chapter 12 Dante and the Human Identity: A Transformation from Grace to Grace
Nancy Enright Seton Hall University
Christian humanism is most often associated with the early Renaissance, with figures like Thomas More and Desiderius Erasmus and other professors of “the New Learning” during the period beginning roughly around the year 1500 and lasting throughout the 16th century and slightly beyond it. However, as students of the Middle Ages know, respect for classical learning and authors pre-dates the Renaissance, expressing itself clearly in medieval works, including Dante’s depiction of Virgil in The Divine Comedy. “Are you then that Virgil? you the fountain/that freely pours so rich a stream of speech?” Dante questions the ghost of his literary inspiration as he appears to him on the threshold of hell. Dante’s mixture of admiration and gratitude toward his mentor, Virgil, shows quite clearly that classical culture was val- ued highly by the medieval Christian world, as a pinnacle of both reason and poetic achievement, qualities with which Charles Williams identifies Virgil in his Figure of Beatrice, but, while both attributes are valued in the Christian humanist mindset reflected by Dante, they are not enough to lead a soul to salvation. For that, grace is necessary, personified by Beatrice in The Divine Comedy and ultimately identified with Christ and His Church by the end of the poem; Virgil’s help is not enough. Therefore, the encounter between Dante and Virgil in The Divine Comedy epitomizes the relationship between Christianity and classical culture in the context of medieval Christian humanism. However, beyond this combination of deep respect, even rever- ence, for Virgil and the simultaneous limitation attributed by Dante to Virgil, the treatment of the great classical poet in The Divine Comedy can be read as Dante’s answer to key Christian humanist questions concerning human identity and dignity, the ideals of morality and education flowing out of this concept of humanity, and the role of classical culture in the connection between these two inter-related ideas. In fact, a careful study of the relation- ship between Dante and Virgil, as depicted by the former, will reveal that Dante’s attitude links his text with a Christian view toward the classics and the intellectual life overall, which can certainly be identified as “medieval Christian humanism,” but extending well beyond the Middle Ages and the
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Renaissance, backward to the beginnings of Christianity and forward to con- temporary times. Christian humanists, like Dante, of the 14th century grappled with questions of ultimate meaning that have interested thinkers before and after, as well as during, the medieval period: What is the human person? What is the basis of human dignity? What moral and educational goals reinforce this dignity? And, for Christians in the medieval period, the following question was also extremely important: what role does classical culture play in living out these moral and educational goals, in connection with an accurate understanding of the dignity of the human person? Clearly, Dante shows us that Virgil, as the embodiment of the best of classical culture, conveys part, but only part, of the answer Dante is ultimately offering to the first of these questions regarding the nature of human identity and dignity. The human person is a creature of reason, as Virgil shows in his wise counsel of Dante. The human person is noble and literate, as we see in Virgil’s being honored as a great poet, a figure of inspiration to Dante, and this depiction hints at the answer to the second question regarding moral and educational goals in keeping with humanity’s high identity. Education, including the works of the classics, is a useful part of moral and intellectual development, as Dante clearly shows through his own education by Virgil. However, important as this intellectual journey is, it is not enough to save a human soul. Dante shows this limitation, also through the character of Virgil, again and again. It is through Dante’s delicately balanced treatment of Virgil that he asks and answers the third question, regarding the role of classical cul- ture in the salvation of the human soul, and in answering this question Dante shows himself to be in line with nearly two millennia of Christian humanists. In the beginning of Inferno, a defining characteristic of the interaction between Dante and Virgil is courtesy, as we see in their first tentative interac- tions. Dante greets Virgil with warmth and genuine gratitude for the important influence of the earlier poet on his protégé:
O light and honor of all other poets, may my long study and the intense love that made me search your volume serve me now. You are my master and my author, you- the only one from whom my writing drew the noble style for which I have been honored.1
By calling him “my master and my author,” Dante is acknowledging his debt to Virgil for helping him develop that “noble style” that has brought him fame.
1 Inferno 1.82-87, in Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy, trans. Allen Mandelbaum (London: 1995).