Dante and the Canonists: Adhesions and Deviations on the Dialectic between Heresy and Schism

Abstract

In this article, I will highlight how Dante’s clear separation between heretics and schismatics is radical compared to contemporary thought and can, therefore, tell us a great deal about his conception of these two sins and about the nature of the characters condemned in Cantos X and XXVIII. In fact, the heresy of disobedience, a political weapon created ad hoc to favor the imposition of the hierocratic model, tended, in the reflection of jurists, to bring together these two sins so well-separated by Dante. The proposal of a new interpretation of these concepts that is more adherent to their historicity, with a specific and radical meaning, can open up interesting reflections on Dante’s possible desire to affect this historical process. It also brings new interpretations to questions that still lack a convincing answer, such as the silence on the numerous heretical movements that had characterized the decades preceding the writing of the Commedia, the presence of Dolcino among the schismatics, and the selection of Epicurus as an exemplum of heresy.

1. Introduction

Dante’s Paradiso is characterized by a conspicuous presence of theological dialogues aimed at unveiling to the pilgrim the concepts and precepts of the doctrinal dogmas. In a more rhapsodic and less structural manner, this also occurs in Purgatorio and Inferno, although it is in the first cantica with even less regularity. A paradigmatic case is in the cantos devoted to heresy—at least the triptych IX-XI, but also XXVIII—where the theme is not addressed thoroughly, and the exact nature of the sin is omitted in favor of the portrayal of individual sinners. Thus, instead of a definition of the boundary that separates and sanctions what is orthodox and what is not, the cantos focus on Farinata, Cavalcante, and Pope Anastasius, as well as Muhammad and fra’ Dolcino. However, the heretical theme reoccurs in Dante’s work. First at the summit of the paradiso terrestre in the figure of biblical memory of the fox, again in paradise, in the St. Dominic athlete of the faith who ne li sterpi eretici percosse/l’ impeto suo (Par. XII 100–1), and in the claim of the Christian and non-heretical nature of the complexity of understanding divine justice (Par. IV 67–69).

It is perhaps due to this apparent lack of a heretical component of the infernal Canto that scholars have paid insufficient attention to the theme of heresy, which, nonetheless, must have been «chiaro nella sua [of Dante] mente per la distinzione, ben netta, che egli pone appunto tra eresia e scisma». Indeed, scholars have (partly, rightly so) mostly focused on Farinata’s and Cavalcante’s presence and their political and meta-poetic discourses.1 Obviously, since we are dealing with Dante’s work, the topic of heresy is not completely unexplored. However, I claim that for a better understanding of the subject, it is necessary to proceed with a systematic analysis of individual cases and a profound historicization of the theme. Only then can we truly assess the possible evolution of the concept in Alighieri’s thought, on the one hand, and its radicality, on the other.2

The purpose of this contribution is, therefore, to attempt an evaluation of Dante’s division between heresy and schism by relating it to the works of the canonists at the time on the definition of orthodoxy and heterodoxy.3 In fact, for Manselli, such a distinction represented the overt act of a clear Dantean concept of heresy, and so placing Dante’s thought in his cultural system will allow us to do more than avoid harmful anachronisms. Above all, it will also enable us to make an initial assessment of the relationship between the poet and such a process of defining and his willingness to influence it by adopting more or less radical positions with respect to the models of his time.4

2. Results

2.1. Shaping Heresy: Historical Evolution and Practical Applications of a Concept

It should be noted that it is not possible to find a univocal definition of the concept of heresy in the Middle Ages.5 In fact, the attempts that were made clearly reflect the eschatological reflections and political pressures that characterized the process of definition. When analyzing this process from a diachronic perspective, it becomes clear how the efforts were aimed not at defining a doctrinal or theological concept—which certainly had a much less marked abstract component than it appears to us today—but at factually circumscribing the body of the Church. It was a normative act, which thus implied the identification of what was ethically accepted as socially suitable for the pursuit of the common good and the legal sanction of those who stood outside of it. In short, the urgency required defining not heresy but the heretic, making him a disruptor of society who, by not accepting Roman directives, stood outside of Christianity. A heretic who, therefore, increasingly resembled a schismatic.6

Establishing the boundaries of orthodoxy was a primary necessity from the first definition of Christendom.7 However, while in the first centuries, the reflection on heresy concerned its etymological nature of erroneous election and choice (namely a different interpretation of sacred texts than that established by the Church),8 by the late Middle Ages, the attempt to affirm the temporal nature of papal rule substantially changed the elaboration of the concept of heresy. From a theological point of view, we are now dealing with an ecclesiological concept. Henceforth, having lost any kind of dialogical component, heretics are defined and persecuted by the Church through a process of criminalization and social exclusion.

Historians agree in identifying the 11th-century ecclesiastical reform as one of the first fundamental steps in this development.9 The verticalization of internal relations within the Ecclesia that this entailed gave a new meaning to the papal figure and the Roman Curia. This reform gave to the hierarchical structure that would characterize it in the following centuries. Axiom XXVI of the Dictatus papae proclaims «Quod catholicus non habeatur, qui non concordat Romane ecclesie».10 Thus, anyone who does not agree with the Church cannot be called Catholic and is, therefore, a heretic and excluded from the boni cives.11 It is a crucial turning point: the right opinion, the correct doctrine no longer coincides, or rather not only coincides, with what is expressed by the Holy Scripture and the Fathers of the Church. Rather, it is what is decided by Rome.12

New interventions and increasingly radical reforms followed. The canon Sicut ait beatus Leo of the III Lateran Council established the comparison between those who would fight heretics with arms and those fighting for the liberation of the Holy Sepulchre; the Veronese meeting between Emperor Frederick I and Lucius III, with the decretal Ad abolendam, directed the efforts of civil powers towards the persecution of heretics while leaving them in a position of subservience to religious ones.13 The final sanction of this process came with the interventions of Innocent III and the decisions of the IV Lateran Council. Convened in 1213 with the explicit will «ad exstirpanda vitia et plantandas virtutes, corrigendos excessus et mores, eliminandas haereses et roborandam fidem» was the sounding board and final approval of the pontiff’s expressed wishes.14 In fact, the Vergentis in senium of 1199 had already taken the last necessary step to de-theologize the concept of heresy and connote it with a strictly political meaning by promoting its coincidence with the crimen lesae maiestatis.15

Thus, a concept of heresy is outlined as a label capable of grouping together a heterogeneous set of possible opponents, a tool in the hands of the ecclesiastical institution aimed at asserting the supremacy of the papacy. Those who oppose centralized rule are now heretics. The defense of orthodoxy coincides with that of the ecclesiastical institution: the inquisitorial action, in its form of judgment, is a manifestation of the power that defines itself in contraposition with its enemy. The unity of the respublica fidelium would be guaranteed by loyalty and obedience to the Apostolic See and by papal infallibility. The fides catholica, derived from and nourished by the divina pagina, thus came to overlap with the lex ecclesiastica and, at the same time, to be subject to it. In fact, the latter, with its decretals, became the sole source and, together, the last appeal of orthodoxy. In short, the concept of heresy as a mala interpretatio of the salvific message, its doctrinal character, increasingly loses its central role and slips into an auxiliary function. It will not be abandoned, but it can no longer be considered exclusive. Indeed, it will increasingly be related to ecclesiological and, thus, socio-political references, qualifying the crime of disobedience to papal authority.16 Absolute alignment is now required in the ecclesiological and theocratic spheres, even before internalization of the precepts of the Holy Scriptures.17 At stake, there was a hegemonic vision that sought to constitute an orthodox world in which there was no room for any form of otherness.18

Heretics were thus isolated in order to try, in the first instance, to bring them back into the body of the Church or, if this was not possible, to destroy them. Identified as a disruptor and placed outside the societas christianorum, the heretic thus became the object of all kinds of sanctions and repressive measures. They moved from confrontation to criminalization and demonization, from persuasion to coercion,19 also through careful propaganda that transformed the image commonly used to identify heretics: from zoomorphic and faunal biblical figures (Mt. 7:15; Mt. 13:24–30; Song of Songs 2:15; Judges 15:4–5) to social and demonic fields.20

Defining and Enforcing: Papal Action and the Reflection of Canonists

The reception and diffusion of such programmatic dictates among the various strata of medieval society probably occurred in several ways, and not only through forced imposition. Certainly, the universitates, and the schools in general, made their contribution by simultaneously performing the dual function of producing and developing (and controlling) ideas and ideologies and of training specialists to support and spread them. The training of clergy soon intertwined with the heretical question as well since the clergy had too often proved to be illitteratus and incapable of countering heterodox arguments, which had important consequences on their duty to care for the souls of the faithful. The two issues were made even more interdependent as the Church contracted out both teaching and anti-heretical preaching to the new mendicant orders, which represents one of those happy integrations of movements that could also have ended in condemnation. The rapid success of this teaching proposal was due to the quality of the conventual teaching centers, characterized by theological reflection, which soon led to a natural rapprochement between these scholae and the lay centers of theology faculties, whose teaching they often took over.

The attempt of the Church of Rome to control the cultural centers, and especially theological teaching, was not only limited to this. It also extended to the fruitful attempt to influence the secular educational offer, with the aim of creating centers of theological teaching adhering to the correct Christian thought.21 Just two cases. In 1215, Robert of Courçon, essentially confirming the conciliar decisions, forbade the academic reading of some of Aristotle’s works in the Parisian university. Fourteen years later, Pope Gregory IX instead granted the ius ubique docendi to the Toulouse study, allowing the entire body of Aristotle’s works (alongside those of other philosophers still banned in Paris) to be read in the university born at the end of the anti-Albigensian crusade in 1229.22 It is therefore appropriate to speak of a university policy of the Church.23

As the conventual schools became more structured, there came the demand to equalize them with the centers of university teaching. The controversies raised by this demand were solved by the papacy in favor of the mendicant orders, thus completing the progressive overlap and dependence of the secular centers on the studia conventual. This way, the Apostolic See ensured its vigilance over theological teachings and thus its control over orthodoxy, not only within the university—already partially possible through the heretical condemnation of propositions, of which the 1277 event by Bishop Tempier against Sigieri of Brabant represents one of the best-known manifestations—but also as an effective instrument for resolving disagreements in matters of faith and for imposing religious and intellectual orthodoxy.24

Law schools also played an equally important role, and perhaps even more so. In fact, the law now took on a new value and, with it, changed the condition of the jurists who taught it in the universities. This is clearly exemplified by Gratian’s Concordia discordantium canonum, whose organization of legal material served to regulate the internal life of the Church and to establish its position in the world.25 In the following summae and glosses, which constituted the jurisprudence in the form of sentences, the concept of heresy was explored and extended,26 and the characteristics of the heretic were established.27

To bring here an example as close as possible to Dante, it might be worth analyzing what was stated by Enrico da Susa.28 Known as the Ostiense, and mentioned in this way by the poet, Enrico da Susa was a protagonist of this ecclesiastical propaganda of a legislation per lo mondo (Par. XII 82).29 His Rubrica dedicated to heretics is a long catalog that establishes who should be identified as such. Among these instructions, we find «qui falsam opinionem de fide vel gignit, […] vel sequitur, nam quilibet apostatando a fide in Spiritum sanctum peccare videtur», which introduces the broadest definition of the heretic: «Multis tamen modis dicitur haereticus largo sumpto vocabulo».30 Any doubt about the articles of faith leads to infidelity—dubius enim in fide haereticus dicitur, et infedelis; the reference to the simonics is predictable here—Et simoniacus omnis maximè qui sacramenta pervertit, […] sed licet unde et hoc nomen simoniacus pro haereticis ponitur.31 A new identifying series follows which connects the heretic with the Roman Curia. Everyone who is excommunicated is obviously a heretic—item excommunicatus nam qui non est membrum ecclesiae32 haereticus iudicatur—since not complying with the apostolic see—omnes qui non sunt membrum [sic] sanctae et Apostolicae ecclesiae. The contrast between the heretic and Rome is then increasingly made explicit. Denying the privilege of the Holy See is heretical: «Dicitur etiam haereticus qui privilegium Romanae ecclesiae ab ipso summo ecclesiarum capite traditum conatur auferre», as well as not seeking for communion with it—qui communionem catholicae ecclesiae non recipit –, transgress his commands—Et qui transgreditur praecepta sedis Apostolicae –, and contravening its decrees—Et qui vult contravenire decreta Epistolis Apostolicis.33 It is therefore not surprising that a heretic is narrowly defined as anyone who perceives the articles of faith differently from what is established by the Church of Rome: «stricto modo dicitur haereticus qui aliter sentit de articulus fidei quam Romana Ecclesia».34 It is interesting to note how the etymological meaning of the term heretic is found in its divisive action and not in its elective option: «Dicitur autem haereticus ab haerciscor haercisceris id est divido dividis». This leads to assimilate the heretic to the hermit who divides himself from others and to superimpose heresy on schism: «Inde et eremita quasi divisus ab aliis; ita et haeresis dicitur divisio, id est separatio a fide catholica secundum Azonem,35 haeretico igitur vel schismatico». The Rubrica ends with a part entitled «Annotationes: Sunt et alii modi, quibus quis dici potest haereticus», first among these «qui se ab unitate ecclesiae separat», which highlights an equivalence between schismatics and heretics.36

The following section is dedicated to schismatics: «De Schismaticis: Schisma quid sit. Et unde dicatur».37 The sequence is immediately explained: «sed quia interdum schisma inducit haeresim: quia omne schisma intendit sibi constituere ecclesiam et universalem ecclesiam impugnare». It is worth noting how, for the Ostiense, it is schism that can lead to heresy and not vice versa. From this, we can deduce two things: first, that heresy is not necessary for a schism to arise; second, that heresy appears as a more serious sin than schism. The Summa, when defining Quid sit schisma, states «schisma est illicita divisio per inobedientiam ab universitate ecclesiae facta», a division also moved by an error of faith: «Ideoque schismatici volentes Dei ecclesiam discindere, peccant in fide, quo ad articulum illum, Credo in Spiritum Sanctum et unam sanctam ecclesiam catholicam». The Greek etymology of the term tends to unite the two crimes, which highlights their divisive action: «Et certe hoc nomen schisma graecum, et dicitur a scissura». The unity of the Church is then compared to the indivisibility of Christ’s tunic: «si quis ab hac unitate recedat divisus est et sic schismaticus vestimentum enim domini, ideo schissum non fuit, sed de eo sortiti sunt, quia ecclesia scindi non debet, sed tota in unitate consistit, ut […] sicut domini vestimentum». Finally, the most relevant point for the difference between heresy and schism: «Differt autem ab haeresi in principio nam haeresis in sui principii habet perversum dogma, quod non habet schisma». However, persevering in the schism leads to heresy—Sed si perdurat cadit in haeresim: quia fingit se ab ecclesia recte recessisse et ideo censetur haereticus—since the relationship between the two sins is such that «est inter haec duo talis differentia qualis inter genus et speciem quia omnis haereticus est schismaticus, sed non convertitur».38

In the following subsection, regarding «Qua poena schismatici feriantur»—written ut sciant homines quam grave et quam detestabile sit hoc crimen […] unde nec dubitandum est sceleratius esse delictum, quod est gravius vindicatum—there is again a comparison with the crime of heresy: «alibi dicitur haeresim esse maius inter crimina eo, quod primum locum tenet in poenis […], tamen ex quo schisma iudicatum et confirmatum fuerit, idem est crimen, et utrique est poena eadem infligenda».39 Lastly, it is interesting to note the reference to Frederick II, who is identified as a schismatic: «contra dominum Gregorius 9 [schisma movit] et tandem per Innocenti IV depositus fuit concilio Lugduniensis, debet ergo quilibet schismaticus timere et animadvertere quod licet aliquando naviculam Petri fluctuet, submergi tamen non potest».40

In Ostiense’s work, we clearly see the insistence on pitting the heretic against the Church of Rome, thus tending to unite, or at least to link, the crime of heresy with that of schism. This overlap, however, only works in one direction since it is the crime of heresy that is used to aggravate the condition of the schismatics, who, by separating themselves from the Church, also offend God. The Häresie des Ungehorsams shifts the focus from the concept of heresy to that of heretic, and in the formulation of the contemptus clavium (i.e., the possibility of serrare e diserrare), the pope claims a power that Christ granted to Peter and that no one can oppose.41

Thus, we see how the canonists, on the basis of a historical tradition derived from late antiquity and the early Middle Ages, built up a concept of heresy that was remarkably centered around the offense to papal primacy.42 Indeed, it was precisely the incorporation of the ius romanum into legal speculation that allowed them to almost empty the concept of the heresy of its theological implications and hence to reduce it to a socio-political tool for controlling dissent.43

This, then, was the historical, doctrinal context in which the poet was formed: a context connoted by a weakly theological and strongly juridical-disciplinary concept of heresy.44 Therefore, to properly assess the meaning of Dante’s operation, which clearly separates heresy from schism, it is necessary to relate it to what has been exposed so far and to highlight the differences between the poet’s structuring of the infernal afterworld and the juridical–cultural arrangement made by the holders of orthodoxy.

3. Discussion

Heresy and Schism in Dante

If we recall the guilt expressed by Dante, l’anima col corpo morta fanno, we can say that the heretics sin is a misinterpretation of Scripture, the election of their own reading against that sanctioned by the Fathers of the Church moved by the Holy Spirit (Mon. III 3 11–13).45 An interpretation that also finds support in the presence of Pope Anastasius, a presumed Monophysite, and which has been explained by Andrea Lancia as follows:

Heretici sono e furo coloro li quali, pensando perverse dottrine a loro arbitrio, si partirono dalla catolica ecclesia. A noi non è licito alcuna cosa inducere né eleggere a nostro arbitrio. Di questa cosa avemo autori li apostoli di Dio, li quali né etiamdio elli medesimi nulla cosa dal suo arbitrio indussoro o elessoro, ma la disciplina presa da Cristo fedelmente alle nationi anuntiarono.46

As it is well known, the classification of the sin of heresy is a matter of debate. In fact, it does not seem to fit into the structural division made by Virgil in Inferno XI, in a narrative context that, therefore, sees the two pilgrims still pausing right in the circle of heretics. Furthermore, its position seems to place this circle in an intermediate zone between the sinners punished outside of Dite and those enclosed within the city walls, among whom, almost at the bottom of the infernal funnel, are the schismatics. This separation and the distance between the two sins mark the radicality of Dante’s thought in relation to that of his contemporaries.

According to Lancia:

Una questione si muove qui: quale è maggiore peccato, o la infidelitade, della quale è trattato di sopra canto X, o la scisma, della quale si tratta nel presente canto. Et secondo l’ordine di questo libro pare maggiore la scisma, poi ch’è dannata piú al fondo de l’inferno e seguitando il detto d’Aristotile, il quale arguisce cosí nel primo de l’Ethica: « Il bene della moltitudine si è il maggiore bene e divino », et ne l’viii dice: « Al maggiore male è contrario e opposito il maggiore bene ». Dunque la scisma che è male della moltitudine è opposito al maggiore bene che è divino e santo, però che la scisma corrompe la moltitudine, la infidelitade corrompe pur quello in che ella è. Conchiude dunque: la scisma è maggiore peccato. In contrario s’argomenta cosí: quello è maggiore peccato che è opposito al maggior buono; Dio è sommo buono, lo quale è obiecto della fede, dunque la infidelitade è opposita e contraria a Dio, et la scisma è contraria de l’unione delli huomini; minore bene è l’unione delle genti che Dio, dunque è maggiore peccato la infidelitade che la scisma. La maggioritade del peccato si considera in due modi: l’uno secondo la spetia del peccato, l’altro secondo le sue circumstantie. Lo peccato riceve sua spetie secondo suo obietto; l’obietto della fede, come è detto, si è Idio, l’obietto della scisma si è l’unione della Chiesa. Sotto la spetie del peccato pecca lo infidele, ch’è il primo modo; sotto il secondo modo, ch’è secondo le sue circumstantie, pecca il scismatico. Aristotile non conobbe la cattolica fede e l’autore poetiza secondo Aristotile.47

Lancia seems perplexed by this division but limits himself to justify it with a blunt reference to Aristotle.48

The structuring of Dante’s hell thus seems to support the hypothesis that the official construction of heretics was considered artificial by the contemporaries, although lost in later criticism.49 Even the choice of Epicurus as the exemplum of this sin, as well as the silence about the multiple heretical movements that characterized the decades preceding the writing of the Commedia, seems to point in this direction.50 Indeed, Dante seems to bring the concept of heresy back to a purely intellectual plan, completely disconnected from temporal relations with the Church. The very peculiar position of the heresy within the infernal structure seems to confirm this: immediately after the entrance into Dite, but close to the walls and immediately before d’un’alta ripa (Inf. XI 1).51 A sin that would thus be placed in an intermediate position between incontinence and malice since it is inherent in man’s natural desire for knowledge but does not surrender to the limits imposed on him by God, the dogmas.52

Certainly, as Manselli pointed out, the separation of heretics from the schismatics allows us to evaluate how Dante was well aware of the propagandist approach that had been implemented at least in the previous century and was still in force during his lifetime.53 By depoliticizing the concept of heresy,54 he would be in open conflict with what was then commonly stated in canon laws and would deprive the Church of one of the instruments that had hitherto characterized its policy action.55

The sin of schism, now separated from the heretical one, takes on an exceptional gravity in the poet’s formulation because it is contrary to Dante’s ideal of unity and peace in the societas christianorum. Thus, Dante relegates the disintegrating action of the schismatics to the depths of hell, as they are averse to the development of a society founded on such principles, which are the only possibility for mankind to obtain the maximum human happiness in life. In fact, it is important to note that for Dante, the perversion of a single individual is always a manifestation of a sin that is less dangerous than those that act and affect society as a whole. In his view, society is more capable of influencing individual behavior than the individual society (Conv. IV 4 2–4).

It is precisely the presence of Dolcino in this group that can shed light on Dante’s thoughts on the heretical movements of his time, which, at their extremes, were no longer legitimate criticisms aimed at a corrupt Church but unjustified acts of violence.56 Moreover, it is a fact that in Dante’s text, there is no mention whatsoever of what we might call the heretical component of the schismatics.57 This is a crucial point. Indeed, the conception of heresy as expressed in Dante’s time—a political crime condemned because of the laceration it sought to provoke in the body of the Church—is central in this episode, even though we are among the schismatics. In fact, Dante’s concept of heresy implies arguments that might be said contrary to faith, not to hierocracy.

Dolcinus can be compared to Muhammad precisely because of the belligerent component they share; no heretical component is mentioned here.58 In fact, in just six verses imbued with a warlike lexicon—armi, vittoria (military), acquistar (to conquer)—not even a whiff of doctrine rises from the text, which seems to rule out the possibility that there could be any heresy in it, in Dante’s sense.59 Muhammad himself «risulta impersonare prima di ogni altra cosa la figura del condottiero militare e del lottatore per la fede».60 An image decidedly much more appropriate to the narrative context from which it emerges. In fact, the Canto XXVIII, already in its incipit, has a clear physical and not at all intellectual dimension, in which the unspeakable nature of the violence, of the blood and the physical torments characterize the bolgia: «Chi poria mai con parole sciolte/dicer del sangue e de le piaghe a pieno/ch’i’ vidi, per narrar più volta?» (XXVIII 1–3). Indeed, even if all the people who died in bitter and hard battles were gathered together e qual forato suo membro e quel mozzo/mostrasse, d’aequar sarebbe nulla/il modo de la nono bolgia sozzo (18–21).61

An obvious reference for the Canto—which could represent the heretical component underlying the narrative—is the episode of the inconsutile tunic, a metaphor for the Church of Rome. Tearing the tunic apart, which was impossible even for the soldiers under the cross (Jn. 19, 23–24), is now a mad act attempted by the schismatic of Canto XXVIII. In this perspective, I believe, lies the fundamental difference that separates heretics from schismatics: an error of election due to the will to knowledge inherent in every human being cannot be compared to an attitude that undermines the unity of human society. It is precisely this warlike aspect that is the most overt manifestation of the desire for scission typical of certain heretical movements of the poet’s time. Therefore, while Dante, in his criticism of the secular Church, shares many aspects of the claims made by some of these movements, he cannot tolerate, and in fact harshly condemns, the attempt to create a division within the unity of the Ecclesia—which, even in the decadence in which it now finds itself, is still the one founded by Christ.

This is an otherworldly construction that marks the great distance between Dante and his contemporaries. There is no heresy in Dante’s Dolcino because there is no theological error. There is only schism, which, in Dante’s system of sins, coincides in part or in its entirety with the crime of heresy of the late medieval centuries.62 On the other hand, this is the impression we receive from a reading of the Dolcinian parable, regardless of Dante’s verses. Dolcino led a heretical movement devoid of any criticism of the theological-doctrinal construction of the Church but engaged in aggressions against ecclesiastical structures, perceived as corrupted and totally incapable of fulfilling their role of guiding souls.63

4. Conclusions

Then, if already in the first centuries «la posizione dell’eretico è evidentemente assimilata a quella del nemico» and that a certain military terminology «ha influito molto presto sia nell’elaborazione degli istituti canonistici che sulla posizione giuridica dell’eretico», Dante seems to intervene in this process of defining, which was intensified by the centennial definition of the Church as a secular institution. Thus, Dante associates the warlike terminology with the schismatics while returning the heretics, guilty of an intellectual sin, to the botanical (sterpi, Par. XII 100) and faunal (volpe Purg. XXXII 119) domain—perhaps to emphasize both their perverse nature and their relative danger, which can be overcome by the argomenti/di fede (Par. IV 68–19).64

Therefore, Dante’s relationship with one of the most important canonists of his time seems to confirm the enormous distance that separates in his thought the divine truths from the excessive speculation of the human sciences, as well as a certain critical and anti-academic attitude. It remains to be clarified how Dante acquired this knowledge and what materials he actually had at his disposal,65 thus marking the transition from the context to the effective relationship with the scole.66 What is certain, however, is that the position he adopts on the issue concerning heresy and schism and their relationship stands in an antithetical direction to that established by the canonists and makes the poet’s doctrinal positions autonomous and controversial.67 Continuing the attempt to define the concepts of heresy and schism would be a fruitful operation, which will also help to improve our understanding of the relationship between Dante and the Islamic religion and resolve two cruces in Dante’s work: the cui of v. 63 of Canto X of the Inferno and the structural division operated by Virgil in the XI.