In this canto, Virgil guides Dante through the part of hell reserved for the creators of discord or scandals as well as those who caused divisions in the church. These people are condemned to walk around until they encounter a devil who slices them up with a sword, according to the particular nature of their crime. These are gruesome encounters: Mahomet, for example, is disemboweled for having created a division in the people of God through inventing (from the Roman Catholic point of view) Islam. Worse yet, the punishment never ends; as the sinner walks around, his wound heals, but as soon as it heals, he meets the devil with the sword again and the cycle repeats itself. In The Inferno, the punishment always fits the crime, so in this case, these people are physically torn apart because they metaphorically tore people or groups of people apart in life.