Poetics of Redemption: Dante’s Divine Comedy 9783110637106, 9783110634099, 9783111088907

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Andreas Kablitz Poetics of Redemption

Andreas Kablitz

Poetics of Redemption Dante’s Divine Comedy Translated by Fiona Elliott

ISBN 978-3-11-063409-9 e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-063710-6 e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-3-11-063418-1 Library of Congress Control Number: 2020940476 Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available on the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de. © 2021 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston Cover: Gustave Doré, “The circle of angels”, in: Edmund Ollier (1870), The Doré Gallery, London/New York, Cassel, Petter and Galpin. © Getty Images/THEPALMER Printing and binding: CPI books GmbH, Leck www.degruyter.com

To Albert

Contents Preface

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Lecturae Dantis Reflections of the Ulysses Canto (Inferno XXVI) in Contemporary 1 Scholarly Praxis and in Modern Research Art in the Afterlife or God as Scupltor The Reliefs in Dante’s Purgatorio (Purg. X – XII)

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Videre – Invidere The Phenomenology of Perception and the Ontology of Purgatory (Purg. XIII) 79 Temporality and Eternity in Dante’s Purgatorio The Valley of the Princes at the Foot of Mount Purgatory (Purg. 119 VII – VIII) The End of the Sacrum Imperium From Dante to Petrarch: The Evolution of the Representation of History 161 Poetics of Knowledge in the Paradiso 211 (Paradiso XXVII and XXX) List of Original Publications Bibliography

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Preface The studies on Dante collected in this volume interpret his Commedia as the attempt of a renewal of the Christian work of salvation by means of literature. In the view of his author, the sacro poema responds to a historical moment of extreme danger, in which nothing less than the redemption of mankind is at stake. The degradation of the medieval Roman Empire and the rise of an early capitalism in his birth town Florence, entailing a pernicious moral depravation for Dante, are to him nothing else but a variety of symptoms of the backfall of the world into its state prior to its salvation by the incarnation of Christ. Dante presents his journey into the other world as an endeavor to escape these risks. Mobilizing the traditional procedures of literary discourse for this purpose, he aims at writing a text that overcomes the deficiencies of the traditional Book of Revelation that, on its own terms, no longer seems capable of fulfilling his traditional tasks. The immense revaluation of poetry implied in Dante’s Commedia, thus, contemporarily involves the claim of a substantial weakness of the institutional religious discourse. At this point I would like to express my gratitude to Fiona Elliott for her English translation of the book as well as to Hannelore Rose and Matthea Keser for their editorial support. I would also like to thank Bojan Stojanovic for helping to design the cover and everybody at De Gruyter who was involved in the making of the book. A. K. Cologne, September 2020

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110637106-002

Lecturae Dantis Reflections of the Ulysses Canto (Inferno XXVI) in Contemporary Scholarly Praxis and in Modern Research I Few of the cantos in Dante’s Commedia have inspired such interest amongst 20th-century scholars as Canto XXVI of the Inferno. And in the philology of Dante’s work scarcely any other canto has led to such persistent controversies, which fundamentally always revolve around the same question. At the heart of the debate is the figure of Ulysses who in fact has a decisive role in this canto: after all he appears here as the representative of the sinners that the narrator, on his pilgrimage through the afterlife, has gathered together in this circle of Hell. Of these only the mythical Greek hero is granted a voice. When Dante discovers from Virgil who it is that is hidden in the two-tongued flame that had immediately drawn his attention he feels compelled to talk to Ulysses. But Virgil prefers to address Homer’s hero himself, fearing an arrogant response from Ulysses at the sound of a foreign tongue. Readily and without hesitation the Greek hero answers the question that is asked of him. In his reply he concentrates entirely on his last voyage. He now recounts how, at the end of his life, he passed the pillars of Hercules in order to explore the unknown ocean and that it was on this last voyage that he was shipwrecked. And it is the interpretation of this account that has led to the controversy mentioned earlier. But what is actually at issue in this debate? Above all it is the moral standing of the figure of Ulysses that has been questioned. At issue is whether Dante has introduced him here as a positive or a negative figure. On the other hand, it cannot be denied that the author of the Commedia has placed the cunning inventor of the Trojan Horse in Hell, and not in Limbo, where the honourable heroes have found their last resting place, but far down in the funnel of Hell, in the Città di Dite where the evil-doers endure their wretched existences. Hence Ulysses can only appear in a positive light if one breaks down his character into its various facets. The hero setting out across the ocean to explore an unknown world has to be distinguished from the sinner suffering eternal punishment for his transgressions.¹ In terms of the ensuing debate, the exact definition of the sins that Ulysses has committed is therefore of some significance. Almost unanimously, com-

 For an example of this approach see Fubini 1947, p. 465. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110637106-003

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mentators and interpreters – contemporary and modern alike – assume he is guilty of fraudulent counsel.² Without doubt this fits very neatly into the system of Dante’s Hell, for logically, that is to say in a sequence of increasingly grave sins, the thieves who use violence to achieve their ends are followed by those who use cunning to harm others. However, a shadow of doubt is cast on this otherwise perfectly convincing moral and theological categorisation of Ulysses by the fact that he is never described in terms of this sin, indeed the term consigliere frodolente does not appear once in Canto XXVI. It is only in the following canto, Inferno XXVII, that the term occurs, describing the nature of the sins of the protagonist of this canto, Guido da Montefeltro, who is in the same circle of Hell as Ulysses, namely the eighth bolgia. As a rule when figures are found at the same level in Hell this also means that they are guilty of the same sins. Yet, nowhere in the Commedia is Ulysses himself described as a giver of fraudulent counsel, and the unconsidered attribution of this categorisation to the figure of Ulysses appears all the more problematic if one looks more closely at the context in which the relevant term is in fact used. It occurs at the close of Guido’s account of his own life. As he now knows, he has above all incurred guilt by providing crucially effective advice to Pope Boniface VIII, aiding the latter in his unjust struggle with his opponents. Thus, at his death one of the “black Cherubim” appears, telling St Francis of Assisi, who has hurried to the scene, that any attempts to rescue this damned creature would be in vain. And it is in the words of this black angel that we find the term “false counsel”: Francesco venne poi, com’ io fu’ morto, per me; ma un d’i neri cherubini li disse: “Non portar; non mi far torto. Venir se ne dee giù tra ’ miei meschini, perché diede il consiglio frodolente, dal quale in qua stato li sono a’ crini; ch’assolver non si può chi non si pente, né pentere e volere insieme puossi, per la contradizion che nol consente.” (Inferno XXVII,112– 120)³

 One of the earliest amongst these was Jacopo della Lana in Lana 1324, Inferno XXVI,1– 3: “qui intende trattare [l’autore] la pena delli fraudolenti.” Henceforth all quotations from commentaries on Dante’s Commedia will be given citing the relevant canto and lines only according to the Dartmouth Dante Project: https://dante.dartmouth.edu/commentaries.php (last accessed: 15 October 2020).  All passages from Dante’s works will be cited here and henceforth without page references and according to the edition Le Opere di Dante Alighieri, Edizione nazionale a cura della Società dantesca italiana.

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Whether or not the sin of consigliere frodolente referred to here may be applied to the figure of Ulysses is not least a question of language. For the term itself does not correspond to any moral category in theological argument. Rather it characterises a singular misdeed, the description of which need not necessarily be identical to that of the category it falls under. Thus the sin of fraudulent counsel may very well be a specific aspect of a more generally sinful habitus. These doubts as to the categorisation of Ulysses’ sins appear all the more justified in that the de facto named misdeeds for which he has been banished to Hell can by no means all be described as false counsel. It may apply cum grano salis in the case of the Trojan Horse, and perhaps even to the persuasion used to encourage Achilles to join the war, although at this point the text uses a different term, namely arte. However, it can hardly be applied to the theft of the Palladium.⁴ Moreover, Ulysses’ last voyage into an unknown world cannot be described as consigliere frodolente. Generally the motivation behind this undertaking is attributed to Ulysses’ curiosity, and it is the various assessments of this curiosity that kindle the debate as to the ‘actual’ meaning of this canto. There is no consensus as to whether this curiositas is to be seen as a sinful disposition or whether we are dealing here with a noble desire for knowledge. The question as to how this curiosity should be read is further compounded by a problem of literary history. Should Ulysses be taken as the representative of medieval attitudes which decried any unbridled thirst for knowledge as sinful?⁵ Or is he an early embodiment of the value put on curiosity in the modern era, which no longer confines it within moral limits?⁶ The debate surrounding Canto XXVI of the Inferno has of course also focused on how the contradictions or even discrepancies within this canto may be resolved. What, for instance, might be the explanation for the sinner Ulysses also manifesting one of the noblest of human desires? But even when this last voyage by Ulysses is taken as an expression of errant curiosity, there is still a need to find a way of reconciling this sinful curiositas with his other mis-

 Inferno XXVI, 58 – 63: “e dentro da la lor fiamma si geme/l’agguato del caval che fé la porta/ onde uscì de’ Romani il gentil seme./Piangevisi entro l’arte per che, morta,/Deïdamìa ancor si duol d’Achille,/e del Palladio pena vi si porta”.  Typical of this position are Forti 1961, p. 362, note 1 and Truscott 1973, p. 69.  The most determined, one might even say uncompromisingly positive slant on the figure of Dante is proposed by Momigliano 1946, Inferno XXVI,64– 69: “Il ricordo dei grandi fatti, eternati dalla poesia antica infiamma Dante: di qui quella preghiera intensa, che nasce da uno spirito preumanista. Dante, nonostante le apparenze, non condanna le frodi di Ulisse e di Diomede, ma le esalta, esaltato dal ricordo della poesia classica.” A similar line is also taken by Gmelin 1966, Inferno XXVI, 86 – 142: “But the ancient appreciation of sapientia has become something entirely new, it has turned into a new appreciation of experientia; thus Dante has made Ulysses into a forerunner of the great Renaissance thinkers” (translation by F. E.).

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deeds, for there is general agreement that the circumstances of his situation must be intrinsically coherent. The explanations offered are structured according to two basic patterns. Some strategies seek harmony in the whole, while others affirm the inherent contradictions which are themselves taken as meaningful. Giorgio Padoan, for one, makes a significant attempt to harmonise the content in what I still regard as one of the most perceptive interpretations of Canto XXVI of the Inferno, even if I cannot agree with him in the point that is at issue here. Padoan seeks to resolve the supposed contradiction between false counsel and unbridled curiosity by giving precedence to the former. In his view, Ulysses’ last voyage may also be put down to consigliere frodolente for the actual sin was not the voyage itself but the fact that Ulysses used false counsel to dupe his companions into embarking on this fatal adventure.⁷ Meanwhile the affirmation of the contradictions in the figure as described in this text resorts to a variety of explanations. Thus we find the ensuing discrepancies being attributed to the psychological make-up of the author.⁸ Or the evident ambivalence is taken as an expression of the watershed between two epochs.⁹ The very contradictions thus

 “‘«O frati», dissi, «che per cento milia/perigli siete giunti a l’occidente,/a questa tanto picciola vigilia/d’i nostri sensi ch’è del rimanente/non vogliate negar l’esperïenza,/di retro al sol, del mondo sanza gente./Considerate la vostra semenza:/fatti non foste a viver come bruti,/ma per seguir virtute e canoscenza»’” (Inferno XXVI,112– 120). For an interpretation of these words as fraudulent counsel see Padoan 1959, p. 57. Kay 1980 made a similar attempt to attribute all the misdemeanours of the eighth bolgia to the sin of astutia. And just in passing: as far as the structure of the argument goes, it seems to me that what seems like a very different interpretation by Mazzotta 1975 is in fact decidedly similar to that of Padoan. Mazzotta reads Ulysses’ Canto as an example of rhetoric – the importance of which had already been pointed out by Padoan (see for instance Padoan 1959, p. 53). Mazzotta sees rhetoric above all as laying bare the true nature of all language. In his view, its dubious morality and its duplicity are merely an expression of the deceit that is intrinsic to all language. This argument provides an effective strategy for dismissing the controversy surrounding Ulysses’ moral standing. For, seen in this light, his lie is now no more than the system-immanent conditio of language itself. Thus the coherence of the song is secured in this innate untruthfulness – and the instruments of deconstruction stand surety for the cogency of the song.  Fubini 1947, p. 470: “Come si conciliano l’esaltazione dell’impresa di Ulisse e l’ammonimento ‘State contenti, umana gente, al quia’? Direi che i due passi rappresentano non tanto due opposte concezioni quanto due momenti dell’animo dantesco, che ora sente con dolore la finale inanità del magnanimo sforzo verso il vero dei grandi pagani, ora invece si esalta per la grandezza che si rivela in quello sforzo pur vano, testimonianza dell’intrinseca nobiltà della natura umana.”  This is the main conclusion of Blumenberg’s interpretation: “Dante’s Ulysses is not yet a Renaissance figure, rebelling against the Middle Ages. […] This character, whose curiosity about the world Cicero and patristics had not been able to agree on, again demonstrates the uncertainty on the part of critics, or at the very least the difficulty of measuring his particular attitude to the

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become telling. Not least, there are suggestions that the author’s recourse to an ultimately mythical category, namely that of tragedy, lies behind the contradictions of the text.¹⁰ How do these interpretations by modern scholars since the 19th century differ from those by Dante’s contemporaries? As far as the moral standing of Ulysses is concerned, this was a bone of contention then as now. This is hardly surprising in view of the different opinions of him that already existed in Antiquity, for even then he already stood for some as a paragon of wisdom while others – most notably Virgil – saw him as a considerable rogue with an excessive thirst for knowledge. Thus the dichotomy between unacceptable curiosity and an honourably inquiring mind does not simply reflect the division between two epochs in the post-ancient world, for in the culture of Dante’s own time there was already a tradition of uncertainty regarding the figure of Ulysses. However – to my knowledge – in the commentaries of the 14th and 15th centuries his curiosity is never cast in a specifically positive light. Indeed, broadly negative judgements of his character are much more common than the opposite; and where a writer does detect a positive side to the mythical hero’s character, it is not his noble thirst for knowledge but rather his magnanimitas that receives particular mention. At the same time it seems to me that the crucial difference between the studies and commentaries by modern Dante scholars and those by his contemporaries lies not so much in the different estimations of Ulysses’ moral standing, but is, if anything, sooner to be found in the function of literary comment as practised during the two periods and in the status of the outcome of such literary discussions. I should like to elucidate this difference initially by focusing on the opposition between the terms ‘truth’ and ‘meaning’. In a sense this opposition is

world against the valid or still valid standards of that age. That alone would be sufficient grounds for claiming that something new is happening here” (Blumenberg 1980, pp. 141 f.; translation by F. E.). Stierle similarly understands the figure of Dante’s Ulysses as a sign of a watershed situation: “Dante’s new Ulysses undoubtedly gives substantial, lasting imaginary form to a burgeoning, irreversible drive in the search for knowledge that was by now pushing to go beyond the existing limits” (Stierle 1988a, p. 114; translation by F. E.).  The very title of Nardi’s analysis attaches central importance to this category: “La tragedia di Ulisse” (Nardi 1942). This most-quoted study of Canto XXVI of the Inferno emphasises the dichotomy between the poet and the theologian; a conflict that is ultimately won by the latter – not without a certain expression of melancholy being attributed to the author. Ulysses’ offence seems here to be an extension of the Fall from Grace, he himself appears as the heir to Adam who rebelliously transgressed against the divine command (Nardi 1942, p. 98). The conclusion drawn by Croce 1922, p. 98 in his study of this canto is similar to that of Nardi, even if he – more clearly than the latter – presents Dante’s quiet rebellion against the unquestioningly accepted theological verdict in terms of an absolute human truth.

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somewhat lop-sided. For who could deny that even the allegorical commentaries by Dante’s contemporaries are aimed at uncovering the meaning of the text, after all one of the central issues in the theory of exegesis is the distinction between different levels of meaning: the sensus historicus, the sensus allegoricus etc. And yet the status of what is conveyed on these various levels is fundamentally different if the meaning of the text is identical to a truth that is valid in its own right, independently of the text to be commented upon. To take this to a provocative extreme: an exegesis which has the truth as its ultimate goal formulates textual meanings that are not informative as such. In such an exegesis the texts are stating what is already known. Admittedly the best counter-argument for this claim would appear to be provided by the one text that has been interpreted more than any other in our culture. This text is of course the Bible, which as the Word of divine revelation stands out as a paradigm of informativity. Yet this is only an apparent contradiction. For significantly exegetic theory has distinguished different grades of information content specifically for the text of the Holy Bible. Probably the most influential programme for the interpretation of the Bible, in Augustine’s De doctrina christiana, expressly states that everything the Bible does not say literally in one place must be explicitly said elsewhere in this text.¹¹ Thus everywhere that the text needs – allegorical – interpretation, it is ultimately not saying anything new. Allegory is a strategy for mediating ideas; it is geared towards the psychology of the reader whom it would like to win over to the truth. In such cases the ingenium of the interpretation is not setting out to discover new content but is aiming instead to disentangle existing complexities. It is about insight, not about epistemology – it is about insight into a truth of such magnitude that it cannot be said often enough. Thus the text that reads as an allegory is always the bearer of a truth that is distinct from the text itself and quintessentially valid. This in turn means that only certain, selected texts could ever be the object of such an interpretation: texts that hold the promise of a truth but where that truth is not immediately apparent. The opposition of truth and meaning postulated here is seen not least in an outcome that seems to me to be one of the most characteristic features of the way that literary scholarship handles a text. This feature may be initially described using a distinction between two terms that comes from Augustine’s semiotic theory, which he himself developed in his own exegetic text, De doctrina chris See Augustinus, De doctrina christiana, II,6 [8]: “magnifice igitur et salubriter spiritus sanctus ita scripturas modificauit, ut locis apertioribus fami occurreret, obscurioribus autem fastidi detergeret. Nihil enim fere de illis obscuritatibus eruitur, quod non planissime dictum alibi reperiatur.” All passages from late antique and medival authors will be cited here and henceforth without page references according to the specific edition indicated in the literary index.

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tiana: the distinction between signum datum and signum naturale. ¹² A signum datum is a sign that is intentionally used to convey a certain notion to another person. The classical case of the signum datum is of course the verbal sign. A signum naturale, on the other hand, is a sign that indicates something else without the aim being to draw attention to it. Augustine takes smoke and tracks as his examples. In other words: the signum datum has links with epistemology, the signum datum with semiotic praxis. The signum naturale has its roots in the metonymic relationship between two things, while the signum datum requires communicative competence. It seems to me that a significant characteristic of academic literary interpretation and/or reading is that precisely this distinction is lacking, indeed that it is even systematically neutralised. While noone questions the pertinence of semiotic categories for the literary text, for the communication between author and reader, it is much harder to answer the question as to what the author is actually communicating to the reader; yet this question focuses precisely on the very information that all the various interpretations and readings are supposed to convey. What emerges from the difficulty of finding the answer to this question is fundamentally a latent discrepancy between the paradigm of semiotics and the praxis of scholarly literary exegesis. For the information gleaned from the reading of the text ultimately eludes the distinction between a signum datum and a signum naturale. This point may be illustrated taking Canto XXVI as our example: even if we read the contradiction between the opprobrium heaped on the head of the sinner Ulysses and the celebration of the hero who has liberated himself from the confines set on the desire for knowledge, confines that violate human nature, as an expression of the dilemma Dante was faced with – the moral sanctions of the Church on one hand and his own desires on the other – this still leaves the question open as to whether this is an intentional self-portrayal or the involuntarily revelation of certain symptoms. And it is no different in the case of interpretations of the Ulysses

 Augustinus, De doctrina christiana, II, 2 (1– 2): “signum est enim res praeter speciem, quam ingerit sensibus, aliud aliquid ex se faciens in cogitationem uenire, sicut uestigio uiso transisse animal, cuius uestigium est, cogitamus et fumo uiso ignem subesse cognoscimus et uoce animantis audita affectionem animi eius aduertimus et tuba sonante milites uel progredi se uel regredi et, si quid aliud pugna postulat, oportere nouerunt. signorum igitur alia sunt naturalia, alia data. naturalia sunt, quae sine uoluntate atque ullo appetitu significandi praeter se aliquid aliud ex se cognosci faciunt, sicuti est fumus significans ignem. non enim uolens significare id facit, sed rerum expertarum animaduersione et notatione cognoscitur ignem subesse, etiam si fumus solus appareat. sed et uestigium transeuntis animantis ad hoc genus pertinet et uultus irati seu tristis affectionem animi significat etiam nulla eius uoluntate, qui aut iratus aut tristis est; aut si quis alius motus animi uultu indice proditur etiam nobis non id agentibus, ut prodatur.”

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Canto as the mirror of a historical watershed situation, caught between medieval vilification and the favourable attitude of the modern era towards theoretical curiosity. Nor does the interpretation of the canto as an expression of that inevitable falsification of the truth – that is an inherent component of all rhetoric and language alike – decide for us whether this is system-immanent revelation or the intentional mediation of a particular insight. Or to put it in terms of a question once aptly posed by Gérard Genette in another context – qui parle? Perhaps this uncertainty has a parallel in the ambiguity of the English word ‘expression’. When something is taken to be the ‘expression’ of something else this can equally well refer to two different things: to intentional representation or to a symptom. But lest there should be any misunderstanding: there are of course cases where this distinction is readily apparent. For instance, it seems to me clear from Padoan’s commentary on Canto XXVI that he reads the figure of Ulysses as a very conscious figuration of a specific type of sinner. Only it is characteristic of the ‘system’ of literary scholarship that precisely this distinction is disregarded. The literary text, as it is interpreted or read, can equally well be an allegorical representation or a symptom. And, drawing a more general conclusion from the specific case that is of interest to us here, if we understand the text as the expression of the emancipation of the arising bourgeoisie, as a manifestation of an Oedipus Complex, as a representation of an epistemological constellation, as a system or negation of order, then this specifically destroys the difference between signum datum and signum naturale, between allegory and symptom. And as a consequence of the neutralisation of this opposition, interpretation is no longer a privilege granted to a certain class of texts, but becomes a universal practice. Any kind of text can become a subject to be analysed just as every object is open to scientific explanation. What is thus reflected in the neutralisation alluded to here, is not least the institutional locus of literary scholarship: the levelling out of the opposition between allegory and symptom is a result of the integration of traditional exegetic praxis into the structures of academic praxis. This ousting of traditional forms of commentary is perhaps seen symptomatically at the very point where commentators from Dante’s own time and modern Dante scholars seem to be particularly close to each other. Then as now, it was and is customary to name sources, preferably classical, biblical or from patristics. But then, and now, the function of these ‘sources’ is significantly different. Dante’s contemporaries refer to the source in order to make a firm connection between his text and a truth that has stood the test of time. In the 19th and 20th centuries, however, scholars look to the source for a cause which may account for the fact of the existence of a certain item in the text. A compelling reason for the levelling out of allegory and symptom may be found not least in the distinction between truth and meaning we touched on ear-

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lier. Wherever the latent import of a text does not enjoy universal validity then the question as to its defensibility acquires a certain relevance. How – this question asks – can the non-evident be rendered plausible? This uncertainty leads to a series of consequences which concern the relationship between a text and its meaning in a number of different ways. Firstly there is a striking absence in contemporary commentaries on Dante’s text of precisely that feature which permeates modern interest in the text of the Commedia: that is to say, there is no controversy. At first this seems all the more astonishing, for surely the struggle to determine the exact meaning of the text must be at its most intense when the message of the text is in fact identical with the truth, when it is the truth that is at stake. Yet the opposite is the case. Where a truth is certain, then it is enough to make the connection between the text and that truth. Thus different interpretations are not problematic, as long as they are not in direct conflict with each other. If the text only ever tells the truth then the content of the particular truth becomes less significant, and the criteria for the correlation between a primary and a secondary meaning are less rigorous. The true meaning elicits much more stubborn discussion where its contents are basically contingent and its validity depends solely on a connection being shown between the text and its interpretation. The dissolution of the structural connection between truth and meaning lends plausibility to the interest in the text as a configuration of specific symptoms. If, using the results of one’s interpretation, it is possible to identify the origins of the text, then the contingent connection between its literal and its actual meaning is also stabilised. This in itself explains the preference for meanings which are either highly abstract or particularly relevant. A telling example of this would seem to me to be Bruno Nardi’s interpretation who not only sees a continuation of the Fall of Adam in the figure of Ulysses, but also sees him as the embodiment of a human fate. For him Ulysses is not so much a figura of Adam but a symbol of the conditio humana. However, where the meaning stands as a truth, its contents can be very much more partial. In that sense, universality replaces universal validity. Perhaps this tacit postulate of academic literary exegesis comes most clearly to light in Juri Michailowitsch Lotman’s now famous description of a literary text as a “secondary, model-forming system”. For, as he adds, this model is always a model of the whole world.¹³ The universality of the work as a whole replaces the consistent validity of what it says in a mediated form. The neutralisation of the opposition of allegory and symptom, which I have briefly presented here as a characteristic of the academic approach to a literary

 Lotman 1972, p. 22 and p. 27.

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text, is not only relevant to a disparity that is much discussed nowadays: the disparity between interpretation and reading. This opposition which is indeed so hotly debated amongst literary scholars today in fact overlooks one question that is crucial to any interpretation: the question as to its function, indeed the question as to its necessity. Admittedly this can be countered with the claim that where the meaning of a text is ultimately left up to the individual reading then this is an answer in itself: a reading of this kind evidently provides an indispensable approach to the text itself, which after all only exists in the modus of its appropriation by different individuals. This notion of reading is the answer to the structural opacity of the text, which now itself appears as a symptom of the necessary latency of the meaning. But reading as a methodical programme is thus no more than a more radical version of a tacit premise that was basically already inherent to literary scholarship where it insisted on the identifiability of a meaning that was at least clear within certain limitations: the assumption that a text is fundamentally in need of interpretation. The methods of contingent, individualised reading thus relocate the premises of literary scholarship in the text under scrutiny. Seen in this light, it would seem that the disparity between interpretation and reading is also a consequence of the missing answer to the question as to the status of the mediated meaning of the text. Multiple readability dispenses with drama when it comes to encoding given symptoms. The same text may just as well reflect Oedipal patterns as a specific episteme or it may derive its real meaning from a self-emancipating group of social climbers. Only when these symptoms achieve the status of intentional, allegorical representation does such a polyvalence become somewhat precarious. The current opposition between interpretation and reading as rival methodological approaches has its roots not least in a reluctance to face the answer to the question as to the origins and task of textual interpretations. It is also an outcome of a disciplinary complacency where textual interpretation has become a universal praxis, because no distinction is made between signum datum and signum naturale.

II While modern research thus tends to ignore the difference between allegory and symptom in its text interpretations, for Dante’s contemporaries the notion that the text of the Commedia needs interpretation was out of the question, because it is intentionally obscure. In this respect the designation that commentators use to characterise Dante’s text is in itself significant. To take just one example that may stand for many, Benevenuto’s commentary on Canto XXVI opens with the following words:

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Postquam in duobus capitulis proxime praecedentibus autor noster tractavit et determinavit de poena furum qui puniuntur in septima bulgia; nunc consequenter in praesenti XXVI capitulo agit et tractat de poena alterius fraudis, quae dicitur astutia sive vafritia, quae punitur in octava bulgia.¹⁴

Tractavit et determinavit are the words Benevenuto uses of Dante’s text, and Dante himself uses the phrase modus tractandi in his letter of dedication to Can Grande della Scala, in which he defines some principles of a suitable exegetic approach to the sacro poema, although it is not entirely clear who the author of the latter was. In view of the underlying attitude to literature, the notion of modus tractandi is central, for it demonstrates that the primary goal of the representation is to be found in an order of knowledge. The scene depicted in it thus also has a particular intellectual content; the scene is itself a treatise and a definition, which in itself gives the portrayal of its allegorical status. Therefore, in this implied concept of a literary text the mimetic structure of the portrayal is secondary to the intellectual structure that it represents through the allegory. The portrayal does not stand as an analogy to everyday reality, but as the representation of a concept, a structure to mediate ideas. The modern scholarly neutralisation of the opposition between allegory and symptom noted earlier can be explained not least by the prevalence today of a different notion of literature, which sees the latter as mimetic. A symptomatic reading is possible when the portrayal stands as an object in its own right, when it no longer automatically counts as a communicative structure, but takes the form of an object that is constructed according to principles from the world we know.¹⁵ This object thus has

 Benevenuto 1380, proemio.  The general meaning of such symptomatic readings of a text for literary study seems to me to be particularly apparent where the investigation into a text sets out primarily to reconstruct communicative structures. A significant example of this may be seen in the essay by Avalle (Avalle 1975). Unmistakably the product of the 1970s theory of structural narrative, it draws comparisons with related contemporary narratives and, having identified a number of fixed narrative functions, it sets out to reconstruct something along the lines of a narrative grammar in Ulysses’ account of his last journey. But it seems that this reconstruction is not enough to pin down the specificity of Dante’s text within this particular paradigm, because at this point the author resorts to psychology: “La scelta dei dati offerti dalla tradizione compiuta da Dante è invece completamente diversa. Essa sottintende, attraverso la drastica riduzione del racconto ai suoi termini essenziali, la semplificazione delle motivazioni e l’insistenza quasi ossesiva sul ‘pensiero dominante’ di Ulisse (nella migliore tradizione, ad esempio, di un Chrétien), la sua ben nota, forte ed esclusiva passione per il ‘patetico’” (Avalle 1975, p. 63). So now the text has once again become the symptom of a psychological state. Interpretations of this kind are still found in the most recent of commentaries. Writing on Dante’s relationship to Ulysses, Chiavacci Leonardi with specific reference to Inferno XXVI, proemio, tells us: “Ulisse è una parte di sé.”

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its place in the order of things. In this respect, there is a much deeper significance to what seems at first like a perfectly inconsequential name, as in the case of the designation generally used today for Canto XXVI of the Inferno. It is widely known as the Ulysses Canto. This name clearly favours the scenes portrayed in it over the intellectual configuration that this canto represented in the eyes of Dante’s contemporaries. It also sets out the parameters for an exegetic reading. It focuses on one person, thereby already drawing attention to that person’s relationship to other figures, above all of course to that figure who is responsible for the text as its narrator and who appears as a protagonist in the story itself. The concentration on the order governing the action invites recourse to psychology as a framework for an explication du texte. As we have seen, the concept of an allegorical structure for a text that is simply telling the truth corresponds with the assumption that in fact the text contains no new information but is recounting the familiar in a new way – be this to make it better understood or to draw attention to its significance. But how does modern literary scholarship see the information content of literary texts in need of interpretation? It seems that the answer to this is as undecided as the question of whether a text should be understood as allegory or symptom. Of course these areas of indecision are connected with each other. Where the meaning of the text has to do with an order of causality, it must ultimately go back to something already known, to a familiar set of circumstances. This seems to me to be one of the reasons for the repetition of the same meaning and contents (the Oedipus complex, the rise of the bourgeoisie, or the self-revelation of language as a duplicitous game) – only changing according to their popularity at any one time – in respect of otherwise very different texts. While this repetition of constantly recurring explanations doubtlessly induces a certain fatigue effect, this impression only reflects the opposite expectation, according to which each single text has an individual meaning that is there to be discovered. Hence interpretation seems to demand an ingenium that not only has to uncover the new meaning in a text but also has to identify the procedures by means of which one can make certain of this unknown. The ‘method’ of empathy which became known above all as the ‘art of interpretation’ was perhaps the most radical theoretical proposal in this hermeneutics of the new.¹⁶ Similarly, regarding

(Chiavacci Leonardi 1991– 1994). Significantly, contemporary interpretations of the figure of Dante are always poetological, focused on the process of allegorical mediation. See, for instance, Serravalle 1416, Inferno XXVI,13 – 18: “Vult dicere, quod ad faciendum hanc fictionem et descriptionem, oportuit ipsum operari cum manu, pedibus, cum calamo, cum tota intentione, toto corde, tota anima, tota fantasia.”  See Staiger 1971.

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the question of the information content of a literary text there is also a structural uncertainty. On one hand there is an assumption that the text in principle includes semantic innovation, on the other we find a praxis of interpretation that determinedly relates the text back to the already familiar.¹⁷ But – to come back to Dante’s Commedia – what is the situation in this text with regard to the issues raised here? Is it possible to extrapolate from the sacro poema indications of the need for a specific interpretation? Doubtless there are various moments where the narrator points to the allegorical meaning that is encoded in the literal meaning of his words. In that sense, the contemporary praxis of interpretation – which is indeed very largely indebted to the system of multiple textual meanings as found in biblical hermeneutics – would appear to meet the postulates of the text very precisely. And yet this level of congruence between the methods of interpretation set out in the Commedia itself and the contemporary praxis of exegesis is by no means guaranteed. A first indication of a certain discrepancy between the specific requirements for an interpretation of the sacro poema and the customary practice of allegorism is already to be found in the letter of dedication to Can Grande della Scala. Dante scholars, who gladly point to this passage as a guarantee of the allegorical structure of the Commedia, have not been noticeably bothered by the fact that, if one looks more closely, the traditional hermeneutic system of the Bible has changed markedly in one respect: Et ideo videndum est de subiecto huius operis, prout ad litteram accipitur; deinde de subiecto, prout allegorice sententiatur. Est ergo subiectum totius operis, litteraliter tantum accepti, status animarum post mortem simpliciter sumptus; nam de illo et circa illum totius operis versatur processus. Si vero accipiatur opus allegorice, subiectum est homo prout merendo et demerendo per arbitri libertatem iustitie premiandi et puniendi obnoxius est.¹⁸

Here the literal meaning is already concerned with a transcendental reality – the classical domain of the sensus anagogicus. This looks like a straight exchange between the positions of the sensus anagogicus and the sensus litteralis. The effect of this permutation is evident not least in the consequences for the allegorical, moral meaning of the text. For the literal meaning is now the goal of what is contained in the sensus allegoricus. It seems that the familiar textual schema can only be adjusted to fit this text at the price of a substantial transformation of its own principles. What is above all open to question here is the ‘truth value’

 Not least the terminology of the word ‘model’, as used in literary hermeneutics, is basically ambiguous in this respect. The range of reference of this term shifts between Entwurf (sketch, outline, design) and Abbildung (likeness, image).  Dante, Epistola XIII, 24 f.

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of the sensus litteralis. With reference to this, Dante himself had drawn a clear distinction at the opening of the second tract of the Convivio between poetic allegorism and biblical exegesis. Only in the case of the Holy Bible is the literal meaning also the historical meaning. In a poetic text it fulfils the role of a bella menzogna. ¹⁹ However, the sacro poema would seem to elude this limitation to bella menzogna. The wording of the Commedia and the organisation of the story it tells leaves little doubt as to the facticity of the journey it depicts into a world beyond ours, and not least the identification of the sensus litteralis with the sensus anagogicus that comes from the hint of a hermeneutics for this text as found in the letter of dedication to Can Grande della Scala provides a clear pointer. On the other hand, precisely this postulate of the facticity of a journey into another world had to be a challenge to Dante’s contemporary readers. The praxis of lectura Dantis, the consistently allegorical interpretation of the Commedia thus also constitutes an attempt to impose a certain discipline on this text. The aim is also to lessen the provocative aspect of this text that comes from the claims it makes, to return events to the level of signs. Meanwhile, in the case of the text of the Commedia, it is clear to see how it positively resists any reduction of this kind.²⁰ This in fact means that we are here postulating a structure that matches that of the revealed scripture. Thus it is my intention in what follows here to detail precisely this structure, taking Canto XXVI of the Inferno as my example. I shall endeavour to demonstrate how the text of the Commmedia relates to the biblical text, thereby also showing that it has the authority of special knowledge. Biblical exegesis and the perception of a transcendental world come together in this canto, authorising knowledge that the author of the Commedia alone is privy to. Ulysses’ Canto, as we shall show, portrays the granting of that new truth specifically denied to this text by the allegorical interpretations offered in the commentaries that confine it exclusively to the already known. I should like to open by looking at some lines in Canto XXVI that have not otherwise played a particularly prominent part in investigations of this text. The lack of attention to these lines is in part explained by the fact that they do not expressly concern the personage who has given this canto its name.²¹ They do not therefore quite fit into the mimetic order that scholars have attempted to re-

 See Convivio II,1, 3 and II,1,6.  This different semantic structure of the text is seen not least in a series of contradictions which soon trip up any attempt at a consistently allegorical interpretation of the Commedia. I have attempted to demonstrate this elsewhere; see Kablitz 1999.  Thus Gmelin writes of Inferno XXVI,1– 48: “The opening of the canto is overshadowed by the after-effect of the horror felt at the transformations of the thief” (Gmelin 1966, p. 154; translation by F. E.).

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construct for this canto. Yet it should not be forgotten that Canto XXVI of the Inferno is in effect anything but mimetically consistent. It starts with an ironic reference to Florence; the narrator predicts great misfortune. The description of Florence connects with the events of the previous canto, and is legitimised by the memory of five Florentine thieves that Dante had met in the seventh bolgia. The end of the canto similarly does not come at a point that coincides with the structure of the narrative. It finishes at the close of Ulysses’ account, while the next canto opens with a retrospective description of his encounter with the sinners gathered here and of his farewell. This external arrangement already points to the fact that this canto is not necessarily mimetic in its construction. The lines that we will focus on here do seem to me to provide something of a key to its structure. As far as the events in this canto are concerned, the lines in question deal with the moment when the Pilgrim sees the flames containing the souls of those being punished. But it is only in a series of positively extravagant comparisons that the text homes in on what the Pilgrim de facto sees, and precisely this movement in the text will prove crucial to the recognition of its deeper meaning: Quante ’l villan ch’al poggio si riposa, nel tempo che colui che ’l mondo schiara la faccia sua a noi tien meno ascosa, come la mosca cede a la zanzara, vede lucciole giù per la vallea, forse colà dove vendemmia e ara; di tante fiamme tutta risplendea l’ottava bolgia, sì com’ io m’accorsi tosto che fui là ’ve ’l fondo parea. E qual colui che si vengiò con li orsi vide ’l carro d’Elia al dipartire, quando i cavalli al cielo erto levorsi, che nol potea sì con li occhi seguire, ch’el vedesse altro che la fiamma sola, sì come nuvoletta, in sù salire: tal si move ciascuna per la gola del fosso, ché nessuna mostra ’l furto, e ogne fiamma un peccatore invola. (Inferno XXVI, 25 – 42)

No doubt these lines, with their allusions to familiar situations, are intended to depict for the reader the unknown world of Hell, which is beyond our worldly imaginations. Yet, bearing this function in mind, it is clear even from a cursory reading that this effect progressively diminishes. This is due in part to the transition from an everyday comparison to a biblical reference. At the same time, however, there is also an ever decreasing affinity between comparans and comparatum. For the connection between Elijah on his journey heavenwards and the

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sinner languishing in Hell is scarcely self-evident: and even the external impulse for the comparison – the prophet in the fiery chariot disappearing as Elisha watches and the flames in the eighth bolgia in which the bodies of the sinners are hidden – seems so minimal that it could hardly serve as an illustration. Moreover, the biblical text has been altered. The Bible passage, which the comparison draws on, refers to the Old Testament. Here the moment is recalled when the prophet Elijah leaves his pupil Elisha and, as the latter watches, ascends into Heaven in a fiery chariot drawn by fiery steeds.²² Nowhere does the relevant Bible passage say that Elisha, watching the prophet’s chariot, could only see a flame. While this may, in view of the context, stand as a possible reading of the text, there is no mention at all of a cloud (“sì come nuvoletta”, v. 39) at this point in the Bible.²³ This addition by Dante is all the more striking in that it seems to be of little importance for the purposes of a comparison with the flames of the sinners. Yet it is precisely the decreasing similarity of external affinities, the progressive reduction of similarities open to sensual perception that provides the key to the understanding of both these comparisons. In this respect it is also worth taking note of the difference that Dante makes between the functions of these two comparisons. The first refers to quantity (“Quante il villan […] vede lucciole”), the second to quality (“E qual colui che si vengiò con li orsi vide il carro d’Elia”). Thus these comparisons, which give two different perspectives of the same phenomenon, not only illuminate the characteristics of what is being perceived, they also serve to characterise perception itself, which will prove to be their actual purpose. At first sight Dante’s depiction of the peasant sitting on a hillside, watching countless glow-worms in the evening light, appears completely harmless. It seems very much to be drawing on an everyday occurrence that can help to paint a picture of the scene in Hell. Scholars have thus described this positively Arcadian genre picture as an idyll, thereby also identifying the literary tradition that Dante is consciously taking up in these lines. At the same time, however, these lines also include a fair amount of additional information that is in a sense superfluous, even a hindrance to the illustrative purpose of these words. In view of this there is no need to identify the person observing the glow-

 II Kings 2,11 f.: “11 cumque pergerent et incedentes sermocinarentur ecce currus igneus et equi ignei diviserunt utrumque et ascendit Helias per turbinem in caelum 12 Heliseus autem videbat et clamabat pater mi pater mi currus Israhel et auriga eius”. Texts from the Bible are quoted here and henceforth from the edition by R. Weber, Biblia Sacra 1975.  This has led some commentators to suppose that Dante simply made a mistake here. See Porena 1946, Inferno XXVI, 34: “È una deduzione o una falsa reminiscenza di Dante.” We shall show in what follows that this is not in fact the case.

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worms as a peasant nor to say what he is doing (“forse colà dove vendemmia e ara”). But above all the numerous periphrases used here make little sense in this context and are yet another hindrance to any illustrative intent. These periphrases always refer to a specific time. “Nel tempo che colui che ’l mondo schiara la faccia sua a noi tien meno ascosa” refers to the summer, indicated by the position of the sun. And evening is established by the changeover from one insect to another, that is to say, the flies are replaced by mosquitoes. But precisely this description casts doubt on what seems to be to commentators the most important aspect of the comparison with the villano: the poetics of the idyll.²⁴ For – not to put too fine a point on it – the mosquitoes give the scene a distinctly uncomfortable feel.²⁵ If this is true in a very literal sense, then it is all the more true if we turn to the symbolism of the Book of Nature that tells of a non-corporeal meaning hidden in all the corporeal things of this Earth. If we apply this code from the liber naturae to the comparison with the villano, then the information that is superfluous to any purely illustrative intention makes sense as far as the allegorical meaning of these lines is concerned. Let us start with the uncomfortable insects: flies and mosquitoes alike have a symbolic meaning as embodiments of cogitationes molestae. ²⁶ Moreover the periphrase they help to create has a further meaning. It seems that the scene in the comparison comprises a whole collection of insects, with the glow-worms, that the peasant is gazing at, establishing a significant connection with the others. But the allegorical significance of the insects can be linked to a symbolic meaning embodied in the peasant. He, too, has a reputation for taking an all too intense interest in the things of this world.²⁷  Grabher typifies the many who have taken this line, Inferno XXVI, 25 – 42: “Il quadro del villano […] ha un idillico senso di calma e di silenzio contemplativo” (Grabher 1934– 1936).  Serravalle 1416, Inferno XXVI, 25 – 33 was well aware of this: “Pro quo notandum est quod tempore estivo musce de die volant et molestant animalia et homines.”  See Hieronymus Lauretus 1580, p. 705 (s. v. musca): “Potest etiam musca significare curas carnalium desideriorum, motusque libidinis ac cogitationes molestas”; p. 298 (s. v. culex): “Possunt etiam cyniphes designare malignas et molestas cogitationes.”  Thus, in Gregory’s the Great, Moralia in Iob, V,11 we find the following assessment of Esau, who is described in the Old Testament as a huntsman and a peasant (Genesis 25, 27): “Qui etiam agricola esse describitur quia amatores huius saeculi tanto magis exteriora incolunt, quanto interiora sua inculta derelinquunt.” This interest in external matters makes him forget his own inner life and, with that, the state of his own soul. Very much in keeping with these, we can read in a now famous passage from Augustine’s: “Et eunt homines admirari alta montium, et ingentes fluctus maris, et latissimos lapsus fluminum, et Oceani ambitum, et gyros siderum, et relinquunt seipsos” (Augustinus, Confessionum Libri Tredicem, X,8,15). The interpretation of the figure of Esau as beholden to this world, its false truths and false eloquence is widely prevalent in biblical exegesis. Hieronymus sees him as the epitome of eloquentia saecularis (Hieronymus, Commentarii in prophetas minores, In Abdiam). Caesarius of Arles puts him in the

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Thus if one pursues the allegorical potential of the scenario that unfolds in the comparison with the villano, then precisely that sin comes into play that is punished in this eighth bolgia of the Funnel of Hell: the sin of curiositas. Before the consequences of this connection are discussed in somewhat more detail, let us first look at a further aspect of this connection. If one takes into account the – encoded – allegorical meaning of this supposed idyll, then the description of the summer also makes new sense: “nel tempo che colui che ’l mondo schiara la faccia sua a noi tien meno ascosa”. To put it in the terminology of rhetorics, what we have here is a permixta apertis allegoria. The metaphor of the face written into the periphrase reveals who it is that is hidden – allegorice – behind the sun and its light. The sun’s light is nothing other than the goodwill of the Lord God; it stands for divine mercy. This then gives the curiosity of the villano its actual status. The symbolism of the comparison makes it clear that the person observing the insects, and by implication Dante himself, is misguided, in that the only motivation behind the gaze he is casting at the countless flames that he sees before him is simple curiosity – and what is more, at a moment when God is indulging him like no other by allowing him to wander through that world beyond this one. The focus on the amount, the quantity of insects (quante) shows that this is only a superficial and hence dubious interest in the truth of the world beyond, the real meaning of which is not yet recognised here. While the first of the two comparisons thus denotes a morally suspect attitude that the Pilgrim is still beholden to, the second comparison demonstrates a radical change in his attitude, which in turn allows him to perceive a reality that no mortal has ever had access to before. Admittedly this second comparison does initially cause a certain amount of confusion in that it does draw what at first seems a strange analogy between the biblical prophet Elijah and the sinners who through their own fault are having to endure a justly wretched existence. Yet at the same time this contrast is also so telling that the very contradiction it generates acquires an eloquence all of its own. For the contrast is drawn between the prophet who talks on God’s behalf to his fellow human beings, proclaiming the divine truth, and those whose speech and deeds are fraudulent and hence sinful.²⁸ Scholars have rightly seen Ulysses with his cunning and his injurious

same category as those whose knowledge is focused on the things of this world: “qui […] terrena sapiunt” (Caesarius Arelatensis, Sermones Caesarii uel ex aliis fontibus hausti, 86, 2).  Virgil describes the sins for which Ulysses has been banished to Hell (Inferno XXVI, 55 – 63): “Rispuose a me: ‘Là dentro si martira/Ulisse e Diomede, e così insieme/a la vendetta vanno come a l’ira;/ e dentro da la lor fiamma si geme/l’agguato del caval che fe’ la porta/onde uscì de’ Romani il gentil seme./Piangevisi entro l’arte per che, morta,/Deidamia ancor si duol d’Achille,/e del Palladio pena vi si porta.’” Thus he names three sins that have caused Ulysses

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schemes as the diametric opposite to Elijah.²⁹ Indeed, in exact exegetic terms, he may be seen as the latter’s anti-type.³⁰ Crucial to any attempt to understand the complex comparison between the prophet’s ascent into Heaven and the punishment of those who have sinned against the truth is not least the symbolic tradition that Dante is drawing on here. As contemporary commentators already noted, the scenario presented in Canto XXVI owes a certain amount to the Epistle of St James in the New Testament. The particular importance of the latter for Canto XXVI is that in it the tongue of the person who gives false counsel is equated to a flame that destroys the whole body.³¹ For it is precisely thus that the Pilgrim and his companion encounter the penitents.³² Thus when Dante chooses this form of punishment for the sinners in Canto XXVI of the Inferno, the crime thus implied immediately comes to mind. Untruthful talk ends in self-destruction. The punishment meted out by God thus only completes what the sin has already set in motion,³³ and this congruity also confirms the just nature of the punishment that is imposed on those who sin against the truth. Of some significance in this respect is the fact that Christian symbolism uses the semantics of fire and – more precisely – of tongues of fire in precisely the opposite manner. This is seen above all in the account of the miracle of Pentecost in the Acts of the Apostles; for as the Bible tells us, the Holy Spirit descended to the Apostles and

to find himself in Hell: the deception with the Trojan Horse, his tricking Achilles to taking part in the war, and the theft of the statue of the goddess.  The contrast between the prophet and the provider of fraudulent counsel is stressed by Damon 1967, pp. 320 f., although he sees it as ironical. Lansing 1977, pp. 120 f. also stresses this contrast. However, I cannot share his broader conclusion that the reference to Elijah’s ascent into Heaven symbolised Dante’s own earlier lost wanderings in philosophy.  To my knowledge Mazzotta, is the only one to use this term (Mazzotta 1975, p. 41).  James 3, 5 f.: “5 ita et lingua modicum quidem membrum est et magna exultat ecce quantus ignis quam magnam silvam incendit 6 et lingua ignis est universitas iniquitatis lingua constituitur in membris nostris quae maculat totum corpus et inflammat rotam nativitatis nostrae inflammata a gehenna”.  This is seen particularly clearly in the description of Ulysses’ verbal account of his adventures, which equates him with the tongue of flame (Inferno XXVI, 85 – 90): “Lo maggior corno de la fiamma antica/cominciò a crollarsi mormorando/pur come quella cui vento affatica;/ indi la cima qua e là menando,/come fosse la lingua che parlasse,/gittò voce di fuori e disse: […]”.  This connection between retribution and sin is further clarified in Canto XXVI. Thus Ulysses himself refers to the ardore that drove him to explore the world, saying that no other duty was able to hold its own against the destructive force of this fire (Inferno XXVI,94– 99): “‘né dolcezza di figlio, né la pieta/del vecchio padre, né ’l debito amore/lo qual dovea Penelopè far lieta,/vincer potero dentro a me l’ardore/ch’i’ ebbi a divenir del mondo esperto/e de li vizi umani e del valore.’”

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settled on the head of each one in the form of tongues of fire, which is why they started to talk to the people gathered there “in tongues”.³⁴ The effect of the presence of the Holy Spirit hence takes the same symbolic form as its perversion.³⁵ Dante exploits precisely this symbolic correspondence, thereby making the connection in the initially seemingly puzzling comparison between the words that originate in the Holy Spirit and the words that deny it. Whoever tries to take for himself a truth that is not his by rights, will appear as the exact opposite of those out of whose mouths the Holy Spirit speaks, and thus he is consumed by the same flame that raises the prophet up into the Heavens on his chariot of fire.³⁶ However, for a proper understanding of the comparisons discussed here it is not enough simply to take account of the contents; it is equally significant that the text here cites a passage from the Bible. For this in turn refers to the source of the knowledge that Dante is drawing on here in order to comprehend what his eyes are registering. How perceptively he recognises the true nature of the flames which surround the sinners is evident not least from his answer to Virgil’s explanation. When the latter wants to explain what they are looking at, Dante immediately assures him that he had already understood this himself.³⁷ By citing the Bible passage Dante’s own words reveal the source of his knowledge. The revealed scripture directs his perception and leads him to the deeper meaning of what he sees before his eyes. This recognition thus forms a marked contrast to the purely superficial interest that is apparent in the comparison with the villano, and which is part of that same avaricious looking which is being punished in this circle of Hell. This differentiation between mere vivendi voluptas and recognising the truth is also at the root of the difference between the quante

 Acts 2, 2– 4: “2 et factus est repente de caelo sonus tamquam advenientis spiritus vehementis et replevit totam domum ubi erant sendentes 3 et apparuerunt illis dispertitae linguae tamquam ignis […] 4 et repleti sunt omnes Spiritu Sancto et coeperunt loqui aliis linguis prout Spiritus Sanctus dabat eloqui illis.”  The symmetry of this symbolism had already been noted in patristics. See Caesarius Arelatensis, Sermones Caesarii uel ex aliis fontibus hausti, sermo 96, 2: “Duo enim sunt ignes: est ignis caritatis de spiritu sancto, est et ignis cupiditatis; ille conburit omne quod malum est, iste consumit omne quod bonum est. In anima enim ubi ignis caritatis arserit, omne malum consumit; sicut e contrario in quo ignis cupiditatis accensus fuerit, nihil quod bonum est remanebit.”  This punishment gives specific meaning to the much-cited Bible passage “Deus noster ignis consumens est” (see Hebrews 12, 29); Paul’s words refer to Deuteronomy 4, 24: “quia Dominus Deus tuus ignis consumens est Deus aemulator”.  Inferno XXVI,46 – 51: “E ’l duca, che mi vide tanto atteso,/disse: ‘Dentro dai fuochi son li spirti;/ciascun si fascia di quel ch’elli è inceso.’/‘Maestro mio,’ rispuos’io, ‘per udirti/son io più certo; ma già m’era avviso/che così fosse, e già voleva dirti.’”

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(v. 25) and the quale (v. 34), by which Dante’s text makes clear the systematic connection between the two comparisons. ‘Quantity’ denotes a purely superficial interest in appearances, while ‘quality’ denotes a deeper insight into the true essence. But this insight owes its existence to the Holy Bible. And it is here that all curiositas comes to an end, for the Bible opens the way to the knowledge that comes from God and which is sufficient explanation of the universe.³⁸ This in turn also explains why the comparisons, which at first sight would appear to be there to illustrate sensual perceptions, seem less and less visual in their analogies. Visible appearances become secondary in importance to the deeper meaning of the physically present phenomenon.³⁹ In this connection it is not without interest that traditionally in biblical exegesis, the figure of Elijah ascending into Heaven in his fiery chariot is himself taken as a representation of the study of the Bible.⁴⁰ This traditional exegetic conclusion seems to me above all pertinent to the reading of Dante’s text because this same text – as we have already seen – changes the actual words of the Old Testament – a change that, as we shall see, points to a specific interpretation of this passage. At issue is the comparison of the fiery chariot to a cloud, sì come nuvoletta (v. 39), seemingly inconsequential yet striking by virtue of the

 Patristic writers had already recognised Elijah’s ascent into Heaven in a chariot of fire as a corrective to the desire for visual spectacle, satisfying a spectandi voluptas, that did not lead into destructive sensuality, but which aimed above all to discover the truth: “Si spectandi uoluptas est, habes hic aurigam spiritalem sanctum helian qui curru igneo usque ad metas peruectus est caeli, currus que pharaonis demersos in profundum” (Quodvultdeus Carthaginensis, Liber promissionum et praedictorum Die, 13).  The significance of the context of the two comparisons and the way they are made has only been investigated – as far as possible – by Sturm. She sees it as representing two different intellectual operations. While the comparison with the glow-worms stands for an optical verification of the quotidian, the comparison with Elijah symbolises abstraction (Sturm 1974, p. 96). Sturm takes this combination as an expression of the conflict between emotion and control, which in turn underpins the overall structure of Canto XXVI in the Inferno. It seems to me that this is a very pertinent reading of the representation of two opposing intellectual operations in the comparisons following one after the other. However, it seems to me that the character of these interpretations also reflects the central ethical opposition that defines this canto. The image of the villano represents not merely a sensual awareness of everyday things, but is still closely bound up with curiositas. The insight gained from the Bible opens the door to a form of knowledge that comes from God and which is thus above all moral suspicion. It is this access to knowledge – as we shall now show in detail – that puts Dante on the same level as a prophet.  See Petrus Chrysologus, Sermonum collectio, sermo 92: “Sensim nos sermo euangelicus ad altiora promouet, ad superna pertollit. Nec mirum, fratres, si eliam currus aethereus euexit ad caelum, cum cotidie ista euangeliorum quadriga hominum genus caeli perferat et transmittat ad regnum.” See also Cassiodorus, Expositio psalmorum, psalmus 126.

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fact that it does not have its origins in the Bible itself. Nowhere in the biblical account of Elijah’s ascent into Heaven is there any reference to this. What makes this comment all the more meaningful is not least its lack of mimetic plausibility. For to draw an analogy between fire and a cloud is anything but immediately self-evident; thus this comparison similarly does not fulfil the – ‘realistic’ – function that would initially seem most likely. It does not illustrate the biblical story by drawing on familiar experiences, if anything it has the opposite effect and seems to obscure rather than to clarify the visual image. But precisely this points to the very different meaning of this comment: for it creates a connection with another ascent into Heaven, itself infinitely more significant in salvation history: this of course is the ascent into Heaven of Jesus Christ. The Gospels make no mention of a fiery chariot but do tell of a cloud that hides Jesus from the Apostles’ eyes.⁴¹ The – figural – connection made here between Elijah’s ascent into Heaven and that of Jesus Christ, by altering a detail of the Old Testament account, is a time-honoured practice in biblical exegesis. The ascent of the Prophet Elijah into Heaven – for all the difference in the circumstances – prefigures the ascent into Heaven of the Son of God.⁴² Thus the alteration to the biblical passage undertaken here by Dante credits Elijah with fore-knowledge of the future ascensio of Jesus Christ. This in turn then directs our interest to the ensuing analogy between Dante and Elisha, between the figure gazing after the prophet as he rises up into Heaven and the figure who recognises the sinner surrounded by flames. To my knowledge, so far only Margherita Fraenkel has gone into this in any detail. In essence she concludes that the analogy between Dante and Elisha is set against the con-

 In the Acts of the Apostles we read (Acts 1,9): “et cum haec dixisset videntibus illis elevatus est et nubes suscepit eum ab oculis eorum”.  Eusebius ‘Gallicanus’, Collectio homiliarum, hom. 20, linea 39 – 41: “Legimus beatum eliam, curru igneo, cum corpore ad superna praereptum. Haec omnia implentur in christo: ecce iterum elias noster, igneo diuinitatis uehiculo, corporeus ascendit ad caelum.” Isidorus Hispalensis, Allegoriae quaedam sanctae Scripturae, Ex veteri Testamento, par. 95: “Elias Christum demonstrat, quia sicut igneo curru ad superna sublatus est, ita Christus ministeriis angelorum assumptus est in caelum.” Caesarius Arelatensis, Sermones Caesarii uel ex aliis fontibus hausti, sermo 124,6, linea 8 – 10: “Sicut ergo supra diximus, sanctum heliam intelligite typum habuisse domini salvatoris: denique, sicut dominus, postea quam multas virtutes exercuit, postea quam passus est, resurrexit et ascendit in caelum, ita et helias, post multa mirabilia, quae per eum deus fecit, igneo curru elevatur ad caelum.” For more on the differences see, for instance, Gregor the Great, XL homiliarum in euangelia, libri duo, 2, 29, 5: “Notandum quoque est quod Elias in curru legitur ascendisse, ut uidelicet aperte monstraretur quia homo purus adiutorio indigebat alieno […] Redemptor autem noster non curru, non angelis subleuatus legitur, quia is qui fecerat omnia nimirum super omnia sua uirtute ferebatur.”

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trast between Elijah and Ulysses. Both, the author of the Commedia and the pupil of Elijah are, in Fraenkel’s view, endangered by the desire to use their reason to satisfy a false ambition.⁴³ I cannot, however, agree with this interpretation; above all since the interpretation of the figure of Elisha that is implied in this. This interpretation would appear to be contradicted both by exegetic tradition and by the particular circumstances that accompany Elijah’s ascent into Heaven, in other words, the Old Testament context of the biblical passages cited in Dante’s comparison. Before Elijah is drawn away from the Earth, when he sees that he must soon take his leave, he allows Elisha one wish. And the latter asks for nothing less than a double portion of the spirit of his teacher. The departing Elijah assures him that this will be granted, if Elisha sees him as he is taken away.⁴⁴ Scholars have understandably had difficulty with Elisha’s wish, as demanding as it is bewildering. But a possible explanation is to be found in the figural interpretation of this passage, which relates Elijah’s ascent into Heaven to that of Jesus Christ. What else was Elisha asking for than that same spirit that Christ granted his Apostles on his own departure?⁴⁵ The ascent into Heaven is of course directly connected with Pentecost, and biblical scholars have seen the choice of Elisha as Elijah’s successor in this context.⁴⁶ But this is the same connection made by Dante’s alteration to the biblical text. By presenting Elijah’s ascent into Heaven as a prefiguration of that of Jesus Christ, he attributes to Elisha a share in that spirit that was to come down to the Apostles in tongues of fire. Thus Dante also confirms the gift of prophecy that must be his as the worthy successor to Elijah. The alteration to the Old Testament text is thus equivalent to an exegesis of the same. It marks Dante’s insight into the deeper meaning of the holy scripture; it also signals the inspired reader of revelation. The sight of the punishment being meted out

 Fraenkel 1986, p. 113.  II Kings 2,9 f.: “9 cumque transissent Helias dixit ad Heliseum postula quod vis ut faciam tibi antequam tollar a te dixitque Heliseus obsecro ut fiat duplex spiritus tuus in me 10 qui respondit rem difficilem postulasti attamen si videris me quando tollor a te erit quod petisti si autem non videris non erit”.  See Acts 1,8: “sed accipietis virtutem supervenientis Spiritus Sancti in vos et eritis mihi testes in Hierusalem et in omni Iudaea et Samaria et usque ad ultimum terrae”.  Beda Venerabilis, Homeliarum euangelii libri II, 2,15, linea 298 – 300: “Petiit heliseus ut fieret spiritus heliae duplex in se; et edocti a domino discipuli promissam spiritus gratiam accipere desiderabant quam non uni tantum genti iudeaea quam ipse praesens in carne docuit sed et cunctis per orbem nationibus praedicare sufficerent. An non duplicem spiritus sui gratiam pollicebatur cum ait: qui credit in me opera quae ego facio et ipse faciet et maiora horum faciet?” For a similar interpretation see also Quodvultdeus Carthaginensis, Liber promissionum et praedictorum Dei, 2, 30.

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to those who have sinned against the truth goes hand in hand with the perception of the truth concealed in the words of the Holy Bible. And it is precisely this effect of an encounter with the world beyond that is presented at this point in the text of the Commedia. Yet Dante’s comparison does more than simply highlight the Pilgrim’s perceptive awareness of the truth of the holy scriptures. If anything, his insight imbues him with a power that makes him the true successor of Elisha and reveals the final reason behind the analogy with the Old Testament prophet. Crucial to this is one last aspect of the comparison that is of interest here. This is the as yet undiscussed description that Dante gives of Elisha: “colui che si vengiò con li orsi”. As commentators since the 14th century have remarked, these words refer to the same chapter of the Old Testament. It closes with an account of the children ridiculing Elisha, how he then cursed them in God’s name and how two bears came from out of the wood and devoured forty-two of them.⁴⁷ Scholars have naturally not found it easy to find a plausible explanation for Elisha’s reaction, in that it would seem to make nonsense of all the precepts of Christian morals. The merciless curse that condemns the children to annihilation is scarcely reconcilable with the other Elisha who has just taken up Elijah’s mantle. Once again Bible scholars have sought a solution in a figural interpretation of the person of Elisha and of his actions. Those who pour scorn on him are seen as the precursors of those who will later nail Christ to the Cross.⁴⁸ And the very words used by the children are not without significance: ascende calve. It is only natural to connect their cries with Calvary where Christ would later be crucified.⁴⁹ Of particular importance to the lines of the Commedia under discussion here is an interpretation of this biblical passage that reads the bears who tear the children limb from limb as a premonition of the destruction of Jerusalem. As

 II Kings 2, 23 f.: “23 ascendit autem inde Bethel cumque ascenderet per viam pueri parvi egressi sunt de civitate et inludebant ei dicentes ascende calve ascende calve 24 qui cum se respexisset vidit eos et maledixit eis in nomine Domini egressique sunt duo ursi de saltu et laceraverunt ex eis quadraginta duos pueros”.  See Augustinus, Enarrationes in Psalmos, psalmus 46, 2: “cum adscenderet propheta dei elisaeus, clamabant post eum pueri irridentes: adscende calue, adscende calue; ille autem non tam crudeliter quam mystice, fecit illos pueros ab ursis exeuntibus deuorari. […] nemo ergo irrideat crucem domini; iudaei sunt possessi a daemonibus et deuorati. nam in caluariae loco crucifigentes christum, et leuantes in cruce, tamquam ipsi dicebant sensu puerili, non intelligentes quid loquerentur: adscende calue. quid est enim: adscende? crucifige, crucifige.”  Augustinus, Enarrationes in Psalmos, psalmus 83, 2: “elisaeus enim personam cuiusdam tunc gerebat, cuius filii sumus, filii core, domini scilicet nostri iesu christi. iam occurrit caritati uestrae ex euangelio, quare caluus, gerebat personam christi; recordamini quod in caluariae loco crucifixus est.”

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such the bears appear as figurae of Vespasian and Titus, who will initiate the destruction of Jerusalem as just punishment for murdering the Son of God.⁵⁰ Thus Elisha could be exonerated of the offence of having acted from false, self-seeking motives; rather it was the Holy Spirit that spoke through him.⁵¹ The punishment of the Jews, albeit ineffective, was meted out not for personal satisfaction but as salutary castigation.⁵² Interestingly very similar concerns are found from the outset in commentaries on the Commedia. ⁵³ For their authors, too, were at pains to free Dante of the reproach that he, for his part, had dealt unfairly with his native city, when he wished destruction upon it. Yet, it is hardly possible to understand the opening of the Canto other than as an expression of the narrator’s longing that misfortune should soon befall Florence as punishment for its sins: Godi, Fiorenza, poi che se’ sì grande che per mare e per terra batti l’ali, e per lo ’nferno tuo nome si spande! Tra li ladron trovai cinque cotali tuoi cittadini onde mi ven vergogna, e tu in grande orranza non ne sali. Ma se presso al mattin del ver si sogna, tu sentirai di qua da picciol tempo di quel che Prato, non ch’altri, t’agogna. E se già fosse, non saria per tempo.

 See Hieronymus, Tractatus LIX in librum psalmorum, psalmus 84, linea 17 ff.: “uerum helisaeus ille patientissimus, qui propterea uenerat in bethel ut saluaret, respexit se aliquando: respexit, et iussit de saltu exire duos ursos, et interfecerunt quadraginta duos pueros. sic et dominus noster, hoc est noster chore, cum uenisset in bethel, et uellet ascendere, inrisus a paruulis, iubet exire duos ursos, hoc est uespasianum et titum, et interfecerunt quadraginta duos pueros. qui sunt isti quadraginta duo pueri? ab ascensu xpisti usque ad subuersionem hierusalem quadraginta duo anni sunt.” See the interpretation along these lines in Hieronymus, Epistulae, 120.  Caesarius Arelatensis, Sermones Caesarii uel ex aliis fontibus hausti, sermo 127,1, linea 39: “Nemo ergo beato heliseo ore vipereo derogare praesumat: quia hoc quod de pueris illis factum est, non tam ipsi propria virtute, quam per illum spiritus sanctus fecisse credendus est.”  Caesarius Arelatensis, Sermones ad monachos, sermo 127, 2, linea 1 ff.), “ut supra suggessimus, quod beatus heliseus non iracundiae morbo commotus sed zelo dei succensus ad corrigendum populum iudaeorum parvulos illos permisit lacerari; non ut vindicaret, sed potius ut illos corrigeret: tamen in hoc facto etiam passionem domini salvatoris praefiguratam fuisse evidenter ostenditur. Nam quomodo pueri illi indisciplinati clamaverunt beato heliseo ascende calve, ascende calve, ita et insensati populi iudaeorum vero heliseo christo tempore passionis voce sacrilega clamaverunt: crucifige, crucifige.”  See Serravalle 1415, Inferno XXVI,10 – 12: “aliqui exponunt, dicentes, quod auctor imprecatur malum civitati sue; sed non bene dicunt: nam non imprecatur, sed predicit, ut timeant Deum et caveant a peccatis, timens iram Dei ne superveniat in civitatem suam.”

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Così foss’ ei, da che pur esser dee! ché più mi graverà, com’ più m’attempo. (Inferno XXVI,1– 12)

This apparent call for punishment troubled commentators who were naturally concerned for the author’s reputation. In fact the parallels to the exegetic efforts to preserve Elisha’s moral integrity may be taken as evidence of the considerable similarity between the opening of Canto XXVI and the comparison centring on the prophet – “colui che si vengiò con li orsi”. It is important in this respect to take due account of the biblical horizons of the ironic opening lines. Exhortations to joy directed towards a city are found more than once in the Old Testament with reference to Jerusalem.⁵⁴ The occasions for such joy are the expected arrival of the Lord, and the news that he has retracted his harsh judgement of the city and will protect it in future from all evil.⁵⁵ The ironic call for joy thus specifically caricatures the Old Testament model, and it is only logical that it should be followed by a prophecy of the expected ruin of Florence. It is particularly important to bear in mind the biblical background of the sarcastic opening of Canto XXVI when it comes to the comparison with the prophet Elisha. For there is a clear analogy here between the prophet and Dante; and the link is made by much more than merely the optical impression which is the basis of the comparison. This is confirmed not least by the periphrase that introduces the prophet, which after all makes little sense in the immediate context of the comparison. Yet in the wider context of this canto the allusion to the avenger – “colui che si vengiò con li orsi” – is very carefully explained. With the help of the traditional exegesis of this biblical passage we have seen the relationship between the description of Elisha and the deserved misfortune that will befall Jerusalem. Dante thereby sets up a link between himself and this prophet. Just as Elisha points to the fate that will afflict Jerusalem, so, too, Dante prophecies the just punishment awaiting Florence for its sins. What is only cautiously hinted at by the conditional clause in verse 7 (“Ma se presso al mattin del ver si sogna”), is then justified as the canto progresses – a justification that makes a not incon-

 Such exhortations are seen above all in the books of the prophets Isaiah, Zephenia and Zechariah. Is Isaiah 12,6: “exulta et lauda habitatio Sion quia magnus in medio tui Sanctus Israhel”. And Zephenia 3,14: “lauda filia Sion iubilate Israhel laetare et exulta in omni corde filia Hierusalem”. Zechariah 2,10: “lauda et laetare filia Sion quia ecce ego venio et habitabo in medio tui ait Dominus”. Zechariah 9,9: “exulta satis filia Sion iubila filia Hierusalem ecce rex tuus veniet tibi iustus et salvator ipse”.  See Zephaniah 3,15 f.: “15 abstulit Dominus iudicium tuum avertit inimicos tuos rex Israhel Dominus in medio tui non timebis malum ultra 16 in die illa dicetur Hierusalem noli timere Sion non dissolventur manus tuae”.

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siderable claim of its own. In the face of the curiosi, that is to say, those who have wrongfully tried to take possession of a truth that was not theirs by right, the Pilgrim situates himself, with quiet self-confidence, in the tradition of the prophet. As one who has been granted insight into another world, he also lays claim to knowledge of the future of this world. In the very place where the antithesis of his own journey into the afterlife is being duly punished – that antithesis being the self-glorifying voyage of Ulysses which could only end in death and damnation – Dante admits himself to the ranks of those who have gained privileged insight into knowledge that they alone have a right to – the diametric opposite of all illegitimate curiosity. In fact this knowledge still derives from the holy scriptures. The present – like the future – can be extrapolated from what is ordained in the text of the Bible itself. Thus the authority of this figure, who has been granted access to the truth of the afterlife, is still rooted in the exegesis of the holy scripture. But the text of the Commedia, where the capacity to perceive the truth in the afterlife is drawn from insight into the revealed scripture, goes further than any previous interpretation of the biblical text. It transforms the exegesis into the revelation of a new truth. The sacro poema follows where the holy scripture left off. It is the new gospel for a world that – as we can see from the selva oscura at the beginning of the Commedia – is in danger of squandering what once was redeemed, and is therefore sorely in need of renewal. The close connections made with the Bible justify the claim to a truth that casts the Commedia as the final stage in divine revelation. And here, under the gaze of the sinners against the truth, we see the ultimate justification for the elevation of the Pilgrim to prophet. This claim is consistently matched by the structure of the text, which has a poetics as deeply mysterious as that of the Bible itself. We have seen how Canto XXVI, which seems at first to fall into separate, barely connected sections has a logic of its own drawn from a discursive order that exists beyond the immediately evident meaning of the text – and which both presumes and resumes the exegesis of the holy scripture. This underlying semantic coherence may be seen above all in the connection between the beginning and the end of Canto XXVI. Closer examination reveals how the reference to the city of Florence as a victim of its own pride corresponds to the report of Ulysses’ voyage beyond the limits set for human beings in this world. In both cases there is a journey across the sea, leading to destruction. But there are yet more details that link these two passages. The narrator addresses the vainglorious city of Florence with the following words: “Godi, Fiorenza, poi che se’ sì grande che per mare e per terra batti l’ali” (Inferno XXVI,1 f.). And in the description of Ulysses’ voyage which will end in Hell we read: “De’ remi facemmo ali al folle volo” (Inferno

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XXVI,125); and here it is that Dante finds citizens of his own home town: “e per lo ’nferno tuo nome si spande”.⁵⁶ The motif of the wings that recurs here, and the symbolic transformation of the ship’s oars into wings, has a particular allegorical meaning, for wings are traditionally a symbol of pride.⁵⁷ The presence on two occasions of this symbol ascribes the ruinous goings-on in Florence to the same cause as Ulysses’ audacious voyage. These intratextual connections – to use the technical term – within the canto may also provide some assistance in clarifying one issue that has caused controversy amongst commentators from the outset. The point at issue is the uncertainty of precisely who it is that Dante, in line 9, imagines will carry out the punishment that he is prophesying for his home town: “di quel che Prato, non ch’altri agogna”. Could Dante have been referring to another town as Prato, are the puzzling altri some other, unnamed person? Berthier, in his commentary, suggests instead none other than divine Providence as the possible identity of altri. ⁵⁸ And it would seem that the text itself contains one argument for this interpretation, and once again it is the correspondence with Ulysses’ story that provides the relevant reference. Ulysses closes the account of his shipwreck with the words “com’ altrui piacque” (Inferno XXVI, 141), and at this point there can be no doubt that the Being held responsible here is that same one who alone has power over human life and death. In view of other correspondences between the opening and the close of the canto, it would seem reasonable to presume a connection here, too. Thus the altri responsible for the punishment of Florence would be that same God who saw to it that proud Ulysses’ voyage should end in Hell.⁵⁹ The characterisation  To my knowledge Sturm is the only one to point out this correspondence between the opening and the end of the text; however, I cannot agree with her interpretation of what she has observed. She sees this correspondence as a reflection of Dante’s being torn between the damning unmasking of delusions of grandeur and simultaneous personal pain, as they also appear in the Ulysses episode (Sturm 1974, p. 102). For my own view of the connection between the figure of Ulysses and the city of Florence see the following interpretation.  See for instance Gregorius Magnus, Moralia in Iob, 31,15, linea 6: “Alas in altum erigere est per effrenatam superbiam cogitationes aperire.” The interpretation of Isaiam 18,1 is crucial to an allegorical interpretation of this kind. See for instance Hieronymus, Commentarii in Isaiam 18,1, linea 45 f.: “alas autem nauium, uela quibus suspenduntur et trahuntur, intellege. et pulchre alas dixit nauium, omnis enim haereticus pollicetur excelsa, et cum alas habere se iactet, tamen haeret in salsis fluctibus, et procul non recedit a terra, in medio que cursu patitur repente naufragium.”  In his commentary on line 9 he writes: “E quindi il non ch’altri si dovrebbe intendere di tutti quelli che punirono Firenze, e anche della Provvidenza divina” (Berthier 1892– 1897, Inferno XXVI,9).  At this point there is perhaps another – possible – correspondence between the characterisation of Florence at the beginning of Canto XXVI and Ulysses’ narrative at the end. “Se presso

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of the city of Florence – now metaphorical, now literal – reaching out into the world, points to the same fundamental sin that Ulysses committed when he sought to penetrate a world closed to human beings. Moreover, in this correspondence there is also a clear condemnation of Ulysses’ last voyage. It was an expression of sinful arrogance, which afflicted the accursed city⁶⁰ and the proud sailor alike.⁶¹ This correspondence between the opening and the close of Canto XXVI is not without significance regarding the function of this canto within the Commedia as a whole. It shows that this canto is not ordered mimetically according to the

al mattin del ver si sogna” (Inferno XXVI,7): here morning is described as the time when the truth about the fate of his native city was revealed to the narrator. The morning is also the time when Ulysses sets out on his voyage to ultimate ruin: “e volta nostra poppa nel mattino, de’ remi fa‐cemmo ali al folle volo” (Inferno XXVI,124 f.).  The characterisation of Florence in Dante’s aside at the beginning of Canto XXVI has another biblical reference point besides Jerusalem. In the Old Testament, too, there was a city whose fame was built on its marine enterprise, which was identified as nothing other than superbia by the exegetists. The city was Tharsis, which has repeatedly been identified with Carthage. See Augustinus, Enarrationes in psalmos, psalmus 47,6: “apud ezechielem autem a diuersis interpretibus, ab aliis carthago, ab aliis tharsis interpretata est; et hac diuersitate interpretum potest intellegi hanc appellari tharsum, quae carthago dicebatur. manifestum est autem, quod primordia regni carthaginis nauibus floruerunt, et ita floruerunt, ut inter ceteras gentes excellerent negotiationibus et nauigationibus. nam quando dido fugiens fratrem delapsa est ad terras africae, ubi carthaginem condidit, naues quae paratae erant ad mercationem in eius regione assumserat ad fugam, consentientibus sibi regionis eius principibus; et ipsae naues etiam condita carthagine ad negotiandum non defecerunt. atque hinc nimium superba facta est ciuitas illa, ut digne per eius naues intellegatur superbia gentium, praesumens in incertis tamquam in flatibus uentorum.” The connection between Florence and Carthage (which introduces the traditional opponent of Rome and moreover one of the important locations of the Aeneid into the equation) opens up yet another level in Canto XXVI of the Inferno. This additional level links the situation as such to salvation history, and its importance can be shown by means of a whole number of indicators. (This would in itself throw light on the remarkable description of the subterfuge with the Trojan horse: “l’agguato del caval che fé la porta/onde uscì de’ Romani il gentil seme”. This reference to the story of the foundation of Rome, with its combination of porta and gentil seme, evokes a certain imagery that really only goes back to one particular context: that of the incarnation. The Virgin Mary is the door through which Redemption comes into this world. This initially utterly surprising connection can be readily explained by the role of the Imperium for the historical theology of the Commedia. The downfall of Troy thus becomes a figura incarnationis). In this context I can do no more that point out this underlying strand of historical theology in Canto XXVI; unfortunately space does not allow me to provide detailed evidence. Suffice it to say that the prophecy regarding the future of Florence thus also acquires an even preciser place in salvation history.  Ulysses’ superbia is an expression not least of the epithet folle in the phrase folle volo (Inferno XXVI,125) that he used of himself. See the finely differentiated analysis by Bosco 1958.

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structure of its contents; rather it is concerned to represent the insight that ensues from the encounter with those that have sinned against the truth. And the canto itself replicates this process of recognition. Contrary to the tacit assumption on the part of commentators, it is this process – and not mimetic depiction, not the figure of Ulysses – that is the real focus of this canto. Canto XXVI portrays the consequences of the encounter with the sinners against the truth, and for the Pilgrim and author of the Commedia itself these consequences induce the opposite of the sin that he sees here. They lead to the recognition of a truth that comes from God, and with that the rejection of false dealings with the truth – the renunciation of the curiositas that he was still in thrall to at the outset. As such, this notion of contrasting insight into the nature of sin, which leads to virtue, is entirely compatible with traditional patterns of theological doctrine: it has long been an accepted premise in moral theology that a – theoretical – encounter with sin could serve to illuminate virtue. But Canto XXVI very decisively goes further than this conventional outcome of an individual’s insight into the nature of evil. For the Pilgrim does not acquire a natural insight into the essence of good and evil, rather in this canto he is granted privileged knowledge that designates him as the last prophet, and the encounter with Ulysses marks the moment of his initiation into this truth.⁶² This then is the source of the meaning of this episode within the Commedia, as identified by commentators and marked by the different reference to Ulysses. The graciously granted truth, transcending all earthly knowledge, is also expressed – as I have attempted to show here – in the structure of a text that takes biblical exegesis a stage further, thereby generating a new truth. It is for this reason that Dante includes in the text of the Commedia semantic patterns that correspond to those of the holy scripture; in a sense he transforms exegetic techniques into an aesthetic of production. As a consequence, the sacro poema also provides the key to a truth which only the initiated can find in it. Thus the latent nature of its meaning also stands surety for its authority. But the prophetic knowledge that is thus granted Dante allows him to look into the future, and he can see the misfortune that will punish his native city for its pride just as Ulysses’ pride will also be punished, and that also locates the present in an order of knowledge and of history that has its origins in the revealed scripture. When I refer rather unspecifically to the transgressions of those now occupying the eighth bolgia as sinning against the truth, then it is in an attempt to compensate for the lack of an exact term for the systematic connection between the different sins encountered here. As we saw at the outset of this essay, the as-

 Benevenuto 1380, Inferno XXVI, 34– 42, simply states: “ita Dantes alter Eliseus.”

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sumption of a certain disparity in the moral and theological valency of Ulysses’ deeds has had a significant influence on th e debate surrounding Canto XXVI. The accusation of illegitimate curiosity does not seem to tally with the fact that express mention is made of a series of deceptions as the reason for his being banished to Hell. This discrepancy also led to the figure of Ulysses as it were being divided into several different personas, each with a different moral status. Yet it seems to me that this – supposed – disparity of his deeds is resolved if one views the notion of curiositas in the theoretical context that was associated with it in Dante’s day, and which is considerably more important than the meaning indicated by the semantics of the word itself. The incomparably wider-reaching ethical concept that is addressed under the heading ‘curiosity’ is immediately evident at the opening of Thomas Aquinas’s discussion of the sin of curiositas. At the opening of the relevant Quaestio he defines the opposite position, which is generally named at this point and then progressively undermined during the course of the argument: Videtur quod circa cognitionem intellectivam non possit esse curiositas. Quia secundum Philosophum, in Ethic., in his quae secundum se sunt bona vel mala, non possunt accipi medium et extrema. Sed cognitio intellectiva secundum se est bona: in hoc enim perfectio hominis videtur consistere, ut intellectus eius de potentia reducatur in actum, quod fit per cognitionem veritatis.⁶³

By virtue of the moral integrity of any act of perception, which is invoked here in an unmistakably Aristotelian spirit, the reprehensible nature of curiositas seems to cease to be an issue, for it, too, serves purely as an aid to discovering an – unknown – truth. And as such it can only be good. Thomas thus has considerable difficulty insisting on the traditional damnation of illegitimate curiosity in the face of the apparently unquestionable purity of the curiosity that seems to be an intrinsic component in the most noble human leaning, the thirst for knowledge. In order to do so, he very precisely defines as it were the systematic points in the epistemological process where, despite its intrinsic reliability (ipsa enim veritatis cognitio, per se loquendo bona est), nevertheless one might per accidens act sinfully. For instance, the acquisition of knowledge could by implication be seen as sinful if it induces pride. And the very thirst for knowledge can also be sinful if from the outset the goal is superbia. Specifically at this point Thomas Aquinas cites the Church Father Augustine with a comment that has a particular significance with regard to the figure of Ulysses, indeed which seems like an exact description of his actions: “Sunt qui, desertis virtutibus, et nescientes

 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, II-II,167,1.

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quid sit Deus et quanta sit maiestas semper eodem manentis naturae, magnum aliquid se agere putant si universam istam corporis molem quam mundum nuncupamus, curiosissime intentissimeque perquirant. Unde etiam tanta superbia gignitur ut in ipso caelo, de quo saepe disputant, sibimet habitare videantur”. If the discussed allegorical nature of Ulysses’ last voyage shows it to have been a vainglorious undertaking, then this is by and large entirely in keeping with the conclusion drawn in the doctrinal text of the Summa theologiae. But how does this sinful curiositas on Ulysses’ part relate to the other sins, falsehood and treachery, for which he has expressly been banished to the eighth bolgia? In fact the condition (named in the Summa directly after the passage quoted above) under which the acquisition of knowledge can become sinful specifically because of a wrongful aim, deals with this case: “Similiter etiam illi qui student addiscere aliquid ad peccandum, vitiosum studium habent: secundum illud Ierem. IX: Docuerunt linguam suam loqui mendacium: ut inique agerent, laboraverunt”. Here we see the connection between Ulysses’ curiosity and his treacherous deeds. It derives from the particular line of argument which seeks to uphold the traditional Christian notion of the reprehensibility of curiositas against the anthropological approval of the thirst for knowledge as such in the philosophy of Aristotle.⁶⁴ Thus the figure of Ulysses and the logic of his depiction may largely be reconstructed from the system adopted by Aquinas in his discussion of the illegitimacy of the search for truth. But this canto does not aim to replicate this system, it is rather the case that by transposing it into the setting of the eighth bolgia, Dante sets the scene for his elevation to the status of new prophet that occurs here. For the desire to gain knowledge that human beings do not naturally have access to is one of the cases of sinful enquiry listed in Aquinas’s Summa article.⁶⁵ To counter this, Dante arranges the text in such a way that he places himself – as opposed to those who are trying to acquire illegitimate knowledge – in the role of one who has been granted legitimate access to knowledge closed to others. But this adoption of the mantle of the prophets, the mantle

 Also the dubious morality of that curiosity that was allegorically encoded in the comparison with the villano, is mentioned in Thomas Aquinas’s systematic overview of different variants of sins against the truth: “Tertio, quando homo appetit cognoscere veritatem circa creaturas non referendo ad debitum finem, scilicet ad cognitionem Dei. Unde Augustinus dicit, in libro de Vera Relig., quod in consideratione creaturarum non est vana et peritura curiositas exercenda, sed gradus ad immortalia et semper manentia faciendus” (Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, II-II,167,1).  Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, II-II,167,1: “Quarto modo, inquantum aliquis studet ad cognoscendam veritatem supra proprii ingenii facultatem: quia per hoc homines de facili in errores labuntur.”

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of those who penned the text of the holy scriptures as dictated by the Lord God Himself, is immediately evident in this prophecy at the opening of this canto, when he foresees the misfortune to befall his native city of Florence – just as Elisha foresaw the ultimate demise of the city of Jerusalem. This claim to the status of prophet is thus the underlying meaning of the Ulysses Canto, which might more appropriately be called the Canto of Dante’s initiation. And this claim also generates a semantic structure which impels the reader to seek the hidden meaning of the canto – no different to the case of the Bible itself whose undreamt-of truth has led to its exegesis. As it were the last Litmus test for this interpretation is provided towards the end of this canto in the words Ulysses once spoke to his comrades, to persuade them to join him on one last adventure.⁶⁶ It is specifically this speech by Ulysses that has formed the backbone for those interpretations of the text that see Canto XXVI of the Inferno as evidence of the rejection of the medieval opprobrium attached to curiositas. In fact Ulysses’ appeal to his frati, in which he tells them that they have been born to acquire virtute e canoscenza and not to live like animals, would surely seem to celebrate an ethically founded desire for knowledge that perfectly matches the tenets of morality and looks likes the very opposite of curiositas. Yet this reading of Ulysses’ address takes no account of the fact that it is, strictly speaking, contradictory, because it links the prize of virtue and knowledge – which seem to be above any moral doubts – with a different characterisation of the desire for knowledge that considerably affects its ethical reliability. This other characterisation is found in essence in the turn of phrase “questa tanto piccola vigilia de’ nostri sensi”. Modern Dante commentators have made slightly heavy weather of explaining the combination of vigilia and sensi: life as a state of being awake, death as a state of sleep. These somewhat contrived explanations can, however, be readily replaced if one takes into account another meaning of the notion vigilia, which was common currency amongst contemporary commentators and seems to have sunk into obscurity since the 19th century. Vigilia is a term used in the Roman Catholic liturgy. All the major festivals of the ecclesiastical year are preceded by a vigil to ring in the feast day. Thus the vigilia de’ sensi is a reference to life as the evening before death. And in the same breath, this life appears as the time which is only open to sensual perception. But precisely this considerably limits the level of the knowledge that Ulysses wants to encourage his comrades to seek, at the risk of their own lives. For it is knowledge of this world only, knowledge that will only satisfy the senses and is hence not worthy of a human being, the animal rationale who is far

 See the exact wording in note 7.

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above the level of the bruti. Thus Ulysses’ words clearly demonstrate his blindness to the truth. The terms he uses show precisely the insight he is lacking.⁶⁷ For the vigilia de’ sensi is the evening before the festival that awaits the redeemed in death, a life that has left the sensual behind it and is devoted to the undistorted contemplation of the truth. To be sharing already in that truth is the extraordinary privilege that has been granted the Pilgrim Dante. Thus, perceiving the sinners against the truth, he is elevated to the status of prophet, of those chosen ones who share in a knowledge that specifically goes beyond the natural cognitive faculties of human beings and is far above any suspicion of originating in mere curiosity. It seems that Canto XXVI of the Inferno is dealing with what might be called Dante’s initiation. Rather than presenting a depiction of curiositas and those who have succumbed to it, this canto is about the effect that results from Dante’s insight into what is it to sin against the truth. The text itself represents the acquisition of the new truth that Dante gains access to; its semantic patterns, which, like the holy scriptures demand their own exegesis, lay claim to that authority that is the right of a canonic text.

 This once again draws attention to the motivation behind Ulysses’ curiosity. We have already seen, in our observation of the correspondence between Ulysses’ account of his last voyage and Dante’s characterisation of the self-glorification of his native city of Florence, how the allegorical meaning of the imagery common to both shows that superbia is also the reason for Ulysses’ departure for an unknown world. But this motivation, indicated allegorically, is given more palpable expression in his own words. Significantly, in this context, contemporary commentators and modern commentators offer very different interpretations of the syntax of the opening lines of Ulysses’ account. Commentators and editors today naturally assume that the text reads thus (as cited above): “‘«O frati», dissi, «che per cento milia perigli siete giunti a l’occidente, a questa tanto picciola vigilia d’i nostri sensi ch’è del rimanente non vogliate negar l’esperïenza, di retro al sol, del mondo sanza gente».’” However, in contemporary commentaries the syntax of this passage reads as follows: “‘«O frati,» dissi «che per cento milia perigli siete giunti a l’occidente, a questa tanto picciola vigilia d’i nostri sensi ch’è del rimanente? Non vogliate negar l’esperïenza, di retro al sol, del mondo sanza gente».’” In grammatical terms: instead of a relative clause introduced by che these commentaries have an interrogative clause, which casts a very different light on the meaning of Ulysses’ words. Now his concern is for what will remain of this short life. Therefore he encourages his companions to undertake a hitherto undreamt of journey which will bring them – lasting – fame.

Art in the Afterlife or God as Scupltor The Reliefs in Dante’s Purgatorio (Purg. X – XII) “Here the singularity and particularity of human interests and purposes disappear in the face of the absolute grandeur of the ultimate purpose and goal of all things; yet at the same time the otherwise most transient and fleeting aspect of the living world stands before us, entirely epic in its stature, its innermost depths probed, judged according to its value and non-value by the highest concept, by God Himself. For as these individuals strove and suffered, as they were in their intentions and achievements, so they will remain here forever, petrified into immutable images.”⁶⁸

These lines, from one of the most famous interpretations of Dante’s Divine Comedy, are unmistakably from the pen of a philosopher. Unmistakably, because Hegel’s commentary firmly places the Commedia in an intellectual tradition that consistently subsumed all art within a notion of conceptual truth. This in turn explains the evident affinity of Dante’s epic to the visual arts as seen by Hegel. For it is made up of images, figures that we may gaze upon, which, for Hegel, embody an afterlife that signifies nothing other than the substantiality of this world made manifest. Concept and Anschauung, here in the form of visual contemplation, are linked directly with one another, and this alliance seamlessly maintains the heritage of a theory whose very name points to the original connection between recognition (Erkenntnis) and contemplation. Indisputably Dante’s Commedia participates in various ways in this intellectual tradition. It applies for one to the notion of a Heavenly and distinctly philosophical paradise, that seeks – in the undisturbed contemplation of a God who is identical with perfect truth – to demonstrate the epitome of all happiness. At the same time the pilgrimage through the afterlife is in itself beholden to an order of knowledge that links recognition of the truth and visual contemplation.⁶⁹ Yet this same notion of a journey already indicates that ‘Dante’s’⁷⁰ path through Hell, Purgatory and Heaven involves more than simply observing other-worldly truth. His journey is also a continuation of the viator mundi, a pilgrimage through this world

 Hegel 1986, pp. 406 f. (translation by F. E.).  Hegel also points this out very perceptively: “The representation also has to comply with the already finished subject matter. It can only be a excursion through realms that are fixed once and for all, that […] are to deliver a painting and a report of what has been seen” (Hegel 1986, p. 407; translation by F. E.).  The single quotation marks used here are to indicate the difference between the ‘empirical’ author and the Pilgrim and narrator. They should be taken as read in what follows. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110637106-004

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as a symbol of Earthly life, and this journey is above all a test. Thus, as he makes his way through the afterlife the Pilgrim has to overcome a whole array of dangers, and the overall undertaking is a merciful deliverance from the confines of deepest guilt: nothing less than this is the allegorical meaning of the selva oscura in the opening lines. Thus Dante’s Commedia draws one of its main impulses specifically from the reconciliation of an order of knowing and an order of doing. The Pilgrim’s journey through the realms of the afterlife is as much a demonstration of the utilisation of knowledge and recognition for the purpose of moral purification, as it establishes a framework that legitimises the very acquisition of knowledge. However, in so doing the narrative construction of the Commedia highlights the risks that attach to a concept of art that would want to lay claim to the Divine Comedy as solely the heir to theoria. The radicalism with which Hegel ascribes Dante’s work to this intellectual tradition derives not least from his identification of God as a concept. “Its innermost depths probed, judged according to its value and non-value by the highest concept, by God Himself” – thus Hegel makes the transition from the fleeting nature of existence to the permanence of a substantial image. A similar note is struck when the Christian order of life, the focus on the next life that guides this life, is now seen as an orientation towards the “ultimate purpose” and as the “goal of all things”, which are in turn nothing other than concepts referring to the conquest of all materiality and exteriority. This transformation of divine judgement into a concept which, remarkably enough, disregards the difference between virtue and sin, between Heaven and Earth, frees the essential from the non-essential; thus the reduction of the mythical dimension to that of theoretical concept clearly indicates the deeply pagan nature of Hegel’s view of the Christian epic. Yet, his interpretation only takes the implications of the theoria, that Dante’s epic itself shares, to the same radical conclusion. But Dante’s Commedia is by no means so clear-cut, rather it draws a significant portion of its potential as a narrative precisely from the conflict between the heritage of a pagan theory and the premises of an older Christian interpretation of the world. When Dante confronts commentaries and the scholastic summa with a narrative, then the discursive nature of the form itself should be seen as an indicator of his critical engagement with the precarious basis of all Christian theoria which theology seeks to disguise by conceptual abundance.⁷¹ The narrative mise-en-scène of the  The question of the legitimacy of this knowledge is not only a matter of its moral basis, it is also a matter of the possibility of such knowledge. In the opening of his Summa theologiae, Thomas Aquinas devised an ingenious albeit strictly speaking rather flawed strategy for justifying theology as a scientia. At the same time he concedes that cognition of what goes beyond natural human powers of recognition cannot be the object of scientific study. Yet he nevertheless at-

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recognition of truth as a journey through the afterlife dramatises precisely the elsewhere unspoken-of dichotomy between theory and myth. Instead of simply transforming the truth into a simple object of contemplation, the Commedia explores the preconditions and the price of such a transformation. In what follows, we shall therefore look more closely at this function of the text in a scene that is perhaps particularly significant in this respect, significant because it contains within it images, images in which reality is seen in the shape of pictorial representation and which Dante uses to focus on the truth of what is visible to our gaze. As the Pilgrim comes to the superbi in Purgatorio, he encounters these images, not – as Hegel would have it – petrified, but hewn into stone, as reliefs, on the first ledge of the mountain of Purgatory: Là sù non eran mossi i piè nostri anco, quand’ io conobbi quella ripa intorno che dritto di salita aveva manco, esser di marmo candido e addorno d’intagli sì, che non pur Policleto ma la natura lì avrebbe scorno. (Purgatorio X, 28 – 33)

God as image-maker – this notion was a familiar one in the Middle Ages.⁷² As a metaphor it gives concrete form to the equally current notion of the Creator as artist, which in turn presents the creatio ex nihilo as the work of an artifex. But, without question, one of the consequences of this metaphor is the interpretation of the world as mimesis. God’s creatures are seen as likenesses of those primeval images inscribed into His mind, and nature itself is seen as the tool

tempts to equate the status of the sacra doctrina with that of a scientia by means of an analogy: “Sed sciendum est quod duplex est scientiarum genus. Quaedam enim sunt, quae procedunt ex principiis notis lumine naturali intellectus, sicut arithmetica, geometria, et huiusmodi. Quaedam vero sunt, quae procedunt ex principiis notis lumine superioris scientiae: sicut perspectiva procedit ex principiis notificatis per geometriam, et musica ex principiis per arithmeticam notis. Et hoc modo sacra doctrina est scientia: quia procedit ex principiis notis lumine superioris scientiae, quae scilicet est scientia Dei et beatorum. Unde sicut musica credit principia tradita sibi ab arithmetico, ita doctrina sacra credit principia revelata sibi a Deo” (Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I,1, 2c). However, the analogy postulated here between higher and lower forms of science seeks to obscure – skilfully yet equally transparently – the fact that it is only in the first case that there is a connection between two scientiae; the doctrina sacra, on the other hand, owes its existence to divine revelation. Dante’s narrative solution of a journey through the afterlife would thus appear to be a reversal of the relevant justification of theological knowledge. It relocates this knowledge in the afterlife, where it becomes accessible to human beings through the grace that has allowed Dante to visit and observe this transcendental world.  Cf. the relevant discussion in Curtius 1973, pp. 527– 529.

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for the continuing transformation of the ideae or exemplaria of the divine mind into the world of living creatures.⁷³ Just as an architect first designs a house in his imagination, before he starts to build, so, too, every living creature has its origins in a divine idea.⁷⁴ However, this fundamental parallel between art and creation clamours all the more urgently for an answer to the question as to why Dante makes no lesser figure than God Himself into the sculptor in Canto X of his Purgatorio, that is to say, why does he have God recreate His own creation? Why, to put it in theologically exact terms, is the Creator of the formae substantiales presented as the originator of formae accidentales? ⁷⁵ The answer is needed all the more urgently in that the reliefs the Pilgrim sees in the place occupied by the Proud also put to shame the works of other artists, including that of nature itself: “non pur Policleto, ma la natura lì avrebbe scorno”. Why, therefore – to come to the nub of the question – does the author of the Commedia introduce a divine sculptor whose sculptures simultaneously detract from His work elsewhere? Is the task of the Almighty to correct his own imperfect Creation? But how can this be reconciled with his omnipotence? And, lastly, why should His work even be assessed in terms of rivalry with one such as Polyclete? We will start by exploring these questions, which will in turn provide a first insight into the potential for conflict – both concealed and revealed – in the Commedia, which itself has its roots in an interpretation of deeply Christian notions using the tools of ancient philosophy.

I The interpretation of Creation as the product of divine art, goes, as we have seen, hand in hand with an interpretation of the world as mimesis: it is now the likeness of an original image. But strictly speaking any such ontological relationship questions some important assumptions regarding the meaning of the concept of Creation itself. Therefore it is worth devoting some attention to its implications. It is readily apparent that the hierarchical relationship of original image and likeness basically reverses their conceptual connection. To see how this works, we need only glance at the thought process which Plato uses to explain the existence of ideas: they are the logical postulate of existing things, they are therefore images of objects. Meanwhile it would be overly hasty to extrapolate from this  Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I,44, 3c.  Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I,15,1c.  The images as such in fact do not fit the “idee estetiche della scolastica” that Roffarè equates them with “in modo generico” (Roffarè 1967, p. 323).

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their metaphysical nothingness. Instead of confining oneself to demonstrating the relevant contradiction, it is more pertinent to try to understand how this all too obvious circumstance could be ignored. What it reflects is a deep underlying trust – preceding all theory – in the given. Therefore ‘perceiving’ and ‘recognising’ belong together, in that the forms of observation of the given – the ideas – become the medium of its substance. Therefore images become categories of existence. For visual contemplation is nothing other than the reliable registration of what is present. Thus the perception of objects becomes a confirmation of their existence: the images of these objects appear as a category of their substance, and transform those objects into likenesses of their images. It is clear that these premises in effect cast the relevant metaphysical figure in a precarious light at the moment when the world is no longer thought of primarily as given, but as made. This is the inevitable outcome of its interpretation as having been created. Yet ultimately one’s view of the originator becomes distorted as soon as reality appears as a likeness of a higher form of itself. The circumstances of the analogy mean that the act of creation is forgotten. This is the other side of what theology usually presents as the effect of this analogy. For it generally insists that as such the world has a similarity with its Creator inscribed into it, and hence also a pointer to its originator.⁷⁶ The perilous nature of this ontology of creation, however, is evident in epistemology and, at the same time, compromises all scholarly learning. For the connection between the creature and the ratio of its Creator corresponds to the connection between the human mind and the object recognised by the human being: for to recognise the object means nothing less than the human mediating  The difficulties that ensue for theology from this analogy of earthly existence and the divine mind may particularly be seen where it has to justify this metaphysical relationship in the face of the wording of the Bible. For in the Old Testament we read that it was purely for Man that God created him in His own image. Thus in the Bible the fact of constituting a likeness is a distinction, but not an ontological principle. Thomas Aquinas thus finds himself obliged to distinguish between different types of similarity in order to convey the ontological relationship between God and His creation and the text of the holy scripture. For while it is true that every creature is an image of the ratio exemplaris in the divine mind (cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I,93, a. 2, ad 4), it is only the creatura rationalis that is deemed worthy of the imago Dei. The rest of creation is left with the similitudo of a vestigium (cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I,93, a.6c). But this ingenious solution obscures the fact that strictly speaking a ‘trace’ casts doubt on the similarity. (The difference between likeness to God as the elevation of a privileged creature and mimesis as a categorical ontological basis can be seen particularly in the narrative consequences of the creation of human beings. Instead of securing the world order, the human being – created in God’s image and appointed master of the world – is the one who upsets that very order. For the fact that the human being is an imago Dei becomes the source of his/ her wrongful rebellion against God’s will.)

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this object with his mind.⁷⁷ But recognition is regarded thereby as an adequate link between that human mind and its object, which in turn – fatally – renders any link to the Creator of that object fundamentally superfluous. By its structure the analogy between creation and recognition which is intrinsic to the ontologisation of creation thus fatally excludes the divine originator of the creature from the act of its recognition by the human being. And precisely because of this all learning had to become suspect – as an attempt to gain power – and, as a filia superbiae, was ascribed to the realms of curiositas. ⁷⁸ Strictly speaking this discreditaion of scientia is about something other than what is named by the term curiosity. For it is problematic not because of the yearning for the new, not because of the dissatisfaction with what one has, rather, and much more radically, it is dangerous because of the act of recognition itself. Thus the traditional designation of this vice basically plays down the suspicion that it also expresses. It seems to pinpoint a false motivation for recognition, but in truth it introduces into the anthropology of the animal rationale a serious contradiction in that it casts doubt on the legitimacy of one of its most fundamental behaviours, namely the act of recognition. The ontology of the creature and epistemic theory find themselves in unavoidable conflict with each other.⁷⁹ Hence Christian thinkers have developed other forms to symbolise the simply unimaginable, the creatio ex nihilo: forms that put a much greater accent on the act of Creation. A particular feature of this is the widespread view of nature as a second Book of God, that is to say, drawing a parallel with the holy scriptures – the interpretation of divine disposal as His proposal to human beings. Where Creation is regarded as God’s Word, as a sign given to humanity, then naturally the author of this message becomes the centre of interest. Not the concept, but the Word, not the likeness, but the sign now become the categorical imperative of nature. Not an order of seeing, but one of hearing (or reading) be-

 Thomas Aquinas, himself an Aristotelian, described this as the reconciliation of the forma of the object with the species intelligibiles of human intelligence (cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I, 84).  It is for this reason that in the writings of Augustine the analysis of the structure of recognition as the psychology of pride is presented as a denial of the creator: “sed peccata animas fallunt, cum uerum quaerunt, relicta et neglecta ueritate. nam quoniam opera magis quam artificem atque ipsam artem dilexerunt, hoc errore puniuntur, ut in operibus artificem artem que conquirant, et cum inuenire nequeuerint – deus enim non corporalibus sensibus subiacet, sed ipsi menti supereminet – ipsa opera existiment esse et artem et artificem” (Augustinus, De vera religione, II, 36,67).  For more on Augustine’s notion of curiosity see Blumenberg 1980, pp. 103 – 121.

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comes its integrating dimension here.⁸⁰ And, with that, to perceive or recognise nature is to read the annals of revelation, the decoding of which opens up specifically not what is evident but what is hidden. The seemingly familiar now reveals not an evident analogy of the similar, but the alien nature of the transcendental. Reading in the Book of Nature renders it alien, and thus the metaphorics of the legibility of the world inevitably lead to a latent conflict with ontological theory which declares the Creator as the artist of the similar.⁸¹ This conflict is played out in the canti of the Purgatorio that concern us here. The hidden dangers of the image of Deus as artifex come to light above all in the question of the legitimacy of art produced on this Earth. Since time immemorial it has not been easy to justify art in terms of ontology. Art was left initially with no more than the ungrateful role of second class images tainted with the blemish of a double loss of being. Thus, in his Politeia, Plato memorably rejected all forms of mimesis. Aristotle later took the same category as the starting point for his legitimation of art, which was to prove to be an overwhelmingly successful strategy. If art imitates nature, then it does not spoil the perfection of the latter, rather it completes the task of nature. For art avails itself of nothing less than what nature has already planned.⁸² Admittedly this also means that the formula ars imitatur naturam is inevitably slightly disparaging of nature and has to attribute to nature a certain tardiness with regard to the needs of human beings. Perhaps this formula reveals its in fact critical potential nowhere more clearly than when Aristotle, in his discussion of poiesis, demonstrates what ‘imitation’ means. For the claims that poetry is superior to historical texts on a philosophical level in truth inevitably comprises an ontological distancing from nature. It is only the poet who is able to portray the course of events on a level acceptable to a logistician – that is to say, to correct that disorder that is intrinsic to them. It is certainly not by chance that the latent critical potential of techne sparks into

 Thus also in Christian thinking there are two rival hierarchies of sensual perception: one attributing the highest status to the eye, the other favouring the ear (see note 107).  For more on the ‘book of nature’ see Blumenberg 1993, pp. 47 ff. Blumenberg derives his approach to the metaphorics of the book of nature from a relocation of Platonic thinking into the realm of the divine mind. This in turn means that the world must no longer be viewed as thinkable, but as the product of thinking per se. And it is in keeping with the logic of this change that nature cannot be recognised through contemplation alone but has to be “understood through thinking, in other words, it has to be ‘read’” (Blumenberg 1993, p. 48; translation by F. E.). However, it seems to me that the metaphorics of the second book are if anything a corrective for a pagan theory received by theology which specifically linked thinking and Anschauung. It shows once again that this world is born of the Word and therefore is not only open to theoria and needs a hermeneutics which makes it possible to decipher the coded message of its creator.  Cf. Blumenberg 1957.

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life not where it is satisfying a pragmatic need on the part of human beings, that nature has not adequately provided for, but where its mimesis itself produces an object of contemplation. Here techne finds itself in competition with theoria. And it is plain to see that these latent, subversive implications of art had to become all the more perilous where nature turned into creation, where it was clear to see the originator of the given. For now even the most inconsequential deficiency in the world indubitably cast tacit doubt on the competence of the Almighty, who by definition could only create that which is perfect. Of course ars can be integrated into the structural order of the world: as the Creator brings forth all creatures in the image of the rationes exemplares of His own mind, so, too, can the human artist create his works. Dante himself made express use of this structural premise of art.⁸³ However, drawing an analogy between art and nature raises all the more decisively the question as to the need for human art. The relevant analogy thus seems to be as much an attempt to provide a structural justification for art as a danger to its legitimacy. Indeed, the success of this structural legitimation proves to be extremely ambiguous, for the more legitimate it appears, the more urgent it becomes to answer the question as to the need for it, which ultimately leads to the question of the origin of the rivalry between Creator and artist.⁸⁴ As we shall endeavour to show in what follows, in the latent threat to the

 Cf. Inferno XI,97– 105, the passage by Virgil which makes express reference to the Artistotelian justification of art: “‘Filosofia’, mi disse, ‘a chi la ‘ntende,/nota, non pure in una sola parte,/ come natura lo suo corso prende/dal divino ‘ntelletto e da sua arte;/e se tu ben la tua Fisica note,/tu troverai, non dopo molte carte,/che l’arte vostra quella, quanto pote,/segue, come ’l maestro fa ’l discente;/sì che vostr’ arte a Dio quasi è nepote.’” A similar line of argument is found in Dante’s Monarchia II, 2: “Sciendum est igitur quod, quemadmodum ars in triplici gradu, in mente scilicet artificis, in organo et in materia formata per artem, sic et naturam in triplici gradu possumus intueri. Est enim natura in mente primi motoris, qui Deus est; deinde in celo, tanquam in organo quo mediante similitudo bonitatis ecterne in fluitantem materiam explicatur.”  In this connection it seems remarkable that Dante himself points out the deficiencies of nature, more precisely the blemishes in the beauty of nature remarkable because the Pilgrim in the Commedia recognises by its very beauty, the superiority over nature of the marble relief hewn by God. Elsewhere in the Monarchia where he again draws a comparison between divine and human art he significantly attributes the responsibility for any deficiencies to the material which is an obstacle to the pulchritudo of God’s creation: “Et quemadmodum, perfecto existente artifice atque optime organo se habente, si contingat peccatum in forma artis, materie tantum imputandum est, sic, cum Deus ultimum perfectionis actingat et instrumentum eius, quod celum est, nullum debite perfectionis patiatur defectum, ut ex his patet que de celo phylosophamur, restat quod quicquid in rebus inferioribus est peccatum, ex parte materie subiacentis peccatum sit et preter intentionem Dei naturantis et celi” (Dante, Monarchia II, 2. A similar line of argument is found in Convivio III,4,7 and in Paradiso I,127 ff.). This argument, from a

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work of Creation that comes from the existence of a legitimate human art, there is in fact a reason for that curious change wrought in the Lord from metaphorical image-maker to actual sculptor in Canto X of Dante’s Purgatorio. In order to show this we must first turn to the following canto, the eleventh in Purgatorio. It is devoted to the actual encounter between Dante and the Proud, and, as in the Commedia, he enters into conversation with one of them, in this case the miniaturist Oderisi da Gubbio. Of course the profession of this penitent is of particular interest, and leads straight to the question as to which of the Proud is given a voice in the first circle of the mountain of Purgatory. They all belong to one of two categories: power-brokers or artists. This selection is significant, and it is hardly by chance that it favours those whose existence reflects two of the most basic attributes of the Lord God: His omnipotence and His creative power. It also points to a dimension of superbia where the formal definition of the sin is not named as such. For in its formal qualities pride, the appetitus propriae excellentiae, is seen as an aberration in the God-willed hierarchical order.⁸⁵ However, the choice of particular manifestations of pride raises an issue that is suppressed by the system governing the various sins: the moral volatility of the order itself, a volatility that affects both the artists of this world and those who exercise power in it. Both groups are just as much an integral component in the official order as they secretly undermine its premises, in that they do not leave intact the concerns of a God who, becoming their rival, is in danger of losing His undisputed superiority. The grounds for the power of the princely rulers or the justification of earthly art both constitute problem cases for the theory that seeks to explain the order of this world by analogy as a mimetic representation of God’s work, thus inevitably coming into conflict with the mythical potency of this God. A detailed, curious depiction of the risks of Earthly power in the image of God has already been painted in the report of Dante’s sojourn in the last of the stations of Antepurgatory, the valletta dei principi – curious in the ultimately empty theatricality of the repetition of the temptation scene from the Book of Genesis.⁸⁶ The girone of the superbi is instead devoted above all to the artists,

theological view, is extremely dubious, because it in fact questions the omnipotence of the Lord God. At the same time the world is caught in a positively Manichean distinction between the perfect will of the Creator and the waywardness of the material which thwarts the Creator’s intentions. Could it be that this description of an imperfect state of affairs – which is strikingly not explained by any denaturation resulting from human original sin – also contains a tacit justification for the existence of human art alongside that of divine art?  For more on appetitus propriae excellentiae see Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I‐II, 84, 2c. On the destruction of order through a false estimation of the self, see II-II,162, 3c.  For more on this see the chapter “Temporality and Eternity in Dante’s Purgatorio”.

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in order to provide an implied answer to the latent provocation that results from the very fact of their existence. The manner in which the Pilgrim addresses Oderisi is itself already more than a mere address, rather it is an element in the moral-theological programme laid out in these canti. For he describes Oderisi as “onor d’Agobbio” and “onor di quell’ arte”.⁸⁷ However, this reverence for the latter’s reputation raises the question of hierarchical status that kindles superbia in all its manifestations. Thus Dante’s words are significantly still beholden to a particular attitude, the moral untenability and absurdity of which are explained to him by the penitent: “Frate” diss’ elli, “più ridon le carte che pennelleggia Franco Bolognese; l’onore è tutto or suo, e mio in parte. Ben non sare’ io stato sì cortese mentre ch’io vissi, per lo gran disio de l’eccellenza ove mio core intese. Di tal superbia qui si paga il fio; e ancor non sarei qui, se non fosse che, possendo peccar, mi volsi a Dio.” (Purgatorio XI, 82– 90)

It is clearly evidence of the purgation that has already taken place when Oderisi now freely admits his own inferiority.⁸⁸ And in doing so he identifies the form of pride that he is now repenting. Disio dell’eccellenza seems almost like a translation into the vulgate of the current theological formula appetitus propriae excellentiae. The reason for conceit appears to be the inability to recognise another’s superiority – this, too, a topos in moral theology.⁸⁹ But here superbia remains confined to competition within Earthly life. The disturbance that it creates in the proper order of things consists in the mismatch between one’s status – forever having to be reaffirmed in a constant battle for superiority – and one’s estimation of oneself. It is this insight that Oderisi now presents as a general law of human existence: “Oh vana gloria de l’umane posse! com’ poco verde in su la cima dura, se non è giunta da l’etati grosse!

 “‘Oh!’ diss’ io lui, ‘non se’ tu Oderisi/l’onor d’Agobbio e l’onor di quell’arte/ch’alluminar chiamata è in Parisi?’” (Purgatorio XI,79 – 81).  There are no reliable sources on the “Franco Bolognese”, which he recognises as superior. Vasari reports having seen some drawings and miniatures by him, which he praises highly for their quality.  Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, II-II,162,4c.

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Credette Cimabue ne la pintura tener lo campo, e ora ha Giotto il grido, sì che la fama di colui è scura. Così ha tolto l’uno a l’altro Guido la gloria de la lingua; e forse è nato chi l’uno e l’altro caccerà del nido.” (Purgatorio XI,91– 99)

What Oderisi initially concludes from his own art applies in fact to every art form, as much to painting as to the art of poetry. Thus Giotto superseded Cimabue and Guido Cavalcanti put Guido Guinizelli into the shade.⁹⁰ This admission of conceit thus becomes a recognition of the nothingness of all fame; the narcissistic wound inflicted by his insight into his own inferiority turns into the comforting reassurance that the superiority of others is of no value. This is in a sense the other side of the transformation of a self-accusation into a recognition of the nature of the world. But both are part of the process of purgation. Self-denigration is the corrective for self-overestimation that is only partly paid for by the symbolic physical punishment of being humiliatingly weighed down by boulders that turn the Proud into creeping worms.⁹¹ For the mountain of Purgatory is a purgatorium above all because not only does a person pay for their sins,⁹² but their reason, which had become disturbed and hence inclined to sin, is restored through a learning process. This in turn explains the fact that each girone displays examples of the vice to be punished and of the virtue they have squandered – portrayed in a number of different ways. Amongst these are the reliefs that attract the attention of the Pilgrim as soon as he enters the circle of the superbi. These pictures of humility in the wall of the mountain of Purgatory are matched by the pictures of pride on the ground. These exempla vitii et virtutis be they seen or heard – serve to point out the moral order, and as we shall see in individual cases, this use of symbols is itself a constituent part in the system underlying the process of purgation. And this bifurcation of the process of purgation, the link between paying for one’s sins by suffering physical torment

 One time-honoured traditional interpretation, which has much in its favour, concludes that in the last two lines cited here Dante was referring to none other than himself. Now it is he who has taken precedence over Guinizelli and Cavalcanti. This only leaves the question as to which self-estimation is dominant here: pride at his own achievement or insight into the meaninglessness of this precedence.  Cf. Purgatorio X,115 ff.  In order to define the relative compensation Dante draws specifically on a metaphor from economics. Cf. for instance Purgatorio XI, 88: “‘Di tal superbia qui si paga il fio’”. A more general reference to the compensation due is made in Purgatorio XI,70 f.: “‘E qui convien ch’io questo peso porti/per lei [sc. la superbia], tanto che a Dio si sodisfaccia’”.

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and a corrective for a deficient mental attitude, once again highlights the fundamental division of the underlying ethics into a rational and a mythical dimension. The latter incorporates the punishment of sin through the infliction of physical pain: the bodily humiliation of one who has defied the demands of a God who requires redress for any such rebellion. But this physical chastisement goes hand in hand with a process of intellectual restoration that presumes an approach which sees sin not as resistance but simply as an error. However, this blemish can only be cleansed, not by being subjugated, but by the sinner’s capacity for insight being reinstated. Both are a condition for one’s entrance into the splendour of Heaven, which once again reflects the relevant, categoric ambivalence between myth and theoria. For even the pleasure to be derived from the sight of God, the fruitio divina, is just as much as undeserved gift as perfect cognition. But one of Dante’s most striking interests here is the mediation between the two dimensions of this ethic, between its rational and its mythical side. Thus he seeks at all times to use different forms of physical punishment to expose the nature of the sin being punished, thereby turning mythical humiliation into an instrument of recognition. Precisely this is the point of the omnipresent semiotic coding of the punishments.⁹³ However, amongst the strategies designed to reconcile humiliation and rationalism, there is also the wider application of Oderisi’s self-accusation and admission of his own inadequacy as a generalising insight into the nature of this world. Once again, as in the exempla, a connection is drawn between the individual and the general, and the individual experience of the purified sinner is also taken as an exemplary case. At the same time these words by the penitent artist stand as a structural equivalent to the text of the Commedia. The sinner becomes the narrator’s accomplice. For penitence that leads to the right perception of the truth, as in a mise en abyme, reflects the aim of a text that seeks to induce the same insight in the reader by its depiction of Purgatory. And it is in keeping with the logic of this symbolic equation, that in the following reported events the narrator is seen overtly to be taking the part of the sinners.⁹⁴ We will come back to this structural equivalence between penitence and the representation of truth at a later time. However, at present we should look more closely at one feature of the characterization of the superbia by the painter Oderisi, especially in view of the function of the images that the Creator Himself has chiselled into the marble of the  I have endeavoured elsewhere to describe the structure of the punishments in Dante’s Inferno as an attempt to reconcile the demands of rational theology with the mythical foundations of these physical punishments (see Kablitz 1994).  Cf. Purgatorio XII,1– 3: “Di pari, come buoi che vanno a giogo,/m’andava io con quell’ anima carca,/fin che ’l sofferse il dolce pedagogo.”

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mountain of Purgatory. For, remarkably enough, insight into the nothingness of all human capacities and the frailty of human art comes to the sinner through his observation of the course of things in this world. It is in the constant perfecting of art, an uninterrupted sequence of ever more ambitious endeavours, that we can identify the vanitas of human presumption. For it is only in the etati grosse, in times of extraordinary confusion, that the reputation of any individual endures.⁹⁵ Thus the constant perfecting of human art, in keeping with the order of things, must also generate insight into the instability of all umane posse. The ancient Christian notion of the vanity of this world, which is as nothing compared to the splendour of the Lord, is seen here as recognition of the short duration of the superiority of any individual in a process of constant improvement that is without question being played out in this world. Time is still seen here as the destroyer of human greatness, and as such it still continues its biblical purpose as a punishment for human self-aggrandisement. But, as it were in competition with its erstwhile heritage, time acquires a contrary function. It now also constitutes a dimension for the constant improvement of human capabilities. It almost looks as though an ethic that revolves around a personal relationship between God and the individual can no longer integrate a process that transcends the individual.⁹⁶ The relationship between the instability of the human being beholden to time and the stability of the God unaffected by time, which to a large part defines the categorical value difference between the two, is now measured against the transience of the superiority of an individual as opposed to a continuing process of perfecting human skills which itself belongs to the order of things. But if it is this same process that is to engender recognition of the vanity of all human abilities, then the question arises as to how it can simultaneously direct our attention to a God who is basically no longer visible in this continuing self-perfecting on the part of human beings. The old opposition between a futile world and a reliable God is undermined by the conditions outlined here of the perception of this essential difference, and ultimately the recognition of this God becomes contingent. Human art, seemingly open to infinite improvement, detaches itself from traditional theological categories, where it is now only superficially included. However, as it is thus emancipated it also reveals an ominous potential, which is now answered by none other than God

 Cf. Purgatorio XI,91– 93.  The theory of original sin, which applies equally to all human beings, does not provide a counter-argument. For its temporality is not that of a process, rather it is the basis of a structural simultaneity. Each person, no matter when they should happen to exist, represents the same Adam or Eve.

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Himself with the reliefs that transfix the Pilgrim’s gaze as he approaches the Proud: Là sù non eran mossi i piè nostri anco, quand’ io conobbi quella ripa intorno che dritto di salita aveva manco, esser di marmo candido e addorno d’intagli sì, che non pur Policleto, ma la natura lì avrebbe scorno. (Purgatorio X, 28 – 33)

It seems to me far from arbitrary that it is the Classical sculptor Polyclete who is named as the yardstick for the perfection of the sculptures by the Lord. A significant reason for his name being mentioned is a comment made about him by Quintilian. For in the Institutio oratoria he is not simply listed first amongst those of his profession, rather he is granted this honour because he has perfected the beauty of the human form “supra verum”, beyond that found in nature.⁹⁷ The status granted his art thus also demotes nature, which must be a provocation in the sense that nature is the handwork of a God whose omnipotence means that He can only create that which is perfect. Dante’s answer to this provocation is twofold. First, in his celebration of the divine relief he reverses the relationship between Polyclete and nature suggested by Quintilian: this masterpiece not only outdoes his art, but even nature itself. However, the precedence thus regained by nature is highly doubtful, for it is bought at the cost of its simultaneous humiliation by a superior art. Thus it is only on the surface of things that the integrity of God’s power as Creator is reinstated. In rhetorical terms this purpose would appear to be served by the implied distance from a natura that is independent of God in that it enters into direct competition with the master of Classical sculpture. Yet this rhetorical implication of independence cannot cause the Creator’s responsibility for nature to evaporate. The rivalry between nature and Polyclete in reality stands for God’s contest with an art which is seen in Canto XII of Purgatorio to contain a concealed threat to the order that He has ordained. If Dante really is suggesting here that the Lord is demonstrating His superiority with a work of art that simultaneously casts doubt on the perfection of His first act of creating, then this could also be read as His deflection of the challenge that an almighty creator must feel in the face of an increasingly perfect human art set up according to the example of the Lord and fully legitimate. Thus he sets the sequence of constant perfecting against a work that would

 Cf. Quintilianus, Institutio oratoria, XII,10,8: “humanae formae decorem addiderit supra verum”.

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shame even the unchallenged master of the art of sculpture. But the real danger that this art capable of ever greater perfection poses for the unconditional supremacy of the Lord, is clear in the way that He outdoes Himself by out-classing nature which is doing no more than fulfilling His will. Thus the superbi on the mountain of Purgatory are subjected to two-fold divine punishment. The physical torment that they are suffering under the weight of the stones punishes the conceit of those who, in their pride, consider themselves superior to others and thus upset the balance of the divine order. Yet the exempla of pride and humility with which the Lord wishes to generate the correct insight in the penitents, also deny the demands of a human art that seems legitimate yet at the same time impinges on the integrity of the Creator. This art, apparently part of the order of things, can thus no longer be held in check through the punishment of individuals but can only be cut down to size by a universal humiliation that would appear to oblige God to inflict injury on Himself. Thus Purgatory corrects both the individual’s moral contravention of the divine commandments and repairs an ontological ‘order’ that proves now to be a form of disorder in that it is only on the surface of things able to integrate human art as a mimesis of divine art. And now the price has to be paid for equating Creation to God’s art. For while this implies the inferiority of human art to that of the Creator, in fact it equates the act of creatio ex nihilo, which none can comprehend, to a human activity, which in turn means that divine Creation loses its supremacy. Perhaps now only Purgatory with its ontological placelessness – lacking ontological protection because it was founded in Christian ethics and thus basically at odds with the originally pagan, metaphysical order – provided the space for a theological correction of that theoretical order which was threatening to endanger the unconditional superiority of the Creator.

II Cantos X–XII of Purgatorio do not simply present – to use the terminology of our own time – the aesthetics of production as applied to divine art. They also develop an aesthetic of ‘reception’ that holds the key to a whole theology of perception. And it is through this that Dante establishes the essential superiority of those other-worldly portraits, whose perfection, outclassing all other art, is not confined to their overpowering beauty alone. Thus the fact that God outdoes all Earthly sculptors does not simply mean that He has won a contest to produce perfect beauty. The reliefs, which none other than He has hewn from the marble of the mountain of Purgatory, also correct the deficiencies which have always caused theologians to regard art with suspicion. In the sense that art induced

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scepticism because it created illusions,⁹⁸ now these examples of divine art turn illusion into a means to gain a higher truth. In the sense that human art tempted human beings to become curious, distracting them from their Creator,⁹⁹ now God’s reliefs kindle a curiositas that exposes the viewer to divine reality. Yet Dante’s depiction of art cleansed of all flaws will once again – and all the more decisively – mobilise those doubts that the art of this world raises.¹⁰⁰ The impulse behind the development of this notion of an art that is able to overcome all its otherwise inherent perils comes as the Pilgrim is gazing on the images hewn by a divine hand. The scenes depicted on the walls of the mountain of Purgatory and on the ground of the ledge are all taken from the Bible or from ancient history and mythology. The twelve exempla of pride in Canto XII, which we shall come to later, are taken alternately from the Old Testament or from pagan mythology and pre-Christian history. Canto X portrays three examples of humility: a scene from the Old Testament, one from ancient history – significantly post-Christian – and one from the New Testament, the only such scene in the whole series. This selection alone shows that the images follow a carefully thought-out plan.¹⁰¹ But the choice of subject matter and source as well as the sequence of the images acquires its real meaning by being combined with a theory of perception that in turn leads to a regular theology of aisthesis. Among the salient features of this theory is above all a semantics of hearing and seeing, the foundations of which are laid in the first scene: L’angel che venne in terra col decreto de la molt’ anni lagrimata pace, ch’aperse il ciel del suo lungo divieto, dinanzi a noi pareva sì verace quivi intagliato in un atto soave, che non sembiava imagine che tace. Giurato si saria ch’el dicesse “Ave!”; perché iv’ era imaginata quella

 Cf. Augustinus, Soliloquiorum Libri Duo, II,9,16 – 10,18.  Cf. Augustinus, De Musica Libri Sex, VI,13, 39: “Avertit denique amor vanissimæ cogitationis talium rerum: et hoc agit sensualibus numeris, quibus insunt quasi regulæ quædam artis imitatione gaudentes: et ex his curiositas nascitur ipso curæ nomine inimica securitati, et vanitate impos veritatis.”  Toscano, on the other hand, makes a connection between the description of the relief in Canto X and a treatise on the art of that period, namely the litterae laicorum (Toscano 1984, p. 435).  Isella has convincingly made a link between the combination of these three sonnets and Convivio IV, 5,1– 6 (Isella 1968, pp. 151 ff.). Mazzotta refers aptly to a “synopsis of salvation history” (Mazzotta 1979, p. 238).

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ch’ad aprir l’alto amor volse la chiave; e avea in atto impressa esta favella “Ecce ancilla Deï”, propriamente come figura in cera si suggella.” (Purgatorio X, 34– 45)

The only example taken from the New Testament is on the subject of the Annunciation. This choice and its position at the beginning are significant in a number of ways. This is so in the first instance with regard to the logic of the sequence itself. For the news of the coming of the Redeemer not only presents us with the example of the humility of Mary, who unconditionally bows to God’s will and declares herself the handmaiden of the Lord. Here we are shown the preconditions for the virtue of humility that ended the age of all-pervading superbia which has its own roots in the Fall from Grace in the Garden of Eden. As such the syntagmatics of the exempla represent a semantics of time. It presents these paradigmatic examples as a history of virtue, which they symbolise, and in the transmutations of this history the form of this symbolic representation will ultimately find its own place. In this sense it is important that the Annunciation scene represents a message. The relevant lines specifically refer to the “decreto”. This message marks the central event in salvation history, the moment when the Son of God became man, which in turn opened the gates to Heaven (“ch’a–perse il ciel del suo lungo divieto”). But as the beginning of the incarnation the Annunciation is also the moment that the Word became Flesh. It marks the entrance of the Verbum Dei into the sensory world, and precisely this theology of the Word is what Dante has translated into the mediality of the image. The relevant link between the form of the representation and the meaning of its contents in the context of salvation history begins with the description of the impression that the Angel Gabriel is physically present. The semantics of the verb “pareva” is intentionally combined with the various possibilities inherent in “appearance”. Thus it refers as much to suddenly being visible in time and space as to the notion of “seeming” which is crucial in the relationship between any representation and its subject matter. Thus, significantly, the opening of the first sentence allows both possibilities, until it becomes clear at the end that it is about a depiction of the Angel that came to Mary (“dinanzi a noi pareva sì verace quivi intagliato”). Of course the initial ambiguity has to be understood as the mimesis of an illusion, which again demonstrates the masterly skill of these pictures. It is the old argument of the inability of the viewer to distinguish the picture from reality, which is borne out again by the perfection of this divine art. But it was precisely for this reason that theologians were suspicious of art, because it created illusions, and any such pretence of truth could only lead the Christian to suspect it might be the work of an evil force. How then can the illusion created

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by God the sculptor be reconciled with the completely clear moral judgement of their creator, of one whose untainted integrity could never be doubted? However, the answer to this question leads to the spiritual valences of this humbling of human art on the mountain of Purgatory, which initially seemed to be about no more than God’s entering into a contest to create the most perfect beauty. The depiction of the Annunciation as the first of the salvation history exempla has a special importance in view of the position it holds. The connection is made by the express allusion to the opening of the gates of Heaven through the message brought by the angel. For Purgatory is itself an institution that opens up the path to paradise, and in that sense its existence is a direct consequence of the news brought to humankind of the arrival of the Redeemer. Bearing this in mind, the illusionistic liveliness of the image takes on a significance that raises it above mere deception. In effect it represents the status of that mid-way realm whose inhabitants live as much in the certainty of redemption as they know that they must still earn the right to enter Heaven. The ‘illusion’ of the presence of the message of salvation as an effect created by an art that blurs the border between truth and likeness, appears here as the signum of that world which opens up access to certain future salvation. The ‘illusion’ of the living presence of this salvation is the key to the temporality of the mountain of Purgatory, it becomes a figura, a sign of the guarantee of coming redemption. Thus it is highly significant that the course of the narrator’s encounter with the superbi, as it is described in Cantos X – XII of Purgatorio, has itself a figural structure. For at the end of their observation of all the exempla, an angel appears bodily before the Pilgrim and his companion, showing them the path they must take to Heaven.¹⁰² The appearance of the angel vouches for the success of the edification that has come to them through the exemplary images, in that it transfers the scene shown in the first depiction into the actuality of the present moment. At the same time, however, this figural connection within the text again marks the semantic status of the specific signification of the divine images: their supposed potential for illusion, the creation of the impression that the heavenly messenger is present there and then, explains the status of a world that lives in the certainty of future salvation.¹⁰³

 Purgatorio XII,79 – 81: “‘Vedi colà un angel che s’appresta/per venir verso noi; vedi che torna/dal servigio del dì l’ancella sesta’”: even the metaphorics of these lines cite the Annunciation.  It seems to me that precisely the figural structure within the ‘story’ of this canto shows that divine art in Purgatory is very different from the ‘actuality’ of that place. This is not hindered by the fact that the reliefs surpass the ‘reality’ of the earthly world. In my view it is the lack of attention paid to this distinction between different levels of reality which can be usefully brought

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This characteristic of the scenes depicted in Purgatory arises above all from a particular connection between word and image. Dante himself used the formulation “visibile parlare”¹⁰⁴ to express this. What he means here may be more precisely described literally as a ‘trans-gression’ of the visual by the word: “non sembiava imagine che tace. Giurato si saria ch’ei dicesse ‘Ave!’”. But this ‘going beyond’ the pictorial is the core of the previously mentioned theology of aisthesis. In the sense that we were able to see the illusion of reality, generated in the relief, as a code for the certainty of salvation, so, too, it makes absolute sense that this same effect is largely created by the acoustic presence of the word. For the representation of the message of salvation brought by the angel thus becomes a theological commentary in its own right: the annunciation of the advent of God’s Word into this sensory world amounts to a structural pattern of a depiction of the Annunciation in which the Word becomes visible and goes beyond the silent image. The semiotics of this image make it a symbol of Christ’s incarnation.¹⁰⁵ The Word breaks into the order of the visible.¹⁰⁶ The presence of this Word is still an ‘illusion’ but its undeniable existence raises it above mere deception and makes it an unmistakable sign of the certainty of salvation. The temporality of the Annunciation and the temporality of the expectation of salva-

to bear against the interpretation of Cantos X–XII put forward by Bartolini (Bartolini 1987). Her thesis of the self-definition of Dante’s art in the emblem of the divine portraits (Bartolini 1987, p. 50) may be regarded as distinctly modern not least because of the equally unmistakable modern reduction of the ontological question to a matter of determining the relationship between art and reality. Her recurrent interpretation of the text of the Commedia as a figure of self-reflectivity, as a continuing variation of the self-determination of its art has its roots not least in this limitation of the overall perspective. For an apt interpretation of the marble relief in Cantos X and XII see Atchity 1976, pp. 93 ff.  Cf. Purgatorio X ,95.  The theological horizon of this “visibile parlare” is Augustine’s theory of language. In this he distinguishes between the internal and ‘actual’ word – that derives from the activities of the human mind and which he defines as “visio scientiae” – and the designation of that word based on its sound (see Augustinus, De trinitate XV,10); for more on the reception of this theory see Dante, De vulgari eloquentia I, 3, 2 f. The specifically theological dimension of this concept of language consists in the interpretation of the connection between the internal and external word as a symbol of incarnation: “Ita enim verbum nostrum vox quodam modo corporis fit, assumendo eam in qua manifestetur sensibus hominum; sicut Verbum Dei caro factum est, assumendo eam in qua et ipsum manifestaretur sensibus hominum.” (Augustinus, De trinitate, XV,11, 20).  Tateo interprets the transformation of the image into a word as a symbol of the rivalry of the arts, as a form of demonstration of the superiority of poetry over the visual arts, but in my view this is not in itself adequate. (Cf. the chapter “Teologia e ‘arte’ nel Canto X del Purgatorio”, in: Tateo, 1972, pp. 137– 171, here pp. 169 f.).

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tion on the mountain of Purgatory combine in the signification of an image in which the presence of the Word becomes tangible reality.¹⁰⁷ It is not only the words of greeting spoken by the angel that the Pilgrim believes he can hear, but also the humble reply by Mary on hearing that she is to become the Mother of the Redeemer: “Ecce ancilla Deï”. In his description of the image Dante is at pains to explain why the Pilgrim has the impression that he actually hears the Angel Gabriel’s Ave: “perché iv’ era imaginata quella ch’ad aprir l’alto amor volse la chiave”. The emphasis placed on the reason for this impression seems at first like a ‘realistic’ explanation: the sight of the angel and Mary together means that the scene can only be interpreted as a representation of the Annunciation. But the overt situation has another dimension, indicated by the wordy description of the Mother of God which follows that of the angel. After the angel is introduced as the bringer of tidings which will open Heaven (“ch’aperse il ciel”), Mary is named as the one who turns the key and thus unlocks Paradise. In addition the chosen mode of speech shows that with his greeting, the angel expects Mary to be fully ready to submit utterly to the will of God. The superseding of the image by the living Word, the suggested presence of which embodies the promise of the incarnation of the Verbum Dei, joins forces with the semantic structure of a form of speech that turns the description of this image into a theological commentary, opening up a deeper truth. The situation where the visible is superseded by the Word is continued in a passage that demonstrates clearly the truth of what has just been perceived. The semiotics of these divine carvings, which become a vision of the Word, is extended in the

 The basis of this reconciliation of image and word in a “visibile parlare” is the medieval rivalry between hierarchies of sensual perception, which in itself reflects the juxtaposition of two different modes of interpreting reality as indicated at the outset of this chapter. On one hand the Middle Ages adopted the Classical notion, logically derived from the order of the philosophical categories of that time, that the sense of sight is the highest sense, for it has the greatest capacity for truth. (For evidence of the reception of this ancient precept see Augustinus, De trinitate, XI; Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I,78, 2c.) However, the privileged status of revelation as the most fundamental experience of God through Man, must just as logically cause the sense of hearing to take precedence. Thus the assurance of God’s word remains intact where all other senses fail. See for instance the hymn for Corpus Christi Adoro te devote ascribed to Thomas Aquinas: “Visus, gustus, tactus in te fallitur,/sed solus auditus tute creditur;/credo quicquid dixit dei filius:/nihil veritatis verbo verius” (as cited in: Gardenal 1993, p. 308). Of course this text, dedicated to the Eucharist, also plays with the equivalence of the word and the Verbum Dei of Christ. To a certain extent, in the depiction of the relief in Purgatory Dante reconciles the two orders, by turning the audible word as a figura incarnationis into a visual experience. And thus these images are also seen to surpass nature. The linking of the two orders is confirmed not least by further examples which will be discussed shortly here.

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semiotics of a text that integrates the allegorical structure of the holy scriptures, the very Word of God. Thus we have here something like a foundation of allegorical encoding. Above all, however, we see a structural equivalence between the mediality of these images and the allegorical encoding itself. In the same way that the Word goes beyond the depiction of the Annunciation as the signum of the arrival of the Verbum Dei, so, too, the ‘realistic’ description of this image also unlocks a deeper truth, for which the depiction of a visible external, the sensus litteralis, is simply a sign. The theology of aisthesis that we have read in the representation of the Annunciation is continued in the two other examples of humility. As we have already said, the first is from the Old Testament, the second from Roman history. The Annunciation stands between them in more than just a chronological sense. Rather its meaning in terms of salvation history is documented in the differences between the other two representations. Let us start by looking at the characteristics of the picture that portrays the handing over of the Ark of the Covenant:¹⁰⁸ Era intagliato lì nel marmo stesso, lo carro e’ buoi, traendo l’arca santa, per che si teme officio non commesso. Dinanzi parea gente; e tutta quanta, partita in sette cori, a’ due mie’ sensi faceva dir l’un “No”, l’altro “Sì, canta”. Similemente al fummo de li ’ncensi che v’era imaginato, li occhi e ’l naso e al sì e al no discordi fensi. Lì precedeva al benedetto vaso, trescando alzato, l’umile salmista, e più e men che re era in quel caso. Di contra, effigïata ad una vista d’un gran palazzo, Micòl ammirava sì come donna dispettosa e trista. (Purgatorio X,55 – 69).

The very detail of this description is programmatic. What it does, however, lack, is the succinctness of the message which is inscribed into the prototype of all humilitas. But, leaving aside certain differences, this picture has one undeniable similarity with the representation of the Annunciation: once again this relief generates in the viewer something like an illusion of reality. Once again the viewer imagines that he is not only seeing the image. This time he does not have the impression of hearing a word; instead it is as though he can hear the singing of a  Cf. II Samuel 6,1– 23.

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choir and can smell the scent of incense. He has the impression of sensual perception. And it is hardly by chance that the sense of hearing and of smell are placed here side by side. In the scholastic hierarchy of the senses, inherited from the philosophy of Antiquity, these two – in this order – follow immediately after the sense of sight.¹⁰⁹ If it is fair to say that this time the illusion engendered in the viewer stays at the level of a sensory impression without attaining the news-value of a word, then this adds to another impression also created by the distinctly silent scene depicted here.¹¹⁰ It contrasts the dancing figure of David, who – as a sign of his humility before God – does not take into account the dignity of the office he holds as king, with that of his wife Michal who has no feeling for the fact that he is behaving thus only to please God, and stares uncomprehendingly at him: “sì come donna dispettosa e trista”. Dante’s characterization of her also reveals the punishment that God has meted out to her: she will remain barren. This aspect of the text alone presents Michal as a counterpart to Mary. The childless woman is contrasted with the Mother of God, pride is contrasted with the epitome of humility. Thus only one half of the Old Testament exemplum shows an instance of humilitas. It contrasts the humility of King David – according to the Gospel of St Matthew an ancestor of the future Redeemer¹¹¹ – with the pride of Michal, to whom God has denied any descendants. The unblemished virtue of the New Testament is set against the half-hearted virtue of preChristian salvation history. But the connection between the two scenes is not confined to this difference. What also links them, is a figural connection that was already identified by patristic biblical exegesis. For the Ark of the Covenant, which is shown in the image as it is being delivered, has been read as a symbol of Mary, as a figura of the bearer of the Word made flesh.¹¹² This connection alone explains the juxtaposition of these scenes in Dante’s catalogue of exempla. Thus in the link between the first two exempla, the typological difference between the only seemingly equal elements of a paradigm go hand in hand with a contrast in the semiotics of these pictures that implies a hierarchy in the onto Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I,78, 2c.  This is all the more striking in that the text of the Bible itself has a number of passages that eloquently portray David’s humility and Michal’s pride and which could well have been cited here (cf. in particular II Samuel 6, 20 – 22). Instead, hardly less significantly with regard to the semantics of Dante’s scene, no mention is made of the singing of the choir and the scent of incense described in the Old Testament.  Matthew 1,17.  Cf. Hieronymus Lauretus 1580, s.v. arca, p. 130: “Significat etiam beatissimam virginem Mariam, quæ habuit intra se Verbum carne indutum”. It seems to me that in the context of these examples the relevant typological reading of this as the Ark of the Covenant is more appropriate than Auerbach’s interpretation which sees it as a figura ecclesiae (see Auerbach 1966, pp. 242 f.).

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logical order of nature. While the image in the representation of the Annunciation creates the impression of the presence of the Word, a similar illusion in the representation of the Old Testament scene – with its figurative links to the New Testament – does not go beyond the lesser phenomenon of a merely sensory impression.¹¹³ The final piece in this combination of a scholastic order of nature and the temporal order of the history of salvation is provided by the third exemplum of humility, which centres on the Emperor Trajan. Its contents take up an old legend. According to a number of witnesses, Pope Gregory had been instrumental in having the heathen Trajan’s soul called back from Hell. He had succeeded in doing this because he had been able to cite an example of this ruler demonstrating extreme humility.¹¹⁴ For when the Emperor was once on the point of setting out on a military campaign, an old widow appeared before him and asked him to avenge her loss. In the end he yielded to her pleas and showed himself prepared to forego the promise of military renown for the sake of seeing that justice was done: I’ mossi i piè del loco dov’ io stava, per avvisar da presso un’altra istoria, che di dietro a Micòl mi biancheggiava. Quiv’ era storïata l’alta gloria del roman principato il cui valore mosse Gregorio a la sua gran vittoria; i’ dico di Traiano imperadore; e una vedovella li era al freno, di lagrime atteggiata e di dolore. Intorno a lui parea calcato e pieno di cavalieri, e l’aguglie ne l’oro sovr’ essi in vista al vento si movieno. La miserella intra tutti costoro pareva dir: “Segnor, fammi vendetta di mio figliuol ch’è morto, ond’ io m’accoro”; ed elli a lei rispondere: “Or aspetta tanto ch’i’ torni”; e quella: “Segnor mio”, come persona in cui dolor s’affretta,

 Simonelli, on the other hand, attributes no more than a “funzione scenografica” to the voices and scent (Simonelli 1955, p. 137).  Cf. the article “Traiano” by Stocchi 1976, pp. 685 f. Enlightening remarks on the ‘subtexts’ of the example of Trajan in Dante are to be found in Vickers 1983, pp. 67– 85, see particularly pp. 74 f. By comparison the closing passage here which seeks to read a poetological dimension into this depiction and to present it as an allegory of the “power of art” would seem to be somewhat contrived (see Vickers 1983, pp. 80 ff.).

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“se tu non torni?”; ed ei: “Chi fia dov’ io, la ti farà”, ed ella: “L’altrui bene a te che fia, se ‘l tuo metti in oblio?”; ond’ elli: “Or ti conforta; ch’ei convene ch’i’ solva il mio dovere anzi ch’i’ mova: giustizia vuole e pietà mi ritene.” (Purgatorio X,70 – 93)

“Biancheggiava” – this is the impression that first catches the Pilgrim’s eye, and draws attention to the question of colour, although at this point it is still the white of the marble that strikes the Pilgrim. But soon he will also see other colours and notice the gold of the eagles on the banners. So it is clear that this time the ‘illusionism’ of the pictures produces colour impressions. And these insignia suggest a second impression, namely that of movement: “in vista al vento si movieno”, it looks, we are expressly told, as though the eagles are flying. The impression of the presence of singing and incense in the Old Testament is followed by one of movement and colour in a representation of a moment in Roman history. The shift into the post-Christian era is accompanied by a change in the natural phenomena that characterise the picture, and this also means a step ‘upwards’ in the hierarchy of nature: from the olfactory and the acoustic to two optical phenomena. But these visual impressions are no more than an introit. For the picture dissolves increasingly into dialogue. Once again the Word takes the upper hand, indeed all optical perceptions become lost in a “visibile parlare”. The conversation between the Emperor and the widow, consisting of a number of exchanges, converts the ruler – who is seen at the outset in all his gloria – to the virtue of humility. The stasis of the Old Testament scenario, with the contrast between the humble King David and the unrelenting pride of Michal, is now followed by the dynamic progress of a conversion. The Word that has come into the world through the Son of God even affected the heathens of the post-Christian era – and it affected the actions of the Emperor just as it also affected the semiotics of the image that portrays the sea-change in his morals. For once again the picture seems to suggest the presence of the Word: once again this Word outclasses everything the eye might see. The theology of history, which unfolds in the sequence of the “imagini di tante umilitadi”,¹¹⁵ is linked to a theology of representation. At the same time, however, this also sets up a link between the hierarchy within scholastic natural philosophy and the order of salvation history. If it is true that God’s reliefs outdo nature, then – even from a distance – they still cite the orders that apply in nature. But at the same time this citation secures these hierarchies. And that same nature, opened up by theory,

 Purgatorio X,98.

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still remains subservient to the history of God’s Word. Thus the mimesis of history on the mountain of Purgatory turns the orders of theory into its signs.¹¹⁶ The fact that the observation of the three examples of humilitas closes the question of this other-worldly art – or at least takes a first step in this direction – is confirmed not least by the conclusion the Pilgrim draws from his experiences: Colui che mai non vide cosa nova produsse esto visibile parlare, novello a noi perché qui non si trova. Mentr’ io mi dilettava di guardare l’imagini di tante umilitadi, e per lo fabbro loro a veder care, “Ecco di qua, ma fanno i passi radi”; mormorava il poeta, “molte genti: questi ne ’nvïeranno a li alti gradi.” (Purgatorio X,94– 102)

The delight in things new was one of the driving forces that theologians claimed to find in any interest in art, and which they then used as evidence of its dubious morality. In fact the reliefs hewn by God confront the Pilgrim, as he himself says, with something completely unfamiliar; but now the delight in the new does not distract the viewer from the heavenly Creator but rather leads to Him. The images are valuable to the viewer for the sake of their “fabbro”, as we are told in these lines, and this carefully considered comment releases them from a suspicion that

 This theology of history could then also provide the key to an explanation of the provenance of these portraits, and more precisely to their intertextual signature. Various writers have pointed out the similarity of the Purgatory relief and the temple frieze in which the wounded Aeneas, on his arrival in Carthage, discovers pictures of the Trojan War (see Vergilius, Aeneis I,450 ff.). On the other hand, those writers who see the Commedia in terms of ‘realistic’ poetics, have drawn attention to the influence of Romanesque sculpture on the author (see for instance Gmelin 1958, p. 207). Whatever Dante’s interest in the art of his day may have been, the connection to Virgil’s Aeneid appears too significant to be ignored (see note 124, below, for a number of connections in detail). Meanwhile the appearance of the girone of the Proud seems to cite yet another model. Could it be mere coincidence that the Old Testament also refers to the “picturae variae” in the carving on the walls and on the floor decorations in Solomon’s Temple? (I Kings 6, 29 f.: “29 et omnes parietes templi per circuitum scalpsit variis celaturis et torno et fecit in eis cherubin et palmas et picturas varias quasi prominentes de pariete et egredientes 30 sed et pavimentum domus texit auro intrinsecus et extrinsecus”.) If one accepts this hypothesis, then Dante’s circle of the Proud synthesises two pre-Christian sacred structures into one place of penance – as it were transposing their figural status in salvation history into one figure of Christian ethics. But as such his portraits are multiple representations of the Word: they depict scenes that are described in texts, and in their form they cite this description.

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normally accompanies art. Here curiositas saves itself. At the same time the delight that goes with the contemplation of these scenes seems justified. For it arises from nothing less than an encounter with God’s superior ability. It is thus also the experience of virtue that generates utterly legitimate delight. However scrupulous Dante has been in this explanation of God’s reliefs, his explicit conclusion makes it clear that the experience of the new only applies to the one who is observing these images. For nothing can or could ever be new to their omniscient Creator.¹¹⁷

 This apparent concern to protect the Lord from any injury to His perfection anticipates the opening of Canto XI, which has some of the most curious lines in the cantos devoted to the Proud in Purgatory. As so often in this book of the Commedia, the penitent souls are seen in prayer, and it is hardly by chance that those who have been guilty of the source of all sin, superbia, should utter the first of all prayers, the Lord’s Prayer. But the Lord’s Prayer has been strangely altered, indeed it reads almost like a theological commentary on this prayer, aiming to guard it from any possible misinterpretation. Thus the first attribute of the Heavenly Father cited in the Lord’s Prayer, “qui es in caelis”, elicits an explanation which seems as scholarly as it is anxious: “O Padre nostro che ne’ cieli stai,/non circunscritto, ma per più amore/ch’ai primi effetti di là sù tu hai” (Purgatorio XI,1– 3). As though the subtleties introduced by philosophers had made it possible to misunderstand this prayer that Jesus taught his disciples, it is no longer enough to call out to our Father in Heaven. On the contrary, it is now necessary to expressly say why the Omnipresent Lord – despite the form of address used – is not limited to that realm alone. Of course the self-generated theological proviso can only be disposed of by yet more theological learning: God has ontologically a greater affinity with those to whom he is more similar. Consequently he is also closer to them. The ultimately mythical place of residence of the Lord God now has to be theologically justified. This time the relationship of myth and theory – reconciled again and with a new precariousness – comes down in favour of myth. In a similar manner, a whole sequence of pleas in the Lord’s Prayer are subjected to commentaries that seek rather to defend than to explain it. At the same time this Pater Noster uttered by the Penitents in Purgatory is in keeping with other tendencies that we have already observed in this in-between realm. In the same way that the reliefs made by God surpass both art and nature in the earthly world, so, too, in this other realm where salvation is certain, the more enlightened Lord’s Prayer is fitting. Once again the process of purification is seen, aside from its mythical dimension of compensating for damage done, as a process towards intellectual perfection. This is naturally a tribute to a rational ethic that links sin and mistaken actions. But could it be that the Jesus of the New Testament left his disciples with an inadequate prayer?

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III The last lines cited above take us directly to the next sight that arouses the curiosity that has been awakened in the Pilgrim by Virgil: he sees “molte genti”.¹¹⁸ And it is only now that his gaze falls on the penitents themselves, and significantly once again it is Virgil who directs his gaze, having earlier already gently suggested that he should not look at only the first of the images.¹¹⁹ Virgil’s sense of urgency is of course symbolic and allegorice contains a warning to the Pilgrim not to lose sight of their Heavenly goal, a timely reminder to the not yet purified Pilgrim. And the pictures that so vividly depict the message of salvation are only interim measures and only make sense as pointers on the path to Paradise. Thus Virgil also hopes to find out about the path to the next ledge from those now approaching. But Dante initially discovers in them a new topic of interest. This encounter with the superbi reopens his deliberations on the particular curiositas which signifies one of the gravest consequences of pride, namely rebelling against God’s will by seeking a form of knowledge that denies the existence of the Creator. It is part of the logic of Purgatory that stilling this curiosity also leads to an insight into its harmful consequences, and the narrative does full justice to this expectation. The encounter with a godly art, where curiositas was purified through the recognition of the Creator, is followed now in the travellers’ observation of the punishment of the Proud by the recognition of the vanitas of all concupiscentia oculorum. Moreover there is yet another connection between the reliefs on the side of the mountain of Purgatory and those figures on whom the Pilgrim’s initially confused gaze falls: it seems that they in fact occupy complementary positions. For while the reliefs hewn in stone by God raise the human figure far beyond the perfection of nature, raw lumps of stone laid on the backs of the Proud as punishment deform their appearance to the point of unrecognisability. Thus in the portraits carved by the Lord and the penitent superbi on one hand we see nature outdone while on the other hand we see a demonstration of fallen nature. But both belong equally in the programme of the mountain of Purgatory; for the distorted forms of these human beings, who, as punishment for their reprobate behaviour, have been rendered unrecognisable, become in what follows the point of departure for an insight that leaves all sensory cognition far behind. Thus Dante’s Canto logically continues the previous theology of perception in a theol Purgatorio X,103 – 105: “Li occhi miei, ch’a mirare eran contenti/per veder novitadi ond’ e’ son vaghi,/volgendosi ver’ lui non furon lenti.”  Purgatorio X,46 – 48: “‘Non tener pur ad un loco la mente’/disse ’l dolce maestro, che m’avea/da quella parte onde’ l cuore ha la gente.”

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ogy of recognition. It adds to the outdoing of Earthly art and nature alike a rejection of a perception of nature which, in its confinement to the visible and perceptible world, becomes the chains of an impenetrable blindness. Nature, initially outdone by art, is subsumed in an order of truth, which adds a hermeneutics of truth to the sensory presence of the Word. Once again Dante comes down on the side of an order of the Word as opposed to the demands of a theory, that – to its detriment – identifies truth and visual contemplation; and this renewed affirmation of the authority of the Word leads to a self-manifestation of speech which avoids the traps of mere descriptiveness. In view of this it is of importance that in this connection Dante, for the first time, expressly refers to the Reader and to his own text: Non vo’ però, lettor, che tu ti smaghi di buon proponimento per udire come Dio vuol che ’l debito si paghi. Non attender la forma del martìre: pensa la succession; pensa ch’al peggio oltre la gran sentenza non può ire. (Purgatorio X,106 – 111)

Dante’s care in his use of language gives the proximity of a verb of hearing (“udire”) and a reference to a visual phenomenon (“la forma del martìre”) a particular significance, and indeed at this point the text develops yet another facet of the semantics of seeing and hearing, which were already of interest earlier on. Significantly it is the optical impression that could be the source of an error, because it threatens to make one forget that what one sees is only transitory. The words of the text that the Reader takes in (happily able to neglect their written form) generate a mental image that the eye takes in and which can create an illusion because it confines the gaze to that moment. Dante’s caution is concerned with the consequences of just such a possible mistake. For the Reader, forgetting the purpose of the punishments in Purgatory, could doubt the goodness of his Lord, and he should be protected from such short-sightedness. He is in need of an explanation by being reminded of what is hidden from his eyes: “pensa la succession” he is told. And the medium of speech, although an aspect of the Word, is not immune to illusions which the sensory impressions greeting his eyes threaten to engender. For words create images which can distract one from the truth. This feature of the text of the Commedia – as a language that is unmistakably of this world – initially makes it seem like the opposite of the relief in which the Word broke through the visuality and itself seemed to become visible. But the text itself already has a corrective for its own dangers. This consists for one in the relevant warning that could help prevent such a mistake being made. But above all the progress of the text demonstrates how the real

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meaning behind the external forma reveals itself, and how the threat that comes from a delight in visual pleasure, which also cannot escape the Word, can be overcome in a hermeneutics of the truth: Io cominciai: “Maestro, quel ch’io veggio muovere a noi, non mi sembian persone, e non so che, sì nel veder vaneggio”. Ed elli a me: “La grave condizione di lor tormento a terra li rannicchia, sì che ’ miei occhi pria n’ebber tencione. Ma guarda fiso là, e disviticchia col viso quel che vien sotto a quei sassi: già scorger puoi come ciascun si picchia”. O superbi cristian, miseri lassi, che, de la vista de la mente infermi, fidanza avete ne’ retrosi passi, non v’accorgete voi che noi siam vermi nati a formar l’angelica farfalla, che vola alla giustizia sanza schermi? Di che l’animo vostro in alto galla, poi siete quasi antomata in difetto, sì come vermo in cui formazion falla? (Purgatorio X,112– 129)

Virgil had alerted Dante to the fact that “molte genti” were making their way towards them. But the Pilgrim is unable to identify human beings in the shapes creeping along under the weight of the heavy stones. “Non me sembian persone” and “si nel veder vaneggio” we are told, again in carefully chosen words which focus exclusively on their outward appearance. Virgil comes to his aid by recommending Dante to take a more analytical look (“disviticchia col viso”) which would allow him to make out who is under these weighty boulders. Strictly speaking Virgil’s words disqualify the very procedure that he suggests. For ultimately it is his words that set Dante on the right path, the advice from the ‘Master’ to his attentive pupil. This, too, is part of the semantics of seeing and hearing developed in this canto, and once again seeing comes off second best. This in itself is entirely in keeping with the hierarchy in a culture where empiric knowledge, any form of experientia, was less highly valued. But the success of Virgil’s instruction is immediately evident, and manifests itself in a manner which is highly significant in a number of ways. The rhetorical form of a question beginning with an exclamation clearly demonstrates the fact that Dante is overwhelmed by what he is seeing and recognising. But this, as it happens, leaves out precisely what Dante was initially unable to recognise, and it goes beyond anything that the pre-Christian heathen Virgil could explain to him. For he is not interested in the “persone” themselves, rather his attention

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is focused solely on the deeper meaning of the forma that the penitents are confined in. His cognising perception thus very markedly leaps beyond the immediately perceptible object, which itself initially defies conceptual identification. It leads to indifference towards the natural object. However, a remarkable feature of the allegorical decoding of the penitents is above all the fact that insight into the punishment of the Proud reveals the essence of this world. For the text makes it incontrovertibly clear that the “superbi cristian” are “Everyman”, and that the attribute is analytic in its nature: “noi siam vermi”. It is the nature of human beings per se that the Pilgrim now gains an insight into. Behind the punishment of the Proud it is possible to make out the impaired nature of human beings locked into original sin and always susceptible to superbia ever since Adam’s Fall from Grace. Thus the mountain of Purgatory is just as much a world where the damaged minds of sinners are healed in preparation for their recognition of God’s truth in Paradise, as it provides a hermeneutic instrument to reveal the hidden truth of this world: the relationship of this world and Purgatory itself becomes a hermeneutic figure. An ontological difference in the order of nature is replaced by the structure of an allegorical text. The order of the universe appears as an order of the Word and dismisses the perception of nature as meaningless – or more precisely as a temporary instrument. For it is only on the basis of nature that we can penetrate to the actual truth of things, yet this truth also reduces the natural object to insignificance. In effect the perception of nature is the same as perceiving this insignificance. The curiositas of the inquisitive Pilgrim is cured to the same extent as its primary domain, the perception of nature, is put in its proper place. For the order of the universe that is born of God’s Word, is based on the orders of speech. Therefore its being is revealed through hermeneutics; yet these hermeneutics at the same time integrate a cognitive perception of nature that is directed towards the visible world, as a precondition of its own discovery of truth. Nevertheless, the perception of nature remains on a lower level, for the medium of its perception, the sense of seeing, cannot get beyond actual blindness: “Non v’accorgete” the now enlightened Pilgrim – albeit so recently still uncomprehending – asks the human beings in amazement. But what they should see is by no means readily evident. Thus the gaze becomes the shackles of a blindness that can only be overcome through a hermeneutics of the world. But the truth of the world is at home on the mountain of Purgatory. And the punishments here are also the tools of knowledge. Purgatory – which owes its existence to an order of behaviour whereby guilt may be expunged through penitence – is thus in turn thrown open to an order of knowledge. It is as though the order of the afterlife, born of the story of sin and redemption, cannot escape a claim to rationality that suits an ontological order, but that also competes with this deeply Christian

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order. But the insights won here affirm their moral legitimacy in the same breath: for now the connection has been made between recognition and penitence. The transformation of the world into an order of the Word reconciles the truth with a myth that only allows recognition at the price of some form of humiliation. It is the rejection of the in effect self-sufficient appreciation of nature that completes this gesture of self-humiliation and renders it the symbolic equivalent of a purgation that opens up access to the actual truth. But the allegorical truth of this world, shifted into Purgatory, is not without consequences for the text of Purgatorio, which is itself unmistakably allegorically encoded. It seems to me a special refinement of the penultimate line of the passage cited above, that the word used for an insect is Greek in origin, thereby alluding to the language in which the theoria of nature is at home (“poi siete quasi antomata in difetto”). But this concept is used symbolically here, and now provides the key to the deficiencies of a mental attitude which – caught in the shortsightedness of its superbia – squanders the truth of human beings. The descriptiveness of this symbolic language escapes that same risk that the author Dante has just warned his readers of. Thus the allegorical language itself integrates the moral programme of Purgatory. In turning away from a literal meaning that remains locked into the sensory nature of this world, it sets the seal on the admission of the inadequacy of all natural recognition, in order to find in this self-sacrifice a right of access to the truth. The texts of Purgatorio and of the mountain of Purgatory themselves become equivalent instruments of a truth that seeks to give a function to the recognition of nature by devaluing it. It is as though the truth of this recognition refused to be denied, and thus the Commedia reacts with a deeply Christian gesture to this challenge. It secures its legitimation through symbolic humiliation and for this purpose avails itself of a structural pattern that allows the recipient to decipher the message from God on high.

IV It is only when he has humiliated himself in solidarity with the Proud, that the Pilgrim gazes on the examples of pride. Virgil has scarcely encouraged him to leave what he is looking at when he tells him to look down once again: ed el mi disse: “Volgi li occhi in giùe: buon ti sarà, per tranquillar la via, veder lo letto de le piante tue.” Come, perché di lor memoria sia, sovra i sepolti le tombe terragne portan segnato quel ch’elli eran pria,

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onde lì molte volte si ripiagne per la puntura de la rimembranza, che solo a’ pïi dà de le calcagne; sì vid’ io lì, ma di miglior sembianza secondo l’artificio, figurato quanto per via di fuor del monte avanza. (Purgatorio XII,13 – 24)

As so often in the Commedia the comparison used here seems at first sight to serve no other purpose than to illustrate an encounter with the afterlife by drawing on familiar experiences from this world. So the depictions on the ground of the mountain of Purgatory look like tombstones bearing images of the deceased as reminders to the living. Once again, however, the function of the comparison is not restricted to the analogy of a perception; once again it also prepares the way for a symbolic order. Thus the figures which these images are a reminder of, are not depicted for the sake of one person’s individual remembrance. As examples of superbia they depict the dead in a wider sense: they have also succumbed to that death that theology has equated with sin since time immemorial.¹²⁰ And in these images, too, the subject matter is not without a certain influence on the form of the representation and on their perception by the viewer. Yet again the mediality of the scenes holds the key to a theological programme, and we will be able to observe how – as the counterpart to the exempla humilitatis in Canto XI – they reverse the forms of representation seen there. They are images of death in a number of senses: in a representation of annihilation they give form to the moral death of the superbia, meanwhile the very pictoriality of these images itself becomes a symbol of this death. If the tombstones are there as reminders of the dead, then memoria gains an additional meaning in this context. Only when the Pilgrim, by symbolically sharing the part of the penitents, starts to shed his own sins,¹²¹ does he start to see the images of pride as he continues on his way. As we have seen, Virgil bids him look down at them, having just told him to rise up and move on; thus his advice seems like a therapy to prevent a relapse into the sinful disposition that he has just overcome. The Pilgrim’s observation of the examples of pride also serves as an admonitory reminder of his own fallibility, it keeps the sinner’s memoria awake and kindles regret for individual guilt which can help ward off any desire

 Death as a consequence of sin, as its punishment, is as such identified metonymically with it. For a definition of peccatum as the death of the soul see, for instance, Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, XIII, 2.  In the allegorical code of the narrative, this liberation manifests itself in greater ease of walking: “Io m’era mosso, e seguia volentieri/del mio maestro i passi, e amendue/già mostravam com’ eravam leggeri” (Purgatorio XII,10 – 12).

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to sin again.¹²² The series of exemplary cases of superbia seen in the sequence of images thus instigates two-fold remembrance: this is associated with historic memory that preserves the past and, at the same time, sorts the past according to the standards of a moral order. And this remembrance is also part of the psychology of an individual’s behaviour, which uses the repentant sinner’s own past as a repertoire for the future in order to prevent any relapse into sin. In this respect it is striking to see that Dante here continues to draw parallels between individual and collective history. Initially this holds true in the sense that the condition of overcoming one’s own pride corresponds to a review of events that without exception belong to a pre-Christian age. Reinhart Herzog has shown how, as a consequence of the exegetic tradition, in the paradigm of these exempla biblical and ancient mythological scenes are presented in a fully symmetric order.¹²³ Thus the series opens with an analogy between Lucifer and the gigantomachia of Greek mythology, and ends with a confrontation between Tomyris and Holofernes.¹²⁴ But the syntagmatics of these images is determined by the chronology of the Old Testament which they follow very faithfully from Genesis through the Books of Kings to the Book of Judith. Overlaid on this chronology there is a second order, more precisely another typological structure.  In this respect it is striking that the words used to denote the memory of the dead has much more to do with the regret that goes with a bad conscience than the concerned remembrance of those left behind: “per la puntura della rimembranza, che solo a’ pïi dà de le calcagne”.  Herzog 1983, pp. 159 ff. Delcorno has drawn a convincing connection between the choice of Old Testament examples and the Summa vitiorum of Guillelmus Peraltus (Delcorno 1983, pp. 19 ff.).  See Herzog’s system: “1. Lucifer – Gigantomachia (Victim) 2. Gigantomachia (Victor) – Nimrod. 3. Niobe – Saul. 4. Rehoboam – Arachne. 5. Alcmeon – Senncherib. 6. Tomyris – Holofernes.” It is worth noting that the last of the images described by Dante, on the subject of the ruined city of Troy, has no biblical match. It is tempting to speculate that the reference point to the story of the Aeneid is not to be found in an Old Testament equivalent, but in a typologisation of this story which leads into the text of the Commedia. The temptation is increased above all by the similarity – noted by commentators and already mentioned here – between the reliefs of the superbia and the temple frieze where Aeneas, on his arrival in Carthage, discovers illustrations of the Trojan War (see Vergilius, Aeneis I,450 ff.). It is not possible within the scope of this essay to give a detailed account of the evidence for this. Were this not so, it would be possible to show how Dante’s encounter with the exempla superbiae corresponds to Virgil’s description of Aeneas’ contemplation of the temple frieze in Carthage, how he sets the painful memories of the uprooted hero against the untroubled distance of the convert. The parallel is maintained even in the details. Thus the entrance of Dido contrasts with the already mentioned appearance of the angel who points to the path that the travellers must continue on to come to Heaven (“Bella creatura” is how the narrator in the Commedia describes the angel [Purgatorio XII,88]; Virgil’s narrator talks of the “forma pulcherrima” of Queen Dido [Vergilius, Aeneis I, 496]).

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Almost all the biblical examples have been interpreted by exegetists as typus diaboli. ¹²⁵ The sequence of these scenes thus reveals step by step the destructive potential that came into the world with the fury of Lucifer whose rebellion is depicted in the first image. With its particular syntagmatic order, the series already appears as a counterpart to the exempla humilitatis, which showed the effects – on the past and on the future – of the incarnation of the divine Word. The sequence of examples of pride is, however, not only determined by the criteria of its contents, it also reflects the changing attitude of the viewer to the images, and this change is indicated by the various, anaphorically recurring words that structure the account of the exempla.¹²⁶ “Vedea” is the first term used for this purpose:¹²⁷ Vedea colui che fu nobil creato più ch’altra creatura, giù dal cielo folgoreggiando scender, da l’un lato. Vedëa Brïareo fitto dal telo celestïal giacer, da l’altra parte, grave a la terra per lo mortal gelo. Vedea Timbreo, vedea Pallade e Marte, armati ancora, intorno al padre loro, mirar le membra d’i Giganti sparte. Vedea Nembròt a piè del gran lavoro quasi smarrito, e riguardar le genti che ’n Sennaàr con lui superbi fuoro. (Purgatorio XII, 25 – 36)

The sequence of these examples alone reveals the progressive effects of that first rebellion against God. For one thing they generate something of a proliferation of participants, up to and including the “genti superbi” who took part in the construction of the Tower of Babel; and the increase in their number goes hand in hand with the change in their status, from fallen angel through mythical giants and Earthly power brokers to – ‘simple’ people. It is as though we are seeing the  See the relevant references in Hieronymus Lauretus 1580, s.v. Nemrod (p. 714), s.v. Saul (p. 900), s.v. Sennacherib (p. 914), s.v. Holophernes (p. 518). It is only in King Rehoboam’s case that there is no corresponding interpretation.  The other two anaphoric lexemes are “O” and “mostrava”. The resulting combination of the three first letters, VOM, has been read as “uom”. Already identified by Moore 1968, p. 268. The theological radicalism of this interpretation seems to me that this indication of essential belonging firmly attributes superbia to human beings.  Parodi has attempted to link the three divisions of examples of pride with three types of superbia: praesumptio, inanis gloria, ambitio (cf. the chapter “Gli esempi di superbia punita e il ‘bello stile di Dante’”, in: Parodi 1965, pp. 147– 161, here p. 153). On the problems this entails see the introduction to Canto XII by U. Bosco in U. Bosco/G. Reggio 1979, p. 203.

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continuing perversion of the original order, an act of destruction that affects humans and ultimately the things they have produced as well. The past history of superbia is thus also the past history of all ars. ¹²⁸ But the movement of this proliferation of Evil is connected to an order of language that manifests itself as a multiplication of names. The first of the examples, which tells Lucifer’s fall is the only one that entirely avoids names, and the relevant name is replaced by a description that clearly explains the contents.¹²⁹ At this point the name and the visible reality that it names are still congruent. But all the subsequent designations lose this transparency. For the names become ever more numerous and ever more diverse. Now they are anything but self-evident: first there are names of people, then the name of a place. The confusion of tongues is mirrored by the text itself. But amongst the features of these four examples there is also an order of seeing. For the narrator’s gaze, as he contemplates the reliefs – indicated by the regularly repeated vedea – corresponds increasingly to the gaze of the individuals depicted there, who themselves are contemplating the destructive consequences of superbia. The act of looking at the pictures becomes an act of observing the gaze of the participants (“Vedea […] mirar”; “Vedea […] riguardar”). However, a first, significant outcome of the analogy drawn here between observer and protagonists, through the replication of their gaze, is the recognition of the sin, the disastrous consequences of which are made visible here. When Nimrod looks in bewilderment at the Tower of Babel, he also sees the peoples “che ’n Sennaàr con lui superbi fuoro”. Here the term is used that gives a name to the sin; and significantly it appears at exactly the point where linguistic confusion descends on the human beings in response to their pride. Dante’s own lines, with their proliferation of now opaque names had already prepared the ground for this moment; these very lines now stand as a symbol of Babel. And once again behind the order of the visible there is an order of language; but it reverses the movement of the first pictures. The reliefs depicting superbia are images of speechless Thus when Jahve examines the work of the people in Schinear, he is significantly concerned about the progress of human skills: “coeperuntque hoc facere nec desistent a cogitationibus suis donec eas opere conpleant” (Genesis XI,6). God’s punishment is thus intended to prevent a process that is the same as that which leads the painter Oderisi to recognise his own inadequacy. In the meantime progress in the arts is part of the order of this world, but despite this it has not entirely lost its explosivity. It is this explosiveness where things are not fully integrated into the world order that these cantos are addressing.  Commentators generally point to Luke 10,18: “videbam Satanan sicut fulgur de caelo cadentem”. The connection between the relevant description in Dante’s text and the name of Lucifer becomes clear if one takes into account Isaiah 14,12: “quomodo cecidisti de caelo lucifer qui mane oriebaris”.

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ness; they are the counterpart to the exempla humilitatis, which gave form to the advent of the Word. The former demonstrate the consequence of that first rebellion against God, namely the progressive loss of the Word from which God had once created the world. But the person viewing these images has already learnt something. When he, with Nimrod, sees the peoples whose language has been taken from them, he is able to name their trespasses, and his mention of this name immediately has consequences for his own behaviour: O Nïobè, con che occhi dolenti vedea io te segnata in su la strada, tra sette e sette tuoi figliuoli spenti! O Saùl, come in su la propria spada quivi parevi morto in Gelboè, che poi non sentì pioggia né rugiada! O folle Aragne, sì vedea io te già mezza ragna, trista in su li stracci de l’opera che mal per te si fé. O Roboàm, già non par che minacci quivi ’l tuo segno; ma pien di spavento nel porta un carro, sanza ch’altri il cacci. (Purgatorio XII, 37– 48)

Distanced observation has given way to obvious dismay, the cause of which is his insight into their sins, as we see from the syntagmatics of the examples. Once again – and for the last time – the gaze of the Pilgrim unites with that of the protagonist in the scene, indeed it is almost as though their gazes become confused, thereby making the very language used here ambiguous. Does the first line refer to the sad eyes of Niobe, whom the Pilgrim sees, or is it referring to his own eyes, which reflect his pain at her misfortune? The rhetorical form of these sentences creates yet further confusion in another respect. Remarkably this occurs at the moment when the person viewing the scene comes closest to its subject, that is to say, at the moment when the viewer’s gaze mingles with that of a figure who must recognise the ruinous consequences of her deeds, a sideways shift of sorts – for this is the first time in the series that a representation has been seen as such: “vedea io te segnata in su la strada”. The sign is expressly named as such and the ground they are standing on is identified as the place where the representation is located. Hitherto the narrator had recounted events in terms of a perception that did not differentiate between image and reality, and had depicted all the figures as though they were present in person. Now, by contrast, images are declared as such; the initial outcome of this is that the different levels seem to merge into each other. Niobe is addressed as a person just as much as reference is made to the depiction of her. And the very next scene, showing King Saul, continues in the same vein. The local deixis of the represen-

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tation is expressly named (“quivi”) and set against the location of the events (“in Gelboè”); the result is a confusing duplication of place. Once again Dante exploits the ambivalent semantics of the verb parer. “Parevi” can just as well refer to the impression created by Saul’s suicide using his own sword, as it can be a reference to the representation itself (in that sense a continuation of the “quivi”). While the depictions of the examples of humility had made much of the illusion of reality in these pictures, now we see an ever greater emphasis on their function as signifiers. And in doing so, Dante’s narrative creates striking parallels between insight into the nature of the sins represented and insight into the representation itself. For, immediately after the sin has been named – and for the first time – the picture as such becomes a motif in its own right. In view of this the additional detail found in the next image, regarding the quality of these sins, is not without significance: “O folle Aragne”. For the first time the Pilgrim refers to the sinner as such and the fact that he very obviously distances himself from the scene is a response to Arachne’s absurd decision to challenge none other than Athene to a contest in the art of weaving.¹³⁰ As a punishment the goddess tears Arachne’s work into pieces and turns her into a spider. Dante’s depiction shows both. None of the exempla referred to here so decisively makes the image per se its subject as this one, coming as it does exactly at the mid-way point in the series. For each of the ill-matched contestants seeks to create a more perfect picture, and Athene does not miss the chance to use her pictures to show Arachne the fate of those who dare to pit themselves against the Gods.¹³¹ Here the picture itself is the medium of the superbia, and thus in a sense Arachne becomes the fi–gura of an art that dares to compete with the Heavenly artist. She embodies that danger which God’s own pictures are now encountering. Like Athene, God focuses in his reliefs on the consequences of pride, so that penitents may gaze upon them. Significantly, the viewer of this scene becomes more and more aware of his own role precisely at the moment when he is making a point of distancing himself from the deeds of those depicted, and interestingly he does this for the first time when it is a female visual artist who is guilty of presuming to compete with Heaven. Thus the Pilgrim has in a sense learnt two things: in the first place he is able to recognise the sin committed by those depicted in these pictures. In the second he is now also able to perceive the picture as such. The recognition of the sin of superbia as such and the rec Cf. Ovidius, Metamorphoses, VI, 55 ff.  “ut tamen exemplis intellegat aemula laudis,/quod pretium speret pro tam furialibus ausis,/quattuor in partes certamina quattuor addit/clara colore suo, brevibus distincta sigillis” (Ovidius, Metamophoses, VI, 83 – 86).

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ognition of the pictures as mere representations are combined with one another. Just as the protagonists in this scene must recognise the consequences of their deeds, so, too, the Pilgrim notices that he is standing facing pictures. The extension of their gaze into the gaze of the observer elicits an analogous effect in him. This parallel is indicated not least by the term with which Dante alerts Arachne to the reprehensible nature of what she has done: for he calls it “folle”. The illusory quality of the picture is in keeping with the error of that sin that scholastic theology has defined as its signum: its air of goodness is no more than an illusion.¹³² It is hardly by chance that the next picture as it were provides the proof of the viewer’s insight into the purely pictorial nature of what he is looking at. For, once the picture has been recognised as a sign, it ceases to be a threat to the viewer: “O Roboàm, già non par che minacci quivi ’l tuo segno; ma pien di spavento nel porta un carro, sanza ch’altri il cacci”. Only the king is full of horror, for he has been deserted by God and is thus, defenceless, at the mercy of the Jews. But he no longer has any power over the viewer who has seen through his picture for what it is. This insight on the part of the viewer sets the seal on the viewer’s imperviousness to attacks from a sin that can only be dangerous if its ontological insubstantiality remains undetected. And where the picture is seen through, language regains its clarity: “non par” leaves no room for doubt. The recognition of the follia of pride and the recognition of the picture thus belong together. In the reliefs of superbia, too, their mediality becomes a sign for what they represent. The fundamentally illusory nature of all depiction is the ontological complement of a moral deficit that has its roots in a mistake; and thus the particular qualities of these pictures also reveal the nature of this sin. The nature of evil, or more precisely the insubstantiality of what is no more than its privatio boni, is symbolically equivalent to a pictoriality that can only evoke the semblance of truth. The message conveyed here is summed up by Dante in his commentary on God’s art, in which he makes mention of much more than just mimetic skills: Morti li morti e i vivi parean vivi: non vide mei di me chi vide il vero (Purgatorio XII,67 f.)

 Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I-II,77, 2c: “[…] cum voluntas sit boni vel apparentis boni, nunquam voluntas in malum moveretur, nisi id quod non est bonum, aliqualiter rationi bonum appareret ; et propter hoc voluntas nunquam in malum tenderet, nisi cum aliqua ignorantia vel errore rationis”.

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It seems like an affirmation of the Pilgrim’s gaze – wiser now and freed from all illusion – when, in the last four examples he no longer describes what he perceives but the message it conveys. “Mostrava” is now the repeated introduction to each of these examples: Mostrava ancor lo duro pavimento come Almeon a sua madre fé caro parer lo sventurato addornamento. Mostrava come i figli si gittaro sovra Sennacherìb dentro dal tempio, e come, morto lui, quivi il lasciaro. Mostrava la ruina e ’l crudo scempio che fé Tamiri, quando disse a Ciro: “Sangue sitisti, e io di sangue t’empio”. Mostrava come in rotta si fuggiro li Assiri, poi che fu morto Oloferne, e anche le reliquie del martiro. (Purgatorio XII,49 – 60)

The materiality of the pictures is referred to even more clearly than hitherto and “lo duro pavimento” expressly named as the bearer of their message. Of course this designation is more than just an indication of the stony ground, for it points at the same time to the quality of what it shows. Once again the newly-won moral insight is transposed into allegorical language. Moreover Dante draws on yet another linguistic practice in his characterization of the scene depicting Alcmeon’s revenge on his mother Eriphyle when she allowed herself to be bribed with a necklace and betrayed her husband’s hiding place. The formulation of the relevant sentences is unmistakably ironic: “fé caro parer lo sventurato addornamento”. The illusory nature of that bonum that Eriphyle imagined she would acquire with Harmonia’s jewellery is also expressed in a language that reveals this illusion as such.¹³³ In the next scene, Dante – with great subtlety – corrects the confusion of the deixis that had ensued with the description of the previous section of the relief. “Quivi” now no longer refers to the location of the depiction, which is in competition with the location of the events of the narrative. “Quivi” now exclusively means the Temple of Niniveh in which his own sons slayed the Assyrian King

 The relevant Aristotelian definition of irony has been adopted by later scholars. Thus Thomas Aquinas is hard put to determine its moral status (see Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, II-II,113). It seems to me, in view of this function of irony as an equivalent to the hypocrisy of sin exposed in the pictures, that Dante is adding yet a further ironic dimension to the moral conclusion that he draws from the sight of these pictures: “Or superbite, e via col viso altero,/figliuoli d’Eva, e non chinate il volto/sì che veggiate il vostro mal sentero!” (Purgatorio XII,70 – 72).

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Sennacherib, now without military success. Thus the language resolves the linguistic confusion that the pictures have generated. This is the only point in the whole series of these examples that words are cited; according to the report by Orosius, these are the words Tomyris spoke to Chyros, here translated by Dante from the Latin original: “Satia te sanguine, quem sitisti”.¹³⁴ But it is also specifically at this point that we can see how these images differ from those that seem to make the Word itself visible. Tomyris in fact remains silent: his words are only cited, and only identifiable in the representation by their destructive consequences. The reliefs which gave form to the advent of the Word are now countered by images of speechlessness, which reveal the name of sin in that they depict the loss of human beings’ original language as the result of rebellion against God. The destructive potential of a ontologically insubstantial sin is equivalent to the loss of language, to the silencing of the original Word – the Word that stood at the beginning of all creation. Thus in these pictures, language – in contrast to its role in the reliefs of the incarnation – will remain absent, and ultimately similarly absent in them is also the sin that they are actually about. For the sin of pride, being without substance, resists representation of any kind. So these reliefs of superbia only express the effects of its destructive potential. They are signs of a second order: they are mere likenesses, and they only manifest the signs of the death – ruins and corpses – that sin brings into the world, “le reliquie del martiro.” But the physical death that they depict is only the external, visible side of metaphysical insubstantiality and speechlessness which constitutes the ‘nature’ of all sins – as of all illusory pictures and depictions. And yet in these pictures there are some residual elements that do not fit into the overall programme. For these reliefs are unusually beautiful, and once again God’s artistic skills surpass everything that the Earthly viewer has ever seen. Therefore he describes them as being “Di miglior sembianza secondo l’artificio” and once again pays homage to their maker (see Purgatorio XII, 22 f.). “Di miglior sembianza”: the two-sidedness of this formulation in fact shows up the categorical indecisiveness regarding a phenomenon that it is impossible to fully master. For Christian thinkers, on one hand, have regarded beauty as a signum of the god-created world and have exploited it as evidence of the Creator. Beauty is in fact the transformation of the good and the true into a form perceptible by our senses. But, at the same time, beauty is also always an outward appearance and is undeniably under suspicion of being in league with some base, metaphys-

 Cf. Paulus Orosius, Historiae, II,7,6. The respective reference will be found in the relevant commentaries.

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ical evil. Thus, in the pictures whose illusionism the Pilgrim recognises, God’s teaching on the nature of sin finds itself caught up in a contradiction that cannot be resolved. For even the pictures that lay bare their own insubstantiality are also the work of a deity whose art only admits complete beauty. Thus in the exempla superbiae, in which this same deity is competing with the art of human beings and in which the potential for illusion cannot be raised to the level of a figura of the certainty of salvation – but can only be used to expose itself – the alliance between appearance and sin that they depict breaks down. Certainly God’s works always proclaim His truth. In that sense it is only logical that His portraits tell us of the nature of all illusory appearances. But at the same time His creatures are expressions of His perfection, which is itself reflected within them. The ontology of creation undeniably turns them into a reflection of this perfection. This illusion thus can no longer be unconditionally written off as the product of an evil force. Even the work that exposes the true facts of this illusion participates in that same illusion. Thus the ontological parallel between the art of human beings and the creation of a Heavenly artifex leads to a deep division: the outward appearance of beauty is just as much a signum of nothingness as evidence of perfection.

V “O Roboàm, già non par che minacci/quivi ’l tuo segno”: Aristotle had already shown in his Poetics that things – like wild animals or corpses – that we are reluctant to behold, lose their terrifying impact as soon as we see these in pictures, no matter how faithful to nature. Under these circumstances they can even give us pleasure, for the human being delights in recognising a depicted object and nothing gives the animal rationale greater pleasure than the act of recognition.¹³⁵ But it is the very affinity between Dante’s words – when he declares his imperviousness to any threat from the image of the proud King Rehoboam – and the passage just cited from the Poetics that highlights the distance between the two works. It is a striking fact of the medieval reception of writings by Aristotle named in the Commedia as “’l maestro di color che sanno”¹³⁶ and whom Dante elsewhere simply called “il Filosofo”, that the Poetics was not regarded as particularly influential. Oddly enough its day was not to come until the rest of the Stagirite’s Œuvre ceased to shine quite so brightly. Rainer Warning has

 Aristotelis, De arte poetica liber, chap. 4.  Inferno IV,131.

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shown that the popularity of the Aristotelian principle of imitation during Early Modernity was hardly appropriate to the time, for the poetry of the late Middle Ages had long undermined its premises.¹³⁷ And the Divine Comedy can readily demonstrate how alien the Poetics remained, even where the scholarly adoption of Aristotelian thinking could have paved the way for a positive acceptance of Dante’s text. For however close Dante’s words as he turns away from Rehoboam are to the description in the Poetics of the impact of certain images, so, too, is there an unmistakable difference between the two. The cathartic effect of mimesis diagnosed by Aristotle arises from the intellectual pleasure that is intrinsic to every process of recognition. On this basis the Stagirite acquires a device with which he can correct the Platonic rejection of imitation. In its premises it is the same argument that he uses when he sets out the philosophical superiority of the structural pattern of poetic mimesis. This connection becomes clear in the analogous effect of a mimesis into whose temporality the poet has inscribed a logical figure: that of probability. This, too, does not fail to induce a cathartic effect, and so the person viewing a tragedy learns to shake off his terror of the unexpected. He is able to achieve this not least because he is able to discover there a piece of logical order where he initially assumed only disorder to be. For – as we read in the famous ninth chapter of the Poetics – tragedy should be probable and wonderful at once. In other words: prospective improbability should appear logical in hindsight. Aristotle’s appreciation of mimesis ultimately avoids that metaphysical blemish that its name indicates, which is why this category only apparently bears this name. Aristotle replaces the making of likenesses with rational profit: be it that the likeness disappears in a moment of pleasurable recognition, or be it that probability replaces it as a logical structure for outdoing chance. But the Pilgrim’s ability to overcome his fear at the sight of the picture of the proud King has other pre-conditions. It is not based on a transformation of a threat into the pleasure of recognition which is made possible by the distance created by the picture. Rather it combines the insight into the illusion regarding the difference between picture and reality with the recognition of the true nature of the sin, the consequences of which are clearly shown in the picture. Thus we find again that alliance between a moral and a metaphysical scepticism which already discredited the mimesis in Plato’s Politeia. But any such doubt now becomes all the more perilous. For the illusory nature of the picture becomes equivalent to an evil that implies much more than just an ontological deficit, but is constantly under suspicion for subversion and for rebellion against the Almigh-

 Warning 1983, p. 313.

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ty. It is for this reason that Dante makes a link between the source of all sin, namely superbia, and the deception intrinsic to the picture. At the same time this marks the disappearence of the pre-conditions of a rehabilitation of mimesis through its transformation into a psychology of recognition or a textual structure constituting a gain of logical order, as Aristotle managed to do. For delight in cognitive perception for its own sake quickly becomes sinful curiositas, and the making of a picture of the world that goes beyond its own order could only lead to presumptuous competition with the Creator. While theology had declared mimesis to be an integral component of the world order, so that it could use this concept to explain both divine creation and human art and to relate the two to each other, now the Commedia specifically explores the risks involved in any imitation. Without doubt the Commedia itself very definitely partakes of a theological theory that ascribes just such centrality to mimesis. This already applies to its cosmology, and the narrator of the Commedia does not tire of drawing attention to the analogy between artist and Creator. But, by contrast, the sacro poema develops a deeply Christian scepticism regarding all forms of pictoriality and depiction, setting these against an order of the Word that contests ontological theoria. Its coordinates are not determined by eidetic correspondence but by the mystification of the non-evident, not the representation of the similar but a hermeneutics of hidden meaning. It seems to me that at this point the structure of the representation itself becomes a semantic programme. Dante placed his poetic works very consistently in the service of this order of God’s Word and integrated the latter’s structures. Thus, as we have seen, he inscribed into his own works something like a pattern of multiple written meanings. But an appropriation of allegorical coding of this kind turns his work in the same moment into a very different kind of mimesis: into a mimesis of divine speech that ultimately becomes a simulation of such speech and thus raises, all the more insistently, the question as to its own truth.

Videre – Invidere The Phenomenology of Perception and the Ontology of Purgatory (Purg. XIII) Although it is barely mentioned in any of the modern commentaries to Dante’s Commedia, earlier commentators of the sacro poema came up with a rather plausible explanation for the punishment of blindness meted out to the envious on the second terrace of the mountain of Purgatory. ché a tutti un fil di ferro i cigli fóra e cusce sì, come a sparvier selvaggio si fa però che queto non dimora. (Purgatorio XIII,70 – 72)

The argument provided by Dante’s contemporaries for this form of punishment employs a principle that was then designated by the term ‘etymology’.¹³⁸ This principle is founded on the presupposition that phonetic relationships between words can provide a key to the essence of the things that these words define. In the context of the passage cited above, the focus is on the relationship between envy and seeing, between invidia and videre. ¹³⁹ From the perspective of such an

 See the chapter “Etymologie als Denkform”, in: Curtius 1973, pp. 486 – 490.  In the Proemio of Lana’s commentary, we read right in the beginning: “L’autore intende di purgare nel presente capitolo li invidiosi, e metteli che sono vilmente vestiti, sicome da viltade può venire invidia, e metteli accigliati, che sicome per la veduta essi hanno acquistato quel vizio, così gli occhi stanno coperti e serrati nel Purgatorio, come apparirà nella esposizione del testo. […] Or l’autore propriamente li punisce nelli occhi; sicome è detto la invidia per vedere l’altrui bene sì si ingenera, e perciò ha ella nome invidia ab invidendo quia non potest videre bonum aliorum.” (Lana 1324). Several commentators of the time (for example L’Ottimo Commento 1333 and Anonimo Fiorentino 1400) have made a similar connection between envy and visual perception. Other commentators of the 14th century present the connection between envy and seeing differently. See for example Pietro Alighieri’s remarks regarding the envious: “Quod sint assimilandi caecis satis patet; nam invidi mirabiliter caeci dici possunt, cum excaecantur, unde illuminari deberent de gratia Dei colata proximo suo. Unde Job 5.º de eis ait: per diem incurrent tenebras, et quasi in nocte sic palpabunt in meridie. […] Item invidia facit, quod non videatur, quod expedit videre; et ideo dicitur invidia, quasi non visio. Item nonne est caecitas gaudere de malo, cum gaudim debet esse ex communicatione convenientis cum conveniente, et cum naturaliter sint boni, et sic de bono gaudere deberent?” (Alighieri 1340). In Benevenuto 1380, we find yet another interpretation of this link between visio and invidia: “Hic poeta ultimo describit ultimam poenam durissimam invidorum per comparationem eorumdem caecorum quae est similiter propriissima; et vult dicere sententialiter, quod sicut caeci sunt privati visu, ita quod non possunt videre solem justitiae, Deum.” https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110637106-005

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‘etymological’ correspondence, envy appears to be a negation or even a refusal of seeing. If one follows through this trace left by the signifier, it becomes possible to discover much additional support for a characterization of envy in which the equation invidere = non videre is thematized. One can thus go far beyond the evidence already put forward in the theological literature of the patristic period and the work of commentators contemporary to Dante. I would like to introduce a few examples in support of this. In his sermons, Augustine warns his listeners: “oculis enim uidemus, non nostris oculis inuidemus.”¹⁴⁰ In his treatise on John’s Gospel, the interpretation of a passage on how Jesus left his listeners after speaking to them has a very similar wording: “haec locutus est iesus, et abiit, et abscondit se ab eis. […] sed ab eis qui uidebant et inuidebant, quia nec uidebant, sed in lapidem illum caecitate offendebant”.¹⁴¹ In this context, envy also signifies a form of blindness, and its definition is once again developed out of the etymological correspondence between videre and invidere. In Cyprian of Carthage’s De zelo et liuore, one of the most exhaustive moral-theological treatises on the sin of envy, this correspondence is even clearer: “Quid in zeli tenebras ruis, quid te nubilo livoris inuoluis, quid inuidiae caecitate omne pacis et caritatis lumen extinguis?”¹⁴² Here Dante’s choice of forced blindness as a form of punishment for the envious is even more apparent. This punishment is significant in many ways. It does more than simply transform the relevant moral theological characterization of envy into physical poena. Since invidia is also considered to be a peccatum poenale, the punishment, if in keeping with the sin committed, also corresponds to further theological analysis of the offense as well.¹⁴³ The punishment, then, is inherent to envy by its nature, or better, its un-nature. In the punishment, the perversion of nature inherent to sin – its inherent blindness – is revealed. Like self-punishment, envy destroys not only the natural relation to the other, but it also, and above all, calls for unnatural self-destruction. If the form of punishment chosen by Dante is a key representation of the theological identification of invidia with caecitas, reference to it in commentary on the Commedia has nevertheless been quite limited. It can, however, be dem-

 Augustinus, Sermones ad populum, Classis III, 277.  Augustinus, In Iohannis euangelium tractatus, 52,14.  Cyprianus Carthagenensis, De zelo et liuore, 11,185.  Regarding the definition of the peccatum poenale see Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I-II, 87, 2c: “[…] per accidens etiam peccatum quod ex hoc sequitur, poena dicatur. […] Alio modo, ex parte substantiae actus, quae afflictionem inducit: sive sit actus interior, ut patet in ira et invidia; sive actus exterior, ut patet cum aliqui gravi labore opprimuntur et damno, ut expleant actum peccati”.

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onstrated in Canto XIII that the linkage of envy to blindness brought out by this punishment forms the core of a more extensive conception that structures the scenery of this canto. My aim in the following will therefore be to prove that, within the context of the purgation of the envious, Dante designs a specific order of perception characteristic for Purgatory as the intermediary region between heaven and earth. The conditions and effects of this order of perception differ as much from those of this world as they do from those of heavenly paradise. As I will further explain, the order of perception in purgatory transforms the order of our familiar world. At the same time, this transformation mirrors the effects of redemption on fallen creation. Here, the effects of salvation brought upon mankind through the crucifixion of Christ become intuitable in the physical sphere. The transformation of the universe that begins with the incarnation – the entry of the transcendent God into the material world – is manifested in the corporeality of Purgatory, that realm in which the redemption of fallen man takes place continuously. If redemption remains a mere potentiality for the (still) sinful man of this world, it becomes an irrefutable reality in Purgatory. Hence it is undeniable that the transformation of perceptual orders simultaneously corresponds to a specific ontology of Purgatory. The salvation that continuously takes place in Purgatory is anchored in the substantial and, namely, ontological order of this realm between heaven and earth. As will be demonstrated in more detail, this order is also recognizable in Canto XIII, Purgatorio. This rough sketch of my thesis raises the question of why the ontological foundations of Purgatory are developed in precisely this part of the text. The answer is not difficult to find, and results from the position of envy within moraltheological systematics. For envy, which represents the blindness of men to divine truth, constitutes the reversal of that virtue which Christian ethics understands as mater omnium virtutum: the counterpart of caritas. The description of envy cited from Cyprian of Carthage’s De zelo et liuore had already defined this vice as an extinction of the lumen caritatis. This complementarity of envy and charity comes forth even more clearly in Thomas Aquinas’ definition of Invidia: Invidia autem, secundum rationem sui obiecti, contrariatur caritati, per quam est vita animae spiritualis, secundum illud I Ioan. III : Nos scimus quoniam translati sumus de morte ad vitam, quoniam diligimus fratres. Utriusque enim obiectum, et caritatis et invidiae, est bonum proximi, […] invidia autem de eodem tristatur.¹⁴⁴

 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, II-II, 36, 3c. The opposition of invidia and caritas is not limited to this definition. It is laid down in Thomas Aquinas’ moral theological systematology

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As the sin that makes one begrudge the other good things, and which therefore also enables one to wish him evil, envy inevitably contrasts with caritas, whose essence is to wish the neighbor the same good things that one would wish for oneself. Yet, this systematic relation between envy and caritas, which assigns invidia a capital position within the hierarchy of sins, also has a historical dimension or, more precisely, a dimension within salvation history. According to an often-quoted¹⁴⁵ old testamentary characterization of invidia from the Book of Wisdom, envy marks the beginning of all evil in this world: “invidia autem diaboli mors introivit in orbem terrarium”.¹⁴⁶ Within moral-theological systematology, envy is seldom positioned above pride.¹⁴⁷ Yet, the pertinence of this position

itself, as envy is considered to be part of the category of vitia opposita caritati (see Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae II-II, 23 introduction; 34 introduction).  See for example Cyprianus Carthagenensis, De zelo et liuore, 4; Petrus Chrysologus, Sermonum collectio, 101; Hieronymus, Commentarii in IV epistulas Paulinas, Ad Ephesios, 1; Augustinus, Sermones ad populum, Classis III, 294; Isidorus Hispalensis, Sententiarum libri III, 3; Aelredus Rieuallensis, Opera omnia II. Sermones I – XLVI, 35; Bernardus Claraevallensis, Epistolae, 7,18; Bonaventure, Sermones dominicales, 30, 5; Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, II-II, 36,4, ad 2.  Liber Sapientiae 2, 24.  This calls for the question of the role of envy within the systematology that founds the order in Purgatorio. It coherently follows the hierarchy of the seven peccata mortalia defined by Gregory the Great, in which superbia, not invidia takes the position of the first and most serious of all offenses (see Gregorius Magnus, Moralia in Iob, 31,45: Here, the sequence of the deadly sins is not only understood as a hierarchical sequence, but also as causal series, insofar as the respectively more serious peccatum causes the next one). Meanwhile this order of sins developed by patristic theology does not entirely correspond to the much less systematical biblical one. In the Old Testament, as well as in the New Testament, we find competing hierarchies of sins. In John’s first epistle, for example, pride, curiosity and voluptuousness are named as the original evils of man (see I Iob 70, 2,16. The systematology in question is taken up by Augustinus, Confessiones, 10, 37,60). The traces of such a competition of different sin hierarchies can also be found in the Commedia. At first this applies to differences between the systematology of Inferno and Purgatorio. In Hell, the geography of the room is not structured by the scheme of the peccata mortalia. It is instead hybridized with the Aristotelean systematology of vices, but not without transforming, or even deforming, the theological systematology in a decisive way. (Striking, for example, is the absence of superbia and invidia, the most serious offenses within the order of deadly sins. Dante-commentators of the time have already dealt with this problem. For example, after the end of his commentary on Purgatorio XIII, 20, Benevenuto remarks: “Sed antequam ulterius procedam, lector, nolo praetermittere quaestionem dificillimam quae oritur hic; quare scilicet poeta noster tam curiose et seriose hic pertractat de invidia, de cuius poena nullam mentionem fecit in inferno; nec minus videtur dubitandum de vana gloria, de qua tam egregie jam tractavit hic, et in inferno videtur omnino praeteriisse”, [Benevenuto 1380].) Within the Commedia, diverging orders of vices do not result only from the integration of pagan systematology into Christian ethics. The Christian systematology of sins itself presents itself in different ways. Remarkable in this regard is the first order of peccata in the sacro poema

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for the sacro poema can also be seen in another part of the Commedia. Already in Canto I, Inferno, in what one might call the prooemium of the whole Commedia, Virgil defines envy as that which causes the rage of the bestia who blocks Dante’s way to the sun-splashed hill and, immediately after his escape from the forest of sins, makes him fear for his life: Molti son li animali a cui s’ammoglia e più saranno ancora, infin che ’l veltro verrà, che la farà morir con doglia. Questi non ciberà terra né peltro, ma sapïenza e amore e virtute,

which is already conveyed in allegorical form in the opening canto of the Inferno. This is clearly an allusion to the tre fiere that hinder the wayfarer from ascending the sun-splashed hill (see Inferno I, 31– 60), and that the commentators of the sacro poema in general identify with the peccata of luxuria, superbia and avaritia. The immediate correspondence, here under consideration, between envy and the program of redemption of Purgatory that is created in the thirteenth canto of Purgatorio ultimately recurs – with the implicit quote from the Book of Wisdom – to a systematology of sins that assigns invidia the role of origin of all guilt. In this context, see also Petrus Chrysologus, Collectio sermonum, sermo 48, linea 91: “Inuidia delictorum uenenum, criminum uirus, peccatorum mater, origo uitiorum.” The statements of the Bible are contradictory regarding not only the question of the systematization of sins, but also that regarding their origin. Unlike in the Book of Sirach we read: “initium peccati omnis superbia” (Ecclesiasticus 10,15). This judgement has become dominant in theology. (Aside from the quoted systematology of Gregory the Great see Augustinus, De natura et gratia, 29, 33; Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I-II, 163.) While Dante follows the dominant moral theological paradigm regarding the basic structure of the Purgatorio, he borrows from other orders of peccata at the same time. Basically Dante mediates between the hierarchies within the Bible that compete with each other, between a definition of envy as the true opposition of caritas, playing the prominent role of the antagonist of redemption, and the interpretation of pride as the origin of all sin. Thanks to an allocation of tasks, this compromise ultimately turns out to be successful. Without a doubt, pride remains the first of all offenses in the Purgatorio. Yet, from Cantos X–XII, Purgatorio, superbia is largely limited to the connection with artists and their offenses. In this way, superbia appears to be a peccatum that, above all, is aimed at competition with God and his work of creation. Envy is held accountable for sin as a phenomenon which perverts the action of man and his perception of reality from the roots up, and which, being the radical opposite of all charity, destroys human interrelations. (By the way, one could ask whether Dante’s implicit mediation between different hierarchical orders ultimately merely extends what already in scholastic systematology itself is incipient. Certainly, Thomas Aquinas makes it quite clear that pride represents the first and most serious of all of man’s offenses. His formulation in Summa theologiae, II-II,163,1c is unambiguous. Yet, Thomas Aquinas’ moral theological systematology basically covers up the extent to which this hierarchy follows tradition. His definition of superbia, determined by him as one of the partes temperantiae, doubtlessly marginalizes this offense within the order of sins against envy which is – as mentioned – part of the vitia opposita gaudio caritatis and which therefore opposes the most important of the three virtutes theologicae.)

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e sua nazion sarà tra feltro e feltro. Di quella umile Italia fia salute per cui morì la vergine Cammilla, Eurialo e Turno e Niso di ferute. Questi la caccerà per ogne villa, fin che l’avrà rimessa nel lo ’nferno là onde ’nvidia prima dipartilla. (Inferno I,100 – 111)

The unholiness encoded in this allegorical scene has its origin in nothing other than invidia. Originating from hell and bringing calamity across the world, the rapacious animal – from whom only the widely discussed Veltro, whose identity remains enigmatic to date, can provide redemption – stands in the tradition of the tempter as the origin of all evil.¹⁴⁸ Here as well, invidia is implicitly held accountable for the Fall of man. This role of envy within the salvation history concerns the institution of Purgatory as well. Significant in this regard is the following definition of the mountain of Purgatory which already appears in the first verses of Canto XIII, Purgatorio: Noi eravamo al sommo della scala, dove secondamente si risega lo monte che salendo altrui dismala. (Purgatorio XIII,1– 3)

“Lo monte che […] altrui dismala”: this formulation is nothing but a periphrase of Purgatory, and it once again represents an exact reversal of the definition of envy. If the intrinsic essence or non-essence of envy is to wish the neighbor evil, then the mountain of Purgatory, on the other hand, seems to relieve the neighbor from evil. The act in which sins are forgiven is therefore brought into an immediate relationship with an offense defined in the Old Testament as the origin of all misery in the world. The act of redemption consequently appears as the annulment of that envy through which death and unholiness first come into the world. God’s ungrounded as well as limitless love, which is expressed in the sacrifice of his son, is the answer to the destructive envy of man. There is therefore a substantial relationship between invidia and the institution of Purgatory in

 This connection with the biblical scene of the Fall in Eden becomes even more evident in the ’Larger Geography’ of the Commedia. The allegory of the selva oscura at the beginning of the sacro poema contrastively corresponds with paradise on earth, which here is shifted into the hereafter of Purgatorio. Therefore the forest of sins symbolically stands for the state of the fallen world whose moral corruption still has the same origin as narrated in Genesis. For further details, cf. A. Kablitz 1999.

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which the redemptive work is realized. The purgation of guilt, which makes possible God’s unfounded love, becomes a redemptive counter-program to that envy which is the beginning of sin. This systematic connection between invidia and Purgatory also helps to explain why the ontological foundations of this intermediary realm between this world and heavenly paradise are outlined in precisely this part of the Commedia. Canto XIII, Purgatorio, contrasts the blindness of the envious, which signifies nothing other than blindness to God’s salvation, with a transformation of terrestrial forms of perception in which the work of redemption is manifested. This transformation, which still needs further explanation, also discloses the ontological specificity of that world which owes its existence to Christ’s deed of salvation. The connection of envy with blindness raises yet another question that will also play a role in Dante’s description of the terrace of invidia. While the phonetic similarity of videre and invidere makes us attend to the relationship between sense perception and ethics, the correspondence between signifieds calls attention to the relationship between the sign and its meaning. In a certain way, this constellation combines the question of the relationship between perception and virtue with that which subsists between the sign and its sense. In this manner, the patristic combination of videre and invidere brings into play the semantic ambivalence of the term sensus itself: a link between the perception of physical objects and the significance of language already brought out in the writings of the Early Fathers.¹⁴⁹ The double senses of sense – as the understanding of signs and as the sense perception – belong together, and, in his description of the encounter with the envious, Dante will determine this connection as a specific characteristic of the world of Purgatory.

 I would like to give some more evidence for this as well. In Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, XI, 3 we read: “Sicut ergo de visibilibus, quæ non vidimus, eis credimus qui viderunt, atque ita de cæteris quae ad suum quemque sensum corporis pertinent : ita de his quæ animo ac mente sentiuntur (quia et ipse rectissime dicitur sensus, unde et sententia vocabulum accepit), hoc est de invisibilibus quæ a nostro sensu interiore remota sunt, iis nos oportet credere, qui hæc in illo incorporeo lumine disposita didicerunt, vel manentia contuentur.” See also Augustinus, De anima et ejus origine 4, 23, 37: “His verbis satis indicas quid esse spiritum hominis sentias, id est, rationale nostrum, quo sentit atque intelligit anima; non sicut sentitur corporis sensibus, sed sicut est ille intimus sensus, ex quo est appellata sententia.” Isidorus Hispalensis, Etymologiarum Libri Viginti, XI,1,13: “Dum ergo vivificat corpus, anima est; dum vult, animus est; dum scit, mens est; dum recolit, memoria est: dum rectum judicat, ratio est; dum spirat, spiritus est; dum aliquid sentit, sensus est. Nam inde animus sensus dicitur pro iis quæ sentit, unde et sententia nomen accepit.” Gregorius Magnus, Moralia in Iob, 23,17, linea 29: “Sententia quippe a sensu uocata est. Et recta quae intellegit, non ex sola scientia, sed etiam ex sententia dicere appetit, qui nequaquam tantummodo sciendo dicere, sed sentiendo desiderat experiri quod dicit”.

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I We begin our lectura of Canto XIII, Purgatorio, with the scene in which the wayfarers arrive in the second girone of Purgatory. Undecided about what direction they should take, Virgil turns toward the sun, seeking for help: “Se qui per dimandar gente s’aspetta”, ragionava il poeta, “io temo forse che troppo avrà d’indugio nostra eletta”. Poi fisamente al sole li occhi porse; fece del destro lato a muover centro, e la sinistra parte di sé torse. “O dolce lume a cui fidanza i’ entro per lo novo cammin, tu ne conduci”, dicea, “come condur si vuol quinc’ entro. Tu scaldi il mondo, tu sovr’ esso luci; s’altra ragione in contrario non ponta, esser dien sempre li tuoi raggi duci”. (Purgatorio XIII,10 – 21)

The ignorance of these two wayfarers regarding what direction to take is, as in the analyses of scholastic theology, established as the fundamental situation of action. “Troppo avrà d’indugio nostra eletta.” Eletta is a technical term, the Italian translation of the Latin concept of electio. It implies that, according to the ethics cited above, action is essentially based on the choice between at least two alternatives and that this choice of the proper goal itself decides the moral quality of action.¹⁵⁰ How does Virgil overcome this situation in which it is apparently impossible to make the right choice? He resolves the problem by following the light of the sun and turning in the direction indicated by it. The symbolic code that this decision is based on is easy to trace, and is more or less explained in all of the commentaries. The light of the sun stands for the light of God, which shows men the right way in their decisions.¹⁵¹ Yet, this inter-

 Regarding the scholastic definition of the category of electio and its function see Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I-II,13.  This reduction of action to its basic principles also has to be seen in connection with the place in which the wayfarers are located. Even the Haughty promptly offered to show Dante and Virgil the right way to the peak of the mountain of Purgatory. But on the ledge of the envious they can no longer be counted on: “Se qui per dimandar gente s’aspetta […] troppo avrà d’indugio nostra eletta”. As envy does not allow one to promote the well being of others, there is no help. This failure of any kind of mediation draws the attention to God’s guidance as the basic condition of all action. In this way, the particular conditions in the circle of the envious reveal the theoretical premises of action par excellence.

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pretation remains unclear as to precisely which divine power is here designated. What does that light of the sun mean?¹⁵² Once again, the context of the verse in question provides an explanation. The term eletta used in the previous terzina seems to refer to the sun as the embodiment of a rational power or intellect that is able to clarify points of contention through its judgement. Yet, the more detailed description of this light brings into play precisely its other and equally as conventional symbolic significance as a symbolization of divine love. Already the first of the epitheta that are attributed to the sun claims love as one of its qualities. For this light is called dolce, which thereby plays on love’s most common descriptions, and which invokes the topic formula quid dulcius caritate. ¹⁵³ Significant in this regard is verse 19: “Tu scaldi il mondo, tu sovr’ esso luci.” Calor caritatis ¹⁵⁴ represents an equally well-known characterization of God’s love, while its shine over the world refers to the intellect. The altra ragione mentioned in the following verse also makes this clear. (We will have to come back to the interpretation of these difficult words.) The light of the sun to which Virgil

 The allegorical interpretation of the sun has been a controversial issue since the first commentaries on the Commedia were written. In Lana’s commentary, the sun is identified with God Himself: “Porse al sole cioè a Dio, il quale è sole, e che illumina omnem hominem venientem in hunc mundum.” (Lana 1324). Benevenuto looks at it as the sun of justice: “et intellige ad solem justitiae qui est Deus”, and at the same time identifies it with God’s grace: “lumen solis est ipsa gratia Dei” (Benevenuto 1380). Whereas Pietro Alighieri interprets the sun as a rational power, as “scientia speculative” that Virgil is addressing: “reduxit se ad solem, idest reduxit se ad scientiam speculativam.” (Alighieri 1340). It’s rather obvious, that the last two readings are mutually exclusive. While theologians perceive ratio as a part of nature, they see grace as a supernatural power.  Caesarius Arelatensis, Sermones Caesarii uel ex aliis fontibus hausti, 22,1, linea 24: “Quid dulcius caritate, fratres carissimi,? qui nescit, gustet et videat”. Augustinus, De anima et ejus origine, 3,15, 23: “Adsit Dominus tuæ menti, et tantam spiritui tuo spiritu suo facilitatem humilitatis, lucem veritatis, dulcedinem charitatis, pacem pietatis infundat, ut victor tui animi esse malis in veris quam cuiuslibet contradicentis in falsis.” Ambrosius, De officiis, 2, 30,155: “Nihil charitate dulcius, nihil pace gratius”.  Hieronymus, Tractatus in librum psalmorum, psalmus 147, linea 177– 179: “si cuius ergo anima refrixerit, ut aquilo uentus frigidissimus: si quando autem calor caritatis in corde nostro refrigescat, si peccauerit, si refrixerit, si mortuus fuerit […] diligenter adtendite quod dico: si refrixerit, si mortuus fuerit. frigescere autem mortuorum est; calere uiuentium”. Gregorius Magnus, Moralia in Iob, 33, 3, linea 26: “Quia enim meridianum caritatis calorem perdiderat, iam sub peccati umbra quasi sub frigore aurae torpebat”. Caesarius Arelatensis, Sermones Caesarii uel ex aliis fontibus hausti, 101,4, linea 9: “Sicut enim quotiens nimio frigore aqua constringitur, solis calore superveniente resolvitur, et discendente eodem sole iterum obduratur, ita nimio peccatorum frigore refrigescit caritas multorum, et velud glacies obdurantur: et cum eis iterum calor divinae misericordiae supervenerit, resolvuntur; ille utique calor, de quo scriptum est: nec est qui se abscondat a calore eius”.

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turns thus appears as a synthesis between the different sense perceptions proper to man. It is no accident that the verse cited above unites seeing, the highest sense in the hierarchy of the five senses, with the sense of touch, the lowest. In this way, the light of the sun appears as the sum of all sense perception. Significantly enough, this symbolic hierarchy also reverses the hierarchy familiar both to theology and to philosophy.¹⁵⁵ For here love, the mater omnium virtutum which is experienced as warmth, corresponds to the lowest, because most material, of all senses, while dolce – which directed at the sense of taste and barely ranges higher than the sense of touch – already corresponds to the first and highest attribute. This inversion of the traditional ontological-ethical hierarchy of sense perceptions significantly raises the question of the relation between this scene and the symbolic code of the Book of Nature – the code which all along has been teaching Christians how to read the material world through the signs of the intelligible world. Without doubt, Virgil’s prayer to the sun goes back to the code of liber naturae, but its application to the world of Purgatory results in some consequences. The first consequence regards the relation between perception and hermeneutics. For the material world, both the sense perception of the physical and the symbolic interpretation of material as a representation of the transcendent world remain different operations of the intellect. But it is precisely this difference that Virgil’s words eliminate. The sun no longer simply means love and reason, those powers that lead man to God. Instead, the rays of the sun now actually lead the wayfarers on their way to earthly, and finally to heavenly, paradise. The knowledge of physical reality becomes indistinguishable from the interpretation of this same reality as if it were the sign of another world. This identification of both operations also provides a glimpse into the specific ontology of Purgatory mentioned above. In this intermediate world, which is still part of the material sphere and yet leads irreversibly to the spiritual world of heavenly paradise, the relation between physical and spiritual spheres has been essentially altered. Undoubtedly, this severely interferes with the ontological order derived from ancient philosophy, and which Christian thought had also appropriated. Still this change in the relationship between the material and the intelligible characteristic of purgatory can be partially explained through the translation of the dynamic Christian history of salvation into a static model of pagan metaphysics. Purgatory, which owes its existence as well as its possibility to  In this hierarchy, the sense of sight is the highest of all, followed by the sense of hearing, the sense of taste and the sense of touch (see Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I,78, 3c). It is easy to recognize the underlying principle of this hierarchy. The more material a form of perception is, the lower is its ontological position.

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Christ’s deed of redemption, makes obvious the consequences of incarnation, and of the presence of the transcendent within the material world. It is the place of immediate physical evidence for the spiritual, and consequently, the place where sense perception and the symbolic interpretation of the world become indiscernible from each other.¹⁵⁶ The perception of the sense and the interpretation of its symbolic sense are reconciled. “Videmus nunc per speculum in enigmate tunc autem facie ad faciem”: with this momentous sentence, Paul gave the medieval symbolism of the Book of Nature its foundation.¹⁵⁷ But in the reality of Dante’s Purgatory, neither one of the alternatives given in Paul’s distinction applies. Here the world is far more than a mere enigma or a mere mirror of another world; and yet the undisguised sight of God’s reality, facie ad faciem, naturally continues to be denied to the penitents accommodated here, even though they were given an absolute promise. The ontology of Purgatory therefore mediates between two alternatives. One could say that it provides the ontological pendant to the moral process of purging. Purgatory is still a material world, but its material objects can no longer be separated from its moral sense. Even the mountain of Purgatory itself is more than just a sign for the ascension to God; it causes the actual ascension to heavenly paradise. In the same way, the light of the sun leads actually, and no longer merely symbolically, to heaven. Instead of posing riddles, this world transforms the symbolic senses of the Book of

 Such a combination of history and systematology can also be observed in other places of the Commedia. For example, in the order of sins of Inferno. None of the traditional systematologies of ethics, either of Pagan or of Christian origin, considers betrayal as the most serious of all offenses. If in Dante’s Hell this peccatum is nevertheless assigned a place on the peak of reprehensibility, the reason has to be sought in the story of the life of Jesus, whose death was initiated by Judas’ betrayal. At the same time, such a negative qualification of betrayal allows for a synthesis between this narration and another one. For in this manner, the murder of God’s Son can be compared to the murder of the father of the Roman Empire, which was initiated by Brutus’ and Cassius’ betrayal of Caesar. The end of Jesus is juxtaposed to the end of the founder of that political order, in which the incarnation and Christ’s deed of redemption were to take place. Both the work of Jesus and the Roman Empire would survive the attempt at their destruction; and this parallel also refers to the structural connection between the history of salvation and the history of the Roman Empire which will be marked by Justin’s Rome address in Paradiso (for more on this see the chapter “The End of the Sacrum Imperium”). Undeniably, the geography of Dante’s Hell is basically founded on the combination of different ethical systems, whereby the Aristotelian differentiation of vice in the Nichomachean Ethics plays the decisive role in structuring the Inferno. At the same time, Dante hybridizes this systematology with the orders of a narration that characterize the hierarchy of peccata in the same way. What can be observed in Inferno concerning the relationship between history and ethical systematology also applies to Purgatorio regarding the relation between salvation history and ontological order.  I Corinthian 13,12.

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Nature into modalities of a purifying ascension to God. The perception of physical objects in Purgatory is therefore synonymous with insight into virtue, into right conduct on the way to salvation. Here, seeing always means intuition of the way towards salvation. In this way, sense perception in Purgatory indeed appears as a negation of all invidia, and as an overcoming of the blindness bound up with it. Intuition into the reality of Purgatory opens the eye absolutely for God’s truth. As it is outlined in the ontology of Purgatory, this sublation of the difference between truth and hermeneutics – and thus also between knowledge and the interpretation of reality – has further consequences. For the sensuous presence of the sensus moralis also makes possible the sublation of contradictions which cannot be resolved within the logical possibilities of this world. What one most commonly experiences, when interpreting the world as if it were the second book of Revelation, is the ambivalence of its signs. Our attempt to give an allegorical interpretation of the sun to which Virgil addresses his prayer could verify this ambivalence of signs as well. Symbolically, it oscillates between reason and God’s love. Indeed, one of theology’s most difficult tasks is the determination of an appropriate relation between these two fundamentally opposing categories for human action.¹⁵⁸ Their opposition is based on the fact that each of them represents a set piece of two ultimately incompatible concepts of ethics: the pagan ethics of reason which defines the intellect as the founding instance of virtue, and the new testamentary ethics of affect which declares love as the standard for all action. The sensible presence of moral inclination in the Book of Nature, on the other hand, eliminates the need for this decision between alternatives. It thereby unites that which, according to the theological postulate, belongs together, and which all rational explanation is still barely able to bring to synthesis. As brightness and warmth, forms of sense perception, intellect and love become different effects of the same light. That which is ultimately beyond rational mediation is disclosed by way of a synaesthetic experience in the world of pur See Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I-II, 24, 3 ad 1: “Ad primum ergo dicendum quod passiones animae dupliciter se possunt habere ad iudicium rationis. Uno modo, antecedenter. Et sic, cum obnubilent iudicium rationis ex quo dependet bonitas moralis actus, diminuunt actus bonitatem: laudabilius enim est quod ex iudicio rationis aliquis faciat opus caritatis, quam ex sola passione misericordiae.” A comparable coordination of ratio and caritas is made Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, II-II, 26,1 ad 3: “Ad tertium dicendum quod ordo pertinet ad rationem sicut ad ordinantem, sed ad vim appetitivam pertinet sicut ad ordinatam. Et hoc modo ordo in cariate ponitur.” A different coordination of the two categories is made, for example, in Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, II-II, 24,1 ad 2: “Et ideo per hoc quod caritas est in voluntate non est aliena a ratione. Tamen ratio non est regula caritatis, sicut humanarum virtutum: sed regulatur a Dei sapientia, et excedit regulam rationis humanae”.

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gation from all guilt. The place of purification is also a place where all opposites are reconciled. But this also involves a question, if not the fundamental question of all theological ethics: the question of the relation between the free will of man and the will of an almighty God. Virgil’s prayer, which eliminates all distinctions between the two powers, also provides an answer even for this rationally irresolvable question. When the material world can no longer be separated from its allegorical-moral significance, the difference between the will of man and divine guidance is, significantly enough, neutralized as well. But how does this mediation become successful? Even for this purpose, Dante does not recur to rational-discursive mediation. Instead, he employs a linguistic procedure. Once again, the etymological dimension of language becomes effective: that dimension, that is, which also underlies the correspondence of invidia and videre that unfolds in this canto. The semantics of the verb conducere (v. 17 f.: “tu ne conduci […] come condur si vuol”) offers an essential approach for solving the problem of human free will. For a closer examination, the double use of the same verb negates the opposition of divine guidance to human conduct. The first time Conducere means God’s guidance and, the second time, it means nothing but the conduct of man. This homonymy thus negates all difference between outside control and personal conduct. The logical problem of the will and its freedom is also settled by linguistic means. This time, it is not a homonymy but instead a grammatical form that serves this purpose: “come condur si vuol”. “Si vuol” – that is the form located half way between active and passive. In Greek grammar it is defined by the term ‘medium’. The characteristic effect of this grammatical mode consists in the sublation between agens and patiens; and barely anything else could settle the frightening question of human free will in the face of an almighty divine. Language itself now indicates that the opposition of personal will to divine law is only apparent. It is with the help of a certain theological grammar that Dante, from out of the significations of linguistic signs, develops a solution to the theological controversy. That which cannot be logically mediated according to the standards of this world, reveals itself, in the reality of Purgatory, to be a pseudo-problem. While the introduction of Virgil’s prayer makes intelligible the peculiarities of Purgatory’s reality, the end demonstrates the capital difference of that reality from this world: the difference through which all of the calamity of this world arises. Once again, the method of semantic variation plays a decisive role. For this difference is articulated by a barely noticeable change in the meaning of words that have already been used. In order to follow up on this latent transformation of meaning, it is first necessary to clarify the meaning of the two final verses of the prayer to the sunlight: “s’altra ragione in contrario non ponta,/

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esser dien sempre li tuoi raggi duci”. The explanation of these lines, which can be found in most typical commentaries, runs as follows: ‘If no other motifs speak against it, your rays always have to remain the guide.’ At closer glance, however, such an interpretation is sacrilegious. Indeed, it presupposes that there might be some reason that would justify opposition to the light of God, and thus also to his guidance. Since God’s guidance does not allow exceptions, this assumption is irreconcilable with the foundations of Christian belief. Everything, therefore, depends on the interpretation of the verb dien in the last verse. The usual interpretation of this line reads an obligation, or an “ought”, into it. But precisely this reading generates the heretical effect outlined above, because, in this case, the conditional sentence implies an unacceptable limitation. Yet, if one reads dien as a description of an actual given, or of an inevitable necessity, this effect can be avoided: ‘Because God’s light shines above the earth, we cannot imagine other than that his rays lead men. Unless an other (false) reason compels men to do otherwise.’ Here, as in so many other cases, it is worth consulting contemporary commentators on the Commedia. Lana’s explanation, which sets a standard for subsequent commentaries, contains the following remark regarding the verses of Virgil’s sun prayer that are here under consideration: “Qui invoca l’aiutorio di Dio soggiugnendo: se contrarietà di cognoscibilità non ne impaccia, sempre lo inteletto li governa per la sua grazia.”¹⁵⁹ Lana’s interpretation avoids all heresy. The restriction of the conditional sentence defines no legitimate exception, aside ultimately from a disturbance in the natural order. Yet, this disturbance has its foundation primarily in sin, since sin itself is perceived as an error.¹⁶⁰ What obstructs the universal effectiveness of God’s guidance is therefore nothing other than the sinful desire of men.¹⁶¹

 Similarly worded explanations can be found, for example, in L’Ottimo Commento 1333 and Anonimo Fiorentino 1400.  See the decisive definition in Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I-II,74, 5 c: “Habet autem ratio duplicem actum : unum quidem secundum se, in comparatione ad proprium obiectum, quod est cognoscere aliquod verum; alius autem actus rationis est inquantum est directiva aliarum virium. Utroque igitur modo contingit esse peccatum in ratione. Et primo quidem, in quantum errat in cognitione veri: quod quidem tunc imputatur ei ad peccatum, quando habet ignorantiam vel errorem circa id quod potest et debet scire. Secundo, quando inordinatos actus inferiorium virium vel imperat, vel etiam post deliberationem non coercet.” Proof of the pertinence of this rationalistic psychology of sin for the Commedia is the systematology of peccata in Inferno, which is basically oriented around the Nicomachean Ethics.  The passage in question of Benevenuto’s comment that holds the darkness of sin accountable for the failure of God’s light to be effective is explained exactly in this sense: “Sicut enim sol sensibilis semper illuminat mundum, et tamen interdum nubes vel nebula eripit nobis conspec-

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In order to obtain a better understanding of this passage, it is also necessary to consider the above mentioned, but to an extent unnoticed, transformation in the meaning of the words here employed. The light of the sun, which at the beginning of Virgil’s sun prayer is meant in a literal sense, becomes metaphorical at the end. The initially actual light inevitably becomes figurative, because at stake is no longer exclusively the momentary situation of the wayfarers on the second terrace of Purgatory, but rather the effect of the sunlight in general, i. e., the validity of God’s guidance (“esser dien sempre li tuoi raggi duci”). Consequently, it can compete with the altra ragione only under this condition. For this world, the rays of the sun that guide the wayfarers through Purgatory signify the still merely metaphorical light that governs men’s actions. Basically, these verses also indicate a cause of sin. When the perceptible material world is no longer identical with its moral sense, and when therefore the truth loses its evidence, error becomes a possibility. When perception is replaced by rational calculation, action becomes potentially sinful. The linguistic process of metaphorization that takes place in these verses thus represents the transition from the evidence of the spiritual to its merely symbolic presence. At the same time, it once again marks the ontological difference which separates the world of Purgatory from this world. It also decisively marks the status occupied by everything immaterial in this world. Now, even human reason appears as a merely metaphorical, and thus highly unstable, reflection of that light which, in its immediate presence, shines for those in Purgatory who are already on the way to heavenly paradise, and who can thus be certain of their salvation.

II While the first station in the sequence of events narrated in Canto XIII, Purgatorio, was dedicated to an account of how the orders of the liber naturae are transformed in Purgatory, the second station is dedicated to that other book: the first book of Revelation, the book of Scripture.

II.1 After walking for roughly a mile, Dante and Virgil encounter flying angels who preach the Gospel. The narrator attributes the speed with which the two wayfar-

tum eius; ita lux divinae gratiae semper illuminat nos, nisi tenebra peccati privet nos illa” (Benevenuto 1380).

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ers proceed to their will. The will, as a factor of speed, becomes synonymous with the pace of their reconciliation with God. Moral sense again becomes materially perceptible. Physical phenomena are identical with moral ones, and this too follows logically from the specific ontology of Purgatorio. At the same time, the benign effects of trust in the sun – that is, in God’s guidance – become clear. Angels appear and invite them to the Lord’s table, and in this way point out the way to paradise as a confirmation that they are on the right path. The encounter with God’s messengers who preach the Gospel also brings Scripture to the center of interest, where the liber naturae had previously been. This shift from the Book of Nature to the Book of Books therefore implies a shift of senses. It is not any longer the sense of sight, but the sense of hearing which occupies the center of Dante’s attention: Quanto di qua per un migliaio si conta, tanto di là eravam noi già iti, con poco tempo, per la voglia pronta; e verso noi volar furon sentiti, non però visti, spiriti parlando a la mensa d’amor cortesi inviti. (Purgatorio XIII, 22– 27)

The narrator obviously attaches great importance to the fact that the wayfarers can hear, but not see, the flying spirits that invite them to the Table of Love. Although this is not mentioned in commentaries on the Commedia, the proper significance of this explicit distinction between the different forms of perception becomes comprehensible only through an intertextual reference that is inscribed in these lines. Flying angels can be found only once in the Holy Scripture, namely in John’s Apocalypse. Of particular relevance for our context is that we also encounter a flying angel who preaches the Gospel: et vidi alterum angelum volantem per medium caelum habentem evangelium aeternum ut evangelizaret sedentibus super terram et super omnem gentem¹⁶²

Shortly after, John discovers an angel who invites him to the Heavenly Meal: et vidi unum angelum stantem in sole et clamavit voce magna dicens omnibus avibus quae volabant per medium caeli venite en congregamini ad cenam magnam Dei¹⁶³

 Apocalypse of John 14,6.  Apocalypse of John 19,17.

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This scene, quoted from Canto XIII, Purgatorio, synthesizes the two visions from John’s Apocalypse. In Dante, both the flying angel who brings the Gospel and the standing angel who invites to the heavenly supper are transformed into flying angels whose invitation to the Table of Love is extended both to the penitents gathered in the second terrace of the mountain of Purgatory, and also to the two wayfarers. That the angels in Dante can be only explicitly heard, but not seen, is determined by the negative reference to the text of the Apocalypse. Unlike in the eschatological moment, the immediate intuition of divine reality remains concealed for the penitents. Even though the voices of the invisible angels can be perceived, a deeper sense is inscribed in the difference between hearing and seeing, the different forms of perception. In this way, hearing the words of Revelation foreshadows the intuition of transcendent reality. Essential for such a figural relation between the two forms of perception is, above all, another moment of the scenery described by Dante. The reader of the Commedia knows that circling angels play an important role in a different, more prominent place. It is they who set the spheres of paradise in motion. The angels circling around the mountain of Purgatory appear as a figura of those scholastic angels, or more precisely the intelligenze motrici, that move the heavens of paradise by reading God’s will from his mind.¹⁶⁴ In this girone of the envious, Dante thereby brings about a fascinating synthesis of scholastic cosmology and the theory of the Bible. It is well known that, in the Middle Ages, the mortal authors of the Scripture are only considered to be writing clerks to whom God has dictated his own words. Here in the purgatorium, they are replaced by angels, those beings that, according to the scholastic cosmology largely adopted by Dante, read God’s mind and in this way move the universe. One consequence is that the book of Revelation turns into the immediate physical presence of a permanent prophesy. Once it was the angel of the Lord who brought God’s Word to the mother of the redeemer, in order to make possible the incarnation of God’s son. In the world in which the effects of the incarnation of the word are fulfilled through the remission of sins, the preaching of the Gospel through God’s messengers becomes a permanent institution, an immediately present and sensuously perceptible reality.¹⁶⁵ At the same time, the book of Revelation

 Dante uses this formulation in Convivio III,6, 5. In Beatrice’s description of the order of heaven in Paradiso II,112– 148, the angels, who move the heavens, are called beati motor: “Lo moto e la virtù d’i santi giri,/come dal fabbro l’arte del Martello,/da’ beati motor convien che spiri;” (Paradiso II,127– 129). Closer to the concept in Convivio is the phrasing in Paradiso VIII,109 f.: “li ’ntelletti/che muovon queste stelle”.  At the same time, the angels’ announcement of the exempla virtutis is part of a representational order (of these exempla) that structures the whole Purgatorio, and can here be only sketch-

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becomes a figural element of the cosmic motion of the heavens. It is, so to speak, integrated in the cosmic order of the universe and is made an integral part of it. The Gospel of Love preached in the Scripture and the love that moves heaven, “l’amor che move il sole e le altre stelle,”¹⁶⁶ as it says in the last verse of the Commedia, are tied together. The work of redemption that is guaranteed in the Bible and the work of creation are of one and the same origin. Salvation history, which informs us about the redemption of men through which God’s love becomes effective, therefore also enters into relation with the order of the universe. This fig-

ed out. With the ascent of the mountain of Purgatory, which accords with the hierarchy of the seven deadly sins, the penitents participate increasingly in this order of representation. As we saw in the chapter “Art in the Afterlife or God as Scupltor”, beginning with pride, the most reprehensible of all sins, exempla are carved out of stone, and the series starts with the originary scene of redemption. The first exemplum thus presents the announcement through the angel Gabriel. These images, which God himself carved out of stone, and which by far surpass the other creations, acquire their true value through their effect on the viewer. For in this image, the word of the angel seems to become perceptible, and this impression is nothing but a form by which the mystery of incarnation itself is presented. It signifies the manifestation of God’s Word in the material world, and the transcendence of visible reality through the entry of the Verbum Dei. The ontological effects of the incarnation of God’s Son determine the forms of appearance in Purgatory. Part of the logic of the exempla of the order realized in Purgatorio is that, in the next circle (namely the one which belongs to the envious), the word announced through the voices of the angels becomes immediately perceptible and, as such, audible. With this ascent within the hierarchy of the deadly sins, the presence of Divine Revelation grows continuously. The progress of the series, therefore, takes place through the increasing participation of the penitents in the exempla, which they will ultimately announce themselves in order to participate the immediate presence of the Verbum Dei. In this way, the series of exempla virtutis also realizes the effects of the entry of God’s Word into the world, which had been the content of the first exemplum of the scene of annunciation. The exempla virtutis therefore seem to be more than a mere representation of the word of Revelation. Instead, the changing form of their presentation combines representation with a progressive integration of the penitents within this word. In this way, the representation of the Gospel of Redemption simultaneously becomes the mode in which the salvation gained back by the sinners in Purgatory is realized. The series of exempla, with its changing pragmatics of presentation, includes a whole theology of God’s Word. The Verbum Dei distinguishes itself from the mere “word” precisely because it cannot merely be grasped as a sign. Representation here is always more than mere semiotics. It is at work in the presence of that which it defines. Or, to use a dichotomy that takes up the current debate about the status of all signs, the Verbum Dei sublates the opposition between presence and absence. Christ, as the Word of the Father, includes his living presence in this world; the incarnation of the word brings salvation to the world. At the same time, God’s other Word, the Word of his revelation in Scripture, guarantees the presence ot the narrated work of salvation. For this reason as well, the connection between incarnation and the exegesis of Scripture is thematized in the continuation of Canto XIII, Purgatorio.  Paradiso XXXIII,132.

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ural synthesis of God’s Gospel of Salvation and the cosmic order can be conceived as a continuation of the transformation of traditional orders thus far observed in Canto XIII. Not only do the traces of salvation history in the conventional metaphysical order become legible, but also, and at the same time – in, so to say, an inverted movement – the preaching of the Gospel of Salvation is integrated in the cosmological order. That is why the angels, who tell the story of the redemption of man and therefore of the restitution of the world fallen with him, refer to the motion of heavens which keep God’s work of creation going. It is no accident that the synthesis of cosmos and history takes place at a point which is itself located halfway between history and the orders of creation. Only the Fall of angels and men has made necessary its institution.¹⁶⁷ This intermediary position already makes plausible the particularity of its ontology, an ontology in which physical and moral reality become indiscernible from each other. It also explains the symbolic connection made on the mountain of Purgatory between the preaching of the Gospel and the cosmological order of Heaven. There where future salvation is certain, where the glory of heavenly paradise is reliably promised, in that place the preaching of God’s Gospel of Salvation consequently and coherently becomes a figura of this paradisal order. The act of listening to God’s Gospel, as it comes through the mouths of invisible heavenly messengers, becomes the figura of heavenly reality. The act of hearing points to the future seeing. This figural relation between two forms of sense perception represents a deeply Christian interpretation of that hierarchical order which is defined according to the scheme of the five senses, and which has its origins in pagan philosophy.¹⁶⁸ The static metaphysical order of philosophy,

 Dante, as is well known, made an immediate connection between the origin of the mountain of Purgatory and Lucifer’s Fall. As narrated at the end of Inferno, this mountain is made of the same soil that stems from the crater of Hell produced by Satan’s Fall (see Inferno XXXIV,121– 126). These physical and causal relations also encode the Divine Plan of Salvation. According to this relation of cause and effect, the project of redemption is of the same origin as Lucifer’s Fall. Therefore, Dante’s account of the mountain of Purgatory’s genesis represents a continuation of the traditional theological conviction that no evil, no rebellion against the will of the Creator, is able to damage the integrity of His creation. This argument above all makes it possible to justify the punishment of sinners. If any offence represents a disturbance of the order, it will be corrected through a complementary change that will repair the initial disturbance. But Dante refers this argument for the correction of the damaged work of creation to the origin of the history of redemption. The plan to restore fallen man is as old as the Fall of Satan, even if deliverance from his guilt could begin only after Golgotha and Easter Morning. In order to restore the integrity of the original creation, the rebellion of angels as well as of mankind is thus corrected in a two-fold manner. Punishment and redemption prevent this integrity from being damaged.  see note 155.

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which assigns a respective ontological rank to different sense perceptions, is invaded by the dimension of time. Ontological difference turns into a figure of promise. This change of traditional orders through the integration of patterns of salvation history also continues the transformation of traditional ontology that we have so far observed in Purgatorio.

II.2 The figural analogy between the book of Revelation and the cosmic order is continued in an exegetic theory developed in the subsequent verses. This hermeneutic theory also reflects the consequences of the incarnation of Christ, and articulates its effects on the significance of scriptural writing. In this context, one should first of all note the formula with which the narrator characterizes the exempla virtutis that are presented by the angels, as he names these examples of virtue inviti alla mensa d’amor. A significant double sense is inscribed in this expression. To begin with, it can be grasped as a symbolic representation of love for the neighbor. To put it rhetorically, it appears as a permixta aperta allegoria, and symbolizes the effects of caritas with the picture of company at a table. The invitations to the Table of Love imply yet something else. They can also be understood as invitations to a heavenly paradise that, in the Commedia itself, is defined as a meal.¹⁶⁹ This double sense of the formula of inviti a la mensa d’amor clarifies the status of God’s Word in the world of Purgatory. For it indicates the presence of an immediate connection between the sensus moralis and the sensus anagogicus of the Scripture.¹⁷⁰ Insight gained in the moral sense of the Bible, which is synonymous with acquisition of the virtue it defines,

 At the beginning of Canto XXIV, Beatrice explicitly defines the Blessed whom she introduces to the earthly wayfarer sodalizio eletto a la gran cena del benedetto Agnello, and in verse 5 of this canto she also speaks about vostra mensa: “‘O sodalizio eletto a la gran cena/del benedetto Agnello, il qual vi ciba/sì, che la vostra voglia è sempre piena,/se per grazia di Dio questi preliba/di quel che cade de la vostra mensa,/prima che morte tempo li prescriba,/ponete mente a l’affezione immensa/e roratelo alquanto: voi bevete/sempre del fonte onde vien quel ch’ ei pensa’.” (Paradiso XXIV,1– 9). For her, the evangelical narration of the Wedding of Cana reveals in yet a different sense the meaning of invito a la mensa d’amor.  For this context as well, Dante could reach back to traditional theological thought. In an allegorical interpretation of the effects of the virtutes theologales Bernard of Clairvaux understood the mensa caritatis as an anticipation of the joys of the Heavenly Meal: “Fercula praeparantur filiabus regis domus suae, et mensae ponuntur congruae. In mensa quippe Fidei panis ponitur doloris, et aqua angustiae, et caetera poenitentiae fercula. In mensa Spei panis confortans, et oleum exhilarans faciem, et caetera consolationis fercula. In mensa Charitatis panis vitae, vinumque laetificans, et omnes deliciae paradisi” (Bernardus Claraevallensis, Parabolae, 5,6).

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provides a reliable guide for he who is purged and who, in the scriptural sense, has insight into heavenly paradise. Dante more thoroughly develops the exegetic order defined by the formula inviti a la mensa d’amor through the three exempla caritatis. These exempla are given by the angels circling around the mount of Purgatory: La prima voce che passò volando “Vinum non habent” altamente disse, e dietro a noi l’andò reïterando. E prima che del tutto non si udisse per allungarsi, un’altra “I’ sono Oreste” passò gridando, e anco non s’affisse. “Oh!”, diss’ io, “padre, che voci son queste?” E com’ io domandai, ecco la terza dicendo: “Amate da cui male aveste”. (Purgatorio XIII, 28 – 36)

There is no doubt about the origin of these three exempla. The commentaries unanimously identify them as quotes from the Gospel’s narration of the Wedding of Cana,¹⁷¹ from Cicero’s De amicitia,¹⁷² and as a citation from the central phrase in the New Testament that constitutes the moral core of Christ’s appeal to his followers to love their enemies.¹⁷³ Yet, the account of these sources only insufficiently contributes to the interpretation of these examples. As the figure beneath whose wings the angels have put the formula inviti a la mensa d’amor, caritas is clearly related both to the ancient example, which is about the spirit of sacrifice of one friend for the other, and to the law of love for the enemy. Yet, the link between caritas and Mary’s words to her son, Vinum non habent, is not immediately plausible. In addition, the quoted exempla appear to be decidedly disparate. The interpretation of these exempla therefore has to pay particular attention to  In II John 3 we read Mary’s sentence “Vinum non habent”, with which she explains to her initially reluctant son that the hosts have run out of wine.  Dante probably became acquainted with the story of Pylades and Orestes, whose relationship was considered by the ancients to be an example of perfect friendship, through Cicero’s Laelius de amicitia (Cicero, Laelius de amicitia, VII, 24; see also Cicero, De finibus, V, 2; Ovidius, Epistulae ex Ponto, III, 2,69 f.). The quoted sentence “Ego sum Orestes” refers to a certain event within the story there narrated. The two friends go to Tauris in order to steal the statue of Artemis, but their project is discovered. They are presented to Thoas, who demands Orestes’ death. Since the king does not know Orestes, Pylades pretends to be Orestes in order to save his friend’s life.  See Matthew 5,43 – 45: “43 audistis quia dictum est diliges proximum tuum et odio habebis inimicum tuum 44 ego autem dico vobis diligite inimicos vestros benefacite his qui oderunt vos et orate pro persequentibus et calumniantibus vos 45 ut sitis filii Patris vestri qui in caelis est qui solem suum oriri facit super bonos et malos”.

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the question of its context. Ultimately striking – not least of all in the comparison between different collections of exempla in the cantos of Purgatorio – is the particular brevity of the examples presented by the angels. Moreover, this striking brevity produces a variety of effects. In the end, the sentence containing the core message of the New Covenant, diligite inimicos vestros, requires no further explanation. But this is not true for the other two sentences, which seem to call for vast commentary. Still, the dissimilar facets, the apparent disparity and the singular brevity of the sentences above cited all belong to an exegetic theory developed within them, one which unites the hermeneutics of the Scripture with the ethics of caritas. As always, the series of exempla virtutis opens with an example from the life of Mary, as it is she who addresses the sentence Vinum non habent to her son. This sequence itself mirrors a theological program, given that the Blessed Virgin is the first human being in whom the work of redemption takes place. From this it is already clear, as is also the case elsewhere in Purgatorio, that a meaning related to salvation history is inscribed in the series of three exempla. But the question still arises as to what connects the sentence cited from the story of Jesus’ first appearance in public with the central christian virtue of love emphasized by the angels as crucial to their message in their inviti a la mensa d’amor. This virtue, which is central to the angel’s message, represents both the counter-concept and the corrective for all envy. This connection can be made more precise with assistance from previous exegesis of the relevant Bible passage. Bernard of Clairvaux, for example, interprets Mary’s utterance as an expression of her benevolent and compassionate character.¹⁷⁴ The connection between the story of the Wedding of Cana and the notion of caritas is also given through the biblical-exegetic interpretation of wine as a sign of love for the neighbor.¹⁷⁵ Yet, the allegorical potential of this story from the New Testament,

 See Bernardus Claraevallensis, Dominica prima post octauam epiphaniae, sermo 1, 2: “Deficiente vino, dixit Mater Iesu ad eum: Vinum non habent. Compassa est enim eorum verecundiae, sicut misericors, sicut benignissima. Quid de fonte pietatis procederet, nisi pietas?”  See Bernardus Claraevallensis, Dominica prima post octauam epiphaniae, sermo 2,4: “Hic ergo nonnumquam vinum deficit, gratia scilicet devotionis et fervor caritatis. Quoties mihi necesse est, fratres, post lacrimosas querimonias vestras, exorare Matrem misericordiae, ut suggerat suo benignissimo Filio quoniam vinum non habeatis?”; Gedefridus Admontensis, Homiliae dominicales, 126: “Vinum non habent. Possumus per vinum aut fervorem amoris, aut gratiam devotionis, quae ex cognitione Dei surgunt in homine, non inconvenienter accipere.” Even when there is no explicit reference to the Wedding of Cana, wine is considered to be a symbol of charity. Hermannus de Runa, Sermones festiuales, 29: “Caritas enim similis est uino. Vinum namque eos, quos inebriauerit, reddit hilares, audaces, fortes, obliuiosos et quodammodo insensibiles. Sic caritas mundando conscientiam mentem exhilarat, deinde audacem reddit, quando per con-

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which is cited together with Mary’s sentence, is not limited to the symbolic representation of caritas in the form of wine. Rather, the series of three exempla caritatis seems to achieve its real characteristic through the fact that the conversion of water into wine at the Wedding of Cana is simultaneously considered a symbol of reading the Scripture. Such a metonymic reference within the text of the Commedia itself makes apparent an exegetic dimension within the words cited from the Bible. After the narrator has announced the exempla spoken by the angels as inviti a la mensa d’amor, the first example continues the isotopy of the banquet. This metonymic reference between the characterization of the scriptural words and their literal sense draws attention to the question of how the message of love ascribed to them by the narrator’s introductory characterization is related to their literal meaning. Relevant in this context is the exegesis of Christ’s first miracle, which sees the opposition between the letter and the spirit of the Scripture to be encoded in the conversion of water into wine.¹⁷⁶ According to the relevant interpretations, the incarnation also plays a decisive role in this context. The appearance of God’s Son in the world brings to light precisely that concealed sense of the Bible that had been inscribed in the Book of Books at all times, but that had always remained in the dark. As the cited interpretations verify, the reading of the miracle of the Wedding of Cana does not refer merely to the opposition between the letter and the spirit of the Scripture, or between its literal and its allegorical sense. The conversion of water into wine also refers to the two parts of the Bible: the Old and the New

scientiae munditiam fiduciam praestat, deinde uires auget”; Isaac de l’Étoile, Sermons, 44,12: “Caritas enim sicut vinum miscetur, maxime ubi Sapientia mensam ponit, vinum miscet et ad convivium parvulos vocat. Sola namque invitatur ad convivium Sapientiae, ubi panis est veritas et vinum est caritas.”  Beda Venerabilis, Homeliarum euangelii libri, II,1,14: “Sed quantum inter aquam et uinum distare inter sensum illum quo scripturae ante aduentum saluatoris intellegebantur et eum quem ueniens ipse reuelauit apostolis eorum que discipulis perpetuo sequendum reliquit. […] Videamus ergo, fratres sex hydrias scripturarum aqua salutari repletas uideamus eandem aquam in suauissimum uini odorem gustum que conuersam.” Heiricus Autissiodorensis, Homiliae per circulum anni I, pars hiemalis, 20: “Sed dominus aquam in uinum conuertit, quia litterali intellectu euacuato legem spiritualiter intelleganda esse monstrauit, cum superficiem litterae legalis euangelica doctrina mutauit; nam quantum inter aquam et uinum distat, tantum inter carnalem et spiritualem scripturarum intellegentiam discrepat.” Eusebius Gallicanus, Collectio homiliarum, 5, linea 46: “Operante ergo christo in cana galilaeae, uinum deficit, et uinum fit, id est: […] umbra remouetur, ueritas repraesentatur; carnalia spiritalibus comparantur; in nouum testamentum, obseruatio uetustatis transfertur, sicut beatus apostolus dicit: vetera transierunt et ecce facta sunt noua.”

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Testament.¹⁷⁷ Indeed, the relation between the two is comparable to the relation between the different sensus of the Scripture. In the same way that the sensus litteralis functions as a sign for the deeper sense of the Bible, the book of the Old Covenant can be interpreted as figura, as a foreshadowing of the redeemer. This opposition between the Old and the New Testament which is symbolized in water and wine also concerns the ethics of love embodied in the exempla caritatis. The Old Covenant already knew the law of love of the neighbor, but the redeemer was to radicalize this law and make it the law of love of the enemy. According to the exegesis of this Gospel, this difference is also inscribed in the text on the Wedding of Cana. While the law of the Old Testament is embodied in the good wine that the hosts run out of at the end of the banquet, the better wine created by Christ through miracle of the transformation of the water represents the law of love of the New Covenant.¹⁷⁸ Precisely this principle of love offers the key to the proper understanding of God’s Word. As stated in Augustine’s De doctrina christiana, the programmatic treaty on medieval exegesis of the Bible, the authentic sense of Revelation – the meaning beyond the sense of the letter – becomes accessible only through Christ’s deed of redemption and through the regnum caritatis erected along with it.¹⁷⁹ From this perspective, the series of the three exempla acquires the plausibility that it had initially lacked; and this change to transparency from their initial opacity simultaneously corresponds to the hermeneutic program represented in the respective verses. The sequence of the three inviti a la mensa d’amor also specifies the way in which this message of love ought to be derived from the text of Revelation. For the principle of love, which delivers the key to the true sense of God’s Word, is formulated as the last of these three exempla. This initially confusing series of three sentences, which

 See also Beda Venerabilis, In Cantica canticorum libri VI, 1,1, linea 67: “Quantum uino legis uinum praecelleret suum mystice in euangelio significat ubi deficiente in nuptiis ecclesiae typicis uino uetere nouum ipse de aqua fecit uinum maiore prorsus laude dignissimum.”  See for example Eusebius Gallicanus, Collectio homiliarum, 5: “Vino ergo deficiente, uinum aliud ministratur: bonum quidem uinum est ueteris testamenti, sed noui melius. Vetus testamentum, quod iudaei obseruant, uanescit in littera; nouum, quod ad nos pertinet, saporem uitae reddit in gratia. Bonum uinum, id est bonum praeceptum, est legis, quando audis: diliges proximum tuum et odio habebis inimicum tuum; sed melius et fortius uinum est euangelii, quando audis: ego autem dico uobis: diligite inimicos uestros et benefacite his qui oderunt uos.”  See Augustinus, De doctrina christiana, 3,15: “seruabitur ergo in locutionibus figuratis regula huiusmodi, ut tam diu uersetur diligenti consideratione quod legitur, donec ad regnum caritatis interpretatio perducator.” Only he who is able to derive this very sense from it can claim to have understood the Scripture truly (ibidem, 1, 36): “quisquis igitur scripturas diuinas uel quamlibet earum partem intellexisse sibi uidetur, ita ut eo intellectu non aedificet istam geminam caritatem dei et proximi, nondum intellexit”.

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seems to lack any kind of coherence, is retrospectively clarified. Christ’s law of love for the enemy provides the purpose and the foundation both for all the behavior appropriate for a Christian, and for the message of the Gospel itself as well. This, therefore, is the principle to be found by reading the Scripture, and it is the sense that one has to derive from it.¹⁸⁰ If the exegesis of the Gospel’s narration of the Wedding of Cana derived from it a program for reading the Scripture, the sequence of three exempla caritatis translates this program into practice by revealing Christ’s Gospel of Love as the core of the Scripture’s message. It should be noted, however, that, compared to the wording in the New Testament, the formulation of the law not to deprive even the enemy of one’s love has been partially altered. In lieu of “diligite inimicos vestros”, the wording is now: “Amate da cui male aveste”. This transformation again aims quite precisely at the place where the wayfarers are located. For it makes sense if we relate it back to envy and to its theologically precise definition: “Invidia autem de eo [bono proximi] tristatur”. Lamenting the good of others leads one to wish them evil, and, in the end, seduces one to do evil things to them. Nothing makes this clearer than the series of exempla invidiae in the subsequent canto, which start with the memory of Cain’s assassination of his brother Abel.¹⁸¹ The change of wording in Christ’s law “diligite inimicos vestros” thus shows envy to be in true opposition to that principle which Christ brought into the world through his deed of redemption. “Lo monte che salendo altrui dismala” – this is how the mountain of Purgatory is named in the third verse of Canto XIII. The mountain itself, as well as the sinners liberated upon it, appears as an immediate effect of love for the enemy: of that love given by the redeemer through his sacrifice in order to save those who have turned away from God. In this way, the deed of redemption itself is placed in the foreground and, consequently, it too finds its place in the exempla caritatis. But we have not yet considered the second example. As I mentioned above, Dante probably took the narrative of Pylades, who is willing to sacrifice his life for his friend Orestes, from Cicero’s De amicitia. Indeed, these two had already been considered as a typical example for the perfect friendship in medieval writing before Dante, and this perfection must have seemed particularly surprising when one considers that, for the pagans, such virtue was thought to be something rather

 These three exempla also realize the principle that any hidden meaning of the Scripture has to be explicitly formulated in a different place. See Augustinus, De doctrina christiana, 2,6: “magnifice igitur et salubriter spiritus sanctus ita scripturas sanctas modificauit, ut locis apertioribus fami occurreret, obscurioribus autem fastidi detergeret. nihil enim fere de illis obscuritatibus eruitur, quod non planissime dictum alibi reperiatur”.  See Purgatorio XIV,133.

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unlikely to exist.¹⁸² Pylades and Orestes can therefore be seen as a paradigm of the spirit of sacrifice, which is also described by Christ as the true touchstone of all friendship: “maiorem hac dilectionem nemo habet ut animam suam quis ponat pro amicis suis”.¹⁸³ In John’s Gospel, the words in question intriguingly constitute a part of Jesus’ final speeches, the words addressed to his disciples during the last supper. This context provides real significance to the Cicero quotation inserted between the memories of the Wedding of Cana and the formulation of the law of love for the enemy. Retrospectively, the conversion of water into wine recalled in the first of the exempla also foreshadows the institution of the altar sacrament during which Christ’s sacrificial death symbolically takes place. At the same time, Pylades’ willingness to die for Orestes appears to be a figura of redemptive death. As is so typical for the Commedia, the series of these three exempla thus brings pagan literature within the horizon of salvation by providing a figural interpretation. The other series of exempla in the Purgatorio also proceed in the very same manner. Meanwhile, the sequence of the three exempla presented by the angels indicates where exactly the crucial difference between the figura and its implementum has to be located. A passage that turns out to be helpful in this regard is from Isaac of Stella’s Sermones. The mythical scene, which is also quoted by Dante, gives rise to the following thought: Impii eramus, et propterea inimici, de salute nil tractantes, nil sperantes; et gratis venit, inopinatos que praevenit, qui vere prior dilexit nos Christus, et pro impiis mortuus est. Hoc est quod admirans Apostolus, ait: Ut quid Christus pro impiis mortuus est, cum pro iusto nemo velit mori? Nam pro bono id est pro amico, et commodo sibi, forsitan quis audeat mori, ut de Pylade et Oreste, legitur; sed nos inimici eramus, sicut sequitur, reconciliati sumus Deo per mortem Filii ejus, multo magis nunc, etc.¹⁸⁴

With the example of Pylades’ spirit of sacrifice, Isaac of Stella shows precisely the difference that distinguishes the law of love for the friend, already existing sub lege, from the Christian outbidding of this law. With love for the enemy,

 See for example the often quoted tract on friendship by Aelredus Rieuallensis, De spiritali amicitia, 1, 159: “nec mirum si inter ethnicos uerae uirtutis rari fuerunt sectatores, qui uirtutum largitorem et dominum nesciebant, de quo scriptum est: dominus uirtutum ipse est rex gloriae. in cuius profecto fide non dico tria uel quatuor, sed mille tibi proferam paria amicorum; qui quod illi de pylade et oreste pro magno miraculo dicunt uel fingunt, parati erant pro inuicem mori.”  John 15,13.  Isaac de l’Étoile, Sermons, 5,1. Paul’s passage, quoted incompletely by Isaac, has to be supplemented as follows: “si enim cum inimici essemus reconciliati sumus Deo per mortem Filii eius multo magis reconciliati salvi erimus in vita ipsius” (Romans 5,10).

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one risks dying for affection, even if it is affection for the adversary. Behind Isaac’s words, then, we have to see both the context, and the content, of the passage cited from Paul. In comparison with the extraordinary character of Christ’s death on the cross, even Pylades’ already highly unusual sacrifice for Orestes, a righteous person, pales into insignificance. For God’s son dies for the sake of sinners, and thus even for the sake of his enemies. For this reason, the redemptive grace emanating from his self-sacrifice revolutionizes the world.¹⁸⁵ In this way, the sequence of the three exempla caritatis basically unfolds a double series. It combines a theory of Scripture with an interpretation of the story of salvation, both of which find their aim as well as their ground in the law of love for the enemy. It is this same Gospel of Love that has given the Word of God its deepest sense and made possible the salvation of man. The scene where angels circle around the mount of Purgatory integrates Scripture with scholastic cosmology. In the exempla caritatis, the exegetic order of the words of Revelation is assigned to the order of universal salvation history. In both cases, love is identified as the foundation of the world. In that place where the power of redemptive work becomes obvious like no other, the different forms of divine Revelation are con-

 Romans 5, 5 – 9: “5 spes autem non confundit quia caritas Dei diffusa est in cordibus nostris per Spiritum Sanctum qui datus est nobis 6 ut quid enim Christus cum adhuc infirmi essemus secundum tempus pro impiis mortuus est 7 vix enim pro iusto quis moritur nam pro bono forsitan quis et audeat mori 8 commendat autem suam caritatem Deus in nos quoniam cum adhuc peccatores essemus 9 Christus pro nobis mortuus est multo igitur magis iustificati nunc in sanguine ipsius salvo erimus ab ira per ipsum”. Faithful to the word of minimus Apostolorum, theologians have considered the essence of the event in Golgotha to be a surpassal of that willingness for sacrifice that is expressed in the death for the friend. See Augustinus, Sermones ad populum, Classis III, 215, “ecce ergo in christo maiorem inuenimus charitatem, qui animam suam non pro amicis, sed pro suis tradidit inimicis.” Chromatius explicitly thematizes this moment in which the Old Law is surpassed by the New Law: “Vnde uult dominus communem legem dilectionis humanae lege dilectionis euangelicae superare; ut non solum circa eos qui nos diligunt, sed etiam circa inimicos et odientes amoris nostri ostendamus affectum, ut uerae pietatis ab bonitatis paternae in hoc imitemur exemplum.” (Chromatius Aquileiensis, Tractatus LIX in evangelium Matthaei, 26, linea 46). Certainly this interpretation also raises the question of how it relates to Christ’s farewell addresses in John’s Gospel, since immediately before his own death the redeemer had defined the supreme proof of love to be death for the friend. But this apparent contradiction in the exegesis can also be eliminated. See, for example, the argument of Gregory the Great, who, with a merchant-like logic, is able to resolve the alleged aporia: “Mori etiam pro inimicis dominus uenerat, et tamen positurum se animam pro amicis dicebat, ut profecto nobis ostenderet quia dum diligendo lucrum facere de inimicis possumus, etiam ipsi amici sunt qui persequuntur” (Gregorius Magnus, Homiliae XL in euanglia, libri duo, homilia 27, 2).

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densed into one Gospel of Love. It is that love which brought redemption into the world in order to liberate it from the claws of invidia. We have already noticed the striking brevity that characterizes the exempla caritatis. This characteristic is also a part of the exegetic program developed in the words of the angels. The varying effects of these quoted words are essential for an understanding of the deeper sense of their brevitas. While the last of the three invitations to the Table of the Lord do not require further commentary, this is not the case for the other two. The hermeneutic structure of the three exempla also reflects a widely spread conviction within the exegetic tradition: that the various degrees of explicitness in a text can be explained according to the orders of salvation history. It is, once again, a passage from Paul’s epistle to the Romans which has been revolutionary for such an understanding of the detail in the Gospel of Revelation. He considers the fulfillment of Scripture that begins with incarnation to be the reduction of God’s Word to its core.¹⁸⁶ The theological commentary on Paul’s word has identified that core itself, and once again discovered within it Christ’s law of love.¹⁸⁷ The exempla delivered by the angels therefore present the exegetic principle itself. They guide the penitents to a Gospel that requires no other explanation besides itself, and whose evidence simultaneously makes accessible the meaning of further Scripture. Just as the effects of Christ’s deed of salvation born out of his boundless love are permanently fulfilled in Purgatory, this text regains its readability by sublating knowledge about redemption, and by therefore becoming accessible up only to the just Redemption: it also means the exegesis of the Scripture in praxi. Redemption makes present the sense of the Scripture that become a present reality of this world with Jesus’ deed of salvation.

II.3 As outlined above, the second station of the “story” told in Canto XIII, Purgatorio, is dedicated above all to the sense of hearing. While the previously discussed

 Romans 9, 28: “verbum enim consummans et brevians in aequitate quia verbum breviatum faciet Dominus super terram”.  Regarding the passage in question from the epistle to the Romans, Augustine says: “quod est ergo uerbum consummans et breuians? diliges dominum deum tuum ex toto corde tuo, et ex tota anima tua, et ex tota mente tua; et diliges proximum tuum tamquam te ipsum” (Augustinus, De doctrina christiana, III, 3). We find a corresponding formulation in his De spiritu et littera 36,64. See also Hieronymus, Commentariorum In Isaim Prophetam 4,10: “abbreuiatus autem atque perfectus sermo euangelicus est, qui pro cunctis laciniosæ legis cæremoniis, dedit præceptum breuissimum dilectionis et fidei, ut quod nobis fieri noluerimus, ne fecerimus alteri.”

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verses focused on the hermeneutics of Revelation – on the significance of prophetic words – the following verses emphasize the sound of these words. The text of the Commedia announced the words spoken by the angels as inviti alla mensa d’amor, as invitations to the Table of Love. Clearly, this formulation defines the perspective of the narrator who has long possessed insight and who, from memory, introduces the prophesy of the angels in an exegetically adequate manner. The text itself, however, continues by presenting us with a hapless traveler of the hereafter who is unable to interpret the heavenly voices, and who must therefore once again ask his mentor Virgil for help. Even before the last of the three exempla, Dante had asked Virgil for information, and thus already revealed his own lack of understanding: “‘Oh!’ diss’ io, ‘padre, che voci son queste?’” As in other instances, Virgil grants his pupil’s request willingly and promptly: E ’l buon maestro: “Questo cinghio sferza la colpa de la invidia, e però sono tratte d’amor le corde de la ferza Lo fren vuol esser del contrario suono; credo che l’udirai, per mio avviso, prima che giunghi al passo del perdono”. (Purgatorio XIII, 37– 42)

If we were still able to reconstruct an exegetic theory of Scripture by analyzing the words of the angels, Virgil answers Dante’s question with words that are highly enigmatic. Indeed, he combines two different symbolic models in a manner which, at first glance, appears rather daring. The relevant commentaries refer to the first model, which presents the canonical allegorical representation of sin in the form of a wild horse.¹⁸⁸ For this reason, the penance of the sinners who sojourn here appear as a whip that is supposed to stop the raging animal. Dante’s text focuses primarily on the acoustic effect of the whip. This focus on sound leads to the second of the allegories. For the whip is described as a string, which brings into play the idea of a harp. By speaking of the contrario suono, Dante also seems to refer very precisely to the medieval theory of music. Musical

 As an evidence for this interpretation, which was already widely accepted in patristic literature, see Ambrosius, Expositio psalmi CXVIII, littera 10, cap. 11: “Uiuacis animae uigor, sensus rationis et intellectus capax atque iudicii, ut digna domus tanto habitatore uideatur, non amittat suae praerogatiuam naturae, ne hominis nomen amittat. scriptura enim eum hominem dicit, qui est ad imaginem et similitudinem dei, peccantem autem non hominem, sed aut serpentem aut equum adhinnientem feminis aut uulpiculam aut iumentum uocare consueuit. nolite fieri sicut equus et mulus, quibus non est intellectus; in freno et camo maxillas eorum constringe qui ad te non adpropinquant”.

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harmony, for example, is considered to be the effect of two tones that are in opposition to each other.¹⁸⁹ Dante was also able to call upon traditional ideas for his identification of the remission of sins with musical harmony.¹⁹⁰ But the traditional argument is adapted to an equation of the whip with a musical instrument, which is at first quite surprising. The reference to love as both the original cause of punishment and of music helps to explain this initially confusing combination: “e però sono tratte d’amor le corde de la ferza.” Because it has been brought about by God’s love, the noise of castigation sounds melodious. Here, the deeper sense of the daring connection between these two allegories is revealed. What this unusual construction expresses on the rhetorical level is nothing other than the theological premise of purgation itself, which according to a logical point of view, is inevitably based on a contradiction. Only God’s inconceivable love is able to turn the punishment earned for injustice committed into a path to salvation. The institution of Purgatory itself, which is beyond all rationality, is made linguistically manifest through an ostentatious hybridization of apparently incompatible allegories. It is once again a linguistic process that is held accountable for the representation of God’s truth, a truth that cannot be grasped with any kind of logic. At the same time, this allegory of the remission of sins assigns a purgative function to Scripture itself. God’s Gospel, in both the words of the Scripture and those of the pagan tradition integrated within it, it becomes music. Together with the voices of the angels, these words enact that music that patristic exegesis of the Bible had already interpreted as the Book of Forgiveness. ¹⁹¹ Still, what there was merely an allegorical sign, here becomes a materially perceptible reality on the mountain of Purgatory. There is yet another respect in which the reference to the contrario suono points towards the medieval theory of music. The formulation alluding to the castigation of the sinners also implies that their behavior can be seen as music. Indeed, the theory of music of the time provides support for such an interpretation. Boethius’ De Musica, a text which determined the medieval conception of music like no other, conceives of music produced by voices and instruments as merely the third, and basically least important, form of (music’s) appearance. Musica mundana is accorded the first rank, because it is primarily

 See for example Boethius, De institutione musica, 1,8: “Consonantia est acuti soni grauisque mixtura, suauiter uniformiterque auribus accidens.”  See for example Ambrosius, De Iacob et uita beata, lib. 2, cap. 9, par. 39: “qui cantus dulcior qui sonus suauior quam remissio peccatorum et resurrectio mortuorum?”  Ambrose, Expositio psalmi CXVIII, littera 7, cap. 26: “ideo que canticum dicitur domini testamentum, quia remissionem omnium peccatorum domini que iustitias in scripturis euangelii suaui mentis exulatione concinimus.”

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expressed in the music of the spheres that Boethius, in accordance with the Pythagorean doctrine, firmly holds on to. The second position is assigned to musica humana, where even human life is conceived as musical sound.¹⁹² Cicero already perceives virtuous behavior, in analogy to music, as perfect harmony: as that which, like a good piece of music, harmonizes all single parts to a perfect whole.¹⁹³ Christian thought has taken this analogy even further. The virtuous life now appears as song that the believer presents to the Creator in order to offer him praise.¹⁹⁴ The harmony disturbed by the life of the envious is therefore restored by means of a castigation that springs out of love, and that thus reestablishes harmony by means of the contrario suono. Dante initially seems unable to perceive the sound of love, i. e., the harmony produced by the words of the angels. Virgil promises him that there will be change in the near future: “credo che l’udirai per mio avviso.”¹⁹⁵ This well-calculated formulation once again combines hearing with seeing, the two senses whose relationship with one another forms one of the leading themes of this canto. Because it gives in-sight and makes the truth audible, Av-viso is what Virgil names the explanation that he gives to Dante. At the same time, Virgil’s announcement draws attention to the previously elaborated understanding of God’s Word that underlies these verses, an understanding of the Bible formulated by Christ himself. The following well-known exhortation of Jesus Christ can be found in several places in the New Testament: “Who hath ears to hear, let

 See Boethius, De institutione musica, 1, 2: “Principio igitur de musica disserenti, illud interim dicendum uidetur, quot musicae genera ab eius studiosis comprehensa esse nouerimus. Sunt autem tria. Et prima quidem mundana est; secunda uero humana; tertia quae in quibusdam constituta est instrumentis, ut in cithara uel in tibiis, caeterisque quae cantinlenae famulantur. […] Humanam uero musicam quisquis in sese ipsum descendit, intelligit. Quid est enim quod illam incorpoream rationis uiuacitatem copori misceat, nisi quaedam coaptatio, et ueluti grauium leuiumque uocum, quasi unam consonantiam efficiens, temperatio?”  See Cicero, De officiis, 1,40,145.  See for example Augustinus, Enarrationes in Psalmos I – L, psalmus 32, enarratio 2, sermo 1; Cassiodorus, Expositio psalmorum LXXI – CL, psalmus 91.  Essential for the interpretation of these verses is the definition of the grammatical object of l’udirai. Mattalia’s detailed commentary describes this object as follows: “l’esempio, gridato, che fa da ‘freno’.” (see Mattalia 1975, 237). This explanation is contradicted by the fact that the singular of merely one Exemplum would not make any sense; there is no reason to limit this text to just the angel’s last sentence. On the contrary, Virgil uses the plural corde when he speaks about the whip with which the penitents are castigated. There is another respect in which Mattalia’s explanation makes no sense: Dante has obviously already perceived the words of the angels. Hearing the contrario suono, as I shall explain further, can thus mean only the proper understanding of this exempla. It signifies the knowledge of caritas, which opposes envy and becomes audible in the voices of the angels.

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him hear.”¹⁹⁶ Significantly enough, the biblical context of this line is a discussion about the proper understanding of parables; it is therefore of immediate exegetic relevance for the interpretation of Scripture. Naturally, the true hearing of God’s Word is generally related to the spiritual ear which alone is able to grasp sense properly.¹⁹⁷ Listening, which is conceived of as right understanding, again marks the origin of all Christian truth. It stems from God’s Word and can be obtained only through the ear.¹⁹⁸ This truth is a result of the divine Gospel; hearing properly, therefore, always also means listening to God.¹⁹⁹ For the moment, Dante is still one of those who do not have the right ear to hear. But Virgil knows that this will soon change, and that shortly his “protégé, prima che giunghi al passo del perdono”, will perceive the truth announced in the angel’s voices. The deeper sense of this message can now already be grasped from the tone of their voices. The Gospel of Love encoded in the deeper sense of Scripture, which opens itself up both to the believer and to the purged, enables God’s Word to become the musical tone of love in the voices of the angels. Here the true sense of the Scripture, and the sound of the words that announce it, merge into the one Gospel of God’s Love. If, in the Book of Nature, we were able to see how the visual perception of physical things on the mountain of Purgatory could no longer be separated from  “qui habet aures audiendi audiat”: Matthew 13,9; Marcus 4,9; 7,16; Luke 14, 35. Even more explicit is the corresponding passage in John’s Apocalypse: “qui habet aurem audiat quid Spiritus dicat” (see Apocalypse of John 2,7; 2,11; 2, 29; 3,6; 3,13).  See Ambrosius, Explanatio psalmorum XII, psalmus 48, cap. 4: “qui habet aures audiendi audiat. illas aures dicit interioris hominis spiritales”.  The continuous use of acoustic terms for the allegorical sense of the Scripture can be explained according to this. See for example Augustine’s comment on the story of Emmaus: Augustinus, In Iohannis epistulam ad Parthos tractatus, tract. 2: “Quidquid illarum Scripturarum est, Christum sonat ; sed si aures inueniat. Et aperuit eis sensum, ut intelligerent Scripturas. Unde et nobis hoc orandum est, ut ipse sensum nostrum aperiat.” See also Augustinus, Sermones. De Scripturis, sermo 17,5: “Sic et modo Judæis sonat vox Christi per vocem Scripturarum veterum: vocem earum audiunt, faciem sonantis non vident.” The passage cited from Augustine’s Sermones once again gives significant evidence of a Christian interpretation of seeing and hearing in the manner adopted by Dante for this canto. Hearing seems to be an anticipation of seeing. What Dante mentions with respect to the difference between the penitents in Purgatory and the promised perception of God’s immediacy in Paradise is, in Augustine, referred to the relation between the time before incarnation – which is limited to the hearing of the Word – and the time after incarnation in which the living presence of the Word can be seen. To this extent, Augustine’s differentiation between seeing and hearing also has a christological dimension. The vision of God is reserved for the time of the incarnation of the Word.  Augustine unmistakably exploits the affinity of words, which also exists in Latin, in order to define right hearing as listening to God, in order to reveal listening as obedience: “non omnes habebant aures audiendi, hoc est, obediendi.” (Augustinus, Sermones. De Scripturis, sermo 17, caput 1,1).

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the perception of the deeper meaning inscribed in them, here we can see something comparable regarding the words of Scripture. For the comprehending listener, the tone produced by the angels with the sound of their voices already reveals its true sense. While Virgil’s initially enigmatic characterization of the angel’s words could be explained through the medieval theory of music, the scene now under consideration implicitly includes a reference to the third genre of music referred to by Boethius: the music of the spheres. This tacit reference becomes particularly clear through the analogy made in this canto between the cosmological order of creation and the first book of Revelation. While the angels who circle around the mountain of Purgatory correspond to the intelligenze motrici of Paradise, the sound of their Gospel points to the music of the spheres in Paradiso. Immediately after his entry into Paradise, Dante begins to hear this music, and the narrator immediately ascribes its existence to the effect of God’s love.²⁰⁰ This music thus always has the same origin. If the motion of the heavenly bodies generates music, then it is the origin of this motion, namely God’s love, that is expressed in the music of the spheres. In the same way, the Gospel of Love – which, for those who understand it, is inscribed in the profounder sense of Revelation – transforms God’s Word into music.²⁰¹

III Listening to God’s Gospel is not limited to an anticipation of the future contemplation of God’s glory, but also has effects on the wayfarer’s perception of his immediate environment. For it is only now, after having heard the angel’s words, that Dante begins to see people: to see the envious of this circle that are gathered here: Allora più che prima li occhi apersi; guarda’mi innanzi, e vidi ombre con manti al color de la pietra non diversi. (Purgatorio XIII,46 – 48)

More than ever, Dante opens his eyes and begins to recognize things that he had not noticed before. These verses contain an implicit explanation for Dante’s ini-

 See Paradiso I,73 – 84.  Regarding Dante’s defense of the theory of music of the spheres in the Commedia against scholastic criticism, and also regarding the further development of this theory, see my work in progress: A. Kablitz, Himmelswahrnehmungen. Dantes Begegnung mit dem Paradies.

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tial blindness to the figures of the penitents. The color of their coats, namely, cannot be distinguished from that of the rocks. He thus begins only now to recognize forms, and therefore to go beyond the perception of color. As I will have to substantiate further, this change goes back to the scholastic analysis of perception. Meanwhile, we can see how Dante derives a method of purgation from this scholastic theory. Once again, all natural orders are transformed on the mountain of Purgatory, in order to integrate completely the physical world into the purificatory program that is Purgatory’s raison d’être. For this transformation of the philosophy of nature into an ethical model, the deeper significance of the pale blue color (attributed to the stone as well as to the coats), is also of a certain relevance. This color makes legible Dante’s combination of the scholastic theory of nature with the hermeneutics of the Book of Nature. Through this combination, he employs the penitent person’s perception in order to develop a counter-model to the envious person’s blindness. The reader has already heard about the rock’s color earlier in this canto. Already in the ninth verse, we read about the “livido color de la petraia”. As noted in all of the commentaries, the pale blue of the rock stands for envy, a term for which the noun livore itself is synonymous.²⁰² What Dante now perceives can be explained through the significance of this color: “ombre con manti al color de la pietra non diversi.” In the silhouettes of these figures, he first recognizes that sinners are guilty of envy. Initially, he had not even noticed them at all. As the text progresses, however, even this impression of the gathered sinners proves to be inadequate. All of a sudden, he hears the figures pray. They sing the Litany of the Saints, and, all at once, his visual impression changes: E poi che fummo un poco più avanti, udia gridar: “Maria, òra per noi”; gridar “Michele” e “Pietro” e “Tutti santi”. Non credo che per terra vada ancoi

 The place to which the envious sojourn itself turns into a representation of their offence. This thought cannot be further developed here. Meanwhile it would be interesting to further analyze the concept of space that is involved in this symbolic arrangement. In his impressive interpretation of the works of Fra Angelico, Didi-Huberman refers to the Aristotelian-scholastic conception of space which is essentially different from any modern idea. Here, space is not conceived of as something that is external to the figures that appear in it, but as a principle of their generation (see Didi-Huberman 1995, p. 34). It would be worthwhile to analyze the construction of Dante’s Commedia from the perspective of this spatial concept. It seems as if the Aristotelian principle had gone through a specifically Christian transformation, in which the relation between space and that what it embraces is seen to be primarily symbolic.

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omo sì duro, che non fosse punto per compassion di quel ch’i’ vidi poi; ché, quando fui si presso di lor giunto, che li atti lor a me venivan certi, per li occhi fui di grave dolor munto. Di vil ciliccio mi parean coperti, e l’un sofferia l’altro con la spalla, e tutti da la ripa eran sofferti. (Purgatorio XIII,48 – 60)

After hearing their prayer, Dante recognizes the envious as repenting sinners who lovingly support each other. Even the stone, which bore the color of envy, suddenly appears as a support for those who are about to stumble. This is another obvious illustration of the mountain of Purgatory’s effect, of which the following was said at the beginning of the canto: “lo monte che salendo altrui dismala”. The sinner’s prayer corresponds to the angel’s message and, in both cases, hearing makes possible a perception of things that until then could not have been seen. This forms yet another too significant component of the order of perception that is designed in Canto XIII of the Purgatorio. The sense of hearing once again takes over the task of providing guidance towards the proper mode of seeing. This gesture is much like that in which we were able to understand the Revelation of God through the Word, as the preparation for the future intuition of his glory.²⁰³ Dante’s suddenly altered perception of his environment also provides insight into the previously mentioned transformation of scholastic theory of perception into an ethical model of purification. Essential for this transformation is the progressive transition from the recognition of colors to the recognition of figures. As I pointed out, Dante at first sees primarily one color, which actually causes him to ignore people. The similarity in shade of color makes it difficult to distinguish people from rocks. This description of his perception corresponds very precisely to the first level of a process of seeing defined by scholastic philosophy in terms of a transition from visual perception of a thing to knowledge of it: to its perception, that is, through the intellect. The theory of sense perception developed above all in Quaestiones 77 to 84 of the first part of Thomas Aquinas’ Summa theologiae describes this process as follows: Et per hunc etiam modum forma sensibilis alio modo est in re quae est extra animam, et alio modo in sensu, qui suscipit formas sensibilium absque materia, sicut colorem auri sine auro. Et similiter intellectus species corporum, quae sunt materiales et mobiles, recipit

 The same, by the way, applies to the function of music of the spheres. It draws Dante’s attention to the circling motions of the spheres. See Paradiso I,76 – 78.

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immaterialiter et immobiliter, secundum modum suum: nam receptum est in recipiente per modum recipientis.²⁰⁴

Human sense perceives not an external material thing, but a forma sensibilis without the matter itself. For the visual sense, the forma sensibilium is primarily color.²⁰⁵ In a second step, the intellect transforms the formae sensibilium into species corporum, and this is done by means of the phantasmata which are made through abstraction of the formae sensibilium. ²⁰⁶ This is how the breakthrough from merely external perception to intrinsic cognition takes place. Dante’s description of his own perception of the repenting sinners (the envious), follows these two stages as well. In the beginning there is the forma sensibilium, the perception of color, and at first only gradually do different figures stand out against this general impression.²⁰⁷ The coats of persons stand out against the stones. But then the wayfarer comes to recognize the species corporis, the nature of the fabric. He recognizes cilicio, horsehair, or to be more precise, camelhair.²⁰⁸ The commentaries on the Commedia point out mainly the material qualities of this fabric. As a prick-

 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I, 84,1 co.  Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I,1,7 c: “Proprie autem illud assignatur obiectum alicuius potentiae vel habitus, sub cuius ratione omnia referuntur ad potentiam vel habitum: sicut homo et lapis referuntur ad visum inquantum sunt colorata, unde coloratum est proprium obiectum visus.”  Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I, 84,6 co: “Intellectum vero posuit Aristoteles habere operationem absque communicatione corporis. Nihil autem corporeum imprimere potest in rem incorpoream. Et ideo ad causandam intellectualem operationem, secundum Aristotelem, non sufficit sola impressio sensibilium corporum, sed requiritur aliquid nobilius, quia agens est honorabilius patiente, ut ipse dicit. Non tamen ita quod intellectualis operatio causetur in nobis ex sola impressione aliquarum rerum superiorum, ut Plato posuit: sed illud superius et nobilius agens quod vocat intellectum agentem, de quo iam supra diximus, facit phantasmata a sensibus accepta intelligibilia in actu, per modum abstractionis cuiusdam”.  Dante also describes such processes of perception, which start with an impression of a color, in other places of the Commedia. A famous example is given at the entrance of Purgatorio. After leaving the horror of Hell and seeing daylight again, the wayfarer at first does not notice anything but blue color: “Dolce color d’orïental zaffiro/che s’accoglieva nel sereno aspetto/del mezzo, puro infino al primo giro,/a li occhi miei ricominciò diletto,/tosto ch’io usci’ fuor de l’aura morta/che m’avea contristati li occhi e ’l petto.” (Purgatorio I,13 – 18). Insofar that seeing, that starts anew for the refugee from Hell, begins with the most basic visual perception.  See for example Eusebius Gallicanus. Regarding John the Baptist he says: “ille pilis camelorum id est cilicio uestitus incessit, se saluator quodammodo pilis camelorum se induit quando in se deformitatis nostrae foeda atque distorta peccata suscepit, incuruum graui onere exonerans mundum et in se transferens humanorum pondera delictorum” (Eusebius Gallicanus, Collectio homiliarum, 30).

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ling fabric it is suitable for penance. There is also, once again, a biblical reference behind this material. In patristic literature, cilicium is known as a fabric worn by the penitents.²⁰⁹ This goes back to an episode from the book Paralipomenon of the Old Testament. As the Lord punishes David by sending the pest upon his people, he wears a dress made of camelhair as a sign of his penance.²¹⁰ In this way, the shift in Dante’s perception from forma sensibilium to species corporis is accompanied by a correction that concerns not only his own moral status, but also the moral status of the penitents seen by him. The merely external, and therefore superficial, impression that he gains of the envious is superseded by the recognition of their penance and, in that moment, perception becomes pity. Significant in this regard is the inversion of the function of the eyes, which, so to say, is staged grammatically: “per li occhi fui di grave dolor munto”. External reality no longer enters the interior of man through the eyes. Instead, tears of pity exit from the eyes, visible for everybody. In this way, Dante also transforms the scholastic theory of perception of the physical. In lieu of being the organ of perception, the eyes turn into a physical instrument for expressing pity. True cognition, therefore, means loving devotion to the neighbor. This is the true form of seeing, a videre that equals the negation of all invidia. The true insight into the essence of things, as well as of man, is owed to caritas. The emphasis on this hierarchy between the cognition of physical things and the ethical disposition of misericordia is also orchestrated by the text. Before describing what he is perceiving in detail, the narrator tells the reader about the pity that is overcoming him, even though the reader is not yet able to gather

 Hieronymus, Tractatus LIX in librum psalmorum, psalmus 140: “qui enim uestitur cilicium, debet lugere sua peccata, non gloriari et ostender hominibus”; Cyprianus Carthagenensis, De lapsis, 35, linea 666 – 679: “Vos uero, fratres, quorum timor in deum pronus est et in ruina licet animus constitutus mali sui memor est, paenitentes ac dolentes peccata uestra perspicite […] orare oportet inpensius et rogare; diem luctu transigere, uigiliis noctes ac fletibus ducere, tempus omne lacrimosis lamentationibus occupare; stratos solo adhaerere cineri, in cilicio et sordibus uolutari; post indumentum christi perditum, nullum iam uelle uestitum, post diaboli cibum malle ieiunium; iustis operibus incumbere quibus peccata purgantur, elemosynis frequenter insistere quibus a morte animae liberantur”.  I Paralipomenon 21,14– 16: “14 misit ergo Dominus pestilentiam in Israhel et ceciderunt de Israhel septuaginta milia virorum 15 misit quoque angelum in Hierusalem ut percuteret eam cumque percuteretur vidit Dominus est misertus est super magnitudinem mali et imperavit angelo qui percutiebat sufficit iam cesset manus tua porro angelus Domini stabat iuxta aream Ornan Iebusei 16 levansque David oculos suos vidit angelum Domini stantem inter terram et caelum et evaginatum gladium in manu eius et versum contra Hierusalem et ceciderunt tam ipse quam maiores natu vestiti ciliciis et proni in terram”.

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the reason for this. Praying the Litany of the Saints thereby acquires a higher meaning, as its immediate effect is even more clearly presented in the form of devotion to the penitents. This sequence of verses also makes clear that loving devotion to the neighbour has priority above the reasons for such devotion. It is misericordia, therefore, that generates the wayfarer’s purgation. It leads to a rejection of the incomplete impression that had initially prevented Dante from seeing more than merely the traces of sin. Misericordia, then, “opened his eyes” in a double sense. With this transformation of scholastic epistemology into an ethical program, Dante’s own purification takes place: the purification of his eyes which, in the near future, are meant to see heaven.²¹¹ As Augustine had already ascertained: “diligendo proximum purgas oculum ad uidendum deum.”²¹² Yet, what remains  Pietro Alighieri’s concluding comment is again relevant here, especially regarding this anagogical dimension of the purification of Dante’s eyes: “Per quae omnia figura caecitatis potest aperta esse et manifesta. Ad quam exclamat Psalmista dicens: obscurentur oculi eorum ne videant, et dorsum eorum semper incurva. Unde in decretis dicitur: caecus est qui supernae contemplationis lumen ignorat, et qui praesentis vitae tenebris pressus, venturam lucem non conspicit. Et Mathaei 13.o dicitur: et videntes, videbitis, et non videbitis” (Aleghieri 1340).  Augustinus, In Iohannis euangelium tractatus, 17, 8. In this context it is not irrelevant that in De doctrina christiana Augustine provides a very similar description of the appropriate way to insight in the true sense of the Scripture. He outlines the transition from the fifth to the sixth stage of the lecture of Scripture as a way of purgation: “in quinto gradu, hoc est in consilio misericordiae, purgat animam tumultuantem quodammodo atque obstrepentem sibi de appetitu inferiorum conceptis sordibus. hic uero se in dilectione proximi nauiter exercet in ea que perficitur. et spe iam plenus atque integer uiribus, cum peruenerit usque ad inimici dilectionem, ascendit in sextum gradum, ubi iam ipsum oculum purgat, quo uideri deus potest, quantum potest ab eis, qui huic saeculo moriuntur, quantum possunt” (Augustinus, De doctrina christiana, II, 7). Here, too, reading Scripture aims at the purification of eyes. To this extent, Dante transfers what the exegetical tradition had determined for the use of God’s Word into the physical world of Purgatorio. In this way, exegesis of the Scripture and the perception of the natural world are fundamentally synthesized on the mountain of Purgatory. In the scenery of Canto XIII, Purgatorio, this is already expressed by the way in which the scriptural words spoken by the angels participate in the purification of the wayfarers. Also, this synthesis, which assigns equal importance to both Scripture and the physical world, makes particular sense in the intermediary region of Purgatory, which serves no other purpose than that also served by the Bible. Both lead to insight into the true God, which, consequently transforms the perception of Purgatory’s physical reality into moral insight. In this way, the significant difference that, in this world, separates the two books of Revelation from each other, seems to be sublated. Their difference lies essentially in how explicit they are. For the primary, literal sense of the Holy Scripture, which is always conceived of as sensus historicus, already speaks about the story of salvation. To this extent, it is always already beyond present physical reality. In Purgatory, meanwhile, this difference is repealed, and the hermeneutics of the scriptural Word coincides with the perception of same effects in physical reality.

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a mere exhortation for him, a leading principle of action, is fulfilled in the reality of Purgatory. What is symbolic for the Church Father, becomes material reality on the mountain of Purgatory. As we were able to see throughout the analysis of this canto, this transformation of an allegorical model into an actual event also mirrors the specific ontology of Purgatory: an ontology to which the transformation of the orders of perception into an ethical dispositive also corresponds. In that place in which redemption continuously takes place through the deliverance of fallen man from his guilt, the condition of this salvation turns into an ontological structure. If the corporeality of this place represents the immediate presence of the event of salvation, then the consequences of incarnation – of the entry of transcendence into the corporeality of our world – have become a living reality. Unlike in the Book of Nature of this world, material things no longer refer only symbolically to a higher reality. Rather, in the corporeality of a world where salvation is certain, the ascent of the sinner to heavenly paradise actually takes place and, consequently, the perception of physical things is also transformed into a moral disposition.²¹³ The deeper sense of the Book of Nature first became accessible to man only through the incarnation of Christ and his victory over death and sin. But on the mountain of Purgatory, where the Fall of the world is undone, intelligible sense turns into material reality.

 This integration of the consequences of incarnation into the ancient ontological model is accompanied by a reversal of the hierarchy between metaphysics and ethics. In pagan philosophy, reason, which is also the guiding principle of ethical virtue, has a position of ontological priority, and derives its rank from the hierarchy of metaphysics. The superiority of the intelligible over the material will remain a determinant notion in ethics. But the New Testament has questioned this fundamental priority of reason. Important in this regard is the passage from Paul’s epistle to the Philippians 4,7: “et pax Dei quae exsuperat omnem sensum custodiat corda vestra”. (That the word sensus means nothing other than reason itself has been clarified by later exegesis. See for example Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, XXII, 29: “pax Dei, quae, sicut ait Apostolus, superat omnem intellectum”.) It is not reason, but God’s love, which is the foundation of this world and which, defining the highest value in Christian thought, sets the standard for action. Here, therefore, it is not an ontological, but an ethical principle that occupies first rank. The ontological consequences of this prioritization of ethics can be seen in Augustine. In Augustinus, De doctrina christiana, I, 32, linea 3 f. we find an interesting formulation: “quia enim bonus est [sc. Deus] sumus, et in quantum sumus, boni sumus. porro quia etiam iustus est, non inpune mali sumus, et in quantum mali sumus, in tantum etiam minus sumus.” Existence itself, therefore, is made dependent on the question of moral integrity. Dante has taken up deeply Christian reflections regarding the relation of ethics and ontology. His Purgatorio, however, radicalizes the integration of Christian forms of thought within ancient metaphysics. The ontology of Purgatory intervenes in the structure of the metaphysical order itself providing dignity to the inferior sphere of materiality – the place where redemption itself appears – by means of the incarnation of the word.

Temporality and Eternity in Dante’s Purgatorio The Valley of the Princes at the Foot of Mount Purgatory (Purg. VII – VIII) The mountain of Purgatory is the place in Dante’s Commedia where more than anywhere else time and eternity are shown in relation to each other. This statement of course primarily applies to the constitutive difference between Hell and Purgatory, and concerns the time limitation on the punishments that must be endured in the afterlife for sins committed in the mortal world. The end of the punishment gives it a higher purpose for the castigation of the sinner is also his purification from guilt. The fixed periods of punishment smooth the path towards the eternal bliss of contemplating God. However, on closer observation this combination of time and eternity merely proves to be the core of a range of questions revolving around the relationship between the two categories, and which are very systematically addressed in Dante’s Purgatorio. As we shall demonstrate in what follows, it is especially in the foothills of Mount Purgatory that Dante explores various facets of this relationship. For in the Purgatorio it is not only temporality that makes its presence felt in the eternity of the afterlife. The intrinsically paradoxical interplay of these two in fact mutually exclusive categories – combined here solely due to the process of redemption which is itself above logic – at the same time has symmetrical parallels in the temporality of the mortal world. The scenario of the so-called Antepurgatory is devoted to such complementary effects. For this ante-chamber to redemption becomes a figuration of time in the redeemed world. It literally makes tangible the semantics of a temporality, which itself already contains within it implications of eternity. It is perhaps correct to say that in no other surroundings is Dante so very much the poet of the earthly world.²¹⁴

 This sentence has unmistakable overtones of Auerbach’s renowned study, Dante als Dichter der irdischen Welt (Auerbach 1929). That Auerbach’s interpretation, which largely concentrates on the Inferno, does not entirely hold good for the Purgatorio has convincingly been pointed out by Stierle 1988, p. 273, note 7. The implicit differences between Auerbach’s reading and the interpretation proposed in what follows cannot be discussed in detail here. Auerbach understands “the final eschatological fate” of his individual figures as the “most extreme intensification of their individual, historic being” (Auerbach 1929, p. 108, translation by F. E.). Consequently, for Auerbach the whole Commedia is a representation of the temporal world, which frees this world from all that is merely coincidental. Thus he replaces the ethical connection, highlighted as the basis of the link between this world and the next, with an ontological one. In his interpretation the pilgrimage through the afterlife is reduced to a journey through a persistently https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110637106-006

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The first of those many questions concerns the relationship between the purifying punishment and the lifetime of those who have gone astray; for in Dante’s construction of Purgatory it is very soon apparent that the purifying castigation itself will not provide the whole answer to this question. The source of the problem is closely connected to the conditions which permit access to the mountain of Purgatory in the first place. For it is the sinner’s own insight – his appeal to the God that he had turned away from by his sinful behaviour, and whose forgiveness he can elicit by repenting – that preserves him from the eternal torment of Hell. So it is not the quality of the sins committed that distinguish the occupants of the Inferno from those in Purgatory. Souls guilty of many of the deadly sins – accidia, ira, avaritia, gula and luxuria – are found in both realms. Rather more surprising in a comparison of the systematics of Hell and Purgatory is that the most vicious and specifically Christian mortal sins, primarily superbia, do not have a place in Dante’s Inferno. And it goes without saying that the question as to the discrepancies between the distribution of sins in the two realms of the afterworld is one of the most troublesome issues in the exegesis of Dante’s work. So it is not the nature, nor in fact the gravity of the transgression that raises the hope of redemption despite one’s evident guilt; it is rather ultimate insight into one’s guilt that opens up the path to salvation. This in turn lends weight to the precise moment in one’s life when that insight occurred. But the time spent in sin in this world cannot be expunged by a punishment that is determined by the quality of the sin. For the limited duration of this punishment, which

earthly world, whose contingent-historic reality is presented in substantive form. The difference between this world and the next is thus intentionally adjusted to fit the difference – identified in Hegel’s Aesthetics – between contingent reality and art: for Auerbach it is the constitutive features of this art that condition the representation of reality in the afterlife. For our part, in what follows here we will seek to establish a different relationship between historical reality and transcendental representation in Dante’s Commedia, in which the main difference concerns the ontological make-up of the earthly world. In view of the fact that we will describe the realm of the Antepurgatory as a transcendental representation of the mortal world, then, as will be demonstrated, this figuration of historical reality may be seen as a response to a theology of history which entrusts this history and its course with the task of representing a substantive order. The figuration of the earthly world in the next world thus becomes a remedy for the risks to salvation history that a substantiation of this world incurs. The transcendental representation of earthly reality does not render the substance visible, as in art, instead the figuration in the Commedia of the earthly world in the foothills of the mountain of Purgatory serves as a marker for the, in fact, final transcendental insignificance of all earthly deficits. This difference also means that in what follows the Commedia is seen as poetry of the earthly world, not because of the universal programme of its poetics, but because it becomes that at a particular point in the scenario of the afterlife: at the foot of the mountain of Purgatory, whose most fundamental function is to make it possible for the souls there to revise what they did on this earth.

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comes to an end with the beatific vision of God, is solely the outcome of the selfwilled end to a sinful existence, which already took place in this world with the sinner’s return to God. Thus temporality here means above all the possibility of revision, and the actual lifetime of the sinner is not taken into account in this purgation. That it nevertheless is not without significance in that mediation between time and eternity which takes place on Mount Purgatory, is seen first in the Antepurgatory at the point when the Pilgrim encounters the souls of those who are destined for purgatio but who have not yet earned the right to start the process. In the Antepurgatory, the waiting area for punishment, the combination of time and eternity sets in motion an almost mathematically precise calculation balancing lifetime and purgation. At the same time, however, the representation of earthly time in Purgatory is not restricted to the figuration of individual lifetimes. As an important factor in the salvation process, in the Antepurgatory we also see the orders that govern the divine work of salvation in time. Temporality is seen here above all as institutionality. And it is for this reason that the Pilgrim’s path through the Antepurgatory leads into the valletta dei principi, in which, as we shall see, the ranks of the negligent Princes symbolically mirror the fate of that institution, the monarchia temporalis, in which Dante – with his Monarchia – locates nothing less than the logic of salvation history.

I On his arrival in the Antepurgatory the Pilgrim initially encounters three groups of penitents. He meets the negligenti, those who only renounced sin in the moment of their death. In their case it is decreed that they must wait the length of their life on earth before their actual purgation can begin.²¹⁵ Then he meets a

 Speaking for all the other negligenti, the Florentine lute-maker Belacqua answers Dante’s question as to why he is sitting in this spot (Purgatorio IV,127– 132): “Ed elli: ‘O frate, andar in sù che porta?/ché non mi lascerebbe ire a’ martìri/l’angel di Dio che siede in su la porta./ Prima convien che tanto il ciel m’aggiri/di fuor da essa, quanto fece in vita,/per ch’io ’ndugiai al fine i buon sospiri’”. And of course it is scarcely by chance that it is an instrument maker who speaks on behalf of the Negligent. The choice of this occupation fits in fact very smoothly into the course of events in the Antepurgatory, and sustains that moral scepticism towards art that already became apparent with the arrival of the singer Casella on the Island of Purgatory. For in response to Dante’s request for an amoroso canto to lighten his progress, Casella starts to sing Dante’s canzone Amor che ne la mente mi ragiona. But Cato abruptly interrupts his singing, because it is only delaying the souls in their ascent towards salvation. At this early stage, we already see the structural connection between enjoyment of the arts and neglecting one’s

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throng of souls who died violently at the hands of others and similarly only turned to God when death was upon them.²¹⁶ For this group, still waiting for their purgation to begin, the text gives no definite indication of how long they must wait. However, it seems reasonable to assume that the same conditions will apply for them as for those who died a natural death. At the same time, the difference between this encounter and that with the other group of negligenti is that the souls who died a violent death insistently urge the Pilgrim to pray for intercession on their behalf once he has returned to Earth; for the prayers of the pious can shorten their time on Mount Purgatory. The fact that specifically in the case of these penitents express attention is paid to the possibility of prayer shortening the suffering of souls on Mount Purgatory, which is repeatedly referred to in the Purgatorio, is connected with the circumstances surrounding the change of heart of those who died at the hands of others. The text very noticeably links the two verbs “pentendo e perdonando” (Purgatorio V, 55). What therefore distinguishes these eleventh-hour repentants from the others is the immediate effect of their renunciation of sin. For they not only gain insight into their mis-spent lives, they also demonstrate their brand new godliness by forgiving their own murderers – an example of loving thy brother as thyself which does not by chance have the appearance of an imitatio Christi, recalling the forgiveness that the Redeemer of fallen humankind felt for his murderers even in the moment of His sacrifice for the world.²¹⁷ It naturally follows from this difference to the other negligenti that, in the case of the per forza morti, such emphasis is put on the chance of their suffering being shortened. Perhaps we see more clearly here than anywhere else an important foundation stone of the theology of forgiveness on which the Purgatorio as a whole rests. Divine caritas constitutes the pre-condition for redemption; but at the same time it also forms the basis of the community of redeemed souls united in neighbourly love, whose devotion can in turn thus also have a salvational effect for Him. In a sense the penitent victims of external violence are a figural representation of the connection between redemption and neighbourly love. As a sign of their change of heart they forgive their murderers, thereby following the example of Golgotha, which, as salvation history recounts, first paved the way for their redemption from sin. At the same

soul and its salvation, which is encountered again in the figure of the lute-maker Belacqua and which establishes a categorical connection between the arts and accidia (alias melancholy).  As the Pilgrim is hurrying on, one group amongst them cries out to him, describing their fate: “Noi fummo tutti già per forza morti,/e peccatori infino a l’ultima ora;/quivi lume del ciel ne fece accorti,/sì che, pentendo e perdonando, fora/di vita uscimmo a Dio pacificati,/ che del disio di sé veder n’accora.” (Purgatorio V,52– 57).  Luke 23, 34 :”Iesus autem dicebat/Pater dimitte illis non enim sciunt quid faciunt”.

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time, they also enter into the community of the redeemed who can accumulate acts of caritas and thereby compensate retrospectively for their earlier failure to act virtuously. The fact that the redeemed form a community also has specific implications with regard to time: as is generally the case in the organisation of Purgatory, it allows the possibility of retrospective action – because Purgatory itself is timeless, because it is outwith time. The scene describing the encounter with the murdered negligenti, however, also sets out – not least by its drama – the limitations of this united community of souls on the path to salvation. For it reveals how concern for one’s own salvation may be at odds with caring for one’s neighbour. While the souls of those waiting here, who have discovered a mortal man, beg him with almost panicstricken urgency to pray for them on Earth, Virgil is exhorting his ward to make haste. The wiser for Cato’s admonitions when he himself had succumbed to the lure of Casella’s singing, now he energetically encourages the Pilgrim not to be distracted from his path. He should only listen to the pleas of the negligenti as he continues on his way.²¹⁸ This is clearly a compromise, which has to suffice when one cannot in fact simultaneously take care of one’s salvation and that of others. The path to salvation does not allow for delay. Time there is always short because the eternal bliss of Paradise must not be put off, for this could only ever imply doubt in the value of the joy to be found there. But the Pilgrim’s unswerving progress towards the contemplation of God is in danger of being delayed by his concern for the souls he has met, and so the two demands have to be reconciled. But what this compromise reveals – which seems, like all compromises, a little suspect – is the limited efficacy of concern for one’s neighbour as grounds for salvation. As indispensable as it seems, according to the ethics of caritas, as a component in attaining eternal bliss, it has little weight on the path to salvation, because the demands of God the Redeemer cannot solely be met by a charitable response to one’s neighbour. For this neighbour also lives in time, and concern for him thus, by definition, is in a sense a distraction from eternity. So far we have not mentioned the third group of penitents, chronologically the first that the Pilgrim encounters in the Antepurgatory. This group is made up of those who were excommunicated on Earth. It has been decreed that they must stay in this place for 30 times the length of their godlessness. The Staufer son, Manfred, explains to the Pilgrim the situation of those who were excluded from God’s work of salvation on Earth but who have been spared eternal dam-

 Purgatorio V,43 – 45: “‘Questa gente che preme a noi è molta,/e vegnonti a pregar’, disse ’l poeta:/‘però pur va, e in andando ascolta.’”

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nation because, even if late in the day, they have come to God.²¹⁹ Thus Manfred is counted amongst those who repented their mis-spent lives in the very moment of their – violent – death.²²⁰ That he and those like him form a group of their own amongst those waiting in the Antepurgatory, in fact has a bearing on the answer to the question as to the effect in the afterlife of temporal decisions about eternity. At the same time this also touches on an aspect of the correlation of time and eternity, which is particularly of significance to Dante’s encounter with the last group waiting for their purgation to begin, namely the Princes in the valletta dei principi. For the mediation of temporality and eternity, not least, leads to various kinds of institutionalism. This naturally applies first and foremost to the institution of the Church. And it applies just as much to the forms of organisation of earthly power, even if the connection is less apparent at first sight. But it is precisely this connection that Dante will examine in particular detail at the last station of the Antepurgatory. For the moment, however, he is concerned with the efficacy of the Church’s influence on eternity. Thus, for one, in the case of the excommunicates, the hitherto simple equivalent of lifetime and time to be spent in the Antepurgatory is replaced by a more complex calculation, which takes into account the length of time spent “in […] presunzïon”. Thus the amount of a person’s lifetime spent within the institution of the Church takes precedence over time spent in other circumstances, and this alone shows the weight of institutional influence on this time. For multiplication is an originary figure of power. Nevertheless, the multiplication in the Antepurgatory of the period of godlessness is also a formula to demonstrate the definitive ineffectiveness of the temporal regulation of eternity, without at the same time relegating the institution of the Church to complete ineffectiveness. This concession to an in fact mistaken decision is remarkable in so far as it also recognises institutional effectiveness where this decision opposes the divine will. For Manfred expressly says that the refusal to grant him a church burial amounted to a misapprehension of God’s will. Consequently the institution in fact became autonomous, in that it  Purgatorio III,136 – 141: “Vero è che quale in contumacia more/di Santa Chiesa, ancor ch’al fin si penta,/star li convien da questa ripa in fore,/per ognun tempo ch’elli è stato, trenta,/in sua presunzïon, se tal decreto/più corto per buon prieghi non diventa.”  Purgatorio III,118 – 135: “‘Poscia ch’io ebbi rotta la persona/di due punte mortali, io mi rendei,/piangendo, a quei che volontier perdona./Orribil furon li peccati miei;/ma la bontà infinita ha sì gran braccia,/che prende ciò che si rivolge a lei./Se ’l pastor di Cosenza, che a la caccia/di me fu messo per Clemente allora,/avesse in Dio ben letta questa faccia,/l’ossa del corpo mio sarieno ancora/in co del ponte presso a Benevento,/sotto la guardia de la grave mora./Or le bagna la pioggia e move il vento/di fuor dal regno, quasi lungo ’l Verde,/dov’e’ le trasmutò a lume spento./Per lor maledizion sì non si perde,/che non possa tornar, l’etterno amore,/mentre che la speranza ha fior del verde.’”

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changes from an organ to carry out God’s will into an equivalent of divine decision-making. But the definitive responsibility of the institution, which is thus empowered as an autonomous executor of the salvation process, is substantially weakened at the same time. For the temporal regulation of eternity can be transcendentally reversed just as, on the other hand, the extra-institutional prayers of the faithful can diminish the effects of excommunication and shorten the waiting time in the Antepurgatory. That which is pledged on Earth by those entrusted to do so, only holds good for a time in Heaven.²²¹ The introduction of temporality in the afterlife through the device of Mount Purgatory seems as such to be a symmetrical answer to the concession to a temporal institution, that had been granted the power to influence eternity. It is only in the corresponding installation of time in the afterlife that there is a means to revise decisions, and this comes about by a small piece of power over eternity being relinquished and handed over to temporality. However, the duration of this influence can be calculated – and thus defused – without being rendered entirely meaningless. Thus the Church’s influence on eternity becomes just a factor in the calculation to determine the temporary delay of salvation.²²² The mathematical account thus taken of a person’s lifetime in the calculation to determine the waiting time before purgation, can, however, be seen in connection with another crucial change that comes about for the penitent sinner on the mountain of Purgatory with the opening of the path to salvation. For the certain knowledge of future salvation not insignificantly cuts through the logic of the mediation of the earthly world and the afterlife, which applies equally in Hell and in the Heavenly Paradise. While in one it was the unforgivable sin that determined the place of a soul in the infernum, in the other it is the worthiness of the chosen ones which not only grants them immediate access to God’s splendour, but also decides the place where they become visible to the Pilgrim. For the Blest and for the Damned in Hell alike, there is therefore a transparent connection between life in this world, between guilt or virtue, and the place one oc-

 Hence it is only with this reservation that the followers of Peter are still intended to fulfil the task that Christ entrusted to Peter at that famous moment in the New Testament when He handed the keys of heaven to him: “et tibi dabo claves regni caelorum/et quodcumque ligaveris super terram erit ligatum in caelis” (Matthew 16,19).  The fact that the time a person was excommunicated should be multiplied by 30 to calculate the time to be spent in the Antepurgatory may at first seem entirely arbitrary. However, there may perhaps be a plausible explanation in the allegorical significance of the numeral 30, which goes back to the book of Deuteronomy 21,13. The description there of the woman who grieves at home for one whole month has been adopted in biblical exegesis as a symbol of the repentant soul. See the relevant reference to Ambrose in Hieronymus Lauretus 1580, p. 1087.

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cupies in the afterlife. But precisely this connection has been lost to the penitent sinners. What destines them for definitive salvation is nothing other than that one moment of insight into their guilt and their renunciation of that same guilt, which in the final estimate amounts to the same as a wholly virtuous life. The rational correspondence, that applies elsewhere, between life on Earth and the place a soul occupies in the afterlife, which always also involves a calculation balancing lifetime and eternity, is thus ultimately abandoned in the case of the penitent sinners; and instead of acquiring or generating a right to salvation by their change of heart, they rather win this right by denying their own life, by negating it in that one moment of renunciation. One might parry this with the fact that sin, too, that one despicable act is also in effect a moment that crucially influences all eternity. Thus, for instance, in Canto V of the Inferno, Francesca da Rimini names just one episode as the cause for her being banned to the company of the lussuriosi. But this impression obscures the fact that beside the peccatum as the actus malus there is also the vitium, the habitus, the vice that is constantly revisited.²²³ In that sense, sin also always implies a whole lifetime, which is counted towards eternity. Repentance in the moment of death, on the other hand, ultimately makes life superfluous. It is precisely this irrelevance of earthly life to salvation that is expressed in the waiting time in the Antepurgatory. And, as such, this waiting time appears not only to be a temporal repetition of life, as a strategy to preserve a remnant of meaning for its duration. It is also a symbolic reflection of the life spent in sin: the enduring postponement of the beginning of purgation, the blocked access to Mount Purgatory for as long at the penitent had lived, corresponds to a life that was equally ineffective as a means to gaining access to salvation. For this uselessness returns very logically as a time of waiting, an empty time, which is basically nothing more than time per se. Thus the enforced delay before ascending the mountain of Purgatory symbolises a life that was meaningless in terms of salvation. The mathematically measured time of waiting takes on a symbolic quality, and the repetition of that life on the foothills of Mount Purgatory amounts to an allegorical interpretation of it: the repetition and the interpretation of that life are one and the same, it is – in the etymological sense – a symbolic re-presentation. And here we already see the beginnings of a semiotic connection between the earthly world and the afterlife, the relationship between a commentary and its ‘text’. The mountain of Purgatory becomes the place where the hidden meaning of earthly existence is laid bare. It is a place where the truth of that existence is more evident. The ethical function of the purgation

 For more on this differentiation see Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I-II, q.71, a. 3c.

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of incurred guilt, which primarily determines the relationship between this world and the next world of Purgatory, thus in a sense goes hand in hand with an epistemic relation between the two. This is also Dante’s answer to the distinctly delicate question as to the ontological status of an afterlife that remains tied to the materiality of the earthly world. The place where the correction of earthly transgressions is carried out, is at the same time a place where the truth is more evident than elsewhere; here meaning that is hidden elsewhere is brought to light and paralleled, as are restoration and cognitive progress.²²⁴ Hence the uselessness of an earthly life spent in sin appears in the shape of an aimless circling around the realm of redemption. At the same time, however, the Antepurgatory as such basically figures as a theological interpretation of time itself. The place where the time of waiting means nothing other than empty time, that is, lost time, nothing other than mere time, embodies the excessiveness and consequent substantive emptiness which is always peculiar to time in God’s Creation. However, the fact that the neutralisation of the sinner’s entire life for the sake of one moment of penitence is not entirely in keeping with the logic that elsewhere regulates the relationship between this world and the afterlife in the Commedia, may especially be seen in one of the figures that the Pilgrim encounters in the Antepurgatory. Amongst those who met a violent death and only distanced themselves from their sinful existence at the moment of death, there is Buonconte da Montefeltro, who led the Ghibellines of Arezzo in their battle with the Florentines, and who himself fell at the battle of Campaldino. When he has introduced himself, by name, to Dante, the latter immediately asks – as though he at last could discover the answer to a puzzle that had long been troubling him – what happened to his corpse, which was never found. Buonconte’s account of the fate of his corpse is in fact a description of a mythical struggle for the soul of a sinner who only repented at the very last moment: “Io dirò vero, e tu ’l ridì tra ’ vivi: l’angel di Dio mi prese, e quel d’inferno gridava: ‘O tu del ciel, perché mi privi? Tu te ne porti di costui l’etterno

 This parallel, which ultimately links two rival ethic orders is a constant structural element in the Purgatorio, as we saw in the preceding chapters. It mediates between the rational ethics with their roots in Antiquity – which regards immoral acts as an intellectual deficit, a mistake – and a mythic ethics, which sees sin as a lesion in the divine plan. Both ethics thus countenance different forms of therapy. Making good a mythic guilt, which arises from the attempt to damage a divine being who will tolerate no resistance, requires purification through corporal punishment. The reinstatement of one’s intellectual capacities, however, means that the sinner requires instruction, as seen in the example on Mount Purgatory.

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per una lagrimetta che ’l mi toglie; ma io farò de l’altro altro governo!’” (Purgatorio V,103 – 108)

Repentance in the face of death led to a struggle between an emissary from Heaven and a fallen angel from Hell, who is narrowly outdone by the heavenly messenger due to a single tear as a sign of repentance. But, only defeated in the last moment, and having already hastened to the scene to collect his booty, the fallen angel does not go away entirely empty-handed; and covers his losses by making off with the corpse of the saved soul. He expressly bemoans the fact that there is an inequality here. He feels cheated of his due, considering that one single tear made good a whole life. And since he has therefore to yield up the soul of the deceased (“l’etterno”) he proceeds to subject the lifeless body to punishment that is hardly less than the torments of Hell. With a mighty cloudburst he causes the rivers to swell so that the corpse is swept away in their rushing torrents and lost on the river bed.²²⁵ As the last triumph of his actually ineffectual outburst of violence, he wrests the sign of the cross from the chest of the corpse, that sign with which the dying man had returned to his God. Obviously the fiend’s destructive rage in fact amounts to nothing, and even the sign of the cross stolen from the corpse had managed to achieve its salvational purpose while the sinner was still alive. Nevertheless, this mythical agon for the soul of the saved man – which seems so archaic compared to Dante’s otherwise extremely elaborate theology of the afterlife – ultimately reflects a latent incongruity between the logic of Hell and the ‘logic’ of a Purgatory where one last moment can make a whole life trivial. What we see here is the destruction of the principle of equivalence between existence in this world and in the next. The systematic, supposedly marked order of the realm of the afterlife itself obscures this covert rupture in its order. The rationalised geography of the afterlife seems to disguise the fact that competing concepts of ethics are allotted to the different locations in it.²²⁶

 Purgatorio V,112– 129: “‘Guinse quel mal voler che pur mal chiede/con lo ’ntelletto, e mosse il fummo e ’l vento/per la virtù che sua natura diede./Indi la valle, come ’l dì fu spento,/da Pratomagno al gran giogo coperse/di nebbia; e ’l ciel di sopra fece intento,/sì che ’l pregno aere in acqua si converse;/la pioggia cadde, e a’ fossati venne/di lei ciò che la terra non sofferse;/e come ai rivi grandi si convenne,/ver’ lo fiume real tanto veloce/si ruinò, che nulla la ritenne./Lo corpo mio gelato in su la foce/trovò l’Archian rubesto; e quel sospinse/ne l’Arno, e sciolse al mio petto la croce/ch’i’ fe’ di me, quando ’l dolor mi vinse;/voltòmmi per le ripe e per lo fondo,/ poi di sua preda mi coperse e cinse.’”  Party to this rationalisation is not least the history of the origins of Hell and Purgatory. For the Commedia traces them back to the same source: The soil that rises up out of the funnel generated by Satan’s fall created Mount Purgatory. But this genetic connection is nothing other than an allegory of their systematic correspondence. (Incidentally, this very correspondence raises

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But what the system fails to mention, comes to light in the mythical episode which Dante very consistently develops from his own continuation of the legend of the lost body of Buonconte. Significantly it is this very principle of equivalence that, in competition with the theology of redemptive forgiveness, now enters a mythic dimension. The mythic quality of this episode stands out all the more clearly when Buonconte describes the natural phenomena – which he at the same time interprets as the work of the devil – using terminology that to a certain extent cites the most recent stand of scientific theory: “Ben sai come ne l’aere si raccoglie quell’umido vapor che in acqua riede, tosto che sale dove ’l freddo il coglie.” (Purgatorio V,109 – 111)

Assuming the Pilgrim’s understanding, Buonconte describes the formation of clouds and rain as a natural, causal process. Thus it seems all the more striking when this same phenomenon is directly afterwards ascribed to the machinations of the devil and reinterpreted as a mythic phenomenon.²²⁷ However, this unexpected emergence of things mythic does make sense as an indication of the volatility of the systematic order. Significantly, the devil thus appears as the cause of a natural catastrophe. His appearance disturbs the regular course of things and unhinges the existing order. He enters the scene, in the shape of “fummo” and “vento”, in order to transform ordinary rain into an extraordinary storm. “Giunse quel mal voler che pur mal chiede/con lo ‘nteletto, e mosse il fummo e ‘l vento/per la virtù che sua natura diede”. The physical shapes that the devil adopts are anything but contingent. Wind and smoke are time-honoured allegories for the devil and his stratagems.²²⁸ That this symbolic offsetting of a natural against a mythic order – which concedes to the devil a share in nature – is a reflection of that minimal right that God’s adversary claimed from the all too late-repentant sinner, is shown not least by the behaviour of the angel. For the heavenly messenger also allows the fallen angel to do as he wishes, or at least does nothing to stop him in what he is doing. The devil’s right to the corpse does not seem to be at issue, and so he seems to have preserved a tacit right to that individual that he had counted on for almost a whole lifetime and who only now – when it seemed that everything had been signed and sealed – has eluded the

other questions. Does this mean that the dispositive of Redemption derived from the same source as the fall of the angels? Or more precisely: Is there a causal link between the two?)  See Purgatorio V,112 ff. cited in note 225.  See, for instance, Hieronymus Lauretus 1580, s. v. aer, p. 73.

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devil, who had hastened to the scene and was already waiting to make off with his certain spoils. And this remaining claim is manifested in the violence that he inflicts on the corpse, bringing the torments of Hell to this Earth.²²⁹ But this mythic concession, which underlines the volatility of the ethical order, in turn has consequences for the natural order itself. For, if the soul-less body is understood as a symbolic equivalent for a life spent in sin, then its materiality is subjected to a last, dangerous demonisation. And it is dangerous, because the mythic concession to the remaining claim of the devil thereby amounts in the final estimate to an ontological manichaism, which defines the corporeal as evil, and thus ultimately robs its of it place in a creation which, as God’s work, can only be good. All attempts to reconcile an ethics of forgiveness with rational ethics that function according to the principles of equivalence, all endeavours to mend the latent rupture in the systematics of the Christian afterlife in the Commedia, can only lead to yet further disruptions. And the qualifying time for the saved in Antepurgatory can only, within limits, sustain the offsetting of temporality against eternity, which otherwise regulates the relationship of this world and the next. Indeed, the strategy to solve the problem seen here also proves – dialectically – to be its symptom. Now it would be possible to counter this argument with the fact that the Antepurgatory is not about normal forgiveness but about an extreme case of the demands made on divine forgiveness. For here Dante meets those who have only repented of their sins at the moment of death. One moment of repentance outweighs an entire mis-spent life. But in actual fact this doubtlessly extreme temporal discrepancy in a sense is not a problematic case, since it by definition avoids other complications. For how stable is the change of heart of those who already renounce their sins at an earlier stage in their lives? And if a person lapses, how does this affect the length of time they must wait? In comparison, repentance at the last moment is an unendangered repentance, because it is final. In that sense it avoids complexity and at the same time appears as an emblem of that theology of forgiveness, which first made possible the mountain of

 The sound of the pouring rain is an unmistakable allusion to the punishments in Hell where notably the golosi are also caught in a similar cloudburst. Perhaps it is not by chance that these punishments are described in the numerically corresponding anto, no. VI, of the Inferno. As well as echoes of the torments of Hell, there are also unmistakable overtones here of the ravages that communicate God’s anger to human beings in the Old Testament. See for instance the account of the disastrous floods in Isaiah 30, 25: “et erunt super omnem montem excelsum/et super omnem collem elevatum rivi currentium aquarum/in die interfectionis multorum cum ceciderint turres”. (For more on Old Testament references in the punishments in the Inferno, see: Kablitz 1994, p. 152 ff.).

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Purgatory. For the ‘logic’ of repentance and forgiveness ultimately cuts through any logic of relativity. Redemption cannot be offset against anything else. Those waiting at the foot of Mount Purgatory seem like the representatives of the attempt to preserve at least a remnant of the equivalence between lifetime and eternity – that was in principle relinquished with the establishment of purgatory. But this attempt to offset one against the other, whose structural volatility was seen in the mythical episode concerning Buonconte da Montefeltro, simply becomes a figuration of the insignificance of our time in this world.

II The question as to the meaning of time for the eternal bliss of the blessed sinners, as we have already seen in the scenario of the Antepurgatory, does not only concern the individual biography. Time is also a discomfiting category in that story which first made the redemption of the individual sinner possible. Indeed time raises the question of the meaning of salvation history itself, for it in fact upsets the validity of the systematic ethics that are reflected in the different orders of sins, be it in the case of the eternally damned in Hell, or of those hoping for redemption in Purgatory. Structurally there are instantly apparent parallels between the life of the individual who lives by sin, and the story of humanity that was blessed with divine grace. In both cases, there is just one moment which determines the irrelevance – in terms of salvation – of all that has gone before. Thus the life of the penitent in principle reflects the course of the salvation history which made his or her redemption possible in the first place. The causal connection between the accessibility of salvation to the repentant sinner and collective redemption has already been seen by means of a figural correspondence in the group of those who met a violent death. For the forgiveness for the murderers in the moment of death, which follows the example of Christ on the Cross, points at the same time to that central moment in salvation history which first made the individual forgiveness of sins possible. However, despite this structural correspondence there is at the same time an essential difference between individual and collective redemption. For while the moment of repentance of the individual ultimately neutralises his or her past, the individual who is born too soon, who thus misses out on collective redemption, remains definitively excluded from salvation. But the Antepurgatory does not try to avoid this discrepancy between the two orders of earthly temporality, between individual biography and collective history. And it is for this reason that its figuration of earthly time is not restricted to the lifetime of the individual sinner. Rather the scenario at the foot of Mount Purgatory simultaneously symbolises the history

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of the salvation of all humanity, in order thereby to arrive at an answer to the questions that arise from this discrepancy we have noted. For in the final estimate this divergence leads to problems in the relationship of temporal order and moral laws, history and ethics.

II.1 The explosive nature of the question of the moral stature of the individual and the point in time of their redemption is notably addressed in the text in the figure of Virgil, and in this connection the opening of Canto VII takes on particular importance. It begins with the scene in which the Mantuan Virgil introduces himself to his compatriot Sordello. But his description of himself and his life in fact focuses on one single point: an explanation of the reasons why the utterly moral poet nevertheless had to be refused access to salvation. What has to be answered here is the provocative question as to the limitations of the ethics reflected in the systematic orders of Hell and Purgatory, which also have to make transparent the relationship between this world and the next; and basically it is nothing other than the mere factor of ‘time’ that has excluded Virgil from God’s magnificence: “Anzi che a questo monte fosser volte l’anime degne di salire a Dio, fur l’ossa mie per Ottavian sepolte. Io son Virgilio; e per null’ altro rio lo ciel perdei che per non aver fé.” Così rispuose allora il duca mio. […] “Non per far, ma per non fare ho perduto a veder l’alto sol che tu disiri e che fu tardi per me conosciuto.” (Purgatorio VII,4– 9; 25 – 27)

Above all the fact of being born just a little too soon lends a sense of quiet tragedy to the morally so perfect figure of Virgil. This appears all the more striking in that Sordello, the Mantuan successor of Virgil, who may be counted amongst those who have profited from the story of salvation, reverently pays homage to his famous forefather as the master of his own language. But this also implies a striking ‘secularisation’ of the artes. ²³⁰ For on the path to salvation, Sordello, the beneficiary of redemption, will walk ahead, guiding the two travellers.

 Purgatorio VII,16 – 21: “‘O gloria de’ Latin’, disse, ‘per cui/mostrò ciò che potea la lingua nostra,/o pregio etterno del loco ond’ io fui,/qual merito o qual grazia mi ti mostra?/S’io son d’udir le tue parole degno,/dimmi se vien d’inferno, e di qual chiostra’.”

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One of the most remarkable facets of the Virgil’s depiction of himself is the express parallels he draws with the historical circumstances of his own life and the individual circumstances of those who were never baptised: “Quivi sto io coi pargoli innocenti dai denti morsi de la morte avante che fosser da l’umana colpa essenti; quivi sto io con quei che le tre sante virtù non si vestiro, e sanza vizio conobber l’altre e seguir tutte quante.” (Purgatorio VII ,31– 36)

Once again it seems that the congruity between individual life and universal history is secured. For the missing baptism in a person’s biography corresponds to the act of redemption in salvation history. And yet there is an aspect of this that disturbingly upsets this parallelism. For unbaptised infants never had an opportunity to prove their moral worth, whereas Virgil led a life beyond reproach. Aside from the fact that he had failed to partake of the “tre sante virtù”, the theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity, this heathen was not guilty of a single one of the vices that otherwise set the seal on eternal damnation. Thus an absence of salvation is compatible with perfect ethical integrity. But this conclusion also contains within it a provocation that the elevation of Aristotelian and scholastic ethics must inevitably entail for Christian thinking, which had to reckon these ethics against the conditions of salvation history. In the Commedia it is above all the Inferno that is the realm of these ethics, whose categories also define the systematics of Hell. But with this move to the Purgatorio, it is more than the stature of the sinners that changes; there is also a shift in the ethical reference system – in the direction of the affect ethics of caritas. So from the point of view of the rival rational ethics of Aristotle, which rule the Inferno, and which are not invalidated, it has to be a tacit skandalon when the reprehensible life of the repentant sinner ultimately has no significance with regard to his or her salvation and at worst leads to a delay in the redemption process, a delay that symbolically reflects its insignificance.²³¹ We have already been able to trace – in the

 That these ethics are also valid for the Purgatorio is vouched for, not least, by the figure of Virgil, who represents this concept and, until the moment of the purified Dante’s arrival at the peak of Mount Purgatory, fulfils the role of guide through the Christian afterlife. With his words of farewell as they arrive in the Earthly Paradise, Virgil points out again the enduring significance of a set of ethics, which sees virtue as the result of rational self-control. For the moral status that he grants his ward after they have climbed Mount Purgatory rests precisely on the restoration of a rational mind, that can now no longer go astray (Purgatorio XXVII,127– 132): “e disse: ‘Il temporal foco e l’etterno/veduto hai, figlio; e se’ venuto in parte/dov’ io per me più

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mythical figure – the not quite eradicated discomfiture this induces. But above all, it has to be provocative when moral integrity can be largely inconsequential: and this discomfiture is developed in the text in the figure of Virgil. Thus it is as though the Antepurgatory addresses through him the elsewhere suppressed deficits of scholastic ethics, whose ontological foundations cannot be reconciled with the ultimately contingent salvation history of Christianity. In contrast to what the apparently convincing ethical systematics of the afterlife seem to suggest, promising a simple reckoning of earthly deeds and afterworldly rewards, the ontological interpretation of earthly existence also effects, by contrast, a dissociation of this world from the next. Dante’s efforts to establish the logical transparency of the earthly world – which do not even halt at the course of salvation history – are bought at the price of the radicalisation elsewhere of the contingency of gaining salvation. For even in the state of gracelessness that reigned before the Incarnation, it is possible for a heathen to achieve moral perfection, and yet such perfect integrity is also categorically incapable of leading to salvation, despite the fact that – after the redemption of humanity and in the name of the same ethics – Christians are threatened by the same eternal damnation. It is that same precarious logic of the history of salvation that Dante addresses in the valletta dei principi, the last station on the journey through the Antepurgatory.

II.2 This last station in the Antepurgatory is different from all the others in a number of ways. This is already evident in the fact that it is connected with a further allegorisation of earthly time, this time concerning the times of day. Dusk has de-

oltre non discerno./Tratto t’ho qui con ingegno e con arte;/lo tuo piacere omai prendi per duce;/ fuor se’ de l’erte vie, fuor se’ de l’arte.’” It is only once the status naturae, lost in the Fall of Man, has been regained that the function of the poet from Antiquity comes to an end. That his authority is no longer intact is seen not least in the fact that now, as Dante’s guide, he needs support. This dual nature of his role as a guide thus reflects the ambivalent validity of a set of ethics that is pagan in origin, although it is still seen to apply in the deeply Christian process of expiation, as Dante’s Purgatorio visibly demonstrates. The continuing pertinence, for the Christian too, of a set of ethics with pagan roots and its relevance for the attainment or loss of salvation, is not least confirmed in Dante’s self-interpretation in his letter of dedication to Can Grande della Scala (any lingering doubts, in this specific case, of its authorship are of secondary importance). This letter is concerned specifically with rightful rewards or equally just punishment, both of which are gained or lost through our own free will (Dante, Epistole XIII, 25). But in the symmetry of this dichotomous ethics there is ultimately no room for the gracious corrective – made possible through the process of redemption – there is only room for an ethics of Purgatory.

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scended, and so Sordello advises the travellers to find a place where they can spend the night.²³² For the lack of sunlight will make it impossible to even set one foot in front of the other: night makes it impossible to progress further on the path to salvation.²³³ This allegorisation initially fits seamlessly into the structure of the Antepurgatory that we have already identified, namely as a symbolic representation of the earthly world. And here, too, the allegorical potential of the natural world is explicit in its afterworldly form. The precise effects, that Sordello ascribes to darkness, turn it into a figuration of a psychology of gracelessness which in fact goes back to Augustine: anyone who tries to approach ever closer to salvation without the light of the sun, will experience nothing other than the impotence of his own will: “quella [sc. la notturna tenebra] col non poder la voglia intriga”. This is the familiar condition of the human being left to his or her own devices and hence irrevocably lost to sin. Thus, we cannot help but be all the more struck by what awaits the travellers in the valley that Sordello leads them into as a place where they may spend the night. The troubadour’s indication that they should expect a “bel soggiorno”, and particularly his promise of “diletto” in their nocturnal stopping place must strike a discordant note.²³⁴ For any such pleasure is scarcely in keeping with a place of penitence, which is what makes the valletta dei principi stand out so markedly from the other places on Mount Purgatory – with one notable exception. Above all, astonished incomprehension must ensue when precisely the place, that is supposed to offer shelter during the nightly darkening of the sun of mercy, is described as a “bel soggiorno” that promises to be a pleasurable interlude. The text itself expresses this astonishment, and has Virgil put it into words: Allora il mio segnor, quasi ammirando, “Menane”, disse, “dunque là ’ve dici ch’aver si può diletto dimorando.” (Purgatorio VII,61– 63)

 Purgatorio VII,43 – 48: “‘Ma vedi già come dichina il giorno,/e andar sù di notte non si puote;/però è bon pensar di bel soggiorno./Anime sono a destra qua remote;/se mi consenti, io ti merrò ad esse,/e non sanza diletto ti fier note’.”  Purgatorio VII,49 – 60: “‘Com’è ciò?’, fu risposto. ‘Chi volesse/salir di notte, fora elli impedito/d’altrui, o non sarria ché non potesse?’/E ’l buon Sordello in terra fregò ’l dito,/dicendo: ‘Vedi? sola questa riga/non varcheresti dopo ’l sol partito;/non però ch’altra cosa desse briga,/che la notturna tenebra, ad ir suso;/quella col nonpoder la voglia intriga./Ben si poria con lei tornare in giuso/e passeggiar la costa intorno errando,/mentre che l’orizzonte il dì tien chiuso.’” The allegorical interpretation of night as a symbol for gracelessness is generally accepted by Dante scholars. See, for instance, Petronio 1966, p. 9.  With regard to “bel soggiorno” see Purgatorio VII,45. That the encounter with the souls in the valley at night will take place “non sanza diletto” is promised by Sordello in Purgatorio VII,48.

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But the reader’s bewilderment becomes all the greater at the description of the valley, into which Sordello leads the travellers through the afterlife, and which indeed does his earlier description “bel soggiorno” proud: Tra erto e piano era un sentiero schembo, che ne condusse in fianco de la lacca, là dove più ch’a mezzo muore il lembo. Oro e argento fine, cocco e biacca, indaco, legno lucido e sereno, fresco smeraldo in l’ora che si fiacca, da l’erba e da li fior dentr’ a quel seno posti ciascun saria di color vinto, come dal suo maggiore è vinto il meno. Non avea pur natura ivi dipinto, ma di soavità di mille odori vi facea uno incognito e indistinto. (Purgatorio VII,70 – 81)

There is only one other occasion in the Purgatorio that we see a similarly splendid place: the Earthly Paradise on the peak of Mount Purgatory.²³⁵ But why does the Pilgrim encounter similarly luxuriant creation at the point where he has to wait for the end of the darkness of night, that is to say, the time of gracelessness? Of course, in the finely calculated systematics of the Commedia the evident parallel is anything other than aleatoric. Rather it very intentionally presents the Valley of the Princes at the foot of Mount Purgatory as a figura paradisi. ²³⁶ But what might the sense be of a prefiguration here – amongst the negligent earthly power brokers – of the return to the place where nature was still intact before the Fall?²³⁷

 See in particular Virgil’s description of Earthly Paradise when he bids farewell to Dante: Purgatorio XXVII,133 – 135: “‘Vedi lo sol che ’n fronte ti riluce;/vedi l’erbette, i fiori e li arbuscelli/che qui la terra sol da sé produce’.” Buck has pointed out the rhetorical model of a locus amoenus in the depiction of this place (Buck 1970, pp. 5 f.).  For more on this see Martinelli 1989, p. 141.  Pasquazi interprets this contradiction as a contrapasso and, as such, part of the punishment. According to Pasquazi the splendid valley reminds the Princes of their erstwhile dignity, so that they feel their own failure all the more acutely (Pasquazi 1976, p. 868; see also Pasquazi 1972, pp. 365 f.). However, it is not in keeping with the logic of the Purgatorio if the time spent in the Antepurgatory is already seen as part of the punishment. Moreover in this – it has to be said disturbingly psychological – interpretation, there is no explanation regarding the function, in this context, served by the depiction of this place as a figura paradisi. This problem alone would appear to require some other answer.

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The interpretation of Cantos VII and VIII of the Purgatorio, proposed in what follows here, may in fact be read as my endeavour to answer these questions. Let us briefly pre-empt the conclusion: The Valley of the Princes in the Antepurgatory may be understood as a symbolic figuration of the institution of the monarchia temporalis, that order that Dante describes in his text on the Monarchia as the perfection of earthly order, which is why its establishment also has to make the course of salvation history transparent. As a symbolic figuration, however, the scenario at the foot of the mountain of Purgatory shows at the same time something left unsaid by the theory of the tract. In particular it faces up to the consequences of the destruction of that imperium whose founding by Augustus offers Dante, in that context, an explanation of why the Incarnation took place at a particular moment in time. Already in the previous cantos of the Purgatorio, Dante had bemoaned the wretched state of the Empire that had lost its centre in Italy and had, simultaneously, imposed permanent unrest on that country.²³⁸ But the text of the Monarchia does not answer the question of the status of the transcendental work of redemption if the earthly preconditions for God to become Man are destroyed. The answer now given by Dante in the journey through the afterlife portrayed in the Commedia, specifically in the Valley of the Princes at the foot of Mount Purgatory, can thus basically be seen as a corrective for the risks that are inherent in the ontologisation of salvation history. And significantly the text, which tells of what the travellers see in the afterlife, addresses questions of history and its institutions, questions that are actually concerned with redemption theology. Thus the Purgatorio ultimately reverses the relationship between temporality and eternity which defines the Monarchia. ²³⁹ While we have already seen elsewhere in the Antepurgatory that the figuration of the earthly world takes on the quality of an allegorese, then it is also true to say that here, too, the representation of the monarchia becomes an anagogic commentary on it. Other than in the text of the Monarchia, where the institution of a monarchia temporalis serves as an earthly representation of transcendental order, now the imperium becomes the confirmation in the afterlife of certain redemption, a promise that history itself will ultimately annul.

 See in particular the famous, seemingly unstoppable, invective at the end of Canto VI in the Purgatorio, that opens with the apostrophe “Ahi serva Italia” (which was also the inspiration for Petrarch’s Canzone, Canzoniere CXXVIII): Purgatorio VI,76 – 151.  Lest there be any misunderstanding: this does not imply a relative chronology of the Monarchia and the Purgatorio. In this case ‘answer’ refers to a conceptual and not a temporal difference.

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II.3 The first of the arguments that can support the interpretation of the Valley of the Princes as a transcendental figuration of the monarchia temporalis is geographical. For the ranks of the negligent Princes, who have gathered for their evening prayers, correspond rather precisely to a map of the imperium in the late 13th century, which is why we have cited Sordello’s catalogue in full here.²⁴⁰ Little by little he presents the Princes, whose regret at their earthly misdemeanours is readily apparent: “Colui che più siede alto e fa sembianti d’aver negletto ciò che far dovea, e che non move bocca a li altrui canti, Rodolfo imperador fu, che potea sanar le piaghe c’hanno Italia morta, sì che tardi per altri si ricrea. L’altro che ne la vista lui conforta, resse la terra dove l’acqua nasce che Molta in Albia, e Albia in mar ne porta: Ottachero ebbe nome, e ne le fasce fu meglio assai che Vincislao suo figlio barbuto, cui lussuria e ozio pasce. E quel nasetto che stretto a consiglio par con colui c’ha sì benigno aspetto, morì fuggendo e disfiorando il giglio: guardate là come si batte il petto! L’altro vedete c’ha fatto a la guancia de la sua palma, sospirando, letto. Padre e suocero son del mal di Francia: sanno la vita sua viziata e lorda, e quindi viene il duol che sì li lancia. Quel che par sì membruto e che s’accorda, cantando, con colui dal maschio naso, d’ogne valor portò cinta la corda; e se re dopo lui fosse rimaso lo giovanetto che retro a lui siede, ben andava il valor di vaso in vaso, che non si puote dir de l’altre rede; Iacomo e Federigo hanno i reami; del retaggio miglior nessun possiede. Rade volte risurge per li rami l’umana probitate; e questo vole

 Pasquazi has already described this catalogue as a representation of Europe and the shattered imperium (Pasquazi 1972, pp. 301 and 365).

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quei che la dà, perché da lui si chiami. Anche al nasuto vanno mie parole non men ch’a l’altro, Pier, che con lui canta, onde Puglia e Proenza già si dole. Tant’ è del seme suo minor la pianta, quanto, più che Beatrice e Margherita, Costanza di marito ancor si vanta. Vedete il re de la semplice vita seder là solo, Arrigo d’Inghilterra: questi ha ne’ rami suoi migliore uscita. Quel che più basso tra costor s’atterra, guardando in suso, è Guiglielmo marchese, per cui e Alessandria e la sua guerra fa pianger Monferrato e Canavese.” (Purgatorio VII,91– 136)

Commentaries on the Commedia have specified the precise historical identity of the rulers listed here. Enthroned above all the others is the Emperor Rudolf of Habsburg. He is closely followed by Ottokar II of Bohemia, Philipp III of France, Henry I of Navarre, Peter III of Aragon and Sicily, Charles II of Anjou, Alfons III of Aragon, Henry III of England and Margrave William VII of Monferrat and Cavanese.²⁴¹ Their harmonious companionship is intentionally contra-factual and consigns to oblivion the confusion and conflict that turned them against each other during their lifetimes. Thus they form the afterworldly figuration of what is missing in history: the picture of an imperium that, under its Emperor’s leadership, harmoniously unites all the other rulers. In a manner that is unusual in the context of the Antepurgatory, this list of all those present – aside from the considerable differences that Sordello’s commentary makes between their various life changes – includes them as equals in one and the same group. It would seem that here the categories of individual ethics, which might be used to judge the individuals’ lives, no longer apply. They are all equally guilty of the destruction of that monarchia universalis, which itself stands for the desired state of the world order. Thus at this point the text also noticeably avoids the detailed evidence that is presented elsewhere to justify an individual’s right to salvation by the late renunciation of sin. Any such evidence is missing here. Also missing is any reference to the length of time that must be spent in the Antepurgatory, that is to say, how long the delay before their salvation. Therefore, much here suggests that the status the Princes share – despite being of such different moral standing – namely the part they played in the universal empire, together with their individual acts of repentance, takes on an importance of its own and

 See, for instance, Pacelli 1965, pp. 23 ff.

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contributes to their right to ultimate redemption. That they may not yet set out on the path to salvation, but must for the time being wait together for redemption, is explained instead by their shared guilt in the destruction of this imperium. But how does this shift from individual ethics to a collective ethics come about in the Antepurgatory? If the apparent harmony amongst the rulers gathered in the Valley of the Princes is obviously contra-factual in terms of the reality of the past, then this contradiction is already inscribed into the evening scenario in the valletta dei principi. This discrepancy is seen particularly in the antiphony which the penitent Princes strike up. The text itself, in line 82, only cites its first words (“‘Salve, Regina’ in sul verde e ’n su’ fiori/quindi seder cantando anime vidi”), and yet the song only reveals its full meaning if one takes into account the words of the whole prayer to the Mother of God: Salve, Regina, mater misericordiae vita, dulcedo et spes nostra, salve. Ad te clamamus exsules filii Hevae. Ad te suspiramus gementes et flentes in hac lacrimarum valle. Eia ergo, advocata nostra, illos tuos misericordes oculos ad nos converte. Et Jesum, benedictum fructum ventris tui, nobis post hoc exsilium ostende. O clemens, o pia, o dulcis Virgo Maria.

With these words the earthly Princes turn to the heavenly Queen. That the words of this hymn in fact counter the previous description of the paradisaic valley, is hinted at in the text of the Purgatorio itself. After all, we are expressly told that the Princes sing their prayer, Salve, Regina, “in sul verde e’ n su’ fiori”. But their prayer begs for intercession for all those who are languishing “in hac lacrimarum valle”.²⁴² And the words of the hymn to the Virgin Mary are in other senses, too, a

 I am not convinced by the interpretation of this contradiction offered by McCracken in the context of the Princes’ complaints about the Valley of Tears in the Garden of Paradise: “This line illustrates beautifully the frustrated irony of the soul’s position, trapped as they are in an earthly paradise that seems but a valley of tears because of their forced inaction” (McCracken 1993, p. 121). “Irony” implies an intentional, if not apparent, discrepancy between the semantics of the place and the status of the souls who are only seemingly redeemed. In what follows here, we shall instead define the wholly un-ironic function of this figura paradisi as a representation of the reliability of the salvation process.

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straight reversal of the scenario sketched just before. Given that we were able to interpret the splendid Valley of the Princes as a figura for Earthly Paradise, now Eve’s children (“exsules filii Hevae”), who themselves have just been driven out of Heaven, tell the Mother of God of their suffering. Thus the Salve, Regina confronts the paradisaic place with its role elsewhere as the place of a fallen world, as the locus of those who have lost their right to Paradise through their own guilt. In fact, this description seems to fit the situation of the penitent Princes much better, those Princes who were guilty of helping to destroy the imperium. But how can this marked contradiction be resolved? As we will show, in this aporetic contrast, the text of the Purgatorio plays the history of theology off against history itself. Thus at the foot of Mount Purgatory, the institution of the imperium changes from a temporal representation of the eternal order of Creation into an afterworldly representation of the promise of a redemption, which will in the end render insignificant all temporality.

II.4 In order to make our case in detail, we should first glance briefly at the theoretical-historical construction that Dante developed above all in this treatise on the Monarchia and in the fourth tract of the Convivio. The three books of the Monarchia are devoted to answering three questions: Is a universal monarchy necessary? Is the romanus populus the rightful keeper of this imperium? Is imperial authority dependent on papal authority? Of the arguments collected by Dante to answer these questions, especially the historico-theological interpretation of the monarchia temporalis is of interest for our discussion here, for it also denotes the ontological foundations of the order of power that Dante sees as the perfect state for the world. Crucial for his interpretation – in terms of salvation history – of the establishment of the Roman Empire by Augustus is the identification of an explanation for the point in time of the Incarnation. The premise of such an explanation is the acceptance that the historic moment may be justified by the historic state of the world when Christ was born. But here we already see signs of something that will emerge, in the comparison of the Monarchia with the Purgatorio, as the perhaps constitutive difference between the two texts. An explanation of the Incarnation by the previous establishment of a perfect world situation may offer both an ontological justification for God’s appearance in this world and, at the same time, marginalise the salvational process of redemption. For the Incarnation of the Son of God becomes here above all a question of the preconditions in the earthly world, while the Valley of the Princes in the Antepurgatory will instead give greater weight to its transcendental effects. In a sense Dante’s Monarchia gives precedence to the birth of the Redeemer over His resur-

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rection. Thus in terms of the ontological legitimation of the Incarnation, the factual presence of the Redeemer in time logically takes on greater significance compared to the transcendental work of reconciliation that took place on Golgotha. But the Purgatorio reverses this relationship. Thus the monarchia temporalis changes here from an ontologically founded institution, whose function is to explain the appearance of transcendence in temporality, into a figuration of a transcendental promise that it stands for in time. The change of perspective may thus also be described as a re-orientation, where attention shifts from a chronological explanation of the historic emergence of the imperium and turns instead to a figural interpretation of its anagogic effect. Indeed, it is the relationship of causality and the figurality of history itself that is at issue in this juxtaposition. And with that we already have a hint that the historic facticity of the imperium has lost some of its significance sub specie aeternitas. After the redemption of humankind, it is possible to make do even with a tattered empire. As we have seen, the core of Dante’s theological historical construction is the assumption that the advent of the Son of God presumes the existence of an intact world order.²⁴³ This postulate of a structural correspondence is firstly revealing in view of the quality that the Incarnation thereby gains. For in a sense it becomes a figure of confirmation.²⁴⁴ Here revelation means affirming the already given, and this alone lessens the function of the process of redemption. The causal explanation of the specific point in time of the Incarnation means that it is oriented towards the past rather than the future. Salvation history is now largely subsumed by the pre-history of the Incarnation. However, we still need to clarify the question as to why the establishment of a monarchia universalis has to be seen as the creation of that perfect world order which can make the Incarnation plausible. In principle Dante proposes two arguments in this con-

 Dante, Convivio Trattato Quarto,V, 3 f.: “Volendo la ’nmensurabile bontà divina l’umana creatura a sé riconformare, che per lo peccato de la prevaricazione del primo uomo da Dio era partita e disformata, eletto fu in quello altissimo e congiuntissimo consistorio de la Trinitade che ’l Figliuolo di Dio in terra discendesse a fare questa concordia. E però che nella sua venuta lo mondo, non solamente lo cielo ma la terra, convenia essere in ottima disposizione; e la ottima disposizione de la terra sia quando ella è monarchia, cioè tutta ad uno principe, come detto è di sopra”.  Dante, Monarchia II,10,4 : “Dico ergo quod, si romanum Imperium de iure non fuit, Christus nascendo persuasit iniustum; consequens est falsum”. Significant in this connection is not least Dante’s argument that Christ intentionally had Himself registered in the census decreed by Augustus (idem, II,10,6): “Sed Christus, ut scriba eius Lucas testatur, sub edicto romane auctoritatis nasci voluit de Virgine Matre, ut in illa singulari generis humani descriptione filius Dei, homo factus, homo conscriberetur: quod fuit illud prosequi.”

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nection. They are both ontological in their nature; the first has its roots in anthropology, the second relies on an analogical structural model. The first of the two arguments above all has recourse to Aristotelian thinking which is, however, subject to unacknowledged alterations in its substance. Significant in this regard is Dante’s preference for monarchy as a form of state, which contradicts the Aristotelian preference for the polis. Nevertheless, Dante develops his position with reference to Aristotelian anthropology, which he, however, revises in one – essential – particular. This alteration can be described as a transfer to the genus humanum of categories which were defined by Aristotle in terms of the individual human. For Dante, the influence that individuals have – through their innate reason – over their actions is no longer a matter of individual understanding, for he now defines this function as a communal task of the genus humanum. ²⁴⁵ In this way the individual gives way to a collective, which is in its turn to be organised according to principles that also apply to the individual. Just as the human understanding has to control the baser forces of the soul, so the emperor has to lead humankind as a whole towards virtue. This constitutes an essential difference to the political thinking of the Stagirite: in his view the community is responsible for solving communal tasks. In Dante’s construction of a monarchia temporalis the community, as represented by the autocratic ruler, takes over the tasks of the individual. Communality itself is in this way basically absorbed into a hierarchic relationship between the many and the one.²⁴⁶ This results in a further substantial difference to the Aristotelian doc-

 Dante, Monarchia I, 3,7 f.: “Nam, etsi alie sunt essentie intellectum participantes, non tamen intellectus earum est possibilis ut hominis, quia essentie tales speties quedam sunt intellectuales et non aliud, et earum esse nichil est aliud quam intelligere quod est quod sunt; quod est sine interpolatione, aliter sempiterne non essent. Patet igitur quod ultimum de potentia ipsius humanitatis est potentia sive virtus intellectiva. Et quia potentia ista per unum hominem seu per aliquam particularium comunitatum superius distinctarum tota simul in actum reduci non potest, necesse est multitudinem esse in humano genere, per quam quidem tota potentia hec actuetur”.  This change is particularly striking when it impinges on a cornerstone of ethics, namely free will. Almost imperceptibly this, too, is transformed from a substantive feature of the individual into a matter for which genus humanum as a whole is responsible, which means nothing less than that it is shifted into the jurisdiction of the emperor. But this ‘shift’ is almost a form of perversion, for the freedom of the entire human race is thus transformed into the thoroughgoing dependency of the individual. Cf. Dante, Monarchia I, XII,6 – 9: “hec libertas sive principium hoc totius nostre libertatis nostre est maximum donum humane nature a Deo collatum […] quia per ipsum hic felicitamur ut homines, per ipsum alibi felicitamur ut dii. Quod si ita est, quis erit qui humanum genus optime se habere non dicat, cum potissime hoc principio possit uti? Sed existens sub Monarcha est potissime liberum. Propter quod sciendum quod illud est liberum quod

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trine which is only superficially quoted, a difference that concerns the relationship between ontological hierarchy and power. For Aristotle, both are congruent: the ontological valency defines power relationships. Inferiors are duty bound to be obedient.²⁴⁷ Dante’s anthropological justification of universal rule, however, cements one man’s predominance over others, who are basically his ontological equals. The institution of the monarchia temporalis thus brings about the dissociation of ontological hierarchy and factual power relationships. That this institution, however, basically sustains the disruption of the ontological order, exposes its real basis, which is itself ultimately a consequence of an original anthropological defect: the inability of the individual to live up to the virtue that his or her own understanding can conceive of. What we see here is the surreptitious deformation of the pagan theory by a specifically Christian intention. For what emerges from the assumption of this original shortcoming is nothing other than the doctrine of original sin. Post-lapsarian human beings have specifically lost the real essence of human nature: the capacity, with the aid of reason, to act virtuously. The institution of the monarchia temporalis is in effect an auxiliary construction for the post-lapsarian world. Although Dante is well aware that humanity only requires guidance from church and state after the Fall,²⁴⁸ his argumentation, by the persistent use of ontological arguments, glosses over precisely this difference between Creation, as it originally was, and the fallen world. Thus almost imperceptibly and in a variety of ways, he adjusts Aristotle’s figures of thought in order to deploy them against their original purpose.²⁴⁹

‘sui met et non alterius gratia est’, […] sicut via necessitatur a termino. Genus humanum solum imperante Monarcha sui et non alterius gratia est”.  This congruity of ontological status and a position of power in fact is the source of the crucial problem that faces the Politics of the Stagirite: namely the explanation for the power plays between ontological equals. However, it becomes necessary to establish an authoritative power for the sake of different ontological relations, that is to say the relationship of the whole to the part. An authority is needed which has the power to sustain the unity of the whole, which is composed of its different parts. Aristotle’s state-political construction may in a sense be described as an attempt to mediate between these two ontological demands.  Dante, Monarchia III, IV,14: “Preterea, cum ista regimina sint hominum directiva in quosdam fines, ut infra patebit, si homo stetisset in statu innocentie in quo a Deo factus est, talibus directivis non indiguisset: sunt ergo huiusmodi regimina remedia contra infirmitatem peccati.”  Let us elucidate this with reference to one example at least. As Dante notes in the fourth tract of his Convivio Trattato Quarto, IV, 5, Aristotle’s Politics does indeed tell us that wherever different parts have to be united as one whole there is a conflict between rulers and ruled (Aristotle, Politics 1254 a). Dante, however, omits to mention that this argument is not used to establish power relationships within the state, but to determine who rules in the household, and in the case in question it is – piquantly in the given context – used to justify slavery as a natural condition. The Convivio, however, uses this argument to justify the absolute power of the emper-

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Most notably he blurs the difference by postulating an analogy between divine rule and the organisation of earthly power.²⁵⁰ But this neutralisation of the difference between the status naturae and the postlapsarian distortion of the original order of the world ultimately leads to nothing less than a latent ontologisation of the state of the world damaged by the Fall from Grace. This ontologisation of the fallen world cannot fail to leave its mark on the theology of history, which, in the establishment of the universal monarchy by the Roman Emperor provides an explanation for the specific point in time of the Incarnation. For salvation history is above all a history of the founding of the monarchia temporalis, its aim is to establish the preconditions of the Incarnation itself. However, the ontologisation of salvation history implied by this comes above all to light in the fact that the course of this history, the progressive establishment of a universal imperium, is turned into the causal history of the advent of the Redeemer. But the Incarnation in fact means the completion of a logical development, that was provided for from the outset – rather than the beginning of a new aeon.²⁵¹ And it almost seems to have been forgotten that

or who must avoid the risks of monarchic rule. For rivalries between a number of rulers lead, as he tells us, to internal squabbles which the emperor can settle in the interests of general peace. Aristotle’s argument is thus seriously distorted twice over. On the one hand notions are applied to the state, which in the Politics are designed for the home. At the same time, for Dante, the institution of the monarchia is designed not to cope with a positive task, but is in itself merely the corrective for the dangers that are always inherent in the possession of power. It therefore does not derive its justification from a natural order, but is deployed to tame unnatural practices. So its real source is in the moral and theological psychology of superbia, which is concerned to prevent the destruction of the basis of human life by the perversions of power (Dante, Convivio Trattato Quarto, IV, 3 f.): “Onde, con ciò sia cosa che l’animo umano in terminata possessione di terra non si queti, ma sempre desideri gloria d’acquistare, sì come per esperienza vedemo, discordie e guerre conviene surgere intra regno e regno, le quali sono tribulazioni de le cittadi, e per le cittadi de le vicinanze, e per le vicinanze delle case, (e per le case) dell’uomo; e così s’impedisce la felicitade. Il perché, a queste guerre e alle loro cagioni tòrre via, […] e quanto all’umana generazione a possedere è dato, essere Monarchia, cioè uno solo principato”.  Dante, Monarchia I,VIII, 2– 5: “De intentione Dei est ut omne causatum divinam similitudinem representet in quantum propria natura recipere potest. […] Ergo humanum genus uni principi subiacens maxime Deo assimilatur, et per consequens maxime est secundum divinam intentionem: quod est bene et optime se habere, ut in principio huius capituli est probatum.”  This is specifically made clear by Dante’s reading of the Pauline commentary on the time of Incarnation. In his Epistle to the Galatians (4,4), Paul the Apostle described God sending His Son to Earth in the “fullness of time”. But Dante puts it as follows: (Monarchia I, XVI, 2 f.): “Et quod tunc humanum genus fuerit felix in pacis universalis tranquillitate, hoc ystoriographi omnes, hoc poete illustres, hoc etiam scriba mansuetudinis Cristi testari dignatus est; et denique Paulus ‘plenitudinem temporis’ statum illum felicissimum appellavit. Vere tempus et temporalia queque plena fuerunt, quia nullum nostre felicitatis ministerium ministro vacavit. Qualiter

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that “outset”, which first set history in motion, constitutes an originary disturbance of the world order, which ultimately is as incompatible with the causality of the course of history as the idea of redemption must contradict all causality. But the real Achilles heel of this construction of history is the instability of the salvational interpretation of the order of power, for the threat to its factual status must be a threat to the redemption process itself. The ontologisation of a salvation history, for which a causal link between the orders of temporality and the divine work of redemption is postulated, is in danger of gambling with the success of redemption itself for the sake of the factual instability of all temporal orders. And it is this danger that Dante encounters in the scenario of the Valley of the Princes. The strikingly contra-factual agreement between the Princes, who are guilty of the factual disintegration of a monarchia temporalis, which represents the transcendental process of salvation, and the figuration of a garden, that prefigures the heavenly Paradise, shifts the perspective from the historic-causal foundation of the imperium to its anagogic meaning. Thus the valletta dei principi appears in the construction of the Purgatorio as a figura for that Earthly Paradise in which the Pilgrim, cleansed of all his sins, will arrive at the end of his journey on the mountain of Purgatory, as a sign that he has been freed of all guilt. Of course the world is still a lacrimarum vallis, and nothing can demonstrate this more vividly than the world’s relapse into a state, that seemed finally to have been overcome when God became Man. But the same salvation history, whose figural potential holds its own – in the Valley of Princes at the foot of Mount Purgatory – against its factual form, in effect remains untouched by the reality of this world. And it is for this reason that the singing of the Princes seems so autem se habuerit orbis ex quo tunica ista inconsutilis cupiditatis ungue scissuram primitus passa est, et legere possumus et utinam non videre.” The advent of the Redeemer is not only very markedly interpreted as a testament to the conclusion of the salvation process, rather the fundamentally precarious role of the events on Golgotha becomes clear in a salvation process of this kind. As commentators have rightly remarked, the allegory of the “tunica inconsutilis”, used to describe the monarchia temporalis, is taken from John 19, 23. But the reference there is to a garment belonging to the crucified Jesus which the Roman soldiers did not dare to tear apart because it was woven without a seam. Basically the connection is already made here between the absence of the Son of God and the disintegration of that political order whose establishment has to lend plausibility to a particular time being the moment when the Incarnation occurred. This conceptual correlation of Incarnation and imperium ultimately links it with the presence of the Son of God in this world. The order of the monarchia temporalis corresponds to the visible God, whose physical presence in this world ultimately sets the seal on the salvation process. Thus the absence of the same God once again endangers the perfect world order – and thus the events on Golgotha significantly become a risk factor in the survival of the imperium. In the final estimate, there is no room in ontologised salvation history for the transcendental work of redemption.

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alien in this space, which is anything other than a vale of tears, but in its paradisaic splendour a promise of future redemption. Even in the darkness of gracelessness, this valley constitutes a “bel soggiorno” and promises lasting “diletto”. Thus the scenario of the valletta dei principi is used to draw a balance against a salvation history that reckoned God’s work of salvation against the orders of temporality and which, nevertheless, could not entrust its certain success to the instability of time. For the transformation of the in fact shattered monarchia temporalis into a figura paradisi at the same time demonstrates the definitive salvational irrelevance of facticity. In the redeemed world the process of salvation is independent of it. Thus the ontologisation of salvation history is matched by a degradation of the importance of history.

II.5 Like a leitmotif running through the catalogue of Princes in the valletta, that Sordello presents to Dante and Virgil, there is the comparison between the rulers and their successors. But this interest becomes distinctly disturbing, albeit scarcely acknowledged by Dante scholars, when Sordello gives an explanation for the as it were regulated moral decay of each dynasty: “Rade volte risurge per li rami/l’umana probitate; e questo vole/quei che la dà, perché da lui si chiami” (Purgatorio VII,121– 123). At first sight we cannot help but wonder that the moral depravity of the mighty should be part of God’s intention, who otherwise leaves no transgression unchastised. And, even more confusingly, as though following a programme He has precisely those succumb to vice who should uphold the virtue of those in their care.²⁵² So here nothing less than the notion of the allloving God is at stake, the God who can only ever want the best for humankind. So why should this God not only tolerate the recalcitrant Prince but even have an active interest in him? Such a grave and at the same time risky adjustment of the image of God, normally presented as the Redeemer, only makes sense if equally serious danger is also seen elsewhere. And in fact, Sordello’s surprising comment does reveal the anxiety which is at the root of this initially merely disturbing claim. For that God, who only rarely grants a good king a worthy successor, is unmistakably a God concerned to maintain his own power. It seems He is afraid

 In the Monarchia Dante names the protection of virtue as one of the most important tasks of a ruler. See in this connection the comments quoted above on the protection of human free will by the emperor. See also remarks in this connection in Thomas Aquinas, De regno, II,4 (I,15): “[…] ut suis legibus [rex] et praeceptis, penis et premiis homines sibi subiectos ab iniquitate coherceat et ad opera uirtuosa inducat, exemplum a Deo accipiens qui hominibus leges dedit, obseruantibus quidem mercedem, transgredientibus penas retribuens.”

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that, given a filiation of unblemished rulers, He would no longer be perceived as the actual regent of earthly conditions – so it is for this reason that He does everything He can to show that He is the source of all virtue. But this fear on the part of the Almighty that He might lose His all-embracing authority once again reflects the risks of the scholastic concept of an analogical explanation of princely power, which sees in the rulers of this world an image of the ruler of the universe and at the same time uses this analogy as a legitimation for this same earthly power.²⁵³ It is precisely at this point that the scholastic theory of princely power as a likeness of God’s power distances itself from the ur-Christian doubt in the legitimacy of any kind of power that is given to one person over his equals. For Christian thinking saw the existence of earthly rulers as no more than a consequence of the Fall from Grace. As punishment for their rebellion against the Almighty human beings are in return subordinated to their own kind, so that order may be restored.²⁵⁴ Thus in scholastic theology, earthly power turns from a consequence of the Fall into a mirror of the universal order. Nevertheless, this purifying reinterpretation, which develops an ontological principle from a vestige of the Fall from Grace, is not without risk. We have already seen in Dante’s Monarchia that this ontologisation of monarchic power does not take place without also incurring distortions. For Dante’s text had to gloss over the fact that it is only the institution of the monarchia temporalis itself that establishes an ontologically founded difference which has no basis in the natural hierarchy of things. But the risks of this construction are not limited to a latent disruption of the ontological order. They also come to light in the consequences for the analogical explanation of earthly power as a mirror of divine potestas, and these dangers may explain why the Almighty – for the sake of maintaining His own

 In this respect, in his Monarchia Dante is only adopting a scholastic theory of power formulated elsewhere, which he, however, consistently develops into a theology of history, that is to say, into a theory of salvation history. For more on the Scholastics’ concept of princely power as a mirror of divine rule, see, for instance, the relevant explanation by Thomas Aquinas which he develops from an equally unmistakable recasting of Aristotelian categories: Thomas Aquinas, De regno, II,1 (I,12): “Sed quia, sicut supra ostendimus, homo est animal naturaliter sociale in multitudine uiuens, similitudo diuini regiminis inuenitur in homine non solum quantum ad hoc quod ratio regit ceteras hominis partes, sed ulterius quantum ad hoc quod per rationem unius hominis regitur multitudo.”  Cf. in particular the interpretation of temporal power in: Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, XIX,15: “Rationalem factum ad imaginem suam noluit nisi inrationabilibus dominari: non hominem homini, sed hominem pecori. […] Prima ergo servitutis causa peccatum est; ut homo homini condicionis vinculo subderetur: quod non fit nisi Deo judicante, apud quem non est iniquitas, et novit diversas pœnas meritis distribuere delinquentium.”

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unlimited power – should have an interest in Man made in His image also appearing as His antitype. The dynastic transmission of power is in fact a not unproblematic arrangement for an almighty God. For it amounts to a naturalisation of this power, which then competes with its analogical justification. This may be seen not least by drawing a comparison with the original likeness to God that human beings have always had in accordance with the overall design of Creation. Biological continuity is in this case just as conclusive as it is for the distortion of human nature, after the Fall, in the form of original sin. But power over his equals is not intrinsic to natura hominis, which in itself makes inherited qualities risky in this case. The significantly absent question in the Monarchia as to the enthronement of the various rulers in fact proves to be a tricky issue in Dante’s theory of history. The transfer of power believed to be modelled on divine rule in fact demands that the investiture of the new ruler should be at the hands of that same God. But the only logical solution, according to the systematics of the whole, also discredits all the practical alternatives; for every temporal method for transferring power that reflects the power of the godhead, fails to take account of its transcendental foundations, indeed it threatens to turn this theoretical legitimation of earthly power into a risk to itself. Thus dynastic continuity is in danger of turning the similitudo divini regiminis into a natural right. Once again we see one of the weaknesses of Dante’s theology of the history of salvation. On one hand it offers an explanation for the historic process of the establishment of the institution of the world-embracing imperium. ²⁵⁵ On the other hand, however, it fails to provide a theological answer to the question of the continuity in the allocation of power. And thus it is hardly by chance that, now that it is no longer the institution but the figure of the power broker that is in the spotlight, the old Christian moral scepticism towards all earthly potestas replaces any legitimation in terms of the theology of history, and the factual efforts undertaken to secure dynastic power within the – in fact God-willed – order of power becomes a problematic case for Christian ethics. For being in possession of power now contains the danger of superbia and is no longer guaranteed to please God. The ontologisation in theological history of the institution of the monarchia temporalis can as such not be reconciled with the categories of Christian ethics. It almost seems as though this theory of history offers an explanation for the pagan pre-history of the Incarnation, but is unable to cope with the historical process of the redeemed world. Especially the temporality of the

 Dante himself uses the term “processo” in various ways for this (see, for instance, Convivio Trattato Quarto,V, 20).

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latter becomes a problem, for it is unable to guarantee any continuity beyond individual biographies. The logic of this salvation history is incompatible with a set of ethics that does not regard individual worthiness for salvation as an institutionally given guarantee, but only as contingent grace. But this resistance of ethics to the theology of history only reveals what basically already applies in the case of salvation history. For as convincingly as it may also be rationalised in the establishment of an institutional order, which at the same recaps the logic of its course, the centre of any history of salvation – the undeserved redemption from self-inflicted guilt – remains a contingent act which by its very nature contradicts all logic. And it must therefore be for this reason that this God has an interest in demonstrating, through the Princes, that wielding power, which always implies a similitudo divini regiminis, is without transcendental significance. Thus Dante sets the dynastic transmission of this power against the non-transmissibility of the one virtue that is relevant to an individual’s salvation. This quasi biological installation of moral decay once again recalls human original sin, and yet this natural comparison also reveals the change that has in the meantime affected this theological interpretation of reality. For moral deficiency is no longer seen here to derive logically and hence inevitably from original sin; its origins are much more contextual, and it turns into the corrective for a virtue that has become perfectly possible, and whose seamless continuity from one generation to the next threatens to obscure the divine origin of all power. It is no longer the wilful damage to Creation that is to be punished, for now it is a matter of warding off the threat posed by an order which renders the Redeemer invisible precisely when it is functioning best. And it is very clear that this danger is especially alive where power – that has become a mirror of divine rule – is passed down through the generations. Thus, by introducing the God-willed moral dubiety of earthly rulers, Dante remedies the risks incurred by the institutionalisation of power – once understood as the expression of the denaturation of the world initiated by original sin – and its interpretation as a mirror of the process of salvation.²⁵⁶ This remedy has curious consequences. For it is part of

 Incidentally, as in the case of the hymn with which the Princes turn to the heavenly Queen, here we again have a hidden key to the scenario in the valletta dei principi. The last of the pleas which the Penitent address to the Mother of God expresses the hope that she will one day show them her son: “Et Jesum, benedictum fructum ventris tui, nobis post hoc exsilium ostende”. But this very reference to the blessed fruit of the womb of the Mother of God invokes a model that is the diametric opposite to dynastic succession. For it was a contingent, because unearned, act of grace that made the birth of the Son of God possible. In the same sense, the Almighty decides not to endow the princely houses with moral integrity by means of biological inheritance, but to grant it to each individual as a special gift.

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God’s intention that those rulers are corrupt, whose most fundamental task is to uphold virtue. And we have already seen that the transformation of the monarchia temporalis, discussed above, into the scenario of the valletta dei principi, from a salvational institution into a figura paradisi, reduced the importance of the factual state of the imperium compared to its transcendental meaning. The now accepted programmatic damage to this imperium once again radicalises the demonstration of its factual insignificance compared to its transcendental meaning. Nevertheless, the God who is concerned to demonstrate His superiority, and who exploits the negligent Princes to this end, does not thereby also prove that He is still the all-loving God whose sole purpose is the salvation of His creatures. How then can this interest in the corrupt Princes be reconciled with this loving care? An answer to this may be found in the next canto, in Canto VIII of the Purgatorio, although the answer is presented here in the shape of an allegorical scene which in turn raises a whole number of questions. The repentant Princes join together singing the evening hymn Te lucis ante terminum. However, the plea contained in this for God’s protection from the dangers of the night²⁵⁷ is immediately answered in the following scene: Io vidi quello essercito gentile tacito poscia riguardare in sùe, quasi aspettando, palido e umile; e vidi uscir de l’alto e scender giùe due angeli con due spade affocate, tronche e private de le punte sue. Verdi come fogliette pur mo nate erano in veste, che da verdi penne percosse traean dietro e ventilate. L’un poco sovra noi a star si venne, e l’altro scese in l’opposita sponda, sì che la gente in mezzo si contenne. Ben discernëa in lor la testa bionda; ma ne la faccia l’occhio si smarria, come virtù ch’a troppo si confonda. “Ambo vegnon del grembo di Maria” disse Sordello, “a guardia de la valle, per lo serpente che verrà vie via.” (Purgatorio VIII, 22– 39)

 “Te lucis ante terminum,/Rerum Creator poscimus,/Ut pro tua clementia/Sis praesul et custodia./Procul recedant somnia/Et noctium phantasmata:/Hostemque nostrum comprime,/Ne polluantur corpora./Praesta, Pater piissime,/Patrique compar Unice,/Cum Spiritu Paraclito/Regnans per omne saeculum.”

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And indeed Sordello’s promise is soon fulfilled: Com’ ei [sc. Virgilio] parlava, e Sordello a sé il trasse dicendo: “Vedi là ’l nostro avversaro”; e drizzò il dito perché ’n là guardasse. Da quella parte onde non ha riparo la picciola vallea, era una biscia, forse qual diede ad Eva il cibo amaro. Tra l’erba e ’ fior venìa la mala striscia, volgendo ad ora ad or la testa, e ’l dosso leccando come bestia che si liscia. Io non vidi, e però dicer non posso, come mosser li astor celestïali; ma vidi bene e l’uno e l’altro mosso. Sentendo fender l’aere a le verdi ali, fuggì ’l serpente, e li angeli dier volta, suso a le poste rivolando iguali. (Purgatorio VIII,94– 108)

The text itself alerts us to the allegorical meaning of this scene.²⁵⁸ It has rightly been pointed our that this represents a reversal of the temptation scene in the book of Genesis.²⁵⁹ And this connection is indicated by the text itself in that it compares the serpent that now threatens the Princes with the snake that once offered the apple to Eve. Above all the figures of the two angels, with their burning swords, recall the guards that God posted at the entrance to Paradise in order to prevent anyone entering the Garden after Adam and Eve had been driven out.²⁶⁰ But now, instead of keeping human beings out of the Garden of Eden,

 Purgatorio VIII,19 – 21: “Aguzza qui, lettor, ben li occhi al vero,/ché ‘l velo è ora ben tanto sottile,/certo che ’l trapassar dentro è leggero.”  See Cervigni 1988. But Cervigni fails to say why this scene includes the negligent Princes. Moreover it remains unclear why a redemption scene is set during the night of gracelessness.  Forti puts the spotlight on the swords that the angels are carrying and interprets them, along the lines of the two-swords doctrine that goes back to Luke 22, 38, as symbols of the two remedia, the Church and worldly power (Forti 1969, p. 490). Forti’s strongest argument against the popular identification of the two heavenly messengers as guardians of Paradise rests on there being two of them. For indeed, in Genesis 3, 24 only one cherubim is mentioned. At the same time, however, Forti has no explanation for the fact that the angels’ swords are burning – a clear allusion to the relevant point in Genesis – nor can he gave a reason as to why their tips are broken off. Apparently the gladius Dei have been blunted – and so the mere arrival on the scene of the divine emissaries is enough to drive away the serpent. The most important argument against Forti’s interpretation, which he himself has some trouble with (see Forti 1969, p. 493), is provided by Dante himself. For in the Monarchia III, IX, 2 he expressly counters that same interpretation of the passage from Luke as symbols of the two realms. At the same time, problems always seem to arise whenever there is an attempt to determine the

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the angels prevent the tempter from finding a way into the valletta. As obviously as this is a transformation of the original scene in Paradise into its opposite, as puzzling the question remains as to the function this allegory of temptation could have here. For the serpent is threatening those whose fate has long been decided. Its appearance at the foot of Mount Purgatory in fact makes little sense from the point of view of the Princes who are awaiting purgation and who are certain of ultimate redemption.²⁶¹ But a matter that cannot be solved by the immanent logic of Purgatory, can be explained as a figuration of that salvation history which first made the establishment of a mountain of Purgatory possible; indeed, the evening-tide scene at the foot of the mountain amounts to a transcendental nullification of earthly history, which at the same time reveals the meaning of this figuration.²⁶² Of some importance in this respect is Sordello’s comment that the guardian angels come from Mary’s bosom (line 37). Thus a direct connection is established between the Fall and Redemption. The Princes, threatened by the serpent, thus at the same time become representatives of redeemed humanity, which is still exposed to sin, just it is also preserved from sin by God’s protection. And it is for this reason that Eve has been replaced by the Princes, who stand for the institutional order of the monarchia temporalis, whose establishment is the worldly guarantee of redemption. If pride was the beginning of all sin, then the earthly rulers are now especially afflicted by pride; yet the temptation has in fact no consequences. This again shows the same ambivalence that Dante already manifested in the valletta dei principi as a result of his interpretation of history. The establishment of the imperium signifies just as much the earthly completion of

meaning of an allegorical scene in the Valley of the Princes by drawing on only one passage from the Bible. It seems instead that here a number of different scriptural passages have been combined. Besides the obvious reference to Genesis 3, 24 there is also an allusion to the annunciation in the New Testament (see Purgatorio VIII, 37: “‘Ambo vegnon del grembo di Maria’”). That two angels should appear as God’s emissaries is not unusual in the Bible. Thus, for instance, in Genesis 19,1 we read of two angels who come in the evening hours: “veneruntque duo angeli Sodomam vespere”.  This lack of function is all the more striking in that the Princes, at the same time, seem very concerned in their obvious anticipation of the nightly spectacle: “quasi aspettando, palido e umile.” But what can be their cause for concern when their salvation has long been assured?  Musa has taken the hymn Te lucis ante as an opportunity to raise the question as to the Why of this temptation, that no longer has any relevance to the souls of the dead. He, too, remarks on the symbolic nature of the scenery, “symbolizing all Christians in a state of Grace” (Musa 1974, p. 90). But his interpretation of the Valley of the Princes as a symbol of redeemed Christendom neither answers the question as to why the negligent Princes should be the vehicle for this symbolisation, nor offers a reason for its function.

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the work of redemption as it also becomes the source of new sins, in keeping with the tradition of original sin. For the sake of the risks to His work of salvation, this sin even had a part in God’s plans, which ultimately reveals His own paradoxical interest in seeing His work damaged. But this more than accepted questioning of the worldly success of the Incarnation is set against a demonstration of the reversal of the Fall from Grace. Basically, this scene at the foot of Mount Purgatory revokes the Fall from Grace. The repetition of the events in the Garden of Eden amounts to their nullification. The act of temptation becomes the demise of the tempter, because the messengers of God thwart the devil’s intentions. But this scene does not thereby in fact become an allegory of redemption, instead it serves as an allegory of the redeemed world.²⁶³ In addition to which, this world remains in the grip of sin; and the achievements of the Incarnation for this world cannot ward off new guilt, but even themselves incur new dangers. Nevertheless, the sins after the redemption of humanity are sins that have escaped the source of all sin, the mythic Fall of Man. And it is for this reason that the Princes replace Eve. The representatives of the institution that reflects the coming of the Redeemer take over the role of the ur-mother, and scarcely anything could show more clearly than this that the time before the redemption of humankind has lost its importance. The point in time of the Incarnation now seems like the end of all history, whose course is both represented and halted in the institution of the monarchia temporalis. But in this allegorical scenario the salvational act of Christ also nullifies history between the Fall and His Incarnation sub specie aeternitas, because it is not of importance in terms of salvation. And this is why Virgil, although free from all blame, must languish forever in Hell. The changes in the conditio humana after the establishment of the imperium can be seen in the metamorphosis of original sin already discussed here. The universal filiation of original sin has become a contextual corrective, which no longer punishes unintended guilt but which is to free the redeemed world of the renewed danger of forgetting God the Father. Therefore good rulers are followed by bad ones. But sin that is not original sin and hence does not reproduce itself is a forgivable form of sin – and this must especially be so in the case of a

 For more on the scene as a representation of redemption, see Cervigni 1988. Its allegorical figuration first forms the scenario of the Earthly Paradise that starts with Canto XXVIII of the Purgatorio. However, it can be demonstrated that the representation of redemption at that point is itself a conceptual reversal of the scene in the Valley of the Princes. If we have here a figural interpretation of temporal orders, expressing their ultimate insignificance, then vice versa the triumphal procession of the church will demonstrate specifically the dependence of the transcendental process of redemption on the redeemed sinners.

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sin that is of interest to God himself as a remedy for the risks of His own act of salvation. Nevertheless, the Incarnation as the end of history also engenders the ultimate insignificance of the orders of this world and its fate. Therefore it is possible to damage the salvational institution of the monarchia temporalis without incurring irreversible consequences. And this is why in the valletta dei principi the shattered imperium of this world is reinterpreted as a figura paradisi, as a confirmation of the steadfast certainty of salvation, which no destruction can ever impinge upon again. The redeemed world – a world for which Purgatory has opened up the possibility of transcendental revision – exists under the proviso of its ultimate insignificance. This is the message that the scenario of the Antepurgatory mediates in the figuration of this world’s temporality. And now it is clear why the Princes, whose salvation has long since been assured, are still exposed to temptation. For the factual functionlessness of this temptation scene sets in motion the potential of its allegorical meaning. It does not make any real sense, and as such in fact depicts the disempowering of the tempter in the redeemed world. Thus in the end the transcendental figuration of the earthly world in the Antepurgatory proves itself to be a consequence of its relative insignificance: it is only in the eternity of the afterlife that the truth about time will become apparent. But, just as the truth of history in the Antepurgatory is revealed in the figures of those who are still awaiting salvation, so, too, the redeemed world has itself become no more than a period of waiting before the final redemption. The foothills of the mountain of Purgatory are an allegory of our own world.

II.6 If the transcendental figuration of the world thus becomes a consequence of its ontological status, then the Commedia thereby also defines an element of its immanent poetics. And the poet, as Pilgrim, becomes the self-depiction of a poesia that reveals the deeper meaning of reality. This poetological programme still adheres to the concept that is developed in the first tract of the Convivio. The poetic scrittura of the Convivio, which was scarcely different from the Holy Scriptures, was seen there as a structure for the symbolic representation of the truth, which follows the schema of the fourfold meaning of the Scriptures. Only the quality of the sensus litteralis marks a difference between the Bible and poetry, for only in the case of the former is the literal meaning tied to historical truth. It seems as though the Commedia, in its sketch of the Antepurgatory, were glossing

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over this very difference.²⁶⁴ However, the source of this blurring of boundaries may be found in a combination of poetics with an ontological concept, more specifically in the notion of the Book of Nature, which only ever presents the things of this world as signs of a higher world. The Convivio entrusts poetry alone with a programme of complex semiotic representation. And now we see how it is entwined with the structure of reality itself. This connection may be seen in the changed relationship between literal and allegorical meaning: this is no longer the relationship between text and commentary, between a ‘mimetic’ favola and its theoretical interpretation, for now the higher meaning itself becomes the subject of a figuration that is again symbolic. In this sense the programme of multiple scriptural meanings and the ontology of the liber naturae intersect, at the same time throwing light on each other: in the opposition of earthly life and the afterlife the structure of the world itself now represents the semantic construction of the scriptures, and the journey through the afterlife thus logically becomes a figura for a form of poetry that uncovers a higher truth. It seems intrinsic to this combination of the Book of Nature with an allegorical concept of poetry, that poesia at the same time changes from a mode of representation – a modus tractandi as contemporary terminology would have it – into a specific order of knowledge. It becomes the locus of special knowledge, to which one can only gain access by being specially chosen to do so. The conceptual analogy – already set out in the Convivio – between poetic and biblical scrittura is developed yet further in the concept of a Commedia which, from the semantic structure of poetry described in it, develops the model of its own favola, a favola that can no longer be distinguished from a historia: the “bella menzogna” that the Convivio reserved for poets alone (Trattato secondo, I, 3), here becomes a privileged grasp on a hermetic truth. Fiction becomes the home of a higher truth. And in this sense it is only logical when the journey through the afterlife in the sacro poema puts itself at the service of a world which it can show – by means of the knowledge it provides – how to escape its wretched state. Here we can find the reason why the Pilgrim had been chosen by God’s grace in the selva oscura. But this extraordinary claim to truth in poetry can only be founded in a shattered world, which – as a symptom of its own ruin – has frittered away the evidence of truth. Thus poetry just as logically becomes

 The truth of the literal meaning of the Commedia – in contrast to the theory of the Convivio – is also pointed out by Ragonese 1966, p. 166.

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an instrument of redemption as it in fact needs a debased world to justify its own raison d’être. ²⁶⁵

III Dante’s figural interpretation of the monarchia temporalis in the Antepurgatory, its transformation from the executive institution of salvation history to a symbolic assurance of transcendental salvation in fact plays out the conflict between two models of the Christian interpretation of history. It confronts a causal-teleological interpretation of the historical process from the Fall to the Redemption with a figural process, whose uncertain outcome is brought to bear in the juxtaposition of Dante’s Purgatorio and Monarchia. In both cases the revaluation of time is at issue, that time, which first entered the world as a punishment for the disobedience of the first human beings and which brought death to humankind – and which has now become an aspect of redemption and opens the way to eternal life. But both interpretations of time are deficient, the deficiency in one complementing that in the other. The figural interpretation of the course of events offers no explanation for the point in time of the Incarnation. Figural interpretations always presuppose the Redemption, without being able to accommodate it convincingly in history. For only the redeemed world can symbolically carry within it the promise of salvation, and because it always already implies the Redemption, it offers nothing to explain its beginnings. Figural interpretations ignore any passage of time, in order to locate its results in every present. But precisely this, the motivation of the passage of time, is the achievement of a teleologically conceived historia, which puts the specific moment of the Incarnation at its centre. It is able to make the progressive course of events plausible as the continuous preparation for the coming of the Redeemer, yet it is helpless in the face of the transcendental effects of the divine act of salvation. Thus for these interpretations, the post-history of the Incarnation rather logically becomes a history of the disintegration of that institution whose establishment first made

 The continued development in the Convivio of the poetics laid out in the Commedia, which we have scarcely done more than outline here, has some further consequences which we cannot go into in detail here. Suffice it to say, that a crucial matter in this is Dante’s construction of his own history of poetry, which is organised along the same lines as the history of salvation. Thus Virgil becomes a figura Dantis. This categorical upgrading of poesia seems to me important, not least in view of the archaeology of humanist poetics, which cannot as such be described as a counter-model to Dante’s poetology, but as the unfolding of a new definition of the ‘poetic’ rooted in his own work.

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the Incarnation of Christ possible. And in this symmetrical correspondence a figural interpretation just as logically diminishes the, in fact, central event of Incarnation, because it already recognises its effects from the moment of the Fall onwards.²⁶⁶ Causality is thus basically a pattern of earthly temporality. A history built on causality leads to Bethlehem, but is unable to integrate the events on Golgotha. It can only deal with transcendence where that transcendence is compatible with the Incarnation on this Earth. Meanwhile, figurality regards time as an aspect of the constant revelation of transcendence, yet this permanence – which is only the other side of God’s omnipresence – also robs time of its essential feature: the linearity of a continuous course. The Valley of the Princes in the Purgatorio tries to mediate between the two alternatives, neither of which is in itself satisfactory. Thus the valletta dei principi not only appears as a counter-argument for the theology of history in the Monarchia, rather it seeks to arrive at a synthesis of the two.²⁶⁷ For as a figura paradisi, the monarchia temporalis changes from a representation of a justification for the Incarnation into an assurance of the inviolability of its transcendental consequences. But this synthesis can only work in the afterlife on Mount Purgatory, because it appears as the reversal of figural logic: no longer does the earthly world stand anagogically for the afterlife, rather the transcendental place becomes a figura for earthly salvation history. Thus the figuration of the earthly world in the afterlife itself follows logically from the consequences of the interpretation of history as a representation of transcendence. Yet the evident reversal of hierarchies comes at a price, for

 The consequences of the unresolved rivalry between the two conceptions of salvation history are seen not least in the latent arbitrariness in the access to eternal blessedness which is embodied in the juxtaposition of Cato and Virgil. While the upstanding republican, who took his own life, is seen as a figura for liberation from slavery of a very different kind – liberation from the slavery of sin through the death of Christ – and has an important part to play in the transcendental process of salvation, Virgil – without a single sin to his name – must suffer in Hell, simply because he narrowly missed the establishment of the imperium and hence the advent of the Redeemer.  In my view there has to be a question mark over Mazzotta’s attempt to take the structure of the Divina Commedia as a fundamental rejection of any philosophy of history. Mazzotta suggests that the latter is replaced by a theology of history which denounces the insecure footing of all ideologems of history and instead defends the irreducible value of the individual (see Mazzotta 1979, p. 5). A rather doubtful aspect of Mazzotta’s interpretation is his somewhat existential defence of the contingent given as opposed to all forms of abstracting appropriation, which possibly is only superficially an actually theological figure of thought. However, the crucial objection seems to me to be raised by the text itself. For rather than elevating the factual above all rational extrapolations, Dante posits a transcendental scenario that not insignificantly relativises the importance of facticity in a redeemed world, thereby simultaneously reconciling his own philosophy of history with the demands of the transcendental work of redemption.

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the revelation in the afterlife of the truth of this world only serves to lay bare its transcendental insignificance. The effort to arrive at a transcendental reconciliation between the conflicting theologies of history thus becomes a symptom for an implacable paradox: temporality and eternity will never come together in a cogent synthesis.

The End of the Sacrum Imperium From Dante to Petrarch: The Evolution of the Representation of History The periodisation of history must be one of the most successful constructions of humanism. In almost any historical selfinterpretation even today it is generally accepted that an epochal caesura must be drawn between the Middle Ages and the Modern Era. The following reflections take precisely this general acceptance as their point of departure. For in that very acceptance we can see a significant difference between two distinct orders of historical thinking, and this affords a first insight into the epochal break that will be sketched below. In order to examine this difference, it is useful to recall for a moment the, in fact, suppressed etymology of the concept ‘epoch’ as it is commonly used. Epoché in the first instance literally means nothing other than ‘caesura’, whereas we now normally use it to designate a period of time. Epochs of this sort are also known to us as a plurale tantum. Only in the plural do they make sense. In this way our use of the concept transforms epochal caesuras into semantic differences, into oppositions, which bestow on each epoch its characteristic profile as well as its distinctive quality. Understood in this way, epochs – precisely because of the way they operate against the meaning of the word – can be seen as strategies for disciplining contingency. They, as the term space of time demonstrates, convert temporal changes into spatial structures, and thus subsume changes within semantic orders. They also presuppose a certain Olympian detachment on the part of the beholder, who is capable of discerning a structure in the flow of events. Perhaps the eminent achievement of such categories of order can best be seen where the definition of an era basically amounts to a tautology. This can be illustrated with a topical example, so often on our lips today: Postmodernism. The name scarcely says more than what it is not. Nevertheless, a comprehensive sense of self has developed from it, since it mediates for an uncertain phenomenon at least the certainty that it in part forms the identity of an epoch, that is, of an order of life. If one wished to name the prime characteristic of the change that will be the focus of our attention in the following pages, it might be that, in the perception of those who lived through that change, it was not seen as a sequence of two differently defined epochs. The responses of both Dante and Petrarch to their common experience of radical discontinuity rather appear to be complementary consequences of the impossibility of describing the evident caesura as the opposition of two eras – the impossibility, that is, of converting the epoché in https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110637106-007

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the etymological sense into the infinitely more reassuring sequence of two epochs in the sense with which we are familiar. The changes they observed seemed like a skandalon, and were for that reason either to be denied or reversed. Perhaps the trio of epochs which a later phase of humanism was to develop, and which still shapes our perception of history to this day, Antiquity, the Middle Ages and the Modern Era, reflects the explosive effect which the recognition of an epochal break produced. For the Middle Ages, as an epoch, seems like an embodiment of the discomfiture caused by this caesura. The odium of the Dark Ages, a non-time, is inscribed in the semantics of the concept from the outset. But it takes some time before the experience of discontinuity is transformed into the order of two successive epochs.²⁶⁸ While Dante attempts to make the rupture in question disappear by bolstering traditional historical patterns of interpretation, Petrarch accentuates it in order to make the experience of discontinuity itself into a literary model for depicting history. If therefore, from the point of view of the historian, it is possible to discern something like an epochal caesura between the two authors in their perception of time, as well as in their associated self-perception, then it is founded on the marked difference with which Dante and Petrarch react to what is fundamentally the same phenomenon.

I If the loss of order indicated above is experienced so radically here, this is of course an absolutely consistent effect of the Christian interpretation of history. It is clear that the history of salvation can basically only admit of one real caesura: the Incarnation and Redemption of humankind through Christ’s work of salvation. The history of humankind divides logically into the opus conditionis and the opus restaurationis. ²⁶⁹ Other than Redemption no substantial changes

 It thus seems to me that Mommsen’s attempt to prove conceptually that Petrarch himself believed in the dawning of a new age derives from an interest in a form of historical categorisation that directly contradicts Petrarch’s conception of history (cf. Mommsen 1942, esp. pp. 240 – 242).  The distinction in question stems from Hugh of Saint Victor. It might seem that he himself assumes further ages beyond this general differentiation of two epochs: “Opus conditionis in sex diebus factum est. Opus restaurationis non nisi sex ætatibus perfici potest. Sex tamen sunt contra sex, ut idem cognoscatur esse Redemptor, qui et Creator” (Hugo de S Victore, Excerptum Allegoricarum Libri XXIV, Columna 203). One objection to this impression is that the series in question is merely a numerical one, and this in itself levels out every caesura. Furthermore the division of the opus restaurationis into six epochs is just a secondary effect of a certain hermeneutic interest in establishing a parallelism between the account of creation and the history of

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are permissible. But this theological pattern of interpretation, at the same time, takes an agnostic stance regarding pagan history and the changes in it. Yet the theological interpretation of history did also venture into this field, and thus exposed the inviolable transcendental work of redemption to the unstable order of this world. It is to the skandalon of that loss of order that both Dante and Petrarch in their different ways respond, and this brings into play the risks, which any interpretation of pagan history in terms of salvation history is bound to entail. The theologians’ interest in integrating history from the outside the Old and New Testaments into the annals of salvation history is not hard to understand. For only such an integration can establish the Almighty’s universal remit in this world. It is significant that an effort of this kind appears precisely in the text that, with its distinction between a sinful civitas terrena on the one hand and the God-fearing civitas Dei of the faithful on the other, makes a radical separation between all temporal orders and the orders of a Christian life. Significantly, however, this strict differentiation in Augustine’s De Civitate Dei, founders precisely on history, for it forces the author, within certain limits, to revise his systematic distinctions. There are above all two categories which determine Augustine’s treatment of history: in his view history is both a dimension of securing order, and an instrument in the revelation of truth. The specificity of his concept can be seen in the variable combination of these two modes of interpretation, and it will be possible to observe how the decisive difference in Dante’s theology of history develops out of a substantial adjustment of the relationship between these two categories. The phenomenon which brings order and revelation into play in history is essentially that of power. Augustine’s history of the civitas terrena is essentially a history of the organisation of dominion, which in turn is decisively characterised by an underlying, contemptible aspiration to power.²⁷⁰ The temporal state is to this extent a continuation of the Fall of Man. It extends humanity’s rebellion against God’s decrees – itself a result of the dominandi libido of human beings – into political institutions. The civitas terrena is therefore part of that perversion of order which came into being with the Fall of Man; and yet it is, on the other hand, also

the world. (For the significance of the days of creation for the periodisation of history, see: Krüger 1976, pp. 26 f.)  Cf. Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, I, Praefatio: “Hoc vero quod Dei est, superbæ quoque animæ spiritus inflatus affectat, amatque sibi in laudibus dici, Parcere subjectis, et debellare superbos (Virgil. Aenid. lib. 6, vers. 854.) Unde etiam de terrena civitate, quæ cum dominari appetit, etsi populi serviant, ipsa ei dominandi libido dominatur, non est prætereundum silentio quidquid dicere suscepti hujus operis ratio postulat, et facultas datur.”

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a guarantor of the continued existence of the indestructible divine order, which no human misdemeanours can touch. Above all in Augustine’s analysis of the phenomenon of temporal power, we see the extent to which, in his view, the prolongation of man’s contemptible resistance to God’s Commandments simultaneously preserves that same divine order. In the prelapsarian order the power of men over other men was unknown. It was only as a punishment for humankind’s rebellion against God, for the sinful desire of humans to be elevated above their station, that they were subjugated to their own kind. Temporal power is consequently just as much an extension of the Fall of Man, as a corrective for it. It preserves, through the logic of a compensatory reversal of the original conditions, the inviolable (because formally defined) divine order.²⁷¹ The legacy of the Fall is unmistakably inscribed in both the great empires which for Augustine remained the only decisive ones in the history of mankind: the empire of the Assyrians and the Roman empire. He is also concerned to underline the continuity of the two,²⁷² just as the use of the name ‘Babylon’ is in itself a moral judgement on them.²⁷³ If the establishment of temporal power as the extension and the corrective of the Fall is part of the inviolable divine order, it also reveals its reprehensible status. For God purposely puts power in the hands of evil in order to demonstrate

 With regard to this interpretation of temporal power, see in particular Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, XIX,15: “Rationalem factum ad imaginem suam noluit nisi irrationabilibus dominari: non hominem homini, sed hominem pecori. […] Prima ergo servitutis causa peccatum est, ut homo homini condicionis vinculo subderetur: quod non fit nisi Deo judicante, apud quem non est iniquitas, et novit diversas pœnas meritis distribuere delinquentium.”  There is a clear attempt here to present the sequence of the two empires as an exhaustive temporal and spatial order. Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, XVIII, 2,1: “duo regna cernimus longe cæteris provenisse clariora , Assyriorum primum, deinde Romanorum, ut temporibus, ita locis inter se ordinata atque distincta. Nam quo modo illud prius, hoc posterius; eo modo illud in Oriente, hoc id Occidente surrexit: denique in illius fine hujus initium confestim fuit (a). Regna cætera, cæterosque reges velut appendices istorum dixerim.” In XVIII, 2, 2 Babylon is called “quasi prima Roma”; Rome is designated as “quasi secunda Babylonia”. For an interpretation of pagan history that is identical even in its very formulations see: Isidorus Hispalensis, Etymologiarum Libri Viginti, IX, 3, 3.  Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, XVIII,41, 2: “non frustra talis civitas mysticum vocabulum Babylonis acceperit. Babylon quippe interpretatur Confusio”. This name, too, indicates that the empire of Babylon carries on the heritage of the tower of Babel and the linguistic confusion it caused, which in itself is a continuation of the first story of human pride in the Garden of Eden.

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its nullity.²⁷⁴ At the same time, however, the deep ambivalence of power is manifested in history as the locus of God’s revelation. For this same history cannot be limited to the ruinous effects of the Fall of Man alone; it is also the history of salvation, that history which finds its fulfilment in Christ’s act of redemption. Thus the Almighty reveals himself as the God of redemption by making his chosen people great.²⁷⁵ As a reflection of God’s omnipotence, power – the liberation from subjugation – is proof of His superiority, and of His role as the supreme source of all good. The Almighty proves himself to be the All-loving God. God’s self-revelation no longer permits temporal power to be seen only as an order-assuring corrective to the Fall of Man, and therefore as purely reprehensible. Power, as the mirror of the rule of God, can only be right. Thus it seems that in this ambivalent evaluation of temporal power there is a latent conflict between two models for interpreting history, between its interpretation for one as an authority for securing order, and for another as a medium of revelation, between a logical and an analogical interpretation of power and its functions. In a sense this ambivalence relativises the strict opposition Augustine otherwise establishes between civitas Dei and civitas terrena. In fact, he succeeds again and again, with extremely flexible combinations of both procedures, in resolving this double standard as a conjunction of two fully compatible perspectives. While power, for him, is a perverse object of desire, because such a desire on the part of human beings disrupts the God-given order, it is, as God’s gift, just as much a means of bestowing added value on humankind, since it allows human beings to participate in the most of fundamental of His qualities. Just how seamlessly Augustine is able to combine the two perspectives can be seen especially clearly in his explanation of the reasons for Rome’s great stature. If God elevated this admittedly pagan empire above all others, then the granting of such domination is to be understood as a reward for virtuous behaviour.²⁷⁶ More so, perhaps, than anywhere else in De Civitate Dei the processes of

 Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, IV, 33: “Et ideo regna terrena et bonis ab illo [sc. Deo] dantur, et malis; ne ejus cultores adhuc in provectu animi parvuli hæc ab eo munera quasi magnum aliquid concupiscent.”  Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, IV, 34: “Itaque ut cognoscerentur etiam illa terrena bona, quibus solis inhiant qui meliora cogitare non possunt, in ipsius unius Dei esse posita potestate, non in multorum falsorum, quos colendos Romani antea crediderunt, populum suum in Ægypto de paucissimis multiplicavit, et inde signis mirabilibus liberavit.”  Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, V,13: “Quamobrem cum diu fuissent regna Orientis illustria (a), voluit Deus et occidentale fieri, quod tempore esset posterius, sed imperii latitudine et magnitudine illustrius. Idque talibus potissimum concessit hominibus ad domanda gravia mala multarum gentium, qui causa honoris, laudis et gloriæ consulerunt patriae, in qua ipsam gloriam

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interpreting the civitas terrena and its workings are here intertwined with particular complexity. Of course, that power which God concedes as a reward for good behaviour cannot be dismissed outright as reprehensible. It has to be accepted as a reflection, however pale, of that divine attribute which will one day be the lot of the redeemed faithful in the splendour of paradise.²⁷⁷ The granting of great power over other mortal beings becomes in effect a compensation for the fact that the transcendental splendour of paradise must necessarily be inaccessible to unbelievers. Roman rule therefore has to ensure that virtue does not go unrewarded, and that order is thus maintained.²⁷⁸ This construction of Augustine’s is especially remarkable, because it is made possible by a positively virtuoso enhancement of his procedure for securing order, an enhancement which to some extent reflects his efforts to ensure that this order has no loopholes. It seems that it is not enough to attribute the existence of temporal power to God’s punishment alone. For none other than the Almighty Himself is responsible for the establishment of that temporal power.²⁷⁹ This inevitably also means giving up something of His own, and so must be seen to be positive in other ways. Augustine consequently finds a way to declare the unquestionably illegitimate Roman lust for fame to be a mode of disciplining vices elsewhere, and thus turns humankind’s original sin into a source of partial virtue, which requires its reward. At any rate, this is the form that the, in some measure, structural ambivalence of this world takes in Augustine’s theology of history. By reversing

requirebant, salutemque ejus saluti suæ præponere non dubitaverunt, pro isto uno vitio, id est amore laudis, pecuniæ cupiditatem et multa alia vitia comprimentes.”  Thus the orders of the Roman state might logically be declared a figura for paradise, a shadow of salvation. Cf. Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, V,17, 2: “Præsertim quia remissio peccatorum, quæ cives ad æternam colligit patriam, habet aliquid, cui per umbram quandam simile fuit asylum illud Romuleum, quo multitudinem, qua illa civitas conderetur, quorumlibet delictorum congregavit inpunitas.”  Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, V,15: “si neque hanc eis terrenam gloriam excellentissimi imperii concederet, non redderetur merces bonis artibus eorum, id est virtutibus, quibus ad tantam gloriam pervenire nitebantur.” Of course such an upgrading of temporal power obviously entails risks, so Augustine is quick to downgrade the now positive power – which is granted as the reward for virtues that could not be honoured in any other way – as a revelation of the superiority of divine rule (V,16): “Proinde non solum ut talis merces talibus hominibus redderetur, Romanum imperium ad humanam gloriam dilatatum est; verum etiam ut cives æternæ illius civitatis, quamdiu hic peregrinantur (II Cor. v,6.), diligenter et sobrie illa intueantur exempla, et videant quanta dilectio debeatur supernæ patriæ propter vitam æternam, si tantum a suis civibus terrena dilecta est propter hominum gloriam.”  Cf. Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, IV, 33: “Deus igitur ille felicitatis auctor et dator, quia solus est verus Deus, ipse dat regna terrena et bonis et malis. Neque hoc temere et quasi fortuitu, quia Deus est, non fortuna; sed pro rerum ordine ac temporum occulto nobis, notissimo sibi.”

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the original order of creation it prolongs the disruption of that order through the Fall of Man, and corrects it at one and the same time. But it still stands under the rule of a God, whose power and goodness thus continue to be revealed to the fallen world. That the competition between both modes of interpretation in Augustine’s writings does not lead to conflict is explained by their status as universally applicable procedures, constantly amenable to new combinations. Securing the integrity of the order of creation rests on the ubiquitous validity of these procedures themselves; they can be deployed to suit any given context, because they are not bound to any definite realisation. Indeed the ultimately infinite extensibility of such patterns of explanation means that any perceived disruption in the order of the whole world can always be corrected. Given that the very ambivalence of the category of power demonstrates God’s equally ambivalent role in relation to the fallen world, it is hardly surprising that Augustine establishes, at least in outline, a connection between the course of the history of the civitas terrena and that of the civitas divina, that is to say of salvation history. He draws a comparatively weak parallel, limited to a metonymic relationship, to a temporal juxtaposition of the prophecies and the founding of empires.²⁸⁰ It is hardly a coincidence that the most stringent connection is established for the moment of the Incarnation, that is to say, for the moment when all prophecies are fulfilled. It almost seems as if the quality of the connection changes as the history of salvation progresses. For Christ was born just when Augustus established peace on earth.²⁸¹ The metonymic relationship has become an analogical one. The peace of God, which the redemption of humankind brings, finds its reflection in the order of the civitas terrena. At the moment of Redemption the order of the whole world becomes the mirror of the salvation that has now come upon it.

 Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, XVIII, 27: “ut scilicet quemadmodum regni Assyriorum primo tempore exstitit Abraham, cui promissiones apertissime fierent in ejus semine benedictionis omnium gentium; ita occidentalis Babylonis exordio, qua fuerat Christus imperante venturus, in quo implerentur illa promissa oracula Prophetarum, non solum loquentium, verum etiam scribentium in tantæ rei futuræ testimonium solverentur.”  Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, XVIII,46: “Regnante ergo Herode in Judæa, apud Romanos autem jam mutato reipublicæ statu, imperante Cæsare Augusto, et per eum orbe pacato, natus est Christus secundum præcedentem prophetiam (Michæ. v, 2) in Bethlehem Judæ, homo manifestus ex homine virgine, Deus occultus ex Deo Patre.”

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II If one wanted to formulate a main difference between Augustine’s and Dante’s conceptions of the theology of history, the notion of systematisation might appear to be a good point of departure. However, it soon becomes apparent that this only leads to an inadequate designation of the difference between the two positions, because there is more at issue here than a mere increase in logical stringency. Augustine underpins God’s authority over the civitas terrena that has fallen away from Him, by using a constantly adjustable interpretation of it as an instance of the demonstration of the divine order, and at the same time as an instrument of His revelation. Indeed he is able to confirm God’s rule over the unsuccessfully recalcitrant temporal empire precisely through the flexibility with which he deploys these procedures. By contrast, Dante orders these categories in relation to each other in such a way that they establish a fixed order. To designate the corresponding change as systematisation does justice to this difference only to the extent that it leaves a crucial premise unmentioned. Every systematisation implies increased conclusiveness. However, its being possible in the first place presumes a theological concession which does not seem to be in keeping with the increase in rational stringency in the interpretation of history as such. To locate pagan history – the development of the civitas terrena – within a fixed order, is to attribute a stability to it, which from Augustine’s point of view is ultimately unthinkable. What is changed in Dante’s case is above all the semantics of time. Augustine knows time as a dimension of unreliability and changeability.²⁸² It is precisely thus that its origin is revealed, time having entered the world as God’s punitive response to the disruption of the eternal and therefore reliable order. Precisely the instability of all things temporal implies that order itself can only be guaranteed by unlimited flexibility in the employment of the processes which produce that order. Dante, however, transforms time into a logical progression and therefore makes it calculable. To attribute such reliability to the course of events is in the final estimate only plausible in view of salvation history and the Redemption of the world. Logically, Dante’s outline of the development of the civitas terrena turns into a prehistory of the Incarnation. It is essentially teleological in nature, whereas Augustine’s history of the temporal state is above all determined by its beginning, and works out the  Augustine explicitly distinguishes, for example, between the realm of heaven which is immutable, and the temporal empire, that varies constantly because it is subjected to time: “Hæc est religio, quæ universalem continet viam animæ liberandæ; quoniam nulla nisi hac liberari potest. Haec est enim quodam modo regalis via, quæ una ducit ad regnum, non temporali fastigio mutabundum, sed æternitatis firmitate securum” (Augustinus, De Civitate Dei, X, 32).

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consequences of the Fall of Man. This redefinition of time and its function goes hand in hand with the redefinition, mentioned earlier, of the relationship between the categories of ‘power’, ‘order’ and ‘revelation’. If in De Civitate Dei the revelation in history appears instance by instance as a contingent demonstration of divine truth, in Dante’s work it becomes a form of structural representation of divine order. This brings with it a substantial change in the status of temporal power. It is now the authority in which the transcendental order is structurally reflected. Moreover the institutionalisation of temporal rule thus changes its function and is transformed from a fixed record of the disruption of order at the beginning of history, into a representation of that order, which is the aim of all history. But this transformation of the theology of history comes at a high price. For a fixed order is incomparably more prone to disruption. It is consequently a feature of Dante’s theory of history that he not only produces a systematic design, but at the same time strives for a resolution of the risks it entails. These two tasks are, however, distributed in a significant way between different texts. While we find the outline of the systematic theory in the Convivio and in his writings on the Monarchia, it is in the Commedia that we find sub specie aeternitatis the hazardous consequences of this theology of history corrected. In the transcendental reading of temporal history in the sacra poema the awkward consequences of constructing a system are dispelled by means of allegorical hermeneutics. It is significant that here history is transformed into a text from whose signs the hidden message of God may be deciphered.

II.1 The establishment of a basis for determining the time of the Incarnation forms a central feature of the theology of history which Dante develops in his treatise on the Monarchia and in the fourth tract of his self-commentary, the Convivio. The premise for his explanation has to be the assumption that this point in time is justified by an intact state of the world at the moment when Christ became man.²⁸³ But here already one of the risks inherent in this historical construction appears: an explanation of the moment of Incarnation, which is based on the

 Dante, Convivio, Trattato Quarto,V, 3 f.: “Volendo la ‘nmensurabile bontà divina l’umana creatura a sé riconformare, che per lo peccato della prevaricazione del primo uomo da Dio era partita e disformata, eletto fu in quello altissimo e congiuntissimo consistorio della Trinitade che ’l Figliuolo di Dio in terra discendesse a fare questa concordia. E però che nella sua venuta lo mondo, non solamente lo cielo ma la terra, convenia essere in ottima disposizione; e la ottima disposizione della terra sia quando ella è monarchia, cioè tutta ad uno principe”.

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previous establishment of a perfect state of the world, can just as easily marginalise the Redeemer’s work of salvation²⁸⁴ as provide an ontological justification for God’s appearance on earth. For the Incarnation of the Son of God is then mainly a question of the preconditions here on earth. This ideal state of the world into which the Redeemer is born consists, as has already been noted in the cited explanations from Dante’s Convivio, in the establishment of a monarchia universalis. ²⁸⁵ But why is it precisely this that fulfils the prerequisites for the Incarnation? Dante essentially adduces two arguments for this. They are both ontological in character; the first is anthropological, the second proposes an analogical structural model. The first of the two arguments goes back mainly to Aristotelian thinking, which in substance is, however, subject to unacknowledged alterations. Significant in this regard is Dante’s preference for monarchy as a form of state, which contradicts the Aristotelian preference for the polis.²⁸⁶ Nevertheless, Dante develops his position with reference to Aristotelian anthropology, which he, however, revises in one – essential – particular. The alteration in question can be described as a transfer to the genus humanum of categories which were defined by Aristotle in terms of the individual human. For Dante, the influence that individuals have – through their innate reason – over their actions is no longer a matter of individual understanding, for he now defines this function as a communal task of the genus humanum. ²⁸⁷ In this way the individual gives way to a

 In this way the Incarnation basically becomes the corroboration of an already existing condition: “Dico ergo quod, si romanum Imperium de iure non fuit, Cristus nascendo persuasit iniustum; consequens est falsum” (Dante, Monarchia II, X,4). Not least significant in this regard is Dante’s argument that Christ purposely had himself registered in Augustus’ census: “Sed Cristus, ut scriba eius Lucas testatur, sub edicto romane auctoritatis nasci voluit de Virgine Matre, ut in illa singulari generis humani descriptione filius Dei, homo factus, homo conscriberetur: quod fuit illud prosequi” (Dante, Monarchia II, X,6).  It is this fundamental concurrence in the foundation of political theory on the history of religion which casts doubt on the differences between Monarchia and Convivio that d’Entrèves claims to find (cf. Passerin d’Entrèves 1965, p. 34).  With this transformation of Aristotelian systematics, Augustine is in tune with the political theory of the Scholastics. The Aristotelian Thomas Aquinas takes the same line: he legitimises the rule of a monarch as the equivalent to God’s rule over the universe, and therefore attributes primacy to the former (Thomas Aquinas, De regno, II,1 [I,12]; the detailed quotation can be found in chapter “Temporality and Eternity in Dante’s Purgatorio”, note 253). The decisive difference between Dante and the political theory of Aquinas therefore consists in attributing the systematic order of the form of state to a theology of history. The essential difference is based on the integration of time into the systematics.  Dante, Monarchia I, III,7 f.: “Nam, etsi alie sunt essentie intellectum participantes, non tamen intellectus earum est possibilis ut hominis, quia essentie tales speties quedam sunt intel-

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collective, which is in its turn to be organised according to principles that also apply to the individual. Just as the human understanding has to control the baser forces of the soul, so the emperor has to lead humankind as a whole towards virtue. This constitutes an essential difference to the political thinking of Aristotle: in his view the community is responsible for solving communal tasks. In Dante’s construction of a monarchia temporalis the community, as represented by the autocratic ruler, takes over the tasks of the individual. Communality itself is in this way basically absorbed into a hierarchic relationship between the many and the one.²⁸⁸ Instead of forming an order of just participation in the whole, it is now based on an order of rule. This results in a further substantial difference from the Aristotelian doctrine which is only superficially quoted, a difference that concerns the relationship between ontological hierarchy and factual power. For Aristotle, both are congruent: the ontological rank defines the power relationships. Inferiors are duty bound to be obedient.²⁸⁹ Dante’s anthropological justification of universal rule, however, cements one man’s predominance over others, who are basically his ontological equals. The institution of the monarchia temporalis thus brings about the dissociation of the ontological hierarchy from the political conditions of power. That lectuales et non aliud, et earum esse nichil aliud quam intelligere quod est quod sunt; quod est sine interpolatione, aliter sempiterne non essent. Patet igitur quod ultimum de potentia ipsius humanitatis est potentia sive virtus intellectiva. Et quia potentia ista per unum hominem seu per aliquam particularium comunitatum superius distinctarum tota simul in acti reduci non potest, necesse est multitudinem esse in humano genere, per quam quidem tota potentia hec actuetur”.  This shift is particularly striking wherever it affects free will, a central issue for ethics. Here, too, it is shifted almost imperceptibly from a substantive feature of the individual to the responsibility of the genus humanum, which can only mean that it becomes the prerogative of the Emperor. This ‘shift’ actually amounts to a ‘perversion’, freedom turns into bondage. (Dante, Monarchia I, XII,6 – 9): “hec libertas sive principium hoc totius nostre libertatis est maximum donum humane nature a Deo collatum – sicut in Paradiso Comedie iam dixi – quia per ipsum hic felicitamur ut homines, per ipsum alibi felicitamur ut dii. Quod si ita est, quis erit qui humanum genus optime se habere non dicat, cum potissime hoc principio possit uti? Sed existens sub Monarcha est potissime liberum. Propter quod sciendum quod illud est liberum quod ‘sui met et non alterius gratia est’, ut Phylosopho placet in hiis que De simpliciter ente. Nam illud quod est alterius gratia necessitatur ab illo cuius gratia est, sicut via necessitatur a termino. Genus humanum solum imperante Monarcha sui et non alterius gratia est”.  The result of this congruity of ontological status and position of power is the crucial problem facing the politics of the Stagirite: the establishment of power relationships between ontological equals. The establishment of an authority of power is, however, required for another ontological relationship, that of the part to the whole. An authority that disposes of all power is needed to ensure the unity of the whole, which is composed of its component parts. Aristotle’s state-political construction can in some respects be described as an attempt to mediate between both ontological claims.

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this institution, however, basically sustains the disruption of the ontological order, exposes its real basis, which is itself ultimately a consequence of an original anthropological defect: the incapacity of the individual for virtue due to a lack of rational control. What we see here is the surreptitious deformation of the pagan theory by a specifically Christian intention. For what emerges from the assumption of this original shortcoming is nothing other than the doctrine of original sin. Post-lapsarian human beings have lost precisely the real essence of human nature: the capacity, with the aid of reason, to act virtuously. The institution of the monarchia temporalis is in effect an auxiliary construction for the post-lapsarian world. Although Dante is well aware that humanity only requires guidance from church and state after the Fall,²⁹⁰ his argumentation, by the consistent use of ontological arguments, glosses over precisely this difference between Creation, as it originally was, and the fallen world.²⁹¹ In this way Dante almost imperceptibly and in a variety of ways adjusts Aristotle’s figures of thought in order to deploy them against their original purpose.²⁹²

 Dante, Monarchia III,4,14: “Preterea, cum ista regimina sint hominum directiva in quosdam fines, ut infra patebit, si homo stetisset in statu innocentie in quo a Deo factus est, talibus directivis non indiguisset: sunt ergo huiusmodi regimina remedia contra infirmitatem peccati.”  This seems to me to be the position which Dante adopts in the much debated question of whether he viewed the state as belonging to the natural order, or as having been established by God’s providential intervention as a consequence of the Fall (for more on this controversy cf. Lumia 1965, p. 56). The main feature of Dante’s position is that he abolishes the opposition in question. As is incontrovertibly stated in the Monarchia III,4,14, without Adam’s fall, there would have been no need for either the State or the Church, since both are God’s merciful answers to humankind’s misdemeanour. It is equally incontrovertible that this correction of the fallen world becomes ontological in Dante’s writings. The imperium as the institution, within which the Son of God was to become man, in some ways anticipates the work of Redemption in this ontological form, which is designed to restore to the world its original intact order. It proves essential to co-ordinate the establishment of systematic relations with the dimension of time.  Let us take one example. One can in fact, as Dante notes in the fourth tract of the Convivio (Trattato Quarto, IV, 3 f.), read in Aristotle’s Politics that there is always a contradiction between the rulers and the ruled, wherever different parts have to be contained within one whole (Aristotle, Politics, 1254 a). Dante, however, omits to mention that this argument is not used to establish power relationships within the state, but to determine who rules in the household, and in the case in question it is – piquantly in the given context – used to justify slavery as a natural condition. The Convivio, however, uses this argument to justify the absolute power of the emperor who must avoid the risks of monarchic rule. For rivalries between a number of rulers lead, as he tells us, to internal squabbles which the emperor can settle in the interests of general peace. Aristotle’s argument is thus seriously distorted twice over. On the one hand notions are applied to the state, which in the Politics are designed for the home. At the same time, for Aristotle, the institution of the monarchia is designed not to cope with a positive task, but is in itself merely

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It is especially at this point that the difference to Augustine’s theology of history and the task that it foresees for the establishment of temporal power comes to light. Instead of perpetuating the Fall of Man and at a stroke punishing it by inverting the dependency relationships, the institution of temporal rule is now allotted an ontological stability, whose aim is to consign the legacy of original sin to oblivion. In particular, a postulated analogy between divine rule and the organisation of temporal power serves this purpose.²⁹³ I have already indicated that one substantive difference between Augustine’s and Dante’s conceptions of history is the conversion of contingent revelation into structural representation. I can now give a more precise assessment of this difference. History as the prehistory of the Incarnation presents itself as the progressive representation of a transcendental order, which is in turn an order of domination. Securing order in a fallen world is not achieved with the aid of universally applicable corrective procedures, but by means of the progressive optimisation of an initially corrupt state of the world. That this basically turns the Incarnation into a figure of representation, a confirmation of the completion of a process that preceded it, has two especially risky effects. On the one hand, as already mentioned, the role of transcendental redemption in such a theology of history remains uncertain, and the events on Golgotha to an extent disappear behind those in Bethlehem. On the other hand the teleological history, which develops towards and is completed by the Incarnation, turns into a risk for the times after Christ’s presence on Earth, since history in fact does not end with the Incarnation. This danger appears especially grave, in that the representation of salvation in the orders of this world now subordinates the reliability of the Redemption to the ongoing instability of this world. For this reason the factual experience of the collapse of

the corrective for the dangers that are always inherent in the possession of power. It therefore does not derive its justification from a natural order, but is deployed to tame unnatural practices. So its real source is in the moral and theological psychology of superbia, which is concerned to prevent the destruction of the basis of human life by the perversions of power: “Onde, con ciò sia cosa che l’animo umano in terminata possessione di terra non si queti, ma sempre desideri gloria d’acquistare, sì come per esperienza vedemo, discordie e guerre conviene surgere intra regno e regno, le quali sono tribulazioni delle cittadi, e per le cittadi de le vicinanze, e per le vicinanze delle case, (e per le case) dell’uomo; e così s’impedisce la felicitade. Il perché, a queste guerre e alle loro cagioni tòrre via, conviene di necessitade tutta la terra, e quanto all’umana generazione a possedere è dato, essere Monarchia cioè uno solo principato” (Convivio Trattato Quarto, IV, 3 f.).  Dante, Monarchia I,VIII, 2– 5: “De intentione Dei est ut omne causatum divinam similitudinem representet in quantum propria natura recipere potest. […] Ergo humanum genus uni principi subiacens maxime Deo assimilatur, et per consequens maxime est secundum divinam intentionem: quod est bene et optime se habere, ut in principio huius capituli est probatum.”

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the monarchia universalis, that is the disintegration of the Roman Empire, becomes for Dante an unacceptable skandalon, which consequently must be eliminated. Augustine’s combination of the structural instability of the world and the constancy in the use of the principles which were applied, as each case required, to reconcile this irreducible instability with an equally unshakeable transcendental order, proves by contrast to be incomparably more resistant to all the vicissitudes of a history which did not come to an end with the Incarnation. That Dante himself therefore felt concerned about the threat to the work of redemption, is then in significant part an effect of his teleological conception of history. His concern follows logically from his theoretical appropriation of the effects of the Redemption for the way things work in this world, that is, from the interpretation of time as the structural representation of transcendental order. Neutralising these risks is the task for the text of the Commedia. ²⁹⁴ Viewing the terrestrial world from the afterlife is intended to correct the consequences which arise from the appropriation of transcendence for the orders of this world. Dante tries to do this at several places in the sacro poema. Thus in the valletta dei principi des Purgatorio he sets out an interpretation of the imperium, which proclaims this political institution to be a figural promise of paradise, and thus relegates its factual existence to secondary status.²⁹⁵ Likewise, in Canto VI of Paradiso, where the Pilgrim meets Justinian, he sets out a hermeneutic view of history, which is intended to protect its course from all putative damage. This meeting will be the subject of scrutiny in the following pages.

 For the opposite view cf. Ferrante, where extensive congruity is assumed between the positions in both the Monarchia and the Commedia. The text of the sacro poema is then allotted the task of illustrating the theoretical framework with concrete examples (cf. J. M. Ferrante 1984, p. 76 and pp. 126 ff.). An analogous position is found in Armour 1989. As the following demonstrates, the compass of the poetic text is not limited to the merely didactic function of illustration. It is more that the narrative text places a complementary interpretation of history alongside the theoretical one. (The basic congruence outlined by Ferrante and Armour between the positions which Dante adopts in the Commedia and in the Monarchia tract is not the unanimous opinion of the secondary literature. With regard to other phenomena and for other reasons than those under discussion here Goudet 1969, pp. 147 ff., established significant differences between the two works.)  What this achieves is a reversal of the relationship between symbolism and temporality. The orientation of the figura towards the future turns a congruence of this world and the next into a herold of the future, and renders factual events at any given moment secondary to their final meaning (for more on this see the chapter “Temporality and Eternity in Dante’s Purgatorio”).

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II.2 In the sphere of Mercury, Dante meets Justinian. The very words²⁹⁶ with which the renewer of the imperium greets the Pilgrim show the changed balance between life on Earth and the afterlife in comparison to the theoretical tracts: “O bene nato a cui veder li troni del trïunfo etternal concede grazia prima che la milizia s’abbandoni, del lume che per tutto il ciel si spazia noi semo accesi; e però, se disii di noi chiarirti, a tuo piacer ti sazia.” (Paradiso V,115 – 120)

Victory and struggle now determine the relationship between Heaven and Earth. Proving yourself in the campaign of life precedes the final triumph. The fact that the military commander and Emperor Justinian, who is therefore the imperator in the double sense of this word, greets Dante with such a periphrasis, is significant in various ways. It is unmistakable that on the one hand a specific concept of ethics lies behind his metaphors. Christian thinking has repeatedly understood virtue as sustained triumph over all temptations, as a successful repudiation of the tempter and antagonist of God, whose continuous onslaughts turn human life into permanent agon. At the same time the metaphors of armed struggle point ahead to the story which Justinian will tell in the next canto, the history of the Roman Empire, which he similarly depicts as permanent agon, a struggle waged under the emblem of the eagle, the Roman military standard. Thus the perspectives of history and ethics become intertwined, and the life of the individual human corresponds to the course of history as a whole. The struggle to establish temporal rule thus also becomes a mythical defence against evil. Already at this point a first significant difference from the theory developed in the Monarchia and the Convivio emerges. History no longer appears as a progressive representation of a transcendental order, but as an agonal confrontation with the powers of evil. Structure is replaced by myth. But while pagan history thus acquires ethical validation, ethics as such does not emerge unscathed from its mediation through this history. Especially the end of Justinian’s speech will demonstrate this in a thoroughly surprising revaluation of earthly fame. The transformation of history from an order of structural representation into a mythical order of struggle for the just cause goes hand in hand with a symbolic coding of this history, whose transcendental dimension can now be hermeneuti-

 Brezzi points out the exceptional position of Justinian’s speech in the Commedia, in which no other figure is given a full canto without an intrusion by the narrator (cf. Brezzi, 1986).

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cally revealed.²⁹⁷ Indeed, Justinian’s account of Roman history turns it into a history of signs in which its own meaning is revealed. Even the grammatical structures of his narratives can be read as a revelation of the divine will: “Poscia che Costantin l’aquila volse contr’ al corso del ciel, ch’ella seguio dietro a l’antico che Lavina tolse, cento e cent’ anni e più l’uccel di Dio ne lo stremo d’Europa si ritenne, vicino a’ monti de’ quai prima uscìo; e sotto l’ombra de le sacre penne governò ’l mondo lì di mano in mano, e, sì cangiando, in su la mia pervenne. Cesare fui e son Iustinïano, che, per voler del primo amor ch’i’ sento, d’entro le leggi trassi il troppo e ’l vano.” (Paradiso VI,1– 12)

This is how Justinian begins his response to the first of Dante’s two questions, inquiring about the identity of his interlocutor. Even these few lines on their own encode large parts of the theological history which is spelt out in these cantos of the Paradiso. What is significant in the first instance, is the fact that Justinian reveals his identity with recourse to a story, thereby revealing himself to be part of that story. His identity is thus in great measure conditioned by its prehistory. Equally significant is the moment with which he chooses to begin his story. According to the external data, he is talking about the transfer of the cap The allegorical coding of the narrative is signalled equally allegorically at the end of Canto V (Paradiso V,133 – 139): “Sì come il sol che si cela elli stessi/per troppa luce, come ’l caldo ha róse/le temperanze d’i vapori spessi,/per più letizia sì mi si nascose/dentro al suo raggio la figura santa;/e così chiusa chiusa mi rispuose/nel modo che ’l seguente canto canta”. Not only is the double encoding (“chiusa chiusa”) indicated as such, but the basis of this coding is indicated at the same time. It is developed from the light symbolism of salvation, which designates both the fruitio divina and the superior knowledge of the Blest, whereby each naturally belongs together with the other (Paradiso V,118 – 120): “‘del lume che per tutto il ciel si spazia/noi semo accesi; e però, se disii/di noi chiarirti, a tuo piacer ti sazia’”. But the information offered to the Pilgrim in these words of Justinian’s finds a limitation in the mortal man’s limited faculty of comprehension. Transcendental illumination is only partly accessible to the Pilgrim, which means that it is impossible for him to absorb the information. The impossibility of looking directly into the dazzling light finds its semiotic correspondence in an allegorically encoded speech which is announced for the next canto. The duplicated adjective chiusa chiusa is subtly made into the junction between the designation of the light which conceals itself and the encoded speech, whose modo is thereby also named. The transition to enigmatic speech is achieved in large measure by prominent stylistic features in both the final lines. For, significantly, the duplication chiusa chiusa corresponds chiastically to the repetition “canto canta”.

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ital of the imperium romanum by the Emperor Constantine to Byzantium in the year 330. But it is only the multiple rhetorical encoding of this event that reveals its deeper meaning. “Poscia che Constantin l’aquila volse contr’ al corso del ciel”: Crucial to the integrative conception of history being developed here, is the metonymic substitution of the emblem of the Roman army for the empire.²⁹⁸ While this shift introduces an interpretation of the imperium as the institution of permanent agon, at the same time the aim of this enduring struggle also becomes visible. A conclusive indication of this is contained in the periphrasis “l’uccel di dio”, which of course primarily indicates the mythological connection between Jupiter and the eagle, but, because of the way it is formulated, inevitably brings the Christian God to mind. It is important in this regard that the eagle in the Middle Ages was widely held to be a figura Christi; and precisely this symbolic potential provides the key to the programme of theological history being developed here.²⁹⁹

 Cf. Mazzotta 1979, pp. 180 f.: “By focusing on the eagle as the emblem of history, Dante shows the typological unity of history, its continuous renewal as it appears to be defeated by its enemies. Further, by telling the story of the empire through its emblem, Dante implies that history is a representation and a purely symbolic construct; by this implication, he manages to preserve a crucial distinction between the providential, immutable structure of history and the changing process of events.” However, it seems to me that Mazzotta’s conclusion, which turns history itself into a merely symbolic construct that is immune to facticity, is in the final estimate a modern, if not even post-modern premise for this deeply figural medieval concept. On the contrary, history here is more than mere representation; focusing on the eagle as the sign that stands for it in fact has a hermeneutic effect on the given. Instead of preserving the integrity of the salvational programme from the vicissitudes of historical events that are beyond its control, it enables the course of events itself to be read as the reality in which the work of salvation comes to fruition. As can now be demonstrated in detail, Dante in a sense develops a semiotics of the Incarnation. The advent of the Son of Man in this world makes history transparent with regard to the meaning it contains; it permits the radical change to be seen, which His presence within it has brought about. The rhetorical operation of a metonymic transfer corresponds to the transformation the world has undergone through Christ’s act of redemption.  May just a few references from Patristic literature suffice here. A significant starting point for the symbolic exegesis of the eagle which is developed in Patristics is to be found in Psalm 102, 2 and 5: “benedic anima mea Domino […] qui replet in bonis desiderium tuum renovabitur ut aquilae iuventus tua”. For the christological interpretation of this verse of the psalm see, for instance, Maximus Taurinensis, Collectionem sermonum antiquam, sermo 55, linea 41: “Vnius ergo aquilae renouandum in nobis adserit iuuentutem; quam unam et solam aquilam recte christum dominum dixerim, cuius iuuentus renouata est tunc, cum a mortuis resurrexit.” Gregorius Illiberitanus, De Salomone V, linea 178: “Aquilam in hoc loco christum dominum nostrum debemus accipere, qui post uenerandam resurrectionem, qua docuit humanum genus in uitam hominem, quem rapuerat de faucibus inimici.” For the purposes of our discussion here, it is particularly the agonal aspect of Christ’s redemptive act indicated in the image of the eagle that is

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The theology of history which Justinian’s speech sets out translates the structural connection between the political order of the imperium and the Incarnation, which is established in the Convivio one and the Monarchia, into the depiction of a figural agon. The essence of this secular struggle is based in the last analysis on transposing the figural interpretation of history itself into a theory of history. Decisive in this is the transformation of single symbolic correspondences into the permanent condition of a process. Every figura consists in a predictive interpretation of the future, of its implementum. Such figural relationships create connections between single objects, persons, or events: Eve as a figura for the church, the bride in the Song of Songs as the figura for the Mother of God, the exodus of the people of Israel from Egypt as a figura for the Redemption.³⁰⁰ Taking the eagle as a figura for Christ automatically places it in the paradigm of those signs which have their implementum in the person of the Redeemer. However, from such a semiotic relationship, which superimposes on history a series of presages of salvation, Dante, in Justinian’s speech, extrapolates the very historical process which prepared the way for the Redemption. From time immemorial this Redemption had taken an important part in the figural interpretation of history, because it was only the Redemption that enabled this history to be read as a plentiful array of pointers to future salvation. Now, however, history is no longer restricted to the symbolic preparation of the Redemption, the historical process in itself becomes the thing that will make it possible. This is the reason why that mythical agon against the powers of evil, which is the foundation of the imperium’s world domination and therefore makes the Incarnation of the Son of God and the redeemed divine state possible, is embodied in the emblem of the eagle as a figura Christi. Just as the Convivio and the Monarchia once interpreted temporal power as a reflection of the divine order, with the result that the Roman Empire appeared as the complement of the Incarnation, now the pattern of a figural interpretation of history is translated into the structure of a historical process that prepares the arrival of the Redeemer. The work of redemption that ensues from the presence of God in this world has more than a merely symbolic

important. It is formulated more explicitly in VII, linea 112: “Et ut aquila serpentes deuorat et eorum uenena calore coquit interno, ita et christus dominus noster percusso dracone, id est diabolo lacerato, quod humanum sibi corpus assumit, peccatum illud quod hominem tenebat obnoxium tamquam perniciosum uirus exstinxit, sicut apostolus ait: et de peccato damnauit peccatum in carne sua, et alibi: qui cum peccator non esset, pro nobis peccatum fecit.”  Auerbach’s groundbreaking work still sets the standards for gauging the status of the corresponding figural patterns of interpretation for Dante’s Commedia (Auerbach 1938; Auerbach 1946; Auerbach 1953; Auerbach 1971, especially the chapter devoted to the Commedia: “Farinata und Cavalcante”, pp. 186 ff.).

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presence here, while He is still awaited. It is as though Dante were presenting the consequences, in terms of the theory of history, of an Incarnation which was to make a reality of the presence on Earth of God, and whose coming had been inscribed since time immemorial in the fallen world. The basis of this is Dante’s own understanding of the advent of the Redeemer Himself as a historical process stretching over centuries.³⁰¹ The figural announcement of the Redemption therefore turns into its preparation and becomes an ongoing struggle against that enemy whom Christ will finally triumph over on Golgotha.³⁰² The text of the Paradiso provides another still more precise indication of the transcendental dimension of the eagle, when it once again moves into the centre of interest in Cantos XVIII–XX. The cantos in question portray the meeting with the just rulers who reside in the sphere of Jupiter. For our purposes it is especially the scenario directly following this that is significant: first the living flames –

 Here the question arises as to whether Dante views the origins of Roman history as a repetition of the Fall. In this connection Canto I of the Inferno, more precisely Virgil’s perception of himself, is significant. He styles himself as the poet of Aeneas, who came from Troy: “poi che ’l superbo Ilïón fu combusto” (Inferno I,75). Notably, Virgil introduces here the moral-theological notion of superbia which is used to designate the original offence of which the first humans were guilty in the Garden of Eden, and which was thereafter to determine the course of the world until it was freed from this guilt by the Redemption. This seems to indicate a parallel between the Fall of Man and the origin of the empire where the Redemption was to take place.  Dante’s recasting of the figural interpretation, his transformation of a semiotic relationship – the symbolic announcement of the Redemption – into the actual historical process of its preparation, despite its radical nature, is a consistent development of a premise of mediaeval symbolic thinking, and one which is non-existent in modern symbolism, namely the ontological basis of symbolic relationships. To understand the world as the book of nature, and history before the Redemption as its ongoing annunciation, has to mean more than just a semiotic relationship. Such symbolic connections in fact make the reality of this world much more a part of the other world; transience becomes a part of the substance of God’s perfect reality. This is practically the exact opposite of Saussure’s concept of the arbitraire du signe, the theory of linguistic signs that was to become the one and only theory of reality for the so-called post-modernists, a more or less ontological theory that would like to sweep away all ontology. Dante’s theology of history is therefore quite consistent in its development of the premises of all mediaeval symbolic interpretations of reality. The liber naturae is already an effect of Creation itself. It puts the seal on the reading of the world as the work of its Creator, and guarantees His continued presence in the world He has created. The crucial point for figural patterns of interpretation is therefore the historical moment of the advent on earth of the Son of Man. These figural patterns therefore make time, and not the Creation, the dimension of the meaning of the sign. The Incarnation, however, equips the fallen temporal world with the renewed presence of God’s reality, and it is this ontological aspect of the Redemption which Dante applies to the figural interpretation of history. In this context it is more than an array of figurae, it is rather the progressive unfolding of the presence of the transcendental God on Earth.

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which is how the Blest appear to Dante – arrange themselves into two chains of letters which quote the beginning of the Book of Wisdom: “Diligete iustitiam”, then “Qui iudicatis terram”. The ‘M’ of the last word finally turns into a golden eagle which is the embodiment of nothing less than divine justice.³⁰³ This interpretation of the eagle that forms from the Blest as a symbol of justice – which seems to be confirmed by the course of the scene – is not uncontroversial. Although it is consistently corroborated in early commentaries on the Commedia, it has been challenged in recent research, and alternative interpretations have been suggested. None other than Christ Himself has been suspected in the figure of the eagle.³⁰⁴ If, however, one situates Dante’s vision in the sphere of Jupiter in the overall context of the Paradiso, these two readings are not mutually exclusive. In fact this vision makes more obvious the inner connection between the history of the Roman Empire and the Incarnation of the Redeemer which Justinian’s story had already implied. In this way Canto XVIII assumes a deeper meaning, not least in the light of Canto VI of Paradiso, and vice versa. As the renovator of the imperium – now elevated to heaven – had presented it, the luminous vision of the eagle reveals the transcendental basis of Rome’s history. Thus the course of the Commedia itself has a figural structure and can be seen to be a progressive revelation of a transcendental truth which becomes increasingly apparent. The combination of text and image which we find in the vision of the eagle has one further dimension. It turns the community of the Blest into a double form of revelation and permits the Scriptures to flow into the book of nature.³⁰⁵  Cf. Paradiso XVIII, 88 – 114: “Mostrarsi dunque in cinque volte sette/vocali e consonanti; e io notai/le parti sì, come mi parver dette./‘DILIGITE IUSTITIAM’, primai/fur verbo e nome di tutto ’l dipinto;/‘QUI IUDICATIS TERRAM’; fur sezzai./Poscia ne l’emme del vocabol quinto/rimasero ordinate; sì che Giove/pareva argento lì d’oro distinto./E vidi scendere altre luci dove/ era il colmo de l’emme, e lì quetarsi/cantando, credo, il ben ch’a sé le move./Poi, come nel percuoter d’i ciocchi arsi/surgono innumerabili faville,/onde li stolti sogliono augurarsi,/resurger parver quindi più di mille/luci e salir, qual assai e qual poco,/sì come il sol che l’accende sortille;/e quïetata ciascuna in suo loco,/la testa e ’l collo d’un’aguglia vidi/rappresentare a quel distinto foco./Quei che dipinge lì, non ha chi ’l guidi;/ma esso guida, e da lui si rammenta/quella virtù ch’è forma per li nidi./L’altra bëatidudo, che contenta/pareva prima d’ingigliarsi a l’emme,/con poco moto seguitò la ’mprenta.”  Cf. Chierici 1962, who develops the relevant interpretation from the mediaeval attribution, that is amply documented and has been outlined above (cf. note 299), of the eagle to the figure of the Redeemer. Cf. also the excellent review of this book by Melzi 1965.  The relationships between text and image as a medium of revelation are structurally more complex, though it is not possible to go into this in our context, so we can do no more than allude to this in passing. The eagle now also begins to address Dante and to provide information in response to his insistent questions about divine justice. So the scriptures become an image,

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This is already remarkable in that it allows the fruitio divina of the heavenly paradise still to survive as a medium of revelation. The goal of Redemption therefore also names the way by which it is to be attained. The vision of truth in Paradise turns directly into an annunciation. This Paradise, through which the Pilgrim from Earth is journeying seems to be only explicable as a message to this world. In the same way, however, a direct correspondence emerges between the symbolism of history and its transcendental meaning. The interpretation of the form in which the Blest exist as a figure of revelation is basically an extension of the interpretation of terrestrial life as God’s self-revelation in transcendental form, and its purpose is to establish a basis in Heaven for a figural reading of earthly reality. For this reason the implementum itself here becomes the sign, and the difference is basically one of explicitness. The metonymic transformation of the imperium into the history of the emblem of its army is therefore legitimised by God’s equally symbolic self-revelation as the source of all justice in Paradise.³⁰⁶ Thus Justinian’s account of the fate the Roman field eagle, in the light of its figurative meaning, reveals further facets of the underlying interpretation of history. “Contro al corso del ciel”: Constantine transferred the centre of the empire from the West to the East, against the course of heaven, which is of course a reference to the movements of the planets. But this further metonymic switch indicates at the same time, that Constantine’s decision went against the plans Heaven had drawn up, and was therefore against the divine will.³⁰⁷ In this connection the grammatical structure of the sentence takes on a significance of its own. The eagle is in the logical and in the grammatical sense the object, and the subject is Constantine himself. It is striking in Justinian’s narrative that the eagle is normal-

and the image in turn begins to speak. This vision, too, fits into the comprehensive structure of mediating word and image, which runs through Dante’s Commedia and more particularly the Purgatorio. It is to some extent this dual composition of the world (ontologically) as an image of God and (mythically) as the product of His word, that Dante is concerned to mediate. (For more on this see the chapter “Art in the Afterlife or God as Sculptor”.)  It is this transformation of temporal history into the history of the signs of the Revelation, which constitutes the main difference to the conception presented in Dante’s Monarchia. Goudet sees instead in the Commedia an upgrading of the Christian imperium at the cost of the heathen one (cf. Goudet 1969, pp. 167 ff.). However, it seems rather that the semiotic structure of Justinian’s speech, which is linked to a symbolic history, is engaged in a progressive appropriation of the pagan empire, too, for Christ’s work of Redemption. It is a reflection of this progressive integration of pre-Christian history into the perspective of the Redemption, that – at a wholly central point in Christian ethics – there is a revaluation of the Christian catalogue of virtues, which is as unexpected as it is dangerous. This will be further examined below.  Cf. also Ferrante 1984, p. 267.

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ly always declared to be the master of events, and consequently appears as the grammatical subject. Already the lines quoted here demonstrate this. For while Constantine turns the eagle against its natural course, the eagle himself, as is explicitly stated, always followed that course. In this way his transposition into the grammatical object is proof of his offence against God’s will. The syntax here, which seems anomalous only to the uninitiated, shows that the eagle is intended as His representative. When the active agents themselves become the objects of those signs in which the Roman Empire (metonymically) and the will of God (figurally) are combined, then this indicates that it is only in appearance that the visible agents in these events are the bearers of the sign of the secular struggle.³⁰⁸ Thus the work of God in history is even reflected in the grammatical structure. Since the effect of this work is as invisible as it is powerful, it has to be revealed by a rhetorical transformation of linguistic normality. At the same time, the opening lines of Justinian’s narrative also introduce the pagan prehistory of the Christian imperium into the equation. It is not by chance that the text reminds us of the origins of the empire and describes the path the eagle followed, from the appearance of Aeneas onwards: the ur-father himself is thus integrated into that movement which is described as the corso del ciel, and in this way the difference between Rome’s Christian and pre-Christian eras is already relativised.³⁰⁹ But for the theology of history that is developed here, the metaphorical transformation which the figure of the eagle undergoes is of considerable importance. Justinian describes the effect of Constantine’s relocation of the heart of the Empire to the East, contrary to the divine will, as follows: “e sotto l’ombra de le sacre penne/governò‘l mondo lì di mano in mano;/e, sì cangiando, in su la mia

 One point where this switching of the roles of the participants on the basis of – outward – evidence is particularly obvious, is the description of Augustus’s actions as Caesar’s successor: “Di quel che fé col baiulo seguente,/Bruto con Cassio ne l’inferno latra” (Paradiso VI,73 f.). The imperator becomes the mere bearer of a consecrated emblem, whose concealed but actual meaning demotes the emperor to no more than the executor of its influence. Occasionally Dante’s text plays subtly with the uncertainty about the identity of the actual subject of the action. So, in relation to Caesar he says, “per voler di Roma il [sc. il sacrosanto segno] tolle” (Paradiso VI, 57). The following lines initially leave it unclear which participant is intended as the unnamed subject of following the predicate – whether it is the one who grasped the eagle, or the sacrosanto segno himself. By the time Augustus is introduced as quoted, it has become clear that the actual agent remains the same, and only the person carrying the eagle changes. In this way the ambiguity in the grammar reflects the deception of those who fail to recognise the true power relationships behind the superficial evidence of the observers.  Aeneas is not named by name either, but is introduced as the antico who married Lavina. In this way he appears as the ur-father who founds a new dynasty in a new place.

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pervenne”. Here again the sign is declared to be the real lord of the Empire, while its individual rulers appear only to be the successive hands, in which it is placed at any given time.³¹⁰ At the same time, however, the concrete symbol is changed into an allegorical figure. Under its sheltering wings, it rules the world. The eagle thus becomes the symbol of just rule itself and this metaphor anticipates the scene in the sphere of Jupiter when what is here coded in an image becomes explicit. This figural transformation does, however, have one extremely significant side effect. For even when it has been driven back into its eastern provinces the Empire still continues to rule the entire world in the image of the eagle with its outspread, protective wings, “governo ‘l mondo”. The representation of the institution in a symbolic form, which reveals its transcendental meaning, at the same time makes it immune from the actual state of power. Even the de facto regional rule thus remains world rule. But this occasional limitation to a symbolic claim only means a temporary reduction in its factual power. For none other than the ‘I’ of this narrative, Justinian the renovator himself, who bears the name of justice as his own,³¹¹ will re-establish the factual might of the imperium. The theological potential of the imperium, that is expressed in a figural sense by the emblem of its ruler, cannot in the long run be limited in the redeemed world to a merely symbolic meaning. The world domination of the empire in which the Redemption became possible, because it represented the perfect state of this world, must actually exist, and thus it is also to be reinstated anew. The course of history itself also attains a figural quality in this way. If the factual existence of the imperium appears unstable, this instability, too, is ascribed to the fundamentally Christian notion of renewal. The notion of the opus restaurationis is, so to speak, declared to be the immanent principle governing the institution, in which the Redemption took place. Thus the empire becomes immune to the actual dangers it faces, because its occasional weakness or non-existence only belong to that order of renewal, in which the opus restaurationis is enacted time and again. The symbolic potential of the eagle once again is brought to bear, under whose emblem the process of history unfolds. It was that particular quality, which the psalmist ascribed to it – “renovabitur ut aquilae iuventus tua”³¹² – that predestined it to be the figura Christi. It is this text that underpins the interpretation of the eagle as a prefiguration of Christ, and it is in this capacity for regeneration that the Redemption figurally announces itself,

 Rulers, like generals, become mere tools in the divine plan (cf. Iliescu 1988).  Cf. Mazzotta 1979, p. 180.  Cf. above, note 299.

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and which now also determines the formal course which history will follow, and within which the work of salvation will be completed. Dante’s solution, which is to elevate the opus restaurationis to an immanent law that governs history, appears to synthesise quite ingeniously the two notions of the course of history, that distinguish the Christian image of history from the pagan one. Augustine was particularly vehement in his opposition to all cyclical models, because they propagated an eternal return which is not compatible with the notion of redemption. For that reason, he determinedly countered all cyclical theories with a linear model, that recognises the Incarnation as the cornerstone of all history, and negates all repetitive structures for the sake of the uniqueness of the Incarnation.³¹³ Dante’s own theology of history, however, exposes the risks of such linearity, which eventuate precisely when the Incarnation is also declared to be the centre of a representation of transcendental order within temporal power structures. For the instability of such institutions thus becomes a latent threat to the redemptive process itself. It is not least this danger – we cannot go into more detail here – that was the point of departure for the undertaking that began with the Commedia. In itself, it appears to some extent to be an opus restaurationis. So it is only consistent if the transcendental account of the history of that imperium, in which Christ became Man, also serves to correct the overt impression of a dissolution of the Empire. For now its history emerges as that of its own restoration, and the course of that history is thus recast as an ur-Christian figura for renovatio. The cyclical theory thereby becomes an integral component of the history of secular rule which continues to be conceived as linear, and which continues to have its telos in the Roman imperium – except that renovatio now becomes the imperium’s immanent law. In this respect it is significant that the history in question is recounted by none other than Justinian, the grand restorer of the imperium. It seems equally significant that he locates the beginning of the expansion of Roman power at the point where the history of Rome had begun, and to which Constantine, mistaking God’s will, had returned. Restauratio in the Christian sense becomes especially clear as the basic pattern in the history of the imperium, if one includes

 Cf. Augustine’s polemic in De Civitate Dei, XII,14 against the Ancients’ concept of a circuitus temporum, as being irreconcilable with belief in the Incarnation. Augustine’s rejection of all cyclical conceptions of history has further implications. A cycle basically implies eternity. Linear conceptions, on the other hand, imply beginning and end. Time thus becomes a figure of transition (alias pilgrimage).

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Justinian’s account of that history since its beginnings.³¹⁴ The very moment with which he chooses to begin the triumph of the sacrosanto segno is striking: “Vedi quanta virtù l’ha fatto degno di reverenza; e cominciò da l’ora che Pallante morì per darli regno.” (Paradiso VI, 34– 36)

Justinian’s telling of this event, as reported in Virgil’s Aeneid, displays a remarkable narrative structure, which takes on a deeper meaning in view of the salvation history with which the fate of the imperium is also connected here. The event itself is a sacrificial death which makes victory possible. Even the beginning of the career of the sacrosanto segno thus appears as a figura for Redemption, as a prefiguration of that death which was to bring salvation. Thus the fate of Rome in Justinian’s narrative is expressly connected with the incarnation of the Son of God.³¹⁵ It is at this moment that the character of the imperium also changes markedly. Up to this point its history as such has been described as a history of threats repelled.³¹⁶ But as the time approaches for Heaven to lead the world back a suo modo sereno, the expansion of Rome begins.³¹⁷ The expansion of temporal power is therefore directly paralleled by the events leading to the Redemption, and yet there is again an important difference in comparison to the concept in the Monarchia. For it is not the institution of universal rule which in Justinian’s narrative becomes the mirror of divine order, nor is its representation placed in any structural relationship with the Son of God’s entry into this world. Here it is rather the agonal figure of the establishment of power, which under the emblem of the eagle is related to that final struggle which the Redeemer fights victorious-

 This narrative serves at the same time as proof of the failure of all contemporary attempts to oppose the sacrosanto segno (cf. Paradiso VI, 28 – 33).  Paradiso VI, 55 – 57: “‘Poi, presso al tempo che tutto ’l ciel volle/redur lo mondo a suo modo sereno,/Cesare per voler di Roma il tolle’”.  Cf., for instance, Paradiso VI,43 – 51: “‘Sai quel ch’el fé [sc. il sacro santo segno] portato da li egregi/Romani incontro a Brenno, incontro a Pirro,/incontro a li altri principi e collegi;/onde Torquato e Quinzio, che dal cirro/negletto fu nomato, i Deci e ’ Fabi/ebber la fama che volentier mirro./Esso atterrò l’orgoglio de li Aràbi/che di retro ad Anibale passaro/l’alpestre rocce, Po, di che tu labi’”.  Cf. the description of Caesar’s campaigns, which, as presented, are actually no more than the conquest of the world by the sacrosanto segno through Caesar: “‘E quel che fé da Varo infino a Reno,/Isara vide ed Era e vide Senna/e ogne valle onde Rodano è pieno./Quel che fé poi ch’elli uscì di Ravenna/e saltò Rubicon, fu di tal volo,/che nol seguiteria lingua né penna./Inver’ la Spagna rivolse lo stuolo,/poi ver’ Durazzo, e Farsalia percosse/sì ch’al Nil caldo si sentì del duolo’” (Paradiso VI, 58 – 66).

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ly against the powers of evil. And this victory is infinitely renewable, because it is inalienably inscribed into the emblem, in whose name it is won. Finally, in the depiction of the immediate circumstances of Justinian’s restoration of the imperium a distinctly theological reference to the Incarnation catches the eye. For only when the Emperor abandoned the false doctrine that attributed only one nature, one divine being to the incarnated Son of God, did success come his way – as a statesman who renewed the law in the Corpus Iuris, and as the military leader, under whose command Belisar won his resounding and therefore God-willed victories.³¹⁸ Only when the human nature of Christ had been reinstated to its appropriate position in the Emperor’s faith does the – internal as well as external – renewal of the imperium begin. Once again the person of the Redeemer and the might of Rome are in conjunction. In the same sense that the birth of Christ once stood in direct relation to the establishment of the imperium, He regains His former world dominion when the emperor abjures the false doctrine and recognises the presence of both natures, the human and the divine, in the incarnated Son of God. Only theological orthodoxy permits the renovatio imperii. ³¹⁹ On the basis of this connection, however, temporal power once again acquires a theological basis. It is not merely the mirror of a transcendental order, whose establishment is confirmed by the birth of the Redeemer. For the parallel institutions of church and state acquire a christological dimension, and represent the double nature of the Redeemer, which orthodoxy

 Cf. Paradiso VI,10 – 27: “‘Cesare fui e son Iustinïano,/che, per voler del primo amor ch’i’ sento,/d’entro le leggi trassi il troppo e ’l vano./E prima ch’io a l’ovra fossi attento,/una natura in Cristo esser, non piùe,/credea, e di tal fede era contento;/ma ’l bendetto Agapito, che fue/ sommo pastore, a la fede sincera/mi dirizzò con le parole sue./Io li credetti; e ciò che ’n sua fede era,/vegg’ io or chiaro sì, come tu vedi/ogne contradizione e falsa e vera./Tosto che con la Chiesa mossi i piedi,/a Dio per grazia piacque di spirarmi/l’alto lavoro, e tutto ’n lui mi diedi;/e al mio Belisar commendai l’armi,/cui la destra del ciel fu sì congiunta,/che segno fu ch’i’ dovessi posarmi’”. The juxtaposition of law reform and territorial expansion, the establishment of justice internally and the struggle against external foes represents exactly those two dimensions of worldly power, which the “milizia del ciel” (Paradiso XVIII,124) symbolises. In the sphere of Jupiter it takes on the form of the eagle that stands for justice – both symbolically and as the guiding force of history. It is hardly by chance that the reform of the Corpus Iuris itself is described in a way that picks up on the Aristotelian conception of justice: “d’entro le leggi trassi il troppo e ’l vano”. The restitution of the law appears as a regaining of the juste milieu, and is in fact taken straight from the concept of virtue in the Nicomachaean Ethics: in itself a definiens of justice that is proclaimed there to be the epitome of virtue itself.  This postulate of orthodoxy is on the other hand central to the theology of history set out here. Only the assumption of the Redeemer’s double nature provides the necessary basis for the construction of a history of salvation, within which the history of humankind can be understood as the progressive realisation of the Incarnation of God and the necessary preconditions.

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defends against all false doctrines.³²⁰ For that reason the expansion of the Roman Empire is connected just as much with the coming of Christ as with the rehabilitation of the proper faith in his true being. And because temporal power is simultaneously ascribed to the mythical agon for salvation, the victory, once won, can be repeatedly renewed, because it is an irreversible victory. At the same time, the opus restaurationis thus proves itself to be the immanent law of the institution, under whose rule the events of the Redemption took place. When cyclical and linear history are theologically reconciled in this manner, when damage to the Empire cannot ultimately harm it, because the Empire itself is a component in the Redemption figure for the restauratio, then it has become immune to the risks inherent in an interpretation of the history of the civitas terrena as a progressive, but, with the Incarnation, dangerously terminated representation of divine order in this world. There is a price to pay for Dante’s forcible theologisation of the history of the imperium, which is now also absorbed into a metonymic representative that encodes its role in the history of salvation, in the same way as the course of this history is subsumed in the ur-Christian figure of the renovatio. This consequence is seen with striking cogency in the field of ethics. For directly subsuming the actions of the individual ruler under the operation of the sacrosanto segno, in which nothing less than the hand of God manifests itself, to some extent relativises their individual-ethical validity. The actions of these men of power are in large measure appropriated for the planned salvation, whose fulfilment their actions promote, as a result of which they cannot ultimately be anything other than good. Consequently they cannot fail to be rewarded in the afterlife. This, however, is to grant such a reward to persons, who, according to the traditional stance of Christian moral doctrine, would already have squandered it. This inversion of values reveals Justinian’s answer to Dante’s second question. For not only is the Pilgrim anxious to discover who is coming to meet him; he also wants to know why he is meeting these blest persons in the sphere of a star whose light is hidden from humankind by the rays of the sun:³²¹ “Questa picciola stella si correda d’i buoni spirti che son stati attivi, perché onore e fama li succeda:

 That Dante has the relationship of both institutions in mind can be seen explicitly in the text, for as a result of his conversion to the right faith he states: “Tosto che con la Chiesa mossi i piedi”.  Paradiso V,127– 129: “‘ma non so chi tu se’, né perché aggi,/anima degna, il grado de la spera/che si vela a’ mortai con altrui raggi’”.

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e quando li disiri poggian quivi, sì disvïando, pur convien che i raggi del vero amore in sù poggin men vivi. Ma nel commensurar d’i nostri gaggi col merto è parte di nostra letizia, perché non li vedem minor né maggi. Quindi addolcisce la viva giustizia in noi l’affetto sì, che non si puote torcer già mai ad alcuna nequizia. Diverse voci fanno dolci note; così diversi scanni in nostra vita rendon dolce armonia tra queste rote.” (Paradiso VI,112– 126)

These words uttered by Justinian are remarkable in several respects, since they not only revise a central feature of Christian ethics, they also cast a rather astonishing light on the mental disposition of the Blest. To start with the first point: it is more than a little surprising to find people admitted to Paradise, who on Earth had striven for temporal fame. The lust for gloria, the desire to attain superiority over others through fame would inevitably have had to seem highly suspect to Christian moral doctrine, in that it was a continuation of the original iniquity through which sin – and hence all misery – came into the world. The person who strives for gloria makes him or herself guilty of the most heinous of deadly sins, superbia. We could already observe in Augustine’s De Civitate Dei that the establishment of Roman power was accompanied by certain concessions in relation to the unconditional condemnation of the various forms of lust for fame. Even the author who, more than any other, stressed the role of temporal power in the perversion of the original order of creation, is, as far as history is concerned, more lenient in his judgement of the rule of man over man. For him this slight concession could be legitimised: in the categories of the ethics he postulated elsewhere, even if the theological duplicity of power itself also came to light in the process. For such power constantly fluctuates between perverse object of desire, and participation, granted by the grace of God, in divine glory. In this sense heathens who had rendered supreme service to the empire were rewarded for their virtuous efforts with power that elevated them above all others. The fact that this virtus has its source equally in an illegitimate lust for gloria, is corrected by Augustine with a recapitulation of ethical arguments: striving for great fame shields against other scandalous vices. But the reward that falls to the successful founders of Rome’s greatness ultimately remains an ambivalent gain. As a partial reflection of divine power it is an entirely appropriate reward for virtuous behaviour. But because this temporal power is on the other hand a consequence of the Fall, the dubious morality of the action still cor-

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responds to the questionable nature of holding such power, which always has a hand in the perversion of the original order in the fallen world. Dante eliminates any such contradictions. In his writings, the power seekers who have rendered sterling service to the empire receive their divine reward. And in doing so Dante offers no secondary ethical justification – on the basis of other individual achievements – for admitting to Paradise those who lusted for power. Whereas in the writings of Augustine the differentiation between temporal – hence ultimately inconsequential – rewards, and transcendental glory remains intact, Dante modifies this differentiation into a distinction between different degrees of heavenly grace. The rather unspectacular introduction into Paradise of personas who on Earth were obsessed with gloria, and the extremely extensive, if also unspoken abandonment of a central tenet of Christian ethics, only make sense if one relates them to the theologisation of the process elsewhere, which for Dante is achieved by the imperium and what he sees as its salvational development. The, for the ethics of the Commedia, central opposition of personal intention and effective success is largely dispensed with here in the face of actions carried out under God’s instruction and contributing towards the realisation of His work of earthly salvation, the effect of which outweighs their motivation. So as a last way out, all that remains is to convert the traditional ethical distinction into a differentiation of the degree of grace that will accrue in each case. The theologisation of temporal power in effect revises a central tenet of Christian ethics, which had always been predicated on individual action, the validity of which is, however, diminished by the primacy of the collective work of salvation.³²²  That Dante is concerned that precisely these individual ethics should remain in force can be seen especially clearly in the figure of the Emperor Constantine. It is incontrovertibly clear from Justinian’s account that in transferring the imperial capital to the East he was acting against the will of God. At the same time the Pilgrim finds Constantine among the just rulers in the sphere of Jupiter. The reason that the eagle gives Dante for Constantine’s elevation to this sphere of Paradise virtually turns him into a demonstration of the validity of an ethical system that evaluates individual intentions and turns a blind eye to the factual consequences of the individual’s actions (Paradiso XX,55 – 60): “L’altro che segue, con le leggi e meco/sotto buona intenzion che fe’ mal frutto,/per cedere al pastor si fece greco:/ora conosce come il mal dedutto/dal suo bene operar non li è nocivo,/avvegna che sia ’l mondo indi distrutto”. It almost seems as if there is an interest developing here in using precisely the person who acts counter to the salvational plan for this world, to prove the continuing validity of an ethical system that judges actions by the intention and not the results. It is not least for this reason that it makes sense to elevate the man who damaged the empire above its restorer Justinian. (This line of thought cannot be pursued here. However, it could be demonstrated in the cases of several of the Blest, that their elevation to Paradise is more a demonstration of otherwise controversial theological principles, than a reward for their individual achievements. This could be demonstrated in the cases of Trajan and Ripheus whom God had elevated to Heaven although they were not Christians.

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The conversion of the distinctions which had previously marked out good and evil, into different experiences of blessedness, in turn casts light on a very remarkable facet of the mentality of the Blest. For Justinian moves with no little haste to dispel any suspicion that the various degrees of beatitudo might cause feelings of envy in the less favoured among the Blest, which would indeed hardly be reconcilable with the state of undiminished fruitio divina. Worthy of attention are especially those arguments, that he adduces to bolster the plausibility of the absence of any nequizia. This purpose is served on the one hand by making the recognition of the appropriateness of the reward into a component part of blessedness itself. Complete realisation of the truth consequently also requires an ability to recognise the relationship between endeavour and reward. Significantly, however, such an individual explanation for the absence of envy seems to be insufficient. For in an outflanking movement Justinian deploys an argument that is to some extent cosmic. It is only in combination that the varying degrees of grace produce that complete harmony, that leads to eternal order.³²³ There is an interesting tradition relating to this aesthetic argument for the establishment of the harmony of the whole. For Augustine already uses a very similar explanation for the participation of evil in the perfect whole of creation, which cannot be diminished by this malum. Just as in an oration, the antitheses used for effective contrast are part of its perfect beauty, so, too, evil contributes, in Augustine’s view, to the harmony of the order of the whole.³²⁴ This

These exceptions seem like correctives to the strictly observed – and in Virgil’s case tragic – principle, according to which only the faithful could gain access to Paradise. The exception to the rule is intended to compensate for a plausibility gap in divine justice. Significantly, the two heathens to whom this unheard of grace is accorded, play a part in the history of the Roman Empire, in whose establishment God’s will is documented.)  Unlike Augustine, who uses rhetoric to make this comparison, Dante uses music. The difference is explained by the function which music has for the construction of Paradiso in the Commedia in general, and which it derives from Dante’s specific interpretation of the Pythagorean doctrine of the music of the spheres. It is significant for his re-positioning of the traditional theory, when in Justinian’s words the harmony of the heavens is said to be founded on an ethical basis. This is tantamount to abolishing the distinction which Boethius, more than anyone, had transmitted to the post-ancient world in his tract De institutione musica, which was central to the musical understanding of the Middle Ages as a whole. Whereas Boethius makes a distinction between musica mundana, the harmony of the spheres, and musica humana, the correct relationship between the human body and soul, Dante here combines both of these manifestations of music. This change, however, proves to be a symptom of the revision of the Pythagorean theory, which Dante supported against scholastic criticism and, to this end, put on a new footing.  Cf. Augustinus, De ordine libri II, I,7, linea 27– 35: “ita nec praeter ordinem sunt mala, quae non diligit deus, et ipsum tamen ordinem diligit; hoc ipsum enim diligit, diligere bona et non diligere mala, quod est magni ordinis et diuinae dispositionis. qui ordo atque dispositio quia

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form of aesthetic satisfaction, too, is advanced as a component of the salvation of the redeemed, so that the differences which continue to exist in Paradise, and which sub specie aeternitatis basically perpetuate vestiges of the deficiencies of this world, may be integrated into the whole. So here the comparison with art also makes structural sense for the order of Heaven.³²⁵ It is probably due to concern about the latent inadequacies that cannot be eliminated, that a hastily introduced preventative is also required, in order to nip any invidia in the bud: “Quindi addolcisce la viva giustizia/in noi l’affetto sì, che non si puote/torcer già mai ad alcuna nequizia”. The transformation of the distinction between good and evil into different degrees of grace and the, related, more positive view of the striving for earthly Gloria – now that its effects elsewhere conceal its questionable motivation – provide an important pointer with regard to the origins of humanist thinking. The upgrading of fama despite any Christian suspicions of gloria is generally regarded as an achievement of the humanists, who drew their legitimisation for this directly from the writings of the ancients. But, as the Paradiso and the Commedia demonstrate, the revaluation of men’s striving for fame had already come to pass on the basis of a theologisation of this world’s history, and that means: a history of temporal power. The progressive reconciliation of rule on Earth with the rule of God, and, in addition, the transformation which manifests itself in the establishment of such rule, of the man of action into a mere executor of a divine will, relativises the validity of individual ethics. Thus the effect of an individual’s actions on the divine work comes to outweigh his or her questionable motivation – and the quest for elevation by means of fama only somewhat diminishes eternal grace. It is this revaluation of a central tenet of Christian ethics by the progressive theological mediation between temporal and transcendental orders, with which the humanists were confronted. What remained for them to do, was to determine afresh the value of such gloria, now that it no longer had its place within

uniuersitatis congruentiam ipsa distinctione custodit, fit, ut mala etiam esse necesse sit. ita quasi ex antithetis quodam modo, quod nobis etiam in oratione iucundum est, ex contrariis, omnium simul rerum pulchritudo figuratur.”  It is the latently apologetic element in Justinian’s argument which in my view calls into question the structural analogy which Ferrante establishes between the different grades of salvation in the spheres of heaven and the functionally determined differences of rank in temporal society (cf. Ferrante 1984, p. 265). A corresponding judgement may already be found in: Gilbert 1925, p. 153. Here a temporal social order implicitly becomes the model for the construction of the heavenly paradise. However, this latent inversion of the hierarchy of all mediaeval symbolic orders in a certain sense symptomatically illuminates the status that Ferrante’s study attributes to political and social elements in the Commedia.

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an unbroken continuity of history, since radical discontinuity had become the determining principle in the perception of historical temporality.

III If Dante’s reading of the history of the imperium as a transcendental allegory revolves around the aim of negating, theologically, the factual break in that institution, the ultimate purpose of his allegorical poetics of history is to render invisible the discontinuity in the historical process. And as we have already seen at the start of this essay, in Petrarch’s work we can discern, by contrast, the development of a poetics of historical memoria, which hinges entirely on just such a discontinuity. In the following we will elucidate different variants of Petrarch’s poetics of history in two instances, one the Latin epic Africa, the other a letter from the collection in the Familiares.

III.1 The form of the Latin epic itself could accurately be described as an element in that poetics of memoria, with which Petrarch’s representation of history responds to the fact of the historical discontinuity that he repeatedly stresses. However, it would be an error to explain this return to the classical form as a strategy for the unmediated humanistic restitution of a lost Antiquity. If such a finding is misleading in relation to this text, it is above all because the narrative itself makes the conditions of such a reconstruction its subject. At the same time the epic, Africa, is presented as a response to Dante’s clearly recognisable attempt to decisively theologise earthly life. Thus Petrarch’s alternative scheme also remains deeply rooted in Christian notions, which he uses to correct the risks inherent in Dante’s concept – not without at the same time perpetuating the consequences of Dante’s concept of history in his own corrections. But what form do these poetics of memoria actually take in Petrarch’s epic? The content itself of Africa is significant in this context, in that it deals with the successful repulsion of Hannibal by Scipio Africanus. The epic therefore has as its subject the decisive battle in the struggle between Rome and Carthage for world domination, that is to say the real crisis in Rome’s rise to world power. But it is not the final breakthrough to definitive world rule that the text stresses – it is in fact designed to demonstrate the fragility of historical success. In this respect the essential co-ordinates of the text are established in the first two books, which after a prologue by the narrator – unmistakably indebted to Virgil’s Aeneid – concentrates on reporting Scipio’s meeting with two of his deceased

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forebears, his father and his grandfather, and his departure into heaven. As undeniable the reference in this part of Africa is to Cicero’s Somnium Scipionis, and equally to the vision of Rome’s future which Anchises sees in the underworld in the sixth book of Virgil’s Aeneid,³²⁶ there is at the same time an unmistakable reference to Dante’s Commedia, for which Petrarch, especially in these first two books establishes an alternative scenario.³²⁷ The rejection of a salvational interpretation of the establishment of Rome’s world domination can be seen first of all in the narrator’s reflections on the origin of the turmoils that he is about to describe. They, too, are consequences of the Fall, with which all misfortune entered the world; they, too, are still a consequence of the invidia, with which death came into the world.³²⁸ For death, misfortune and an uncertain future are indelibly inscribed in this world.³²⁹ In Petrarch’s epic such adversities serve as a test, they are to be understood as the touchstone of our respect for the will of God.³³⁰ Instead of being part of the Redeemer’s plan for salvation, what is reflected in the Punic Wars is the typical and therefore irrevocable condition of the world after the Fall. So it is only logical if a temporal institution such as the imperium

 For this scene’s intertextual links to classical literature see Giannarelli 1987. For the traces of Middle Latin literature in general in Petrarch’s Africa cf. Velli 1985.  By contrast Bernardo assumes substantial continuity between Dante and Petrarch (cf. Bernardo 1965, esp. p. 63).  Cf. Petrarca, L’Africa, I,71– 81, p. 6: “Quae tantis sit causa malis, quae cladis origo/Queritur: unde animi, quis tot tolerare coegit/Dura pererrato validas furor equore gentes,/Europamque dedit Libie Libiamque rebellem/Europe, alterno vastandas turbine terras./Ac michi causa quidem studii non indiga longi/Occurit radix cuntorum infecta malorum/Invidia, unde oriens extrema ab origine mors est,/Atque aliena videns tristi dolor omnia vultu/Prospera. Non potuit florentem cernere Romam/Emula Carthago.” The attribution of all evil to envy is a quotation from an Old Testament description of its effect, which Christian thinking has appropriated. Cf. Liber Sapientiae 2, 24: “invidia autem diaboli mors introivit in orbem terrarum”. Two references for the Patristic reception of this judgement must suffice: Ambrose, De paradiso, 12, 54: “quae causa autem inimicitiarum nisi inuidia? sicut Solomon ait quia inuidia diaboli mors introiuit in orbem terrarum.” And Augustinus, Sermones. De Sanctis, 294: “Nam quia ad diabolum, hoc est, principem peccati, et vere primum peccatorem, non pertinet origo, sed imitatio; cum de illo Scriptura loqueretur, Invidia, inquit, […] mors intrauit in orbem terrarium: imitantur autem eum, qui sunt ex parte ipsius ( Sap. 2, 24, 25). Imitando eum fiunt ex parte ipsius”.  Petrarca, L’Africa, I, 214– 221, p. 12: “Namque hactenus ire/Et dolor et gemitus et mens incerta futuri/Atque metus mortis mundique miserrima nostri/Milia curarum, rapide quibus optima vite/Tempora et in tenebris meliores ducimus annos:/Illic pura dies, quam lux eterna serenat,/Quam nec luctus edax nec tristia murmura turbant,/Non odia incendunt”.  Petrarca, L’Africa, I,465 – 470, p. 23: “‘Deus hoc Naturaque sanxit/Legibus eternis, hominem in statione manere/Corporis, edicto donec revocetur aperto./Non igitur properare decet, sed ferre modeste/Quantulacumque brevis superant incommoda vite,/Ne iussum sprevisse Dei videare’”.

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has no claim to eternal existence. Scipio’s vision of Rome’s great future therefore logically ends in the vision of its final dereliction. The imperium, too, shares the fate of all things temporal. It is transient, and its transience proves that it is of this world. Scipio’s vision thus constitutes an alternative vision to those of Anchises or Justinian, which – even if they each derive from a different motivation – both continue to subscribe to the “imperium sine fine dedi”, to quote Jupiter in the Aeneid. ³³¹ The vision of greatness here also becomes a vision of downfall, and, if only for that reason, disallows any analogy between the transcendental process of Salvation and the establishment of temporal power. The vision of Rome in Africa mobilises a supremely Christian – in Dante’s case deftly camouflaged – scepticism towards the institutions of this world. Just how inadequate salvational patterns of interpretation are for the history of the imperium being depicted here, is especially evident where Petrarch uses them explicitly, for all that emerges is their lack of pertinence. The final victory over Carthage, for example, is compared with no lesser event than the Resurrection: […] Liceat terrestria celo Equare, eternis mortalia, maxima parvis: Sic prope descendens celo sua vincla resolvit Captivis antiqua potens et Tartara fregit Voce Deus secum in patriam miseranda reducens Agmina et exhaustas longis cruciatibus umbras.³³²

This in the first instance takes up a figural pattern of interpretation such as is found throughout the Commedia. Even the upright republican Cato, who took his own life, is honoured in this way by being appointed guardian of Purgatory, since his suicide in the cause of the freedom of the res publica points ahead to the redemptive death with which Christ won back for fallen humankind its freedom from guilt. To this extent Rome’s final triumph in the struggle for world domination could in fact be interpreted as a figura for the victory over the enemies of God.³³³ However, in Petrarch’s case the very reticence with which such a comparison is announced is striking. It basically turns into a rhetorical flourish, stripped of any substantial historical meaning. For as part of the history of salvation, the Redemption deviates in one particular, if not the decisive one, from  Vergilius, Aeneis, I, 279. The theory of history which Dante develops in the Commedia can be read as a theological exegesis of that sentence from Virgil’s epic.  Petrarca, L’Africa, VIII,999 – 1004, p. 256.  In Dante’s text it is expressly stated that Scipio’s victory on the way to Rome’s universal dominion was won by God’s providence; cf. Paradiso XXVII,61– 63, and Convivio IV, 5,19.

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Scipio’s victory over Carthage. Glorious as his success turns out to be, it will require one further campaign to put the final seal on the ruin of Carthage. Above all, the power that Rome gains is only to be temporary; for this triumph in itself is only achieved by Scipio through his meeting with his late father in the certain knowledge that Rome’s domination, too, will at some time end. Such limitations are, however, not acceptable for the Son of God’s triumph over evil, which cannot be conceived as anything other than final. The figural interpretative model thus turns into a problematic comparison, and thereby once more supports the rejection of that interpretation of the Roman imperium that seeks to present its establishment as a temporal equivalent of the Incarnation and the Redemption. Nonetheless, in terms of Petrarch’s Africa and his oeuvre as a whole, there is no denying that the polity of the Romans was superior to all others. But what is the basis of this superiority, if, on the other hand, it can no longer be combined with the process of salvation and redemption? For both the categories and the order of the world remain quite incontrovertibly Christian in the picture of the Roman world that the epic presents.³³⁴ Petrarch’s essential argument for the primacy of Rome is a moral one and replaces the postulate that it is the temporal representation of a transcendental order. It is above all Scipio’s uncle who reveals this guideline for human action to his nephew, when he has been elevated to heaven: “Sed dum membra vigent – brevis est mora –, suscipe nostri Consilii quid summa velit. Tu sacra fidemque Iustitiamque cole. Pietas sit pectoris hospes Sancta tui morumque comes, que debita virtus Magna patri, patrie maior, sed maxima summo Ac perfecta Deo; quibus exornata profecto Vita via in celum est, que vos huc tramite recto Tunc revehat cum summa dies exemerit istud Carnis onus pureque animam transmiserit aure. Hoc etiam monuisse velim, nil gratius illi,

 This emerges unequivocally from the narrator’s words in the quotation, and from the words of Scipio’s deceased ancestors, who declared the state of the world to be the result of original sin. Scipio’s father’s answer to the former’s anxious enquiry as to whether the dead live on in the afterlife is also unmistakable: “Lente pater ipse loquentem/Risit, et ‘O quanta, miseri, sub nube latetis!/Humanumque genus quanta caligine veri/Volvitur! Hec’ inquit ‘sola est certissima vita./Vestra autem mors est, quam vitam dicitis.’” (Petrarca, L’Africa, I, 336 – 340, p. 17). Death as life, life as death – in this deeply Christian paradox the revaluation of values is documented, which to the heathens could only be foolishness – to quote Paul in the first epistle to the Corinthians. On the dominance of a ‘sentimento cristiano’ in Petrarch’s Africa, cf. Carrara 1932, p. 130.

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Qui celum terrasque regit, dominoque patrique, Actibus ex nostris, quam iustis legibus urbes Conciliumque hominum sociatum legibus equis. Quisquis enim ingenio patriam seu viribus alte Sustulerit sumptisque oppressam adiuverit armis, Hic certum sine fine diem in regione serena Expectet vereque petat sibi premia vite, Iustitia statuente Dei, que nec quid inultum, Nec pretio caruisse sinit.”³³⁵

“Nil gratius illi, qui celum terrasque regit, quam iustis legibus urbes conciliumque hominum sociatum legibus equis”: The Lord of the world is still the point of reference for this line of thought. But it is no longer a matter of illustrating His universal dominion in the matters of this world. Concern for the state now becomes the predominant moral issue, because commitment to the commonwealth is closest to the acts of God, and must for that reason please Him most. The imperium is no longer part of a history, which is understood as a process of progressive representation of a transcendental order. The Roman state now seems more like a community, in which God’s will is fulfilled by right actions.³³⁶ The similarity between this world and the next is no longer an argument for a structural correspondence of two orders, it now forms a moral order of values for the actions of the individual. Thus the rejection of an interpretation of the establishment of temporal power in terms of salvation goes hand in hand with an increase in the significance of the ethical life of the individual. Service to the community is now the individual’s allotted task, instead of the mere implementation of transcendental control in a secular historical process. It fits this transformation of the role of individual actions in relation to the community, if virtue is also interpreted in terms of an, at first sight, highly traditional ethics of transcendental reward. Instead of gambling on temporal fama, whose transience means that it is scarcely worth the effort, all eyes are now directed toward the heavenly reward, which alone is imperishable and therefore represents the only appropriate recompense. In his ethical programme for his nephew, Scipio’s uncle was already concerned to make it clear that God’s justice could not permit the withholding of a reward that was deserved. As we have already seen, Augustine had argued along similar lines in order to justify the fact that the Christian God had made pagan Rome great. As their reward for virtue on Earth, He had provided those who, in the quest for personal fame, had served

 Petrarca, L’Africa, I,481– 498, p. 23 f.  For more on the importance of Rome as a moral authority see also: Dotti 1992, pp. 140 ff.

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their native land and in so doing had avoided other sins, with an appropriate reward in the form of temporal power – which was of course a highly ambivalent gain. In Petrarch’s Africa, however, the expected bonus for virtuous actions becomes, without further ado, a reward in Heaven, which – distributed as deemed fit by the Christian God – is now awarded even to those heathens who have rendered due service to their homeland. The beginning of this re-assessment of the access to divine rewards is undoubtedly the ethical analogy, cited above, between God’s dominion over the universe and, deriving from that, His bounty towards those humans who show concern for their own nation. In this way, however, Petrarch’s re-structuring of Dante’s theology of history, which adopts a profoundly Christian scepticism with regard to the unquestioning appropriation of the actions of Providence for temporal institutions of power, in the end directly equates concern for the state with the transcendental reward of divine glory, scarcely less risky as a proposition. This equation, moreover, levels the difference between the believer and the unbeliever, which for Dante was still a capital one.³³⁷ The text of the Commedia itself has difficulty in closing this justice gap.³³⁸ Seen in this light Petrarch’s construction looks like a strategy for solving the problem which in Dante remains quite explosive. For when the course of pagan history is so determinedly presented as the action of Providence that the participants are basically no more than God’s minions carrying out his actions, then the withholding of divine reward becomes a covert skandalon. ³³⁹ However, if the just among the heathens are

 This is to some extent the reverse side of the Christianisation of the pantheon of the ancients, which has been stressed again and again as an aspect of the epic Africa (cf. Leube 1960).  What the Pilgrim wants above all, when he asks the eagle in the sphere of Jupiter for information, is enlightenment on the question as to why God denies righteous heathens access to Paradise (cf. Paradiso XIX). It is hardly by chance that it is this allegory of justice, which has to give this information. Nor is it by chance, that this information is to be found where the good rulers are, no doubt including heathens who took part in Rome’s grandiose, providentially guided history. Dante’s Commedia basically offers two answers to this delicate question, whose complementary nature once again demonstrates how explosive the issue is. For the eagle that has been formed from the just rulers in the end evades answering by falling back on the categorical inaccessibility of divine insights to the human understanding (always a precarious argument for a line of thought that also relies on the evidence of divine orders; cf. Paradiso XIX,79 ff.). The second answer, however, alludes to the partial exception, which accords a few heathens access to salvation. But the recourse to the argument of the inscrutability of the divine will, and the reference to the partial breach of principle, are both fundamentally symptoms, by virtue of their complementary duplication, of the insoluble nature of the question they are attempting to answer.  The complementary counterpart of this thoroughly ‘orthodox’ refusal of access to heaven for heathens, is the entirely unorthodox diminution of the explosive ethical problem of striving

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guaranteed a transcendental reward, the Christian afterlife is deprived of an essential part of its identity, and this highly charged effect can scarcely be alleviated by theologising ethical concern for the state. So Dante’s and Petrarch’s mediations between temporal power and a transcendental God appear to be two complementary solutions for one and the same problem. But regardless of their complementary nature they do not belong to a synchronic order of thinking. What distinguishes them above all is the differing semantics of time, that is characteristic of each position – a difference which also decisively alters the representation of history. This difference first finds expression in the status of earthly gloria which has again changed, and now essentially appears as a fama, in which a specific temporal meaning is inscribed. This revaluation of earthly gloria is, not least, one of the consequences of a pagan refashioning of the Christian heaven. It can be seen especially clearly in the changing positions in the argument that – for the sake of preserving order – proposed rewards for virtuous actions, and which as far back as Augustine’s De Civitate Dei was pressed into service to justify Rome’s greatness. But there its purpose was to explain a fait accompli, Rome’s long established world domination. Now it serves to deflect the human desire for earthly fame, whose instability cannot match the permanence of divine grace.³⁴⁰ This seems at first sight to be nothing other than the ur-Christian warning against lust for temporal gloria, which has to be paid for by relinquishing any divine reward. The unreliability of earthly fame has indeed served from time immemorial as a sign of its substantive nullity, because it revealed the superiority of a glory bestowed by God. To be accurate, however, Petrarch inverts the relationship between the consciousness of inadequacy and the orientation towards an eternal reward. Transience no longer serves as proof of nullity. It is rather that the awareness of the factual instability of fame, with which mankind recognises the achievements of virtù, generates the hope of a just God, one who could not do other than grant lasting recompense, a

for personal fame. The transcendental guidance of actions aimed at establishing temporal power overrules the traditional view that actions motivated by personal advantage are reprehensible, and all that remains of the traditional moral reservation is a hint of lessened eternal grace. On the other hand, their appropriation for the providential plan of salvation makes the exclusion of heathens – who were in effect working in the service of God – a covert skandalon of justice, for which reason a selected few must be permitted to break the principle.  Cf. the warning by Scipio’s father: “Illa quoque in vobis ridenda insania mentes/Occupat: eternum cupitis producere nomen,/Secula demulcent animos numerosa, venitque/Posteritas longa ante oculos; libet ire per ora/Doctorum extinctos hominum, clausosque sepulcro/Liberiore via per mundi extrema vagari./Vivere post mortem, violentas spernere Parcas/Dulcia sunt, fateor, sed nomine vivere nil est./Vivite sed melius, sed certius: ardua celi/Scandite felices, miserasque relinquite terras” (Petrarca, L’Africa, II,407– 416, p. 45).

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reward which is consequently expected to be in no other form than sub specie aeternitatis. It is now much more a case of transcendental reward becoming a postulate of the insight into the instability of all temporal compensations, than of that insight being able to establish the categorical nullity of such gloria. But what are the implications of this change in the evaluation of gloria? They point to a change in the semantics of time. Its unpredictability is no longer automatically assumed to be an indication of the added value of transcendence, but rather becomes the postulate of a just God, who has taken responsibility for securing order. That implicitly means that the instability of temporal conditions becomes an insurmountable reality, and human beings have to come to terms with this; for this reason strategies for securing permanence in this world take on a new importance. This change of perspective is shown especially clearly in the fact that, despite its scarcity, earthly fama retains its value, unreliable as it may be. This upgrading of fame in the face to its discreditation by transcendence can be seen in a highly revealing remark by the narrator, as he seeks for an explanation as to why the conqueror of Hannibal did not put the final seal on the end of Carthage. Perhaps, he surmises, the gods wanted to keep the chance of equal fame for Scipio the Younger.³⁴¹ Here temporal fama virtually becomes the aim of God’s providence. This carries on the revaluation of fama which is announced by Dante in the structure of his Paradiso. It is as if the transcendental underwriting of the establishment of temporal power, be it understood as a representation or revelation of divine rule, or as an ethical postulate by Him who rules Heaven and Earth, no longer permits the uncompromising condemnation of temporal gloria, which hitherto invalidated all actions directed at that aim. But this common feature notwithstanding, the revalued fama has a different function in each case, and what it achieves for Petrarch is to remove it from a salvational perspective, thereby toning down the controversial nature of gloria. Instead of acting as the motivation for the completion of a providential historical programme, and therefore losing some of its reprehensibility, it is now elevated to the position of guarantor of permanence in the face of the fragility of the historical process itself. That this is now required of fame becomes especially apparent in the author’s self-presentation in his epic. If his Africa sets out something like a poetics of historical memoria, then a major part of this is that the text itself becomes the object of the events which it relates. This alone indicates an inversion of the relationship between the res gestae and the historia rerum gestarum. It is explicitly

 Petrarca, L’Africa, VIII,610 f., p. 242: “Consulto tamen has superos servasse nepoti/Reliquias famamque reor nomenque secundum.”

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demonstrated in Africa that the text that celebrates the great achievement is not necessarily itself a reliable account of the events it depicts. For neither are appropriate tributes paid to all who deserve them, nor is such a document immune to the destruction that threatens all earthly things.³⁴² Even the reasons given by the poet for the memoria are always contingent. However, this kind of contingency is no longer to be taken as a proof of its triviality. Rather it makes uncertainty into a valuable bonus, precisely because it is uncertain. Thus Scipio’s father, gazing into the future, celebrates the Tuscan who will one day restore the undeservedly faded memory of the victor over Carthage.³⁴³ It is above all the last, the ninth book of Africa, that offers such a vision, which in itself deserves special attention not least because of its placement in the architecture of the epic. As far as the events of the war with Carthage are concerned, this final book tells of the triumphant Scipio’s voyage across the sea, and the saviour of the fatherland’s triumphal procession through the capital. On this journey Africanus is accompanied by the Roman writer Ennius, who is both poet and brother-in-arms. Ennius’s double function as such has a symbolic meaning for the end of the epic, since the transition from the events to their safekeeping in the poetic work is already incorporated in his person. Of particular importance is Ennius’s account of an incident that took place at the moment of crisis, in the decisive battle against the Carthaginians, and it is this that he now relates to Scipio. At the time a vision of the poet Homer appeared to him. Homer puts his mind at rest about the outcome of the battle, and also announces to him the poet of the trecento who will glorify the deeds of Africanus. This second anticipation of the text of Africa has an unmistakable architectonic function in the structure of the epic. Homer’s appearance forms the counterpart to Scipio’s own vision, in which his two forebears appeared at the beginning of the campaign. It is hardly by chance that in each case three figures are involved: on the one hand genealogical sequence of father, uncle and son, and on the other the poetic dynasty of Homer, Ennius and Petrarch. The cultural succession in the second case takes over from the natural sequence of generations. At the same time the temporal

 Petrarca, L’Africa, II,455 – 457, p. 46: “Iam sua mors libris aderit; mortalia namque/Esse decet quecumque labor mortalis inani/Edidit ingenio.”  Petrarca, L’Africa, II,441– 454, p. 46: “Cernere iam videor genitum post secula multa/Finibus Etruscis iuvenem qui gesta renarret,/Nate, tua et nobis veniat velut Ennius alter./Carus uterque michi, studio memorandus uterque:/Iste rudes Latio duro modulamine Musas/Intulit; ille autem fugientes carmine sistet;/Et nostros vario cantabit uterque labores/Eloquio, nobisque brevem producere vitam/Contendet; verum multo michi carior ille est/Qui procul ad nostrum reflectet lumina tempus./In quod eum studium non vis pretiumve movebit,/Non metus aut odium, non spes aut gratia nostri;/Magnarum sed sola quidem admiratio rerum,/Solus amor veri.”

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framework is set incomparably wider. While it remains closely circumscribed in the case of Scipio’s meeting with his immediate ancestors, the series of the poets basically includes the total memoria of poetry, from the ur-father Homer to the immediate present of the text. This difference alone turns the poem into a representation of preservation, of transience overcome. The transfer of prophecy to the poetic work itself also deserves consideration. For one thing prophecy is the opposite of all memoria. Its achievement in the present case consists essentially in securing the text against its own contingency. The contingency of its origins is therefore glossed over by its advance announcement. At the same time, when the work is announced in this way, the figure of the prophecy gives it an unmistakable significance. For only something extraordinary deserves a – mythical – prophecy. This at the same time affirms and revaluates the parallel contingency of historical memory. The uncertain appears special. By the same token the Africa epic is thus moved into an order of knowing which is normally restricted to the events themselves; for in the normal course of things the object of a prophecy is a significant event. Especially at this point it is possible to see that the memoria of the events now begins to replace those events themselves. Historical continuity is no longer guaranteed by the stability of a process, nor is it any longer embedded in a logic of events, which makes it clear that they are controlled by a higher power. History is now produced in the first instance by its poetic remembrance, which not least for this reason is already announced in the moment of the event. Because this remembrance is, however, contingent, it becomes an unexpected gift, which therefore deserves a mythical prophecy. The characteristics of this historiographic programme appear not least in the difference between remembrance and tradition that emerges here. Memoria means the reconstruction of what has sunk into oblivion and not the reproduction of something given. At the same time it becomes clear why the same event is worthy of several representations, Ennius’s text as well as Petrarch’s. For it is the fact of remembrance as such that keeps the past alive and decides both its meaning and its importance. The historiographic text thus becomes the representation of the memoria, through which its historical rank is first established.³⁴⁴ Thus the historia rerum gestarum turns into to the work of memory and begins to take the place of the res gestae, and indeed history is primarily constituted as the remembrance of what is worth remember-

 This seems to me to offer an explanation of the supposed contradiction that Gerosa found in Petrarch’s Africa between the self-stylisation of the author and the stress on the vanitas of the things of this world (cf. Gerosa 1966, p. 23).

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ing.³⁴⁵ The account given by Scipio Africanus’s father of the final collapse of Rome, in which Scipio’s victory over his opponents in the struggle for world domination is finally nullified, is set against the announcement that his person will be kept safe in the work of Petrarch. In place of the continuity of a transcendentally decreed historical process, such as Dante had outlined, there is now historical remembrance as the guarantor of permanence. Memoria thus moves into the vacuum that had arisen for Pe– trarch because of his implicit rejection of a teleological interpretation of history. Because the categorical and therefore irremovable instability of this world does not permit such an interpretation of the historical process, remembrance, too, of course remains contingent. But precisely this increases its significance. This programme of memoria takes on an even sharper edge, if it is clearly distinguished from the concept ‘post-modern’ to which it at first glance seems to be related. That history is nothing other than an effect of its posthumous construction is an assumption that is part of a consensus that has come to be accepted almost without question. It is a consensus which has developed since the fundamental demise of faith in any philosophy of history. To some extent history seems to be an effect of discursive modelling. Understood in this way history rests on a construction which is only apparently a ‘re-construction’ – actually it is a self-deception perpetrated in order to cover one’s own back. But it is precisely at this point that the essential difference to the poetics of memoria in Petrarch’s Africa is revealed. It does not emerge against a background of epistemological scepticism; its point of reference is much more the semantics of time. Post-histoire offers a conception of history for which the logic of the narrative has been transformed into the coherence of the historical process itself. Petrarch’s programme of remembrance instead works against a transience that threatens to destroy the past. It does not therefore target the process of history in order to declare it a merely discursive process; it rather struggles to preserve what is worthy of remembrance. Its aim is therefore not a critique of knowledge, it is moral in nature. History, or rather the past, is a thesaurus of virtue.³⁴⁶ Transience thus destroys

 A connection might be established here with Petrarch’s collection of biographies, De viris illustribus, which unites a series of famous Romans, beginning with Romulus. This structural conception alone makes it a highly significant representation of Roman history. For the individual biographies are established in a sequence that follows the history of Rome, and at the same time is turned into a paradigm of heroes. Instead of a continuous process, we are presented with a series of great men, whose greatness makes them worthy of remembrance. This representation transforms the continuity of a historical process into the paradigm of those whose lives merit appropriate presentation.  For this conception of Petrarch’s historiography see also Martellotti 1983, esp. p. 230.

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righteousness. Only the historian’s work of remembrance, which in this context goes hand in hand with the fama of the man of action, preserves this thesaurus from annihilation by time. This explains the tacit rejection of all speculation about gloria. Because action, especially exemplary action, assumes more weight, the fame of the righteous man of action serves this purpose. Instead of belonging to a collective, secular programme, in which its meaning is substantially fulfilled, Petrarch’s work places action in the service of the ethics of the individual. For this reason ancient Rome – the historical entity whose rank for Dante was determined by its role in the history of salvation – becomes the moral paradigm for history. The background to this humanist evaluation of Antiquity is thus formed to a great extent by the theology of history, which quite decisively declared the reality of this world to be an integral component of the work of salvation, and consequently had to find an explanation for the moment of the Incarnation in the order of a pagan empire. The aim of Petrarch’s programme of historical memoria, on the other hand, itself explains the ultimate ranking of the poet above the man of action. Because the event is only significant by virtue of its memorability, greater significance is accorded to the one who guarantees remembrance. This being so, it is the author, at the end of Africa, who takes the place of the hero whose deeds the epic recorded. This substitution of the account for the event can be seen in additional features which reveal the dependence of things reported on the reports made of them. The process of change in question can be observed in the increasing importance of the work’s own internal laws compared to the historical truth. In concrete terms this is revealed especially by the particular selection of events the narrator chooses to describe. He intentionally refrains from reporting the reverses the conqueror of Carthage was to suffer in later life, especially at the hands of the Senate that had once fated him. All this remains merely in the preterite, as if he wanted to spare the Muses such sad tidings after so much joy.³⁴⁷

 Petrarca, L’Africa, IX,410 – 420, p. 276 f: “Nunc ego non ausim vos hinc ad tristia, Dive,/Materiamque trucem post tot modo leta vocare./Quin potius longius fugite atque avertite vultus./ Certe ego vobiscum fugiam tristesque querelas/Invidie, procerum crimen culpamque Senatus/ Non referam, populique nefas ac sponte receptum/Exilium mortemque ducis titulumque dolentis/Aspera marmoreo subscriptaque iurgia busto./Hec memorent alii: michi nam certissima mens est/Hic metam posuisse operi; patiarque nec unquam/Carmine tam mesto sacras maculare Sorores.” Also worthy of note at this point is the fact that the decision to restrict the work to the depiction of amusing matters, is taken in deference to the Muses. This not only makes plausible the precedence of aesthetic structure over factual truth in mythical guise, it also establishes a quite remarkable role-reversal within the mythical construction itself. For the poet now becomes the trustee of the interests of those figures, as whose pupil he generally appears. So not only is

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But it is not only in such concern for the consistency of the text that the primacy of representation over historical facticity is revealed. The conclusion of Africa shows one further consequence of this primacy; for in the end the author ousts the hero. This effect is achieved by way of an ingenious arrangement of the scenario, which Petrarch at the end constructs in such a way as to make his description of Scipio’s triumphal procession turn into an allusion to his own coronation as a poet on the Capitol. Ipse coronatus lauro frondente per urbem Letus iit totam Tarpeia rupe reversus. Ennius ad dextram victoris, tempora fronde Substringens parili, studiorum almeque Poesis Egit honoratum sub tanto auctore triumphum. Post alii atque alii studio certante secuti. Ipse ego ter centum labentibus ordine lustris Dumosam tentare viam et vestigia rara Viribus imparibus fidens utcumque peregi, Frondibus atque loco simul et cognomine claro Heroum veterum tantos imitatus honores, Irrita ne Grai fierent presagia vatis.³⁴⁸

The specific quality of these lines derives from the interplay between the essentiality and figurativeness of the signs. At the centre of this interplay stands the laurel, which is the prerogative of both the hero and the poet, and as an evergreen tree stands for immortality, and so for their fame.³⁴⁹ The scene, as he describes it, presents the two as equals, since Scipio and Ennius make their appearance side by side. Rating them equally in this way symbolises the equal ranking of bellum and ingenium, and is an indication of the alliance which brings poet and hero into a state of mutual dependence. For the poet needs the hero whom he can celebrate, just as the man of action has to rely on the poet to establish his fame in the first place.³⁵⁰ Given that the two, each understood in the

history dependant on the representation of the one who recalls it; the figure of inspiration, too, that is of the dependency on superior outside knowledge, becomes a consideration.  Petrarca, L’Africa, IX, 398 – 409, p. 276.  Ennius himself had stressed both men’s equal right to the laurel: “Laurea restat adhuc: cuius dignare parumper/Particeps nos esse tibi. Si gloria bello,/Nec minus ingenio constat, patiere virenti/Fronde duces vatesque simul sacra tempora cingant./Immortale decus viror immortalis utrisque/Indicat et longe promittit tempora vite” (Petrarca, L’Africa, IX,108 – 113, p. 264 f).  Petrarca, L’Africa, IX,54– 57, p. 263: “Non parva profecto/Est claris fortuna viris habuisse poetam/Altisonis qui carminibus cumulare decorem/Virtutis queat egregie monimentaque laudum.”

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appropriate way, form the triumphal conclusion of the victory parade, it is especially the continuation of this scene which brings out the symbolic meaning I have outlined. For in what follows Petrarch symbolically extends into the future this triumphal parade through Rome. As he tells us, many were to follow after those in the parade, all of whom had distinguished themselves through great deeds or great works. And the end of this victory parade of the unnamed through time is brought up by the ‘I’ of Petrarch the author, who returns the allegorical triumphal procession back into real space and leads it to the very spot, where Africanus had once celebrated his victory. Now, in this same place, Petrarch is crowned with a laurel wreath. In this way the author’s present is substituted for the absent hero of his successful opus. The author’s complete command over the past is, moreover, made clear in the description of his relationship to Homer’s prophecy. He of course claims modestly to be an imitator of great heroes (“heroum veterum tantos imitatus honores”), but at the same time it is he who will ensure that Homer’s prophecy is fulfilled. The fulfilment of what is announced in Petrarch’s Africa is no longer the automatic effect of a sage who exercises sovereign control over the future: instead the truth of the prophecy becomes dependent on the will of the particular person who can make it happen. Thus the past is fulfilled in the remembrance of it. And it is only for the purposes of this remembrance that it is of any importance.

III.2 In Petrarch’s Africa we were able to see how discontinuity becomes the essential condition for a representation of history. The poetics of memoria that he developed from this finding made the historian’s supremacy over history the key feature of all historiography, and he was therefore able to convert it to the logistics of his own gloria. But at the same time contingency, as a condition of all experience of the past, also appears in a somewhat complementary fashion in Petrarch’s writings. Instead of declaring remembrance to be the self-assured locus of the constitution of history, contingency now becomes the structural pattern for historical memoria, whose own instability threatens to endanger the meaning of history. This will now be demonstrated, using as a paradigm the second letter of the first book of the Familiares, which is addressed to Giovanni Colonna and recalls their walk together through Rome. It is hardly by chance that the difference that has been pointed out between both conceptions – at the same time alternative and complementary – of historical memoria is linked to the difference between two genres. While the ‘official’ I of the epic develops the poetics of gloria from a discontinuity, which forms the premise for of any treatment of the past, the ‘private’ I of epistolography by contrast plays out the fragmentation

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of the perception of the past itself, in order to develop from this the laws of its alternative poetics. “Deambulabamus Rome soli.”³⁵¹ – The letter begins with this laconic remark, and goes on to remind the addressee of the walk they took together through Rome. At first sight it seems astonishing that the writer then immediately appears to abandon his theme. For what can be the point, in his description of his walk through the capital, of asserting without any transition his preference for the mos peripateticus? ³⁵² However, the seemingly unmotivated digression leads to a central feature of the review of the past that meets them at every turn in their tour of the capital of the imperium. What is important for the identification of the connections being made here, is the surreptitious transformation of the peripatetic model, whose etymological sense is to some extent turned against the concept which the name normally designates. For the peripatetics are Aristotelians. They are consequently committed to a concept of truth that guarantees reliable statements on the basis of cogent logic. But it is precisely such a concept that is now repudiated here, more peripatetico. The peripatetic becomes a sceptic who is reluctant to commit himself to the thinking of the academics, and moves without any plan, as his pleasure takes him, back and forth between them. In this way the mos peripateticus turns into the antithesis of Aristotelian philosophy and designates nothing other than a figura curiositatis, and concealed behind this transition is the abandonment of nothing less than the concept of truth.³⁵³

 Petrarca, Le Familiari, VI, 2,1, p. 615.  Petrarca, Le Familiari, VI, 2,1, p. 615: “Meum quidem obambulandi perypateticum morem nosti. Placet; nature moribusque meis aptissimus est; ex opinionibus quedam placent, alie autem minime; non etenim sectas amo, sed verum. Itaque nunc perypateticus, nunc stoicus sum, interdum achademicus; sepe autem nichil horum, quotiens quicquam occurrit apud eos, quod vere ac beatifice fidei adversum suspectum ve sit.”  Only apparently does such a philosophical role-play end with the indestructible intactness of the Christian revelation of truth. Cf. Petrarca, Le Familiari, VI, 2,4, p. 617: “Sic simus omnia, quod ante omnia cristiani simus; sic philosophica, sic poetica, sic historias legamus, ut semper ad aurem cordis Evangelium Cristi sonet: […] cui, tanquam uni literarum verarum immobili fundamento, tuto superedificat humanus labor, et cui doctrinas alias non adversas studiose cumulantes, minime reprehendendi erimus; etsi enim ad summam rei modicum forsan, ad oblectamentum certe animi et cultiorem vite modum plurimum adiecisse videbimur. Hec incidenter, quantum locus iste capere visus est, dixerim.” In anything, the truth of the Gospel here loses its role as the sum of all wisdom. It now only designates a frontier, beyond which a space for theoretical possibilities opens up, whose exploration serves the pleasures of the intellect alone – an intellect whose needs can no longer be satisfied with the revealed truth, and whose experiments in other fields are simultaneously legitimated. This legitimisation of curiositas has the appearance of a zero grade at the opening of Aristotle’s Metaphysics, which identified

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The transformation of the truth into a topography, a transformation which turns every act of recognition into pleasurable contemplation of the object in view, however, also provides the model for the walk through the Roman capital, which is seen as a collection of opportunities for historical remembrance.³⁵⁴ The two walkers stroll through the city in just the same way as the ‘I’ of the letter, by his own admission, enjoys moving freely among conflicting opinions.³⁵⁵ Everywhere they come upon places which are connected with well-known events in Roman history.³⁵⁶ The events in question are arranged chronologically; and their sequence follows the course of Roman history. But this historical list also has a significant semantic effect. What it produces is a series. Stringing events together has a levelling effect in which their significance is lost.³⁵⁷ The effect of this serialisation is, however, especially evident, where the description of the sights they see turns into an account of the conversation between the two wanderers.³⁵⁸ Their conversation, too, is about historiae, but it never goes

the quest for knowledge as the most natural need of human beings – a need whose gratification can only be pleasurable, because it corresponds to human nature. But the pleasure propagated in Petrarch’s Familiares letter has its ultimate basis not in the discovery of truth, but in the delights of playing with possibilities.  The figure in question could be described as a hybrid of Aristotelianism and scepticism. Theoria is combined with pleasure, as in the Metaphysics of the Stagirite, only the pleasure is no longer the effect of discovering truth, it is a substitute for that discovery. It turns into scepticism in the etymological sense, into looking around, which turns the literal meaning of a peripatetic movement against theoria’s promise of certitude.  Petrarca, Le Familiari, VI, 2,5, p. 617: “Vagabamur pariter in illa urbe tam magna, que cum propter spatium vacua videatur, populum habet immensum; nec in urbe tantum sed circa urbem vagabamur, aderatque per singulos passus quod linguam atque animum excitaret”.  May the opening lines serve here as an example: “hic Evandri regia, hic Carmentis edes, hic Caci spelunca, hic lupa nutrix et ruminalis ficus, veriori cognomine romularis, hic Remi transitus, hic ludi circenses et Sabinarum raptus, hic Capree palus et Romulus evanescens, hic Nume cum Egeria colloquium, hic tergeminorum acies. Hic fulmine victus victor hostium artifexque militie Tullus Hostilius, hic rex architector Ancus Martius, hic discretor ordinum Priscus Tarquinius habitavit; hic Servio caput arsit, hic carpento insidens atrox Tullia transivit et scelere suo vicum fecit infamem” (Petrarca, Le Familiari, VI, 2, 5, p. 617).  In one characterisation of this letter we read that it is “a potpourri of typonyms and his– torical remembrances” – which fails to take properly into account the fact that it is ordered chronologically (cf. Mazzocco 1976, esp. p. 207).  Petrarca, Le Familiari, VI, 2,16, p. 623: “multus de historiis sermo erat, quas ita partiti videbamur, ut in novis tu, in antiquis ego viderer expertior, et dicantur antique quecunque ante celebratum Rome et veneratum romanis principibus Cristi nomen, nove autem ex illo usque ad hanc etatem; multus quoque de ea parte philosophie que mores instruit, hinc nacta cognomen; interdum vero de artibus et de earum auctoribus atque principiis.” Even the salvational caesura

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beyond an exchange of points that happen to interest one or other of them. The actual basis of this interest resides in curiositas, a curiosity in search of sensations, which is bent on satisfying that desire rather than deriving moral instruction from the past. This explains the overall cogency of the letter, although its opening passage seems to bear no relationship to its actual theme. If the ‘I’ of this, at first sight seemingly unmotivated, digression expresses a preference for a sceptical view of the truth, which only survives as a charming doxa, then this is no more than an aspect of the same pleasure that he takes in the different objects he encounters, as is seen both in their tour of the Roman capital and in their conversations about their experiences. The events brought to mind by the places they visit are ordered in historical sequence, forming a series, that provides material for intriguing reminiscences and stimulating conversation. But along the way historical memoria yields to the needs of curiositas. This is the reverse side of a historia that is now structurally dependent on memoria. It is now at the mercy of the disposition of the person who produces the history in the first place, and is in danger of getting lost in the abysses of his understanding. History as a work of remembrance brings the psychology of this remembrance into play. Thus the emphatic preservation of past virtue in the epic Africa is countered here with a relish for the stimulus of historical reminiscence. Remembrance as the source of contingency, as developed by Petrarch in his Familiares letter, is the complementary alternative to the poetics of memoria in Africa. ³⁵⁹ In both instances, however, discontinuity remains the essential condition for his treatment of the past – be it that history becomes the effect of its own reconstruction, or be it that the remembrance itself deprives it of all order and meaning. But these two alternatives are complementary, in that they draw two differing conclusions from the abandonment of the theological concept of history which Dante had still struggled to preserve. In contrast to Dante, history for Petrarch is neither a locus for the revelation of truth, nor one for the representation of a transcendental order. History rather appears as the space for a discontinuity, which needs past achievements to be preserved through remembrance,

that divides the periods between which the capital event of the Incarnation occurs, becomes the difference between merely occasional interests.  Corresponding complementary relationships like that here between memoria and curiositas could also be traced in other Petrarch texts. It could be shown that a revaluation of gloria takes place in the Secretum. If moral-theological psychology, in conjunction with a memoria which is limited to presenting the fruitful effects of virtuous actions in a transient world, stands for the immanent poetics of Africa, then in the Secretum it accentuates the suspect, indeed for man’s salvation ruinous, effects of a gloria, which is always based on superbia, the most heinous of all evils.

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as much as it is in danger of making memoria the plaything of curiositas. It may well be that these two alternative variants of historical thinking have determined our treatment of the past right up to the present day. And could it indeed be that the rivalry between historical scepticism – ultimately troubled by its own relativisation of all truth, and therefore with an aesthetic relationship to history – and an emphatic teleology of history, which understands the course of world history as humankind’s discovery of itself, might be a late form – in whatever transformation it is mediated – of that alternative way of thinking history that emerges in the writings of both Dante and Petrarch?

Poetics of Knowledge in the Paradiso (Paradiso XXVII and XXX) “La natura del mondo, che quïeta il mezzo e tutto l’altro intorno move, quinci comincia come da sua meta; e questo cielo non ha altro dove che la mente divina, in che s’accende l’amor che ’l volge e la virtù ch’ei piove. Luce e amor d’un cerchio lui comprende, sì come questo li altri; e quel precinto colui che ’l cinge solamente intende.” (Paradiso XXVII,106 – 114)

These words, which in many ways look so opaque, are spoken to Dante by Beatrice – the woman he once loved in his youth, and who is now guiding him through Paradise – at one of the most difficult points in the Divine Comedy. On their path through the heavenly paradise the Pilgrim and his guide have reached the point at which the material, finite world ends and the intellegible, infinite world begins. It is clear enough that God the infinite, who is free of all fleshly coils, can only have His abode in the realm of infinity. But where theology and philosophy can take refuge in the opposition of these terms, the description of a journey into the life beyond has to make apparent the transition point between the two spheres. Thus, at first sight paradoxically, greater theoretical rigour is demanded of the narrative text of the Commedia than of the theory itself. Theological and philosophical theoria are in a sense taken back to their etymological roots; for, after all, the original meaning of the Greek verb ‘theorein’ in fact expresses no more and no less than ‘to see’. How then does Dante manage to translate the theory into the narrative, into the account of his pilgrimage through Heaven? In our answer to this question, which we shall address by focusing on the lines cited above, we shall also encounter one of the central features of Dante’s sacro poema: namely his use of poetic language to create a mode of speech that is on a higher level than all theory and proves able to overcome its own deficits in the face of a transcendental world. Before we go on to argue this in detail, let us outline the order of heaven that Dante makes the basis of his Paradise. In the Divine Comedy this order is not much different from that posited in Aristotelian and Ptolemaic cosmology. Dante assumes the existence of ten heavens revolving at differing speeds around the Earth, which itself stands still. The highest of these heavens is the empireo: the only heaven which does not revolve, but – like the Earth – is completely at rest. Given that it is to be understood as the place of heavenly paradise, as the https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110637106-008

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abode of angels and the Blest, the assumption of such an Empyreum is what constitutes the specifically Christian contribution to ancient cosmology. That Dante makes the Empyreum no longer a corporeal sphere, but a non-corporeal one, is one of the most important changes in the Divine Comedy vis-à-vis the Christian tradition of cosmology of his time. This change is of great significance for the question that concerns us here, for it shifts the problem of the relationship between the corporeal and non-corporeal world into the realm of the received cosmic order itself. Dante can no longer avoid answering the question as to how each relates to the other, and how it is possible to move from one into the other. The problem that arises here becomes even more acutely apparent if we simply observe the difficulty of even appropriately formulating this problem. Of course, we have to assume that the non-physical sphere is located outside of time and space. But even this statement points to the inevitable paradoxes that await us here. For ‘outside’ is of course a spatial category, and such a formulation therefore tacitly repositions in space the sphere that is beyond space. Modern physics’ solution to the problem of the relationship between space and infinity is well known: physics has turned space itself into infinite space, and in the century we have just left physics dynamised this relation once more: now, it seems, the universe is constantly expanding space. But these solutions for a modern age will not work for a Christian theory of the universe. For the quality of infinity behooves only God the Creator, and not His creation; for thereby a constitutive characteristic of the divine would, unacceptably, be transferred onto His creation. The assumption of an infinite universe is therefore heretical and unacceptable to the mind of the Christian academic. What solution did Dante find? To reconstruct it, we shall now turn to look more closely at the verses cited. Where in the order of heaven are Dante and Beatrice at the moment when she, his guide through Paradise, addresses these words to him? They are in the first of the revolving heavens, the biggest and swiftest of the corporeal heavens, which bears the name primo mobile. They are, therefore, at the boundary of the corporeal and simultaneously (we shall return to this in detail) of the natural world. The verses in question comprise the instruction that Beatrice is giving to her pupil. Later it will become clear why precisely this lesson is of special import. It is not his own observations that Dante is describing at this point; rather he puts the discussion of the essence of the primo mobile into the mouth of one of the Blest. In this respect cognition cannot be separated from instruction. Of course, as the Commedia proceeds, the text reveals that this lesson will quickly bear fruit, for soon Dante himself will be observing the world of the immaterial sphere and simultaneously translating it into language for us. But of that more

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later. For the moment we shall concern ourselves with the content of Beatrice’s instruction. How, then, does Dante achieve the transition from the corporeal to the noncorporeal sphere in these lines that he puts into the mouth of Beatrice? For her words are concerned with precisely that threshold. We shall see that Dante uses various strategies: some concern the essence of what is being portrayed, and some he derives from the peculiarity of the portrayal. To begin with, we must take account of the ontological status of the boundary that is being described. The boundary of the primo mobile is designated as a circle of light (Paradiso XXVII,112: “Luce e amor d’un cercio lui comprende”). The nature of light was intensively discussed in contemporary philosophy and theology, and many saw light as the primary, or least corporeal, element in the physical world, while nonetheless assigning it to the sphere of the corporeal. But Thomas Aquinas, who is indubitably the greatest theological authority of Dante’s age, maintains quite clearly in his Summa theologiae that light is not corporeal, but non-corporeal: “Lux non est corpus”, he posits categorically.³⁶⁰ Incidentally, one of the arguments that he uses to prove his thesis shows how far his thinking is from the notion, crucial to modern physics, of a speed of light that is invisible to the naked eye. For, he argues, if light were corporeal, it would necessarily be possible to apprehend its movement from one place to another. Dante, even though there is by no means a scholastic consensus on the matter, clearly decides in favour of this interpretation of the nature of light. This emerges quite clearly from the context of the lines. For the circle of light is not only made up of light, but is simultaneously made of love. And how could God’s love be anything but noncorporeal? Light and love, therefore, are identified in the same geometric shape: in the shape of a circle, the perfect geometrical form. That clarifies beyond all doubt the status of light, a status which emerges further from hints given by Beatrice. For we are also told that love ignites (s’accende) in God’s intellect. So the origin of love, too, is being thought in terms of categories of light, and thereby the real connection between luce and amor emerges. The ed of line 112, which seems almost to separate rather than link the two words, is actually telling us that we are dealing with the same thing. Light is basically nothing other than the form in which love becomes visible. This indicates on the one hand (and this will concern us further) that in this universe physics and ethics are merely two sides of the same coin. The ontological quality of light that we have described, however, also implies that the boundary of the corporeal

 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I,76,7c.

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world is itself already non-corporeal. In this sense light figures as a first point of contact between the two spheres. Meanwhile the lines cited from Beatrice’s lesson on the nature of the universe also engage with the delicate question of spatial relations: specifically the necessarily non spatial relationship of a sphere, that lies and must lie outside of space, to that same space. Basic to our understanding of this are the observations Beatrice makes regarding the relationship between the divine intellect, as the place where the love of the Creator is kindled, and the primo mobile: “e questo cielo non ha altro dove/che la mente divina”. Thus the divine intellect is described as the place where the first of the moving heavens, the primo mobile, is located. But the sentence with which I attempt to paraphrase Dante’s lines is very inexact; for it does exactly what Dante’s own words avoid. Dante himself is speaking here not of any place or space, but using a formula which at first sight looks a little clumsy. On closer inspection, however, its great subtlety becomes apparent. His formula, translated literally, is: “The first heaven has no other ‘where?’ than the divine intellect.” This mente divina is certainly non-corporeal and cannot, therefore, be identified with any particular place. Situating the first heaven in this divine intellect has the consequence of transforming the spatial relation into a relation of cognition, into an intellectual operation. As is befitting to a god-creator, the creation that is heaven becomes a projection of God’s intellect; the existence of this heaven relies on its cognition in the intellect of God. Now we can see why Dante here deliberately makes do with an interrogative pronoun. For his retreat into a simple question clearly serves as a signal that the spatial question is unsuitable: it is rejected. In the Empyreum, all that remains of our notions of space – so the text teaches us – is our own, unsuitable, question. The apparently clumsy formula is, then, when we look at it more closely, subtle in the extreme; for it functions precisely as a stimulant to cognition. For the first time here we come across a method that Dante will apply again in varying ways in the lines that concern us. The offence against the prevailing rules of language that is called ‘poetic licence’ (an expression which articulates an essential feature of all poetic writing) becomes a means of achieving cognition. In other words, poetic praxis becomes theory. We can put the transformation of spatial relations into cognitive categories to the test in the following lines, 112– 114: “Luce e amor d’un cerchio lui comprende,/sì come questo li altri; e quel precinto/colui che ’l cinge solamente intende.” It is well nigh impossible to translate these lines into a non-romance language. The reason for that is the ambivalence of the two verbs comprendere and intendere. For each verb describes both a spatial and an intellectual relation. To begin with the first of the verbs: of course we can translate comprende in the context of a circle of light as ‘embrace’ or ‘clasp’. This circle of light surrounds (in an

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initial reading of the line) the first of the moving heavens. But it becomes far more difficult to maintain this spatial sense when we come to the second subject of the sentence, amore. At the point when it is also said of love that it surrounds the primo mobile, the second, non-corporeal meaning of comprendere becomes relevant. For comprendere not only means ‘to clasp’; the verb of course also means ‘to grasp’. And if in this line the spatial and intellectual meanings of the verb comprendere already merge, that impression is only confirmed in the last of the lines cited. In that line the complementary perspective, so to speak, is described: the sight of the first of the moving heavens, girded with love. Of it is said that it alone understands what girds it, that is, the circle of light that is love. From an etymological point of view there is admittedly a corporeal element in the verb intendere, the notion of a tension that is directed towards something. But in the common semantic usage of this word the corporeal trace has long been replaced by an intellectual content, and intendere means ‘to understand’, ‘to intend’ or ‘to want’. Here, too, then, we can see how the boundary between the corporeal and the non-corporeal can be removed by the use of words with plural meanings. Spatial relationships again become indistinguishable from intellectual operations; and to effect this transformation Dante uses a method which is frowned on in the language of theory, but extremely widespread and popular in the language of poetry. Dante deliberately and to great effect uses ambivalent formulations: he builds sentences that can be read in different ways and whose ambivalence achieves precisely that mediation between the corporeal and the non-corporeal, between finite and infinite space, that theoria alone cannot achieve. Once again the rhetorical method – here the ambivalence of the verbs used – is turned into an instrument to aid cognition and to help us transcend familiar thought patterns. Again a poetic method becomes a theoretical one. To use the same expression as before: poetic licence, the deviation from the conventional rules of language that is permitted the poet, serves to engender notions which transcend ideas familiar to us. By the bye: inherent in the double meaning of the verb comprendere, which we have just reconstructed, is yet another connection, which has to do with the relationship of affect and intellect, of amore and mente. To understand is not per se an activity of love, but one of the intellect. But Dante dissolves this difference. Even Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians recognises a love that takes on a cognitive role, because even the very highest knowledge fails in the face of love.³⁶¹  I Corinthians 13,7– 9: “7 omnia suffert [caritas] omnia credit omnia sperat omnia sustinet 8 caritas numquam excidit sive prophetiae evacuabuntur sive linguae cessabunt sive scientia destruetur 9 ex parte enim cognoscimus et ex parte prophetamus 10 cum autem venerit quod perfectum est evacuabitur quod ex parte est”.

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Dante, however, unlike Paul, does not play off affect and intellect against each other. Rather, he combines an Aristotelian anthropology, which sees the intellect as the noblest part of all higher beings, with Pauline ethics, which accords the highest rank to caritas; and he combines them in the notion of a mente divina whose thinking (whose manifest form, that is) is love, or, to put it figuratively, the fire of the holy spirit. Out of the combination of these two elements Dante develops his cosmology, in which divine love positions the corporeal world out of the intellect of the Creator into space and time: that love, of which it will be said in the last line of the Commedia: “l’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle” (Paradiso XXXIII,145). In our reconstruction of the double meanings of the verbs comprendere and intendere we have thus far concerned ourselves primarily with the first of the two. But what is that intendere telling us, which in lines 112– 114 describes the relationship of the first of the moving heavens to the origin of its movement? The answer to this question can be gleaned from the first tercet of the lines cited: “La natura del mondo che quieta/il mezzo e tutto l’altro intorno move,/ quinci comincia come da sua meta.” The last of these three lines clearly presents a paradox: “comincia da sua meta”, it says of the first heaven, the primo mobile: it “begins as if from its goal”. For ‘meta’ means ‘goal’. The commentators on the Commedia have struggled with this paradox. In the end they solve the problem by banishing the contradiction and explaining the usage of the word meta differently. Dante, they argue, deviates from normal usage here to mean not a goal but its opposite, the beginning and origin. But this is not the case – indeed, this distortion of the text robs it of its real message. For here, yet again, the superficial paradox reveals itself as a strategy on the path to cognition, and in this case it serves to banish the notion of a corporeal boundary as such. To be sure that this is the case, one must take account of the fact that beginning and end are simultaneously spatial and temporal ideas, and in the context of the lines in question they really do refer to both simultaneously. For the boundary of corporeal space, the boundary of the primo mobile, the first heavenly sphere, and at the same time the boundary of all nature is also the beginning of all movement, for the Empyreum is completely static. In this, incidentally, it corresponds to the Earth, which is also immobile. For it is said of nature that it halts (quieta) its centre (il mezzo); and in the same way it will later be said of the Empyreum that God’s love halts it: “l’amor che queta questo cielo” (Paradiso XXX, 52). So the immobility of the Earth is not originary but secondary. The correspondence that emerges in this way between the mente divina and the central point of creation to that extent makes tangible the patterns of a geocentric world view, but at the same time it exposes the risks posed by that world view. For, while the fact that the empireo is halted marks its difference from

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the creature and corporeal world, the Earth is at the end of a long chain of ever more slowly moving heavenly bodies, at the point where they come to a standstill. Thus the Earth is at the centre of God’s planetary system, and yet it receives only the smallest share of the movement of divine love – it is at the Earth that this love stops. Thus, as much as the Earth is shown to be the centre of nature, in the order of creation it is nevertheless accorded a rank that is finally inferior, and a position furthest away from divine love. It almost seems as if the drama of the world’s fall and redemption is prefigured in this ambivalence regarding the cosmological positioning of the Earth. At the point of maximum distance from the origin of creation it is the most endangered place in the universe; and nonetheless it is at the centre of the story of God the Creator and His creation. But let us return to the details of how the primo mobile moves. It is clear from line 111 that the movement of this heaven is caused by God’s love. But of the same movement line 113 says “e quel precinto/colui che ’l cinge solamente intende”. Intendere therefore stands in a number of oppositional relations. On the one hand it stands in opposition to the intellectual understanding with which God’s love embraces the universe and sets it in motion; and the image of a circular understanding is a pretty exact figurative rendition of scholastic epistemology, notably the Thomist definition of comprehensio. ³⁶² Perfect knowledge, which is depicted in the perfect geometric form of the circle, stands opposite the imperfect movement of the intentio,³⁶³ imperfect because it is directed towards something that has not yet been fully grasped³⁶⁴ and is therefore a linear movement. But even intentio is not merely an activity of the intellect: it, too, is movement and, according to the lines we are considering here, this movement must be identical with the movement that is caused by God’s love. But how do the two things relate to each other? How can this movement be both the result of an outside impulse and intentional self-propulsion? Dante’s order of creation, which is here also based on neoplatonic notions, intends us to understand the movement of the heavens as a consequence of their desire to return to their cre-

 Cf. for instance Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I,12,7, ad 1: “Ad primum ergo dicendum quod comprehensio dicitur […], stricte et proprie, secundum quod aliquid includitur in comprehendente.” Ibidem,14, 3c: “Tunc enim dicitur aliquid comprehendi, quando pervenitur ad finem cognitionis ipsius: et hoc est quando res cognoscitur ita perfecte, sicut cognoscibilis est.”  Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I-II,12,1c: “Respondeo dicendum quod intentio, sicut ipsum nomen sonat, significat in aliquid tendere. […] intentio primo et principaliter pertinet ad id quod movet ad finem.”  Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I,12,7, ad 1: “nullo modo Deus comprehenditur, nec intellectu nec alio: quia, cum sit infinitus, nullo finito includi potest, ut aliquid finitum eum infinite capiat, sicut ipse infinite est.”

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ator.³⁶⁵ Their movement is nothing other than the physical expression of this desire. God’s love, which produces movement in His creations, simultaneously effects in them a desire to return to their origin, and that is why they move. It is precisely the combination of physics and psychology or, to be more precise, ethics, which can explain the paradox inherent in “quinci comincia come da sua meta”. It really does become impossible to distinguish beginning from end, because the origin of movement coincides with its goal, the object of desire. But this also demonstrates that spatial concepts will not suffice to decipher the text. With the help of the paradox that makes beginning and end one, Dante is tacitly translating spatial categories into ethical ones. The notion of a spatial boundary thus disappears into the dialectic of love and desire. Once again a rhetorical device – paradox – functions as an aid to understanding. It puts a process of cognition in motion, which will end in our having to bid farewell to the categories that are familiar to us. Once again poetic devices are transformed in their turn into an instrument of theory. Before I move away from the close reading of Dante’s text which has occupied us thus far, I would like to give one last pointer to the poet’s methods of transcending spatial categories. The lines in question deal with Beatrice’s instruction regarding the nature of the transition between the corporeal and the non-corporeal spheres, which begins when Dante and his companion are still in the primo mobile, that is, in the first of the moving heavens. At the end of the long lesson, which in essence takes in the entire order of the world, Beatrice informs her pupil that they themselves have now arrived in the Empyreum: “‘Noi siamo usciti fore/del maggior corpo al ciel ch’è pura luce’” (Paradiso XXX, 38 f.). At first this looks like a rather inept attempt to avoid portraying corporeal movement in a place where it can no longer exist, but within the logic of the transposition of corporeal into intellectual movement that we have seen in the text thus far, this kind of construction does make sense. For when Dante reaches the Empyreum, after having been taught by Beatrice about the nature of the universe, he does so in a manner of speaking as the result of what she has taught him. Physical locomotion is replaced by intellectual progress, by cognitive gains – and this fits exactly with the strategies of substituting intellectual activity for physical relations that we have already been able to observe. Canto XXX of the Paradiso, with which Dante reaches the Empyreum, thus also tells us something about the cognitive progress he has made. For he will now describe his perception of the bliss he encounters there in his own right, no longer needing to rely on the speech of a guide who is superior to him.

 See, for instance Paradiso I,75 f.: “la rota che tu sempiterni desiderato”.

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But how – the question returns – might it be possible to portray something which eludes spatial and temporal understanding using a language which is inevitably bound into the categories of space and time? Dante does not skirt this difficulty; on the contrary, he very consciously faces up to it, and again develops a series of techniques which allow him to exploit poetic language to develop a vivid image of the transcendental world of the empireo that reflects his own perception. I would like to go on now to illustrate this poetics of transcendence with reference to the description of his encounter with the candida rosa, the rose in the shape of which the Blest who have arrived here group themselves around their creator: O isplendor di Dio, per cu’ io vidi l’alto trïunfo del regno verace, dammi virtù a dir com’ ïo il vidi! Lume è là sù che visibile face lo creatore a quella creatura che solo in lui vedere ha la sua pace. E’ si distende in circular figura, in tanto che la sua circunferenza sarebbe al sol troppo larga cintura. Fassi di raggio tutta sua parvenza reflesso al sommo del mobile primo che prende quindi vivere e potenza. E come clivo in acqua di suo imo si specchia, quasi per vedersi adorno, quando è nel verde e ne’ fioretti opimo, sì, soprastando al lume intorno intorno, vidi specchiarsi in più di mille soglie quanto di noi là sù fatto ha ritorno. E se l’infimo grado in sé raccoglie sì grande lume, quanta è la larghezza di questa rosa ne l’estreme foglie! La vista mia ne l’ampio e ne l’altezza non si smarriva, ma tutto prendeva il quanto e ’l quale di quella allegrezza. Presso e lontano, lì, né pon né leva: ché dove Dio sanza mezzo governa la legge natural nulla rileva. (Paradiso XXX,97– 123)

These lines make the very difficulties of the depiction the subject of discussion, right from the start, namely with the apostrophising of the isplendor di Dio. This plea for inspiration is one of a whole series of such pleas throughout the Commedia, which – following the progress of the Pilgrim into ever higher regions – themselves aspire to ever higher things. Thus at the beginning of the Paradiso the

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apostrophising of Apollo replaced the invoking of the muses.³⁶⁶ Now, having reached the moment when he has to describe the empireo, the author of the sacro poema pleads for that isplendor di Dio, that reflection of divine glory that had once, in heaven itself, permitted him to gaze upon that transcendental reality that is beyond human powers of imagining. What this isplendor can achieve, therefore, namely the transgression of the powers of cognition natural in humans, also already leads to the proprium that is hidden behind the image. It is therefore only right that, in the 14th century, even the very earliest commentators identified God’s grace in this reflection of divine glory. The metaphorical description, however, acquires a particular meaning in the context of the lines considered here. For, as we shall later observe in detail, the concept of inspiration Dante describes corresponds exactly to the manifestation of eternal bliss, the visio beatificata, as he will go on to elucidate. So the supposedly metaphorical model for the text of the Commedia is part of the reality of the Blest. This relation between the text and its subject initially seems to correspond to the difference that Paul once defined as the difference between the cognition of truth in this world and the immediate cognition that occurs in the next, in Heaven. But the similarity between the model for inspiration and the visio beatificata is intended to dissolve that difference: “dammi virtù a dir com’io il vidi”. The language used should reproduce the vision directly. It therefore needs to develop methods that approximate a transgression of earthbound modes of thinking and speaking. But how can we imagine something that is beyond our powers of imagining? All human imaginatio is bound into space and time, and both categories fail in the face of the non-corporeal world of the Empyreum. What we see here again has the structure of a paradox. We can only imagine the foreign reality that is the blessed state of the saved souls by taking recourse to familiar notions, but precisely this familiarity must needs block our view into a sphere that is foreign to humans in this world. It is this very structure, the paradox, that Dante will use here to make possible what seems impossible. To this end he first uses a rhetorical device that seems completely unsuited to the task in hand. For in lines 109 ff. he uses a comparison, more specifically a comparison that develops a pastoral scene: “E come clivo in acqua di suo imo/si specchia, quasi per vedersi adorno,/quando è nel verde e ne’ fioretti opimo”. Such a comparison seems unsuitable in several ways. To start with there is a problem with the comparative method as such, the most notable function of which is to render the unknown

 Paradiso I,13 – 15: “O buono Appollo, a l’ultimo lavoro/fammi del tuo valor sì fatto vaso,/ come dimandi a dar l’amato alloro.”

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imaginable by analogy with what is known. But precisely this analogy is risky when describing a world that is per se outwith the bounds of human imagining. And furthermore, the unsuitability of this comparison seems to emerge from the marked spatial relations it thematises, above all the dominant vertical arrangement of the space. We shall be observing how Dante transforms this impediment into its opposite. The comparison is made up of two separate components. It is basically a hybrid construction. On the one hand, it refers back to the myth of Narcissus: the motif of looking into a watery mirror, which reveals to the beholder his own beauty, inevitably makes one think of Ovid’s image of the youth, in love with himself, who has to pay for his longing with death. Dante was very familiar with Ovid’s Metamorphoses; particularly in the Purgatorio, he uses a number of Ovid’s tales of transformation to convey figuratively the metamorphosis from sinner to one seeking salvation that is so basic to Christian thought. Especially line 110 of our comparison invites the connection with its reference, “quasi per vedersi adorno”: “as if he wanted to gaze at his beauty in the water’s mirror”. But this gesture in the direction of the Narcissus myth seems oddly alienated, for the lines cited are not describing a person, but a mountain, whose peak is reflected in all the glory of its spring blossoms and greenery in the water at its foot. We shall return to this later. For the moment let us instead look at how Dante uses the comparison to deal with the categories of space which are invalid in the noncorporeal world of the Empyreum. In this connection it is noticeable that the image of the mountain reflected in the water is clearly defined by a vertical axis, by the relation between above and below. The – high – mountain is reflected in the water at its foot. And the second part of the description of what is being compared with it, also begins with the characterisation of just such a vertical relationship. “Soprastando al lume intorno”, it reads. Taken in conjunction with the formulation, or more precisely the periphrasis from line 114: that part of human beings which returns to heaven, that is, their immaterial part, is reflected in the light that circles around it. And this, at first sight, merely curious circumscription, which reduces the nature of the person who has returned to heaven to an indication of quantity, a quanto, is also a part of the programmatic intent of these lines, as will become clear. But of that more later. For now let us turn to look more closely at the description of the spatial conditions. In a circle or in a ball – the text leaves these alternatives open, and we shall soon see why it does – in a circle or in a ball the Blest surround the light that is God Himself, and in this way they form a rose, as it is called in line 117. If the word soprastando seems to pick up on the spatial conditions that pertained to the mountain, the characterisation that follows, intorno, immediately calls that analogy into question. For if the individual Blest ones,

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wherever they are, always stand above the light and yet simultaneously surround this light completely, then the relationship between ‘above’ and ‘below’ essentially loses relevance. The difference between the two is dissolved, and the pertinence of such spatial differentials to the Empyreum is in the same breath profoundly called into question. So at the point where the comparison appears to suggest similarities, it is in fact specifically drawing attention to differences. It is basically – as we see here – revoking itself, and we shall be able to observe the application of this method further in these lines. This verbal image, that works against itself, is as such a very particular kind of illustration. No longer does it elucidate the unfamiliar by means of the familiar, nor the abstract by means of the graphic, rather an intentional incongruity alerts us to the general unsuitability of our notions in the face of the non-corporeal Empyreum. Thus the incongruous comparison becomes an epistemic medium; in fact it amounts to the rejection of the imagination that proves to be an unfit means with which to seek insight into the nature of this transcendental reality. Thus, by specifically employing metaphor in this way, Dante uses a poetic device as an instrument to transcend the cognitive modalities of this world. At the same time this also constitutes a remarkable recasting of the function of the imagination, which scholastic epistemology, following the Aristotelian tradition, had linked to our imaginative powers. For this theoria, imagination means a cognitive gain, because it goes hand in hand with an upwards movement, away from merely sensual data to purely intellectual entities.³⁶⁷ But Dante uses this imagination ex negativo in the same sense. And if this comparison does indeed raise cognitive perception onto an abstract level, then this is specifically because it also negates the responsibility of the imagination for our perception of the afterlife. Given that so far we have been able to observe how Dante nullifies the first spatial category – the vertical axis and the opposition between ‘above’ and ‘below’ – then the same may also be seen with regard to the other dimensions of space. Let us, to this end, look more closely at lines 115 – 117: “E se l’infimo grado in sé raccoglie/sì grande lume, quanta è la larghezza/di questa rosa ne l’estreme foglie.” Here another spatial opposition, that of height and width, of vertical and horizontal, plays an important part. And in the sense that Dante now also negates this opposition, then he only succeeds in doing so by setting the two axes in a, so to say, oblique relationship to each other. And it is not least of significance that the sentence quoted in effect lays out a set of condi-

 Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I-II,74,4 ad 3: “bonitas imaginationis est dispositio ad scientiam, quae est in intellectu.”

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tions. For the conditional constructions suggests a consecutio which specifically does not come about. A more expected construction might read: “and if the lowest tier alone can hold so great a brilliance, then how brightly must the topmost tier shine.” But this is exactly what the text does not do, and it even does not do so twice over. For on one hand it contrasts the lowest threshold of the light rose, l’infimo grado, with its larghezza. On the other hand, however, larghezza is a category of expansion which points to the horizontal rather than the vertical. And there is a second difference. For, when we read “quant’ è la larghezza di questa rosa ne l’estreme foglie”, then the category of larghezza corresponds – both grammatically and logically – to the light. Here, then, amplitude, that is, a broadly expansive area, is set against light; and the conditional structure of the sentence shows that ultimately the two are identical. Thus the opposition between vertical and horizontal already disappears on a verbal letter. For the larghezza of the rose is located in its estreme foglie. But estremo, the extreme outer edge, denotes a peripheral position where there is no distinction between vertical and horizontal; thus estremo does not in fact stand in opposition to infimo. But this mis-match also only indicates the principle that is realised in these lines. They dissipate the differences between the classifications of space that we are familiar with, and the removal of these spatial categories brings with it a second, incomparably more incisive change. What now happens is nothing less than the identification of quantitative and qualitative phenomena. For light intensity and lateral expansion are here seen as one. And with that, one of the most crucial distinctions in our reality – the difference between quantity and quality – is negated. In the non-corporeal world of the Empyreum, that by definition also knows no spatiality, the very categories of space became purely metaphorical, a metaphor of that distinction that alone is valid here: the different degrees of blessedness, which are distributed according to the level of grace that is apportioned to each of the Blest: “il quanto e ’l quale di quella allegrezza”. In this sphere quantitas is identical with qualitas. And this also explains the paraphrasis that initially appeared so odd, and that Dante uses with reference to the nature of the souls who have returned to Heaven and who have a part in his salvation: “quanto di noi là su ha fatto ritorno”. The soul of the human being – the immaterial part of his or her being which alone can enter the eternal blessedness of Paradise – is referred to in terms of a quantity, quanto. This at first glance almost derogatory description of the Blest in fact points to the orders of this transcendental world, in which quantitas and qualitas can no longer be distinguished from each other. The negation of the categories of space now also makes its mark on the language of these lines; and while the introductory apostrophe on the “isplendor di Dio” was issued as an appeal to the Lord to give the poet, on his return to Earth,

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the capacity to describe everything as he saw it, then this appeal is answered in these lines. It is worth citing these lines (Paradiso XXX,118 – 123) once again here: “La vista mia ne l’ampio e ne l’altezza/non si smarriva, ma tutto prendeva/il quanto e ’l quale di quella allegrezza./Presso e lontano, lì, né pon né leva:/ché dove Dio sanza mezzo governa,/la legge natural nulla rileva.” In a sense these lines articulate what the previous lines had portrayed in the reversal of the categories familiar to us in this world. Once again the horizontal and the vertical, ampio and altezza are called into play. But what concept are they set against? “Tutto prendeva il quanto e il quale.” Thus we are told that the Pilgrim was not overwhelmed (smarriva) by the breadth and height of what he was seeing, but that he perceived the quantity and the quality of this blessedness tutto, that is to say, in the same moment. Any such perception would be impossible under the laws of our own temporal world. But these words graphically signal the differences. Space is now seen as a dimension of dispersion that is subsumed in the intelligible world; indeed spatiality, i. e. expansion, is shown by the choice of the verb smarriva to be a source of confusion. Here, in the Empyreum, there is, instead, expanseless oneness, which in turn also negates the difference between quantity and quality. The extent to which this nullification of the categories of space also pervades Dante’s language, may be seen in the closing explanation for the invalidation of all natural laws: “Presso e lontano, lì, né pon né leva”. If one were to try to ‘make sense’ of these words, then one might paraphrase them as: “Near and far have no meaning there.” But abstract concepts of this kind take away the real impact of Dante’s words. For the non-validity of the relevant spatial categories is indicated by means of two verbs which, for their part, introduce spatial notions into the equation: “né pon né leva”. And again verticals and horizontals come into play, which are thus ascribed to proximity and distance, although they are not identical to them. Thus the language in these lines evolves a metaphorical conceptuality and by means of a somewhat oblique combination of spatial categories exactly replicates the experience that constituted the Pilgrim’s perception of reality in the empireo itself. And the same may be said of the phrase sanza mezzo in line 122. For this, too, links a spatial connotation, ‘without distance’, with a qualitative one, ‘without mediator’: and this mediation refers to none other than Nature, natura naturans, which at God’s behest keeps Creation alive. The imagery of the formulation sanza mezzo once again causes the difference between quantitas and qualitas to disappear. “Dammi virtù a dir com’io il vidi!”: this wish seems to have been fulfilled in the lines we have been looking at, and thus the text itself stands as evidence of the author’s subsequent divine inspiration. To recapitulate once more: the image in lines 109 – 111, which signals dissimilarity by suggesting comparability paves the way for the dismissal of the cat-

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egories of space that no longer make sense in the non-corporeal reality of the Empyreum. A circumstance that theoretical discourse can only describe as a negative finding is revealed in the comparison that revokes itself, in that it demonstrates the failure of the categories, familiar to us, that we normally resort to in the perception of reality. Thus, here again, Dante transforms poetic language into the instrument of a theoria that elucidates what theory itself is unable to describe. While we have so far focused above all on the negation of spatial categories that Dante pursues in these lines, we shall now devote a little more attention to another phenomenon, namely the characteristics of perception itself, as it is described here. In this connection an important part is played by the notion of the mirror. As we saw, through the reference to the story of Narcissus, the mirror has, on one hand, a mythical stratum. But at the same time it has another, theoretical dimension. For the mirror also features in the patterns used to explain the human capacity for sight. A connection of this kind already seems apparent in the word or, to quote Ernst Robert Curtius, seems to be indicated by the etymology of the name. Speculum and speculari are related to each other, even if the connection may at first seem to be anything other than obvious. For a mirror would appear to be passive; whereas speculari implies an intentional, goal-oriented looking; it implies searching out meaning and serves to mediate something hitherto unknown. But this question leads us to an opposition that pertains to the entire theory of optics as Dante knew it. A fundamental feature of this theory is its inability to decide between two alternatives. For, according to this theory, it is not certain whether seeing is an active or a passive faculty. At issue is the process of seeing: whether it depends on a light that is emitted by the eyes and which refracts on external objects, or whether seeing is a matter of absorbing images that the objects themselves transmit. These alternatives are also important in explanations of intellectual cognitive processes, for the theory of seeing also provides a – metaphorical – model for intellectual cognition, that is to say, our perception of reality. However, the case that concerns us here, the perception of God by the Blest in the Empyreum, removes the difference between the two. Here seeing and perceiving are no longer linked metaphorically, instead seeing, the visio beatificata, is shown to mean nothing less than the undistorted perception and simultaneous recognition of God. How then is the vision of the Blest, which nullifies the difference between seeing and perceiving, presented in Dante’s text? In order to answer this question it is worth looking at a further paradox in lines 112– 115, that we have so far not taken into account. The mirror situation described here presents not fewer, but probably incomparably more difficulties than the nullification of familiar spatial categories. For in the end, we would

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be hard put to say what is reflected where. According to the syntax, the relationship seems perfectly clear. “Quanto di noi là su fatto ha ritorno”: the immaterial nature of the Blest who have returned to Heaven seems to be the subject. Thus the minds of the redeemed souls who have been elevated into Heaven seem to be reflected in the light of God. But, at the same time, these apparently entirely unequivocal syntactical relationships contradict the logic – or at least the laws – of physics. For light, as a mirror for something else, is scarcely imaginable. On the contrary, it is normally light that is reflected in mirror images. So how can this paradox be resolved? We will have to take a second passage into consideration where these light relationships are described rather differently. Concerning the lowest level of the rose, we are told that “in sé raccoglie sì grande lume”. It receives light, and thus God Himself is in fact shown to be the source of all light refractions and reflections. But once again we can make good use of the aporia between different passages, for it demonstrates the truth of the reality of the afterlife. Indeed, here it is no longer possible to distinguish between self-contemplation and the perception of God. The self-perception of the Blest is identical with their gaze on the divine. Thus this God is reflected as much in the faithful who have been elevated into Heaven as these see themselves in their God-given contemplation of their Lord. Dante thus manages to provide a very plastic illustration of the traditional notion of the visio beatificata. The beatific contemplation of the Lord as the epitome – as the very existence – of the redeemed in Paradise coincides with their own self-perception. And this contemplation of the Lord is itself beatific because it goes hand in hand with self-perception; thus the contemplation of God may be understood as a reflection of the self. So Dante’s construction proves to be an ingenious combination of the two theoretical alternatives for the explanation of human seeing. In the situation he creates, it is no longer possible to decide whether seeing is a result of the emission of light from within oneself or whether it is rather the absorption of images transmitted by the objects themselves. Indeed, the reciprocity of light beam and reflection renders this difference insignificant. For the contemplation of God is identical with His self-reflection and at the same time constitutes the self-contemplation of the Blest. With his intentional subversion of the laws governing the logic and the physics of this world, Dante transforms the theory of optical perception into something of a phenomenology of heavenly blessedness. But at this point the connection to the myth of Narcissus, inscribed into the comparison, again proves to be of relevance. And again we are dealing with a negative connection: the similarity is once again lost in radical difference. The potentially fatal self-love of Narcissus, which is exacerbated by his gazing into his own reflection, is now set against the self-contemplation of the Blest which, for them, is associated with eternal life, and which is indistinguishable

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from God’s self-reflection. The analogy with the myth of Narcissus thus also signals its dismissal. But this dismissal goes beyond a mythic allegorese. For Dante’s so to speak anagogic reading of the story recounted by Ovid – that is to say, his response in terms of the afterlife – amounts to an invalidation of this myth. It no longer seems like a puzzle that hides the truth in an opaque form. The similarity again proves to be simply an instrument that serves to point out the difference. This mythic allegorese is thus anagogic because it in effect displaces the myth. It is scarcely even a semi-comfort when the rather sad story of Narcissus, recounted by Ovid, ends with his transformation into a flower, that is to say, into a narcissus. In Dante’s Empyreum, as we see from the lines we have been examining here, the flower that forms is a rose. And it is in this form that the Blest group themselves around the divine light. But that shape of the rose also reveals a last aspect of the light reflection in which eternal grace is realised. The relevant meaning is connected to the symbolic form of the rose. The rose is known as one of the most prevalent allegories for the Mother of God, and thus it also brings the Incarnation into play. Hence the lines examined here can be regarded as a rather hybrid, in a sense scriptural-neoplatonic theory of the Incarnation of the Son of God. If the Blest in Paradise are reflected in God as God is reflected in them, then they also constitute that figure which is in fact the source of this blessedness. For it was only when God became Man that the gates of Heaven reopened. The image of the rose thus transforms the unique, salvational event, that was the root of all grace, into the eternal form that humankind’s salvation takes on in Paradise. At the same time, however, the Incarnation of the Son of God seems as such to be God’s own self-reflection in humankind. Dante’s depiction of transcendental blessedness seems to want to perfect Creation. As we read in the book of Genesis, human beings were originally created as an “imago Dei”, in God’s image. And here, in the Empyreum, salvation history comes full circle, we see the redemption of sinful humankind in the mirror-like nature of this imago. For now human beings not only carry the image of God within them, now this God recognises Himself in His own image. Thus the creation of a likeness of God amounts here – through the Incarnation of that same God – into His self-contemplation in humankind. It is almost as though we were seeing a cosmological theodicy of the self-sacrifice of God. The Incarnation – the sacrifice of God to the immaculate woman, embodied by the rose – now has the same meaning as the process of Redemption. For God’s sacrifice to humankind cannot be distinguished here from the salvation of the individual human being, who sees him- or herself in the contemplation of God, in the visio beatificata. The preconditions for the redemption of humankind, the Incarnation and its result – the eternal grace of the saved – are here identified as one.

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In view of the construction of these verses it is at first sight astonishing to see the ease with which we talk here of an image. For the figure of the rose, that the Blest together form, is indeed an image, an image of the virgin Mother of God and, as such, the beginning of Salvation. And the lines which demonstrate the inability of human imagination to establish the nature of heavenly reality, cannot manage without that image. At the same time it is interesting to look precisely at the point where this image appears. It relates to the Incarnation, that is to say salvation history, the history of God and humankind. Thus precisely this connection to salvation history is presented in the shape of an image. And in the matter of the connection between the transcendental world and the temporal world, again the image makes an appearance. While the ontological characteristics of Paradise would seem to preclude any images, here ongoing salvation history once again reinstates them. We have seen how the verbal image revokes itself, in order to manifest the inability of the human imagination to picture the Empyreum. But this rejection of the image not only concerns its illustrative, graphic nature. It is also a matter of the rejection of the image as an exegetic device. Which at last brings me to an as yet unfulfilled promise. For still unanswered is the question as to the reason for Dante’s radical intervention in the Ovidian Narcissus myth. To put it a little bluntly – what’s the point of this green, flourishing mountain that Dante has replaced Narcissus with? It seems as though the Patristics’ interpretation of the Old Testament might be of assistance here. In the First Book of Kings there is a mountain, named Ephraim, on which lie the towns of Ramatha and Sophim. The interpretation of the mountain relies on the meaning of these names. Ephraim, as Gregory tells us, means ‘fruit-bearing’, furthermore he translates ‘ramatha’ as ‘visio’ and ‘sophim’ as ‘mirror’. And so Mount Ephraim seems like a figura coeli, a symbolic prefiguration of heavenly Paradise: Quis est enim mons ephraim nisi caelum? Mons quippe est frugifer, qui aeternae pulchritudinis flores et fructus indeficientis gaudii semper profert. Bene autem et ramatha et sophim in ephraim monte sita perhibetur, quia illa omnipotentis dei aeterna uisio et altitudo illa ciuium beatorum non in terra habetur sed in caelo.³⁶⁸

Thus Dante’s comparison is not limited to an illustrative effect, the image of the green, flourishing mountain proves at the same time to be an allegorical figuration of that Heaven whose reality is described in the sacro poema in the light reflections of the candida rosa. In view of the undistorted, unmediated contemplation of the afterlife, now this figura coeli also loses its impact and seems no  Gregorius Magnus, In librum primum Regum expositionum libri VI, I,4.

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longer sufficient as a means to imagine Heaven. “Videmus nunc per speculum in enigmate tunc autem facie ad faciem”: With this momentous sentence Paul articulated the difference between the truth of this world and the next.³⁶⁹ And it is only against the background of this formulation by Paul, that Dante’s depiction of transcendental blessedness is seen in its true light. For this reality, too, manifests itself in mirror-relations. But these reflections are no longer mere shadows, inferior likenesses of a higher and actual truth. The self-reflection of the Blest in the light of their God is the unmediated visio beatificata of a truth which knows no higher level. Meanwhile, almost surreptitiously, one might say, this rejection of all imagery is confronted by the new, heavenly image; and significantly the blessedness of the Blest takes the form of an image at the very point where it is alluding to the temporal world. In the sense that the visio beatificata also has its roots in the salvation history of the temporal world, so, too, the Blest form into a rose, into the image of the woman whose role was the beginning of the Salvation that is here perfected. Thus the images in the Empyreum needs must be there, because the transcendental reality of the Blest could not be shaped without reference to the fate of this world.

 I Corinthians 13,12.

List of Original Publications The following list contains the bibliographic information of the original publications, published again in English translation in this volume. We thank the rights holders for granting the translation and reproduction rights for the texts in question. Lecturae Dantis – Reflections of the Ulysses Canto: “Il canto di Ulisse (Inferno XXVI) agli occhi dei commentatori contemporanei e delle indagini moderne”, in: Letteratura italiana antica 2 (2001), S. 61 – 91. Art in the Afterlife or God as Sculptor: “Jenseitige Kunst oder Gott als Bildhauer. Die Reliefs in Dantes Purgatorio (Purg. X – XII) “, in: A. Kablitz/G. Neumann (eds.), Mimesis und Simulation (= Rombach Wissenschaften, Reihe Litterae, vol. 52), Freiburg/Br.: Rombach, 1998, pp. 309 – 356. Videre – Invidere: “Videre – Invidere. Die Phänomenologie der Wahrnehmung und die Ontologie des Purgatoriums (Dante, Divina Commedia, Purgatorio XIII)”, in: Deutsches Dante-Jahrbuch 74 (1999), Berlin: De Gruyter, pp. 137 – 188. Temporality and Eternity in Dante’s Purgatorio: “Zeitlichkeit und Ewigkeit in Dantes ‘Purgatorio’: Das Fürstental am Fuß des Läuterungsbergs (Dante, Divina Commedia, Pg VII – VIII)”, in: Dieter Ingenschay (ed.), Werk und Diskurs. Karlheinz Stierle zum 60. Geburtstag, Munich: Fink, 1999, pp. 32 – 72. The End of the Sacrum Imperium: “Das Ende des Sacrum Imperium. Verwandlungen der Repräsentation von Geschichte zwischen Dante und Petrarca”, in: Walter Haug (ed.), Mittelalter und frühe Neuzeit. Übergänge, Umbrüche und Neuansätze, Tübingen: Niemeyer, 1999, pp. 499 – 549. Poetics of Knowledge in the Paradiso: “Poesie der Wissenschaft: Dantes Kosmologie”, in: B. Rommel et al (eds.), Domänen der Literaturwissenschaft, Tübingen: Stauffenburg, 1998, pp. 233 – 252.

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110637106-009

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