I
Introduction
1. The belief in the immortality of the soul and the natural desire of man to lift the veil shrouding the mysteries of the after-life appear to have been the psychological motives that inspired the authors of the many legends, popular throughout mediæval Christian Europe, the main theme of which is the picturesque description of a fantastic journey to the realms beyond the grave. These are the legends that, in the opinion of the scholars, provided Dante with the raw material for his poem.[422] Accordingly, they have been collected and analysed with scrupulous care by the leading critics, who, needless to add, consider them to be of purely Christian origin, either the spontaneous outcome of popular imagination or the result of centuries of monastic learning embellished by the artistic fancy of the troubadour.[423] The main centre from which these legends radiated over Europe appears indeed to have been the monasteries of Ireland. But it is interesting to note the marked difference between the legends that appeared before and those that appeared after the eleventh century. The monastic tales prior to that century are so poor in material and inartistic in treatment, the scenes representing the future life of the soul so trivial and at times coarse that, even had Dante known of their existence, they could scarcely have served as models for his work. This is admitted by D’Ancona himself. Later on, however, fresh tales appear, revealing a more fertile imagination and greater refinement on the part of the authors. These D’Ancona calls “veri abbozzi e prenunziamenti del poema dantesco.”[424]
2. How is this sudden change in the development of the eschatological theme in Western Christian literature to be accounted for? The hypothesis of the influence of elements, foreign to Western culture but adaptable thereto—inasmuch as their origin may in the end be traced back to the same early Christian stock—would not appear to be extravagant. Graf has observed that many particulars of the universal myth of paradise, although omitted from the Biblical narrative, reappear in these Christian legends; and he adds significantly that it is not known whence they came nor by what means they were transmitted.[425] Yet Graf made most methodical use of all the sources available to modern European erudition. The eschatological literature of Islam alone seems to have escaped the attention of this keen critic, for the Arabic texts, when not translated into some European tongue, were as a sealed book to him. In the following pages an attempt will be made to fill this gap by examining the Moslem legends for evidence of poetic features that may have influenced the Christian legends and thus explain their remarkable efflorescence in the eleventh century.
3. General evidence of such influence may be found in a feature observed by Graf himself. He notes that in many of the more popular legends of that date the souls of the deserving, before being admitted to eternal bliss, are led to a place other than the theological heaven, there to await the day of resurrection and judgment. But, as Graf states, from the fifth century onwards it was a dogma of the Church that the righteous were straightway admitted to the Beatific Vision, and any doctrine to the contrary was accursed.[426] Can stronger evidence exist of the non-Catholic origin of those legends? Islam, on the other hand, holds that from the time of death until the day of resurrection the souls of the just await judgment either in their graves, miraculously transformed into dwellings of temporary bliss, or in a garden of happiness lying apart from heaven.[427] The souls of martyrs alone appear to be immediately admitted to heaven, or rather to a Divine bower at the gate leading to the theological heaven. As will be shown hereunder, the scenes of this life of bliss prior to judgment bear a strong resemblance to several episodes of the Christian legends; and this similarity in descriptive detail, added to the coincidence of dogmatic belief, would seem to confirm the hypothesis of the Moslem origin of those legends. Nor is this belief, which, while still alive in Islam, had long been abandoned as heterodox by Western Christianity, the only proof of Moslem inspiration. Ozanam and D’Ancona state that many of the more poetic and edifying of these legends never received the official approval of the Church,[428] as if the latter had divined the existence, beneath the veil of poetic adornment, of a doctrine not altogether compatible with the orthodox creed. Indeed the palpable evidence of Islamic influence that will be found in many of these mediæval legends fully justifies that attitude.
4. In the following chapters the comparison of these legends with the Moslem tales is based—be it frankly admitted—not upon their entire texts, but upon the summaries furnished by the critics. Less minute, therefore, than the comparison aimed at in the two former parts of this work, it will serve to give a brief survey rather than a definite solution of this interesting literary problem.
Nor is any attempt made to group the Christian legends according to any new system. Where not already collected in cycles, they will be considered separately, even at the risk of repetition. Such repetition will not extend, however, to particulars the Islamic origin of which has already been proved. To these brief allusion only will be made and special attention paid to new features for which no Moslem precedent has so far been found.