Dante and Siger: An Intellectual Mission Overcoming Error and Authority

Abstract

This article places the question of the presence of the Averroist philosopher Siger of Brabant in Dante’s Paradiso within the debate concerning Dante’s relationship with Averroistic philosophy throughout his works, particularly in the Commedia. The purpose of this research is to initially query the issue of Dante’s potential retraction of previously adopted Averroistic positions in the Commedia, and then to examine in greater detail the relationship between the Florentine poet and the Brabantian philosopher. United by the thematic and autobiographical thread of knowledge persecuted by power, embodied in the history of both figures, the proposed viewpoint is that Dante finds a model of intellectual honesty and freedom in Siger’s thought, ready to question even the authority of Aristotle, a model that Dante admires, places in Paradise, and upon which he structures his poema sacro. In conclusion, this work suggests a reading of some paradigmatic and antithetical pairs in the Commedia, linked by common principles yet opposite destinies, including Dante himself.