Commentary Par XXVI 134

This verse has been the cause of a great deal of confusion, as some of its interpreters are honest enough to admit.  Scartazzini, after an exhaustive survey of the history of its interpretation, concludes with the notice that, while it is most embarrassing for a commentator to admit such a thing, he has not resolved its problems.  (For another noteworthy attempt to clarify [if not to solve] the problem, see Porena [DDP Porena.Par.XXVI.134].)  The most enduring, among the several desperate stabs it has caused, has been the following: Vellutello (DDP Vellutello.Par.XXVI.130-138) was apparently the first to claim that 'I' was to be read numerically, as 'one.' Another notion has periodically reappeared (after having been introduced by Scartazzini [DDP Scartazzini.Par.XXVI.134]): 'I' (or 'J') is the first letter of 'Jah' or 'Jehovah.'  A much rarer but still interesting proposed solution is only found as late as Trucchi's commentary (DDP Trucchi.Par.XXVI.133-138): Dante wanted 'I' and not 'El' because 'I' (or 'J,' the same character in his Italian) was the first letter of 'Jesus.'  Nonetheless, the formulation that 'I' equals 'un' ('one') found favor, over the years, with many interpreters (including several editors, who replace what is 'I' in our text with 'un'), beginning with Francesco da Buti (DDP Buti.Par.XXVI.133-142).  Lombardi (DDP Lombardi.Par.XXVI.134) was apparently the first commentator to refer to Dante's earlier treatment of the nature of Adam's first word in De vulgari; he also pointed out that Dante was (whether deliberately or not he does not say) in disagreement with Isidore, who had been plain that 'El' was the name that God was first called.  That 'I' as the number/name of God is a valid reading of this verse is reinforced by the presence of the same alpha-numerical pun on the Roman 'i' as 'one' at [Par XIX 128].

See Casagrande (Casa.1976.1) for a careful consideration of the problems of this verse.  He ends up linking it, through the commentary of the Ottimo (DDP Ottimo.Par.XXVI.133-138), to Isidore's eighth (of ten appellations) name of God (Etym. VII.i), ia, itself connected to the Hebrew word alleluia, as praise of God's name.  Hollander (Holl.1969.1), p. 144n., had previously argued for Isidore's ninth name of God, the tetragrammaton, transliterated as ia ia, as being the text that Dante had in mind, as evidenced by the parodic reference to it and the sixth name of God ('Ego sum, qui sum' [I am that I am]) found earlier in the poem in the Siren's self-naming (Purg. XIX.19), 'Io son, io son dolce serena' and then corrected in Beatrice's self-naming (Purg. XXX.73), 'Ben son, ben son Beatrice.'  (All of these phrases have repetition as a common feature.)  For the view that it is in Isidore's use of Jerome's writings in his formulation of the tetragrammaton as referring to God's ineffability that Dante finds the reason to reject El (the first name for God according to Dante in De vulgari eloquentia [V.E.I.iv.4]) for I, see Damon (Damo.1961.1).  (Casagrande, pp. 266-71, reports that the eighth name, ia, indicates, according to Isidore, God's invisibility, not His ineffable nature.)  For the whole question, see Porena's endnote to this canto (DDP Porena.Par.XXVI.134).

Hollander (Holl.1980.2), p. 128, returning to this subject, offers a hypothetical reason for Dante's change of mind: The poet wanted to associate his own vernacular Italian, in which the name of God coincides with Adamic pre-Hebrew vernacular, with that first of all vernaculars.  And he might have cited (but in fact did not) the following passage in De vulgari (V.E.I.vi.2): 'For whoever is so misguided as to think that the place of his birth is the most delightful spot under the sun may also believe that his own language -- his mother tongue, that is -- is pre-eminent among all others; and, as a result, he may believe that his language was also Adam's' (tr. S. Botterill).  This mocking of boosters of their own inconsequential towns perhaps also conveys Dante's own hidden claim in the Commedia: Dante's version of Tuscan is to be seen as in some way resurrecting Adamic vernacular, coinciding in the vowel 'I,' which is the name of God in each.  For a similar opinion, see Moevs (Moev.2005.1), p. 183.  And see [Par XXIX 17] for the dative pronoun 'i' referring to God.

One might also speculate that Dante considered El as the name of God associated with Hebrew 'grammaticality,' the written language of the scribes of the Bible; for this reason he must retract his earlier opinion (El) in favor of a truly 'vernacular' solution (I).  Further, we may reflect that when he considered the context of his remark in De vulgari (V.E.I.iv.4), he surely would have noted that there he had characterized Adam's first word as an emotive exclamation, indeed a cry of joy.  The word I, which we have just heard Adam use in the preceding verse ('pria ch'i' scendessi'), may sound and feel 'vernacular,' while El may sound and feel 'grammatical,' that is, like a language learned in school.  Adam tells Dante that first God's name was 'I,' and only later was He called 'El.'  The text indicates that this happened sometime after Adam died (i.e., after his span of 930 years), about 1000 years, long enough for the Hebrews to have invented grammar and had their language taught in schools.  John of Serravalle (DDP Serravalle.Par.XXVI.133-138) says that Heber, of the fourth generation from Noah, was the first to speak Hebrew and call God 'El' in it.