Saturn: Beauty of Thinking

(Paradiso, Canto XXI): Saturn, contemplation and Peter Damian

“Only one thing is certain: that nothing is certain / And nothing is more wretched or arrogant than man.”

~ as inscribed on Montaigne’s wall, attributed to Pliny

Welcome to Dante Read-Along! ✨

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Welcome to Dante Book Club, where you and I descend into Hell and Purgatory to be able to ascend to Paradise. Our guide in Paradise is Beatrice, and in this twenty-first Canto, Dante and Beatrice rise to the contemplatives in the sphere of Saturn. You can find the main page of the read-along right here, reading schedule here, and the list of chat threads here.

In each post you can find a brief summary of the canto, philosophical exercises that you can draw from it, themes, character, and symbolism explanations.

All the wonderful illustrations are done specially for the Dante Read-Along by the one and only Luana Montebello.

This Week’s Circle ⭕️

Dante and Beatrice ascend to the seventh sphere of Saturn - The souls of the contemplative - The golden ladder rising into the atmosphere - One soul came forward, St. Peter Damian - Dante’s questions about the silence of Saturn and of predestination - Damian’s reply that no one can know the workings of the mind of God - He denounces the corrupt clergy of his day.

Canto XXI Summary:

Dante gazed upon Beatrice again after the close of the speech by the Eagle in the sphere of Jupiter, and as he gazed, they rose to the seventh celestial realm of Saturn, the home of contemplatives and the final planet in the celestial cosmology before moving into the circles of the fixed stars and Primum Mobile.

He saw something unusual however, in that Beatrice did not smile at him—that smile that grew lovelier with every rise in station. Her beauty was not simply of her form or bearing, but a representation of pure truth, of a revealed theology, mirroring the glory of Dante’s growing understanding of each realm they rose into. Her smile would now, in Saturn, be so magnificent that his mortal eyes could not even bear the sight, and by refraining, she preserved him from sure destruction.

If Beatrice smiled, her smile would express the truth of God as He is known to the contemplatives; and that is as yet beyond the capacity of Dante.¹

Such had been the fate of Semele, in myth, who was destroyed when she asked her lover Jove to show himself to her in all of his divine glory. She had been tricked by the jealous Juno to ask for this boon, as Juno knew well how it would end, the divine light revealed before mortal eyes.

Tickled to death by her appalling fate
and demanding from her too-indulgent lover
a gift soon to undo her, Semele said,
“just as you are when Lady Juno receives you
in her embraces and you initiate
the pact of Venus, hidden from all others—
come likewise unto me.” Even as she spoke
the god would have prevented her from speaking,
but all too swiftly had her words been uttered,
which, like his oath, could not be taken back.

As best he can, he moderates his force,
leaving upon its shelf the thunderbolt
with which he hurled the hundred-handed Typhoeus
into the fire: that would have been too much.

Instead, he picks a bolt the Cyclops forged,
one with reduced anger and a lower flame
(they call such weapons his Light Artillery);
and so appareled, came to Semele;
but she whose mortal body could not bear
such heavenly excitement, burst into flames
and was incinerated by Jove’s gift.
Ovid, Metamorphoses iii.375-384, 389-399

The nature of Saturn is cold, and the planet was in the sign of Leo in that spring of 1300. Here we enter the third triad of celestial intelligences, following the map of hierarchies of Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite that Dante used.

The first triad of the moon, mercury, and Venus were the intelligences that held those still most closely relating to affairs on earth, the second triad of the Sun, Mars, and Jupiter, looked to those whose glory related to power and rule, and here in the third and highest triad we will discover the realms that are the very closest to God, and therefore look to contemplation and adoration in the company of the saints. Beatrice prepared Dante for this realm of contemplation and the sight they would shortly witness:

Let your mind follow where your eyes have led,
and let your eyes be mirrors for the figure
that will appear to you within this mirror.
xxi.16-18

Dante’s desire here was twofold; he weighed the scales of these two desires against each other, on one side his desire to contemplate her beauty, the other to obey her request. In obeying her, he found the greatest joy.

There, revolving in the sphere that held the celestial body named after the god Saturn—father of Jupiter, ruler of the Golden Age of when all was good and evil had not yet invaded humankind—Dante saw a golden ladder before him, extending so far into the atmosphere above him that he could not see the end of it.

And Jacob went out from Beersheba, and went toward Haran. And he lighted upon a certain place, and tarried there all night, because the sun was set; and he took of the stones of that place, and put them for his pillows, and lay down in that place to sleep. And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven: and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it.
Genesis 28:10-12

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Her clothes were made of imperishable material, of the finest thread woven with the most delicate skill. (Later she told me that she had made them with her own hands.) Their spendour, however, was obscured by a kind of film as of long neglect, like statues covered in dust. On the bottom hem could be read the embroidered Greek letter Pi, and on the top hem the Greek letter Theta. Between the two a ladder of steps rose from the lower to the higher letter.
Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy I.1

Mars had the emblem of the cross, and Jupiter of the Eagle; now, here we see the emblem of the ladder, symbolic of ascent and the ready passage to higher realms. Multitudes of lights, each a soul, poured down the ladder, until a single light came forward.

And just as jackdaws, at the break of day,
together rise—such is their nature’s way—
to warm their feathers chilled by night; then some

fly off and never do return, and some
wheel back to that point where they started from,
while others, though they wheel, remain at home;

such were the ways I saw those splendors take
as soon as they had struck a certain step,
where they had thronged as one in radiance.
xxi.34-42

The single soul shone brightly and Dante felt in communion with it, felt the love that was indicated by the growing radiance emitting from it. He did not speak this thought, but pondered in his heart the feeling of what he desired to ask, communing silently with both the soul and with Beatrice as he let his desire be known to her: permission to express himself.

Beatrice granted his unspoken wish to address the soul; although not named until the end of the canto, the one before them was Peter Damian, Benedictine Abbot and Cardinal of the church, and later a saint:

Born of a humble family in Ravenna towards the beginning of the eleventh century, he entered the Benedictine monastery of Fonte Avellana on the slopes of Monte Catria in Umbria, of which, in 1041, he became Abbot. Much against his will, he was created Cardinal and Bishop of Ostia in 1058. He was zealous in his efforts to reform Church discipline and became celebrated as a teacher and preacher.²

Federico Zuccari, The Sphere of Saturn

Dante humbled himself before Damian before asking him two questions: why was it he that had come forward to speak to Dante—hinting again at the idea of predestination which had surfaced in canto xx—and secondly, why was the heaven of Saturn so quiet? In every other heaven, the songs of rejoicing were ever present, but here was silence. Damian answered the second question first; the reason for the silence was the same as the reason that Beatrice did not smile:

“Your hearing is as mortal as your sight;
thus, here there is no singing,” he replied,
“and Beatrice, in like wise, did not smile.”
xxi.61-63

Damian went on to answer Dante’s first question, about what had made him come forward, out of all the other souls traversing the golden ladder. Damian stated simply that it was not a greater love for Dante himself that brought him forward, but the desire that was in him to express the charity of God.

The love that prompted me is not supreme;
above, is love that equals or exceeds
my own, as spirit-flames will let you see.

But the deep charity, which makes us keen
to serve the Providence that rules the world,
allots our actions here, as you perceive.
xxi.67-72

Yet Dante still did not quite understand, or his question had not quite been addressed, for he asked again why Damian specifically had come forward, why he had been predestined for the task. Damian whirled in place, his light shining, at the question.

Even basking in the love of the highest heaven and God, with an inflamed joy and clear sight, as Damian did, he could not—and nor even could the highest realm of angels, the seraphim—give an answer as to the highest workings of the mind of God, in order to give an answer to Dante’s question

But even Heaven’s most enlightened soul,
that Seraph with his eye most set on God,
could not provide the why, not satisfy

what you have asked; for deep in the abyss
of the Eternal Ordinance, it is
cut off from all created beings’ vision.
xxi.91-96

Damian charged Dante to relate, once back in the earthly realms, this message of the mystery of the mind of God.

The warning to men not to presume to penetrate the mysteries of predestination has already been given in canto xiii with reference to the unwisdom of forming rash moral judgements.³

Recognizing that he had reached a boundary of understanding that could not be crossed, Dante withdrew his question; instead, he asked the soul who he was, and here Damian introduced himself by stating where he was from.

In the Apennines mountains within central Italy, he had been housed in the monastery of Santa Croce di Fonte Avellana. He had lived simply and frugally, steeped in contemplation, and where once they had plenty of souls in the forms of monks there to lift up as an offering to God, now there was a lack as fewer dedicated themselves to God. He named himself, and spoke of the necessity of his taking on the role of Cardinal with its red hat, even though he did not want to leave his quiet contemplation for the duties and responsibilities of higher office.

He compared the current state of the clergy to the old ideal of Sts. Peter—Cephas, his Aramaic name—and Paul—the Holy Ghost’s great vessel—who had been simple and lean:

Once there were Cephas and the Holy Ghost’s
great vessel: they were barefoot, they were lean,
they took their food at any inn they found.

But now the modern pastors are so plump
that they have need of one to prop them up
on this side, one on that, and one in front,

and one to hoist them saddleward. Their cloaks
cover their steeds, two beasts beneath one skin:
O patience, you who must endure so much!
xxi.127-135

Damian had fought against the very corruption of the clergy that Dante spoke out against at almost every turn. He ended his speech, and the souls on the ladder gathered toward him. They uttered a cry of near contempt all together at the thought of what the church had become.

Just as he had been awed by their silence, now he was surprised by their energetic cries.

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💭 Philosophical Exercises

John Flaxman, Peter Damian descending to Dante

About a year ago, I was given a book called The Rigor of Angels, written by William Egginton. In this exceptional book, which I highly recommend you to read, Egginton explores how Werner Heisenberg, Jorge Luis Borges, and Immanuel Kant each approached the nature of reality.

I think this, in itself, is a powerful advertisement for you to read this book. But what is truly curious is how Egginton shows that three very different figures, who never knew one another, explored the same reality and came to strikingly similar conclusions.

In Borges’ case this happened through literature; in Kant’s, through philosophy; and in Heisenberg’s, through physics, as he was one of the greatest physicists who ever lived.

The reason I mention this book here is that we have now reached Saturn, the realm of the contemplatives. Here we encounter a staircase: a very ordered set of steps that rises upward, yet Dante’s vision cannot see where it ends or where it leads.

This is exceptionally interesting, because even such a simple object as a staircase—something we encounter every day, perhaps several times—can carry profound meaning. Stairs represent a structured ascent higher, or a structured descent lower. They imply that our movement is not a chaotic scramble upward but an ordered, step-by-step path towards some higher truth.

As my dear reader knows, this image of a structured ascent is omnipresent in sacred texts. I find it visually and spiritually compelling, especially in the context of contemplation.

Contemplation is often confused with chaotic thinking, as if serious thought were just a storm of disordered impressions in the mind, where we try to connect disparate things at random. But this image of the staircase suggests something else: true thinking, thinking that leads to truth—as it did for Kant, Borges, and Heisenberg—is a structured ascent.

What unites these three figures? What connects Heisenberg, the German physicist, Borges, the Argentinian writer of magical realism, and Kant, the critical philosopher from Königsberg? It is that all three understood, first of all, that there is no final step, no visible end point—just as, for Dante, the stairs have no clear end. You can go step by step, higher and higher, and still never see the terminus.

I find this extremely interesting, perhaps even the quiet beauty of this entire canto.

In the sphere of Saturn, Dante is essentially telling us that our thinking, our intellectual explorations, our desire to understand the nature of reality, are themselves forms of divine revelation. God reveals Himself step by step through the very act of contemplating truth.

My reader will have noticed something striking in this realm: there is no music, no singing. And Beatrice warns Dante that if she were to smile here, the radiance would be so overwhelming that his mind would go blind.

Through contemplation we discover God; we understand the nature of reality. And the reason contemplation matters so deeply is that it reveals truth gradually, so that we do not go blind from its brilliance.

Imagine someone trying to explain the entire nature of physics, or quantum mechanics, to you all at once, without any preliminary education. Your mind would simply collapse under the weight of it. As we ascend toward the higher realms, up this stairway without end, each step brings more light, more radiance, and each step allows our sight to adjust to what has just been revealed.

The same applies to literature. Try handing Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment to a five-year-old. The truth on those pages is far too bright for someone so unformed to comprehend. A child must grow, must be trained, must learn how to hold deeper truths. Only then can the novel speak.

(This is also the reason why some great novels are often interpreted so primitively by the minds of unformed adults, without a proper education and genuine instruction, they see simple interpretations even within the great novels.)

It is the same here. Dante shows us that contemplation is beautiful not because it is passive or abstract, but because it brings us closer to truth in a way that we are capable of bearing. It is God’s way of revealing Himself gently, allowing our intellect to mature step by step toward the light.

II.

Another thing that amazes me in Dante’s vision is the placement of contemplation within the order of the heavens. Contemplation comes only after we have passed through the more “earthly” elements. Dante has already gone beyond Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and the Sun. It is striking that contemplation belongs to this highest realm: it comes after love has been purified, after action has been tested, after justice has been contemplated, after the illumination of the Sun.

Only after passing through these realms of earthly and civic life does Dante reach contemplation and become capable of seeing it.

This is why, in this sphere, Dante looks to Beatrice and for the first time she tells him that his eyes may lead and his mind may follow where his gaze directs him. It is a sign that Dante has reached a certain height in understanding the order within himself.

In the themes I want to explore two more element that add some detail to this idea of contemplation: Peter Damian and Dante; and a bit about time to keep silence.

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This Week’s Sinners and Virtuous 🎭

(Themes, Quotes, Terms and Characters)

Sandro Botticelli, Canto XXI

I. Is this the end of Commedia?

The commentator from Columbia University, Teodolinda Barolini, observes that the beginning of the sphere of Saturn marks, in a sense, the beginning of the end of the Commedia.

By crossing this threshold, from the realm of earthly concerns into the realm of pure contemplation, Dante is already approaching the final movement of the journey.

We are drawing closer to God, and because contemplation stands so near to the divine, the ascent through Saturn feels like the quiet opening of the poem’s final act.

II. Peter Damian

Some scholars have also drawn parallels between Peter Damian and Dante himself. Both men were, in different ways, driven out from the lives they wished to lead and pushed into a deeper life of contemplation. Dante, of course, was exiled from Florence and found himself writing the Divine Comedy in a state of enforced wandering and reflection. Peter Damian, on the other hand, was driven into solitude because of his fierce denunciations of clerical corruption and luxury.

It is fascinating to see how both figures, displaced and unwillingly uprooted, transformed their exile into a contemplative vocation. In each case, the loss of worldly place became the condition for a higher, more interior vision.

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Quotes 🖋️

(The ones I keep in my journal as reminders of eternal wisdom):

Let your mind follow where your eyes have led,
and let your eyes be mirrors for the figure
that will appear to you within this mirror.”

That man who knows just how my vision pastured
upon her blessed face, might recognize
the joy I found when my celestial guide

had asked of me to turn my mind aside,
were he to weigh my joy when I obeyed
against my joy in contemplating her.

~ lines 16-24, Paradiso, Canto XXI

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1. Dorothy L. Sayers, Paradise 245

2. Sayers 246

3. Sayers 247