J Hede: Dante's Exegetical Pattern of Thought

Unpublished article, 2006

1

Dante’s Exegetical Pattern of Thought:

Trajan and Ripheus in Paradiso1

By Jesper Hede, PhD

Postdoctoral fellow

Centre for Rhetoric

Department of Comparative Literature

Aarhus University

Abstract

The article examines the question why Dante has placed two pagans—the Roman emperor Trajan

and the Trojan Ripheus—in Paradiso of the Divina Commedia. It tries to solve the problem of

their salvation by outlining Dante’s exegetical pattern of thought and considering the principles of

redemption in the Commedia. The article maintains that the presence of Trajan and Ripheus in the

heaven of Jupiter has an exegetical meaning that underlines Dante’s belief in imperial authority as

the work of divine providence through the invisible mission of the Holy Sprit.

In Dante studies it has long been a standard assertion that the Divina Commedia

displays a medieval exegesis on the redemption of the Christian soul. But it is not

frequently maintained that Dante’s exegesis includes also the redemption of the

pagan soul. By this I mean that, in revealing the ultimate meaning of the course of

history, Dante recognizes the pagan contribution to the universal redemption. He

does so, not overtly, but in subtle ways and with precision and economy. This is

the argument of this article. The argument, however, seems contradicted by

several things in Dante’s poem.

First of all, there are no pagan sages in Paradiso. They are all in Limbo of

Inferno, where they now long for salvation without any hope because their mortal


2

existence was without Christian faith. Nowhere in the poem does Dante reveal

whether they will be saved at universal judgment.2 For this reason, Limbo does

not seem to substantiate my argument.3 The appearance of Cato and Statius,

whom Dante meets in Purgatory, does not substantiate it, either. Cato may stand

for a noble Roman, who died for the sake of liberty, and he may represent a loving

character due to his paternal love of his second wife, Marcia, but he showed

weakness in committing suicide and fought on the wrong side in the Roman civil

war, with Pompey, against the first Roman emperor, Julius Cesar. Statius may

have been a Christian, but he kept it a secret, wherefore he now undergoes long-

term purgation for his lack of zeal. However, it is not difficult to understand why

my argument finds no support in Inferno and Purgatory. The former is the realm

of sin, and the latter is grounded in sin. The one stands for the opposite of

redemption, and the other is turned toward redemption, however, only under the

influence of divine grace. Hence, just as not all Christians go to Paradise, some

pagans are not worthy of salvation.

My argument is based on an interpretation of the appearance of two pagans

in the heaven of Jupiter: the Roman emperor Trajan and the Trojan Ripheus. Their

presence in Dante’s Paradise undermines the claim that the Commedia displays an

exegesis only on the redemption of the Christian soul. Dante scholars have argued

that, with their salvation, Dante wants to underline that the ways of the Lord are

inscrutable. But they often tend to forget that Dante is the lord of his text. Unless

we claim that the Commedia was written on divine inspiration, with God as the

true author and Dante as God’s subservient scribe, there is only one source for


3

every statement in the poem: Dante and his vision of divine order. In short, the

two pagans are present in Paradise because Dante regarded them as worthy of

salvation. Perhaps we do not fully understand the reason, but that does not make it

inscrutable. The problem of understanding can be due to textual ambiguity and

obscurity, but it can also be due to conceptual inconsistency and incoherence on

Dante’s part. For many Dante scholars, there is a simple reason why some textual

problems of the Commedia are not easily resolved. They comply with the Italian

Dante scholar Natalino Sapegno’s assertion that the Commedia “must be seen as a

work that takes shape as it goes along, not an organic, preconstituted block of

forms and concepts.”4 In other words, the poem was conceived as a work in

progress. As a result, it is not difficult to understand why statements are

sometimes ambiguous or even obscure, and why the vision of order is not always

consistent and coherent. To put it differently, Dante wanted to create a book of the

universe that reflects the divine order, but he did not manage to fully provide it

with such an order in substantial terms.

In Dante studies there seems to be a general consensus about the reason for

the inconsistency and incoherence. As the writing went along, from around 1306

to 1321, themes were taken in and explored and episodes invented because Dante

was influenced by the conditions and events of his time. As a result, it is a

common practice in Dante studies to see Dante’s journey through the afterworld

as reflecting, not only his existential motives before embarking on the project, but

also his existential experiences during the writing process in response to the

conditions and events of his time. Hence, among Dante scholars, the notion of the


4

poem’s gradual shaping often constitutes the basis for explaining inconsistent

features of the poem’s thematic content. For example, if we agree with the

American Dante scholar Richard Kay that De monarchia—Dante’s political

treatise on imperial authority—was written around 1318, by request of the

imperial vicar of Verona, Can Grande della Scala, in response to a specific papal

bull of 1317, and we find it likely that that Dante was working on the cantos of the

heaven of Jupiter around the same time, we may argue that Trajan and Ripheus

were inserted into the narrative because Dante was troubled by the papal claim of

authority in imperial affairs and wanted to emphasize the autonomy and

righteousness of imperial authority.5 If so, we may argue that the Commedia

displays a medieval exegesis on the redemption of the Christian soul, but, in two

cases of the saved, Dante was inconsistent in his exposition of the divine order.

Although this interpretation is an easy solution, it is not the one I will

present here. Though generally accepted, it should be noticed that not all Dante

scholars support the notion of a gradual shaping. No doubt, circumstances in

Dante’s lifetime influenced the thematic content of the Commedia in different

ways. The papal bull may have sharpened Dante’s defence of imperial authority.

But the idea of placing Trajan and Ripheus in Paradise can still be due to a general

plan that was conceived before the writing started. I will depart from this

assertion—namely, the idea of a conceptual design that underlies the presence of

Trajan and Ripheus in Paradise. My main concern is how to understand the

thematic consequences of their salvation when we take account of Dante’s

exegetical pattern of thought and the principles of redemption revealed throughout


5

the Commedia. As such, the scope of this article is limited. Its objective is to

explore whether some coherence can be detected in Dante’s choice of Trajan and

Ripheus for salvation. It does set out to explain which virtue is celebrated in the

heaven of Jupiter. In fact, it is still a matter of dispute what the ten spheres of

Paradiso celebrate because, in contrast to Hell and Purgatory with their explicit

references to sins and vices, Dante never overtly conveys the virtuous properties

of Paradise.

Promise and Fulfilment

In many studies of the Commedia the method by which Dante provides his poem

with its exegetical content is identified with the allegory of the theologians as

explained, in contrast to the allegory of the poets, in book 2 of the Convivio, or

the fourfold allegory as laid out in paragraph 7 of Epistle XIII, also known as the

dedicatory letter to Can Grande della Scala, which many Dante scholars regard as

authentic. Dante’s transformation of the medieval theological model of Biblical

interpretation into a mode of poetic expression is normally taken to be a central

point of departure for understanding the poem’s thematic content. But it is not

clear how the four senses—literal (or historical), allegorical, moral, and

anagogical—are operative in Dante’s narrative. The reason for this uncertainty

can be very simple. Dante’s reference to the fourfold allegory is not to be

understood in any strict sense. We do not come to terms with Dante’s exegetical

pattern of thought if we look for the four senses schematically and try to

comprehend their operations narrowly in accordance with the exegetical model.


6

The reference rather indicates a pattern of thought that is inspired by the fourfold

allegory but develops it creatively.

On the one hand, we have the literal sense of Dante’s text—that is, “the

sense that comes from the letter” (Epistle XIII, § 7). This sense involves the

description of the placement of souls in the three realms of the dead, the

description of Dante’s otherworldly journey, and the description of the

cosmological order. On the other hand, we have the transliteral sense or “the sense

that is signified by the letter” (Epistle XIII, § 7). This sense provides the meaning

to the placement of souls, the journey, and the cosmological order. In literary

terms, the former is structurally descriptive, while the latter is thematically

distinctive. The one refers to formal features of the content of the text, while the

other refers to its substantial meanings. But the two senses are overlapping and

interdependent. We cannot understand the substantial meanings independent of

the formal features, and the formal features are determined by the substantial

meanings. This interdependence is due to two fundamental conditions in medieval

exegesis that are fully operative in Dante’s exegetical pattern of thought.

The two conditions are the themes of promise and fulfilment for every soul

mentioned in the Commedia. The operation of the two conditions is simple. Every

soul of the Commedia is the fulfilment, in damnation, purgation, or salvation, of

its former existence on earth, where acts of sin, repentance, or virtue constitute the

promises for the afterlife in Hell, Purgatory, or Paradise. For example, the Vergil

and Beatrice of the Commedia are, in Dante’s view, the fulfilments of the

promises that their earthly existence gave for their afterlife. The two themes


7

follow the medieval practice of combining the Old Testament with the New

Testament, as, for instance, when Joshua’s conquest of Jericho is seen as the

promise fulfilled in Christ’s arrival in Jerusalem. In Dante’s afterworld the

operation of the two conditions underlines the firm belief of medieval Christians

that the afterlife of every soul is determined by its earthly life.

The themes of promise and fulfilment can easily be associated with the first

three senses of the exegetical model. The theme of promise corresponds to the

literal (or historical) sense, and the theme of fulfilment corresponds to the

allegorical sense. The relation between these two senses can be restated as the

relation between earthly and otherworldly existence, and as such, it corresponds to

the moral sense in that the relation provides the moral meaning to the poem’s

thematic content. This form of correlation corresponds to the relation between

disposition and act in ethics. For example, a person is defined as just if he fulfils

his disposition for justice through acts of justice. In short, the disposition is the

promise, and the act is the fulfilment. However, when we turn to the anagogical

sense, things become complicated. In weighing up the virtues, vices, and sins of

the dead, Dante does not only consider whether good or evil has prevailed in their

mortal life, he also judges their life from the perspectives of divine and eternal

law.6

The perspective of divine law can be defined as the meaning attained by

placing the moral meaning of a soul’s otherworldly existence in a Biblical

context. This is the scriptural sense, and in Dante studies it is often identified as

the figural sense, as, for example, when Beatrice is interpreted as Christ’s figure.


8

But very few souls of the Commedia can be given such figural meanings. As a

result, Dante seems to insist on judging the souls also from the perspective of

eternal law. This perspective is the meaning attained by considering the virtues,

vices, and sins of the dead in relation to the universal redemption, and it embraces

all possible figural meanings but ultimately transcends them. Its difference from

the perspective of divine law can be illustrated by considering Joachim of Fiore’s

distinction between the age of the Old Testament associated with the Father of the

Holy Trinity, the age of the New Testament associated with the Son, and the

future age of great leadership associated with the Holy Sprit. The relation between

the first and the second age is figural in the sense that the former prefigures the

latter, and the meaning of their relation is established by reading the Holy

Scriptures. The third age, however, is a prophecy that arises from speculating on

the figural meaning of the relation between the first two ages. The prophecy

claims to reveal the ultimate meaning of the course of history—that is, its

anagogical meaning. This meaning is mystical and esoteric; it is based on the

assumption that a hidden meaning has been discovered that transcends the figural

meaning.

Dante’s mode of reflection is similar to Joachim’s in that he, too, claims to

have a discovered a meaning that transcends the figural sense. But Dante’s vision

is different from Joachim’s in one important respect. Joachim’s “discovery”

concerns the historical evolution of Christian revelation. As such, his vision is

grounded in the mortal world. With his prophecy of a third age of the Holy Spirit,

Joachim argues that the soul can be sanctified in the mortal world.7 Dante’s


9

“discovery” is of a different kind. Although the vision of the Commedia

transcends the mortal world, he firmly holds that the soul can be sanctified only in

the world beyond. In constructing his cosmological vision of divine order Dante

draws on many scriptural sources, Christian and pagan. He relies heavily on the

teachings of the medieval church, but he is extremely inventive when it comes to

the description of Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise and their inhabitants. It is this

inventiveness that makes it necessary to distinguish between the perspectives of

divine and eternal law. Since divine law is restricted to the scriptural meaning, it

is the notion of eternal law that provides room for the kind of religious intuitions

that Dante unfolds in the Commedia. These intuitions arise from his Christian

commitment to the assurance of things hoped for and the conviction of things not

seen as stated in Hebrew 11: 1. But they are not just a cluster of arbitrary, spiritual

evocations. Since eternal law is equivalent to God’s universal order, the use of

this perspective makes it necessary to seek an understanding of which principles

govern the universal order as it can be contemplated by a human being in the

mortal world. This is the overall objective of the Commedia.

Workings of Grace

In the heaven of Venus we see an interesting example of Dante’s commitment to

discovering the anagogical meaning of what seems to be an event of divine

inscrutability. In that sphere we hear about Rahab of Jericho, whose salvation

makes part of a divine plan. Rahab is said to have been the first to rise to Heaven

when Christ harrowed Hell before his return to the Father (Par. 9: 118-26).


10

Though a prostitute, which Dante, however never mentions, Rahab was saved

because she made possible Joshua’s first glory in the Holy Land, whereby the

coming of Christ was prefigured. No one could have predicted that, by helping

Joshua in the conquest of Jericho, Rahab would be the first rise to Heaven. But

with her help she contributed the implementation of the divine plan that led to the

coming of Christ. In other words, the ways of the Lord are inscrutable, but only as

long as man has not understood the signs of the divine plan.

A similar conclusion can be drawn from the appearances of Trajan and

Ripheus among the blessed, despite the fact that they were both unbaptized when

they died and had lived without Christian revelation (Par. 20: 106-23). Formally

speaking, the meaning of their salvation is exegetical. It is rather to be found in

the notion of the workings of grace as the manifestation of the divine will. But the

pattern of thought involved in exegetical thinking is reflected in their salvation.

By this I mean that their salvation is not just to be understood as two exceptional

cases of graceful infusion. On the contrary, they are signs of the divine plan,

however, not that part of the plan that concerns the coming of Christ. They are

signs of the plan that concerns the implementation of righteous government in the

temporal world. They represent the idea that human beings can exercise secular

power righteously without Christian revelation because righteousness ultimately

reflects the divine good.

In order to understand this argument we have to remember that Dante’s

conception of the relation between secular and spiritual power is one of

coequality. The church is not the only divinely installed institution of this world.


11

The origin of the empire cannot be traced back to one particular founder as in the

case of the church. But Dante defines its foundation as the work of divine

providence. Hence the foundations of the church and the empire are due to the

will of God. The church was founded at a particular time in history as manifest in

the literal interpretation of Christ’s words to Peter in Matthew 16: 18: “And I tell

you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the powers of

death shall not prevail against it.” In contrast, the empire was not established at

any specific point. It came into being through a historical development directed by

divine providence. The lives of Trajan and Ripheus fit into this development.

However, no particular statement in the Commedia makes it evident that the

appearances of Trajan and Ripheus contain exegetical meanings. Only by

combining different themes and statements throughout the poem is it possible to

establish it. The establishment presupposes a global focus on the text with the aim

of coming to terms with its total meaning and not a local focus on particular

episodes that can produce only partial meanings.

In the Commedia baptism is said to be the fundamental precondition for

man’s journey of salvation. Vergil calls it the gateway to Christian faith (Inf. 4:

36), and Dante says that faith is the first step on the road to salvation (Inf. 2: 29-

30). For medieval Christians, baptism was man’s first experience of divine grace.

Because of this experience, man could be given a second chance in the afterworld

to commit himself fully to the Christian truth if he failed to do so while still on

earth. Hence no one should enter Paradise without first having experienced grace

by baptism. But when the great eagle in the heaven of Jupiter answers Dante’s


12

disturbing thought that the divine justice might condemn an entirely good man

because he is unbaptized and faithless, it is made clear that, since what is good is

God’s creation, God will never destroy that good since it would oppose the will

that created it (Par. 19: 85-90). Since justice is what is in accordance with the

divine will and the supreme good, a just person can be saved without being

baptized. But the eagle also says that none has ever risen to heaven who had not

faith in Christ before or after he was nailed to the cross (Par. 19: 103-5). In order

to understand this statement, it should be emphasized that faith in Christ implies

more than a belief in the truth of the Passion of Christ. It involves a mysterious

experience of the workings of grace. If man’s faith is a true one, grace works in

him as a reward for his commitment. But he can never be sure of being rewarded.

Therefore man’s humility must always prevail over his acceptance of God’s grace.

That is the reason why the purgation of pride to humility is described as the first

condition for the ascent of the seven terraces of the Mount of Purgatory. Only in

humility can the penitent actively restore his soul and prepare it for a gradual

illumination of divine grace.

In Antepurgatory humility plays a no less important role for the future

journey of the soul, but its significance is different from that of Purgatory proper.

The difference between the two sections is that, in the former, the soul’s

commitment in restoring its sinful state is only potential, while, in the latter, it is

actual. The soul must first acknowledge the humble conditions of human

existence before it can start the journey of salvation. When it reaches the first

terrace of Purgatory proper, it can start the purgation of the sin of pride and


13

gradually attain the virtue of humility. Thus it is granted access to the next terrace.

In Antepurgatory humility is not a virtue of the soul. But by submitting itself to

the divine will, the soul recognizes that humility is necessary for its future

journey. In Antepurgatory the principles of faith contained in the act of repentance

must first be restored before it can be allowed to enter Purgatory proper.

When a person repents in the mortal world, he acts in faith. This is the

reason why the soul can be given a second chance to restore its state of being by

first entering Antepurgatory. But the expression of hope of salvation through

repentance, at the last hour or even in the last minute, is not sufficient for

restoring the principles of faith in the sinful soul. A man who commits himself to

God is a Christian, and for Christians, the cornerstones of the commitment are the

three theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity. It is the belief in these virtues

that has to be restored before the soul can enter Purgatory proper. Thus the virtues

change from potentiality to actuality in the soul. The change is the ultimate end of

the journey of purgation. However, before it can be accomplished, the soul has to

purge the seven capital sins. When this is done, the soul is restored and the three

theological virtues become actual. The soul is now prepared for the ascent to the

heavenly bliss. In sum, man must choose to commit himself to God’s will and

learn the lesson of true commitment. As made clear by Marco Lombardi on the

third terrace of Purgatory (Purg. 16: 73-84), the free will is the ontological

principle of man’s commitment to God’s will.

Rebirth by Grace


14

Grace is a mysterious phenomenon that sometimes overrules the laws of nature.

The salvation of Trajan and Ripheus are two extraordinary examples of the

suspension of the laws of nature. In the heaven of Jupiter we are told by the eagle

that although Trajan had a righteous will, he was not saved. But by the power of

grace he was released from Hell and given a second chance to embrace the

Christian faith (Par. 20: 106-111). The conditions of promise and fulfillment are

fully operative in this theme of conversion. On the first terrace of Purgatory, we

see that one specific legendary episode from Trajan’s life as the “Roman Prince”

is one of three exempla of the virtue of humility carved in pure white marble

(Purg. 10: 73-93). Dante justifies the exemplification of Trajan’s virtuousness by

referring to a well known medieval legend about Pope Gregory the Great’s

compassion for the emperor’s sense of justice. Gregory was believed to have

prayed for Trajan’s salvation, and as a result of his prayer, the emperor’s soul was

released from Hell and returned to earth in order to take in the Christian faith as

body and soul.

There are at least two things to be learned from Trajan’s return to earth.

First, grace can cancel death and suspend the laws of nature by making man re-

experiencing life through rebirth and second death in order to become a Christian.

Second, the incident of earthly return underlines the essential quality of nature.

Shortly before Dante arrives at the seventh terrace of Purgatory, Statius explains

the genesis of the soul and makes it clear that the existence of body and soul

implies a mutual dependence on their unity. In the afterworld the soul exists

without the body, but as soon as it reaches its destination, it creates a substitute for


15

the deceased body (Purg. 25: 79-99). Without the body the soul cannot express

itself and feel its state of being in the afterworld. The substitute is an image of the

body with whom the soul was once united. If we assume that the soul in the

afterworld, by the infusion of grace, attained knowledge that it had not

experienced physically, its condition would not necessarily change. In theory, its

state of being would still be the same because the bodily image is fixed in the

reflection of the state that characterized the unity of body and soul in the mortal

world. Therefore, if the condition of the soul is to change, it has to re-inhabit the

body. Only through re-embodiment can man be converted and his soul re-placed

and the image of the body re-fixed in the afterworld. That is why Trajan had to

return to earth in order to be saved. When Trajan reigned as the “Roman Prince,”

his body and soul were fixed in unbelief. When he died, he could not repent his

unbelief because faith was absent in the image of his body. Therefore, in

principle, Trajan was not an object for salvation. Nevertheless, Dante not only

concludes Gregory’s prayer for Trajan when he shows us the emperor’s presence

among the blessed. By revealing the salvation he also seems to allude to the

divine plan. However, only when we take account of Ripheus’s presence beside

Trajan does the allusion become clear.

Baptism by Grace

When the world ends at universal judgment, God’s plan for the creation and the

course of the world is complete. From God’s perspective, every historical event or

stage of the world before the completion has a specific meaning in relation to the


16

ultimate end. This is the eternal law that Dante tries to comprehend within the

limits of the created world. Formally speaking, it is divine providence that

governs the completion of the plan through its way of directing things toward

their proper end. One of its means is predestination, whose source of origin is

hidden for all who do not see the primal cause of everything (Par. 20: 130-32).

This is the lesson we draw from the salvation of Ripheus in the Commedia. In his

case the object for the exemplification is formally the involvement of grace in

baptism. We are told that, like Trajan, Ripheus was righteous, but what made him

rise to heaven was the faith in God bestowed on him by special grace, whereby his

will was inclined to good. The eagle says that Ripheus was baptized more than a

thousand years before baptism was (Par. 20: 127-29). Thus Trajan and Ripheus

represent, according to Dante, the idea that no one ever enters Paradise without

faith and that grace can give faith to the faithless and baptize the unbaptized

without physical baptism.

Here many Dante scholars end their analysis. They conclude that the

presence of the two pagans in Paradise is Dante’s way of emphasizing God’s

inscrutability. But this is a peculiar conclusion. For what is the meaning of

predestining a pagan warrior for the exemplification of divine inscrutability?

Predestination is the work of divine providence with a specific end. Therefore

Ripheus’s predestination makes sense only if its purpose is revealed. Divine

inscrutability is the term human beings use when they do not comprehend the end

of divine providence. If we consult only the words of the heavenly eagle, we

might conclude that the end is inscrutable because we do not see the primal cause.


17

But although we do not see it, it does not follow that it is not there. If a pagan

warrior is predestined to goodness, it is the work of God’s will. If so, it has a

purpose. God never acts without a purpose. If he did, he would not be in control

of his actions.

The peculiarity of the conclusion is even more striking when we consider

the fact, as often emphasized by Dante scholars, that Ripheus’s salvation is

entirely Dante’s invention. This means that the primal cause is to be found in

Dante’s motivation for claiming that Ripheus, an almost insignificant character in

the Aeneid, whom Virgil only en passant refers to three times (II.339, 394, 426),

personified the fundamental virtues of Christian faith long before the coming of

Christ (Par. 20: 127-29). Vergil’s description of him, in the Aeneid, as “the most

just of all Trojans, who never wavered from the right,” but whose righteousness

the gods never regarded, indicates why he and no one else among the Trojans

could be an object for salvation in Dante’s view. But Vergil’s words do not clarify

the significance of Ripheus’s salvation. It might seem sufficient to answer that

question by combining the fact that justice is an essential subject of discourse in

the heaven of Jupiter with the fact that an essential feature of the divine plan is to

implement justice in the world of the living. But although justice is a significant

theme in the heaven of Jupiter, it does not account for Ripheus’s predestination.

Moreover, when we consider the fact that Ripheus is pointed out together with

Trajan, the problem is further complicated. If we focus only on the appearances of

Trajan and Ripheus in the heaven of Jupiter, we cannot solve that problem. We

have to expand our interpretive perspective in order to understand Dante’s


18

motivation for inventing Ripheus’ predestination and concluding Gregory’s

prayer.

Divine Providence

For medieval Christians, the decisive milestone in the history of mankind was the

Incarnation of the Son. In the beginning of the Commedia we learn from Vergil

that before the death of Christ no human soul ever reached salvation (Inf. 4: 46-

63). But with the heavenly presence of Trajan and Ripheus Dante indicates that

even this turning point in history is ultimately to be placed in the context of God’s

overall plan for the creation of the entire world. This does not mean, however, that

the implementation of the divine plan implicates that the truth revealed by Christ

must occasionally be overruled for the good of the ultimate end, as when salvation

is brought to a pagan warrior who had died in the Trojan War and a pagan

emperor who had persecuted Christians. The case is rather that Dante insists on

seeing every historical event from the perspective of what constitutes the divine

plan and how its end is accomplished. This is the perspective of eternal law.

When the salvation of Trajan and Ripheus seems to involve an overruling of

Christian revelation, the reason is that we focus on the Passion of Christ and not

on the Son’s participation in the Holy Trinity. Since the Son existed in the Father

before the Incarnation, whatever was ordained before this event was done in

accordance with the will of Christ, for it was the will of God, who represents the

unity of the three persons of the Holy Trinity. This notion is summarized in

Christ’s words in John 8: 58: “Before Abraham was, I am.” Hence, with the


19

salvation of Trajan and Ripheus, Dante emphasizes the unity of the divine will.

This means that, when Dante explicitly claims that the salvation of Ripheus is due

to divine predestination, we are to understand the infusion of grace in this

particular individual as an imprint of the divine plan in the mortal world.

But how did Ripheus and Trajan contribute to the implementation of the

divine plan? This question, I believe, can be answered only if we ask whether

there is any specific relation between these two cases of exceptional salvation.

The point of the matter is that the lives of the two pagans demarcate a span of

time that runs from the Trojan War to the height of the Roman Empire. They

constitute a continuum between the beginning and the historical zenith of the most

righteous manifestation of secular power by pagan rulers, according to Dante. As

far as the foundation of the empire is concerned, we seem to detect a pattern of

thought similar to Joshua’s prefiguration of Christ. Ripheus stands for the origin

of the righteousness of the Roman people, and Trajan is the supreme

representation of Roman righteousness. In the Commedia Trajan and Ripheus are

not only placed among the great kings of God’s plan for temporal government

such as David, Constantine, Ezechiel, and William the Good. Together with them

and others, they form the imperial symbol of the eagle. The eagle is, furthermore,

identified as lo Spirito Santo (Par. 19: 101).

Given the emphasis Dante puts on divine providence for the foundation of

the Roman Empire, he seems to associate imperial power with the power of the

Holy Spirit, just as Christ is conceived as the incarnation of spiritual power with

the foundation of the church. If we take account of the medieval doctrine that


20

Christ (or the Son) is the visible mission of the Trinity and that the Holy Spirit is

the invisible mission of the Trinity, it makes perfect sense to associate the

foundation of righteous secular power with the Holy Spirit. The church was

visibly founded by the Incarnation. The empire was invisibly founded through the

workings of divine providence. Ripheus’s predestination represents the primordial

manifestation of divine providence, whereby the foundation of the empire was

initiated by the will of God, and Trajan’s salvation is the confirmation of this will

in the implementation of a temporal institution for the guidance of mankind. In

conclusion, let us recall that in ancient times Trajan was given the title of princeps

optimus (the best emperor), reflecting an assumption that lived on into the

Christian era as manifest in John of Salisbury’s Policraticus (4.8 and 5.8), where

he is characterized as “the best among the gentile emperors.”8

Notes

1 An earlier version of this article was delivered as a paper at the Third Nordic Dante Network

Conference at Oslo University, September 15-17, 2006.

2 The reason why the Commedia does not reveal whether the pagan sages will be saved at

universal judgment is simple. What Dante describes in his poem is the world of particular

judgment. If he had placed the pagan sages in Paradise, he would have made his judgment equal to

God’s. He would have claimed to know what kind of existence awaits all human souls when the

world of the creation reaches its end. It is clear that the Commedia is motivated by political

idealism, and it is likely that Dante believed his poem to be inspired by some spiritual force of

divine origin. But in most cases, if not all, the principles for distributing the souls into Hell,

Purgatory, and Paradise are drawn from Christian doctrines sustained and substantiated by

philosophical and theological teachings. Dante elaborates on human knowledge of divine things,

but he does not disclose supernatural insights into the inscrutable ways of the Lord. The pagan


21

sages of Limbo underline the limitation of Dante’s knowledge of divine things since he does not

answer the question of their salvation.

3 As for the rest of the pagan souls of Inferno, there is no need to take them into account in

considering the question. The reason is simple: they are excluded because they are damned.

4 Lettario Cassata, “The Hard Begin,” in Lectura Dantis: Inferno: A Canto-by-Canto Commentary,

eds. Allen Mandelbaum, Anthony Oldcorn, and Charles Ross (Los Angeles: University of

California Press, 1998), 11.

5 Dante Alighieri, Dante’s Monarchy, trans. Richard Kay (Toronto: The Pontifical Institute of

Medieval Studies, 1998), ix and xxvii-xxxi.

6 The perspectives of eternal and divine law are equivalent to Thomas Aquinas’s distinction

between lex eternal (God’s eternal law) and lex divina (the law of the Holy Scriptures). Aquinas

also speaks of lex naturalis (natural law) and lex humana (human or positive law), but these two

perspectives are not relevant for the present argument. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, pt. 1-

2, q. 91, aa. 1-4.

7 T. K. Seung, Kant’s Platonic Revolution in Moral and Political Philosophy (Baltimore: The

John Hopkins University Press, 1994), 92-93

8 John of Salisbury, Policraticus, trans. Cary J. Nederman (Cambridge: Cambridge University

Press, 1996), 49-53 and 79-81.

Date post:	20-Jan-2023
Category:	Documents
Upload:	ku-dk
View:	0 times
Download:	0 times

J Hede: Dante's Exegetical Pattern of Thought

Documents