FREE ESSAY ON DANTE'S INFERNO

DANTE'S INFERNO

The Inferno:
Dante's immoral drama
of a journey through hell.
In his poem, the Inferno, Dante mentions many well know people. Dante mentions such
people as Pope Anastasius, Alexander the great, Cleopatra, and many others. The poem is
about Dante who has died, and upon reaching the afterlife, he was stopped short of heaven
by three beasts. When Dante flees the beasts, Virgil appears. Virgil states that he is
there to take Dante to heaven, but it will be a long trip through hell. Virgil tells
Dante that the only way to heaven is to follow him. Dante follows, and the majority of
the poem is a very descriptive narrative of what Dante sees and encounters.
Throughout his journey, Dante sees and encounters people he had known or read about in
life. These are all people who had sinned in life and now in death, are punished
eternally. Dante's version of hell is that people will have their sin turned against
them. In many instances, Dante points out what the sin of the person was, and describes
in detail, how they are being punished in hell. 
In Canto III, The Vestibule of Hell, Dante talks about the Opportunists. Souls who in
life never took a side, but instead were on the side where they themselves would gain the
most. Among these souls was Pope Celestine V. In life Celestine allowed the church to
become corrupted because he feared for his own safety. The pope, who watched out for
himself, doesn't have a place in hell. He is neither in hell, nor out of it, as in life
he was neither for good nor evil. 
The poem talks about a lot of people and what their place in hell is, and why they are in
hell. By doing this, Dante has almost written a history book. He mentions many of the
great leaders, empire builders, and church patrons. For example, in Canto XIX he mentions
Pope Nicholas III. Dante and Virgil are crossing over the third bolgia. Dante looks down
and sees that this is where the Simoniacs are. Virgil takes him down and lets him speak
to Nicholas. Pope Nicholas III sold church offices, and because he made a mockery of the
church, he is hung upside down, in a mockery of the baptismal font (Ciardi 166).
The Inferno is a fictional book, Dante was never in hell, and he never saw the things he
wrote about. However, while reading the book, I managed to relate many of the things he
talked about to our judicial system today. In the book, Dante talks about the nine
circles, or levels of hell. Each level dealt with a different sin, and as the level
increased, so to did the severity of the sin and in turn, the severity of the punishment.

In our judicial and political systems today, we have many different levels also. I
consider the levels of hell to be our levels of punishment that range from a month or so
in jail, to the death penalty. According to Dante, the first circle (level) of hell is
limbo. The souls here were people who died before Christ's coming. They are not tortured,
only they are just forced to spend eternity in darkness, and know that they have no hope
of reaching heaven. I consider the first level of hell to be similar to that of a
misdemeanor in our court system. People are really not punished, they just have to pay a
small fee and go on their way. 
However, the last level, or circle of hell, number nine is equal to the death penalty.
Souls in the ninth level, are souls that have committed sins that are so atrocious that
it is hard to imagine. Here Dante finds Brutus and Cassius. The ninth level of hell is
divided into four rounds. It is in the fourth round that Dante finds Brutus and Cassius.
Brutus and Cassius are guilty of treachery to their master-i.e. Caesar. Dante finds both
Brutus and Cassius being eaten by Satan, a three-headed beast who devours souls of the
ninth level. Brutus and Cassius are two of the unlucky ones. It is this level that I
think is equal to the death penalty in our society.
Religion is a major part of Inferno. The religion in the book is similar to what I
conceive religion to be today. Dante, who was a firm believer of God, is on his was to
heaven. However the souls in limbo did not believe in God, and are therefor not allowed
into heaven, but they are not punished either. In today's society, most people believe in
God, but many people do not. Those who don't believe just won't be allowed passage into
heaven. We allow God to have control over our lives, nobody forces us to believe, we just
choose to believe. 
Dante, having written this book based on many of the known facts of his time, did a very
good job of interpreting the fact about the people who he was around. Dante managed to
take what was then all myth and legend, and turn it into something real for people to
read. As previously stated, the book is indeed fictional. However the people in the book
are real, and they did commit the sins that Dante accuses them of committing. The book is
a master piece, very hard to understand, but a masterpiece none-the-less. My only regret
is that I had to have it read by a deadline, and that did not give me the chance to fully
understand what message Dante was trying to convey. However I do know that for having
been written in the 1300's, the book spoke of many things that are true today.