Paradiso, Canto 1 with Dr. Doug Henry
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 29 ก.ย. 2024
- Dr. Doug Henry of Baylor University introduces us to canto 1 of Dante's Paradiso.
100 Days of Dante is brought to you by Baylor University in collaboration with the Torrey Honors College at Biola University, University of Dallas, Templeton Honors College at Eastern University, the Gonzaga-in-Florence Program and Gonzaga University, and Whitworth University, with support from the M.J. Murdock Trust. To learn more about our project, and read with us, visit 100daysofdante...
The stained glass windows are wonderful and a lovely way to introduce Paradise! I'm excited for this. Thank you Dr. Henry!
Thank you, Dr. Henry! This opening Canto will surely define the rest of the work in its bright but subtle ways. The use of light and illumination was poetically astounding. Take notes, ye youthful poets! Order being inherent to the universe and the natural rising to heaven are important things to keep in mind going forward. Us in modernity think of the world as material and flat. The worldview of Dante is one of a great Chain of Being and a world bursting at the seams with life and spiritual connection. Oh for a reenchanted social imaginary...
Paradiso is truly the teleological end of Purgatorio. Onwards and upwards.
The Apollo part is still rather difficult to get around with a protestant imagination. I think the key is the previous invocation of muses and the rather clear reference to Christ. Poetry, Prophecy, and Logos.
Thank you!
Canto 1: God is the unmoved-mover who “resides” in the unmovable sphere of the Empyrean, the ultimate fire of Paradise. In order for Dante to describe his rise through the spheres of the wandering planets to reach the Divine, he calls upon the poetic assistance of Apollo, residing on one the twin peaks of Parnassus, in addition to that of the Muses, living on the other peak, who have helped him write about Hell and Purgatory. Dante beholds Beatrice who is staring directly towards the blazing sun and reflecting its light from her eyes to illuminate him. This experience “transhumanizes” him. He not only sees the fires of the heavens, but he also hears the music made by these celestial spheres. Beatrice informs him that they have been traveling (at warp speed!) towards the first sphere encircling the earth. This motion results from his weightlessness, having deposited the heaviness of all of his sins behind him. His rising upwards is as natural as water descending over a cliff. The light he beholds will not change in quantity, but will be seen for its diverse qualities, as they transverse the eternal wheels (l’etterne rote) surrounding them.
Bluntly, I just don't agree with this interpretation of the canto, regarding Apollo as a representation of Christ. I don't agree that "careful readers" will of course see that Dante is actually speaking of Christ. I think Dante is not doing that. I'm not a literary scholar, but that interpretation to me is imposing a meaning on the text which isn't there. I also think it is a huge gloss on the entire canto, in terms of Dante appealing to Apollo. I think if the invocation of Apollo is taken for what it is, an invocation to Apollo (which incidentally incorporates some rather barbaric and gruesome references), this then sets up a trajectory for Dante and the reader to realize, or discover, as the poem unfolds, that Apollo is ultimately insufficient or inadequate to provide Dante with the support he requests from him. Consequently, although I approached this particular lesson with anticipation, and certainly appreciate the effort put into it, I was a bit disappointed that it didn't afford a richer examination of the invocation of the mythological Apollo.
See my post below. In more literary terms, what I'm questioning apparently is whether in Canto 1, Apollo is a "figura dei" for Christ. I think this lecture over evangelicized the canto and in doing so imposed an interpretation which robbed the canto of richer, perhaps more subtle meanings. By imposing this interpretation on Paradiso right at the start, perhaps this may appeal to current day evangelical Christians who applaud the interpretation, but to do so jeopardizes an even more profound reading.
I was unable to listen to this lecture. Dr. Henry looks like a deer in the head lights of Christianity, too bad. A poor way to start Paradiso.
If Greek mythology is what you want, you are welcome to go at it. We are here reading Dante’s Christian poem that brings us into a vision of Paradise, necessarily invoking Christ as The Logos. I think Apollo does work as a literary device to take the figures of old poetry into new forms. That is what poets do. (See CS Lewis’s Prologue to Milton’s Paradise Lost where he insists we read Milton as Milton intended to be read.)
@@kkutney Is your reply coming from you as a "Christian." How amusing that you want to EXCLUDE me off AWAY from yourself by saying "WE" are here reading Dante's CHRISTIAN poem and if YOU want MYTHOLOGY, you are in the wrong place. Well, HELLO, I'm here. I'm part of the WE whether you like it or not. You are saying the equivalent of IF YOU DON"T LIKE IT THEN GO SOMEWHERE ElSE. How friggin CHRISTIAN of you! How dastardly to imply that WELL, IF YOU ARE HERE FOR MYTHOLOGY then SHUT UP or GO SOMEWHERE ELSE, BECAUSE THIS IS A PLACE FOR CHRISTIANS. For your CHRISTIAN enlightenment, the OPINION expressed by the lecturer about APOLLO is a MINORITY ONE among Dante scholars. Very few ENDORSE it. Go dunk your head in a baptismal font!
Lecture Transcript
Welcome colleagues to this last wondrous canticle of the Divine Comedy. In the final third of the poem, we’re in for a remarkable experience, one that I hope you’ll find edifying and inspiring.
Like the beautiful Trinity Windows of Robin’s chapel here on Baylor University’s campus, Dante’s Paradiso has the triune God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, at the center of everything. Indeed, Paradiso is the part of the poem without which nothing we’ve read before can be rightly understood.
In the Inferno, we saw the diminished life of those who refuse God’s grace and cling obstinately to sin. Now in the Paradiso, we see even more clearly the misery and senselessness of rejecting the glory intended for us by the Lord. We can’t help but ask, ‘why oh why, sad souls in hell do you wallow in self-destruction when God made you for so much greater?’
In the Purgatorio, we saw the joyful cooperation of those who long for redemption in Christ, who walk in faith, hope and love and who embrace the grace of Christian discipleship. We reveled in their stories and praised the virtues that fit them for heaven.
Now in the Paradiso, we’re able to understand better why the arduous ascent up the mountain is both vitally essential and worthy of our best. We can’t help but explain, ‘well done, thou good and faithful servants.’ In the Paradiso, everything comes together in the saints overwhelming pleasure in God’s presence, beauty beyond measure appears. Our theme is the highest fulfillment of human longing. The vision of the God who is love and whose love is made manifest in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Our hero, the pilgrim Dante, now freed of the weight of sin and soaring with lightness of soul will see, hear and understand things which the poet Dante will strain to put into words. And here’s where we must admit a difficulty. Dante knows Saint Paul’s declaration in 1 Corinthians, ‘Eye has not seen, nor ear hear, nor have entered into the heart of man, the things which God has prepared for those who love him.’ Beginning in Paradiso line four, the first canto Dante professes, ‘I have been in that heaven he makes most bright and seeing things neither mind can hold nor tongue utter, when one descends from such great height.’ We’ve all had times when describing a momentous experience was difficult. We can use words literally, ‘I saw a bright light, I heard a loud thunder.’ We can also use words figuratively, ‘It was like drinking from a fire hose, I’ve got peace like a river.’ We can try to connect new and old experiences as when we say, ‘It reminds me of that time when.’ But when one’s experience is well beyond the ordinary words often come up short. Most of us offer excuses, ‘words fail, I guess you had to be there.’ But Dante is determined to do his best to put the vision of glory into words. Where you and I would fail, Dante carries on yet he realizes no ordinary poetic endeavor lies ahead of him his ultimate subject is the consummation of all human desires in two great mysteries of the Christian faith: the incarnation and the trinity.
As extraordinary a poet as he is, he’s trying to put words to extraordinary things that outstrip the human mind in its current condition. Others, we ought to remember, have struggled at this point. Saint Augustine tells us, in his Confessions, that he and his mother Monica were briefly taken up in prayer to ‘the heavens themselves but sighing we returned to the sound our own tongue.’ They fell back into the ordinary life unable to fully describe their experience. Like Augustine, Dante is attempting something hard. He’ll use the best words any human has ever assembled to tell the best things any human has ever known.
In the Inferno, Dante proceeds on the basis of his own ingenuity and memory. In the Purgatorio, he calls upon Calliope, one of the nine muses with epic poetry. But for Paradiso, he needs more than merely mortal poetic powers so in line 13 he writes something remarkable, ‘Oh good Apollo, for his last work of art, make me as fit a vessel of your power as you demand when you bestow the crown of the beloved laurel till this hour, one peak of twin Parnassus has sufficed but if I am to enter the list, now I shall need both.’
We msut remember that Apollo is no mere muse like Calliope but the god of music itself. By invoking Apollo, Dante identifies a need for surpassingly great inspiration. But Apollo is not only the god of music, but of prophecy, which is why, in the ancient world, people journey to Delphi, to hear Apollo’s oracle. By appealing to Apollo, Dante signals his need not only for poetic inspiration, but prophetic power so he can tell and judge what must be. Yet beyond music and prophecy, Apollo is the god of reason or ‘locus.’ Dante’s poetic craft is here most astonishing for we careful readers are to take Apollo, the god of reason, who is the son of the pagan father-god, Zeus, as a poetic figure for Christ, the Logos of God, who is our heavenly father’s only begotten son.
Dante’s prayerful invocation at the outset of the Paradiso then is a stunning Christian adaptation of a pagan image. It’s a poetic figure in which under the guise of Apollo, he beseeches Christ, the Son of God, who inspires prophetic power and who as the Word of God enables the Word within us, our power of reason, to hit its mark.
For all of that, heaven boggles the imagination and strains understanding, and Dante knows it. In line 70 he admits, ‘to signify man soaring beyond man, words will not do, let my comparison suffice for them for whom the grace of God reserves the experience.’ He’ll do his best. As we’ll do our best but in his own way Dante does ultimately say something like, ‘words fail, I guess you had to be there.’
Well, colleagues, there is where Dante will have us find a great multitude in heaven. It includes so many heroic and saintly figures of the faith. We have great things ahead of us in Paradiso.
By the end of the Canticle, we’ll see that the Virgin Mary has highest seed of honor and leads heaven in humble adoration of the Lord. We’ll see the great doctor of the church, Saint Augustine, alongside Saint Benedict and Saint Francis. What about Moses? Who God called to lead his people out of Egyptian bondage and into the promised land? He’s there, the chief of whose people fed on manna, as Dante describes him. Well, be told of Samuel, the son of Hannah, in canto four, who was a valiant Hebrew prophet, priest and Judge. And Joshua, courageous leader of the children of Israel, appears in the sphere of Mars in canto eighteen. Rachel, the beloved and humble spouse of Jacob, sits with Beatrice herself, just beneath the feet of mother Eve. Let’s not forget Ruth, called by Dante in a marvelous turn of phrase, ‘twice grandmother.’ Of the singer, who in grief for his sin cried, ‘have mercy upon me.’
In the fourth sphere, that of the sun, we’ll encounter wise saints including Solomon, King of Israel, who prayed for wisdom above riches, and Boethius, whose Consolation of Philosophy relates his wisdom in the days leading up to his martyrdom. And Saint Thomas Aquinas, the angelic doctor with whom Dante will have a lengthy exchange. Saint Bernard of Clairvaux figures prominently as he’ll be Dante’s final guide when we get to canto thirty-one. All these great saints of heaven are joined by an innumerable host. I can’t wait to read with you of them in the cantos ahead.
Thanks for this!
Sigh. Like others I am disappointed by this presenter’s compulsion to preach from his particular faith perspectives (and baptizing Apollo and other figures of mythology along the way…) instead of focusing on the text at hand. I appreciate the scholarship that sheds light on the text, but please let Dante and his companions be our guides to living a good life.
Words fail! What a perfect introduction to Paradiso.
You had to be there!
Interesting. I didn’t take Apollo as a poetic figure for Christ although now I can grasp the similarity. Because of the mix of mythology, the classics and Scripture, I thought it was just in keeping with the actions of the Greeks seeking the favor of a god before setting out on a quest. In this case, Dante appealing to Apollo to give him the words to convey the magnificence of Paradiso. Really enjoyed the preview of other characters to be encountered. Thank you.
Excellent!
I was taken aback by Dr. Henry's pronunciation of 'Augustine'. Are we talking about Florida?
How would you explain Dante's use of so many pagan images and his appeal to Apollo? Does this seem a bit of a conflict here?
So I'm a bit confused. How can Moses be in heaven when he died before Jesus died on the cross? Shouldn't he be in Limbo with Virgil?
Moses and the other patriarchs of the Bible were ancient Israelites who worshipped the same God that incarnates as Jesus.
Moses looked forward to Christ in the same way we look back to Him.