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to mystic institute.org. Goodness, truth, beauty, the world, according to Dante.

The influential historian of medieval philosophy, Etienne Gilsson, warned,

When a philosopher discusses literature, he often reveals a want of taste.

But when a man of letters discusses ideas, he sometimes reveals a lack of precision.

Jilsson was prefacing his own reflections on Dante and philosophy,

which will also be my aim.

And his quip captures only one of many reasons why Dante is daunting to discuss.

Dante is a philosophical poet, so attending to his philosophy risks neglecting his poetry

while considering his poetry risks neglecting his philosophy.

Gilson didn't escape the problem, by the way, and even in focusing on the question of what kind of philosopher Dante was,

I think his book suffers from deficiencies both in precision or grasp of intelligible truth and in taste or appreciation of appealing beauty.

Particularly on such questions as what it means to be a Thomist, what it means to be a poet, and what it means to be a tomist, what it means to be a

poet, and what it means to be a Christian philosopher and a Christian poet.

Father Kevin Flannery called Jill Sone's book, Ungenerous, contrasting it with a very generous

book about Dante by Ralph McEnarney, which itself only briefly acknowledges

but does not stoop to engage with Jilsone.

Apart from the arguments of Thomists, philosophers, and theologians,

Dante has been interpreted, praised, and judged by poets

...