(God's voice is in red, Satan's voice is in fuchsia, Dante's voice is in blue)
Knock, knock!Who's there?
It's ME! Muhammad!
Muhammad who?
Muhammad the Prophet! (peace be upon me)
Silence ensues as God consults Himself then says, These are the Gates of Heaven. Go thee down that other path which thou hast walked whilst on earth. Knock there and Lucifer will let thee enter.
Muhammad trots down to the Gates of Hell.
Knock, knock!
Who the hell is there?!
Um...Muhammad?
Immediately the Gates of Hell spring open, then Lucifer says, Welcome, Muhammad. Well done, my good and faithful servant. Enter! All that I possess is yours.
Oh hi, Allah, it's you! Great to see you again! Where're my 72 virgins!?
Right this way. (heh heh)
Muhammad's excitement radiates through the air as the door to the Chamber of Virgins slides open. Tearing at his robe Muhammad races in...then disappears into the infinite realm of Inferno's Eighth Circle, to be mutilated and split in half with his entrails hanging out, eternally speaking the words: See now how I rend me!
A brilliant application of the Poet!
ReplyDeleteI took the liberty of extracting from “Dante Worlds” web site, (University of Texas), a wonderful Dante resource, on what the “Eighth Circle” is and why you place Muhammad there, in your meditation.
“The offenses of circles 8 and 9--the lowest two circles of hell--all fall under the rubric of fraud, a form of malice--as Virgil explains in Inferno 11.22-7--unique to human beings and therefore more displeasing to God than sins of concupiscence and violence. While all versions of fraud involve the malicious use of reason, circles 8 and 9 are distinguished from one another according to the offender's relationship to his or her victim: those who victimize someone with whom they share a special bond of trust (relatives, political / civic comrades, guests, benefactors) are punished in the lowest circle; if there exists no bond besides the "natural" one common to all humanity, the guilty soul suffers in one of the ten concentric ditches that constitute circle 8.”
Here is a kink, if you wish to see who some of Muhammad’s mates may be for all eternity.
http://danteworlds.laits.utexas.edu/circle8a.html