Two Possible Sources for Pico's Oratio1

Two Possible Sources for Pico’s Oratio1

M. V. DOUGHERTY

When the 15th century Italian thinker Giovanni Pico della Mirandola wrote his Oratio, he had intended it to preface the public disputation of his 900 Theses, a compilation of wide-ranging statements both historical and original, which he had published in December 1486. 2 The disputation was to take place in Rome in the next year, and the youthful Pico envisioned a forum held before the College of Cardinals with the Pope himself serving as the judge of the proceedings. Distinguished scholars were expected at the event as well, for Pico had o Vered to pay the travel expenses of “any philosopher or theologian” who wished to travel to Rome to join the proceedings. 3 At the time, Pico was 23 years old and was well-versed in Greek, Hebrew, and Arabic texts, and his theses had been drawn from varied sources including scholastic, Islamic, Peripatetic,

1 The Oratio is best known by the title “Oration on the Dignity of Man” though this title appears to have been the invention of later editors rather than a designation estab- lished by Pico himself. Early printings include the title Oratio de hominis dignitate and De hominis dignitate . No original title is extant. On the history of the title of this work, see the recent work of S. A. Farmer, Syncretism in the West: Pico’s 900 Theses (1486): The Evolution of Traditional Religious and Philosophical Systems , Tempe, Arizona 1998, 18-19. 2 Latin texts of Pico’s work are taken from De Hominis Dignitate, Heptaplus, De Ente et Uno, ed. Eugenio Garin, Firenze 1942; Epistola ad Hermolao Barbaro , in: Corpus Reformatorum , Vol. 9. ed. Carolus Gottlieb Bretschneider, Halis Saxonum 1842, 678-87; and Farmer 1998 (op. cit., above, n. 1). Translations of Pico’s works are taken from On the Dignity of Man, On Being and the One, Heptaplus , trans. Charles Glenn Wallis, Paul J. W. Miller, Douglas Carmichael, Indianapolis 1998; The Correspondence of G. Pico della Mirandola and Ermolao Barbaro Concerning the Relation of Philosophy and Rhetoric , in: Journal of the History of Ideas, 13 (1952), 392-402; and Farmer 1998 ( op. cit., above, n. 1). References in the notes are always to the Latin text. Historical documents pertaining to the Papal investigation of the 900 Theses can be found in Pic de la Mirandole en France (1485-1488) , ed. Léon Dorez and Louis Thuasne, Paris 1897. 3 Pico’s invitation and promise of payment came as a codicil at the end of the publi- cation of the 900 Theses which read: “ And if any philosopher or theologian, even from the ends of Italy, wishes to come to Rome for the sake of debating, the disputing lord himself promises to pay the travel expenses from his own funds ( Et siquis Philosophus aut Theologus etiam ab extrema Italia arguendi gratia Romam venire voluerit, pollicetur ipse Dominus dis- putaturus se viatici expensas illi soluturum de suo ).” The text is preserved in Farmer 1998 ( op. cit., above, n. 1), 552.

Hermetic, and Caballic works. Yet the elaborate disputation never took place. A papal commission of theologians and jurists was convened by Innocent VIII in 1487 to examine the veracity of the theses, and, no doubt to the displeasure of Pico, the members of the commission found Pico’s work to “deviate from the straight path of orthodox faith ( a recto tramite ortodoxe dei deviare ).”4 Pico’s planned disputation in Rome was sus- pended and his 900 Theses were burned after becoming the rst printed book to be prohibited universally by the Church. 5 After writing a spirited defense of his banned work, Pico was excommunicated by Pope Innocent VIII.6 For these historical reasons, the Oratio was never presented pub- licly and was never published during Pico’ s lifetime. 7 Yet this work has the distinction of being one of the best-known and most anthologized expressions of Italian Renaissance humanism. Pico’ s legendary erudition and deep acquaintance with nearly all the academic schools known at the time have long made him an interesting subject of study for students of the Renaissance. His panoptic view of diverse intellectual traditions was bolstered by the belief that these major traditions, which are com- monly held to be opposed, are in truth harmonious, and his syncretic orientation seems to have been the impulse behind his far-ranging 900 Theses as well as other works, including On the Concord of Plato and Aristotle .8

4 The text of the ndings of the Papal commission are contained in Dorez 1897 ( op. cit., above, n. 2), 114 V. 5 The novelty of the Papal action toward Pico’s book has been recognized by several scholars. Of the event Rudolf Hirsch writes, “Innocent VIII prohibited in 1487 the 900 theses of Pico della Mirandola in his bull Etsi ex injuncto . This is the rst broad inquisito- rial action in the history of printing, heralding the promulgations of the indices librorum pro- hibitorum.” See R. Hirsch, Printing, Selling and Reading: 1450-1550 , Wiesbaden 1967, 89. 6 The bull of excommunication was later lifted by Pope Alexander VI in 1493. 7 For the details of the historical events of Pico’s life, see Eugenio Garin, Portraits from the Quattrocento , trans. Victor A. Velen and Elizabeth Velen, New York 1963, 190-221; and Farmer 1998 ( op. cit., above, n. 1), 1-179. 8 For varying accounts of Pico’s “syncretism,” see Paul Oskar Kristeller, Introduction , in: The Renaissance Philosophy of Man , Chicago 1948, 220; William G. Craven, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola: Symbol of his Age: Modern Interpretations of a Renaissance Thinker , Geneva 1981, 91-107; Ernst Cassirer, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola: A Study in the History of Renaissance Ideas. Parts I–II, in: Journal of the History of Ideas, 3 (1942), 123-44, 319-46, esp. pp. 128-31, 345. The most extensive account of Pico’s syncretism is the recent work of Farmer 1998 ( op. cit., above, n. 1). In a generous 179-page introduction to the text and translation of the 900 Theses, Farmer identi es his method as one that approaches Pico’s text “as an ideal lab- oratory to study the connections between textual exegesis and the growth of correlative systems” (xiv). As the author explains, the study has been “developed in conjunction with a cross-cultural model of the evolution of premodern religious and philosophical systems” which the author intends to publish at a later time (ix). Readers may nd Farmer’s the- oretical methods and approach to be somewhat untraditional, yet nevertheless Farmer’s