Dante put Muhammad in one of the lowest circles of Hell. At the same time, the medieval Christian poet placed several Islamic philosophers much more honorably in Limbo. Furthermore, it has long been suggested that for much of the basic framework of the Divine Comedy Dante was indebted to apocryphal traditions about a “night journey” taken by Muhammad.
Dante scholars have increasingly returned to the question of Islam to explore the often surprising encounters among religious traditions that the Middle Ages afforded. This collection of essays works through what was known of the Qur’an and of Islamic philosophy and science in Dante’s day and explores the bases for Dante’s images of Muhammad and Ali. It further compels us to look at key instances of engagement among Muslims, Jews, and Christians.
عن المؤلف
Jan M. Ziolkowski is Arthur Kingsley Porter Professor of Medieval Latin at Harvard University, and Director of Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection. His research into the Latin Middle Ages has concentrated on the classical tradition, especially Virgil (The Virgilian Tradition: The First Fifteen Hundred Years and The Virgil Encyclopedia); the grammatical and rhetorical traditions; and the relationship of folk tales and vernacular epics with Latin. In Dante scholarship an edited volume on Dante and the Greeks is in press.