Humanity possesses the unique ability to see both physical and spiritual realities. Thomas Aquinas describes this phenomenon in Summa of the Summa, stating, “The sense of sight, as being altogether material, cannot be raised up to immateriality. But our intellect, or the angelic intellect, inasmuch as it is elevated above matter in its own nature, can be raised up above its own nature to a higher level by grace” (ST, 3. Q11. A4. arg. 3). While a man can see with his physical eyes like any other animal, he can also use his intellect and reason to discover spiritual truths. However, man’s physical body prevents him from fully exercising his intellect to perceive spiritual truths, so he needs divine aid to look up to the nature of God. Throughout Inferno and Paradiso, Dante Alighieri attempts to harness man’s physical sight to carry his understanding up to God's nature by linking God's spiritual presence and absence to physical darkness and light. While he utilizes figurative darkness to indicate the aimlessness, suffering, and isolation that arises in God’s absence, he describes the overwhelming presence of God as a dazzling light.
In Inferno, Dante explores the implications of straying away from God’s light.
In the beginning of the poem, Dante states that his journey away from God leads him off a straight, lit path into dark woods. The darkness of Dante’s woods is an excellent metaphor for God’s absence for several reasons. For instance, like darkness, the absence of God prevents one from seeing where he is going. Dante begins, “Midway upon the journey of our life / I found myself in a dark wilderness, / for I had wandered from the straight and true [path]” (Inf. 1.1-3). Here he refers to the “straight and true” as the path of righteousness leading to eternal life with God that Jesus mentions in Matthew 7:14, saying, “Strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.” (King James Version, Matt. 7:13-14). Dante uses a figurative wilderness to describe his directionless path away from God, while the darkness within it refers to his inability to see his destination. Essentially, in wandering away from the path to God, Dante foolishly forfeits his original path toward Heaven to wander about in intellectual and spiritual darkness.
While he uses darkness to communicate aimlessness, Dante also uses it to indicate the dark suffering that ensues in God’s absence. Eventually, Virgil joins Dante and leads him down the “deep and savage-wooded path” away from God” to Hell (Inf. 2.142). Upon reaching Hell, they see the words,
I AM THE WAY INTO THE CITY OF WOE,
I AM THE WAY INTO ETERNAL PAIN,
I AM THE WAY TO GO AMONG THE LOST
..............................................................................
ABANDON ALL HOPE YOU WHO ENTER HERE [etched with] dark and harsh intent [on the archway of a gate]. (Inf. 3.1-10)
The entry sign to Hell, the ultimate destination of one who journeys away from God, declares the dark message that the souls within it are doomed to eternal woe, pain, and hopelessness. After journeying through the gate, Dante immediately hears the cries of the suffering souls and writes that their “sighs and moans and utter wailing swept / resounding through the dark and starless air” (Inf. 3.22-23). Often, people who flee from God have no ultimate destination in mind, and only want to separate themselves from Him. The farther one travels into the dark absence of God, though, the closer he draws to Hell, a place of dark suffering for those who stray from God through sin.
Darkness also mirrors the absence of God in the sense that spending time in the darkness away from God prepares people to appreciate the light of His presence better. One whose eyes have adjusted to darkness will be overwhelmed by the light of day, while one whose eyes are accustomed to light will experience no change. Likewise, the miserable darkness of Dante’s journey from God in the wilderness grants him a new sense of gratefulness for the light of Heaven. As he reaches a valley in the wilderness, he says,
I raised my eyes and saw its shoulders robed
with the rays of that wandering light of Heaven
that leads all men aright on every road.
That quieted a bit the dread that stirred
trembling within the waters of my heart
all through that night of misery I endured. (Inf. 1.16-21).
In the beginning of Inferno, Dante allows himself to be distracted away from the "straight and true,” Heavenly-lit road toward God (Inf. 1.3). If Dante had appreciated the light of God’s presence in the beginning of the poem, he would have never allowed himself to be distracted from following God. Now, though, after having spent some time in the dark, terrible wilderness away from God, he revels in the light of God’s presence again as it calms his terrified heart.
Spiritual darkness does not always refer to blindness or pain, though. Dante draws a connection between a state of separation from the warmth of God’s love and the cold that accompanies darkness. Poets often describe love as a fiery passion, and light carries heat. As the human body suffers without heat, the soul languishes when separated from the love of God. Accordingly, Dante uses darkness and cold to depict the absence of the heated light of God’s love. Dante views the torment that stems from being separated from the love of God while in the ninth and final ring of Hell, the farthest place from God. He describes the region as a "gloomy,” or dark, well that is far away from the presence of God and the warm light of His love (Inf. 32.16). Here he sees several spirits frozen by the cold absence of God’s love. He writes that the spirits have been frozen in ice up to their waists (Inf. 32.34-35), that their eyelids were locked shut with frozen tears (Inf. 32.46-48), and he describes one man as having had his ears frostbitten off (Inf. 32.52) while Dante himself “tremble[s] in the everlasting chill” (Inf. 32.76). As light carries the heat of love, darkness implies cold, or the absence of the warmth of God’s love. Dante metaphorically illustrates the effects of being separated from God’s love using the frozen torture of the spirits in Hell.
In Inferno, Dante utilizes figurative darkness to describe the various terrors that a state separation from God holds. In Paradiso, Dante instead chooses to focus on what the presence of God might be like. He depicts God’s presence as an overwhelming spiritual light during his discussions with Beatrice and St. Bernard to indicate that man needs aid to understand God. First, Beatrice's conversation with Dante demonstrates that he cannot perceive God’s light fully without heavenly intervention. When Beatrice leads Dante to the Empyrean, the highest and purest level of Heaven, the realm of the mind of God, Heavenly light blinds him until God opens his eyes. Speaking to Dante, Beatrice says,
We're [now] on the outside of
the highest body, in the purest light,
In intellectual light, light filled with love,
love of the true good, filled with happiness,
happiness that surpasses all things sweet. (Par. 30.38-42)
God's intellect, filled with love and joy, is so pure and delightful that it manifests as light–the purest and most delightful of physical substances. Dante then says,
Just as a sudden lightning flash will scare
away the power of vision and deprive
one's sight of things made brilliant in the glare,
So I was now enveloped in a live
gleaming of light that veiled me in a veil
so vivid all around, I lost all sight (Par. 30.46-52).
Sight is the primary sense by which humans gather information from the world around them, so without sight, one would be practically blind to much of reality. Healthy human eyes are struck blind when faced with a sight too intense to register, such as a nearby flash of lightning. St. Thomas Aquinas shares a similar sentiment in Summa of the Summa. “What is supremely knowable in itself,” he says, “may not be knowable to a particular intellect, on account of the excess of the intelligible object above the intellect… the blessed see the essence of God” (Aquinas ST, 3. Q12. A1. co. 3). Though one may be able to know God when it is mediated by scripture, the magnitude of the “purest light” (Par. 30.38-42) of God’s direct presence is so much greater than man’s capacity to see that it strikes him blind.
Only one whom God blesses can see Him in His full capacity. Likewise, the overwhelmingly pure light of God's mind blinds Dante's inferior human sight and intellect. He remains blind to his surroundings until God's love operates on him to lift his vision. Beatrice says,
The love that soothes this heaven has the power to heal
the souls it takes unto itself, with grace
to make the little candle fit to feel
His flame. (Par. 30.52-54)
Beatrice reveals to Dante that God's love and grace can remove his natural blindness, readying him to experience the Empyrean. Immediately after Dante hears her words, he finds the strength to see. "As soon as these brief words found their place within my understanding," Dante writes, "I became / aware I had surpassed my former might: / and a new power of vision burst aflame" (Par. 30.56-58). Dante only gains the ability to see Empyrean after Beatrice declares that God can grant him sight, implying that God intervenes to elevate his sight. Beatrice would have granted Dante the ability to see if she could. However, she entreats God to help him see because God alone can prepare Dante for the light of His mind.
Saint Bernard's prayer to Mary also underscores Dante's need for her help to overcome the limited range of his intellect and his inability to wield it capably as he experiences God. Dante narrates, "Then [St. Bernard and Dante] turned to the eternal Light, / wherein, we trust, no creature else can send / created vision with such perfect sight" (Par. 33.43-45). Logic dictates that one can only create something less complex and powerful than himself. Otherwise, the creator would be unable to conceptualize a design for His creation and harness enough power to implement it. God created humanity, so humanity is less complex and powerful than He. Humanity’s natural sight is not powerful enough to plumb the depths of God’s uncreated nature, so humanity cannot fully comprehend Him without aid.
Humanity, however, does have some limited capability to look up to God, though it typically fails to utilize the capability that it has. Saint Bernard encourages Dante to "penetrate / His rays, as far as human sight complies" (Par. 32.143-144), indicating that Dante can perceive some of God but not all of Him. Humanity’s physical passions limit its ability to understand God by distracting its efforts. Saint Bernard describes humanity's physical passions as a mist that clouds the intellect and asks Mary, the Mother of God, to
[M]elt the mist away
that clouds the intellects of mortal men,
in order that the highest bliss display
Himself to Him …
[and] let human passions yield to your protection. (Par. 33.31-37)
The physical and spiritual eyes, representing humanity's ability to perceive physical and spiritual realities, become ineffectual when their wielder is distracted by human passions. For example, a student distracted by hunger during an exam cannot perform optimally. Accordingly, for a human to muster the strength to understand God, he must free himself from all physical passions. As Dante says, “And I who now was drawing near the end / of all desires, as it behooved me, to / the summit let my leaping flames [of passion] ascend” (Par. 33.46-48). The desire for God is the summit, or the highest object, of human desire. One can only satisfy his desire for God after leaving behind all other desires that would distract his aim. Since humans live in physical bodies, they cannot rid themselves of physical passions alone. Dante, likewise, needs all his mental faculties to comprehend God, but his human nature prevents him from harnessing his already limited sight. As the Mother of God, Mary possesses a unique ability to address God directly on behalf of those who pray to her. Therefore, Saint Bernard asks Mary to intercede on Dante’s behalf by asking God to subdue Dante's distracting passions as he approaches the Trinity.
Throughout both Inferno and Paradiso, Dante uses figurative light and darkness to describe the presence and absence of God and explores the various implications of each. Since man is a primarily physical creature, he often fails to perceive difficult spiritual realities, such as the nature of God. Though he struggles to see spiritual truths, man possesses excellent physical sight and has utilized it to plumb the depths of physical reality. Throughout the Divine Comedy, Dante links God’s nature, which man struggles to comprehend, to the physical interplay between light and darkness, which man easily understands. By linking the obscure nature of God to familiar physical concepts, Dante allows readers to harness both their strong physical senses of sight as well as their weaker intellects to delve into the nature of God, and ultimately grants them a much greater understanding than they could obtain with the intellect alone. Like Dante, Christians often wander away from God and into sin because they fail to understand the terrible implications of life away from Him. Dante encourages readers to stay vigilant and remain on the road to Heaven, for the farther one strays from God, the deeper he journeys into the dark confusion, pain, and loneliness of Inferno. When Dante finally reaches Heaven, though, his physical eyes are overwhelmed by the pure, joyous light of God’s presence. In Paradiso, Dante encourages his readers to seek God until they pass onto the spiritual realm in death, for if they do, He will raise them out of the darkness to bask joyously in the brilliance of His pure, surpassing love.
Works Cited
Aquinas, Thomas. Summa of the Summa, edited and annotated by Peter Kreeft, Ignatius Press, 1990.
Dante. Inferno. Translated by Anthony Esolen, The Modern Library, 2004.
---. Paradiso. Translated by Anthony Esolen, The Modern Library, 2004.
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