"Love follows knowledge."
"Beauty above all beauty!"
– St. Catherine of Siena

Thursday, March 7, 2019

Dante's Paradiso Cantos VI - IX, Summary

Canto VI

The soul who addressed Dante on arriving to Mercury delivers a monologue that lasts the entire canto.  This soul identifies himself as heir to the line of Caesars that governed the Roman Empire.  He is Justinian, the last of the Roman Emperors that tried to reconstitute the empire after the western half collapsed.  He answers to why he is under the sphere of Mercury with a long extended recapitulation of Roman history.  He cites Rome’s mythic founding, it’s early monarchy, it’s subsequent overthrow to establish the Republic, the defeat of foreign enemies, the collapse of the Republic, the establishment of the empire through the Caesars which created the conditions for the birth of Christ, the destruction of the Jewish Temple, and ultimately the establishment of the Holy Roman Empire under Charlemagne.  Justinian then explains how the political parties of Dante’s day, the Ghibellines and the Guelphs, are poor successors to the Roman past.  He explains how the souls under the sphere of Mercury worked for justice during their lifetime but fell short of charity.  Justinian’s reign was known for synthesizing and perfecting Roman law.  Finally Justinian introduces a neighboring spirit, Romeo di Villanove, a man who during his later years was cast into exile. 

Canto VII

Justinian still speaking breaks into a bilingual song intertwining Hebrew and Latin.  He recedes into the group of dancing spirits, leaving Dante (the character) unanswered two questions he was about to ask.  Beatrice, glowing with a radiant smile, answers them.  The first question pertains to the double nature of Christ’s crucifixion in that it was both blasphemy to kill God and redemptive for mankind.  The second question pertains to why God in all His possibilities chose the death of His son as the means to redemption.  Since the Edenic fall was the result of a man’s act (Adam), it was most fitting that the redemption should come through the act of another man.  But since mankind lacked the ability to pay this exorbitant debt, God in His generosity would pay it but would pay it through the sacrificial death of His incarnate son, and thereby satisfy the fitting redemption through mankind.  Beatrice, anticipating a third question, answers why what God creates degenerate and die, even though God Himself is eternal and perfect.  It is because God creates things both directly and indirectly.  Those that are created directly do not die and those indirectly do.  Man’s soul, which is eternal, is a direct creation of God breathing into each individual.

Canto VIII

Without any sense of awareness, Dante is transported to the next sphere, Venus.  This is the planet associated with the pagan goddess of love.  Once within the sphere Dante sees that Beatrice glows brighter and even more beautiful than before.  A group of dancing lights come before them singing “Hosanna,” and one light steps up to speak.  He, Charles Martel, describes himself as having died young, a man who Dante once knew and had affection for.  In his short life, Charles was the ruler of Hungary and other parts of southern Europe.  He contrasts his good rule against that of his brother, Robert, King of Naples, who was a greedy ruler and a collaborator with the Pope against the Holy Roman Emperor.  Dante asks how such a good father—that of Charles and Robert—produce such a bad son?  Charles answers that God created and guides the universe to influence the people on earth but also created diverse people with free will.  Children would be the same as their parents but because God shapes their lives differently and because they respond differently to stimuli, men become different than their parents, and so yield different fruit.  Not all take up professions that fit one’s talents.  It behooves a person, then, to find a profession or state that fits their natural gifts.

Canto IX

Still on Venus, Dante (the character) speaks to Clemenza, Charles’ wife or daughter (it’s unclear) and says that time will bring retribution for those that did her family wrong.  Another splendor moves forward to tell Dante she was from a “degenerate” part of Italy in the northeast where her brother, Ezzelino da Romano scourged the region.  She is Cunniza da Romano who had a long list of love affairs and marriages and who ultimately found contrition and made up for her indiscretions.  She goes on to provide three prophecies: the battle of Vicenza, the death of Riccardo de Camino, and the betrayal of the Forrarese brothers by the bishop of Feltre.  As she fades back, another spirit moves forward to speak, Folquet de Marseilles, known as Folco.  A onetime love poet and perhaps a playboy who renounced his worldly life to first become a friar, then an abbott, and finally a bishop, he was deeply involved in the Albigensian crusade.  He speaks of the brightest splendor who resides under the influence of Venus, that is, the Old Testament prostitute, Rahab, who aided Joshua in his conquest of the Holy Land.  Folco goes on to lament the sad state of Florence where churchmen all seek to enrich themselves.  He goes on to prophesy that the Vatican will soon be free of this sin.



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