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

Sunday, May 5, 2019

Dante's Paradiso Cantos XIX - XXII, Summary

Canto XIX

At Jupiter, the lights that formed the eagle burn bright in front of Dante.  The individual lights speak in unison, so that a voice appears to come as one from the eagle’s beak.  Dante expresses that he has a doubt formulated in his mind of which the eagle must realize.  The eagle articulates Dante’s question: where is the justice of a person in not having the ability to be saved only because he did not have the advantage of being born knowing of Christianity?  The eagle answers using the same line of argument of God to Job: who are you with your limited vision of the totality to judge God’s ways.  God’s will always leads to justice.  The eagle further argues that just because one believes in Christ it does not guarantee salvation.  Indeed, the worst fates are reserved for those that knew Christ but failed to adhere to His teachings.  The eagle then confirms Church teaching that only those baptized in Christ can ultimately be saved.  He goes on to identify twelve kings contemporary to Dante that are judged to be plagues to the world: Emperor Albert, Phillip the Fair, Edward I, Ferdinand IV of Castile, Wenceslaus IV, Charles II, Frederick II, James of Aragon, James II of Aragon, Dionysius, Haakon IV, and Stephan II.  The eagle also identifies two kingdoms run well (Hungary and Novarre) and one poorly, Cyprus.

Canto XX

Still on Jupiter, when the eagle stops speaking, the individual lights stand out as individual points.  In the silence, the murmuring of what appears to be a stream is heard, sounding as if it is a musical instrument projecting from the eagle’s throat.  The murmuring is actually individual voices not speaking in unison, and, when they finally go back to speaking in unison, the eagle describes the single points of light that make up his eye.  Six bright souls, all former kings, form this eye: King David from the Old Testament, Trajan the Roman Emperor, Hezekiah from the Old Testament, the Emperor Constantine, William the Good of Sicily, and Ripheus the Trojan.  These six good kings contrast with the twelve bad ones from the previous canto.  At this, Dante (the character) expresses surprise.  Two of the good kings in heaven are pagans, Trajan and Ripheus.  He had just been told that only baptized Christians (and Old Testament worthies) could be saved.  The eagle goes on to explain that God had found a way to baptize those souls into Christianity, which ultimately came from the power of prayer.  Trajan was baptized through the prayer of Pope Gregory and Ripheus through the prayer of the three ladies of the Christian virtues.  The eagle concludes that only God can know the fates of souls.

Canto XXI

Abruptly the pilgrims are rising toward the next sphere, Saturn, and Dante (the character) turns to look at Beatrice, who is even more beautiful but now not smiling.  She tells him that if he smiled now, he would be burnt to ashes.  Into the crystal planet of Saturn he sees a ladder of great height with many shining lights of souls coming down and still others flying off.  One light of a soul is close by, and his brightness intensifies as Dante gives him attention.  Beatrice encourages a hesitant Dante to ask what is on his mind.  Dante asks two questions.  What has caused the spirit to approach them and why has heaven here at Saturn gone silent?  He answers that he has come down the ladder to bid Dante welcome.  He explains that heaven has not gone silent but that Dante’s mortal ears could withstand the beauty of the music, much like Dante would burn to ash if Beatrice smiled.  Dante then asks a third question, why the spirit was charged to welcome the pilgrims.  In joy to the question, the light spins like a wheel and says that an answer to that question is impossible for anyone but God to reveal.  Dante then withdraws the question and simply asks who the soul is.  The soul says he is Peter Damien, cloistered monk and had lived a life of mystical immersion—Saturn being the sphere of mystical contemplation—until, that is, he was compelled to become a bishop.  Damien then denounces the luxuries of Dante’s contemporary bishops, so bloated, he says, that their horses sag under their weight.  Suddenly a loud cry is heard that freezes Dante in fear.

Canto XXII


Still on Saturn, Dante in fear from the shout turns to Beatrice for guidance.  She comforts him and reminds him he is in heaven where everything is holy.  She explains that the shouts are prayers which his mortal ears cannot comprehend or process, just as her smile cannot be seen or it will turn him into ash.  She then directs his gaze to where one hundred glittering lights are now near them.  The largest of these lights speaks up in response to Dante’s thought on who it might be.  The splendor narrates the key details of his life from which we can deduce—it is never actually said—he is St. Benedict, the founder of the Benedictine Order.  Benedict explains that these flames on Saturn once lived lives of contemplation.  He names a couple of these souls.  Dante asks him if he may see his face unveiled, and Benedict promises him he will when he reaches the highest sphere.  He explains that the ladder on Saturn is a bridge to that highest sphere and goes on say that now on earth his famous rule is but a waste of paper since so few now have the discipline to keep it.  Finally Benedict and the other souls disappear up the ladder.  Dante and Beatrice then ascend to the next sphere, which is not a planet, but rows of fixed stars.  From that height, Beatrice has Dante look back down and see the smallness of the planet Earth.


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