Observations placeholder
Dante - Inferno [theft and robbery]
Identifier
007296
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
The entire seventh cleft of hell was reserved for thieves and robbers in Dante's Inferno. Here a particularly fitting punishment awaited them, their 'light fingers' are immobilised and their own body is subjected to a form of robbery, they are also subject to abuse by snakes.....
A description of the experience
Dante – The Divine Comedy INFERNO I
CANTO XXIV
Such pestilences and such deadly creatures
It could not show, neither could Ethiopia
Nor could that country by the Red Sea
Among that cruel and miserable abundance
Were running naked people, terrified
Without hope of a refuge or a cure;
They had their hands tied behind them with snakes
The heads and tails of which pierced the small of the back
While the rest of them was coiled together in front
And suddenly, at one of the sinners at our side,
A serpent leapt up and transfixed him there
At the point where the neck is fastened to the shoulders
Never was 'o' or 'i' written so quickly
As he caught fire and burnt, and turned to ashes
Which fell together and showered to the ground
And when he was in this manner destroyed,
The dust collected itself without assistance
And suddenly returned to the same shape.
….
And as in one who falls without knowing how,
By a demonic force which drags him down
Or some other obstruction which brings a man to a stop
When he gets on his feet and looks around
He is entirely bewildered by the anguish
He has suffered, and as he looks he sighs
Such was the sinner when he rose up again
O power of God, with such severity
Which out of vengeance will rain down such blows