Commentary Purg XII 1-3

Dante and Oderisi are continuing their movement forward in humility, purging their pride in their differing ways until such time as Virgil will insist on Dante's pursuing other instruction.  Strictly speaking, in ancient Greece a 'pedagogue' was a slave whose task it was to guide children to school and supervise their conduct generally (but not to teach them); in ancient Rome the slave was frequently a Greek and had similar responsibilities, but also introduced the children to the beginning study of Greek.  Dante's word, pedagogo, here in one of its first appearances in the Italian vernacular, according to the Grande Dizionario (Batt.1961.1), has a brief but important role (occurring twice) in a single biblical passage, Paul's Epistle to the Galatians (3:24-25).  (Longfellow [DDP Longfellow.Purg.XII.3] seems to have been the first to note the possible connection.)  In that passage Paul imagines us as having once been, under the Old Testament, guided by the paedagogus (the Law) but as now being taught by Christ, and thus as no longer requiring such guidance.  This Dantean hapax (a word occurring only once in a given universe of words) may reflect that biblical near-hapax.  (Perhaps it should be noted that, two cantos farther on [[Purg XIV 85]], Dante fairly evidently cites another passage in Galatians [6:8] -- see Moore [Moor.1896.1], p. 332.)  If he does, its use here involves a certain apparently gratuitous downgrading of Virgil's admonitions, so frequently before us in this canto.  Their frequency is observed by Giulio Marzot (Marz.1967.1), in whose opinion this canto is 'il canto delle ammonizioni' (p. 422).

      For the yoke that binds these two 'oxen' see the commentary of Fallani (DDP Fallani.Purg.XII.1-3) and Scott's lectura (Scot.2001.1), p. 174: 'For my yoke is easy and my burden light' (Matthew 11:29-30) -- the words of Christ preaching to potential followers.