The Divine Comedy

[Estro Felino]

Twenty-first Canto
Dante yearns* to ask Virgil what that earthquake had been. As Jesus Christ appeared to his disciples in Emmaus (Luke 24:13), a soul had appeared out of nowhere and started following them; all of a sudden he tells them “Brothers, God's peace be with you”. Virgil replies: “May the Just Tribunal take you to the Kingdom of the Blessed”**. Then he reveals him he was a soul from Limbo, and is accompanying Dante, a living man through Purgatory, showing the Ps on his forehead, going with him as far as he is allowed to go (to the Earthly Paradise). After that, he asks the stranger whether he knows what that earthquake was, satisfying Dante's wish too. That soul explains tha beyond the Gates of Purgatory there are no weather phenomena (no rain, or dew, or snow, rainbow or wind), because it already is an otherworldly dimension, relying on spiritual patterns. So earthquakes in Purgatory are not the result of telluric movements, but take place whenever a soul feels cleansed and ready to ascend to Heaven. And a scream of joy and gratitude to God, accompanies this event. It's like a spontaneous feeling that arises in the penitent, who all of a sudden wants to change venue (Paradise). All penitents want to ascend to Heaven, but Godly Justice prevails in their heart, which induces them to atone for their sin until they are purged. The soul reveals he had been staying in that terrace for 500 years. Dante's thirst for knowledge was quenched. Virgil asks the soul to reveal his identity: he is Publius Statius, the poet that lived under Titus, the emperor who destroyed Jerusalem***.
He moved to Rome to wear the wreathe of myrtle (he became a writer of epic poems, like Thebaid). His creative flair had been nurtured by that divine flame that inspires all poets: the Aeneid, the mother of all epic poems; so he reveals his total devotion to Virgil.
Virgil strictly stares at Dante, admonishing him to be quiet. But Dante couldn't resist and winks at Statius, who asks him why he had done that. Virgil allows Dante to tell him the truth, that is, Statius was standing in front of his greatest master. Statius speechless, kneels at him, and would like to hug him, forgetting he is as immaterial as him.


* The poet likens his thirst for knowledge to the thirst for Godly Grace of the Samaritan woman (John 4:4).
** Virgil uses three paraphrases in the same stanza: he defines Paradise as “the Eternal Council”, he calls Godly Justice “the Truthful Tribunal” and calls his Limbo “eternal exile”.
In verse 25 Virgil, through a periphrasis omits the name of Lachesis, the one of the three Fates; Clotho is the one who establishes the duration of life, so the length of the thread ; Lachesis is the one who weaves the cloth of life, unwinding the distaff, while Atropos is the one who cuts off the thread of life. Virgil means to say that Lachesis hadn't woven all the thread of Dante's life yet. In verse 28 Virgil uses two metaphors to say that their soul is of the same nature as theirs, but needs a guide because living men don't know the afterlife. In verse 50, Rainbow is mentioned through a periphrasis: Iris (rainbow) was the daughter of Thaumas, a sea god. In verse 54, Statius means the Angel Gatekeeper by “the place where the vicar of Saint Peter place his feet ”, using a periphrasis to mean “the Gate of Purgatory”. In verse 76, Virgil likens the penances of Purgatory to a web, that people unravel (expiate).
***Statius mentions the destruction of Jerusalem through a periphrasis and a metaphor: “by the time of emperor Titus who, with the Supreme King's help (God), avenged the wounds that would spill the blood betrayed by Judas”. In verse 89, Statius mentions he is from Toulouse; actually he was born in Naples. In verse 93 he means he died before terminating the Achilleid . In verse 101 he uses “sun” as metonymy to mean year.

 

[Estro Felino]

Twenty-second Canto
The Angel had erased a P from Dante's forehead, saying “blessed are those who thirst for justice, for they will be filled (Matthew 5:6)”. Dante felt so much lighter. Meanwhile, Virgil was discussing with Statius: “Love, lit with virtue has always lit another love, as long as its flame was visible”; Virgil meant that he had become fond of Statius, after poet Juvenal (in Limbo) had spoken of him so highly, and wonders how he could become an avaricious in life. Statius smiles at him, saying that in the fifth terrace both the avaricious and the prodigals are purged, and prodigality had been his sin; it was a passage from the Aeneid that made him repent: “oh sacred hunger for gold, why don't you bridle mortals' greed ?*” This conversion saved him from the fourth circle of Inferno. Virgil asks when he converted to Christianity, because his Thebaid didn't sound like it was written by a Christian.
Statius replies that it was the Bucholicae verses that made him see the light: "a new era has arisen, Justice and Golden Age return, and new offspring comes from Heaven**”. In Rome several Christian communities were spreading a similar message, that of the Kingdom of Heaven: so Statius would attend their gatherings. He wept so much when emperor Domitian persecuted them; eventually he was baptized while he was terminating his Thebaid. But he remained a Christian underground, pretending to be a pagan: this sin made him remain in the terrace of sloth for over 4 centuries. Then Statius asks Virgil for the fate of Terence, Caecilius Statius, Plautus, and Varro. He reveals they are all in Limbo with Persius and many others, all around the greatest poet ever***, Homer; and also Euripides, Antiphon, Simonides, Agathon, and the Thebans, Antigone, Deipyle, Argia, Ismene, Hypsipyle, Manto, Tethis and Deidamia.
The three poets are now in the sixth terrace. All of a sudden, they find themselves before a unusually bent tree whose fruits had a pleasant and sweet scent. The tree was downward, to prevent people from climbing it up, and voice coming out of its branches. “you will be missing this food”. From the walls of the terrace, a spring of clear water was flowing upward to the tree branches. And the tree's voice would go on, with examples of continence: how Mary asked for wine in Cana for the sake of the wedding (John 2:3) ; how Roman women would drink water only; how prophet Daniel fasted; how in the Golden age people lived on water and oats only; and Saint John Baptist lived on honey and locusts, in the desert.


* Aeneid, III, 56: Quod non mortalia pectora coges, auri sacra fames (there's nothing you don't push mortals to do, damned greed for gold). It's a passage in the context of Polydorus' assassination, by Polymestor, who hosted Priam's son out of greed for gold only. --In verses 43 , Statius uses a periphrasis to say that he would be in the circle of greed, in Inferno, had he not repented: “I would be going around the grim circles”; he continues saying “so many people will resurrect with their shaved heads (see Canto VII). -In verses 56 there is a periphrasis: Eteocles and Polynice are called “Jocasta's double disgrace”, since they were twins.
-In verse 63, he uses a periphrasis to mean Saint Peter: “you turned your sails to the Fisherman”.
** Passage from the Bucholicae, Egloga 4, 5: iàm redit èt Virgò redeùnt Satùrnia règna iàm nova prògeniès caelò demìttitur àlto. (the Vergin (Astrea) already comes and come the kingdoms of Saturn, a new offspring comes from Heaven). It is a reference to the Golden Age.
- In verse 94, he means that he stayed in the terrace of sloth more than four centuries. So he stayed in Purgatory 9 centuries (4 centuries among the slothful, and 5 centuries among the prodigals).
***In verse 100 the periphrasis omits the name of Homer “the Greek that the Muses breastfed more than anyone else”. In verse 102 Hell is defined as “dark dungeon”. In verse 112 he means Hypsipyle, that showed the spring of Langia, and in verse 113 he means Manto, daughter of Tiresias. In verse 118 Dante likens the hours of the days to maids (it was the 4th hour after dawn, so one hour before noon).

 

[Estro Felino]

Twenty-third Canto
Dante peers among the branches, to see where those voices were from, but he is immediately reprimanded by Virgil. All of a sudden they realize they are not alone. The penitent souls were walking, while sobbing and chanting Labia me, Domine.* They would ignore the three poets, walking on by. They looked so skinny and weak, with a pale face and the dark circles around their eyes. Worse than Erysichton** who was reduced to skin and bone, or the people of Jerusalem under the siege, back when Mary of Elazar fed on her own son.
Their eye-sockets looked like gem-less rings.*** Dante was so shocked: he could not understand how immaterial souls could feel hunger and thirst, just because of the scent of those fruits.
All of a sudden one of them shouted “How graceful”. It was Forese Donati, a dear friend of Dante, who recognized him by the unmistakable voice. Forese was yearning to know who the other souls were. Dante couldn't help but crying seeing his old friend's appearance, hardly recognizable. So he begs him to reveal what makes the penitents slim in such a dreadful fashion.
Forese replies that in the sixth terrace, the gluttonous slim because of that bent tree, grown by godly justice. As in life they overindulged in food and drink, now they suffer thirst and hunger: the scent of those fruits and of that water makes them yearn to eat and drink. And this desire makes them thinner and thinner, while walking around the terrace. It's their inner desire to atone for their own sins, that pushes them to the tree.
Forese had died five years earlier, so Dante fails to figure out why he is already in Purgatory, without undergoing the long waiting of Ante-Purgatory. Forese explains that his wife Nella had been praying for him so much that his time in Ante-Purgatory and in the other terraces was shortened incredibly. His widow is a one of a kind in a Florence where women are not modest. And he predicts that a time will come, when priests prohibit women to show their cleavage in public, and to dress modestly like the Saracens' women do. If women knew how obscenity is punished by Heaven, they would cry out of anguish.
Since all the other penitents were staring at Dante's shadow, the poet tells them about his spiritual voyage, about Virgil and Beatrice; and that Statius is the soul whose successful purging had made the mountain shake, earlier.



*It's from Psalms 51, Dòmine, làbia mea apèries . In verse 15 there is a metaphor: “untie the knot” means “to atone for their own sin”. In verse 16 the silent and modest penitents are likened to a procession of peregrines to a shrine.
** Erysichton was a king of Thessaly that had cut down an entire forest, sacred to Demeter, killing a nymph of the trees in the process, who cursed him, with an insatiable hunger. So he would eat and eat and never be sated. Mary was a character of the Judaic wars by Josephus Flavius; during the siege of Jerusalem, the Jews were starved to death and she killed and fed on her own son.
***Through a simile, Dante likens the face of men to the word omo (man), written with Gothic font. Those faces were so skin and bone, and so hollow that the two Os where gone and only the M (the part of the eyes and rote of the nose) was visible. In verse 60 Dante means “don't let me speak, because those who yearn to know something, will not speak first” with a metaphor. In verse 61 Godly Will is metonymycally called “the eternal Council”, mentioned in verse 72 with a periphrasis: (Godly Will) which led Christ to cry “Eli”, when he set us free with his vein” (metonymy to say blood). In verse 97 he speaks of central Sardinia (Barbagia) and uses again the same term, Barbagia as periphrasis to mean his land, Florence. In verse 109, with another periphrasis, Forese speaks of an incoming time, which is so close, that the babies that are now lulled, will hit puberty and have their first beards (so he says that those indecent women will be punished in less than 15 years, with either spiritual or secular laws against immodesty). In verse 120, the moon is defined Sun's sister (Dante points at the sun).

 

[Estro Felino]

Twenty-fourth Canto
The penitents were all around Dante, amazed to meet a man from the world of the living. The poet wants to know about Forese's sister, Piccarda. Donati replies that his sister went straight to Paradise*, for her own merits. Then he pointed at other penitents who would enjoy being mentioned: Bonagiunta da Lucca, Pope Martin IV from Tours, Ubaldino della Pila and Bonifacio Fieschi, bishop of Ravenna, Marchese degli Argugliosi, from Forli. Bonagiunta looked like he yearned to speak with Dante, but could hardly do it because of his dry mouth. He mumbles that in Lucca, a girl was born and she will host him during his exile years. Then he asks Dante whether he wrote the poem “Ladies that have intelligence in love”. Dante nods, saying that whenever love inspires him, he writes whatever it dictates to him.
Bonagiunta da Lucca, was a poet as well, and he understands how the Dolce Stil Novo differs from his poetry, and that of Jacopo da Lentini** and Guittone: Stilnovists like Dante write, under Love's dictation. As the cranes, who spend the winter in the Nile, fly in arrays, those penitents as a compact group would all speed up the pace; Forese lingers to take a rest, asking Dante when he will meet him, again. Dante says that Florence has become so devoid of good, that he hopes to leave this life soon, and to disembark in the shores of Purgatory. Forese predicts that his own brother, Corso Donati***, one of the worst in Florence will be dragged by a horse to death, to the valley of Hell, and this will happen in very few years. Dante resumes the walking with the two Latin poets, arriving before another tree, filled with apples. The penitents were desperately stretching their hands, weeping, trying to pick one fruit, but it was useless. A voice, coming out of the branches would say that that tree was born from the seed of the apple that Eve ate. The voice would go on and on, talking about Centaurs, defeated by Theseus because they were drunken; or when Gideon denied those drunken Hebrews in the battle against Madian. The three walked for a mile, as soon as an Angel called them out. Dante could not see him, he was dazzled by a light similar to molten glass in a furnace, so he followed the two poets. The angel flapped his wing on his forehead and he could smell the otherworldly scent of the flowers of May, and ambrosia. “Blessed are those who are so enlightened by grace, that theirs is not hunger for food, but for justice”

*Paradise is called “High Olympus”, metaphorically. Piccarda had reached Paradise thanks to her own merits (thanks to her own crown). In verse 24, Dante mentions that Pope Martin IV used to be gluttonous for the eels of the Bolsena lake and the Vernaccia, a wine from Tuscany. In verse 30, through a periphrasis, Dante says that Bonifacio Fieschi was bishop (he led many people with his crosier). In verse 43, he uses another periphrasis: “a girl is born and doesn't wear the dressing yet”, meaning, she's still a baby.
** Iacopo da Lentini is called “the notary”, because he served as notary at the Court of Frederick II. The greatest poets of the XIII century like Iacopo, or Guittone d'Arezzo, were not inspired by love, as Dante and the other Stilnovists (like Guinizelli) were.
***Corso Donati is omitted, through a periphrasis: he is defined as the “one who is to blame the most”. In verse 88, Forese uses a periphrasis: “those heavenly wheels will not have to rotate much” meaning “not so many years will pass, before my prediction makes sense to you”. In fact, in 1308 the Lordship of Florence will condemn Corso to death for high treason. The crowd chased him while he was riding away, but he stepped on a bracket and his horse dragged him for miles, disfiguring him. The crowd reached and killed him.

 

[Estro Felino]

Twenty-fifth Canto
It was early afternoon* and Dante was yearning to know how it was possible for immaterial souls feel hunger and to get thin. Virgil answered with the myth of Meleager**, saying the appearance of the souls is a reflection of their own suffering. But he asks Statius to give a better explanation; the latter explains men have a most perfect part within their own blood,***, which he calls informative virtue. It ends up in male genitalia and becomes seed, which will fecundate female uterus. The male and the female elements merge, creating new life.
The informative virtue turns into a living soul, like that of plants. The only difference is that in humans it develops tissue and organs suitable for sensory perception (sensory soul). As soon as the brain is formed, God breaths a divine soul into the fetus: the new individual combines the three natures into one soul: he lives, he feels, and has self-awareness. When the individual dies, within the soul, memory, intelligence become much stronger. As soon as the soul arrives in either Purgatory or Hell, the informative virtue irradiates it, and the soul develops all sensory perceptions: the soul (shadow) can laugh or cry, and change appearance, according to their own positive or negative feelings.
The three poets are now in the last and seventh terrace, and as usual, they keep the edge of the terrace at their right side. They realize that the walls of the terrace would release a high barrier of fire, and a wind would stoke the flames upwards. So Dante needs to carefully walk along the edge, with the fear of falling into the void.
The penitents were all walking through the fire, singing altogether the hymn Summae Deus clementiae (O Lord of great clemency). After terminating the hymn they would scream examples of virtue, and then would start singing again: “Virum non cognosco” (Luke 1:34 ) or “Diana expelled nymph Callisto for daring try the poison of Venus****”. They would cry examples of chaste and faithful spouses. So it's evident what their contrappasso is: as in life the lustful were constantly kindled by the fire of passion, now they are purged by the fire of atonement.

* The sun, in April, is in conjunction with Aries, which finds itself on the celestial meridian at noon. So two hours later, at 2 PM there is the constellation of Taurus on the meridian, and by night, the constellation of Scorpio.
**Meleager was son of Althaea. The Fates (Moirai) condemned Meleager, as a baby to live until a piece of wood burning in the fireplace at the moment of his birth, was consumed by fire. But the mother doused the wood and hid it. After Meleager killed her brothers, Althaea threw that piece of wood into the fireplace again, and Meleager died, incinerated.
*** It is most likely that he meant the genetic information of the individual, which is inserted in the gametes, and that Statius calls "the purest part of our blood" meaning the most precious part of our cells. In verse 64, Statius omits the name of Averroes, the philosopher who said that no organ within human body was suitable for hosting the soul. Statius points out that Averroes was wrong when he separated the soul from the possible intellect, because he didn't identify the suitable organ, which is the brain. In verse 79 the moment of death is rendered through a periphrasis (when Lachesis, the weaver of the thread of life has no more linen left).
**** Zeus had turned himself into Artemis, so he could sleep with nymph Callisto. Callisto got pregnant and Artemis (Diana) expelled her from her circle of chaste nymphs, since Diana was also the goddess of chastity. Lust is called the poison of Venus.

 

[Estro Felino]

Twenty-sixth Canto
The sun was high while Dante was carefully walking on the edge of the terrace, terrified by the flames. The penitents start whispering, looking at his shadow, and one of them asks him for explanations. All of a sudden a new array of weeping penitents was coming from the opposite direction. The souls of both arrays would joyfully greet and kiss one another; after that, they would resume their walking, and the second array would shout “Sodom and Gomorrah”; and the first array would respond: “Pasiphaë goes into the wooden cow, so that the bull can satisfy his own lust”*.
Then the penitents come closer to Dante again, who explains them that he was a living man, blinded by sin, waiting to meet Beatrice, his guide and rescuer. While the souls were amazed by how Godly Grace operates, Dante asks them who were those penitents coming from an opposite direction. The stranger says they were sodomites**, while his own arrays is that of heterosexual lustful: the cry the name of Pasiphaë because she was the embodiment of carnal lust. As soon as the penitent reveals his name, Guido Guinizelli, Dante was speechless. Guido was his role model, his master, the founder of Dolce Stil Novo, and wants to reach him, but the flames made him desist.*** He confesses his admiration for him, because he had made the vernacular (Italian language) immortal with his poems, promising him to grant his wishes.
Guinizelli was flattered, but wanted him to meet another poet, that in his language, Occitan, had become the best writer ever, both as for prose (novels) and as for love poems. He makes a final request: a Pater Noster (Our Father), when he is in Paradise (the cloister where Christ is the abbot).
Then he disappears in the fire, letting another penitent through. Dante courteously asks him who he was and he, in Occitan****: “your courteous request is so pretty that I won't hide myself: I am Arnaut Daniel, and here I cry and sing, weary about my past folly of love, and I look forward to the days of joys, waiting. I beg you for the sake of the Grace that guides you to the top of this stairway to remind of my suffering, there”. Then he disappears in the fire, as well.

*Pasiphaë had been cursed by Poseidon because her husband Minos had refused to sacrifice the sacred bull to him. The sea god made her crave for intercourse with that bull, so she hid in a wooden cow, built to arouse the beast, and she was impregnated by him, delivering the Minotaur, successively. Dante likens the two arrays to ants which meet and touch each other, probably to exchange olfactive information. In verse 43 he uses another simile, likening the two arrays to the cranes' array who in Summer take two opposite directions: one to the North, to avoid the heat (the legendary Riphei Mountains) and the other to the Nile (to the deserts).
** The sin of sodomy is omitted with a periphrasis, which is an anecdote about Julius Caesar's bisexuality (he was rumored to be the lover of Nicomedes of Bithynia), so Dante says that when Caesar was marching in triumph, someone called him “queen” from the crowd. A very scabrous detail, because in Ancient Rome the males who would have passive intercourse with other males were vulgarly considered women, unlike the men who were active in homosexual intercourse. As Suetonius wrote: Gallias Caesar subegit, Nicomedes Caesarem. (Caesar subdued the Gauls, Nicomedes subdued Caesar). In verse 82 the word hermaphrodite means heterosexual, meaning that Hermes and Aphrodite were man and woman attracted to one another.
***He likens this meeting as the two children of Hypsipyle that wanted to hug their mother, but they couldn't because of Lycurgus' cruelty. Guinizelli says that Dante's beautiful words will leave a memory that not even the waters of Lethe river (the river of oblivion ) can erase.
**** Arnaut Daniel, is the Occitan poet that Guido considers the the greatest craftsman of his mothertongue, the one who mastered any other poet in France, both at prose and at poetry. But since no prose had been written in Occitan yet, he meant that his poetry was even better than the novels written in medieval French, like those about the Holy Grail. He even condemns those who think that the best Occitan poet is Giraut de Bornelh, called “the one from Limousine”, pointing out that people easily believe rumors, rather than forming their own opinion. Also giving another example: Guittone d'Arezzo, considered the best poet by the crowd, until better poets (Guinizelli) surpassed him in fame.

 

[Estro Felino]

To deepen XXVI Canto

 

[Estro Felino]

Twenty-seventh Canto
The sun was setting in Purgatory*, as the angel of God appears to Dante, on a crag beyond the flames, beautifully singing “Blessed are the pure of heart”. The three visitors need to walk through the fire, to get to the Earthly Paradise. But Dante was so petrified that he couldn't move: he had already seen people burnt at the stake, so he was terrified. Virgil tries to convince him, explaining that those flames cannot harm him in any way, and nobody can die in Purgatory. In order to convince him, he tells him that that barrier of fire is the only thing that separates him from Beatrice. The sound of that name gives Dante so much strength**, but he still lingers. Then Virgil walks through the fire first and invites Statius to do the same. Dante follows them: he feels the indescribable heat, which was nothing compared to an incandescent vase of glass. Dante can hear a beautiful singing, and once he comes out of the fire, he spots a dazzling light, and and angel inside it, saying “Come, blessed by the Father”. Then he tells them the sun was setting and they need to hasten. So they speed up the pace with the last rays of sun, but as soon as Dante's shadow was gone, they immediately stop, exhausted. They were like the shepherds resting between two walls of rock***. Dante falls asleep and dreams**** of Leah (from the Genesis): she she was picking flowers and singing. She said her sister Rachel would look herself in the mirror all day long. So Leah is appeased by works, Rachel is appeased by her own looks. The sun rays awaken Dante, who sees the two poets already up. “That sweet fruit that mortals' restlessly seek among the branches, will satiate your hunger, today” says Virgil. Dante was so thrilled that he climbed up to the top of the mountain, rapidly. Then Virgil goes to him, saying that as soon as Dante meets Beatrice, he will take his leave. He points at the beautiful Earthly Paradise with its trees and bushes, saying that he has guided him through the two realms, with reason and intelligence, but Dante doesn't need his guidance any more, since he is now entitled to his own free will. “I therefore crown and mitre you over yourself!", says the Latin poet.


*While in Jerusalem it was morning and noon in Ganges, there was sunset in the southern hemisphere. Jerusalem is omitted through a periphrasis (there where the Creator of the day shed his blood), while Libra is visible from the Ebro river, and it's the ninth hour (noon) in India (Ganges).
** Dante likens the sound of the name of Beatrice to the moment Pyramus, in agony opened his eyes wide open, as soon as Thisbe arrived. Pyramus and Thisbe were two young lovers, whose love was contrasted by their own respective parents. They had decided to meet before a mulberry bush, in order to elope. But a lioness was in that spot, so Thisbe fled, leaving her cloth behind. Pyramus, arrived saw the lioness mauling that cloth and thought his lover was dead. So he killed himself with his sword, spilling blood on the white mulberries that went red. Thisbe came soon after, and Pyramus opened up his eyes. In verse 45, Virgil is likened to the parent who try to lure his own child with an apple.
*** Dante uses two similes, likening him and his two masters to the shepherd watching his own goats. The shepherd after letting his goats pasture, he takes a rest in the shade, while the sun hits, and the goats rest in the shade, as well. And also to the cow-boy who watches the cattle resting, by night, defending it from the wild animals. In verse 91, the simile becomes metaphor: Dante identifies with the cattle, who ruminates while gazing at the star.
**** Dante says he dreams again in the hour where Venus rose from the sea foam, in the island of Cythera (dawn): The dream has been interpreted by many scholars: it probably wants to highlight that while Leah stands for laboriousness, Rachel stands for vanity. Other speculate that Leah is actually an impersonation of Matilda, the woman Dante will meet in Earthly Paradise.

 

[Estro Felino]

Twenty-eighth Canto
Dante walks into that beautiful forest with trees and otherworldly scents. A sweet breeze, towards the West* would move the trees, and sparrows would sing beautifully, like in the pine forest of Classe, when the sirocco blows. All of a sudden he spots a little river, whose waters looked clearer and purer than any other river on Earth. Dante was admiring the beauty and the variety of the flowers, as soon as he spots a beautiful woman picking flowers, and singing sweetly across the river. Dante was fascinated by such a beauty, and kindly asks her to come closer to hear her sing**. She was walking as gracefully as a dancer, lowering the gaze. As soon as she was close enough, Dante could sees her eyes filled with love and an indescribable light, that not even Venus, pierced by Cupid's arrow ever had. The small river (three steps long) was the only thing that would separate the two***. The beautiful woman smiles, saying that garden was the first nest of mankind, mentioning Psalms 92:4. Dante could not understand how waters and wind can exist in an otherworldly dimension, since Statius had explained him there's no weather in Purgatory. She explains him that the Supreme Good had created the garden of Eden for man to dwell; God had raised it to the top of the mountain, to prevent rains and storm to disrupt its peace. Although, the sweet breeze is caused by the motion of the first heavenly sphere (Primum Mobile), which hits the top of the mountain, so that's why the trees shake and the wind scatters the seeds of the plants. But in Earthly Paradise there are not only all trees of the world, but also fruits that don't grow on Earth. A spring of water is originated by God's will, and splits into two rivers: the woman points at the Lethe, which erases the memory of sin, whereas the other river make souls recall all their good actions. And the water of the first needs to be drunk first to be effective. Eventually she discloses a corollary: the poets who have always sung and spoken of the Golden Age, where men were happy and innocent, probably dreamt of Eden, in Parnassus. Dante smiles at the two poets, who smile too.

*Dante means West with a periphrasis:” where the sacred mountain casts its first shadow”. The pine forest of Classe still exists.
** With a simile, Dante likens Matilda (the beautiful woman) to Proserpina, who was abducted by Pluto (Hades) while she was picking flower; with a periphrasis, he means that after the abduction, Demeter went to the underworld to look for her, in vain. And that is why there are the cold months of winter (without spring). Then Dante likens her to a dancer and to a chaste virgin. The name of Matilda isn't revealed until the XXXIII Canto.
*** Dante says that he hated that small river much more than Leander hated the Hellespont, because of the storms between Sestos and Abydos. Hellespont is mentioned as “the bridle of human pride” because it stopped Xerxes's expansionist aims at Greece. Leander wanted to reach the opposite shores, to meet his beloved, Hero.

 

[Estro Felino]

Matilda
Matilda is a character of the Divine Comedy that has always remained enigmatic, because so many scholars have speculated who she was. And why her name is revealed only in Canto XXXIII of Purgatorio.
Since the Divine Comedy is filled with allegorical characters (just think of the Minotaur, the allegory of animalistic violence in Inferno), she is undoubtedly the allegory of man's innocence and purity, which was lost according to so many English writers like Milton and Blake.
So she is not supposed to impersonate any historical character (some scholars have said it probably deals with Matilda of Tuscany or Mechtildis of Hackeborn) because whenever Dante means to present a character from mythology, literature or history, he says it explicitly. And that is why he reveals her name just at the end of the Cantica: he always speaks of her as the beautiful woman.
The name Matilda comes from ancient Germanic and means "force of the battle", and that was a common name in Northern Italy which had been conquered by several Germanic populations.
So we can definitively affirm she is the spirit of pure mankind before it lost the innocence with original sin. She is probably meant to stand for the guardian of the Earthly Paradise.

 

[Estro Felino]

Twenty-ninth Canto
“Blessed are those whose sins were covered by forgiveness (Psalms 32)” would the beautiful woman sing. She would walk and sing gracefully along the river like a nymph, and Dante following her, on the opposite shore. After a while, the woman stops and tells Dante to look and listen: a glow pervades the entire forest, accompanied by an indescribable melody. The poet feels like condemning Eve*, thinking that if she hadn't sinned, he could have enjoyed that ineffable place, much earlier. All the air was glowing red. Then Dante invokes the Muses, Urania in particular, to help him describe what he was seeing: he could spot seven candelabra, glowing more than the light of the full moon, and Hosanna was the song beautifully sung. They would move as slowly as brides, and Matilda suggests him to look at those following them: they were all dressed in white, whose candor doesn't exist on Earth. Dante comes closer and realizes that above the flames, the air had been colored by seven strips of light, seven as the rainbow colors. Those seven beams would go beyond the poet's eyesight. Twenty-four old man**, crowned with white lilies, were marching in pairs, singing “Blessed art thou among the daughters of Adam, Blessed are thy beauties, for eternity”. They were followed by four animals, crowned with leaves. The animals had six wings each, and their wings were filled with eyes, as they are described in Ezekiel 1:1, except as for John, who had feathers. In the middle of them a two-wheeled triumphal chariot was pulled by a Griffin. The Griffin's wings would rise to the sky so high, that their tip couldn't be seen. The wings were golden, the rest of his body was white-red. At the right side of the chariot, three women were dancing: one was as fiery-red as the gloaming air (Charity), the second was emerald-green (Hope); the third as white as snow (Faith). At the left side of the chariot, four women (Temperance, Fortitude, Justice), dressed in scarlet, were dancing as well. One of them had three eyes (Wisdom). The chariot was followed by two old men, one looked like a physician, the other dressed as a warrior, holding a sharpened sword. Then other four men, dressed modestly, and at the end, another old man, drowsy and wise. These seven were crowned with glowing-red flowers. As soon as the chariot was in front of Dante, a thunder echoes throughout the garden and the entire procession stops.


* Through a metaphor, Dante says that Eve couldn't bear to comply with any veil (any prohibition). The Muses are called Virgins of the Helicon, and Dante invokes the Muse of Astronomy, Urania, because it deals with a celestial vision.
**The seven candelabra are probably an allegory of the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit (so, God). In verse 77, the colors of the rainbow are mentioned with a periphrasis (the colors with which sunlight makes a bow and that make the halo of the moon (called Delia, since Artemis was born in Delos).
**The procession is an allegory of the history of Christianity: the seven candelabra are the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, so they represent God, but also the seven stars of the Empyrean. The 24 old men are the 24 books of the Holy Testament, and are followed by the four Evangelists (their wings likened to the many-eyed giant Argus Panoptes). The four Gospels accompany the Chariot of the Church, pulled by the Griffin (that stands for Jesus Christ, who contains both the human and the divine nature). The Chariot is considered more beautiful than any other triumphal chariot in Ancient Rome, and even surpassing the solar chariot, the one misdriven by Phaeton, who was punished by Jove for his pride, hearing the devout Earth's plea. The three dancing women are the three theological virtues (Charity, Hope, Faith), while the four women dressed in red are the four cardinal virtues (Temperance, Fortitude, Wisdom-Prudence-, and Justice). The two old men are Saint Luke, author of the Acts and Saint Paul, author of the epistles. The four old men are the the letters of James, Peter, John and Judas. The last man is John's Revelation.

 

[Estro Felino]

Thirtieth Canto
The procession had stopped*: the old men** turn to the chariot; all of a sudden one of them shouts: “Come, bride from Lebanon”, three times, and everyone would sing along. All of a sudden a hundred angels appear above the chariot, throwing lilies all over (Manibus date lilia plenis), and singing “Blessed are you who come”. Then, inside a cloud of flowers***, thrown by the angels all over, a woman in a white veil, appear, crowned with olive leaves. She had a green mantel and a fiery-red dress. Even if Dante couldn't see his face, a hidden virtue unveiled the power of the love he had met, back when he was still a child. Dante was trembling, after he recognizes Beatrice, so he turns to Virgil, to find encouragement. But he was gone. Dante couldn't help but bursting out crying, devoid of his own spiritual father. “Dante, don't cry for Virgil's departure yet, you will be crying for another sword ”, says Beatrice with austere tone, as a captain watches over his sailors. Dante lifts his gaze and sees Beatrice, still veiled, but standing on the left side of the chariot, staring at him. “ Yes, I am Beatrice. How could you ascend to the mountain , where man is joyful?”.
Dante lowers the gaze before Beatrice's sever look, and he sees his own image reflected in the waters of the Lethe. He feels shame because he could recognize his sins, all at once.
The angels start singing Psalms 31 “In you, Lord I put my Trust”, to show their mercy as opposed to Beatrice's inflexible attitude, likened to a strict mother's gaze. Those angelic notes, sung so beautifully, made Dante burst out crying, so profusely****. Then Beatrice addresses to the angels: “My response is thorough, so it can be heard by the man weeping beyond the river”. Beatrice explains that not only good astral influences, but also Godly Grace had been particularly generous to Dante, providing him with countless virtues in his youth. Beatrice used to show him the right path, when they were little.
But whenever a field is left fallow, the most fertile soil becomes wild and sterile. After Beatrice died, Dante lost himself, following misleading images of sin, and indulging in other women. As a spirit, Beatrice had become much more beautiful, but had stopped being desirable to him.
She had tried to appear to him in his dreams, in vain. That's how Dante stooped so low, in that dark forest, and Beatrice went to rescue him, asking Virgil to show him the consequences on sin in Hell and in Purgatory. So, by God's will, Dante is supposed to show real repentance before drinking the clear waters of Lethe.



* Dante speaks of the seven candelabra that stand for the seven stars of the Empyrean, which have never seen a sunrise, or a sunset or fog (except that of sin) – and liken them (simile) to the obedient stars of the Ursa Major that indicate the way to the ports to the sailors (periphrasis).
** He refers to the 24 old men (the truthful men between the seven stars and the Griffin). In verse 13, Dante likens the angels (called ministers and messengers of eternal life) to the blessed who rise on Doomsday, singing Hallelujah.
*** Dante likens the vision of Beatrice appearing inside the cloud to the rosy dawns, that Dante saw whenever the sun could be stared at, because it was hidden behind the clouds (temperance of vapors). So he likens the beautiful vision of the sun covered by the clouds to the vision of Beatrice coming out of a cloud of flowers, thrown out by the singing angels. In verse 68, a periphrasis indicates the crown of olive leaves (Minerva's foliage, since the olive tree was sacred to Minerva).
****As the snow of the Apennines (the spine of Italy) is turned into ice by the winds of Slavonia (Croatia), and then is slowly melt by the winds of Africa (the land that is never shaded), before the angels (those who sing in the eternally spinning wheels) started singing. It means that he had been holding back his tears until that moment. That song of mercy made him cry his eyes out.

 

[Estro Felino]

To deepen Canto XXX, the encounter between Dante and Beatrice

 

[Estro Felino]

Thirty-first Canto
With austere and strict tone, Beatrice asks Dante whether she was right, inducing him to confess. Dante couldn't speak, he was so shaken, and filled with regret ; then a hardly audible “yes” conms out of his mouth. Dante's voice was so weak that he burst out crying, once again*.
Beatrice asks him the reason why he had chosen ephemeral pleasures over the good that she had always inspired him. Dante, while weeping, explains that he had been lured into them, after her death. Beatrice knows that she was the most beautiful creature Dante had ever laid eyes upon. Her death should have induced him to prefer the eternal over the ephemeral, idealizing her spiritual beauty, instead of yielding to temptation of younger women**. Beatrice asks him to raise his gaze, so he can look at her and feel the rightful regret. The poet painstakingly*** lifts his face, and notices that Beatrice was proudly standing on the chariot pulled by the Griffin. Even if she was veiled, Dante could still see she was even more beautiful than when she was alive, more beautiful than any other woman on Earth. Stung by repentance, Dante acknowledges his guilt and great regret bites his heart, so hard that he faints. He finds himself plunged into the river to his throat, and Matilda above him, saying “Hold onto me”. She was pulling Dante to the opposite shore. While the angels were all singing “Cleanse me” (Psalms 51) so beautifully, Matilda dips Dante's head deep into the river, to make him swallow the water. Then she entrusts him to the care of the Four Cardinal Virtues, who embrace him all, while dancing and singing. They point at the Three Theological Virtues, saying they would sharpen his eyes to look at Beatrice's eyes better. “Let your sight enjoy the two emerald green eyes Love shot his arrows from”. Dante yearns to see her eyes but Beatrice was staring at the Griffin, who could reflect both the human and the divine nature, simultaneously, as in a mirror****. While Dante was admiring such a miracle, the three Virtues start dancing gracefully, inviting Beatrice to turn her gaze to her devotee. All of a sudden Dante experiences the splendor of Eternal Light, which poetry cannot describe: Beatrice reveals herself, showing her ineffable beauty.


* Dante describes his weak voice and profuse crying with a simile: “as the crossbow string is pulled with much strength, that it breaks, and the arrow is shot faintly,” so he burst out crying again, abundantly and his voice (the arrow) became weaker. In verse 37 Dante uses a periphrasis, omitting the Beatrice's “burial”: “such things with their false pleasures led my steps astray, as soon as your face was hidden”. In verse 39 Beatrice calls God “such a great Judge”. In verse 40 there is a metonymy and a metaphor: “whenever the blame arises from our cheeks (through crying), the wheel (of justice), in our Tribunal turns to itself its own blade.” Godly Justice is likened to a bladed wheel that is aimed at the sinner, unless he blames himself and acknowledges his own guilt.
**Beatrice uses a metaphor of the little birds who linger twice or three times before flying away from the hunter's traps, so they are easily caught. Whereas the adult birds immediately fly away. She means that adult men should learn how to avoid the trap of sin.
*** Dante says that a strong oak can be uprooted by a Italian wind or the Libeccio blowing from the land of (Africa) easily compared to the indescribable effort he made to look at Beatrice.
**** The Griffin stands for Jesus Christ who contains both the human and the divine nature. Both natures were present, and were reflected simultaneously by the sun, like in a mirror: “As the sun is reflected in the mirror, the double beast was mirrored by the sun, both with one and the other army”.

 

[Estro Felino]

Thirty-second Canto
Dante was staring at Beatrice's heavenly beautiful eyes and smile, as soon as the Virtues tell him “ Too much staring”. So, dissuaded, he looks away, and couldn't see anything, like someone dazzled by the sun. Then he realizes that the procession led by the seven flames, was marching again*, to the right. Dante, Statius and Matilda would follow them walking by the right wheel. After a while, the chariot stops in the middle of Eden, before a barren tree. All the procession would whisper “Adam”, while encircling the tree. “Blessed are You, Griffin, for not pecking at this sweet wood, it would hurt your stomach”. And the Griffin replies: “So is preserved the seed of every justice”, and after saying that, He ties up the helm of the chariot to a bare branch. That tree suddenly replenishes itself with leaves, and colorful flowers, and all started to sing a beautiful music with lyrics unknown to Dante. The sweet melody was so soothing that Dante falls asleep. Matilda wakes him up, and he, still sleepy** asks where Beatrice was. Beatrice was sitting on the roots of the blossoming tree, watching over the chariot, together with the seven virtues, who were holding seven lights. The Griffin and all the rest of the procession were flying away, to Heaven, singing. Beatrice tells Dante to watch the chariot closely and to report whatever he is going to see, when he returns home***. All of a sudden an eagle darts to the tree, breaking twigs and buds, striking the chariot, which oscillated. Then a scrawny, rabid fox gets onto the chariot, but Beatrice chases him away. The eagle darts once again to the chariot, dropping some feathers on it. An otherworldly voice from Heaven weeps “oh, my ship, you're so evilly loaded”. Then the earth opens up and a horrendous dragon comes out, sticking its tail onto the chariot, taking off most of its bottom. In an instant, the feathers fill up the entire chariot, like infesting grass, and seven heads (three on the helm and four on the sides) sprout on the wood. The four had two horns, the other three, just one (Revelation 17:3). A shameless harlot was standing on the chariot, and next to her, a giant was holding her tight, kissing her lasciviously. As soon as the harlot stares at Dante with alluring eyes, the giant whips her to punish her. Then, after untying the bridles from the tree, pulls the chariot through the forest, disappearing with the harlot and the monstrous beasts.

*With a simile, Dante likens the marching of the procession to a withdrawal of a military array under attack. In verse 31, through a periphrasis, Dante means that the Eden is empty because of that woman (Eve) who trusted the serpent. In verse 34 the covered distance is rendered through another periphrasis: the distance travelled by an arrow shot three times. In verse 43 it means that the tree of knowledge of good and evil is poisonous, allegorically speaking, but it also contains the principle of evil and good, so of justice. In verse 64, Dante's falling asleep is likened to the myth of Mercury and Argus. Io had been turned into a cow by Juno to escape Jove's lust, and she was entrusted to Mercury. In order to rescue Io from Argus, Mercury went to him, telling him the story of Pan and Syrinx, and Argus fell asleep.
** Jesus is rendered through a periphrasis: the One that invites people to see the flowers of the tree (Paradise), whose apples (beatitude) makes angels crave, and which make perpetual feastings in Heaven. Dante likens that moment to the awakening of Peter, James and John after Jesus' transfiguration in Matthew 17:1, when they realize that Elijah and Moses were gone, and Jesus was luminous and bright (had changed clothes). In verse 98, the lamps are probably the allegories of God's light, and they are so strong that neither Aquilone (northern wind) or Austro (southern wind) can turn them off. In verse 102, Paradise is called "that Rome where Christ is Roman".
*** The vision is explained in the following Canto: the Chariot is the allegory of the Church, persecuted by the Eagle (Pagan Rome, the Empire), then remaining solid, and a fox (the heresies) trying to rob her. The eagle (Imperial authority) left some feathers (the temporal power of Constantine's donation). Then the dragon (the Islamic invasions, the schism of the East) utterly brutalized the Church, remained, after the XI century, so corrupt, waste and damaged. Corruption and fornication poisons the Roman curia and the Vatican turns into the harlot of Revelation 17:3, sitting on the seven hills of Rome, and with a giant (Philippe the Fair), who will seduce her and then will abduct her, transferring the Holy See to Avignon.

 

[Estro Felino]

Thirty-third Canto
The seven virtues were sweetly singing, while crying: “God, the Gentiles have come (Psalms 79)". Beatrice was listening, transfiguring as Mary did at the foot of the cross.
And as in John 16:16, she tells them: In a little while you will see me no more, and then after a little while you will see me. She tells the virtues to move forward, and Dante, Statius* and Matilda follow them along.
Then she stops, telling Dante: “Brother, why don't you ask me anything, while walking?”, and Dante replies “My Lady, you do know my desires, and what suits them”.
But Beatrice pushes him to ask, anyway, with no fear. Since she could read his mind, she explains what that vision was: the Chariot of the Church is no more, and God will avenge who is to blame. The eagle (the German Empire) who left its feathers on the chariot will not vacant: a constellation is coming and will give birth to a Godsend, 500 and 10 and 5 (DXV)** who will kill that giant and that harlot. Beatrice is aware that it's an enigma not dissimilar than those of the Sphinx and Themis, but reassures Dante: the puzzle will soon be solved***.
Beatrice recommends him to write about the tree of knowledge of good and evil; a twice barren tree. Whoever harms it, offends God. The first man suffered for 5,000 years for biting that fruit, waiting for Christ to atone for that violation. She reveals that tree stands for Godly Justice, that is why it's so high, and bent. She is aware that her words are incomprehensible to Dante, whose intellect is stony and benighted by vain thoughts****, so she begs him to report all that in his writings, anyway. Dante wonders why Beatrice's speeches cross the line of his intellect; she explains that Godly Knowledge is distant from the human one, as much as Heaven is distant from Earth. Dante points out, as far as he can remember, that he has never been distant from her, because, by drinking the waters of Lethe, he has forgotten all his sins and bewilderment (when he was led astray, forgetting Beatrice). Beatrice announces him that her discourse will be clear, from that moment on. The seven virtues had stopped in a shaded meadow: there, Dante spots a spring that split in two rivers (like Euphrates and Tigris*****) and wonders what they were. Matilda had explained him before, but he has probably forgotten that, due to the waters of oblivion. So Dante can witness that the waters of the two rivers, Lethe and the Eunoë, originate from the same godly spring. Beatrice orders Matilda to lead Dante and Statius to the waters of the Eunoë. That water had an indescribable flavor, and Dante feels reborn, as blossoming plant:
From the most holy water I returned
Regenerate, in the manner of new trees
That are renewed with a new foliage,
Pure and disposed to mount unto the stars


* Statius is called "the wise who remained" meaning that even if Virgil had returned to Limbo, Statius remains. In verse 25 Dante likens himself to a person before to their chief, who are intimidated (they don't draw vivid voice out of their teeth).
** Beatrice speaks of a messenger of God, five hundred (D), ten (X) and five (V) will kill that harlot and the giant (the Avignon Papacy) that plots with her. So many scholars have speculated about the meaning of those numbers. Some have wanted to find a parallel with Revelation 13:18, which indicate the initials of a person. The interpretations can be countless: since the Avignon Papacy ended in 1376, it was also thanks Wenceslaus of Luxemburg, who became king of Germany and so emperor in that period.
*** Dante quotes a passage from the Metamorphoses by Ovid (7, 759) that was misread in the Middle Ages and Laiades (the son of Laius) was read as Naiades (Naiads, nymphs of forests), so the Medieval writers used to believe that Naiads used to solve puzzles. The Medieval interpretation was that Themis was a prophetess competing with the Sphynx, that got revenge on the Thebans because they had asked Naiads for help, to solve the puzzle. Beatrice means that the puzzle will soon be solved but with no harm for sheep nor fodder (meaning that unlike in the Theban myths, there will be no consequence).
**** Beatrice, first likens the hardness of Dante's vain thoughts to the calcareous waters of river Elsa, in Tuscany. She also mentions the myth of Pyramus and Thisbe. Pyramus and Thisbe were two young lovers, whose love was contrasted by their own respective parents. They had decided to meet before a mulberry bush, in order to elope. But a lioness was in that spot, so Thisbe fled, leaving her cloth behind. Pyramus, arrived saw the lioness mauling that cloth and thought his lover was dead. So he killed himself with his sword, spilling blood on the white mulberries that went red. Thisbe killed herself, because she couldn't live without him. So Beatrice points out that the mulberry should have appeased Pyramus instead, instead of making assumptions, as Dante does. So she asks him to report that vision anyway, as the peregrine takes a twig of palm on his staff, as souvenir. In verse 79 Dante likens the memory of the vision as a seal impressed in his mind, as a sigil is impressed with wax.
*****In Genesis 10:12 the rivers Gehon and Pishon, together with Tigris and Euphrates, originate from the same spring in the garden of Heaven. In verse 130 Dante likens himself to a gentle soul that without excuses complies with others' wishes.

 

[Estro Felino]

Paradiso: Introduction and Geography

Paradise is located in an otherworldly dimension that has a specific geographical collocation. That is, according to Dante and on the basis of the Ptolemaic astronomy, Earth is a fixed, immobile planet in the center of the Universe. It is within the sublunary sphere, which consists of four elements (air, fire, water and earth). All the celestial bodies (planets, stars, satellites) are called asters and rotate around Earth; Dante points out that it is Godly Love (through the driving forces of the angelic intelligences) that make all these asters rotate. For instance, there are nine orders of angelic intelligences whose overall number is not determinable. There are seven asters (from the nearest to the furthest: Moon, Mercury, Venus, Sun, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn), which rotate thanks to the otherworldly driving force of their own sphere. Unlike these asters, there are the fixed stars that don't rotate singularly, but it's their celestial sphere (called Sphere of the Fixed Stars, the eighth) that makes them rotate altogether. The eight sphere rotate thanks to the ninth sphere called Primum Mobile, which literally means “first mobile” because it's the first and outermost sphere, the movement of all spheres relies on. Beyond this sphere there is Paradise, called Empyrean (which means “glowing with fire”). It is where God (the Trinity), the Candid Rose (where Mary and the all the blessed are) and the angelic rings are. But, since the blessed experience different degrees of beatitudes, they appear in the different planetary spheres, that correspond to their merits (and so their equivalent degrees of beatitudes). For instance, each aster (through the driving angelic force that makes it rotate) produces an influx that affects mortals' inclinations and virtues, so the loving spirits who gained their salvation thanks to their inclination to love, will appear in the Sphere of Venus, where the Principalities exercise their beneficial influx.

The Empyrean: It's what Paradise really is. It is beyond all the asters, in an otherworldly, superior dimension that transcends matter. So everything is perfect because it's directly created by God's Love, that creates by loving with His Light. God is at the center of Paradise, and is described as three spheres of equal size (Trinity). All around God, the nine angelic rings. In front of God, there is the Candid Rose, where all blessed are.

Candid Rose : It is described as an amphitheater, whose highest seat is occupied by the Virgin Mary. Opposite Mary, in the other side of the circular Rose, the highest seat is occupied by Saint John the Baptist. The amphitheater is divided in two great parts: the side where the blessed of the Ancient Testament are (those who believed in the future coming of Jesus Christ); and the side of blessed of the New Testament (those who believed in Jesus Christ's life, death and resurrection). In the lowest parts of the amphitheater there is no such a division since the seats are occupied by the souls of the children who couldn't develop any self-awareness and belief.

The Nine Spheres:

Sphere of the Moon: the blessed appear as in a mirror. In in life they were forced to break their own vows. Angelic intelligence (the driving force of the sphere): Angels, simple messengers of God.

Sphere of Mercury: the blessed are the bright minds who did good seeking glory and prestige in life. They appear as singing and dancing flashes of light.
Angelic intelligence : Archangels, who command entire arrays of angels, and are important messengers. The most famous ones are Gabriel, Raphael and Michael.

Sphere of Venus: the spirits who loved others intensively, appear as twirling, while singing.
Angelic intelligence: Principalities, who are the custodians of history and time.

Sphere of the Sun: Seekers of wisdom (theologians and scholars). They dance in concentric crowns, singing. Angelic intelligence: Powers, who are the intelligences endowed with incredible wisdom and prudence. Together with Virtues, and Dominions, they make the second order of angelic intelligences of the celestial guardians, who cooperate with God in His design.

Sphere of Mars: Martyrs of the faith (Crusaders, Christian warriors), make up a red glowing cross with Jesus Christ at the center.
Angelic intelligence: Virtues, intelligences endowed with great courage and strength who watch over the greatest changes of history.

Sphere of Jupiter: Promoters and seekers of justice (just rulers). They make up phrases of justice, and their symbol is the eagle (emblem of worldly justice).
Angelic intelligence: Dominions, whose purpose is to entrust specific tasks to the first order of angels (Angels, Archangels, Principalities).

Sphere of Saturn: Contemplatives and ascetics. The blessed appear as effulgent lights flying above an infinite ladder that ends up in Empyrean.
Angelic intelligence: Thrones, who put God's design into practice, by translating the Seraphim's wisdom into actions. The first order of angelic intelligences directly attends to God.

Sphere of the Fixed Stars: Triumphing Spirits (apostles, Mary, Jesus) celebrating Christ's Triumph. They are lights lightened up by a radiant sun.
Angelic intelligence: Cherubim, the intelligences of protection (like in Eden, Ark of Covenant), watching over Light and the Stars.

Primum Mobile: The nine angelic rings, who appear as nine concentric rings spinning around a bright spot. Angelic intelligence: Seraphim, who are pure glowing Love, and since they are the closest intelligences to God, their task is to spread Godly Love with their flame.

 

[Estro Felino]

First Canto
“The glory of Him who moves everything
Does penetrate the universe, and shine
More in one part and less in another.”
Dante is aware that his fallacious memory and the paucity of poetry are not suitable to describe the celestial and beauty of Paradise. So he invokes Apollo, the god of poetic crowning, because the inspiration from the Muses is not sufficient any more. He begs the Delphic god to enter his chest*, to enlighten him, in order to write the last and most compelling Cantica, saying that Apollo will enjoy laurel on the head of a poet who yearns for it**. Also, the spring equinox creates an astral conjunction that favors inspiration***. It was full day in Earthly Paradise, and Beatrice starts gazing at the Sun so deeply, as an eagle would do, and Dante does the same: he directly stares at the Sun, defying human possibilities. The sunlight looked like incandescent iron, and all of a sudden its intensity doubled, as if there were another sun. Then Dante turns his gaze to Beatrice who was completely overwhelmed by that supernatural splendor and the poet empathized with her ecstasy so much, that he felt like changing nature, as Glaucus became immortal after eating that herb.
“It would be impossible to describe transhumanizing**** with words”. Dante felt so much love in his heart, and that love lifts him upwards. All of a sudden, he realizes the sunlight had pervaded the entire sky, and and he couldn't understand why. “You are not on Earth, as you believe, but no thunderbolt was faster than you are now, returning to Heaven (we all come from)”, Beatrice explains to him. Dante wonders how a mortal body can transcend the spheres of air and fire, which are light elements. God has established an order, explains Beatrice, and such order creates the form, that is intrinsic to their purpose. This order gives impulse to all creatures, both living and non. Godly Providence has created an immobile universe called Empyrean, that surrounds the fastest rotating sphere, Primum Mobile. Each living being is naturally drawn to that Sphere (Supreme Good). But since humans are endowed with free will, they tend to be drawn to ephemeral and worldly pleasures (as the work often deviates from the artist's original design) So Dante shouldn't be amazed by his own ascent to the Heavens, because no fire remains on the ground, but tends to go up.



* Dante begs Apollo to literally enter in his chest and to possess him with his spiritual creativity, and he likens this process to the brutal episode of mythology when Apollo flayed Marsyas alive, who had challenged him, out of pride. In verse 36 he calls Apollo Cirrha, after the city where his great temple was.
**Dante calls laurel “the Peneyan fronds” because Daphne (turned into laurel to escape Apollo's assault) was Peneus' daughter. Apollo decided to use laurel as crown to award poets, musicians and conquerors. Dante is also saddened that so few people seek the glory of this crowning, since they are dissuaded by worldly things.
*** Dante calls the sun “the lantern of the world” saying that whenever it is in conjunction with Aries (called the constellation made up of four circles that intersect, forming three crosses).
**** Trans-humanizing is the verb Dante creates to describe the passage from the worldly dimension to the otherworldly one. From that moment on, Dante is aware that he cannot describe this superior dimension to readers who are used to earthly feelings and sensations.

 

[Estro Felino]

Second Canto
Dante likens his spiritual voyage to a sea crossing: Minerva blows the winds, Apollo steers, and the Muses indicate the route; he invites the reader to follow him with their own vessels*. Dante and Beatrice were going higher and higher, at an incredible speed (Dante likens that moment to the time it takes for an arrow to hit the target). An amazing spectacle reveals itself before his eyes, and Beatrice tells him to thank God, for arriving in the Sphere of the Moon. Dante describes it as a bright, solid cloud they were enfolded in, like a pearl of a diamond lit by the sunlight. He cannot understand why he, a material body can be enfolded within an unworldly dimension. He was experiencing what Christians accept by faith; like Jesus Christ merging the human and the divine nature in one.
Dante kindly asks Beatrice what lunar dark spots are, that people falsely attribute to Cain**. He thinks that the difference of brightness depends on the different density of the surface of the celestial body.
Beatrice says he is wrong. In the eighth Sphere, there are the fixed stars, different in quantity and quality; their appearance is the result of countless virtues. Or the moon would mostly be a mass-less celestial body, if the dark spots implied a bigger density. Someone might think that the Moon is like a mirror, which seems rarefied on one side, but actually has a solid mass on the other side.*** Or those spots are darker because they are much deeper than the whole lunar surface.
Beatrice discloses that the Empyrean (the Heaven of Godly Peace) encircles another Sphere (Primum Mobile) that contains the essence of everything. Primum Mobile encircles the Sphere of the Fixed Stars, that distributes those essences among all asters. The other Spheres will dispense them, according to their own purposes. The motion of the spheres is to be ascribed to the angelic intelligences, as the hammer blow is ascribed to the smith. So the appearance of spheres is the seal of those intelligences. The angels' joyful virtue penetrates the Moon, and shines within it. So the levels of opacity and brightness of asters are the result of the formal principle of goodness that created the aster itself.


* Dante points out that readers have always been craving for “angel's bread” (a periphrasis to say theology), which never satiate their hunger for knowledge. So invites the readers to follow him to Paradise, as the Argonauts (the glorious who reached Colchis) followed Jason, who became a peasant, and points out the readers will be amazed more than those. Paradise is defined as the “deiform” kingdom, a word that means that such a realm is made up with a divine dimension.
**Legend wants that the lunar spots originated because Cain was exiled to the Moon, and forced to wander with a bundle of thorns on his back. Beatrice smiles pointing out that humans are easily deceived by their own sense, so they invent irrational myths.
***Mirrors used to be made up of a glass surface and a layer of lead to enable the light to reflect images. Actually Dante has given a scientific explanation, that might lead to the scientific truth (that is that the sunlight can't lighten up all the surface evenly because of the surface is uneven). But Beatrice denies the scientific truth, saying it's wrong to think that dark spots are because those are deep parts of the moon, and the sunlight hardly reaches them. She uses an anecdote that doesn't refute the scientific truth, because her purpose is to give a metaphysical explanation. Beatrice speaks of an experiment: if one takes three mirrors and puts two at the same distances and one at a different distances, and places a lamp that can be reflected by the all three: in the all three there will be the same exact brightness.

 

[Estro Felino]

Third Canto
Dante nods to mean he has understood Beatrice's perfect explanation; all of a sudden he spots something unusual: three evanescent womanly figures, as if they were reflected by a mirror or by clear shallow waters. Unlike Narcissus*, who thought his reflected image was real, Dante thought those were reflected images, so he turns around to see the real figures. Beatrice smiles at him, explaining that those are real souls who are in the Sphere of the Moon because they were forced to break their own vows. Encouraged by Beatrice, Dante asks one of them who she was. It was Piccarda Donati (sister of Forese, see Canto XXIII, Purgatorio), who used to be a nun. Piccarda explains that the feelings of the souls of the First Sphere, are inflamed by the pleasure of the Holy Spirit only, because of the vows breaking, yet they rejoice in it. Hence their appearance, and that's why Dante hadn't recognized her at first. Then Dante yearns to know whether they wish they were in a higher sphere. Piccarda smiles, glowing with love; she explains that all blessed are at One with Godly Will, so they are content with their own condition. Dante understands that even if Godly Grace is irradiated differently, all heavenly spheres are one single Paradise. Then he wants to know what vow Piccarda has broken in life**.
Piccarda speaks of how she, as a young woman joined the Order of Saint Clare***. She had become a nun, but wicked men abducted her from the convent, forcing her to break her vows. And the same thing happened to the woman at Piccarda's right hand, Constance D'Hauteville, mother of Frederick II. Her father forced her to return to the lay state, in order to marry Henry VI of Swabia, but she kept her own vows in the heart.
Piccarda starts to sing Ave Maria beautifully, and vanishes all of a sudden. Dante turns his eyes to Beatrice, but that vision was too dazzling that Dante couldn't stare at her any longer.

*Actually Dante uses a periphrasis, without mentioning Narcissus: he made the opposite mistake than that man who fell in love with a spring. In verse 33 with a metaphor, Beatrice says that the three blessed cannot turn their feet against the veracious light (Godly Truth).
** He asks that question through a metaphor: he wanted to learn from her what was the cloth whose distaff she hadn't terminated (what vow she hadn't fulfilled).
***Saint Clare is implicit in a periphrasis: “perfect life and high merits put a woman in a higher sphere, whose rule entails other women wear the robe and the veil and be in union with their own groom (Jesus) all their life long.”