CliffsNotes on Dante's Divine Comedy-III Paradiso by Harold M Priest

Author:Harold M Priest
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Commentary

Dante and Beatrice have traversed the three spheres which constitute the lower division of Paradise, those which fall within the shadow of the earth, and correspondingly the nature of the spirits associated with those spheres partake of some earthly weakness or imperfection. Marking the transition from the lower to the higher division of Paradise, Dante opens the present canto with a tribute to the wonders of the universal plan. That the earth’s polar axis is tilted and that the resultant angle between the equator and the ecliptic is precisely calculated to produce the cycle of the seasons are cited as evidence of the perfection of God. Whoever contemplates this scheme must have his mind lifted to renewed reverence for the Creator.

This new heaven is the Sphere of the Sun, the region of spirits distinguished for their wisdom. The location of the sun below Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn and the assignment of the great teachers and theologians to a position below warriors, rulers, and those devoted to contemplation is not the result of value judgments but rather the consequence of Dante’s following the Ptolemaic scheme of the heavens, which placed the sun in the fourth sphere. Dante’s enthusiasm for this virtue and for the figures represented in this sphere is indicated by the space allotted to the region and the eloquence of his treatment of the subject.

The first spokesman for the region is St. Thomas Aquinas, who was the chief authority for Dante’s theological doctrines, as, in fact, he has been for Roman Catholicism up to the present.

Among the twelve jewels of light in the crown surrounding Dante and Beatrice, some are named, but others not named are identified in terms that would assure their recognition by informed readers of Dante’s day. The one whose wisdom has never been equalled is Solomon. One described as the authority on the nature and classification of angels is Dionysius the Areopagite. The author whose work Augustine drew upon is Orosius. The trenchant writer who was martyred for “stripping the world’s hypocrisies” is Boethius, author of On the Consolation of Philosophy.

Among those in the circle who were named by Aquinas were: Albert of Cologne, “Albertus Magnus,” who was Aquinas’ teacher; Gratian, whose Decretum did much to bring ecclesiastical laws and civil laws into conformity; Peter Lombard, who referred to his voluminous Sententiae as his “widow’s mite.” The Isidore mentioned is St. Isidore of Seville, a seventh-century author. The Venerable Bede is the well-known author of the Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation. Richard of St. Victor was the author of an important treatise on contemplation. Sigier of Brabant lectured in Paris in Aquinas’ time. Aquinas’ remark that Sigier “hammered home invidious truths” is paradoxical; Sigier and Aquinas were enemies at the University of Paris in the thirteenth century. Sigier taught truths according to logic; Aquinas, according to Church doctrine.

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