Dante’s Political Eschatology: Resurrecting the Social Body in Paradiso 14

Abstract

This article investigates Dante’s engagement with one of the key and most controversial academic questions of the late Middle Ages: the beatific vision after the general resurrection. This essay focuses on Paradiso 14, where the character of King Solomon explains that the souls’ vision of God will increase after reuniting with their resurrected bodies. After briefly reconstructing the theological debate engaged by Dante’s treatment of the general resurrection, and discussing the prevailing tendencies in the scholarship on Paradiso 14 and the body–soul relationship in the Commedia, this essay provides a new interpretation of this canto from a social and political perspective. It argues that in Dante’s eschatological vision, the resurrected body appears to be essential for the ultimate fulfillment of humanity’s social nature.