Paradiso: A Perfect Inequality
The Conclusion of The Divine Comedy
ENTERING PARADISE
Dante enters Paradise after the conclusion of Purgatorio. One theme I’ve been touching on throughout the Divine Comedy is inversion. There are many themes to be abstracted from the greatest poem ever written. However this is one theme that is particularly important in our culture today. The theme of inversion is a pattern that manifests as cultures experience decay. When a culture experiences decay, it can only go two directions: 1.) It continues a pattern of inversion until total destruction occurs, or 2.) The pattern begins to reverse with the cultural order returning. Eventually, a rebirth happens no matter which path a culture takes. The difference is whether one comes out the other side with a renewed sense of virtue and order (paradise) or total death (inferno). Dante shows us what can happen if we choose to reverse our path of inversion.
HUMILITY AND INEQUALITY
The epic conclusion is a Revelation from Dante about his journey in Heaven. He tells us first and foremost that this is about the Glory of God alone and everything mentioned rests in this context. He also tells us his human capabilities will fail to perfectly describe Paradise. He writes,
"The glory of Him who moveth everything Doth penetrate the universe, and shine In one part more and in another less
Within that heaven which most his light receives Was I, and things beheld which to repeat Nor knows, nor can, who from above descends,
Because in drawing near to its desire Our intellect ingulphs itself so far, That after it the memory cannot go.
Truly whatever of the holy realm I had the power to treasure in my mind Shall now become the subject of my songs."
The poem is best presented in a way that humans can understand. What is the lens of this understanding? Dante uses inequality. How does inequality help us to understand heaven? It doesn’t take hold until he reaches the final vision of Heaven- the Empyrean to see Heaven for what it really is. He’s not ready to see Heaven as it’s truly presented until he visits all the souls in Paradise through his human understanding. He’s not yet in perfect enlightenment to understand the true Paradise. Let’s see the different spheres of Paradise:
Heaven has to be presented in a way to Dante that makes a Man like himself capable of understanding or he could never complete his duty of writing this poem. The spheres of Paradise are divided into Virtues acquired with the least amount of Grace to the realm where the Trinity resides- perfect Grace. Dante still needs to be in perfect Grace and enlightenment before he can enter the Empyrean. As he journeys his way up to the Celestial Rose, he needs to acquire these Graces along the way.
He enters the sphere of the Moon having a famous exchange with a beautiful soul named Piccarda. She entered the convent to serve the Lord as a nun only to be forced out the convent through political means to be married off. Because of this act against her will, she’s in a sphere where people broke vows. Dante, in his human reasoning and virtue, rebukes the idea that Piccarda is deserving of the sphere of the Moon for breaking a vow that she was forced to do against her will. Contrary to our modern understanding and apparently Dante’s, Piccarda denies this assertion.
“Nay, ‘tis essential to this blest existence To keep itself within the will divine, Whereby our very wishes are made one;
So that, as we are station above station Throughout this realm, to all the realm ‘tis pleasing, As to the King, who makes his will our will.
And his will is our peace; this is the sea
To which is moving onward whatsoever
It doth create, and all that nature makes.” God is using the suffering of the world caused by sin to bring souls to the best eternal bliss suited for them. He’s using the inequality of sin caused by Man to perfect the happiness of each soul. Essentially, Piccarda is arguing that the wrong done to her brought her to the best sphere possible she was able to reach. The other side of this equation is out of the limits of human understanding. This reminds me of the Book of Job where we often receive an unsatisfactory answer about the question of human suffering in the world. God reminds Job that his understanding of the ongoing events in time are minuscule compared to the understanding of God. We are not created to know all of the answers of life’s deepest mysteries for all time because of his emphasis on Faith.
WISDOM
Dante encounters the Emperor Justinian, who sets the example of a righteous ruler in Paradise. Justinian fought heresies concerning the Incarnation of Christ during his time showing virtues of justice and wisdom. In my own theological journey, I’ve put forth that all heresies of Christendom and all errors of philosophy stem from a rejection of the Incarnation in one way or another. The Incarnation was a shift in Reality as we know it and is irreversible. All attacks on Christendom and Truth stem from a rejection that God became Man— marrying humanity and divinity- forever inseparable. I will discuss this more in future articles.
Dante later reaches the Sphere of the Sun where he will encounter the great philosophical minds of salvation history and the Church. He needs to acquire more Wisdom before he can enter the Empyrean. Some translations of the poem make this more clear than others, but Dante tells us to eat his poem for the greater understanding. He writes,
Looking into his Son with all the Love Which each of them eternally breathes forth, The primal and unutterable Power
Whate’er before the or eye revolves With so much order made, there can be none Who this beholds without enjoying it.
Lift up then, Reader, to the lofty wheels With me thy vision straight unto that part Where the one motion on the other strikes,
This act of “eating” the poem is intrinsically biblical. In the visions of Ezekiel and John, the author of Revelations, we have passages of eating a scroll to have a greater understanding of God’s Divine Will. Ezekiel records,
“And he said to me, “Son of man, eat what is offered to you; eat this scroll, and go, speak to the house of Israel.” So I opened my mouth, and he gave me the scroll to eat. And he said to me, “Son of man, eat this scroll that I give you and your fill your stomach with it.” Then I ate it; and it was in my mouth as sweet as honey.”4
John records a similar image in his apocalyptic work,
“Then the voice which I had heard from heaven spoke to me again, saying, “Go, take the scroll which is open in the hand of the angel who is standing on the sea and on the land.” So I went to the angel and told him to give me the little scroll; and he said to me, “Take it and eat it; it will be bitter to your stomach, but sweet as honey in your mouth.”5
The eating of the scroll represents a greater understanding of knowledge of God’s Will, but is sour because it will entail the suffering of others as it’s one of the big themes in The Divine Comedy. The Truth can often feel depressing- even painful when it reveals things we don’t like to hear. Dante is telling us to consume the poem as the prophets have consumed what God revealed to them. This is typological of consuming the Eucharist as well- the source of Christ.
This is proceeded by Dante’s visit to the Sphere of Mars where he meets his great-great grandfather Cacciaguida. The visit to his ancestor marks a divine lineage giving root to Dante’s credibility and abilities as a poet. He’s marrying his body with his soul in composing his work. Dante fears in his conversation with his ancestor that his poem won’t be well received. The act of eating his poem signals the painful nature that Truth possesses as it encounters our fallen spirits. He’s encouraged to continue on with his journey and write this epic poem.
VIRTUE
Dante continues his way to Sphere of the Fixed Stars where the Apostles reside. The fixed stars represent permanent, unwavering Truth, Wisdom & Grace needed to reside in the Empyrean. Dante is questioned by Peter about his Faith. He’s then questioned by St. James on Hope. And lastly, he’s questioned by St. John on Love. These are the three theological virtues listed by Paul in his epistle to the Corinthians,
“So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.”6
Peter tests Dante by asking him to define Faith. Dante references the Scripture regarding Faith which states,
“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. . . By faith we understand that the world was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was made out of things which do not appear.”7
Peter applauds Dante for this definition of Faith, but clarifies is more important to live by it and then to be able to articulate it. He sees St. James next to be tested on Hope. Dante has a personal attachment to this Virtue as he hopes to one day return to Florence. His longing to return to where he came from is our salvific hope to return to the Paradise we once belonged. In Hope, we want to return to the Love that first bore us. Lastly, he is approached by St. John on the Virtue of Love. He’s the apostle who made the claim that God is Love itself. Dante writes,
"The being of the world, and my own being, The death which He endured that I may live, And that which all the faithful hope, as I do,
With the forementioned vivid consciousness Have drawn me from the sea of love perverse, And of the right have placed me on the shore.
The leaves, wherewith embowered is all the garden Of the Eternal Gardener, do I love As much as he has granted them of good."
CELESTIAL ROSE
The Celestial Rose is one of the most famous images in all The Divine Comedy. Many can write separate articles and dissertations on this image alone. Like Dante in writing his poem, my thoughts will fall well short of what the Rose truly deserves. Dante enters the Empyrean in a state of perfect Grace sufficient to reside in such a place. The harks back to the end of the New Testament in Revelations,
“But nothing unclean shall enter it, nor any one who practices abomination or falsehood, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s book of life.”9
The Celestial Rose is the eternal origin of all Being incorporating nature, art, and geometry pictured in a beautiful white rose that compiles all the souls of heaven. Dante meets St. Bernard in this realm to see the Blessed Mother, the one who sent Beatrice (another Marian typology), to rescue Dante’s life and soul. Dante foreshadows that we are hard pressed to see God without the Blessed Mother as she is the one who bore God into the world. She sits under the Trinity giving way to the Mystery.
The Incarnation is the key to understanding the Rose where the Trinity resides. Where it was Dante who first told us that the Holy Spirit is the Love between the Father and the Son- the acting agent where God intervenes in History. Dante concludes the poem as Love as the primal cause of the universe,
“The Love which moves the sun and the other stars.”10
Love is the answer to all that moves in this world.
Dante, Canto I, l. 1-12, Paradiso, p.1
Ibid. Canto III, l. 79-87, p. 16
Ibid. Canto X, l. 1-9, p. 50
Ezekiel 3:1-3
Revelation 10:8-10
1 Corinthians 13:13
Hebrews 11:1,3
Ibid. Canto XXVI, l.57-66, p. 136
Revelation 21:27
Ibid. Canto XXXIII, l. 145, p. 177