Islam and the Divine Comedy

Miguel Asin Palacios

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781134536504
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Teologia e religione
• Subtopic: Religione

When first published in 1926 this book aroused much controversy. The theory expounded in the book was that Islamic sources in general, and the writings of Ibn al-`Arabi in particular, formed the basis of Dante's poem Divine Comedy, the poem which symbolised the whole culture of medieval Christianity. The book shows how fundamental Muslim legends of the nocturnal journey and of the ascension of the Prophet Muhammed appear in Dante's writings.

PART I

THE LEGEND OF THE NOCTURNAL JOURNEY AND ASCENSION OF MAHOMET COMPARED WITH THE DIVINE COMEDY

ISLAM AND THE DIVINE COMEDY

PART I

THE LEGEND OF THE NOCTURNAL JOURNEY AND ASCENSION OF MAHOMET COMPARED WITH THE DIVINE COMEDY

I

THE ORIGIN OF THE LEGEND

1. THE Moslem legend of Mahomet’s nocturnal journey and ascent to the spheres of after-life originated and developed like most religious legends. Born of a brief passage in Revelations, in its very obscurity it defied theological interpretation. But what baffled the sages in their agnosticism kindled the imagination of the faithful masses, and the details of a story founded upon the sacred text were readily conceived.

One brief allusion only appears in the Koran : “ Praised be He [the Lord] ”—runs the first verse of the seventeenth chapter—“ who called upon His servant [Mahomet] to travel by night from the sacred temple [of Mecca] to the far-off temple [of Jerusalem] whose precinct We have blessed, in order to show him Our wonders.”

2. The mysterious allusion seems from the first to have aroused the curiosity of pious Moslems. A rich crop of legends sprang up as if by magic. The vivid imagination of the East had been fired, and the myth of the nightly journey was soon clothed with a wealth of detail and set in a wonderful variety of episode and scenery.

The entire records of the evolution of the legend in all its ramifications would fill volumes. Around an insignificant verselet of the Koran a plot was woven, and the story developed in the form of hadiths or traditions of the Prophet, who was supposed to describe the wonders he saw on that memorable night. In the following pages an endeavour has been made to lay before the reader some of the principal versions extant. These have been divided into three cycles or groups, which begin with the simple, fragmentary types, and end with those in which Oriental fantasy reaches its climax.

II

FIRST CYCLE—VERSIONS OF THE “ ISRA,” OR NOCTURNAL JOURNEY

1. The simplest cycle seems to be one of the ninth century that is formed of six hadiths, in each of which, with slight variations, Mahomet is made to tell the story of an Isra, or journey by night on earth. Few topographical details, however, are given, and no mention is made of an ascent to celestial spheres.

In the following summaries the two main versions are compared with the Divine Comedy.

Version A of Cycle I

2. Mahomet relates to his disciples how he was awakened from sleep by a man who leads him to the foot of a steep mountain. To climb this, as he is urged to do, seems impossible; but, heartened by his guide, he begins the ascent and eventually reaches the high table-land at the top of the mountain. Proceeding on their way, Mahomet and his guide witness six scenes, one after another, of horrible torture. Men and women with lips torn asunder; others whose eyes and ears are pierced by arrows ; women hanging by their heels while vipers sting their breasts ; others, both men and women, that likewise hanging suck up in agony the stagnant water from off the ground; then, wretched creatures in filthy clothes who reek as of latrines ; and lastly, corpses in the last, abominable stages of putrefaction. These punishments, the guide explains to Mahomet, are meted out in turn to liars ; those that have sinned with eyes or ears ; to mothers who have refused to suckle their children; to violators of the fast; adulterers ; and to unbelievers. Continuing their journey, the travellers suddenly find themselves enveloped in a cloud of smoke; and they hear a confused noise as of mingled cries of pain and fury. Gehenna is there ; and Mahomet is urged to pass on.

Men sleeping peacefully in the shade of trees are now designated as the bodies of those who died in the faith. Children at play are the offspring of true believers. The men with the white, godlike features, who are robed in fine clothes and are exquisitely perfumed, are the true friends of God, His martyrs and saints. On they go, and now Mahomet descries three well-known figures drinking wine and singing psalms. One is Zayd, the son of Haritha, a slave who for love of Mahomet sacrificed his freedom. Had he not fallen in the battle of Muta, when a general in the Prophet’s armies, he would assuredly have been Mahomet’s successor. The second is Jafar, son of Abu Talib and cousin to Mahomet, who was killed in the same battle, after having preached the faith of Islam in Abyssinia. The third is Abd Allah, the son of Rawaha, the scribe and intimate friend of the Prophet, who also died at Muta. The three greet Mahomet with cries of love and allegiance. At the final stage Mahomet raises his eyes to Heaven and beholds Abraham, Moses, and Jesus, who, gathered around the Throne of God, await his coming.

3. This embryonic version, simple though it may be, has its points of coincidence with Dante’s poem.⁹ In each case it is the protagonist himself who recounts his adventures. Each makes the journey by night, led by an unknown guide who appears to him on awaking from a profound sleep. In both legends the first stage comprises the ascent of a steep mountain. Purgatory, hell, and paradise are by both visited in succession, although the sequence and detail differ. The first five torments witnessed by Mahomet represent the purgatory of Islam. The sixth, as also Gehenna, which follows it, is the hell of unbelievers. The remaining episodes deal with the paradise of children, and the heavens of the faithful, of saints, martyrs, and prophets. Both stories end with the vision of the Divine Throne. The sins or virtues of the dwellers of. each abode are explained by the guide, and from time to time the visitor attempts to converse with the souls of men once known to him.

4. Apart from the general outlines, there are few features in common. Even between the torments there is little similarity. With the introductions to the two stories, however, it is different. The description in the Islamic legend of the lofty mountain ; Mahomet’s dismay at having to climb it; his guide’s assurance of help; and, finally, the ascent itself, when Mahomet follows in his guide’s footsteps; all are features bearing a striking resemblance to Dante’s Inferno, and, especially, his Purgatory.¹⁰ Moreover, Dante is warned of the approach to hell by the same sign as Mahomet—a confused noise as of “ parole di dolore, accenti d’ira.”¹¹

Version B of Cycle I¹²

5. Mahomet is suddenly awakened by two persons ; who, taking him by the arm, call upon him to rise and follow them. On reaching the outskirts of Jerusalem, the visions of the after-world begin. The guides, in this version, refuse to answer any questions, bidding Mahomet wait until the end of the journey for an interpretation of what he sees. The first five visions correspond, as in Version A, to the purgatory of Islam.

The Prophet sees a man supine at the feet of another—man, angel or demon. The latter hurls an enormous boulder down upon his victim’s head, crushing his brain. The rock rolls on and, when the torturer recovers it, he finds his victim whole as before; and so the torture is renewed without end. Mahomet stands aghast and asks what crimes the wretch has committed. But his guides hurry him on to where another tormentor is forcing an iron javelin into the mouth of another sufferer, lacerating his cheeks, eyes and nostrils. Farther on, Mahomet sees a man struggling in a river red with blood and seething like boiling pitch. Vainly does he strive to gain the shore, for at each effort a fiend forces red hot stones down his throat, obliging him to swim back into the middle of the stream. This torture, like the previous one, is everlasting. Still farther, they come to a tubular structure, broad at the base and narrow at the top ; and through the walls comes an uproar as of human voices. The interior, Mahomet finds, is like a glowing oven, where men and women ceaselessly writhe, now being flung upwards, now sinking to the bottom, as the heat of the flames increases and diminishes. The scene recurs again and again, and the horror is accentuated by the shrieks of the victims. At length, Mahomet reaches the summit of a dark hill, where men, raving like madmen, exhale, through their mouths, nostrils, eyes and ears, the fire that has been infused into them.

Here, the tortures end. A few steps further on is a garden, green with eternal spring. At the entrance two men, one repulsively ugly, are feeding the flames of a fire with wood. Within, at the foot of a spreading tree and surrounded by lovely children, they see a venerable old man, so tall that his head touches the sky. Ascending by the tree, Mahomet comes to a beautiful abode, like a city of silver and gold, inhabited by men, women and children; some, white and handsome, others black and ugly. A mighty river, whose water is clearer than crystal, separates this from another, larger city. In this river, at the bidding of Mahomet’s guides, the black and ugly bathe and from it emerge purified and transformed into beings of beauty. Mahomet drinks of the water and, again ascending by the tree, reaches an even more beautiful place, inhabited by men both young and old.

At this juncture Mahomet rebels against the silence of his guides, and at last they consent to explain each vision to him. The wretch whose head was being crushed is the hypocrite who, though outwardly professing to honour the holy book, fails to abide by its precepts. He whose mouth is being torn asunder is the liar, backbiter and violator of the fast. The swimmer in the river of blood is the usurer. Those writhing in the furnace are adulterers. The men on the black hill being consumed by fire are Sodomites. The man of repulsive aspect is the steward of hell, who appoints to each his torture. The venerable old man is Abraham, who gathers to his bosom children who die before reaching the age of reason. The first abode is the paradise of true believers; and Moslems, who have sinned but die repentant, must wash away their sins in the river before they can enter heaven. The second is the mansion of the martyrs. All the visions explained, the guides, who make themselves known as Gabriel and Michael, call upon Mahomet to raise his eyes, and in amazement he beholds afar off a castle like a white cloud. This, his guides tell him, is the celestial mansion that awaits him, close to the throne of God. Mahomet would fain enter it at once, but his guides dissuade him, bidding him await his time.

6. This version shows an advance in its descriptive features, which are more suggestive of Dante’s scenes. As in the Divine Comedy, the four spheres of after-life—purgatory, Abraham’s bosom, hell, and paradise—are staged separately, although on one plane until paradise is reached by means of a tree that leads, not as in later versions, to several celestial spheres, but to one only. Neither is Mahomet led, as formerly, by one guide ; although the two are angels and not, as in Dante, humans. For the first time, too, mention is made of the steward who, like Dante’s Minos, awards the tortures to the damned.¹³ But these details are of less importance than other characteristic features. As in Dante,¹⁴ Jerusalem is the starting-point in this version of the Moslem myth. Again, Dante’s commentators are agreed upon the correlativity of the punishments with the sins committed, which is also a feature in the Moslem Versions A and B—the sinner suffers in the members or organs that served the deed.¹⁵

7. But coincidence between Version B and Dante’s text is most marked in the torture of adulterers and usurers. The naked men and women writhing in a furnace inevitably suggest the adulterers in Dante who are incessantly swept on by the gale of hell.¹⁶ Even more striking is Dante’s adaptation of the Moslem punishment of usurers to those who committed violence and deeds of blood. Submerged in the deep waters of a river of blood, they, like the usurers, strive to gain the shore, only to be forced back by the Centaur archers (who take the place of the simpler stone-throwers in the Moslem legend).¹⁷ So strikingly alike are these two features that other instances of resemblance lose by comparison ; as the torture of the Sodomites, burnt inwardly in the Moslem story, and rained upon by fire, in Dante ¹⁸; or the rivers that in both legends separate purgatory from paradise and of whose sweet waters both Dante and Mahomet drink.¹⁹

III

SECOND CYCLE—VERSIONS OF THE “ MIRAJ ” OR ASCENSION

1. The legends of the second cycle date as far back as those of the first. They are, however, grouped apart, for, whereas the former are concerned almost exclusively with the Miraj or ascension, the latter have as their main theme the Isra or nocturnal journey on earth.

2. There are three main versions of the legends forming this second cycle. The first and most authentic comes to us on the authority of Bukhari and Muslim and must, therefore, be considerably older than the ninth century. Of the second version only one fragment is quoted. Here the authorship is doubtful, although it is attributed to Ibn Abbas, a kinsman of Mahomet, and may thus have been the work of an Egyptian author of the ninth century, Ishac the son of Wahab. The third version is generally regarded as apocryphal ; it may have been the work of a Persian of the eighth century, Maysara son of Abd ar-Rabihi, or of Omar son of Sulayman, who lived in Damascus in that century. Summaries of the three versions are as follows :—

Version A of Cycle II

3. In his house (or, according to other versions, in the Mosque) at Mecca Mahomet is awakened by Gabriel,, who, either alone or helped by angels in human form, prepares the Prophet for the ascension. His breast is opened and his heart extracted and washed in water brought in a golden cup from the well of Zemzem ; his breast is then filled with faith and wisdom. Thereupon Gabriel takes him by the hand, and the ascent begins, either from the Mosque of Mecca itself or, as in other versions, the Temple of Jerusalem, Descriptions of the ascension differ, but, generally, Mahomet, holding Gabriel’s hand, is made to rise through the air in flight. In some versions (as in B of the first cycle) the two are raised to heaven by the miraculous growth of a tree ; in others, a celestial animal, larger than an ass but smaller than a mule, carries Mahomet, or Mahomet and his guide, from Mecca to Jerusalem, the gates of paradise and, lastly, the Throne of God. Of the ascension proper there are ten stages.

The first seven correspond to the seven heavens of the astronomers, but are numbered and not named after their respective stars. The scene at each is repeated with true Oriental monotony. Gabriel knocks, and is asked by the guardian who is without and, upon Gabriel’s answering, the guardian asks whether he is alone. When the guardian is satisfied that God has really sent Mahomet as His Prophet, he welcomes the travellers and bids them enter. In each heaven one or more prophets are presented to Mahomet, who is acclaimed Holy Prophet and, at times, holy son or brother.

The order in which the prophets appear is generally : Adam, Jesus and John, Joseph, Idris (or Enoch), Aaron, Moses, and Abraham. Of these characteristic descriptions at times are given. Adam is seen between two hosts of men, now smiling now weeping, as he glances to the right and left alternately. Mahomet learns from Gabriel that these hosts are the blessed and the damned. The cousins Jesus and John appear together; Jesus, of medium stature, with a fair complexion, and fresh as if just coming from his bath. Joseph is of wonderful beauty. Moses, with flowing curls, tall and of stately appearance, bursts into tears when he is reminded that more Islamites will find salvation than those of his faith. Lastly, Abraham, to whom Mahomet bears a greater resemblance than any son, is seen leaning a...