It’s a little hard to believe that I’m done with Paradiso, the third and final book of Dante’s Divine Comedy. It was most definitely a rush to the finish, but it was worth it, as I enjoyed the third portion of the book fare more than I expected to. In Paradiso, Dante travels all the way through heaven, which, at this time, were synonymous with the heavens, from the first layers of those who were not the most courageous on the moon with “the mingled virtue,” to the holy trinity beyond the stars, “appeared to me three circles” (360, 514). In particular, throughout this section, I was intrigued by the geography of Dante’s journey and the replacement of Virgil, his guide through the first two books, with Beatrice, so those two issues will be the focuses of this blog post.
The leveling of Inferno and Purgatorio continued into Paradiso, however, it differs in the direction of movement. Within each book, Dante moves more towards the extreme as he goes through each level. In Inferno, Dante was constantly traveling downward, towards Satan and the root of sin. In Purgatorio, Dante was traveling upwards away from sin. However, in Paradiso, the focus is traveling outwards, away from Earth and all things related to Earth, namely, sin. He stopped by all the planets in the solar system on his way to God, though, naturally, the order was different from today’s standards given that this was written in pre-Copernican times. I thought it was interesting the way Dante imbued the different planets/stars with groups that draw from their characteristics. The sun is filled with the intellectuals and really good Kings, there Dante talks to Thomas Aquinas, perhaps the most famous intellectual of Dante’s era, and meets King Solomon, the greatest King described in the Bible. The symbolism of these souls illuminating Earth is almost too obvious. Venus is filled with those who erred by loving too much, and letting that consume them, as its named after the goddess of love. And, oh yeah, the moon, the one heavenly body that changes shape, is filled by those with inconsistent virtue, who occasionally showed cowardice just as the moon disappears. The symbolism Dante ties into these locations helps tie into the idea that Divine Comedy is allegorical, as allegories require nearly everything encountered to be symbolic.
At the end of Purgatorio, I found the departure of Virgil really odd. Here’s this guy, Virgil, who Dante obviously respects and worships, but yet he just has to up and leave when Dante reached the Garden of Eden. His replacement was Beatrice, the woman who had instructed Virgil to guide Dante along his journey. One thing I noticed, and this was the most interesting feature of Beatrice, is that Dante seems more and more taken with her beauty as he progresses through the spheres of heaven. Just before Dante meets Peter Damaino, in Canto XXI, he writes that “on my Lady’s face mine eyes again were fastened,” and she responds that “my beauty, that along the stair of the eternal palace more enkindles” (451). This is explicitly saying that her beauty increases as she goes through heaven, towards God. He goes even further in his description before he meets god, saying that “the beauty I beheld Transcend ourselves” (496). Somehow, as Dante gets closer and closer to God, Beatrice is more and more beautiful. One of her other main differences from Virgil is that Beatrice has far more opinions on God and theology. She discusses “between God and man the compact” and she spends tons of time talking to Dante about the death of Christ, answering/putting off his religious questions, and explaining the structure of heaven (371). Taking all this into account, I think that Beatrice is symbolic of religion. She leads Dante directly from Earth to God, answering his religious questions along the way. She gets stronger and stronger nearer to God. She, religion, is necessary to get Dante from the end of Purgatory, in which he has understood all of his sins.
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