St. Bernard of Clairvaux in Dante’s Commedia

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St. Bernard of Clairvaux’s appearance towards the end of Dante’s Commedia, which occurs at Book XXXI of Paradaiso, is not something a reader could predict. Bernard was removed from Dante by over 160 years in age. Bernard was a monk and a contemplative while Dante was a poet and an active Florentine government official. While Dante poeta may have wanted a holy person to lead Dante personaggio into the most sacred realms of Paradise, he could have chosen a Christian saint closer to his age and geography—for example, Francis of Assisi, Thomas Aquinas or Bonaventure. Yet Dante assigned the task to Bernard. The purpose of this essay is to examine the possible reasons for Dante’s choice of Bernard as Dante’s last guide in his ascent from Inferno to Purgatorio to Paradaiso. Scholars do not have conclusive proof that Dante read from Bernard’s corpus. Therefore, to trace the path between Bernard and Dante will be more circuitous. While I will not be able to provide a direct cause and effect relationship between Bernard and Dante, I can discuss the conditions of possibility that led Dante to choose Bernard. In order to construct those possibilities, I will look at five factors that may have led Dante to Bernard and they are listed in order of importance. They include the Cistercian charisms focused on individual compunction and corporate unity, Bernard and Dante’s concern about church governance, Bernard’s hagiography, medieval preaching on the Meditations on the Life of Christ and Bernard’s Mariology as interpreted by Dante. I believe that what makes my analysis unique is the emphasis I place on Cistercian charisms and Bernard and Dante’s parallel interests on church governance. I differ from other scholars who see Bernard’s Mario...

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...m the Vita prima. The fourth factor to discuss is Bernard’s text contained in another intermediate manuscript entitled The Meditations on the Life of Christ. The Meditations was written by Giovanni de Caulibus in the mid-thirteenth century. Throughout Europe in the Middle Ages, preachers used this manuscript to evangelize the laity. The Meditations contained sections from Bernard’s works, most notably his homilies on the Song of Songs, and Bernard’s name was often cited in the preaching. The fifth factor is Bernard’s Mariology or what was perceived in Dante’s time as Bernard’s Mariology. I want to show that Bernard was not the Mariologist that many gave him credit to be. Finally, I will do a close reading on the Commedia’s final three Cantos (XXXI-XXXIII) where Bernard appears. In the reading, I hope to show how those Cantos reflect the factors presented above.

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