Between Birgitta of Sweden and Savonarola: Domenica da Paradiso and Prophetic Doubt

At the crossroads between religious doubt and prophetic truth, critique of human knowledge and assertion of inspired intellect, stands Domenica da Paradiso (1473-1553), one of the most controversial prophets and religious leaders in sixteenth-century Florence. This chapter contextualizes the Dialogo of Domenica da Paradiso in the intellectual, religious and political milieu of Renaissance Italy and analyzes it in the light of two models: Saint Birgitta of Sweden and Fra Girolamo Savonarola. It shows how Savonarola and Birgitta, while embodying the authority of the prophet, contributed to shaping the problem of doubt as an essential feature of prophetic authority. Their conception of prophetic authority and doubt, in turn, affects and reemerges in new forms in the experience of Domenica.