The inferno is where the soul recognizes its own sin, rejecting it and turning away from it and towards God. It is an allegory for the Christian journey towards God. In fact, Dante’s entire trilogy is not meant to be taken literally. This version of hell is more influenced by Aristotle than by the Bible, with the punishment fitting the specific crime, as well as by implying that people are only guilty of one specific sin over all others. For those who confessed and repented before they died, their souls labor in purgatory to be freed of their sins – eventually.
Treason: Here, Judas, Brutus, and Cassius are in the jaws of Satan, frozen in a lake of ice.ĭante’s version of hell punishes the unrepentant sinner in a manner that is fitting their sins. Fraud: All types of fraud are punished here including seducers, false prophets, and sorcerers they run back and forth while being whipped by demons. Violence: Those who committed violence against others, property, themselves, as well as con artists immersed in boiling blood. Heresy: These souls spoke or acted against God or the church trapped in flaming tombs. Wrath and Sullenness: Those who were always angry or gloomy the wrathful must engage in eternal fights while the sullen are always sunk beneath the river Styx. Avarice and Prodigality: The place for the greedy and the ungenerous they must smash heavy weights together again and again. Gluttony: The overindulgent sinners forced to lie in freezing slush. Lust: People who committed lust-driven sins like adultery and fornication the souls are blown about in a terrible storm without rest.
Limbo: The unbaptized and the virtuous pagans similar to earth, but sufferers live in sorrow for being forever separated from God. Here, the circles of hell are laid out as nine circles, each punishing greater wickedness, until Dante and his guide, the poet Virgil, reach the center of the earth: While all three literary works are excellent, the Inferno captured the world’s imagination in an enduring way. In English, those are hell, purgatory, and heaven, or paradise. It tells the story of the writer, Dante, searching for his dead lover Beatrice while exploring the three realms, Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso. It is a masterwork of literature, with vivid imagery, well-constructed verses, and even interesting mathematical and scientific themes. This narrative poem took twelve years to write. While there are a variety of sources that portray hell as a place of levels, where different sin is punished according to its nature, the most influential and prominent one comes from Divinia Commedia, or the Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri. Today we will tackle the question: does hell have levels of different punishment? We need to read Scripture to understand the truth. The terrifying images of hell are often influenced as much by church tradition and pop culture as it is by Biblical truth. There is heaven and hell, both locations are briefly described in the Bible, and seem to be beyond human imagination. When contemplating the supernatural plane, the mind conjures images of angels or demons, of streets of gold or burning flames. Understanding the misconceptions about hell and why it exists can be motivating for many to share the Gospel and tell others of a better eternity. This image may have some overlap with the Biblical description of hell, but much of it comes from man’s imagination. Dark pits going deeper and deeper into the bowels of the earth to the lowest spot reserved for the vilest and most hated figures in history often dominate the discussion. While different ideas and imagery have been common through the centuries, one of the most enduring ideas is the levels, or circles, of hell.