is fossilized and petrified, remaining only as an empty “form” – criminal justice. In Hell God’s love is completely hidden behind pure justice, the divine beauty has a face of justice224. Therefore, there can be no place for compassionate conversation, the real dialogue, the inflicted punishments are, in fact, fair and irrevocable. Thus the inscription Dante beholds on the gate of Hell – To rear me was the task of power divine, Supremest wisdom, and primeval love – is still the source of sheer horror, but also of scandal to many generations of readers225. 221 222 223 224 225

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W. Gombrowicz, Diary, vol. 3, p. 187. Ibid., p. 238. Cf. P. Vincenz, Z perspektywy podróży, Cracow 1980, p. 238. Cf. H. Urs von Balthasar, Glory of the Lord … op. cit., p. 92, 97. Cf. A. Sobolewska, Otwarta brama. Dramat powszechnego zbawienia, “Tygodnik powszechny” no. 36 (1998), p. 8; G. Papini, Dante … op. cit., p. 144.

In my opinion, after a careful reading of Dante’s texts and an attempt to understand the spirit of those times, nothing could be more wrong than such an interpretation. It is our contemporary, far from theological thought and reflection, ways of understanding the nature of reward and punishment, love and justice make Dante’s world (and especially, of course, Hell) cruel and unjust. In Dante’s theological and cosmological vision, if God wanted to free sinners from hell He would have to cease to be good, to deny His own goodness. The Hell could be empty only if the spirit ceased to be itself, but then the human person would lose her moral dignity and the Divine persons would lose their internal, absolute goodness. Dante sees the relationship between guilt and punishment as something absolutely necessary, which in no way violates God’s mercy. Faults without penalty would be something overtly evil, demonic and satanic. Not punished fault would show not merciful, but the demonic Lord of the worlds, who is playing with us and mocking us226. These controversial thesis and visions of the Italian poet are consistent with the classical theology, with the teaching of St. Thomas Aquinas, noticeable through the entire cosmological journey. “God, for His own part, has mercy on all. Since, however, His mercy is ruled by the order of His wisdom, the result is that it does not reach to certain people who render themselves unworthy of that mercy, as do the demons and the damned who are obstinate in wickedness.”227

The question of justice constitutes the essential argument in favor of faith in eternal life. The very fact of an individual need to be met, the need for immortal love, is the reason to believe that the man was created for eternal life. Grace does not destroy justice and does not change injustice into righteousness. It is not a sponge that wipes everything away, so that in the end all human deeds on the Earth would have the same value. Only in the light of justice, goodness, truth, beauty, love and hope associated with them human deeds take their proper perspective. In the biblical vision of the world, not all deeds, truths, actions and intentions are equal. Eternity can never be properly understood without realizing and recognizing that historical injustice should never have the last word. Justice and mercy must be seen in their correct inner relationship. If the judgment of God would be based solely on grace, the earthly history would have no serious meaning, but God would still owe us an answer to the problem of evil which 226 Cf. H. Urs von Balthasar, Glory of the Lord … op. cit., p. 106. 227 St. Thomas Aquinas, Sum. Theol., III, Supp., q. 99, a. 1 resp.; a. 2, ad. 1. In the whole question 99, St. Thomas considers the problem of mercy and justice of God against the damned.

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took place in the history of the world. If God were merely the justice, He would ultimately be only a motive of terrifying fear, because no one on earth is perfectly righteous. The correct answer is, therefore, the Judgment performed by the Son of Man – the Word Incarnate. In Christ as God and Man justice and mercy, judgment and mercy were unified228. Hence, in Dante’s vision evil and sin are woven into the great cosmic process, becoming its expression. That is the reason why Hell is so real and exists as a symbolically and poetically expressed belief (supported by the teachings of the Catholic Church) in the eternity of damnation. Hell, unfortunately (and this invariably evokes in us, the people of tolerance and openness to other views, the strong internal opposition) is not and cannot be a myth. If we reject this truth of faith, the distance between the moral good and evil does not exist any more. The denial of eternal punishment for the sin of angels and people means lack of understanding of dignity of angelic/human intellect and will. Earthly life is the time when a person can show his/her true self. There is in a human being a certain continuity of spirituality which becomes ultimately disclosed by death – the moment when the most essential disposition of the soul can be seen. When the “charge” of made by people spiritual choices is eliminated, this result in an explicit rejection of the seriousness of earthly life. Our eternal fate, damnation or salvation, depends on what we have been able to make of our earthly life. This is the message of Dante’s poetry. When traversing the Hell, the poets recognize that the damned defend their own individual truths so fiercely they are willing to deny or negate the only Truth, in which they dwell in spite of themselves. 228 “Only God can create justice. And faith gives us the certainty that he does so. The image of the Last Judgement is not primarily an image of terror, but an image of hope; for us it may even be the decisive image of hope. Is it not also a frightening image? I would say: it is an image that evokes responsibility, an image, therefore, of that fear of which Saint Hilary spoke when he said that all our fear has its place in love. God is justice and creates justice. This is our consolation and our hope. And in his justice there is also grace. This we know by turning our gaze to the crucified and risen Christ. Both these things – justice and grace – must be seen in their correct inner relationship. Grace does not cancel out justice. It does not make wrong into right. It is not a sponge which wipes everything away, so that whatever someone has done on earth ends up being of equal value. Dostoevsky, for example, was right to protest against this kind of Heaven and this kind of grace in his novel The Brothers Karamazov. Evildoers, in the end, do not sit at table at the eternal banquet beside their victims without distinction, as though nothing had happened.” Benedict XVI, Encyclical letter Spe Salvi, no. 44.

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The contemporary idea of gaining further merits after death, a possible conversion and repentance after death profoundly disagrees with the Christian tradition, and the same it conditions the discord and the “scandal” in the face of Dante’s vision229. Only death and the condition of damnation in hell reveals the true nature of the condemned as they really are, without masks and appearances. The drama, however, of this place is expressed in the inability of seeing the cause and effect of what happened, because the damned immersed in spiritual death forever lost the ability to understand the essence of the truth of their sin. The tragedy of sin is revealed in the fact that souls are doomed to endless reliving the same passions, desires (sensual, political, emotional), which obscured from them the ultimate goal. The essence of hell is thus the eternal abandoning of the purpose, which every man desires by his very nature – happiness, which is God, the Creator and Redeemer of the world. As we have seen, Dante’s Inferno is hierarchical. But this is not merely a rhetorical figure, creating a more powerful stylistic description. This is an intentional system, which should be well understood. It may amaze that the murder in the hierarchy of the circles of hell is higher (and is, therefore, treated less severely) than stealing, cheating or treason. A profound wisdom of the poet is expressed in it. The reason itself is not taken away from a man, the gift of rationality remains, but in Hell it is revealed in the most vulgar and perverse form. The moral order of condemnation is based on the ratio, or rather on the specific perversion of it. The logic of punishment in hell is arranged so as to show the degradation of human reason. Thus, the specificity of this place lies in weakening or rejection of the gift of reason. In the Upper Hell (circles 1–6) are those whose appetites have overwhelmed their reason. In the seventh circle are those damned who subordinate reason to violent and destructive emotions, while in the eighth and ninth circle we meet those who perversely abused the gift of reason to commit the worst iniquities – fraud, falsifying and treason. The simonists, thieves, deceitful and hypocrites are at the very bottom of the hell abyss, since they used God’s greatest gift – reason –not to perform and enhance good deeds, but to spread evil with cunning and treacherous 229 See: Puste piekło? Spór wokół ks. Wacława Hryniewicza nadziei zbawienia dla wszystkich [Empty hell? A controversy around Fr. Waclaw Hryniewicz’s hope of universal salvation], Towarzystwo Więź, Warsaw 2000; W. Hryniewicz, Dramat nadziei zbawienia: medytacje eschatologiczne, Warsaw 1996; Id., Abym nie utracił nikogo…: w kręgu eschatologii nadziei, Warsaw 2008; Id., Nadzieja uczy inaczej: medytacje ­eschatologiczne, Warsaw 2003.

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lies, thus reversing the God-given order. They, therefore, stay closest to Satan who, being pure intelligence, become the father of lies by breaking the precept and attempting to annihilate truth by false question in Paradise: Did God really say: You shall not eat from any tree of the garden? The improper use of God’s gifts – of words, documents, obligations, symbols of dignity and honor – which should be based on reasonably perceived reality leads to, as Lotman argues, violating the fundamental pre-established combinations of signs. In this way the very foundations of truth, on which these signs of trust are based and create ties that bind people in a society, are being shaken. When deceived, reason gives the Earth under the dominion of the father of lies and transforms it into Hell. Satan – the father of perversity – advocates breaking of all conventions and agreements. Such a deed is worse than murder because it kills the Truth itself230. Thus, the frozen hellish lake of Cocytus can be perceived, paraphrasing Jean Baudrillard, as a petrified in hypocrisy precession of simulacra – signs which lost their meaning because they are disassembled from the description of the essence of being – the truth of the created things231. The damned are deprived of all hope of seeing God and this is their greatest tragedy – poena damni, because it is the contemplation of the truth of God which is the greatest desire of a man, whose supreme gift is reason, and it causes the strongest longing. God, who is the ultimate goal of all creatures, becomes absolutely and forever unattainable. The ease with which Dante places in hell so many popes and priests is not the result of lack of piety and contempt for the spiritual significance of the Church. Just the opposite. Only by having such a strong faith and so much certainty as to the truth of Christianity, the poet could dare to impose on them such a sentence. If the severity of the great Florentine sometimes shocks us, it is often because we 230 Cf. J. M. Lotman, Wędrówka … op. cit., p. 132; M. Maślanka-Soro, Tragizm … op. cit., p. 117–118. 231 “Territory maps already not precedes or takes longer than it. From now on this map precedes the territory – precession of simulacra – it creates a territory”. Cf. J. Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation, University of Michigan Press 1994, p. 2–6. Precession is a change in the orientation of the rotational axis of a rotating body. In an appropriate reference frame it can be defined as a change in the first Euler angle, whereas the third Euler angle defines the rotation itself. In other words, the axis of rotation of a precessing body itself rotates around another axip. A motion in which the second Euler angle changes is called nutation. In physics, there are two types of precession: torque-free and torque-induced. In astronomy, “precession” refers to any of several slow changes in an astronomical body’s rotational or orbital parameters, and especially to the Earth’s precession of the equinox.

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do not understand its motivation. Dante was allowed to utter critical opinions because of his faith – no one was more ruthless for the gods than Homer, no one for the curia than Dante232. He sends the popes to hell because in his eyes they are people to whom the responsibility for the Church was entrusted, and they will be judged accordingly. If they fulfilled their mission in a wrong way, they must, like all other mortals, suffer the consequences – the law of the Church and the moral precepts of the Gospel are undeniable. Catholicism itself allowed the author of The Divine Comedy to severely condemn the popes and bishops, and at the same time preserve genuine respect “to those keys” – Peter’s keys as a symbol of papal primacy233. Therefore, although the criticism of secularized and prosperous Church is very visible in the poem – Beatrice and St. Peter severely judge the hierarchs who the Bride of the Lord sell for gold, making her the Babylonian harlot – while Dante, in the childish way, as Urs von Balthasar observes, adheres closely to the Church of Christ, its sacraments, the Word of God and the leadership. While he expects the arrival of the emperor as a political saviour, he encourages and appeals for purification of the Church. However, the rough speeches, the clerics met in Hell, condemnation of simony and unambiguous examples of bad deeds of the churchmen have in themselves nothing sectarian or heretical, as in the spiritual way proposed in the thirteenth century by Joachim of Fiore. All the criticism that can be found in the Commedia is not an attempt of reform proposing a new Church and a new direction of faith, but is coming from the inner loving zeal of a secular Christian234.

9)  The Gentiles and children – the issue of limbo As mentioned above, in the description of Dante’s Ante-Inferno, the poet points during his journey to a special place in Hell for those who have lived righteously, but did not obtain the grace of baptism, as they appeared on the world before Christ. These ancient worthies, described by the poet, exist in a particular state: there is neither joy nor sorrow in their faces, they rarely speak, and if they do their speech is somber, their voice is weak, they look with restraint. They live with desire without hope, do not experience suffering, but they are aware of their remoteness from God. Therefore, there is a specific sadness in the Noble Castle, not so much 232 G. R. Hocke, Świat jako labirynt. Maniera i mania w sztuce europejskiej w latach 1520–1650 i współcześnie, tłum. M. Szalsza, Gdansk 2003, p. 198. 233 Most described by the poet popes meet in the Hell, two located on the Mount of Purgatory, and one in the Paradise. 234 Cf. H. Urs von Balthasar, Glory of the Lord… op. cit., p. 25.

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despair as an eternal melancholy. Admiration, respect, dignity is covered with an invisible shroud of sadness235. In the description of what the poets experience in Ante-Inferno the emotion and melancholy of both Virgil and Dante is apparent. The former is sad because he realizes his unfortunate position: deprived of the view of God, the latter shares his mood perceiving him as the noble mind, of authority known to him from the books and ancient stories. The reverence for the architects of ancient culture reaches its culmination here, but it is “wounded” by sad awareness that the righteous pagans will never participate in the glory of Paradise236. Why is this ideal world of culture, dignity, reflection and wisdom that a man is able to create, is filled with indelible gloom? Because the most important thing in the whole poem is supernatural love. It opens the heart and mind to the cosmic order of the world. Love is a “mover”, that gives to the whole world its spiritual and inherent dynamics. In Dante’s vision, although rooted in notions of ancient physics and metaphysics, the divine Mover is not that far-away God-Absolute of Aristotelian cosmos, who in loving himself evinces pleasure and thereby gives motion to Primum Mobile, but the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit – God of love alive. Dante distinctly points it out while describing Paradise – to commune with uncreated God, to transcend humanity, to participate in God’s nature, and to become an adoptive son of God, even the greatest natural virtue is not enough. Dante is radical here, he refuses to the ancient Magnanimi the salvation with the saints in Paradise. Although they have merits resulting from the inherent virtues – cardinal and intellectual – in their lives there is no power and action of theological virtues: faith, hope and love. I would thou know, that these of sin Were blameless; and if aught they merited, It profits not, since baptism was not theirs, The portal to thy faith. If they before The Gospel liv’d, they serv’d not God aright; And among such am I. For these defects, And for no other evil, we are lost; Only so far afflicted, that we live Desiring without hope.237

No one can be saved due to his own goodness. Being naturally good can only result in dwelling in the first circle of the Hell, inhabited by the greatest sages 235 Cf. B. Croce, La poesia di Dante, Bari 1920, p. 21; Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. I, Roma 1970, p. 300. 236 K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 297. 237 Hell, IV, 33–42, transl. H. F. Cary.

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of antiquity. The natural virtues, such as fortitude, prudence, human concern for others, altruism, do not eliminate original sin, as Dante argues. To surpass this condition a supernatural gift is indispensable, and it is unattainable without faith. The ancient sages and heroes were not baptized, not only in terms of external sign – the pagans did not receive baptized as cognition. Their heart did not experience the opening to God, totally new, unexpected, exceeding everything what a man can envisage. The gift of revelation is greater than anything else, because it gives access to the one true God who became a man in Bethlehem. Thomas taught that: “after death men’s souls cannot find rest save by the merit of faith, because “he that cometh to God must believe” (Heb 11:6)”238. Dante remains faithful to this teaching. Thus, despite the poet’s great admiration for Aristotle and love of Virgil’s poetry, he puts them both outside Heaven. The final criterion was for him the supernatural element – the holy faith. Dante’s world is founded on the necessity of a specific order of love, grace and nature. Dante could not save his heroes in contrary to the doctrine of Christian theology, even though he valued and admired them. He, therefore, imagined them in a special place, at the threshold of the Hell, not affected by punishment and suffering, but by solitude. In such way he showed their mysterious fate239. In Dante’s limbo we do not encounter children who died without baptism, though we meet the virtuous – in Dante’s opinion – Muslims: Averroes and Saladin. In the Christian tradition there were supposed to exist two kinds of limbo – the so-called Fathers’ limbo and children’s limbo. According to St. Thomas Aquinas, the both limbos are likely to be situated in the same place, though they differ as to the quality of punishment. “Accordingly if we consider the limbo of the Fathers and hell in respect of the aforesaid quality of the places, there is no doubt that they are distinct, both because in hell there is sensible punishment, which was not in the limbo of the Fathers, and because in hell there is eternal punishment, whereas the saints were detained but temporally in the limbo of the Fathers. On the other hand, if we consider them as to the situation of the place, it is probable that hell and limbo are the same place, or that they are continuous as it were yet so that some higher part of hell be called the limbo of the Fathers (limbus Patrum). […] The limbo of the Fathers and the limbo of children (limbus Patrum et limbus puerorum), without any doubt, differ as to the quality of punishment or reward. For children have no hope of the blessed life, as the Fathers in limbo had, in whom, moreover, shone forth the light of faith and grace. But as regards their situation, there is reason to believe

238 St. Thomas Aquinas, Sum. Theol., III Suppl. q. 69, a. 4 resp. 239 Cf. J. L. Borges, Wspaniały zamek z pieśni IV, transl. M. Zientara, “Literatura na świecie” no. 4 (1995) 285, p. 77.

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that the place of both is the same; except that the limbo of the Fathers is placed higher than the limbo of children, just as we have stated in reference to limbo and hell.”240

Making a place there, and a privileged one, also for the virtuous pagans, and even some Muslims, is Dante’s original idea. This is one of those fragments in The Comedy, which were stigmatized as heresy by the theologians as early as in the fourteenth century. Dante does not mention the unbaptized children who died with the stigma of original sin, but without any actual sins241. This is a theologically difficult issue, and still an actuality. In theological interpretations existed the concept of limbo, but this theory never achieved the status of dogma. However, it was present in theology as the outcome of the efforts undertook in order to solve the question whether children who died without baptism are consigned to hell. Limbus puerorum is a special “part of the hell” for the children who died without baptism. It was imagined sometimes as a place of natural happiness only. The first attempts to clarify this issue that occurred in the third century after Christ refer to the fate of children born of adultery and killed by their mothers242. But the Church does not recognize these theories as her own doctrine. The only patristic text devoted entirely to the question of the fate of the unbaptised children after their death was written by St. Gregory of Nyssa: On infants’ early deaths. Jacek Salij points out that it is not clear whether Gregory asks about the future lot of all the dead children, or solely those dead without baptism: “Will a soul such as that behold its Judge? Will it stand with the rest before the tribunal? Will it undergo its trial for deeds done in life? Will it receive the just recompense by being purged, according to the Gospel utterances, in fire, or refreshed with the dew of blessing”.243

The answer is rather vague: “The premature deaths of infants have nothing in them to suggest the thought that one who so terminates his life is subject to some grievous misfortune, any more than they

240 St. Thomas Aquinas, Sum. Theol., III, supp., q. 69, a. 5 resp, a. 6 resp. 241 C. Grabher, Il Limbo e il Nobile Castello, „Studi Danteschi“ XXIX, (1950), p. 41ff. 242 It is mentioned, among others, in: The Apocalypse of Peter 8; Methodius of Olympus Symposium, Logos 2, 6; Clement of Alexandria, Eclogae propheticae (Extracts from the Prophets) 41. See more: The Catholic Encyclopedia: An International Work of Reference on the Constitution, Doctrine, Discipline, and History of the Catholic Church, vol. 9, ed. Ch. G. Herbermann, Universal Knowledge Foundation 1913, p. 256–257; Compendium of the Traditional Catechism of the Catholic Church, ed. R. Aledo, iUniverse 2013, p. 218–219. 243 J. Salij, Limbus, in Encyklopedia katolicka, vol. 10, p. 1079.

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are to be put on a level with the deaths of those who have purified themselves in this life by every kind of virtue; the more far-seeing Providence of God curtails the immensity of sins in the case of those whose lives are going to be so evil”.244

Although the notion of limbus puerorum appeared only in the Middle Ages, the mature teaching on this subject was already developed by St. Augustine. It was his response to the Pelagian denial of the original sin. According to the Pelagian heresy, infants who died without baptism could be saved and have eternal life, while the kingdom of heaven, only reserved for the baptized, is not available to them. Augustine in countering Pelagius was led to the conclusion that the children who died without baptism are consigned to hell245. “Consider the first-fruit born of the root you praise and think of the change required that he may be loved by God, who loves none but him who dwells with wisdom. God removes what He hates from predestined infants that His love may be for those who, delivered from vanity, may dwell with wisdom. If the last day takes them from the breast, will you dare say they dwell with wisdom outside the kingdom of God, which, according to you, “the good of inviolate and guiltless nature” does not permit them to enter unless the grace of the true Saviour shall redeem and deliver them from the folly of deceitful speech? (…) You say we are senselessly envious of you, in a sort of ‘midday of known truth, where there is no shadow of the unknown’. But you who are without envy, why do you not see great evils in infants? (…) Hence, the sentence of our Lord, “He who does not believe shall be condemned” (Mk 16:16) also pertains to them. For what reason, and in what justice, if they contract no sin by way of origin? (…) If infants, then, are baptized into Christ, they are baptized into His death. (…) who can doubt that non-baptized infants, having only original sin and no burden of personal sins, will suffer the lightest condemnation of all? I cannot define the amount and kind of their punishment, but I dare not say it were better for them never to have existed than to exist there.”246

On the Day of Judgment those who do not enter the Kingdom of God will be condemned, because there is no middle place where unbaptized children could be247. But God is just and if the children are condemned to the punishment of hell, they are “children who have died without baptism, and burdened only with original sin, free from personal failures, will bear the mildest of punishments (mitissima poena)”, but Augustine also dares not to say that nothingness was better for them than the place of the mildest punishment248. 244 Ibid. 245 See: St. Augustine, De peccatorum meritis et remissione et de baptismo parvulorum 1.20.26, in: PL ed. Migne, vol. 44. 246 St. Augustine, Contra Julianum, VI, 1, 3; V, 11, 44. 247 See: St. Augustine, Sermo 294, 3 in: PL ed. Migne, vol. 38, col. 1337. 248 See: St. Augustine, Contra Julianum, 5.11.44, in: PL ed. Migne, vol. 44, col. 809.

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In further theological reflection on this subject the explanation provided by St. Thomas Aquinas received wide approval – he said that there is no suffering in limbus puerorum, while punishment involves only the loss of beatific vision. Thomas explained this problem referring also to Augustine’s thought: “For children have no hope of the blessed life […] Augustine is speaking of punishments due to some one by reason of his person. Of these the most lenient are due to those who are burdened with none but original sin. But lighter still is the punishment due to those who are debarred from the reception of glory by no personal defect but only by a defect of nature, so that this very delay of glory is called a kind of punishment.”249

Aquinas goes to some length to in describing the nature of suffering experienced by the children who have died without baptism: “Therefore, no further punishment is due to the original sin besides the privation of that end to which the gift withdrawn destined him, which gift human nature is unable of itself to obtain. Now this is the divine vision; and consequently the loss of this vision is the proper and only punishment of original sin after death […] As to other kinds of imperfections and goodness inseparable from human nature and resulting from its constitutive elements, those who were condemned due to original sin only suffer no loss. […] But children were never adapted to possess eternal life, since neither was this due to them by virtue of their natural principles, for it surpasses the entire faculty of nature, nor could they perform acts of their own whereby to obtain so great a good. Hence they will nowise grieve for being deprived of the divine vision; nay, rather will they rejoice for that they will have a large share of God’s goodness and their own natural perfections. Nor can it be said that they were adapted to obtain eternal life, not indeed by their own action, but by the actions of others around them, since they could be baptized by others, like other children of the same condition who have been baptized and obtained eternal life.”250

Thomas believed, therefore, that unbaptized children in hell do not undergo any suffering, and even experience a perfect natural happiness through a relationship with God. Children do not know what they are deprived of, therefore they do not suffer the loss of the beatific vision251.

249 St. Thomas Aquinas, Sum. Theol., III, supp., q. 69, a. 6, resp. i ad. 2; q. 75, a. 2, ad. 2. See also: St. Thomas Aquinas, Quaestiones disputatae de malo, q. 5, a. 2, a. 3 resp. 250 St. Thomas Aquinas, Sum. Theol., III, q. 101, a. 1 resp. i a. 2 resp. 251 “Animae puerorum […] Tarent supernaturali cognitione que hic in nobis per fidem plantatur, eo quod nec hic fidem habuerunt in actu, nec sacramentum fidei susceperunt […]. Et ideo se privari tali bono anime puerorum non cognoscunt, et propter hoc non dolent”. St. Thomas Aquinas, Quaestiones disputatae de malo, q. 5, a. 3, ad 4, ed. Leonina, vol. 23, p. 136.

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After these attempts to clarify the problem, in the theology of the thirteenth century emerged the concept of “abyss” where there was no punishment but natural happiness, which, however, was very different from the blessed happiness of the beatific vision. In the fifteenth century the Council of Florence stated: “the souls of those who depart this life in actual mortal sin, or in original sin alone, go straightaway to hell, but to undergo punishments of different kind”252. After this statement, the belief that the souls of unbaptized children receive some mildest punishment was crystallized, and gradually it came to a view according to which these souls are deprived of the vision of God (this is their punishment), but are not subjected to any suffering. Dwelling in the farthest corner of hell, the limbo, perhaps even unaware of the supernatural goods they will never participate in, they enjoy the natural happiness of people who have never committed a voluntary sin. Objectively, they suffer from a fundamental lack, but subjectively they enjoy a quiet life in the hereafter. It should also be noted that in the modern Catechism of the Catholic Church the theory of limbo is not mentioned. The document states simply that these children are entrusted to God’s mercy253. 252 “Illorum autem animas, qui in actuali mortali peccato vel solo orginali decedunt, mox in infernum descendere, penis tamen disparibus puniendas.” Bulla unionis Graecorum (Laetentur caeli), session 6, no. 16, in: Concilium Florentinum, Documenta et Scriptores, Pontificium Institutum Orientalium Studiorum, Roma 1940, vol. I/2. “But the souls of those who depart this life in actual mortal sin, or in original sin alone, go down straightaway to hell to be punished, but with unequal pains.” See: http://www.ewtn.com/library/councils/florence.htm#3. 253 “The Lord himself affirms that Baptism is necessary for salvation. He also commands his disciples to proclaim the Gospel to all nations and to baptize them. Baptism is necessary for salvation for those to whom the Gospel has been proclaimed and who have had the possibility of asking for this sacrament. The Church does not know of any means other than Baptism that assures entry into eternal beatitude; this is why she takes care not to neglect the mission she has received from the Lord to see that all who can be baptized are “reborn of water and the Spirit.” God has bound salvation to the sacrament of Baptism, but he himself is not bound by his sacraments. […] As regards children who have died without Baptism, the Church can only entrust them to the mercy of God, as she does in her funeral rites for them. Indeed, the great mercy of God who desires that all men should be saved, and Jesus’ tenderness toward children which caused him to say: “Let the children come to me, do not hinder them,” allow us to hope that there is a way of salvation for children who have died without Baptism. All the more urgent is the Church’s call not to prevent little children coming to Christ through the gift of holy Baptism”. Catechism of the Catholic Church, no. 1257, 1261.

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Jacek Salij OP points out that the doctrine of limbus puerorum seems not to be the immediate subject of the Catholic faith, but it resulted from defense of the two truths, which form an integral and irremovable part of faith of the Church: all people were born with original sin and it should become a biggest concern for all of us to prevent the children of Christian parents from dying without having received baptism254. In tradition of the Church the opinion that children who have died without baptism are deprived of the beatific vision, for a long time was regarded as the common Catholic teaching. The belief was based on a specific way of integrating the accepted principles of Revelation, though it was never endorsed as a doctrine of faith, or declared to have such certainty as binding articles of faith, which cannot be dismissed without the denial of a truth revealed by God or the Church teaching exercised in a specific act of the Magisterium of the Church. In the year 2007 the document The Hope of Salvation for Infants Who Die without Being Baptised, written by the International Theological Commission, appeared, in which the Catholic theologians claim that the souls of unbaptized children do not go to limbo (limbus puerorum), but to heaven. In the text three main factors were taken into account: the mercy of God, Christ’s mediation and the fact that Jesus gave a special love and care to children. The very concept of “limbo” was deemed an expression of “too narrow and rigorous vision of salvation” and only a theological hypothesis. The authors of the document emphasize that there are “theological and liturgical reasons to hope that infants who die without baptism may be saved and brought into eternal happiness”. There are reasons for prayerful hope, rather than grounds for sure knowledge. “Our conclusion is that the many factors that we have considered above give serious theological and liturgical grounds for hope that unbaptised infants who die will be saved and enjoy the Beatific Vision. We emphasise that these are reasons for prayerful hope, rather than grounds for sure knowledge. There is much that simply has not been revealed to us. We live by faith and hope in the God of mercy and love who has been revealed to us in Christ, and the Spirit moves us to pray in constant thankfulness and joy. What has been revealed to us is that the ordinary way of salvation is by the sacrament of

254 J. Salij OP, Główne kontrowersje teologiczne wokół komunii niemowląt, Warsaw 1982, p. 19–44; Id., Zbawienie dzieci zmarłych bez chrztu, in: Id., Praca nad wiarą, Poznań 1999, p. 197–201. Cardinal Cajetan can be considered a forerunner of the thesis that children who through no fault of their parents died without baptism might be saved in their parents’ faith and by their prayers. (Cardinal Thomas Cajetan, Comm. In Sum. Theol., In 3 q. 68 a. 1–2); W. Granat, Sakramenty święte, vol. 2, Chrzest, bierzmowanie, pokuta, Lublin 1966, p. 119–133.

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Baptism. None of the above considerations should be taken as qualifying the necessity of Baptism or justifying delay in administering the sacrament. Rather, as we want to reaffirm in conclusion, they provide strong grounds for hope that God will save infants when we have not been able to do for them what we would have wished to do, namely, to baptize them into the faith and life of the Church.”255

It should, therefore, be noted that the Church does not have certain knowledge of the salvation of children who died without baptism. God can bestow the grace of baptism omitting the usual sacramental way and this fact has to be borne in mind, especially when this sacrament cannot be administered. At the same time, theologians emphasize that this position cannot be used for questioning the necessity of baptism or unfounded delay in its administering. In our times this issue also has an important pastoral meaning. There are more and more children who in traditionally Christian societies are born into non-practicing families and die without baptism, and many others are murdered by abortion. The issue of state of innocent souls after death also for Dante had to present a theological and emotional dilemma reflected by full of dignity, but at the same time sad atmosphere that prevails in Nobile Castello and tragic question asked in Paradise (Song XIX): how to reconcile God’s justice with the condemnation of those who deserve honor and appraisal? The Eagle from the sphere of Jupiter explains to the poet the meanders of unsearchable judgments of God and the need to comply in the spirit of faith with the justice of God, which thought clearly highlights once again the poet’s belief of the superiority of faith over human speculations256.

10)  Cato as a model of heroism? As was mentioned above, starting from the Earth’s interior to the southern hemisphere of the globe, the poets beholds Purgatory Mount and meets the worthy old man, in which Dante recognizes Marcus Porcius Cato – the Republican statesman who committed suicide on hearing news of the upcoming victorious armies of Caesar. The figure of Cato is not so original and mysterious as the place where the poet puts him. Purgatory is on the side of salvation while suicide (as Dante points out, traversing the seventh circle of the Hell) is a mortal sin. In some comments and footnotes at this passage of The Divine Comedy there are suggestions that Dante interprets Cato’s suicidal act, in the Augustinian spirit, 255 International Theological Commission, The Hope of Salvation for Infants Who Die without Being Baptised, 3.6, p. 102–103. 256 K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 298, 363.

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as justified in exceptional circumstances. I, however, believe that it could be due to the reading the question 96 of the third part of St. Thomas’ Summa, and not the works of Augustine. The African Doctor, while discussing in some detail the problem of suicide in De Civitate Dei, gives the example of a brave Roman women Lucretia, who took her own life not to be disgraced. Immediately, however, he confronts this attitude with the heroism of Christian women. “And accordingly, since Lucretia killed herself for being subjected to an outrage in which she had no guilty part, it is obvious that this act of hers was prompted not by the love of purity, but by the overwhelming burden of her shame. She was ashamed that so foul a crime had been perpetrated upon her, though without her abetting; and this matron, with the Roman love of glory in her veins, was seized with a proud dread that, if she continued to live, it would be supposed she willingly did not resent the wrong that had been done her. She could not exhibit to men her conscience, but she judged that her selfinflicted punishment would testify her state of mind; and she burned with shame at the thought that her patient endurance of the foul affront that another had done her, should be construed into complicity with him. Not such was the decision of the Christian women who suffered as she did, and yet survive. They declined to avenge upon themselves the guilt of others, and so add crimes of their own to those crimes in which they had no share. For this they would have done had their shame driven them to homicide, as the lust of their enemies had driven them to adultery. Within their own souls, in the witness of their own conscience, they enjoy the glory of chastity.”257

This thesis, however, Augustine expressed not only generally, but through the detailed analysis of the most common situations. He examined several historical events that took place in the political life and experiences of the Church. After Alaric had conquered Rome, Christian women raped by pagan soldiers were accused of not committing suicide to protect their virtue. The faithful Christians put forward the question of whether taking their own life should be allowed in order to avoid sin and secure salvation. Donatists, who in the times of Augustine were a very dynamic sect, preached and practiced the principle that self-inflicted death in the name of Christ was equal to martyrdom. If in the case of Roman women who were raped this solution was aimed at avoiding imminent evil, in other cases suicide were to be regarded as a mean to achieve a specific and a very sublime good. This last theme is not outlined so clearly in the pagan philosophy of suicide, even with the Stoics. Augustine yet entertained no doubts as to the

257 St. Augustine, The City of God, book I, XIX, transl. J. F. Shaw, M. Dods, in: A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, vol. 2: St. Augustin’s City of God and Christian Doctrine, ed. P. Schaff, The Christian Literature Company, Buffalo 1887, p. 14.

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moral value of taking one’s own life. He evaluated them all as morally wrong and unacceptable – both suicide from shame and as a means of escape from violence. However, if we put the question about the grounds on which he resisted such a negative judgment of all suicides, it turns out that this part of St. Augustine’s theory is rather scarcely developed. In fact, he uses only one argument: suicide is a murder, and this is prohibited by the law of God contained in the Ten Commandments. In addition to philosophical and theological justification, Augustine proves wrong the reasons evoked with the aim of justifying the moral high ground of the well-known from history of Rome cases of suicide (the Stoic Cato). Besides, he reveals the absurd consequences of the acceptability of suicide, but in fact is guided by Christian religious intuition that, rooted in the tradition of the Old Testament, condemned suicide without allowing any exceptions. It is from this position that he formulates his judgment258. Augustine, therefore, gives an unequivocally negative evaluation to the suicide. “It is not without significance, that in no passage of the holy canonical books there can be found either divine precept or permission to take away our own life, whether for the sake of entering on the enjoyment of immortality, or of shunning, or ridding ourselves of anything whatever.”259

Moreover, he discusses the example of Cato’s putting an end to his life and in Chapters XXIII and XXIV De Civitate Dei expresses his uncompromising disapproval of Cato’s suicidal act, while positively assessing Regulus, who accepted suffering from his enemies and did not take his own life260. It should be noted that in Chapter XXVI St. Augustine attempts to indicate a situation that could justify a suicide: “He, then, who knows it is unlawful to kill himself, may nevertheless do so if he is ordered by Him whose commands we may not neglect. Only let him be very sure that the divine command has been signified. As for us, we can become privy to the secrets of conscience only in so far as these are disclosed to us, and so far only do we judge: No one knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him. (1 Cor 2:11).”261

258 See: more: T. Ślipko, Etyczny problem samobójstwa, Cracow 2008. 259 St. Augustine, The City of God, book I, XX, transl. J. F. Shaw, M. Dodp. 260 “Having such a contempt of life, and preferring to end it by whatever torments excited enemies might contrive, rather than terminate it by his own hand, he could not more distinctly have declared how great a crime he judged suicide to be.” St. Augustine, The City of God, book I, XXIV, transl. J. F. Shaw, M. Dodp. 261 St. Augustine, The City of God, book I, XXVI, transl. J. F. Shaw, M. Dodp.

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Perhaps the reading of this passage of De Civitate Dei made St. Thomas in his discussing the merits of saints in heaven address the subject of martyrdom and ask whether the suicidal act deserves the aureole of sanctity. “Further, an aureole is not due to an unlawful work. Now it is unlawful to lay hands on oneself, as Augustine declares (De Civ. Dei I), and yet the Church celebrates the martyrdom of some who laid hands upon themselves in order to escape the fury of tyrants, as in the case of certain women at Antioch (Eusebius, Eccles. Hist. VIII, 24). Therefore an aureole is not always due to martyrdom.”262

Thomas discusses this issue further, referring to Augustine and the events in Church history: “According to Augustine (De Civ. Dei, I) it is lawful to no one to lay hands on himself for any reason whatever; unless perchance it be done by Divine instinct (nisi forte divino instinctu fiat) as an example of fortitude that others may despise death. Those to whom the objection refers are believed to have brought death on themselves by Divine instinct, and for this reason the Church celebrates their martyrdom.”263

262 St. Thomas Aquinas, Sum. Theol., III, suppl. q. 96, a. 6, objection 6. 263 St. Thomas Aquinas, Sum. Theol., III, suppl. q. 96, a. 6, ad. 6. “Some, shrinking from the trial, rather than be taken and fall into the hands of their enemies, threw themselves from lofty houses, considering death preferable to the cruelty of the impious. A certain holy person – in soul admirable for virtue, in body a woman – who was illustrious beyond all in Antioch for wealth and family and reputation, had brought up in the principles of religion her two daughters, who were now in the freshness and bloom of life. Since great envy was excited on their account, every means was used to find them in their concealment; and when it was ascertained that they were away, they were summoned deceitfully to Antioch. Thus they were caught in the nets of the soldiers. When the woman saw herself and her daughters thus helpless, and knew the things terrible to speak of that men would do to them – and the most unbearable of all terrible things, the threatened violation of their chastity – she exhorted herself and the maidens that they ought not to submit even to hear of this. For, she said, that to surrender their souls to the slavery of demons was worse than all deaths and destruction; and she set before them the only deliverance from all these things – escape to Christ. They then listened to her advice. And after arranging their garments suitably, they went aside from the middle of the road, having requested of the guards a little time for retirement, and cast themselves into a river which was flowing by. Thus they destroyed themselves. But there were two other virgins in the same city of Antioch who served God in all things, and were true sisters, illustrious in family and distinguished in life, young and blooming, serious in mind, pious in deportment, and admirable for zeal. As if the earth could not bear such excellence, the worshipers of demons commanded to cast them into the sea. And this was done to them”. Eusebius Pamphilius, Church History, Life of

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The words as an example of fortitude that others may despise death come from St. Thomas. Dante’s Cato is a guardian of Purgatory, because he renounced his own life for freedom, and the Purgatory is a way towards freedom. I would attribute Dante’s inspiration in portraying Cato to the classical authors (Lucan, Cicero) and to the Angelic Doctor’s comments of Augustine, rather than to a direct Augustinian influence. The African Doctor himself condemns the act of suicide of Cato of Utica264. This glorification of Cato is, therefore, a literary expression of Dante’s desire to bring back to its rightful dimension of ethical and moral dignity everything related to the Cato story. It would confirm the influence of Cicero who regarded this heroic act as exaggerated, but still positive (De officiis, I, 31). As Morawski argues, the symbolic meaning of this character in Dante’s Commedia is a protest against inner slavery and glorification of the spiritual inner strength of the ancient pagan world, but placed somewhere between orthodoxy and heresy. Maybe a special tribute to the Roman statesman is due to the likeness between him and the poet: Dante, after all, was also seeking moral freedom while defending his innocence and dignity265. Virgil in this way introduces the poet to Cato: In the search Of liberty he journeys: that how dear They know, who for her sake have life refus’d. Thou knowest, to whom death for her was sweet In Utica, where thou didst leave those weeds, That in the last great day will shine so bright. For us the’ eternal edicts are unmov’d.266

Perhaps in this context Cato’s personality and his deed is gaining its true and proper religious significance, becomes an exemplum, a testimony, almost martyrdom, in the name of the idea of freedom, which is being developed in the

Constantine, Oration in Praise of Constantine by Eusebius Pamphilius, VIII, 12, 2–5, transl. A. Cushman, Christian Literature Publishing Co., New York 1890. Without any doubt, for Thomas suicide is an absolute evil because it is an act against love, against society, and ultimately against God. A person who commits suicide contravenes all these values, thus committing a grave sin. An exception can be made only for the aforementioned example. 264 “Tartareas etiam sedes, alta ostia Ditis, et scelerum poenas, et te, Catilina, minaci pendentem scopulo. Furiarumque ora trementem, secretosque pios, his dantem iura Catonem.” Virgil, Aeneid VIII, 667–670. See. Dante Alighieri, The Banquet, IV, 11–19. 265 Cf. K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 326. 266 Purgatory, I, 70–72, transl. H. F. Cary.

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Christian poet from the initial strictly political understanding until to its the identification with freedom of will. Admiration for Cato’s action of Cato is akin to the admiration the poet expressed for the ethical doctrine of Stoics, understood as control over desires and complete submission to the law of reason and duty. In Virgil’s Elysium Cato is the master and judge of the souls of the righteous. Perhaps this is why we find the Roman Republican in such a special place – on the threshold of salvation. In this context, the Republican statesman somehow can be regarded as an example of heroism in the name of freedom and opposition to tyranny. Reflection on Dante’s decision to place a suicide in the Purgatory may be of value even today. Indeed, Jacek Salij OP, described a desperate act of Fr. Andrzej Fedukowicz from Zhitomir, a victim of Soviet religious persecutions, which is similar in a way to the case of Cato of Utica. Fr. Fedukowicz’s Golgotha began in November 1923, when he was arrested as the alleged leader of the spy organization, acting – as investigators were persuading him – for Poland and Vatican. He agreed to collaborate as an agent in return for the release of the innocent people who were arrested with him. Arrested again soon, tortured and broken both mentally as spiritually, the priest pleaded guilty to espionage and wrote under the dictation of the Joint State Political Directorate267 officers an open letter to the pope Pius XI. The letter ensured that the Soviet Union has no religious persecution, and if some priests are imprisoned it is only for their political activities. Fr. Fedukowicz “asked” the pope that the Vatican did not require priests to spy and to make the Polish government to cease the recruitment of priests for espionage activities. In a state of complete disorder, Fr. Fedukowicz was released from prison, but then the Soviet press published this “letter to the Pope”, giving it a great publicity. This caused a severe shock in the Catholic community, because people were not yet accustomed to this kind of slanderous accusations, and many gave them faith. What the “author” of this letter must have experienced – mentally broken, alone and condemned by many co-believers – is hard to imagine. In the end, on March 4th, 1925, he doused himself with kerosene and set himself on fire, accusing himself loudly of his wrongdoing. This act elicited a powerful reaction, the funeral drew thousands of people. So far, the unfortunate priest was condemned, now he 267 The Joint State Political Directorate (also translated as the All-Union State Political Administration) was the secret police of the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1934. Its official name was “Joint State Political Directorate under the Council of People’s Commissars of the USSR” (Russian: Объединённое государственное политическое управление при СНК СССР), Obyedinyonnoye gosudarstvennoye politicheskoye upravleniye under the SNK of the USSR, or ОГПУ (OGPU).

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begins to be regarded as a hero, a great witness of enormous harm inflicted to the Church by Soviet authorities. Jacek Salij OP poses the question: would anyone dare to call this an act of suicide? It was the act of a man extremely tormented and abused, who probably did not even realize what he is doing at the time, but he did his best in giving testimony to the truth – the truth that communism is a terrible enemy of humanity itself268.

11)  Dante and Ulysses – a pilgrim and an explorer For understanding the conceptions of space and movement in the universe described by Dante, the mythological figure of Ulysses is very important. Let us recall that the poet encounters a mythical hero in the eighth circle of Hell. However, as Morawski points out, it does not mean a lack of respect for the Homeric hero. Dante harbored a lot of sympathy for Ulysses. This is not surprising. Both characters have a lot in common, especially when it comes to the mission of which they became the exponents. Dante, like Ulysses, sets himself the goal difficult to achieve. The road to it is fraught with dangers of all kinds269. Both heroes are striving for truth. Ulysses travelled beyond the limits of the known world, Dante traversed the gates of Hell to pass through Purgatory and Paradise and finally, after crossing the boundaries of the universe, to reach the highest source of happiness and goodness and stand before God270. Both characters are driven by desire to broaden their horizons, established and perpetuated by the traditional world view. Although Dante as a Christian and theologian must condemn Ulysses’ thirst for knowledge born of pride, as a poet he sympathizes with him271. Hence, Dante’s Ulysses has a double-sided nature: to the evil pouches he comes as an insidious and fraudulent counselor, but there he tells the story of his last voyage and death, pointing to the continuum of both his and Dante’s spatial and moral journey. Both characters are, in fact, “heroes of the road”, always moving in a straight line resulting in curvature. The movement in The Comedy is always directed by the absolute axis, so that there is always either the ascend or descend, accomplished in the contracting or expanding spiral motion. What is more, the movement in Hell in Dante’s poem is associated with ever-increasing spatial confinement, contrary to 268 See: J. Salij, Pytanie o moralność samobójstwa heroicznego, „W Drodze“ no. 3 (2007), p. 119–122. 269 Cf. Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. V, Roma 1976, p. 803. 270 Cf. Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Inferno, letture e commento … op. cit., p. 357. 271 Cf. K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 234, 317.

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the ascent to the heavenly spheres in increasingly widening circles. The hell, contracting to the narrow isthmus, is depicted as the opposite to the extending of the infinite Heaven. The movement of Ulysses in his journey across the sea is slightly distorted by the curvature of the surface of the Earth and the inclination of his ship to the left. However, while Dante’s movement is along the three-dimensional axis of top-bottom, embodying a noble impulse towards higher things, that of Ulysses is a horizontal motion, as if he were travelling on a two-dimensional map. It is no coincidence then Dante claims to see from the celestial spheres of the constellation of Gemini, as if on a map, the sailing ship of Ulysses. sì ch’io vedea di là da Gade il varco folle d’Ulisse, e di qua presso il lito nel qual si fece Europa dolce carco272.

Lotman argues that Ulysses is a kind of Dante’s doppelgänger, both of them travelling, both in constant motion and, most importantly, exceeding the limits of well-known and already-understood world, entering into prohibited areas. Each character in Dante’s poem has its specific location in space, is already there or is moving toward it. Only those two – Dante and Ulysses – are in constant moving led by desire to see what is behind “the borders of the world.” Ulysses calls his companions: “O brothers!” I began, “who to the west Through perils without number now have reach’d, To this the short remaining watch, that yet Our senses have to wake, refuse not proof Of the unpeopled world, following the track Of Phoebus. Call to mind from whence we sprang”.273

What is more, both of them cover the same route, actually making way to the same place – Mount Purgatory: Dante through Hell, Ulysses over the ocean, leaving behind the Mediterranean Sea and sailing to the opposite hemisphere. Both journeys are guided by desire to obtain knowledge of “the vices and the worse of men”, as well as of the unknown world by transgressing boundaries of what is familiar. Both reach the Mount located on the other hemisphere. Here Ulysses meets his tragic end perishing in a shipwreck: 272 La Divina Commedia, Paradiso, canto XXVII, 82–85. “Which from the midmost to the bound’ry winds;/That onward thence from Gades I beheld/The unwise passage of Laertes’ son,/And hitherward the shore, where thou, Europa!” Paradise, XXVII, 82–86. 273 Hell, XXVI, 116–117, transl. H. F. Cary.

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But soon to mourning changed. From the new land A whirlwind sprung, and at her foremost side Did strike the vessel. Thrice it whirl’d her round With all the waves, the fourth time lifted up The poop, and sank the prow: so fate decreed: And over us the booming billow clos’d.274

When Dante describes, as viewed from above, the route of Ulysses, he speaks about varco folle d’Ulisse – “Ulysses’ mad course”. But, as Borges observes, the same word (folle) is used by the poet when in the dark forest, at the beginning of the poem, he comments Virgil’s proposal to select a path through Hell: “I, if on this voyage then I venture, fear it will in folly end.” (Temo che non sia la folle venuta, Inferno, II, 35). Obviously enough, this repetition is intentional. Dante, standing at the foot of Purgatory Mount, is the one who can see what before the death was seen only by the eyes of Ulysses and his sailors. He goes along the trail of the mythical hero who traversed what is known and defined. Then on the solitary shore arriv’d, That never sailing on its waters saw Man, that could after measure back his course.275

The poet probably thinks here of Ulysses and his sad story from the depths of hell, in which he revealed the circumstances of his tragic death. His pride pushed him on a sea journey, while Dante’s journey was not motivated by pride but humility. Hence, Dante’s being girded by a reed by Virgil at the foot of Purgatory Mount “pleased another” The very same words Ulysses uses in his tale when describing the cause of his ship’s sinking at the coast of Purgatory – com’ altrui piacque – it “pleased another” that Ulysses would not return from the expedition276. He wanted to know, directed by his desire, a world without human beings – not discovered by anyone the ocean of the Antipodes. Therefore, this journey was a kind of sacrilege, a transgression, a frenzied and unrestricted pursuit of the unknown. Thus, pride which led Ulysses was punished. Dante, whose journey was born out of humility, 274 Hell, XXVI, 137–142, transl. H. F. Cary. See more: Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. V, Roma 1976, p. 804. 275 Purgatory, I, 130 –132, transl. H. F. Cary. 276 Cf. J. L. Borges, Ostatnia podróż Ulissesa, transl. A. Sobol-Jurczykowski, “Literatura na świecie” no. 4 (1995) 285, p. 90; H. Urs von Balthasar, Glory of the Lord … op. cit., p. 12. Not noticing the fact that the end of the journey of Ulysses described by Dante in Song XXVI of The Hell is the result of the hubris of the hero who wants to cross the borders of the mystery of God, and not an accident, points to ignorance. See: D. Burstein, A. de Keijzer, Secrets ... op. cit., p. 63.

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reaches Purgatory Mount, repents his sins and can continue his salvific journey, succeeding where Ulysses failed. Thus, when Dante looks at the surface of the Earth from the constellation of Gemini, he finds himself at the opposite point to the place of death of Ulysses. Flying from the “Heracles pillars” to the axis of Zion-Purgatory, he repeats (in reverse motion) the way Ulysses’ ship had taken, reaching the point corresponding to the very place where it crashed (at the foot of Purgatory Mount). In this way, Lotman interprets, Dante’s journey is a kind of continuation of the journey of Ulysses since his tragic death. As Ulysses’ knowledge pushed him toward tragedy, so Dante’s knowledge elevates him morally. Ulysses is a traveler wishing to discover the white spots on the map of the Earth, Dante is a pilgrim wishing to explore moral and spiritual meaning of the universe277. Considering the interpretation of the analogy between the journeys of the legendary Greek hero and the Italian poet, I agree with Lotman that, in the broader sense, it unveils the fundamental difference between hunger for knowledge inspired by humility (and therefore closely associated with morality), and a discovery resulting exclusively from a scientist’s genius. Witnessing the end of the medieval world, on the threshold of the modern era, Dante saw one of the primary dangers of the coming times and a new culture they were to bring – the separation of knowledge from religion, and thus from morality. Ulysses symbolizes intellectual pride – the aspiration of knowledge negatively evaluated in the poem of Dante who represents another (deeply medieval) model of science in which knowledge is aimed not so much at a discovery as at getting closer to the mystery of God – the Creator and Governor of the universe. In the Divine Comedy the poet himself illustrates it superbly. The encyclopedic knowledge, which he uses weaving the whole arsenal of contemporaneous knowledge into almost every verse, is not a random collection of isolated news but creates a kind of integrated structure describing the harmonious and perfect space of science and faith. The origins of this approach can be found in the Convivio, but the magnificent full-fledged vision is reflected in the Commedia. In the very center of the enormous edifice of the universe there is a man, powerful by his knowledge, but in harmony with all circles of the universe and well aware of his being a part of this world, which came from the hand of God, and in which everything speaks of Him. Therefore, regarding Dante Alighieri as a precursor of humanism is, in my opinion, indicative of ignorance to his vision of the world which remains deeply 277 Cf. J. M. Lotman, Wędrówka … op. cit., p. 135–137.

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inscribed into medieval mentality. The unity of visible and invisible world, their interpenetration and harmony are the essence of the cosmological model, imbued with deep moral pathos. The division between knowledge and morality, reason and conscience, as well as the idealization of individuality which were already foreseen by Dante in the upcoming atmosphere of empiricism of modernity, represented for him a different, alien world278. He belonged to the Middle Ages – the era of communion between God and man, which believed in Christ and wanted to fulfill the work of Christ’s Church irrespective of cost, as French philosopher Jacques Maritain said – with the unconscious courage of childhood279. This courage meant that the temporal order was put at the service of the supernatural upcoming to establish the reign of Christ over the world. For this reason Dante can be called not only a poet, a philosopher and cosmologist, but also a theologian. The Divine Comedy is the work of a theologian and a special kind of theological discourse, also in a deeper and stronger sense of the word. The poet is fully aware of building his vision upon bold theological ideas maybe too bold for our sensitivity. For some people his is the lecture of theology of fear and terror that does not take God’s mercy into account, for others it is an indication of the integrity of knowledge with the ideals of faith280.

12) Aristotelianism, Thomism and Averroism of Dante Alighieri While reading both The Banquet and The Divine Comedy, the reader familiar with the medieval ideological trends and ideas faces the question about whether Dante can be classified as a convinced follower of any particular philosophical school? If so, was he more of an Aristotelian or a Thomist? Or maybe a concealed Averroist? Among Dante scholars there have been many attempts to answer this question281. In the Convivio Dante expresses his great admiration for the Philosopher and Aristotelianism which presumably, as described above, he learned in Florence from Remigio dei Girolami, and later probably in Bologna. Most likely, his enthusiasm 278 Cf. J. M. Lotman, Wędrówka … op. cit., p. 138. 279 J. Maritain, Katolicyzm i filozofia, „Verbum“ no. 4 (1934), p. 480. 280 See. T. Węcławski, Boska Komedia. Komentarz teologa. Dante, teolog – www. verbasacra.pl/boskompoz-t.htm. 281 See: Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. I, Roma 1970, p. 374, 476–477, vol. V, Roma 1976, p. 633; G. Savarese, Una proposta per foresee … op. cit., 104; B. Nardi, Saggi di filosofia dantesca, Firenze 1967.

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wears off a little later due to the so-called “Condemnation of Paris” and thirteenth century “official” reluctance to Aristotelianism and Averroism. However, the impact of Aristotle can be seen in formulated by Dante philosophical issues related to human final goal and happiness. He shares the Philosopher’s ethical views on the need of ensuring order and accomplishment for people on earth. As Étienne Gilson observes, Dante’s proper political philosophy was based on ethical guidelines of Nicomachean Ethics, from which Alighieri obtained the belief in a special role of earthly social life, its specific and autonomous purposes282. In Book III of The Banquet the author examines the Aristotelian idea of philosophical happiness and speculative perfection, which the human mind can achieve as far as it uses the light of natural reason283. The additional evidence of Aristotelian sources of Dante’s thought can be found in the fact that the latter, in his vision of the cosmos, places moral philosophy in the highest sphere – “Crystalline” – where physics and metaphysics dwell together on the firmament of the world. According to Gilson, it symbolizes opposition to a strong medieval tradition, in which the indisputable superiority of metaphysics (first philosophy) dominated over morality and ethics, which belong to practical philosophy284. For Dante it is a step towards the notion of philosophy that would be “knowledge of a human being as such”. Ethics is the discipline that provides true knowledge of human person and human behaviour, a guide that leads people through life. Hence Dante’s considerable interest in practical solutions concerning the social life. Addressing the men of action (also politically active) he proposes them as a main goal the only kind of happiness attainable in active life, i.e. acting in accordance with virtue. Here the impact of Aristotelian teaching on the purpose of life can be recognized, as well as the appreciation of temporal dimension of human existence, which – in contrary to the earlier medieval theories – becomes for Dante the aim in itself.285 Urs von Balthasar believes that this complex issue should be viewed in the perspective of the principle that Dante applied to Beatrix. For the sake of infinite love, it is not necessary for the Christian to renounce finite love. On the contrary, in a positive spirit he can incorporate his finite love into the infinite. This principle justifies Dante’s life, Dante’s work and his indelible love for Beatrice – a girl who lived in Florence at the turn of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. A puzzle, which 282 283 284 285

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Cf. É. Gilson, Dante … op. cit., p. 110; F. Cheneval, La philosophie … op. cit., p. 80. Cf. C. Vasoli, Myśl Dantego … op. cit., p. 87. Cf. É. Gilson, Dante …, op. cit., p. 126. Cf. E. Porębowicz, Dante jako filozof i teolog, “Nowy przegląd literatury i sztuki”, 4 (1921), vol. II, p. 9–10.

in vain, as Urs von Balthasar observes, Gilson tried to solve, wondering why Dante opposed in an abrupt and incomprehensible way his mentors – A ­ ristotle and Thomas – proclaiming ethics, and not metaphysics, the highest philosophical discipline, may find its solution in the light of this principle. Why? The ­German theologian argues that for Dante ethics, or the knowledge of right behavior, is all about achieving individual perfection based on greatness and nobility of human soul. Therefore, the essence of the poet’s philosophy is the union of love and wisdom, including its erotic and aesthetic dimension. This love is the supreme principle of the world. So Dante’s elevating of ethics to the highest level should not be explained in terms of priority of praxis over theory, of action over innate contemplation, but, as Urs von Balthasar affirms, it should be understood as a primacy of the concrete, personal existence over the scholastic essentialist conception of the world.286 Presumably, this is why in the commentaries on Aristotle Dante sought above all the fragments which corresponded to his ideal of Philosophy-Wisdom, capable to satisfy human thirst for knowledge. However, he harboured an inextinguishable desire to deepen his reflection and experience, as well as involvement in the dramatic social and political crisis of fourteenth-century Italy. That is the reason why Dante, as Étienne Gilson observes, does not pretend he is an expert on theological and philosophical ideas. He rather aims at dissemination of knowledge intended for a circle of educated people, who want to take the risk of making changes both in themselves and the world. Before systematic research on Dante there was a common thesis of strong influence of St. Thomas Aquinas on the Italian poet. Rogiński, among others, wrote about it: “There would be no Dante’s immortal poem if there were no Summa Theologica. It is the same work divided into two parts, one of which has concise and scientific form, while in the second one the same content is sung with melodic poetic language”287. However, after the thorough analysis of Bruno Nardi and Etienne Gilson, based on philosophical doxography, the aforementioned thesis seems to be too far-fetched288. Dante probably knew a few works of St. Thomas Aquinas, as he refers to them in his works, but he rather derives from Aquinas’ thought ideas more theological in nature than strictly philosophical. 286 Cf. H. Urs von Balthasar, Glory of the Lord … op. cit., p. 34–36. Konstanty Michalski thinks similarly. See: K. Michalski, Filozofia … op. cit., p. 528. 287 J. Rogiński, Św. Tomasz z Akwinu. Szkic biograficzny, Włocławek 1924; M. Barbi, Dante… op. cit., p. 53. 288 Cf. B. Nardi, Dante e la filosofia, in: „Studi danteschi“, vol. XXV–XXVIII, Firenze 1940, p. 160; É. Gilson, Dante … op. cit., p. 246.

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Therefore, according to Morawski, Dante cannot be described as a Thomist in the strict sense of the word. He does not accept the Thomistic system in all its impressive complexity and versatility. The Florentine is rather eclectic, prone to choosing what is suitable to substantiate his doctrinal claims and metaphorical images in the Commedia289. What is more, Gilson rejects the easy temptation to seek in the Convivio hard evidence of Dante’s Thomism or Averroism, or belonging to any particular faction of the scholastic tradition. He merely tries to extract some overall doctrinal elements which constitute the dominant themes of the Italian poet reflection in this work: justification of philosophy as a symbol of the Noble Lady; cognition of the specific subject of philosophy and its departments; description of the effects of devotion of the philosopher to the wisdom; analysis of the relationship between faith and philosophy290. Cheneval argues that Dante’s philosophy is imbued with the concept of happiness, which, however, cannot be reduced easily to radical Aristotelianism or Thomism291. Sometimes encountered thesis that Dante in his poem transformed Thomas’ Summa Theologiae into a poetic triplet is, in my opinion, significantly simplified. In the poet’s texts there are many threads referring to the ideas popular at that time. Michalski believes that the Italian poet tried to work through and present in his work in at least four of the then current trends of thought – Augustinism, resurgent neo-Platonism, Arabic and Christian peripatetism292. Wais argues that of all philosophers Dante most valued Aristotle, and therefore can confidently be spoken of as a peripatetic. Whether it was Thomistic peripatetism or Averroistic is difficult to resolve. Certainly, the impact of the Philosopher on Dante’s understanding of a man and society was enormous, as his most important theological, philosophical and political works – The Banquet, The Divine Comedy and The Monarchy – emphatically demonstrate293. Papini believes that Dante’s thought, especially that expressed in the ideological structure of The Comedy, became Thomistic due to Remigio dei Girolami and the Franciscan school influenced by spiritualistic prophecies, inspired by the ideas of

289 Cf. K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 186; B. Nardi, Dante e la filosofia … op. cit., p. 160; B. Nardi, Dante e la cultura medievale, Roma Laterza 1983, p. 269. 290 Cf. É. Gilson, Dante …, op. cit., p. 85ff. 291 Cf. F. Cheneval, La philosophie … op. cit., p. 83. 292 Cf. K. Michalski, Filozofia … op. cit., p. 461, 490. 293 Cf. K. Wais, Dante jako filozof. W sześćsetną rocznicę zgonu poety, “Przegląd Teologiczny. Kwartalnik Naukowy” II (1921), Lwów, p. 194.

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Joachim of Fiore294. It is highly probable that in the concepts, beliefs and even the Apocrypha of the Calabrian abbot the source of Dante’s criticism of ecclesiastical wealth and splendor, so bluntly expressed in verses of The ­Divine Comedy, can be found. Presumably, in the spirit of Franciscan poverty and radical spiritualism the poet manifests in The Paradise his vision of pure Church, evangelical and humble295. The Calabrian abbot Joachim of Fiore was in the thirteenth century one of the main spiritual leaders of medieval Europe. This hermit and preacher taught that humankind in its history was moving through three stages of progress corresponding to the three Persons of the Blessed Trinity: the reign of God the Father (the time of secular power and submission to the rigorous requirements of the Old Testament), the reign of Son of God (the time of the Church) and the reign of the Holy Spirit, in which love, justice, brotherhood and freedom will triumph, and the Church will return through the monastic life to poverty and authentic practice of the evangelical virtues. In the situation of a strong commitment of the papacy to political affairs, as well as growing wealth and splendor of life of the clergy, there emerged in medieval Europe movements characterized by strong spirituality. The theses of Joachim met with great response among the people who were scandalized by the attitude of priests, bishops and the Pope himself, who were often a lot more secular rulers than they were ministers of the Gospel. Joachim was regarded in Dante’s time as a prophet, almost a saint. Immediately after his death his authentic writings and apocrypha met with unexpected response. Therefore, in Dante’s masterpiece Joachim of Fiore symbolizes the renewal of religious life, a sign of hope for the new era to come – the renewal of society and the Church. Perhaps for this reason Alighieri places Joachim in Paradise among the theologians and doctors of the Church, together with Saint Augustine, Saint Bonaventure, Hugh of St. Victor and other scholars, and he delivers in his honor words of appreciation296. And at my side there shines Calabria’s abbot, Joachim, endow’d With soul prophetic.297

Dante’s commentators claim that various references to the medieval Church situation present in The Divine Comedy bear an influence of prophetic and apocalyptic 294 Cf. G. Papini, Dante żywy … op. cit., p. 68. 295 Cf. K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 247. 296 Cf. J. Le Goff, The Medieval Imagination, transl. A. Goldhammer, University of Chicago Press 1992, p. 72–76; C. Vasoli, Myśl Dantego…, op. cit., 101; J. Paśnik, Kultura wieków średnich … op. cit., p. 152; J. Kracik, Trwogi i nadzieje końca wieków, Cracow 1999, p. 91. 297 Paradise, XII, 140, transl. H. F. Cary.

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elements of the Franciscan doctrine of Joachim of Fiore. Joachim undeniably was a mystic, a dreamer, an utopian. His theories were revolutionary and barely suitable to the context of then religious and social concepts, especially Catholic orthodoxy298. Nevertheless, Urs von Balthasar argues that it is impossible for Dante himself to feel the initiator of this new, third theology having its source in the views of the Calabrian abbot, whom the poet regarded as the twelfth (the last) teacher of the Church in the procession of scholars met in the sphere of the Sun. Morawski also speaks of careful (though definitely positive) attitude of the poet towards Joachim – no representative of Joachimism was mentioned in The Comedy. Perhaps Joachim of The Paradise is a symbol of appreciation of certain theses of the spiritualists, but at the same time the cautious approach to this movement, which was already at that time clearly at odds with the hierarchical Church. Therefore, Papini’s thesis about Dante’s mirroring strong influences of joachimists in his poetic vision of the Church appears to be unfounded299. Dante’s placing of Averroes and Avicenna in The Purgatory, and Siger of Brabant in The Paradise, certainly raises the question of the poet’s relation to the Latin Averroism, which was, as it is well known, one of the strongest trends in scholastic philosophy of the thirteenth century, causing the biggest controversies and disputes300. Amazement and curiosity of The Comedy readers derives from 298 Cf. J. Le Goff, Długie … op. cit., p. 181. 299 Cf. H. Urs von Balthasar, Glory of the Lord … op. cit., p. 12; G. Papini, Dante … op. cit., p. 212. Michalski, while discussing the circle of scholars on the sphere of the Sun, argues that a special attention must be paid to the representatives of contemporaneous mysticism – among them there were a few mediocrities and two heretics – Joachim and Siger. Cf. K. Michalski, Filozofia … op. cit., p. 508; K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 250. 300 Averroes took over and developed the conception of incorruptible intellect. Although he was an original thinker and the author of several important works, in the thirteenth century he was known primarily as an interpreter of Aristotle, regarded with such esteem that he deserved to be called a commentator. Obviously, today we know that his comments were not free from Neoplationic influence and dependent, among others, on Alexander of Aphrodisias, but nevertheless much more faithful to the authentic Stagirite’s thought than the other Arabic comments. Michael Scot started to translate Averroes’ comments ca. 1230 at the court of Emperor Frederick II, and thirteen years later all the scripts of the Muslim philosopher were available in Latin. As a result, a strong Averroistic movement emerged at the University of Paris, whose main proponents became Siger of Brabant and Boethius of Dacia. For Averroes, the individual passive intellect under the influence of the active intellect, the lowest of the celestial intelligences, is actualized and becomes the “acquired intellect”, which in turn is absorbed into the active intellect in such a way that it does not die

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the fact that in the Dantesque Paradise a praise for Siger (the most important representative of Latin Averroism) is delivered by his ideological and theological then opponent – St. Thomas Aquinas, and Siger stands to his immediate left, while to the right there is St. Albert the Great. with its possessor but loses its individuality, so there is only one acquired intellect for the entire human species. Thus, there is no individual immortality, the mortal body perishes after death, while the collective intelligence persists. Hence the conception is known as the theory of the unity of the intellect or monopsychism. Both intellects mentioned by the Philosopher Averroes considers a spiritual form exempt from any kind of individuality, and so the only one for all the humankind. Monopsychism entailed complete separation of intellect from the human soul and body. This conception entirely denies the immortality of the individual soul and the human person. The Averroistic doctrine of the universal potential intellect independent of the individual opposes in a very radical way the truth of individual spirituality and immortality of the human soul. Therefore averroism, expanding rapidly in the Christian world in the thirteenth century, challenged the deepest principles of Catholic teaching on the human soul and on man’s personal responsibility for his actions. What is more, Averroes was also of the opinion that the same statements can be true for faith and false in philosophy. Several of thirteenth century scholars supported his views, including Siger of Brabant and Boethius of Dacia. For the orthodox Christian philosophers such an interpretation of the indestructibility of the human soul was completely unacceptable. Christian faith guarantees individual human immortality, and not the participation in the common intellect of some common substance. For this reason St. Thomas in the Summa contra Gentiles objected forcefully to Averroistic theses. About Latin Averroism and its impact on medieval intellectual disputes. See more: É. Gilson, History of Christian Philosophy in the Middle, Sheed and Ward 1980; F. van Steenberghen, Aristotle in the West … op. cit., p. 218–230; F. van Steenberghen, Thomas Aquinas and radical Aristotelianism, Catholic University of America Press, 1980, p. 105–110; Medieval Philosophy: From St. Augustine to Nicholas of Cusa Readings in the history of philosophy; ed. J. F. Wippel, A. B. Wolter, Simon and Schuster 1969, p. 125; H. A. Davidson, Alfarabi, Avicenna, and Averroes, on Intellect: Their Cosmologies, Theories of the Active Intellect, and Theories of Human Intellect, Oxford University Press 1992; P. Swieżawski, Awicenny filozoficzna teoria człowieka, in: Rozprawy logiczne. Księga pamiątkowa ku czci prof. K. Ajdukiewicza, Warsaw 1964; P.  Swieżawski, Centralne zagadnienie tomistycznej nauki o  duszy, “Przegląd Filozoficzny” 44 (1948), no. 1–3; J. Le Goff, Time, Work, and Culture in the Middle Ages, transl. A. Goldhammer, University of Chicago Press, 1980; O. Leaman, Averroes and His Philosophy, Psychology Press 1998; Siger of Brabant, Questiones in t­ertium De anima, De anima intellective, De aeternitate mundi, ed. B. Bazan, Louvain-Paris 1972; St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra gentiles, II, q. 73: That there is not One Possible Intellect in all Men and q. 75: Solution of the Seemingly Demonstrative Arguments for the Unity of the Possible Intellect.

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Lastly this, from whom Thy look on me reverteth, was the beam Of one, whose spirit, on high musings bent, Rebuk’d the ling’ring tardiness of death. It is the eternal light of Sigebert, Who ’scap’d not envy, when of truth he argued, Reading in the straw-litter’d street.301

It can be assumed that in Dante’s poetic symbolism St. Thomas is a representative of speculative theology, St. Bernard of Clairvaux – of mystical theology, and Siger – of pure philosophy to such an extent as its representative in the Dantesque limbo is a pagan Aristotle. If Thomas delivers a eulogy to Siger, it can be guessed that this does not mean the historical Thomas agreed with the views of the historical Siger, but that speculative theology compliments philosophy. Gilson argues that it is a tribute paid in The Paradise to philosophy by theology in the person of its brilliant representative302. However, the open praise of Siger was not safe. Was Dante fully aware that the views of Siger potentially could be open to anti-ecclesial interpretation? Siger’s theses were condemned in 1270, and later in 1277, among the errors of Avveroists who were the subject of the famous condemnation by Bishop Stephen Tempier of Paris. This latter event, Gilson termed “the end of the golden age of scholasticism”303, considers crucial for medieval philosophy. Frederic Copleston is of the opinion that it was not so much an appreciation for Averroism as an affirming of the importance of philosophy and its methodological autonomy in relation to religious inquiry. It seems that for Dante the biggest Siger’s merit was constructing an edifice of philosophy on natural reason only, to make it a rational and “pure” science304. Stefan Swieżawski, however, claims that Siger in the poem does not represent Averroism, but Dante’s own separatism, the separation of church from state the poet strived for all his life305.

301 Paradise, X, 133–138, transl. H. F. Cary. Straw-litter’d street means here the Parisian street where various schools of philosophy were located. See: more: G. Savarese, Una proposta per forese. E altri studi su Dante, Roma 1992, p. 104; Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. I, Roma 1970, p. 476–477. 479. 302 Cf. É. Gilson, Dante …, op. cit., p. 259. 303 Cf. É. Gilson, History of Christian … op. cit., p. 365. 304 Cf. F. Copleston, History of Philosophy, vol. 2: Medieval Philosophy, A&C Black, New York 2003, p. 199–201. 305 Cf. P. Swieżawski, Dzieje europejskiej filozofii klasycznej, Warsaw - Wroclaw 2001, p. 889.

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Undoubtedly, among the twelve luminous spirits dancing in the sphere of the Sun Dante wanted to place the intellectual luminaries gifted by Providence with a special wisdom. We meet there theologians, canonist, wise king, historian, erudite-compiler, educator. There was also needed, according to Steenberghen, a representative of the great Aristotelian philosophy. This philosopher, however, had to be a Christian, while an advocate of the autonomy of philosophy as a science. Dante must have known that Siger of Brabant some twenty five years earlier was the most famous master of the faculty of artium and the most prominent representative of the peripatetic school. For this reason, he made Siger an ally and companion of St. Thomas and St. Albert, thus making this person the sign of freedom and emancipation of philosophy among the prominent, but ideologically entangled theologians306. Bruno Nardi also argues that the fact that these characters were placed in perspective of eternal salvation, expressed a special Alighieri’s reverence for Avicenna, Averroes, Algazel and Alfarabi. He owed to them the theories he employed in his works, both philosophical and poetic: the doctrine of the divine light, the theory of intelligence, the influence of celestial spheres, the need for enlightenment. Nardi’s research on philosophical legacy of Siger of Brabant, conducted in the years 1911– 1912, showed that among the writings of Dante and Siger there are several specific points of convergence and their theories, beyond all doubt, are very close in terms of doctrine307. The distinction between religious truth in the supernatural realm, and political truth in social relationships, is analogous to the Averriostic doctrine of two truths which the human intellect meets. Without a doubt, Latin averroism had its impact on political issues. Theoretically, from the position proclaiming the equality between philosophy and religion there is only a small step to autonomy and equality of the goals defined by these two fields308. It follows therefore that the state authorizing temporal means is an equal partner to the trustee of the supernatural – the Church. It can assumed that Dante in his political speculations could be inspired by Siger’s views, though transferring them to the ground of social relations309. 306 Cf. F. Van Steenberghen, The philosophical movement in the thirteenth century, Thomas Nelson & Sons, Edinburgh 1955, p. 76. 307 Cf. B. Nardi, Intorno al Tomismo di Dante e alla quistione di Sigieri, in: “Giornale Dantesco”, vol. XXII, 5; Medioevo e Rinascimento: Studi in onore di Bruno Nardi, Firenze 1955, p. 907–927. 308 Cf. Enciclopedia Dantesca, vol. V, Roma 1976, p. 238–239. 309 J. Baszkiewicz, Myśl polityczna wieków średnich, Poznań 1998, p. 63. On the political ideas and inspiration of Dante, see: J. Grzybowski, Miecz i pastorał. Filozoficzny uniwersalizm sporu o charakter władzy. Tomasz z Akwinu i Dante Alighieri, Kęty 2007, p. 149.

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Averroes was a philosopher-metaphysician, and Dante – a philosopher-­ sociologist, as he would be called today – so perhaps he owes to the Arab scholar the idea of “the unity of intellect” – unitas intellectus, which he transformed into the idea of “humanity” – humana universitas310. It would be rather difficult, therefore, to defend the thesis that Dante’s special appreciation for the Muslim commentators of Aristotle was only due to their views on the unity of the intellect. It is rather the respect that the poet expresses for the commitment of human intellect to research free from the influence of religious doctrines, whether Muslim or Christian311. Despite the enhanced research and reflection on texts of the Florentine, it should be admitted that a significant number of allegories and poetic intuitions are still not fully explained. Is the specific description of Ulysses’ journey and his condemnation – of his deception, but first of all his intellectual pride – that is unrestrained thirst for knowledge of all human and divine things, can be regarded a prefiguration of the Averroists’ approach, as Maślanka-Soro suggested? Or is it a concealed controversy with the Averroists312? It is difficult to propose a uniform ideological interpretation of philosophical inspiration in Dante’s works. We can deal only with speculations which, nevertheless, reveal unequivocally that the poet was a child of his times – he overwhelmed the multiplicity of trends and ideas that stimulated the medieval European minds.

13)  The difference of Dante’s world A modern man finds it difficult to accept Dante’s imago mundi. The Comedy is not easy to read, firstly because without the footnotes it would be impossible to decipher the meaning of the symbolism of metaphors and characters, secondly, because the world is no longer the great cathedral, in which omnipotence, power and absolute perfection of God is reflected. It is no longer a temple in which the Earth occupies a central place, surrounded by the space of harmonic cosmos, setting the orientation in all directions. The ancients saw it that way. Scipio in Cicero’s famous Dream of Scipio says that “what is there glorious to the contemplation of him, who looks at the small size of the earth, first as to its whole extent, them to that part of it which men inhabit? And yet we, confined to so small a portion of it, unknown to most nations, hope our name will be 310 Cf. Dante Alighieri, Dante Monarchy, Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought, transl. and ed. Prue Shaw, Cambridge University Press, 1996. 311 Cf. K. Morawski, Dante Alighieri, op. cit., p. 224. 312 Cf. M. Maślanka-Soro, Tragizm… op. cit., p. 172.

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diffused to its utmost limits”313. That is the way the medieval scholars understood the cosmos. It is an absolutely anthropocentric vision, but the belief in the central cosmic place of a man does not result from pride, but rather from theological assumptions – God wanted the whole universe because of goodness and uniqueness of human beings. A similar intuition is expressed by Stefan Swieżawski, who explained the hierarchy of beings in terms of metaphysics and cosmology of St. Thomas. The beings differ not only in terms of essence – the difference in existence is fundamental here. The living exceeds the inanimate infinitely. A living being is more complex, more valuable and more “powerful in existence” than an inanimate one. One manifestation of intellectual life (cognition) from this perspective means more than limitless mass of cosmos with its galaxies and nebulae. Therefore, is it not true that the thought of medieval cosmologists, expressed in their image of the universe, illustrate to some extent our contemporary physical intuitions? It is conceivable that a countless amount of inanimate matter, filling everything that exists in the universe, is needed to produce somewhere the conditions that could make intellectual reflection – thought, exceeding in its power everything that is only material – ­possible In light of these considerations, the homocentrism of medieval scholars does not appear to be completely absurd314. In this cosmological model everything has its ordered place and its guide – the spheres are guided by angelic Intelligences while the Earth is guided by Fortune which its sphere revolves unceasingly (see: The Hell, VII, 85–90). Therefore, Dante finds himself lost in his journey, but guided somehow through the enormous edifice of the world, because this world, though inconceivably immense, was unequivocally limited. The last sphere, or Primum Mobile, was a maggior corpo, the greatest of all existing things. To look at the starry Heaven meant to look at it in depth, but also a way “up” of a huge edifice – the Cathedral of God’s creative wisdom, in which all the elements correspond perfectly to design a cosmos temple, the distant cupola of which creates the last circle – the first moved sphere, thereby defining the boundaries of the universe. 313 Cicero, Republic, book 1, 26–27, transl. G. W. Featherstonhaugh. “Scipio lis, quae videant ceteri. quid porro aut praeclarum putet in rebus humanis, qui haec deorum regna perspexerit, aut diuturnum, qui cognoverit quid sit aeternum, aut gloriosum, qui viderit quam parva sit terra, primum universa, deinde ea pars eius quam homines incolant, quamque nos in exigua eius parte adfixi, plurimis ignotissimi gentibus, speremus tamen nostrum nomen volitare et vagari latissime?” M. T. Cicero, De re publica, I, 26–27. 314 Cf. S. Swieżawski, Święty Tomasz na nowo odczytany, Poznan 2002, p. 87.

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To further realize the liturgical and architectural atmosphere of this cosmological model, it is necessary to know that cosmos of ancient and medieval world, though vast yet finite space, is not dark and silent. The Sun illuminates the entire universe, the night is only a shadow of the Earth when the Sun is on the opposite side of the globe, and all celestial bodies moving on their orbits sing in a harmonious choir315. Harmony expressed in the “singing of cosmic spheres” reveals the world full of light, warm and resounding with music. The cosmos is permeated with divine love and peace, interspersed with radiant power and light of angels and souls sent to the spheres and the Earth as living hands of God. The poet throughout his masterpiece reminds us that we live in a such astronomical and theological structure. In the cosmological vision of Paradise everything becomes a game of sounds and colors. Desired Spirit! with its harmony Temper’d of thee and measur’d, charm’d mine ear, Then seem’d to me so much of heav’n to blaze With the sun’s flame, that rain or flood ne’er made A lake so broad. The newness of the sound, And that great light, inflam’d me with desire, Keener than e’er was felt, to know their cause.316

The music and light, optical and acoustic impressions presented by Dante are crucial. Smell and touch play an important role in Hell and Purgatory, but in Paradise dominates the expression of colors and sounds. This vision, bathed in dazzling brightness of light, which supernatural source is no longer the Sun but God Himself – the Light imperishable317. 315 The belief that cosmic space is illuminated and lucid was widespread in medieval thought. Already Gregory of Nyssa wrote: “Those skilled in astronomy tell us that the whole universe is full of light, and that darkness is made to cast its shadow by the interposition of the body formed by the earth; and that this darkness is shut off from the rays of the sun, in the shape of a cone, according to the figure of the sphere-shaped body, and behind it”. Gregory of Nyssa, De opificio hominis, XXI, 3. 316 Paradise, I, 76–80, transl. H. F. Cary. 317 Cf. C. P. Lewis, The Discarded Image … op. cit., p. 74, 82; H. Urs von Balthasar, Glory of the Lord … op. cit., p. 72. Pythagoras was the first person in history known to indicate that fundamental musical intervals correspond to simple numerical ratios and are symbolically reflected in the harmony of the whole Universe. To Pythagoreans we owe the theory that the universe is based upon mathematical principles of harmony, and therefore the music is the audible version of the musical harmony reigning in the whole cosmos – the sun, the planets, the stars – the music of the spheres. Thus the celestial bodies “sing” while incessantly revolving in their spheres

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As Urs von Balthasar emphatically points out: the cosmos is permeated with divine forces, is perceived in a Christian way, and the whole aesthetic power of poetic expression is employed to show Christian theological aesthetics. Naturally, the poet used the vivid and dynamic view of the cosmos developed in antiquity, but with the aim of weaving geographicity and astrologicity into the scenes of Christian harmony318. Who turn’d his compass on the world’s extreme, And in that space so variously hath wrought, Both openly, and in secret, in such wise319

In spite of admiration for the Florentine poet’s genius, his world is distant and extraneous to us not only because its cosmological concepts are not valid any more. It is distant and largely incomprehensible to us, because we, no longer believe in the absolute top or absolute bottom, we are closer to Pascal’s sorrowful and full of anxiety outcry: “Infinite immensity of spaces terrifies me!” Due to astronomical discoveries, the space has become for us a dark, cold, empty space, extremely relative. The position of the Earth is relative to the Sun, so as in our solar system to other stars. Generally speaking, all places, motion and time in the universe are relative. This cosmic space is relativistic as it does not contain any specific points. Milosz called it a nightmare which constitutes the very essence of disinheritance: absolute space and time of Newton, depriving us from order and and the sound produced by them creates an ineffable harmony. The number and the music manifests itself in the mathematical necessity that is ruling the world with supernatural power – here the idea of mediation establishing a universal order is symbolically revealed. Such a cosmologic-musical theory was also present in medieval conceptions. Music meant harmony in reference to God and creation. “The world sings”, although mortal humans cannot hear the music. Hence in the Middle Ages three types of music were discerned: musica mundana (inaudible music around which the universe is still in motion, all the celestial bodies, the elements and the whole of nature), musica humana (the internal inaudible music expressing the harmony of the human body and soul) and musica instrumentalis (all audible vocal and instrumental music). See more: J. James, The Music of the Spheres: Music, Science, and the Natural Order of the Universe, Springer Science & Business Media, New York 1995; M. C. Ghyka, The Geometry of Art And Life, Kessinger Publishing, New York 2004, p. 33; E. Witkowska-Zaręba, Problem wizualizacji struktur dźwiękowych w średniowiecznej teorii muzyki, in: Sacrum. Obraz i funkcja w społeczeństwie średniowiecznym, ed. A. Pieniądz-Skrzypczak, J. Pysiak, Warsaw 2005, p. 372. 318 Cf. H. Urs von Balthasar, Glory of the Lord … op. cit., p. 74; G. Warren, Dante’s Aesthetics of Being, op. cit., p. 124. 319 Paradise, XIX, 40–42, transl. H. F. Cary.

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settlement in the world320. In an absolutely neutral area no direction is privileged: neither East, despite its being the direction where the light of the day comes from, nor West, where the Sun sets. We float in a space like neutral atoms. Our movements and gestures are empty. The drama lies in the fact that in a world where everything is equally important, there is no road, purpose or destination. The world has not only ceased to be deocentric, but ceased to be anthropocentric as well. Our world became extremely relative, where every direction is equally important, or equally unimportant, and thus actually neutral and indifferent. Today’s philosophers and astronomers agree that Copernicus’ discovery was not as much a revolution in astronomy (the heliocentric hypothesis was known long before the revolutionary research of the scientist from Frombork), but rather markedly influential in the mental outlook, in the way of imagining the world321. A paradigmatic shift occurred in world-view orientation. The medieval schema of the universe was geocentric. Copernicus’ hypothesis made way to the concept of nature that uses the simplest way. The former complicated and illogical system met the expectations of philosophical and theological nature rather than cognitive. It offered something that was for the people of that time far more valuable than the mathematical elegance and simplicity – one hundred percent existential security322. In Ptolemy’s system man was in the center of the universe, in the center of God’s attention, while in the Copernican system man is only a creature on a tiny planet, in a powerful, immense and mysterious universe. No longer was humanity at the centre of the universe, but rather humanity was but one small 320 Cf. C. Milosz, The Land of Ulro, transl. L. Iribarne, Farrar, Straus, Giroux, New York 1984. 321 The first proponents of the medieval heliocentric theories that emerged in the Faculty of Liberal Arts at the University of Paris were Francis of Mayrone, John Buridan, Nichole Oresme. See: G. Skirbekk, N. Gilje, A History of Western Thought. From Ancient Greece to the Twentieth Century, Psychology Press 2001; M. Carrier, The Completeness of Scientific Theories. On the Derivation of Empirical Indicators Within a Theoretical Framework. The Case of Physical Geometry, Springer Science & Business Media 1994. 322 Obviously, Copernicus was not the first to question the adequacy of the geocentric model of the universe. These ideas were already present in the works of Leonardo da Vinci, Galileo, or even Nicholas of Cusa – through his work De docta ignorantia the astronomer could become familiar with the idea of infinity of the universe. See: Introducing Nicholas of Cusa: A Guide to a Renaissance Man, ed. Christopher M. Bellitto, Thomas M. Izbicki, Gerald Christianson, Paulist Press 2004; P. M. Watts, Nicolaus Cusanus: A Fifteenth-Century Vision of Man, Brill 1982; H. Blumenberg, The Legitimacy of the Modern Age, MIT Press 1985.

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part of a much larger system in constant movement. It was a huge degradation! Although the cosmological model of the Middle Ages, so brilliantly depicted in Dante’s poetic vision – the Cathedral of the universe, so alien to Pascal’s despair – is still impressive and evokes admiration, but it has one, quite a serious flaw: from the physical-cosmological point of view this model is false. The unusual golden thread stretched by the cathedral poetry of Dante Alighieri between heaven and earth, world of matter and world of spirit, nature and grace, knowledge and faith, and finally man and God, that connected the entire universe in a harmonious model of Christian charity, in the modern era had been, it seems to me, irreparably broken.

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Conclusion Dante’s journey, according to his biographers, ended in Ravenna, on the night between 13th and 14th September, 1321. The poet’s soul departed to the worlds that he wanted to describe and portray in the poetic stanzas, to join the countless souls of people who had already left the temporal world. All the characters of his poem had experienced death – “this sweet pain that reconciles us with God” – and the only one living during this wonderful journey was the poet himself. The journey was a passage to the great community of the dead, a kind of pilgrimage resembling theodicy – learning and understanding who God is and the way He rules the world. Alighieri takes the immortality of human soul for granted. Immortality, and therefore, indestructibility – the soul remains alive eternally (in the endless continuity) and resides “somewhere”, meaning a state, not a physical place. This poem is also a sort of confession of human frailty, weakness, betrayal and all iniquity, with the everlasting hope for redemption, provided a sinner believes in the power of mercy. The travel through the Three Kingdoms is a story of liberation from sin and perdition, a history of gradual fulfilment of Christian life, which should ultimately lead to the encounter with the mystery of God. Without any doubt, Dante is here not only a poet. He acts as an apostle, a prophet and a reformer. He explains the nature of misery of the world, and he is trying to show the way of moral renewal. It is the struggle against the most dangerous transgressions and sins, of which the poet first mentions betrayal, greed, meanness, pettiness and callousness. In The Commedy rich poetic imagination is associated with philosophical and moral discourse, theology with the creed, political polemic with personal references to enemies and friends met in the afterlife, and allegory with allusion. Various books and publications suggest that appreciation of knowledge and human reason, as well as admiration for the ancient culture, are characteristic of Dante, portrayed as the precursor of humanism. Dante is seen as a moralist and humanist, who considers the ancient Rome as a literary and historical horizon of his deliberations. This thesis, however, must be revised because when we go deeper into the poet’s texts, when we look at his world and try to understand his symbols and metaphors, we understand that Dante was a scholastic. He was firmly rooted in the intellectual atmosphere of the Middle Ages, and he used the tools given by the contemporaneous science, poetics, philosophy and theology. The doctrine and discourse presented in Dante’s works are clearly medieval. The problems and 145

trends of the medieval culture constitute the context of the ideas and expressions that shaped his works. It is impossible, therefore, not to see this crucial context in which the author was set, namely the medieval era when God was genuinely placed at the first place. The concept of philosophy as a guide to theological knowledge is closely related to this theocentricity. And although the poet’s ideas and his world view seem to broaden the horizons of the times in which he lived, Dante can scarcely be regarded as a herald of modern humanism. Hans Urs von Balthasar puts it bluntly: “It would be ridiculous to say that although Dante is a great poet, he is unfortunately still involved with medieval, or stricte Catholic dogmatics”323. Dante is the most brilliant poet of the Italian language, undeniably innovative in style and language, but as a poet he can only be understood when placed within the framework of the Christian doctrine with which Dante deeply identifies, and in which his inspirations are immersed. He appears in all his works as a continuer of the scholastic thought and the debtor of that gift which medieval theology and philosophy offered its disciples in schools and universities. Therefore, Dante’s masterpiece should be regarded as a special kind of synthesis – of scholasticism and mysticism, of antiquity and Christianity, of the idea of the Kingdom of God on earth and the Franciscan spiritual Church. The poet simply belongs to this world, the world of the great medieval cathedrals’ builders, for whom, for the last time in history, knowledge and faith, ethics and aesthetics, obedience and reform could exist harmoniously supporting each other and raising miraculous edifices to show the greatness of God and His Church.

323 H. Urs von Balthasar, Glory of the Lord … op. cit., p. 55.

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Bibliography Dante Alighieri’s texts Dante Alighieri, Dante Monarchy, Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought, transl. Prue Shaw, Cambridge University Press, 1996. Dante Alighieri, De Vulgari Eloquentia, transl. and ed. Steven Botterill, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2005. Dante Alighieri, Epistole, in: Tutte le opere di Dante, ed. F. Chiappelli, Milano 1965. Dante Alighieri, Il Convivio, in: Dante Alighieri, Tutte le opere di Dante Alighieri, ed. E. Moore, P. Toynbee, Oxford 1904. Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Inferno, letture e commento di Vittorio Sermonti, Edizioni Scolastiche Bruno Mondadori, Collana di classici italiani commentri diretta da Cesare Segre, Milano 2000. Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Paradiso, letture e commento di Vittorio Sermonti, Edizioni Scolastiche Bruno Mondadori, Collana di classici italiani commentri diretta da Cesare Segre, 2001. Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia. Purgatorio, letture e commento di Vittorio Sermonti, Edizioni Scolastiche Bruno Mondadori, Collana di classici italiani commentri diretta da Cesare Segre, 2000. Dante Alighieri, The Banquet, transl. Richard Lansing, Garland Publishing Inc, New York 1990. Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy, transl. H. F. Cary, M. A., University of Adelaide, Cassell and Company, London, Paris, Meulbourne 1892. Dante Alighieri, Lyrische Gedichte. Übersetzt und erklärt von Karl Ludwig Kannegiesser und Karl Witte, Leipzig 1842.

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