Thesis 8>6
Latin
Dicta interpretum Chaldeorum super .xi. amphorismo, de duplici ebriatione, Bacchi et Sileni, perfecte intelligentur per dicta cabalistarum de duplici uino.
Copy-text Farmer 1998 (farmer1998:24842-24844), u/v as Farmer prints them; the OCR prints the number as '826'. Wirszubski prints 'Chaldaeorum' and 'Cabalistarum' and omits the comma after 'amphorismo' (wirszubski1989:9768-9770). 'amphorismo' is Pico's spelling of 'aphorism'; Farmer notes its conflation with 'amphora' here and in 10>1 and 11>57 (farmer1998:24918-24921).
English
The Chaldean interpreters' remarks on the eleventh aphorism, concerning a twofold drunkenness, that of Bacchus and that of Silenus, will become fully intelligible through what the Cabalists teach about a twofold wine. unverified draft
'amphorismus' is rendered 'aphorism'; in this section it denotes an oracle, as Corazzol reads it (corazzol2019:429-430). 'perfecte intelligentur' is future: the thesis promises an explanation to be given at the disputation. 'ebriatio' is rendered 'drunkenness' to keep the pairing with 'wine'.
Doctrine
The thesis claims that a Chaldean commentary on an eleventh aphorism, which distinguished two kinds of drunkenness, of Bacchus and of Silenus, is fully explained by the Cabalists' doctrine of two kinds of wine (farmer1998:24842-24844). Farmer reads the two drunkennesses and the two wines as symbols of higher and lower modes of love, will or mystical frenzy, refers the sense to 11>17, and places the thesis in the series on beatitude that begins at 2.12 (farmer1998:24916-24918). Thesis 11>17 says that whoever knows what the purest wine is among the Cabalists will know why David said 'I shall be inebriated with the plenty of your house', what drunkenness the ancient poet Musaeus called happiness, and what the many Bacchuses of Orpheus signify (farmer1998:26715-26718). Wirszubski reports Edgar Wind's reading of the duplex ebriatio as the Neoplatonic distinction between vulgar excess and divine madness (wirszubski1989:9785-9787). For the two wines he points to the Liber de Radicibus, a glossary of Kabbalistic symbols, where 'wine preserved in its grapes' signifies the tenth sefirah and 'wine of libation' signifies the unclean side (wirszubski1989:9788-9797). A sefirah is one of the ten emanated entities through which, in Kabbalah, God created the world (corazzol2019:458-459). Corazzol derives the doctrine from Recanati's commentary on Genesis 9:20-21, where the Shekhinah is the vineyard and yields two wines: the stored wine from the side of Piety, the cup of salvation, and the wine of libation drawn from the side of Impurity (corazzol2019:509-530). In Recanati's reading Noah drank the second wine and so committed a sin like Adam's, an act of idolatry (corazzol2019:530-545, 575-577). Corazzol concludes that for Recanati both perfect union with God and idolatry are figured as inebriation, the two wines flowing from the tenth sefirah according to whether the worshipper keeps or breaks the commandments (corazzol2019:563-568).
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Context
The section contains fifteen conclusions on understanding the sayings of Zoroaster and his Chaldean commentators (farmer1998:24715-24718). Corazzol recounts Pico's letter of September 1486 to Ficino announcing Chaldean books: the oracles of the magi Ezra, Zoroaster and Melchiar, an interpretation by the Chaldean wise men, and a booklet on Chaldean theology (corazzol2019:111-120). He argues that the author of these texts was Guglielmo Raimondo Moncada, alias Flavius Mithridates (corazzol2019:199-220). Farmer likewise judges a forgery by Flavius the likeliest explanation (farmer1998:24794-24799). Farmer observes that the section contains material not found in the Greek collections of Psellus or Pletho, and that Pico's numbering of the oracles does not match theirs (farmer1998:24750-24752). Corazzol classes 8>6, 8>7 and 8>8 among the theses that cite aphorisms without naming their author (corazzol2019:429-430). He traces the Kabbalistic notions in 8>5, 8>6, 8>7, 8>9 and 8>11 to Recanati's Commentary on the Torah (corazzol2019:443-451). He sets them against Recanati's account of prayer as theurgy, the purification and liturgy by which the worshipper brings about the unification of the ten sefirot (corazzol2019:457-466).
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Reception
Busi and Ebgi cite the thesis as an instance of Pico's collage, in which a Neoplatonic image is set beside a Kabbalistic placitum: to a drunken god are offered double wines (busi2014:20252-20259, 20272). They state the rule behind such pairings: elements that perform analogous functions in different symbolic systems are interchangeable (busi2014:20264-20268). Their anthology gives the thesis in Italian beside 11>17 under the heading of wine (busi2014:23342-23356, 25202-25210).
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Historiography
Wind, as Wirszubski reports him, supplies the Platonic side of the pairing (wirszubski1989:9785-9787). Wirszubski supplies a Kabbalistic glossary and marks his identification as unprovable (wirszubski1989:9797-9799). Corazzol rejects Wirszubski's source, which he identifies as Mithridates' translation of Yosef ibn Waqqar's Sefer ha-shorashim, because too much would remain unexplained, and turns to Recanati (corazzol2019:505-511). On his reading the two wines hint at the difference between perfect union with God and idolatry (corazzol2019:602-605). He argues that with 8>6 and 8>7 Pico meant to show that Kabbalistic and Zoroastrian doctrine agreed on the theurgical effects of communion with God as against those of witchcraft (corazzol2019:632-636). Corazzol ties this to the Oration's contrast between magic, the consummation of natural philosophy, and witchcraft, which rests wholly on demons (corazzol2019:606-622). The thesis is a promissory note: the Chaldean text it explains is lost or was forged, and what survives is the Kabbalistic key Pico meant to apply to it (editorial inference from corazzol2019:504-505 and farmer1998:24794-24799).
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Pico's sources
- Menahem Recanati, Commentary on the Torah, on Genesis 9:20-21 (and on Genesis 3:6), the two wines of the vineyard: Kabbalistic source proposed by Corazzol (corazzol2019:509)
- Liber de Radicibus vel Terminis Cabalae (Cod. Vat. Ebr. 190, fol. 243r), entries under 'yayin': Kabbalistic source conjectured by Wirszubski ('even if it cannot be proved') (wirszubski1989:9788)
Quotations cited
- “It makes sense to assume, even if it cannot be proved” — Chaim Wirszubski, Pico della Mirandola's Encounter with Jewish Mysticism (wirszubski1989:9797)
- “too many things would be left unexplained” — Giacomo Corazzol, From Sinai to Athens: Giovanni Pico della Mirandola's philological quest for the transmission of theological truth (corazzol2019:508)
- “what exactly Pico read in M however is bound to remain unknown” — Giacomo Corazzol, From Sinai to Athens: Giovanni Pico della Mirandola's philological quest for the transmission of theological truth (corazzol2019:504)
- “a un dio ubriaco si offrono vini doppi” — Giulio Busi and Raphael Ebgi, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola: Mito, magia, Qabbalah (busi2014:20259)
Not established
- Which oracle Pico counted as the eleventh aphorism, and what the Chaldean interpreters said of it: not established; Corazzol holds that what Pico read is bound to remain unknown (corazzol2019:504-505).
- Whether Pico's Kabbalistic source was Recanati, the Liber de Radicibus, or another text: the sources consulted disagree.
- Whether Silenus stands for the lower or the higher drunkenness in Pico's scheme: not established by the sources consulted.
- Any reaction to this thesis by the papal commission: not established by the sources consulted.
Discussed in
- Giulio Busi and Raphael Ebgi, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola: Mito, magia, Qabbalah (2014)
- Giacomo Corazzol, From Sinai to Athens: Giovanni Pico della Mirandola's philological quest for the transmission of theological truth (2019)
- Chaim Wirszubski, Pico della Mirandola's Encounter with Jewish Mysticism (1989)
Farmer's cross-references
- 10>1 Sicut secretam magiam a nobis primum ex Orphei hymnis elicitam_fas non est in publicum explicare, ita nutu quodam, ut in infrascriptis fiet
- 11>11 Modus quo rationales animae per archangelum deo sacrificantur, qui a Cabalistis non exprimitur, non est nisi per separationem animae a corpo
- 11>13 Qui operatur in Cabala sine admixtione extranei, si diu erit in opere, morietur ex binsica, et si errabit in opere aut non purificatus acces
- 11>17 Qui sciuerit quid est uinum purissimum apud Cabalistas, sciet cur dixerit Dauid: Inebriabor ab ubertate domus tuae, et quam ebrietatem dixer
- 11>57 Per praecedentem conclusionem potest intelligens in arithmetica formali intelligere quod operari per scemamphoras est proprium rationalis na
- 28.35 Nulla res spiritualis descendens inferius operatur sine indumento.
- 8>7 Quae dicunt interpretes super .xiiii. amphorismo, perfecte intelligentur per ea quae dicunt cabaliste de morte osculi.
- 8>8 Magi in .xvii. amphorismo nihil aliud intelligunt per triplex indumentum ex lino, panno, et pellibus, quam triplex animae habitaculum, caele