Dante's Inferno Beliefs

The Effect of Personal Beliefs and the Outside World

Throughout history, people used writing and speech to express their innermost thoughts and feelings. Their words conveyed a lot about their opinions, biases and the world around them. The actions and teachings of others affected these people, helping to shape their beliefs, and therefore their words. Concepts such as these were apparent in Dante’s Inferno and the words of Muhammad in the Quran. Both Dante and Muhammad were influenced by the historical happenings around them, which affected their beliefs and, in turn, what they said regarding their rivals.

Dante often mentioned his enemies in Inferno, using a theme of brutally punishing them throughout the poem, such as when he introduced

Medieval Europe stood at the conclusion of the Crusades, locked in a physical and spiritual war against the Muslims when Dante wrote Inferno. The Church created many false aspersions about the opposing faith and their “false prophet”, Muhammad. Though Dante was a knowledgeable man whom—discerning from the details he mentioned about Muhammad and Ali in Inferno—was educated about the truths of Islam and likely didn’t believe the ridiculous fables spread by Christian priests, he was influenced by the views of the

Dante, influenced by Medieval European views and the rift that Islam caused in Christianity, expressed his contempt of Islam by subjecting Muhammad and Ali to eternal brutalization and using burning mosques as a symbol of Hell’s capital. Similarly, Muhammad expressed his disdain towards the Jews and the Christians throughout the Quran, threatening them and pointing out their mistakes. His scorn stemmed from the concepts contained in both religions as well as false teachings spread by the Catholic Church. Both of these instances showed how the teachings of others had excessive influence on prominent individuals and proved that a person’s words portray a lot about their beliefs and the world around