\b0 In Pagan belief, the underworld was considered a place beyond the tomb. In
Christianity, the underworld, or Hell, is the place of punishment for the souls of sinners. The idea of a world beyond the grave situated below ground was initially derived by association - corpses are buried below the ground. Later, in Roman times, it
assumed a cosmological dimension as referring to the lower part of the universe where not just the dead but the gods of the dead were to be found. \par
In the Hebrew tradition, the idea of an afterlife was vague. Initially, the afterworld was thought of
as a huge cave where the souls of the deceased, which were lacking in conscience and will, were gathered together indifferently. By the time of the Maccabees, the idea of a difference in the state of the souls of the just and the unjust had begun to ma
ke some headway. In the sermons of Jesus, Hell is referred to by the term Gehenna, a place of damnation and suffering in contrast with the state of happiness of the righteous in the Kingdom of God. In the Catholic Faith, Hell is regarded as a potential c
ondition of the soul after death. The depiction of Hell by \b \cf4 \ATXht5 Michelangelo\b0 \cf0 \ATXht0 recalls the Divine Comedy of \b \cf4 \ATXht418 Dante\b0 \cf0 \ATXht0 and the medieval concept of Hell, which in the Italian of Dante is called Infer
no from the Latin adjective \i Infernus\i0 , which comes from the word \i Inferus\i0 meaning ôsituated below,ö ôthat which is underneath.ö\par
