Dante and Virgil: Learning from Others

To what degree can, or should, we learn from others different from ourselves? Particularly, how much can, or should, we learn about the path that we believe we must take from those who have chosen a different path?  This is a question as much about social relations and integrated thinking as it is about personal identity and self-discovery.

In Dante’s Inferno, Canto 1, Dante affirms that Virgil is his guide and teacher:

'You are my teacher and my author. 

You are the one from whom alone I took 

the noble style that has brought me honor. 

     (Inferno, 1.85-87; all references to Hollander trans.)

Here Dante refers to his prior poetic writings.  The implication is that Dante will also inform the current poetic enterprise with its subject matter. This is somewhat curious because also in the first canto we read that Virgil will not be Dante’s guide in the last stage of his journey upward to “His city” (l. 126).  The reason Virgil gives is that he is not worthy to guide Dante through paradiso to God, and the reason for his unworthiness is that Virgil himself strayed from the righteous path that Dante seeks to find:

'Should you desire to ascend to these, 

 you'll find a soul more fit to lead than I: 

 I'll leave you in her care when I depart. 

 'For the Emperor who has His seat on high 

 wills not, because I was a rebel to His law, 

 that I should make my way into His city. 

(Inferno, 1.121-126)

Despite Virgil’s spiritual state as a reprobate, as a rebel, as someone in other words who did not bend his will to God and who did not follow his righteous path, Virgil himself asserts that he is, however, fit to instruct and lead Dante through hell:

'Therefore, for your sake, I think it wise 

you follow me: I will be your guide 

(Inferno, 1.112-13)

Yes, we learn later in the Inferno that God had commissioned Virgil for this task.  In Inferno canto 2, we learn that this commission came through three heavenly ladies, but the point is that Virgil bears God’s authority when interacting with inhabitants of hell at various stages. 

My own reflections about my current identity development and self-discovery prompted these thoughts as I recently read Dante’s Inferno:  Virgil the pagan poet is authoritatively permitted, commissioned, to instruct Dante in his pursuit of light and righteousness.  Virgil may have been opposite to God but yet still may be a reliable guide -- in fact, a heaven-sent guide.  The pagan poet acts as pedagogue to the spiritual pilgrim. 

So again, the particular related struggle or question:  What and how can I learn about the path I must take from those who have chosen a different path?

This question strikes me as one of universal concern.  It assumes that we are all wrestling with the question of self, of our own respective identities, while at the same time locating ourselves in connection with (and distinction from) others, even others not of our “circle.”  Or we are negotiating ever expanding circles.  What is the proper relationship?  How close is too close?  Will I be influenced overly by their decisions rather than finding the proper balance between their ideas and my own?

Dante and Virgil, rendered by Botticelli

In my own life, I am currently near that midpoint, just as Dante was, the nel mezzo.  I am trying to ask from familiar and unfamiliar points of view big questions about God (nature, revealed truth), about God’s relations to humans (of what sort is it?), about human nature and the relation of the mind to both the brain (is there really anything that is a “mind”? Is it somehow distinct from the physical brain and chemical reactions?), and about the nature of morality in general and its relationship to God in particular (what is the precise connection? Is there a necessary foundation?).

In asking these and other questions, I find that I must necessarily do at least two things. (1) I must reevaluate what I believe by taking stock first of what I actually think (perhaps with greater precision than I hitherto have or have in some while, a valuable enterprise itself).  And (2) I must weigh that review against the ideas of others who have followed paths that I have not before trodden. Is it better? If not, why is it worse? What to pursue, what to avoid?  What to retain, what to reject?

Of late in my own life have been wondering how modern neuroscientific conceptions of the brain bear on questions of human sinfulness, ethical behavior and responsibility, and the need for salvation at all. Physiologically, what goes into cognition and moral judgment?  What implications might there be, if any, on various religious belief if philosophical and psychological theories about the modular mind and the lack of anything like a singular “self” prove to be true?  What of the question of chemical explanations for innate ideas of transcendence and the divine?

The upshot, and the connection between Dante’s poem and my own external context (and perhaps one of universal concern) is the extent to which I can learn from guides or teachers not within my circle and yet continue to follow the righteous, God-approved path.  Dante altered his path, and in so doing also altered his conception of himself -- at least expanding it.  For Dante in the dark wood of the mid point of his life, it was not a matter of interacting with things like ancient Chinese thought or neuroscience.  But on his path he was surprised to find Virgil as his guide through the Inferno, a guide limited to a portion of the journey, but reliable nevertheless and divinely commissioned however different from Dante he may have been.  But Dante the poet was also relieved and encouraged to find his guide to be Virgil, the Roman poet par excellence.  And it may be that certain connections are more important than differences to initiate our exploration of both.

How may I learn from Virgil without befalling his fate?  That is perhaps one of Dante’s questions, and it is, metaphorically, mine and, in one way or another, also all of ours.