Paradiso (122 page)

29.
   Some readers have reflected that this verse would seem to put Dante in a class by himself, since Paul claims (II Corinthians 12:2) a celestial ascent only as far as the third heaven. But see the note to
Paradiso
I.73 for notice that traditional understanding of the passage identified Paul’s “third heaven” with the Empyrean.
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30.
   
Benvenuto (comm. to vv. 28–30) says that this, Dante’s first visit to the realms of Paradise, is made in the flesh, while the next one will not be (i.e., Dante’s soul will fly up without his body after his death). Of course, he is destined to get that body back at the general resur-rection.
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31.
   While this “light” does not choose to identify himself until verse 135, it is perhaps good to have some sense of Dante’s great-great-grandfather, who is speaking in this scene, “of whose life nothing is known beyond what Dante himself tells us; viz. that he was born in Florence (
Par.
XV.130–133) in the Sesto di Porta san Piero (
Par.
XVI.40–42) about the year 1090 (
Par.
XVI.34–39); that he belonged (possibly) to the Elisei, one of the old Florentine families which boasted Roman descent (
Par.
XV.136;
Par.
XVI.40); that he was baptized in the baptistery of San Giovanni in Florence (
Par.
XV.134–135); that he had two brothers, Moronto and Eliseo (
Par.
XV.136); that his wife came from the valley of the Po, and that from her, through his son, Dante got his surname of Alighieri (
Par.
XV.91–94,
Par.
XV.137–138); that he followed the Emperor Conrad III on the Second Crusade, and was knighted by him (
Par.
XV.139–144), and finally that he fell fighting against the infidel about the year 1147 (
Par.
XV.145–148)”
(T)
.
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32–33.
   The protagonist makes up for his previous “failure” to look at Beatrice in the last canto (XIV.127–132).

Aversano claims that stupefaction is experienced only twice in the Bible, both times in the responses of those who beheld Christ, citing Mark 9:14 (regarding the populace after the Transfiguration) and Acts 9:6–7 (regarding those who witness what is to them strange behavior on the part of Saul on the road to Damascus). But see also Acts 2:7–12, which perhaps contains a more relevant context than those two passages. After the apostles found they were able to “translate” words spoken in tongues into their own language, they were amazed. This is the first use of the word
stupefatto
in the poem. It will twice be used again (
Par.
XXVI.80 and
Par.
XXXI.35). On the last of these it will refer to the reaction of the pilgrim approaching Rome who sees the city for the first time.
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34–36.
   Beatrice’s smile recognizes that Dante has understood his identity better than ever before, biologically, but more important in terms of his family’s heritage, and, still more important, as “Roman” and as Christian, assured of his salvation.
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37–42.
   
This is Cacciaguida’s second kind of speech, one that the protagonist is unable to understand. For some reason André Pézard (Peza.1967.1) does not include this passage in his consideration of the “tongues” spoken by Cacciaguida (he deals with items 1, 3, and 4 in the listing below). This list is found in Hollander (Holl.1980.2), pp. 125–27 (for some further consideration, see Hollander [Holl.1992.1], pp. 38–39, n. 57). However, it seems clear that the reader must consider four languages as spoken by Cacciaguida: (1) vv. 28–30, Latin; (2) 37–42, speech that the protagonist could not recognize; (3) vv. 47–48, the Italian of Dante’s time; (4)
Paradiso
XVI.34–36, the vernacular of Cacciaguida’s day. For support for this view, see Honess (Hone.1997.1), p. 130.
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39.
   Poletto (comm. to vv. 37–39) seems to have been the first commentator to notice the closeness of this line to the tenth verse of the last poem of the
Vita nuova
(XLI.12): “io non lo intendo, sì parla sottile” (I cannot understand the subtle words it [his pilgrim spirit, having visited Paradise and seen Beatrice] speaks [tr. M. Musa]). Benvenuto explains (comm. to vv. 37–42) that Cacciaguida was speaking of pure mental constructs (
conceptiones mentales
) that transcend mere humans’ ability to understand. (See the note to
Par.
XIV.88.) On the other hand, Francesco da Buti (comm. to vv. 37–48) and Cristoforo Landino (comm. to vv. 37–39) both think the context of his first words in Latin, regarding Dante’s status as one of the elect (vv. 28–30), point to the issue of predestination, a position that Sapegno (comm. to vv. 37–42) brings back into consideration, as several others do also. Hollander (Holl.1980.2) is of the opinion that this linguistic behavior on the part of Dante’s ancestor may reflect either Adamic vernacular or the apostles’ speaking in tongues. There is, in short, no consensus about how to read this verse. But see the note to vv. 43–48.
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40–42.
   Benvenuto’s hypothesis (see the note to verse 39) concerning “mental constructs” would seem to be certified by these lines, which tell us that Cacciaguida was not trying to hide his words from Dante but that the language he employed simply overshot its human target, that is, Cacciaguida had momentarily forgotten that Dante was not yet “immortal,” that, in other words, his intelligence still was limited by his humanity.

The word
concetto
represents an important element in Dante’s vocabulary of consciousness. Used as a singular noun for the first time in
Inferno
XXXII.4 (where it refers to the mental construct Dante has in his brain of the lowest landscape of Hell), it does not reappear until here (for the rest of its “career” in the poem, see the note to
Par.
XXXIII.127).
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43–48.
   
These six lines perhaps offer some clarification of the nature of Cacciaguida’s ununderstandable utterance (vv. 37–42). First, he seems to have been addressing God, and certainly not Dante; second, if the words he speaks now flow from the ones he uttered then, they, too, were words of thanksgiving for God’s grace to his descendant.
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48.
   This is the last appearance in the poem of the adjective
cortese
(literally “courtly” [i.e., of the court], and hence “courteous” [i.e., behaving as a courtier does—or should do]). It transforms the usual sense of the word, which often associates it with “courtly love,” into heavenly affection, a rather pronounced Nietzschean “transvaluation of values.” Dante had already availed himself of a similar strategic displacement at the end of the
Vita nuova
, when he refers to God as the “sire de la cortesia” (the Lord of graciousness [tr. M. Musa]).
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50.
   For
volume
, see the note to
Paradiso
XII.122. To what “volume” does Cacciaguida refer? Where today commentators are unanimous in their opinion, it is amusing to read Jacopo della Lana on the problem. According to him (comm. to vv. 49–50) and to perhaps one other (the Anonimo Fiorentino [comm. to vv. 49–51]), it is the
Aeneid
. The Codice Cassinese (comm. to this verse) is perhaps the first to deliver the standard gloss: the mind of God. With few exceptions this is the common opinion during seven hundred years of commentatary. Tommaseo (comm. to vv. 49–51) suggests that the reference may also be to the Apocalypse (3:3), the Book of Life, in which the names of all the saved are recorded. Insofar as we are supposed to think of God’s mind as containing this book (and, since it contains infinity, it must), we realize that Cacciaguida has read in it Dante’s salvation.
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50–54.
   Cacciaguida is using lofty diction to say that Dante’s arrival has satisfied the long craving he has experienced (dating, we assume, from his arrival in the Empyrean circa 1147) to see his descendant’s arrival in the heavens, about which he read in God’s mind, credit for which he gives to Beatrice.
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51.
   That is, the words in this “book” are unchanging, unlike those in human manuscripts, where scribes variously blot, erase, add to, and cross out previous texts. Compare
Paradiso
XVII.37–39. And see Torraca (comm. to vv. 49–51) for a reflection of this verse in the opening line of Dante’s first
Eclogue
to Giovanni del Virgilio: “Vidimus in nigris albo patiente lituris …” (In letters black, upon receptive white, I saw …).
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54.
   
It is not difficult to believe that Dante is here revisiting a theme dear to him, the ill-fated flight of Icarus (see
Inf.
XVII.109–111 and XXIX.113–116;
Par.
VIII.125–126), but now starring Beatrice as a better-artificing Daedalus and Dante as nonfalling wonder boy. See the note to verse 72.
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55–69.
   “Cacciaguida tells Dante that he understands the reason why he does not inquire his name and the cause of his interest in him, which is, that he (Dante) is aware that the denizens of Heaven see the thoughts of others through the medium of the mind of God which reflects them in every detail; and consequently that it is unnecessary for him to state in words what he wishes to be told him, because his wishes are already fully known to Cacciaguida. Still, he encourages Dante to speak, because his (Cacciaguida’s) love will be increased by complying with his request” (Tozer, comm. to these verses).
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56–57.
   See Grandgent (comm. to verse 56): “
Raia
, ‘radiates.’ Unity is the beginning of number, as God is the beginning of thought; from the conception of unity is derived the conception of all numbers, and in the divine mind all thought is contained.”
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68.
   Will and desire are the hallmarks of the soul’s affective knowing and wise loving in Paradise. As Tommaseo pointed out long ago (comm. to vv. 67–69), the
cantica
will conclude with these two spiritual movements in Dante operating harmoniously (
Par.
XXXIII.143).
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72.
   Dante apparently could not resist a second reference to Beatrice as Daedalus (see the note to verse 54). And see Hollander (Holl.1983.1), p. 135n., pointing out that there seems to be a “Daedalus program” in this part of the poem:
Paradiso
VIII.125, X.74–75, XIII.77–78, and here, representing, according to him (p. 136n.), something bordering on the obsessive.
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73–84.
   This tortured preamble to a simple question (“What’s your name?”) is paraphrased by Tozer (comm. to these verses) as follows: “Dante here excuses himself for being unable to thank Cacciaguida as he would wish to do for his benevolence. The ground of his excuse is that, whereas in Heaven a feeling (
affetto
) is accompanied by an equivalent power of thought (
senno
), through which that feeling can find expression, this is not the case with mortal men, for in them the means (
argomento
) of expressing feeling fall short of the wish to do so (
voglia
).”
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74.
   
The term
equalità
, a hapax, has considerable theological weight. Aversano (Aver.2000.2), p. 68, cites Richard of St. Victor,
De Trinitate
VI.xxi: “Quid summa aequalitas sit in illa Trinitate, ubi oportet omnes aeque perfectos esse” (What very great equality there must be in that Trinity, in which it is necessary for all the elements to be equally perfect). Aversano continues by adducing the gloss of Alain de Lille (
PL
CCX.445) to his fourth
regula theologica
: “in Patre unitas, in Figlio [
sic
] aequalitas, in Spiritu sancto unitatis aequalitatisque connexio” (in the Father, uniqueness; in the Son, likeness; in the Holy Spirit, the link between uniqueness and likeness).

If one thinks about the “aesthetics” of the Christian religion (and of Dante’s poem), one has a sense of the centrality of both uniqueness and of likeness. This is nowhere more readily apparent than in the Second Person of the Trinity, Jesus Christ, a uniquely human being (because He is also the immortal God) and yet a commonly human being (because He was also mortal). And, it is perhaps fair to suggest, this theme has nowhere before in the poem been quite so evident or so important as it has become in this canto.
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