Authors: Dante
1.
The phrasing “di colui che tutto move” (of Him who moves all things) is unmistakably derived from Aristotle’s “unmoved mover” (see
Metaphysics
XII.7), familiar in Scholastic writings, as Scartazzini (1900, comm. to this verse) insists. “La gloria,” on the other hand, initiates and controls the Scholastic definition in order to Christianize its terminology. (“Glory” is notably and understandably absent from Aristotle’s or Thomas’s discussion of the first mover.) The word has various possible meanings in the
Commedia
(see the article “gloria” by Sebastiano Aglianò [
ED
III (1975)], pp. 240–42): for example, it may represent earthly renown, a shining quality, the state of blessedness. Here it may retain some of its more earthly resonance, but in only the highest sense: God’s shining forth from his beatitude, the most “famous” of all things that exist.
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2–3.
The
Letter to Cangrande
devotes well over a page to these verses, arguing that we are to find the glory of God’s Being reflected in all that
exists in His secondary creation; likewise, His essence, or His intellect, lies at the heart of all the substances found in the created universe. Thus it is not surprising that we find a gradation among even the things that God has made, some being more or less corruptible than others. Dante offers no examples in this difficult passage, but it is clear that he is thinking of the angels at the highest end of creation, and the less exalted forms of matter (e.g., rocks, mud) at the lowest. The words
penetra
(pervades, penetrates) and
risplende
(shines [with reflected light]) distinguish between God’s unmediated glory and its reflection, its quality various as what it is reflected by.
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4–12.
For the interrelated phenomena in
Paradiso
(beginning with this passage) of “the seeing and understanding of the protagonist—with their related difficulties—and the ability to remember and to express his experience—with
their
related difficulties,” see the densely supported observations of Giuseppe Ledda (Ledd.2002.1), pp. 243–98.
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4–6.
The reference to St. Paul’s ascent to the heavens is unmistakable (II Corinthians 12:3–4) and has long been acknowledged (at least since the time [ca. 1385] of Francesco da Buti [comm. to vv. 1–12]). For a particularly incisive treatment, see Landino on this tercet. More recently, see the extended treatment by Giuseppe Ledda (Ledd.2002.1), pp. 243–59. And see Di Scipio (Disc.1995.1), p. 253, for the pertinence here of the concept of
excessus mentis
(but see the previous recognitions of Sapegno [in his comment to vv. 6–9] and a few other modern commentators). For the Pauline background of the concept, see Di Scipio (Disc.1995.1), pp. 153–55.
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4.
Some commentators, perhaps beginning with Pietrobono (comm. to this verse), put forward the notion that the reference is to all ten heavens, that is, to the totality of this superterrestrial world. A few have also argued that the reference is to the outermost of the physical heavenly spheres, either the Crystalline or the Primum Mobile. However, it seems utterly clear that Dante is referring to the Empyrean, God’s “home” (insofar as He who is everywhere can be thought of as located in a particular anywhere as well). Scartazzini (comm. to this verse) was perhaps the first to refer to the
Epistle to Cangrande
as eventual justification of this reading: “And it is called the Empyrean, which is as much as to say, the heaven glowing with fire or heat; not that there is material fire or heat therein, but spiritual, which is holy love, or charity” (XIII.68—tr. P. Toynbee).
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7.
For his several discussions of the language of desire in Dante, with special reference to
Paradiso
, see Lino Pertile (Pert.1990.1); (Pert.1993.2); (Pert.1998.2), pp. 87–133; (Pert.2001.1). And now see his global study of this subject (Pert.2005.2).
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9.
On this verse, “che dietro la memoria non può ire” (that memory cannot follow after it), see Bruno Nardi (Nard.1960.3), who examines the understanding of the nature of memory as it is reflected in the traditions that develop from Aristotle and Augustine and come down into Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas in order to establish that “when our intellect comes near to the beatific vision of God …, it so immerses itself in it … that the memory and the image-receiving capacity of the mind are unable to contain it any longer” (p. 273). As Poletto and Tozer point out (comms. to vv. 7–9), Dante has explained this verse in the
Epistle to Cangrande
(XIII.77): “Et reddit causam dicens ‘quod intellectus in tantum profundat se’ in ipsum ‘desiderium suum’, quod est Deus, ‘quod memoria sequi non potest’ ” (And he gives the reason, saying that “the intellect plunges itself to such depth” in its very longing, which is for God, “that the memory cannot follow” [tr. P. Toynbee]). There is (mainly unexpressed) disagreement among the commentators as to whether the memory is with the intellect in its first experience of the Godhead and only loses that perception afterward, or, as Dante seems to be saying, is left behind at the outset in the intellect’s excitement. Whatever hypothesis one accepts, the result is the same, as the last verses of the poem will also announce: The vision of God cannot be contained in human memory; rather, we can only claim a memory of having had a memory, now lost.
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10–12.
As though in preparation for the invocation that is to come in the following tercet, Dante resorts to a series of phrases or words laden with literary overtone, whether intrinsically or by the context offered from their other appearances in the
Commedia
:
veramente
(discussed in the following note),
regno santo, mente, tesoro, materia, il mio canto
. For instance, the “holy kingdom” (
regno santo
) that is Paradise may remind us of medieval poets’ assigning themselves geographic/political areas as subjects of their work (e.g., the “matter of Troy,” the “matter of France,” etc.); all the rest of these terms are also used by Dante in passages that refer to the writing of his poem. For
materia
, see
Paradiso
X.27, where Dante refers to the text of
Paradiso
as “that matter of which I have become the scribe.”
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10.
While it is clear that, as commentators have pointed out, Dante’s conjunction (
veramente
, here “nevertheless”) mirrors the formality of the Latin conjunction
verumtamen
, it also necessarily exhibits the only partly hidden claim that this poem is a record of things that have truly (
veramente
) been observed. In 1791, Lombardi (comm. to this verse) was perhaps the first commentator to insist on the force of the Latin root, specifically denying the meaning of
con verità, certamente,
found in the earlier commentaries. It is, however, difficult to accept the notion that the obvious Italian meaning is utterly effaced in the Latinism. In accord with that view, Benvenuto (comm. to vv. 1–12) glosses
veramente
as “not in empty dreams.” Poetry, as commentators should realize perhaps more often than we do, has the propensity to open into a plurality of meanings that cannot be fully rendered in prose. (Dante, however, in
Vita nuova
XXV.10 clearly himself sponsors the notion that the meaning of poems are known to those who make them: “For, if any one should dress his poem in images and rhetorical coloring and then, being asked to strip his poem of such dress in order to reveal its true meaning, would not be able to do so—this would be a veritable cause for shame. And my best friend [Guido Cavalcanti] and I are well acquainted with some who compose so clumsily” [tr. M. Musa].)
Since most of the seven of the preceding uses of the adverb fairly obviously offer only the more usual Italian sense of the word (i.e., “truly,” “really”—as will most of the seven that follow), its undertone here is not easily muffled.
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11.
The word
tesoro
is focal in a number of contexts as we move through the poem. For these, see the note to
Paradiso
XVII.121–122. Here Dante claims to have laid up in his memory the “treasure of Heaven” (see Matthew 19:21).
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12.
For the concept behind Dante’s word
materia
, see the note to vv. 10–12, above. As for the noun
canto
, when it signifies “song” (and not “side” or “edge,” a meaning it has fully seven times, interspersed through all three
cantiche
), it is used twenty-four times in the poem, and includes reference to a gamut of “songs”: (1) classical epic (
Inf
. IV.95); (2) a specific canto or passage in the
Commedia
(
Inf
. XX.2; XXXIII.90;
Purg
. I.10;
Par
. V.16; V.139); (3) Dante’s
former
song, the second ode of the
Convivio
(
Purg
. II.107; II.131); (4) the Ulysses-seducing song of the Siren in Dante’s second Purgatorial dream (
Purg
. XIX.23); (5) songs of biblical derivation sung as part of the rite of purgation, that is, the
Miserere
sung by the penitents
in ante-purgatory (
Purg
. V.27) and the
Gloria in excelsis
sung by the penitent avaricious at Statius’s liberation from
his
penitence (
Purg
. XX.140); (6) Charity’s directive song to which Faith and Hope measure the steps of their dance (
Purg
. XXIX.128); and finally (7) twelve songs in the
Paradiso
directed to or emanating from Heaven, first the holy songs of the Seraphim (
Par
. IX.77) and, last, the
Gloria
sung by the Church Triumphant (if not by Jesus and Mary, already returned to the Empyrean—
Par
. XXVII.3).
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13–36.
The author of the
Epistle to Cangrande
himself divides the introduction to
Paradiso
into two parts, vv. 1–12 and 13–36 (see
Epist
. XIII.48). While the invocation proper occupies only three verses, this entire passage supports and extends it. (For an intense consideration of Dante’s use of invocation, see Ledda [Ledd.2002.1], pp. 55–63.)
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13–15.
The invocation of God, even if as the “good Apollo,” is, once one considers the poetic moment, almost a necessity. (Paulinus of Nola apostrophizes Christ as follows: “Salve o Apollo vere” [Save us, O true Apollo—
Carmina
II.51], as noted by Kantorowicz [Kant.1951.1], p. 228, among a plethora of similar expressions found in Greek [and some Latin] syncretistic passages.) Who else but God Himself can serve as the ultimate “muse” for a poem about the ultimate mysteries of the Christian faith? If the first two of these three verses indirectly but clearly associate Apollo with God (the word
valore
in verse 14 is used at least thrice again undoubtedly to refer to the Power of God the Father [
Par.
I.107, X.3, and XXXIII.81]), while the second indirectly but clearly associates Dante with St. Paul (see
Inf
. II.28, “lo Vas d’elezïone” [the Chosen Vessel]), since Dante, likewise, will be made God’s chosen vessel (
vaso
). And what of the gift that this poet seeks? The “belovèd laurel,” in this exalted context, becomes more than poetic fame, but the true immortality of those who are blessed for eternity, another and better kind of immortality: the “laurel” granted by God to his immortal (i.e., saved) poet, rewarded, among other things, for having written, under His inspiration, of Him. In the
Epistle to Cangrande
, Dante offers the following explanation of the reason poets call on higher authority: “For they have need of invocation in a large measure, inasmuch as they have to petition the superior beings for something beyond the ordinary range of human powers, something almost in the nature of a divine gift” (tr. P. Toynbee—the last phrase reads
quasi divinum quoddam munus
, representing an only slightly veiled reference to the theologized nature of his “Apollo”). For Dante’s single use of the
Latinism
muno
, based on
munus
, see
Paradiso
XIV.33. We should not forget, if we insist on the pagan valence of Apollo, that Dante has already twice “transvaluated” a pagan god into the Christian deity: See
Inferno
XXXI.92 and
Purgatorio
VI.118 for the expression
sommo Giove
(highest Jove). This is surely the same phenomenon that we witness here.
Do these “transvaluations” of the more usual understandings of poetic inspiration and success entirely erase the traces of their original reference among poets and their audiences? We are, after all, reading a poem. And we should have no doubt but that its human agent was as interested in earthly success as any other poet (and perhaps more than most). However, the context makes a pagan understanding of these grand poetic gestures at the same time both impossible and desirable. We are almost forced to recognize the divine claims made by this very human agent, but we are allowed to understand them in completely human terms as well. We find ourselves in a usual dilemma: If we take the truth claims made by the poet on behalf of his poem seriously, we feel greatly troubled (mortal agents are not allowed such claims unless they are
demonstrably
chosen, as, to Christian believers, was Paul); on the other hand, if we insist that these claims are in fact not true, we sense that we have failed to deal with something that, if it makes us uncomfortable, nonetheless must be dealt with; other poets do not make such stringent demands upon our belief. In another way of phrasing this, we can only say No after we have said Yes, that is, by understanding Dante’s veiled claims, no matter what we eventually decide to think of them.
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