Since the beginning of time, legions of people have all had their own interpretation of the after-life, and if there even is one. Many philosophies, religions, and individuals have all asked themselves the same question at one point or another: Is there a Heaven or a Hell? Where will my body go? Will my soul follow?
The Bible has many passages in which it describes its specific thoughts and claims on the “afterlife”. The afterlife as noted in the Bible, is divided into two different places, Heaven and Hell. Under this notion, everyone will continue their life after death eternally either in Heaven or Hell based on the type of life they lived.
Where one spends the rest of their life is determined by whether a person puts their trust in
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In his narrative poem The Divine Comedy Volume 1: Inferno, Dante recounts the story of a Pilgrim’s journey through hell. Inferno is based on Dante’s own idea of what the afterlife looks like and the matter in which it functions. As the Pilgrim sees it, Hell is subdivided into nine different “circles” which separate the sinners by the nature of the indulgence they have committed and its corresponding “contrapasso”, or form of punishment. The larger their sin is, the lower the level to which they are doomed to spend eternity. After reading the poem in its entirety, a reader discovers that Dante has made a spot in Hell for just about every type of sinner, even those who go against the mere thought of the afterlife. While on his journey, the Pilgrim is guided by Virgil the poet. Together they pass through different circles of Hell witnessing the atrocious punishments that all the sinners are serving. Though some circles hold gluttons, and others house those filled with lust, there is one circle in particular which is home to those who chose to live their lives denying the existence of an afterlife as it is explained in the Bible. Dwelling in the sixth circle of Hell are the souls of “arch-heretics”. Heresy is an opinion at variance with the orthodox or accepted doctrine of a church or religious system consequently; heretics are those who have their own opinion against the accepted doctrine (dictionary.com). Mark Musa affirms in his
According to the Bible, there is life after death. When people die, the body becomes separated from the spirit and the soul. It is the body that remains on earth while the spirit goes back to God (John 11:25). Here, depending on your deeds on earth, the spirit may be accepted into Gods kingdom (heaven) or it may be subjected to punishment through hellfire (Matthew 10:28). (625 words)
Often, we cannot see the good until we have experienced the bad. Dante Alighieri, a poet who makes himself the main character in his Divine Comedy, finds himself lost in a dark wood at the start of The Inferno. Though he sees a safe path out of the wood towards an alluring light, he is forced to take an alternate route through an even darker place. As the ending of the pilgrim Dante’s voyage is bright and hopeful, Alighieri the poet aims to encourage even the most sinful Christians to hope for a successful end. Thus, Dante the pilgrim goes to hell in The Inferno to better understand the nature of sin and its consequences in order to move closer to salvation; his journey an allegory representing that of the repenting Christian soul.
The purpose of the pilgrim's journey through hell is to show, first hand, the divine justice of God and how Christian morality dictates how, and to what degree, sinners are punished. Also, the journey shows the significance of God's grace and how it affects not only the living, but the deceased as well. During his trip through hell, the character of Dante witnesses the true perfection of God's justice in that every sinner is punished in the same nature as their sins. For instance, the wrathful are to attack each other for all eternity and the soothsayers are forever to walk around with their heads on backwards. Furthermore, Dante discovers that hell is comprised of nine different circles containing
Since ancient civilizations people have been trying to explain what goes on after death. Throughout history, many cultures have had different theories about what happens. Two distinguished ideas of where people go after death are the underworld and Hell. The idea of the underworld came from the Greeks and Romans. A few famous works by the Greeks and Romans that talk about the underworld are The Iliad, The Aeneid, and, The Odyssey. A famous work that discusses Hell is Dante's Inferno. Hell is an accepted part of the Christianity religion and taught all over the world. The two beliefs are very similar but some distinct differences can be seen.
In Dante’s Inferno, part of The Divine Comedy, Canto V introduces the torments of Hell in the Second Circle. Here Minos tells the damned where they will spend eternity by wrapping his tail around himself. The Second Circle of Hell holds the lustful; those who sinned with the flesh. They are punished in the darkness by an unending tempest, which batters them with winds and rain. Hell is not only a geographical place, but also a representation of the potential for sin and evil within every individual human soul. As Dante travels through Hell, he sees sinners in increasingly more hideous and disgusting situations. For Dante, each situation is an image of the quality of any soul that is determined to sin in
Dante and Virgil have just left limbo, the first circle of hell, and are now on their way into the second circle of hell, where hell really begins. It is here that Dante first witnesses the punishment brought upon the sinners. They encounter Minos, the beast-judge who blocks the way into the second circle. He examines each soul as they pass through and determines which circle of hell they must go to by winding his tail around himself. Minos warns Dante of passing through but Virgil silences him. Dante encounters a dark place completely sucked of any light and filled with noises more horrible than a tempest and sees the souls being whirled around in a
When God created the universe, he then created humans in His own image. In the beginning everything was perfect. Humans did not know about evil at all until their eyes were opened when they ate the fruit from the tree of life, known as the apple. Once that happened, sin was birthed into us causing us to not only die spiritually, but later experiencing death physically. After us humans die, we either go to heaven or we go to hell for all eternity. Our destiny determines by how we choose to live and what we choose to believe. Our actions should match our beliefs. If we do not believe in God almighty and have faith in his Son, Jesus, then we will go to hell for all eternity.
The Inferno is a tale of cautionary advice. In each circle, Dante the pilgrim speaks to one of the shades that reside there and the readers learn how and why the damned have become the damned. As Dante learns from the mistakes of the damned, so do the readers. And as Dante feels the impacts of human suffering, so do the readers. Virgil constantly encourages Dante the pilgrim to learn why the shades are in Hell and what were their transgressions while on Earth. This work’s purpose is to educate the reader. The work’s assertions on the nature of human suffering are mostly admonition, with each shade teaching Dante the pilgrim and by extension the reader not to make the same mistakes. Dante views his journey through hell as a learning experience and that is why he made it out alive.
As humans, we are always imagining what our lives will be like when we die. While the depictions of what hell or heaven may be from the ancient times and now, what has stayed consist is the idea of an afterlife altogether.
Robert Herrick, an English poet, once said, “Hell is no other but a soundlesse pit, where no one beame of comfort peeps in it.” Picture any type of Hell with relief, happiness, or even the smallest crack of a smile. There is no place. In fact, one can only think of the complete opposite, whether it is a Hell filled with neglect, pain, disgust, or a never-ending life of horror. This is the place created by Dante Alighieri; The Inferno is exactly the type of Hell where no person would want to be. Even those who acted upon the lightest of sins suffered greatly. While each realm contained a different sinner, the punishment that each were forced to face was cruel, repulsive, and sometimes rather disgusting. Through grieving tears without an
Circle one of Hell is reserved for those whose only crime is living before Christianity and therefore not worshipping God as is deemed proper by God. These shades are the unbaptised infants and virtuous pagans who came before Christ. Virgil explains the sin in lines 34-39:
The concept of hell can be viewed as three distinct underworld concepts in the Old and New
This indulgent type of behavior is seen in the sinners in the second through sixth circle of hell.
When you think of Hell, what do you see, perhaps a burning pit full of criminals and crazed souls? Or maybe you’re like Dante and have a well organized system of levels in correspondence with each person’s sins. In Dante Alighieri’s epic The Inferno, Dante and his real life hero, Virgil, go on an adventure through a rather elaborate version of Hell. In this version of Hell numerous thoughts and ideals are brought to the attention of the readers. Through Dante’s use of both imaginative and artistic concepts one can receive a great visual impression of how Dante truly views Hell, and by analyzing his religious and philosophical concepts the reader can connect with the work to better understand how rewarding this work was for the time period.
Around 1314, Dante Alighieri completed the Inferno, the first section of what would make up The Divine Comedy, a collection of three poems reflecting Dante’s imaginative journey through Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven. In these poems, Dante the poet describes the pilgrimage that Dante the pilgrim must complete to attain salvation. With the Roman poet Virgil as his guide, Dante the pilgrim must purge himself of his own sinful nature, which can only be achieved by observing and learning from those that have landed themselves in either Hell, Purgatory, or Heaven. Described in Inferno, his excursion begins in Hell where Dante learns about the stories and the sufferings of many sinners. As Dante the pilgrim progresses through Hell it is clear that he assumes different personas. In some instances, Dante the pilgrim is portrayed as an empathetic man who pities the sinners while on other occasions, Dante the pilgrim is portrayed as a callous and indignant being in regard to the sinners. While Dante the pilgrim is depicted in these two completely different ways, it is the insensitive portrayal that more precisely depicts Dante the pilgrim, as that is his true identity when he leaves Hell. His journey affected him so greatly that by the end of his pilgrimage, Dante the pilgrim has transformed from a compassionate man into an impervious and even cruel individual.