Paradiso, Canto 16 with Dr. Jonathan Reimer
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 29 ก.ย. 2024
- Dr. Jonathan Reimer introduces us to Canto 16 of Dante's Paradiso.
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Excellent commentary! Thank you for providing additional historical context and relating its importance to this Canto.
Canto 16: Although Dante requests a history of his own family, Cacciaguida, dismissing the explicit family ancestry, gives a history of the early aristocratic Florentines and a viewpoint that their honor has been diluted by the immigration of others of lesser rank and accomplishments! However, the honor of ancestry may be insufficient if it is not added to by every generation. (Although souls in heaven have obtained "perfection," they are still capable of being swelled with pride when they feel they are being honored!) Neighborhoods or small towns are preferred to large cities, since with the influx of newcomers, there is an increase in crime! Furthermore, the newly arrived merely make the body “fat,” indicative of "corruption." On the other hand, the rise and fall of Florentine aristocratic families may also be due to "outside" influences and not a result of what they, themselves, may have done, or not done. He also tells about the noble family of the Buondelmonte, and the broken engagement which led to a family feud resulting in the formation of the Guelf and Ghibelline parties and the civil war resulting, ultimately, in Dante’s exile from Florence. The flag of the Ghibellines retained the original standard of Florence, a white lily on a red field. The flag of the Guelfs reversed the standard to yield a flag with a red lily on a white field. Reversals are common throughout Dante’s life in the 14th century!
thanks for all of your excellent summaries
Thank you, Dr. Reimer, for these helpful insights!
Thanks for your infectious enthusiasm for this Canto. Commentary on these challenging passages is so valuable.
This is so, so helpful! Thank you Dr. Reimer!
Dr. Reimer, thank you so much for your brilliant presentation about this difficult canto. The message of Cacciaguida to the future: Mongrelization leads to degeneracy. From the time of the Tower of Babel a confusion of blood and culture has been a potential source of evil and hatred. Hate begets hate and violence. Political division at its core is a result of human sin. It is not too difficult to understand that eventually cities come to an end, families die out, and tribes dwindle away, All of man's institutions of every type and kind come to naught and what seems to be permanent is hidden from us because our lives are short. Our so-called governments, those cabals of prideful and presumptuous officials, are monsters to all who run from them and lambs to all go along through ignorance or influence and bribery. By the grace of God and the sacrifice of Jesus Christ and without my earthly ego, vanity, and pride, I am more than "I," I am one with the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Outstanding effort! Would have had no chance at understanding without this help.
Is it just me, or is anyone else struggling with Paradiso? It’s DIFFICULT and it’s BORING! Even Dore’s illustrations are boring. An angel. Several angels. A host of angels. I’m so far behind I’ll probably never catch up.
Struggling, yes! Keep going! Rejoice in the challenge and know you're not alone in the struggle!
Great comment -- I can so relate! I know you wrote this during the first read-through of The Comedia -- I'm doing the second -- but you have stated what I've been saying throughout Paradisio and seriously have no desire to finish reading it except to have "bragging rights" to say, "I did it!" I'll even take it one step further than you did and say that the scholastic presentations aren't nearly as interesting as the earlier ones, either. (Which begs the question: Are the people in the comment section that gush over every presentation paid to do so?!)
Very clearly stated. Leave it to a historian to strip away the high minded ideologies of this Guelph vs Ghibbeline feud we've been reading about for many weeks now and to give us the bare bones background story. Like the way you put this in context, stating that maybe these two groups, about to launch a feud that would destroy and hurt many, might have done better to avoid sin and to have availed themselves of the religious feast activities going on around them. Thanks for this contribution; this cleared up a lot of confusion for me.
Thank you, Dr. Reimer, for tackling this dense Canto. As dry as it was, it was extremely important to grasp. The story of cities used to be so beautiful and tragic and full of the richness of pre-modern life. What of cities now?
Dante's Florence seems like a different city altogether. Where is the peace and the closer, local community? The genealogies are key in connecting the olden and the new. We must see the development of a city like Florence through time; we, as readers, must see the story.
The roots of conflict that affects Dante so intensely aren't random or drop from the sky. Even in the days long before Dante, however much more beautiful and pure (even down to the humblest artisan), the danger of passions and violence remain. They remain with the potential to destroy and warp and destabilize the civic order and the moral order.
The next Canto must answer many questions about Dante's family, Florence, and civic order more broadly. One main question is this: how can a city be good now while its citizens wait for the End and the Eternal Peace? I figure this question, opened by Justinian earlier, may find more answer here in the mouth of a root of Dante's tree, Cacciguida.
Thank you!
Yes, thank you! Such great background info!
Absolutely excellent!