XXIX Here it is told how some learned astrologers disputed about the Empyrean
Edward Storer translation
They spoke of the heaven where Jupiter is and Saturn and Mars, and that of the Sun and of Mercury and the Moon. And how that above all was the Empyrean. And above that is God the Father in all His majesty.
And quite without sense is he who would know God’s profoundest thoughts.
Notes in this chapter
Note 1 · The Empyrean is the seventh and outermost Heaven of Paradise. ↑Note 2 · (sitting there). This novella is particularly abrupt and characteristic in its elliptical constructions. ↑Note 3 · An untranslatable play on words: Cappello meaning hat and also sometimes rebuff, snub. ↑Note 4 · lit.: over head what is? sopra capo che ha? ↑Note 5 · The circle that limits human knowledge. ↑Note 6 · The First Cause, or the Divinity. ↑Note 7 · As they were thus conversing, there came to them a fool who said to them: gentlemen, what is there over the head of that gentleman?2 One of