author
Miguel Asín Palacios
1871–1944
A pioneering Spanish scholar and priest, he explored the meeting point between Islam and Christian thought with unusual range and curiosity. He is best remembered for arguing that parts of Dante’s Divine Comedy may have drawn on Islamic traditions.
1 Audiobook
Islam and the Divine comedy
by Miguel Asín Palacios
About the author
Born in Zaragoza in 1871, Miguel Asín Palacios became one of Spain’s leading scholars of Arabic language and Islamic thought while also serving as a Roman Catholic priest. His work ranged across philosophy, theology, mysticism, and the intellectual history of medieval Spain.
He wrote extensively on major figures and traditions in Islam, including al-Ghazali and Ibn Arabi, and helped bring Arabic and Islamic studies to a wider scholarly audience in Spain. His most famous book, La escatología musulmana en la Divina Comedia (1919), sparked lasting debate by proposing that Dante was influenced by Muslim accounts of the afterlife.
Beyond his books, he held important academic posts and was elected to several major Spanish academies, including the Real Academia Española. He died in San Sebastián in 1944, leaving behind a body of work that still matters to readers interested in how cultures, religions, and ideas shape one another.