Commentary Par XX 103-105

103-105.  This tercet is built on still another chiasmus: Trajan, Ripheus; Christ to come, Christ come.

As opposed to a more comfortable understanding, in other words, that Trajan and (more pointedly) Ripheus had been won to the God of the Christians through implicit faith (see Aquinas, ST II-II, q. 2, a. 7), Dante insists that he believes that we believe that they believed explicitly in Christ, in Trajan's case (less difficult to accept, but involving a major miracle [[Par XX 106-117]], after the fact; in Ripheus's, before [[Par XX 118-129]]).  And so they died, not as unbelievers, but as full-fledged Christians.  The trick here is to add a disclaimer for Trajan (he died a Christian only when he died a second time) and to swallow hard at the claim made on behalf of Ripheus.

The feet of Jesus, transfixed to the cross by a single spike, offered one of the most piteous physical images drawn from the Passion.  See, for example, Bonvesin de la Riva's De scriptura rubra in his Libro de le tre scritture, vv. 153-170 (cited by Gragnolati [Grag.2005.1], pp. 95-96; and see p. 231, n. 57), where, in eighteen verses, the word pei (Milanese dialect for 'feet') occurs six times in Bonvesin's bloody account of the Crucifixion.