Observations placeholder
Dante - Inferno [procuring]
Identifier
007298
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
Procuring is selling a person to another for money. The person sold may get some of the proceeds as a prostitute does, or may get nothing as a slave does, or not only get nothing be unaware that they have been sold. Again, a particularly nasty activity because this hurts people. Many prostitutes are paid in drugs, or kept but not paid, so the effect is a form of slavery anyway.
A description of the experience
Dante – The Divine Comedy INFERNO
CANTO XVIII
On both sides, up on the dismal rock
I saw horned devils with great whips
Who lashed them cruelly from behind
Ah, how they made them take to their heels
At the first stroke! And there was nobody
Who waited to have a second or a third.
While I went on, my eyes met somebody's;
And I immediately said to myself;
'I am sure that I have seen that man before'
And that whipped spirit thought that he could hide
By bowing his head; but it availed him little
And I said 'O you with downcast eyes
If your manner and bearing are not deceptive
You are Venedico Caccianemico
But what brings you into this stinging mess?'
He said to me 'I say it unwillingly;
But I am forced to do so by your clear speech
Which makes me recollect my former world.
It was I who induced the beautiful
Ghisola to do what the Marquis wanted
However discreditable the story may sound
…......
While he was speaking one of the devils struck him
With his long whip, and said to him 'Go on,
Pimp, you'll make no money from women here'