Medieval Astrology and the Inquisition: Cecco d'Ascoli, Dante, and Divine Will
Fortune tellers and fatalist astrologers like Guido Bonatti and Michele Scotto appear with their faces turned behind their shoulders according to the law of contrapasso. These are divided into true fortune tellers and false fortune tellers: the true ones are punished because they wanted to subvert the divine order by wanting to see too far ahead, while the false ones because by lying they attributed the will of the powerful to divine will:
Michele Scotto was, who truly knew
the game of magical deceptions.
See Guido Bonatti; see Asdente,
who now would wish he had attended to leather and cord,
but repents too late.
See the wretched women who left the needle,
the spool, and the spindle, and became fortune-tellers;
they made spells with herbs and images."
Divine Comedy, Inferno, Canto XX, 117-120
Similarly, Cecco d'Ascoli paraphrases about fortune tellers and witches:
calling spirits with their muses
know the future by chance and fortune:
Through the noise of enchanted palms,
Through the forked bone that closed,
these damned souls know the future [...]"
Acerba, Book IV Chapter III
Both, despite being deeply convinced of the influence of the intelligences corresponding to planets and stars, are also convinced of the existence of two realities hierarchically superior to all stars and planets: the will of Man and the will of God. Cecco d'Ascoli will say that the influence of planets acts only if the soul becomes vile, servile, and thieving:
For the power of eternal nature,
Which shining in them are full of glory.
In the form of enamored desire
Moving thus the world is governed,
Through these exalted immaculate lights.
It does not create necessity by moving each one,
But it does dispose the human creature,
Through qualities which the soul following,
Abandons free will and becomes vile
Servile and thieving [...]"
Acerba, Book II, Chapter I
While by its nature it should be a lady dominating over other stars:
Diverse peoples with contrary acts,
Forms their power which does not perish.
[...]
But the beautiful soul similar to the maker,
By its value, can cast shadow on these,
If its gentle will does not incline.
When influence comes from those,
If its virtue is not disturbed by these,
Then it is lady over all stars"
Acerba, Book I, Chapter II
The same words are spoken by Dante in the Divine Comedy in Canto XVI of Purgatory:
purely to the heavens, as if they moved
everything along with them by necessity.
If this were so, free will would be destroyed
in you, and it would not be just
to have joy for good and sorrow for evil.
The heavens initiate your movements;
I do not say all, but supposing I said it,
light is given to you for good and evil,
and free will; which, if it endures
fatigue in the first battles with heaven,
then conquers all, if it is well nourished."
So here we see that astrological positions, especially in relation to free will... however, Cecco d'Ascoli would undergo the Inquisition trial, officially precisely for his astrological positions and would be condemned to be burned precisely in Florence in 1327 with one of the most mysterious and bewildering sentences of the early Inquisition. Officially, Cecco d'Ascoli was condemned for his astrological theories and for this reason was condemned to the stake with his books. However, once Cecco d'Ascoli died, his books were among the most copied and widespread works until the Counter-Reformation, as attested by the large number of manuscript codices that have come down to us regarding the Acerba.
From a purely astrological point of view, finally, Cecco d'Ascoli's positions were not only not extremist, but even more moderate compared to those of authors later canonized by the Church such as Albert the Great. Thorndike himself in the early years of the 20th century raises the question about the real reasons that led to the trial and killing of Cecco d'Ascoli.
A possible solution to the enigma is proposed by Palamidessi, taking up a thesis partially introduced by Valli and Ricolfi, in the First Conference of Studies on Cecco d'Ascoli. Here Palamidessi expresses the opinion that after clarifying how his condemnation should not be attributed to his teaching and his practice as an astrologer, this "initiate and master" should be considered the bearer of "a new Christian vision of life" as overwhelmed by the movement that led to the destruction of the Templars. In the Templars indeed converged the Faithful of Love to which Cecco would have belonged. The poet therefore should be looked at "with another lens as an anticipator of new ideas that have indicated the way to dominate matter and the force of the Universe to create the New Man." To this message of Cecco d'Ascoli therefore should be attributed the meaning of the trial and his martyrdom.
And this indeed seems to be the meaning communicated by Cecco d'Ascoli to Petrarch in one of his last sonnets when he probably already saw the fate of his imminent future taking shape. To Petrarch who calls him "the great Ascholan who illuminates the world" and questions him about the near future, Cecco d'Ascoli makes it understood that he knows what his near future is and that he accepts it for love of Wisdom:
I am not blind, and blind I must become;
[...]
Like a phoenix I sing in death.
Alas! the black cloak has led me so!
Sweet is death, since I die loving
the beautiful sight covered by the veil,
which for my pain heaven produced"
Indeed, on September 16, 1327, Cecco d'Ascoli was burned alive by the Inquisition tribunal in front of the Church of Santa Croce in Florence. He was led to publicly abjure in the Church of Santa Croce draped in mourning on an eminent stage purposely erected in the presence of an innumerable people. There with the assistance of Messer Conte da Gubbio, Rector of the Church of Santo Stefano, and Vicar General of Monsignor Francesco Silvestri, Bishop of Florence, and many other Doctors and Consultors of the Holy Office, was read...