Wu Gongqing, associate professor of the School of Philosophy of Chinese University
Dante Alighieri (1265 – September 14, 1321)
Ulysses' homecoming is a classic theme of Western civilization. From Virgil to Joyce, countless poets and scholars have interpreted and recreated this theme. In the twenty-sixth song of Hell, Dante places Ulysses in the eighth malebolge of the eighth circle of hell and presents his fate through the confession of a sinner: after capturing the city of Troy, Ulysses continues his voyage westward, eventually dying in the sea.
Ulysses's self-description is very different from that of the Greek epic. In Odysseus (i.e., Ulysses), Ulysses returns to his hometown of Itaka after a decade of arduous trek, killing Panelope's suitor and reuniting happily with his wife and children. But in Dante's pen, Ulysses not only did not return home, but also died tragically. Dante's rewriting of Ulysses' fate can be called a major event in the history of Western literature and thought; the image of Ulysses and its allegory have become a continuous concern of countless scholars. But for a long time, academic evaluations of Ulysses were polarized: One faction (Buti) appealed to the Christian tradition, insisting that Ulysses' image was a metaphor for Adam's proud sin, and that the shipwreck was a punishment for his sinful nature; the other considered Ulysses to be innocent and a hero with a heroic character (Benvenuto). At the same time, a growing number of scholars saw that Dante's assessment of Ulysses was twofold: he affirmed Ulysses's intellectually enterprising modern dimension and concluded that he had committed the crime of pride. The dual dimension of Ulysses reflects Dante's ambivalent attitude towards both anticipation and fear of modernity.
The image and identity of Ulysses can be constantly interpreted from the perspective of rhetoric and poetics, but for us, we always have to face the basic question: Why did Dante rewrite Ulysses' fate? It is true that Ulysses's modernity is fundamentally expressed in his passion for exploring and experiencing the unknown world, but the question is, why did Ulysses not return home after many hardships, as Homer wrote about Ulysses, but stubbornly leave home? From home to home, what kind of mental impulses did Ulysses' expeditions reflect? How is this rejection and rebellion against the family connected to his aspect of modernity? All kinds of questions require us to examine more closely the text of the twenty-six songs of Hell and the background of their intellectual history, using the departure from home and home as clues to outline Dante's relationship with modernity.
Gustave Doré illustrated twenty-six songs of Hell
Home in ancient and Christian traditions
It is well known that in the political tradition and moral life of Greco-Romans, the family occupies an important place. The ancient Greeks revered the family, viewing it as the source and end of life, as well as the attachment of the meaning of life. Ulysses returned to Itaka after a decade of war and a decade of wandering, profoundly demonstrating the Greeks' spiritual impulse to return home. In Antigone, the family is considered to be the primary existence that precedes the city-state, with a more fundamental meaning than politics. At a time when the city-state and the family were in conflict, Antigone preferred to choose the family; and Creon, who chose the city-state and took care of the family, fell into tragedy with his entire city-state. The Romans valued the family more than the Greeks. On the one hand, the Romans carried forward the idea of natural order in the classical political tradition, viewing the family as a natural community. In De officiis, Cicero likens the family to "the beginning of the city-state, the hotbed of the republic." On the other hand, the Romans established family relations centered on the "patriarchal right of the family" (patria potestas) through the religious ceremonies of the worship of the family gods and the legal provisions on marriage and marriage and the disposition of property. In the Aeneid, Aeneas desperately guarded his family god and took his father with him when the city of Troy fell. Arguably, the most prominent virtue of a hero in Roman mythology, compared to the heroes of the Greek epic, is pietas to his father, his family, and his father.
Antigone was in front of the body of his brother Pollunicus, a rebellious city-state
The family, while occupying a fundamental place in ancient mythology and daily life, has always faced a philosophical threat. Socrates, as the "cattle fly" of the city-state, loved to talk to the citizens and improve their virtues. But for his wife and children, Socrates did not care much. Socrates spent a long time with his friends before his death, but let his wife leave the scene early and go home. For him, philosophy has a more fundamental meaning. The tension between philosophy and family is more fully reflected in Plato's work. Plato believed that in political life, the private interests represented by the family were in internal conflict with the public interests of the city-state as a whole. Unlike Antigone, in Plato's ideal city-state, the guardians were not allowed to have families. More importantly, the essence of philosophical life is contemplation, and contemplation is the life of a person, self-sufficient, and therefore intrinsically contradicts family life. In this regard, philosophy is anti-family.
Socrates' wife said goodbye to him
Plato's denial of the concept of the family stems fundamentally from his redefinition of man. In Plato's view, the soul is the older and more fundamental nature of man than the body, and the source of life, the cultivation of virtue, and the attainment of happiness are ultimately tied to the soul. The soul is eternal, it was originally in heaven, and then it fell to earth, merged with our bodies, and lost its memory. The more our souls are bonded to the body, the more they fall into bodily desires, and the less they remember of their lives. For this reason, Plato said in Phaedo: Since the essence of death is the separation of the soul from the body, and what philosophy wants to do is to let the soul constantly get rid of the influence of the body and purify itself, then philosophy is nothing more than the practice of death. Through the purification of the soul, we must constantly recall ourselves and return to the world of ideas, just as Ulysses returns to Itaka. In Enneads, Plotinus even asserts that when the soul rises to a state of excellence, the memory of the family and the mother state is forgotten by the soul; the family, which is the source of life, is no longer a dependency of values, but some kind of "indeterminate" (τὸ ἄπειρον) from the sensible world. At this point, the return of the soul replaces the return of the body and becomes the spiritual pursuit of Westerners, and the natural meaning of the family is dissolved.
The platonic inner path of the soul home was eventually inherited and carried forward by Augustine. In the Christian context, Augustine insisted on the derogation of earthly life and fraternal relations; but by redefining marriage and family, Augustine revived the family relationship and placed it in the history of redemption. For Augustine, God is man's true home. Adam, the first man, originally dwelt in God's house, but was banished from Paradise due to original sin, lost God's house, and became a homeless viator. What one has to do is to follow the path of refuge that the soul turns to, after a long "Ulysses journey" back to the House of God. Only in god's house, not in nature's family, can man attain true salvation and eternal peace. For example, in the third volume of Confessiones, Augustine describes in detail the labor and efforts of his mother Monica when he sank into Manichaeism. Monica was not saddened by Augustine's disobedience to Roman traditions, but wept for his betrayal of faith and the church, "far more than a mother weeping for her dead children." In the Christian view, refusal to convert to the church loses the possibility of salvation and means the death of the soul and spirit. Compared to the annihilation of the body, the death of the soul caused Monica deeper sorrow. For Christians, the fellowship of the church, not the natural family, is the basis of human life.
Augustine and mother
However, Augustine had no intention of completely disintegrating the family. As a Roman, he still tried to defend the meaning of the family under the general principles of Christianity. Augustine believed that the Bible tacitly acknowledged the existence of marriage and the family, and that the formation of the family was a prominent manifestation of human sociality: God saw Adam alone, made Eve from his ribs, and then united them. Marriage is a sacrament approved by God; the family is a divine existence derived from marriage. For this reason, even Christians who live in God should and be able to have their own home on earth. Marriage is the inner union of two Christians based on God, not the union of two house gods or families in the Greco-Roman tradition (see Sun Shuai: Nature and Fellowship: A Study of Augustine's Theory of Marriage and Family, Shanghai Sanlian Bookstore, 2014). The Roman tradition of marriage presupposes the pre-existence of family relations, and the union of husband and wife does not mean the emergence of a new family. But under Augustine's transformation, marriage was the union of two strange individuals from their old identities in God, so that this denatural union was itself the beginning of a new family; Christians were united in the family into a small fellowship, and marriage was called "Sacramentum" (Sacramentum). And the goodness of marriage is not only reflected in the symbolic sacrament itself, but also in the fact that Christians are conducive to correcting their sins in the family and eventually joining the church. Augustine's discourse on the sanctity of marriage and the family retained in part the value of the family in classical civilization, allowing medieval people to combine family life and sacred worship, starting with the "caritas" of the couple, and gradually advancing faith and justice. That being the case, why didn't Dante's Ulysses see the family as a destination or ladder, rather than stubbornly leaving home?
Marriage as a "sacrament"
Ulysses's home away from home and the attachment of life
One thing needs to be made clear: Dante's Ulysses is not Homer's Odysseus, but his character recreated from the works of Roman writers such as Cicero, Horace, and Seneca, alluding to the new humanity under the angle of the late Middle Ages and modern times. He left home so resolutely because the natural meaning of the family had been lost to Ulysses. In the twenty-sixth song of Hell, Ulyssie stan says, "No love for my son, filial piety to an old father, and due love that will delight Panelope can overcome me... Enthusiasm (né dolcezza di figlio, né la pieta del vecchio padre, né 'l debito amore... vincer potero dentro a me l'ardore）”。 Loving-kindness, filial piety and love are the three most important emotions in the classical natural family, pointing to future generations, elders and peers, respectively, and the three ensure the inheritance and continuity of the natural family through the inner extension of the soul. But at this moment, all three emotions suddenly failed, and the space of meaning they had built was nowhere to be seen in Ulysses. With that, the sanctity of the family was lost here in Ulysses. The divine family seems to be increasingly becoming a shackle, unable to settle in the restless heart of man. To this end, Ulysses resolutely left home, trying to find the refuge of life outside the family.
Ulysses refused to return home, but continued to sail with "a young man who did not abandon his partner" to the deep and wide sea. The image of the "sea", which points to the world beyond the family, means disorder, turmoil and danger. "The sea" is both in the natural sense, symbolizing the unknown and risky geographical space; it is also in the social sense, symbolizing the turmoil and insecurity of modern society. Ulysses and his companions navigated the seas with great difficulty, profoundly foreshadowing the violent turmoil of modern man in the natural world and social storms.
Ulysses and Siren
For Ulysses, however, the natural world and society outside his family constituted the fundamental motivation for him to leave home. The turbulent sea is precisely the new world to which mankind aspires. Ulysses longed for a new world outside the family because "devnire del mondo esperto" and "de li vizi umani e del valore" triumphed over the constraints of natural emotions in the family. Experience and experience is a modern subjective feeling, which brings fresh stimulation of the senses. The enthusiasm and pursuit of novelty confirms the boredom that family life brings to Ulysses. Modern man wants to experience and experience, whether the object is virtue or sin, the experience itself is the first, and the content is secondary. In ancient times and in the Middle Ages, man was forbidden to do evil; now Ulysses longs to have an experience of sin. This passion for experiencing sin endangers traditional virtues and further highlights the great uneasiness of the modern natural world and society.
What drives Ulysses forward is not only experience, but also awareness. When he reached the Strait of Gibraltar, which served as a boundary marker, Ulysses did not turn back home, but continued to sail. In the twenty-sixth song, Dante uses Ulysses' words of encouragement to his companions to give him a second reason for leaving home—to seek knowledge. "Now that our remnants of life are so short, don't be tempted to use it to know the uninhabited world behind the sun. Think about your origins: you were born not to live like beasts, but to pursue virtue and knowledge (d'i nostri sensi ch'è del rimanente non vogliate negar l'esperïenza, di retro al sol, del mondo sanza gente. Considerate la vostra semenza: fatti non foste a viver come bruti, ma per seguir virtute e canoscenza）。 "The uninhabited world behind the sun is a strange space completely away from home. But Ulysses longed to know because it wasn't known yet. Man is different from the beast, and man's survival lies in the pursuit of virtue and knowledge. This dynamic of understanding the unknown world is destined to contradict man's dependence on the family. Or, in order to leave home and learn about a new world without man, Ulysses and his companions could not return home.
Title page of the first edition of the Divine Comedy (1472)
The virtues that Ulysses wanted to pursue were no longer classical virtues. Moral virtue in Greek philosophy focuses on the cultivation of good qualities, and specific virtues aim at a certain goodness. This ethical interstitial frame is widely applied and transformed in Christian philosophy: virtues aimed at the full realization of the soul itself are adjusted to virtues toward God. The cultivation of virtue and devotion requires God's intervention and is also aimed at glorifying God through good works. And the virtue of Ulysses is rather a new morality that dares to break through the family and constantly experience, experience and understand in the world outside the family. This morality does not require some kind of teleological return, but opens up to the unknown and infinite possibilities. Leaving home and sailing is no longer for the consummation and settlement of the soul, but is completely motivated by exploration and curiosity. This virtue is precisely the fundamental characteristic of modern man. But how could such virtue be possible in the christian age?
Curiosity: The Foundations of Modern Human Nature Leaving Home
Ulysses' departure from home was fundamentally due to a curiosity about the unknown. In classical philosophy, curiosity was connected to a person's desire for knowledge. Aristotle said at the beginning of Metaphysica that "all human beings are naturally eager to know," pointing to man's desire for knowledge. It is also said that philosophy originates from curiosity, which fully affirms the positive role of human curiosity in the pursuit of knowledge.
However, the curiosity and curiosity understood by the classical philosophers were under strict norms, and they affirmed the curiosity because the core of this activity was to explore the truth of things. The basic way and fundamental purpose of knowing the world is to meditate on the world and the self. In the classical philosophers, knowledge was understood as a strict form, with knowledge of substance and existence being being paramount, and the strictest entity being a supreme being who meditated on himself, whose self-unfolding, whose thoughts and reality were highly identical. A quiet, god-like state of contemplation is the highest goal of intellectual activity and the cultivation of virtue. Thus, curiosity to point to truth and contemplation is affirmed, but simple curiosity about the phenomenal world, and experience of curiosity are discouraged. For example, Plato, in his seventh book, Respublica, describes the education of philosophers by giving a unique understanding of astronomy. He severely criticized what Glaucon called a popular understanding of astronomy, that is, the practice of life on earth by studying heavenly things. In Plato's view, true astronomy is not a concern for sensible things, but a mathematical harmony through the observation of the movement of celestial bodies, as a ladder to study the world of ideas. This attitude also determined the contemplative character of Greek science, as well as its basic character of pre-modern science.
However, the classical philosopher's tendency to have limited certainty of curiosity was radically reversed in Augustine's philosophy. In Augustine's view, excessive curiosity about foreign objects and knowledge is not only unjustified, but even sinful, and curiosity is one of the three great sins alongside pride and carnal desire. In the Confessions, Augustine mentions many times that his childhood indulgence in words, poetry, and rhetoric was motivated by free curiosity; his interest in Manichaeism in his youth was driven by curiosity; his astrologers were concerned about the movement of celestial bodies without caring about God; his friend Aribius's enthusiasm for fighting beasts and theatrical performances was out of curiosity, and even his and Augustine's burning desire and enthusiasm for marriage were also motivated by the combination of lust and curiosity; more importantly, Adam and Eve stole forbidden fruits. It is also the inevitable result of curiosity.
Adam and Eve steal the forbidden fruit out of curiosity
In Augustine's view, the sinful nature of curiosity is mainly manifested in three aspects. First, according to De Civitate Dei, curiosity leads to obedience to false gods and thus away from true faith; secondly, the natural philosopher's excessive curiosity about nature, which is more concerned with creation than concern for God, is a projection of the sin of one's own pride, and is therefore derogatory by Augustine as "the fish in the sea"; again, the impulse of curiosity is aimless, based on curiosity's quest or exploration not for happiness or faith, but only for the growth of knowledge, This desire, though different from the indulgence of the flesh, is still focused on feelings and experiences, hence the term "desire for the eyes." All in all, curiosity is ascribed to sin because it implies a disorder of the soul. It is the soul that moves from a state of complete unity to a division, lost in infinite multiplicity; it is a tragedy in which the soul cannot remain internal and is torn apart by the outer world. Curbing curiosity is to focus on the heart and let the heart be with God; it is to reduce the disturbance of the outside world and remain indifferent to the unknown world. In this regard, Ulysses' act of sailing is undoubtedly a crime of curiosity.
However, Dante, who was deeply influenced by Augustine, did not follow Augustine. As early as Convivio, Dante quoted Aristotle as saying, "All men are by nature eager to know." In Dante's view, human nature is invariably hungry for perfection, and knowledge is the ultimate purpose of our soul. Curiosity about knowledge is not only not a sin, but a manifestation of the noblest nature of human nature. In this way, Ulysses' speech is also Dante's own voice; the image of Ulysses reflects Dante's self-understanding. Meanwhile, Dante denied Augustine, but he did not return to Aristotle. Ulysses's curiosity and curiosity are fundamentally detached from the contemplation or contemplation of Plato and Aristotle, but lead to an experience and understanding of the unknown. On the one hand, the accumulation of experiences and feelings is no longer a derogatory phenomenon, but a "knowledge of seeing" that can enhance knowledge and virtue, and experiencing the external world is itself worth seeking. On the other hand, the mastery of existing knowledge does not fill the curiosity, and the human mind cannot be satisfied with a closed known world. This means that the exploration of the external world cannot be directed in a natural way to inner cultivation and higher existence, and therefore cannot return to the family. So when Ulysses reached the monument of Hercules and touched the edge of the known world, instead of returning home, he chose to continue sailing. This openness and enterprising spirit towards new experiences is a thorough attitude of modern man and modern natural science. This spirit was fully demonstrated in the renaissance and early modern practice of philosophy, science and art.
Dante, holding the Divine Comedy, is outside the gates of Hell
It was through a radical correction of the crime of Augustine curiosity that Dante laid the fundamental foundations of humanity for the exodus of modern man from the family. Since curiosity is not a sin, but a fundamental way of knowing the new world, it is a new impetus for humanity to keep moving forward. In this sense, the rewritten story of Ulysses is a modern allegory of human nature that is not afraid of hardships and is bent on experiencing the unknown and understanding the unknown; it is for this reason that the character of Ulysses has been praised by de Sanctis as "a pyramid standing in the quagmire of Malebresque". Inspired by the image of Ulysses, Petrarch began to climb Mount Ventura; Columbus began to sail new seas and discover new continents; modern people have stepped out of traditional family and patriarchal relations to build a social and artificial community of strangers. All of this stems from people's curiosity about the world and comes from the fresh motivation brought by people after they leave home. Dante's Fable of Ulysses is first and foremost a comedy. This comedy shows Dante's identification with modern human nature; or, through this comedy, Dante sketches out the spiritual picture of modern people after leaving home in advance.
"Ulysses": The Homeless Modern Man
Dante's Ulysses is both a comedy and a tragedy. After stubbornly crossing the boundary marker god had arranged for humanity, Ulysses and his companions continued to sail, eventually being engulfed by the sea. The tragic fate of Ulysses reveals Dante's uneasiness about the radical modernity of Ulysses: when a man tries to leave home in pursuit of the meaning of life, he is likely to face a never-ending ocean. This sea is both a natural unknown and a storm of human nature brought about by commercial society. When the constraints of natural emotions in the traditional family are broken, how to maintain a trusting relationship between strangers becomes a top priority. It was out of fear of people leaving their families, and of the storm of society and humanity, that Dante vigorously defended the ethical shape of the stranger society.
This concern of Dante is most vividly presented in the arrangement of the last four songs of Hell. In the last layer of the Ninth Hell, the Cochitus Ice Lake, sinners who committed fraud and betrayal were placed in the four rings. Sinners who betrayed their relatives were placed in the "Ring of Cain", counts of Uglino who betrayed their homeland were placed in "Antenore", and Alberig, who betrayed his guests, was placed in the "Ring of Ptolemaic". At the bottom of the ice lake are Judas who betrayed Jesus and Brutus and Cassius who betrayed Caesar. It is worth noting that Dante's placement of sinners is highly distinctive: sinners who turn their backs on the love of the lord and the king seem to have a stronger sinner nature than the first two types of sinners who broke the bonds of nature, and are therefore placed deeper in hell. For Dante places sinners from the point of view of the gratuitous nature of God's love, the more gratuitous love becomes, the more precious and unbreakable it is. Love between strangers completely lacks classical natural legitimacy and is therefore more urgently needed to be guarded. This can also reveal the fellowship in Dante's philosophy, from the family and the mother state to the stranger, and finally to the political ascending order of the universal empire (see Wu Gongqing: "Unpaid Love: A Philosophical Analysis of the Last Four Songs of Dante's Hell", Reading, No. 4, 2018).
Dante speaks to the betrayer in the ice lake
For Ulysses, the tragedy of leaving home could have been avoided. The boundary monument of Hercules is intended to remind God of the boundary between man and man. But Ulysses ignored this boundary, so he transgressed God and eventually died at the bottom of the sea. In fact, the mountain before Ulysses, the Mountain of Purgatory, was not inaccessible. Guided by grace, the poet Dante not only came to the Mountain of Purgatory, and the sea became calm (the first song of the Purgatory), but also entered the blessed kingdom of heaven, singing and sailing leisurely (the second song of the Kingdom of Heaven). This shows that as long as people rely on God's grace, they can avoid the risks of leaving their families and live happily. The different fates of Ulysses and Dante meant a return to Augustinism: by the desire for knowledge and natural reason alone, man was in danger of slipping into the sin of pride; to move from a decaying creature to a true self and existence, he had to rely on God's grace.
Highest days
Recognizing the boundaries of god and man and limiting free will that could lead to danger is Dante's warning to Ulysses and modern man, as well as to himself. As Dante says in the earlier passage of the twenty-sixth song, "I was grieved at the time, and now in retrospect I see the scene, I feel grief again, and more than ever restrain my genius so that it does not depart from the guidance of virtue". Dante repeatedly prides himself on his talents in Hell, but Ulysses' fate causes him to fall into hesitation and self-reflection. He realized that neither the inherent endowment of the soul nor the fiery free will could depart from the norms of virtue, or else it would inevitably lead to the disorder of the soul. This limitation and hesitation prevented Dante's thought from fully moving toward modernity, while maintaining the definitive character of the Middle Ages, rather of Thomism. Compared with the more recent Renaissance philosopher Pico della Mirandola, Dante's understanding of will is more intellectualistic, and in Dante's eyes, the true will must be regulated by reason and virtue. In Pico's writing, we see that freedom is equated with will, a freedom of will open to infinity that constitutes human dignity and the greatest resemblance between man and God as a creature. Compared with Dante's caution and hesitation, Pico embraced the modern picture of human nature more enthusiastically, accepting the inevitable fate that followed.
Dante had no intention of rejecting Ulysses altogether. Ulysses's fault lies only in his pride and transgression. Ulysses's seafaring moves, along with his passion to experience and experience new worlds, were vigorously celebrated by Dante throughout. Ulysses was in hell after his death, but his punishment was only wrapped in flames, as evidenced by Dante's praise of Ulysses.
Dante and Virgil meet Ulysses wrapped in flames
The most pressing question, however, is whether the "Ulysses" who has left home can still return home, or even find the true meaning of life outside the family? Once the naturalness of the family is broken, can it be bridged? Dante oscillated between grace and humanity, family and society, affirming the passion for curiosity and curiosity, and trying to restrain the will with virtue; both to break through the community of nature and to retain the place of the family in the universal empire, maintaining a delicate balance between ancient and modern times. Unfortunately, this balance was quickly upset by history. After Dante, Western thought soared forward on two of the paths he opened up: in the natural sense, "Ulysses" continued to aspire to seek meaning in the unknown nature, to the infinite expansion of modern science; in the political sense, "Ulysses" was forced to go to the ocean of modern society and became involved in an endless war of human nature. In Dante's plan, God was the true home of modern man, but in the end he was ruthlessly abandoned by mankind. In the end, Westerners are really as Ulysses fabled, unwilling to go home, let alone homeless. At this point, how to settle the contradictory self in the infinitely expanding natural space and place the family and natural emotions in an unfamiliar society has become a fundamental problem that is difficult to solve in the entire Western society.
The fate of the West is the fate of China. The modern fable of Ulysses is a fate that we all have to face together.
Editor-in-Charge: Ding Xiongfei
Proofreader: Yijia Xu