...and here's how Dante Alighieri put it 706 years ago!

Submitted by RPaine (Australia), Feb 14, 2006 at 07:36

Mark: "...depiction of Mohammed in Hell, along with his son Ali."

As Dante Alighieri put it in, The Divine Comedy, Canto XXVII:

Whilst eagerly I fix on him my gaze,
He eyed me, with his hands laid his breast bare,
And cried, "Now mark how I do rip me: lo!
How is Mohammed mangled: before me
Walks Ali weeping, from the chin his face
Cleft to the forelock; and other other all,
Whom here thou seest, while they lived, did sow
Scandal and schism, and therefore thus are rent.
A fiend is here behind, who with his sword
Hacks us thus cruelly, slivering again
Each of this realm, when we have compast round
The dismal way; for first our gashes close
Ere we repass before him. But, say who
Art thou, that standest musing on the rock,
Haply so lingering to delay the pain
Sentenced upon thy crimes." "Him death not yet,"
My guide rejion'd, "hath overta'en, nor sin
Conducts to torment; but, that he may make
Full trial of your state, I who am dead
Must through the depths of Hell, from orb to orb,
Conduct him. Trust my words, for they are true."

The Divine Comedy, Canto XXVII, Dante Alighieri


Credits to: Mark Noonan in his article Sacrilige or Art? At http://www.blogsforbush.com/

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