At the beginning of the Inferno, Dante already experiences the symbolic nature of animals. He is blocked on his path by three beasts; the lion, the she-wolf, and the leopard. These three animals represent the primitive temptations that block our path to God through sin. Throughout the Inferno, Dante repeatedly eludes to primitivity. Primitivity is the act of a human who follows animal instinct or characteristics. Dante constantly proclaims the sinners, as well as the punishers, to be animals. Therefore, Dante uses animal imagery to describe the primitive desires we have to sin and to show how, if left uncontrolled, they turn our souls into damnation and turn us away from our path towards God.
The first, and most forgivable, type of sin is that of incontinence. Incontinence is the lack of self-control over ones actions. Dante describes incontinence as falling into primitive desires like animals often do. These sins of lust, hunger, and wrath are considered animalistic in nature because they display a failure by humans to use their God-given minds to judge their actions. For this reason Dante feels pity for the sinners but ultimately still places them in Hell for failing to use the strength God gave them.
In Canto VI the punisher, as well as the punished, are described as dog-like. Cerberus who oversees this level of Hell is seen as a dog-like monster because of his voice. The Gluttons who also reside in this level are said to howl in pain like a dog. This is symbolic of the fact that these sinners and Cerberus, who both consumed excessively, resemble the characteristics of dogs and their restless craving for food.
Canto IX contains one of many references to frogs. As the messenger from Heaven comes to the gates of Dis the sinners and demons are said to scatter like frogs. This shows how compared to the holy and heavenly messenger, the sinners are like worthless frogs who live in fear of the great enemy. Dante continues with his frog metaphor in Canto XXII when he compares the Barterers to sluggish frogs. Dante calls the Barterers frogs because they live in a boiling pitch and constantly try to poke their heads out like the snouts of a frog in a pond. These barterers are also compared to dolphins and otters because they constantly dip in and out of the pitch like that of these animals. The demons who guide Dante and Virgil through this level of Hell are also compared to an animal, this time it’s a hawk. The demons hover like hawks over a pond waiting for the frogs, or sinners, to surface and tear them apart. Dante uses the imagery of the hawks and frogs to show that the demons hover over the sinners who are degraded to nothing more than prey for the enjoyment of the demons.
In conclusion we see that Dante understood what it meant to sin. His philosophy suggests that God gave us a brain to be superior to animals in making rational decisions and use our free will to become closer to him and salvation. By using the sinners as metaphor to animals, Dante is stating that if we ignore our logic and free will and succumb to our animalistic temptation, we are failing God and wasting the gifts that he gave us. Therefore, Dante argues that if we continue to be like animals and not use our gifts, we will become like the condemned souls of Hell and be forced to live an eternity of torture and separation from God.
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