Yes, all decent people do hate the "idea" of Satan.
This is going be a long post, but then it takes so much time and effort to dispel myth. Talk about a flaw in the Bilbe.
We believe equally in Satan as God now, but this was not always the case as you all know. The Devil like God has become a particular concept in the mind, every person has their own demons. I find the history interesting but the fact we have to ask is, why do we need a Devil if we have God.
Yahweh and Satan relate to a supposed conduct. As we can trace the evolution of God through history from the Summerians through the Egyptians, to the Hebrews, Persians, Greeks, Romans, all have helped in the development of the Devil through cultural transference.
Christians believe Christianity is pure and was fathered by Judaism. But as you study Christianity it has been influenced as much by the Persians, and Greeks and Romans as by Judaism. Strangely our views are more in line with Persian beliefs then Judaism. If you go back, the Devil has never really been a part of the Hebrew Bible. I use the term Hebrew Bible to maintain connectivity of the OT to our Testament. To understand the OT you are required to understand the source material.
It is the Christian philosophy that took the Devil from rags to riches and raised the popularity of Satan to demigod. The Hebrews didn't believe in original sin nor Satan. Satan was a ha-satan and servant to Yahweh in original thought. In the tenure of Judaism there's little need for Satan because ha-satan has always played minor but specific roles. He was simply an obstructor. Anything could be a ha-satan. In Judaism ha-satan (Satan) was not the enemy of God. Satan was submissive to God, acting in his behalf.
Actually in 200 BCE we have ha-satan from the Hebrew Bible promoted to the rank of Satan who becomes this traditional foe. The idea comes from the Book of Enoch. This Bood claims biblical authority, explaining where evil started and fell in favor in late Judaism and with Christian leadership in the 1st century AD. From this text we get the idea of fallen agnles as well as the war in heaven. The idea of Satan is cemented.
The difficulty started with Job when evil was becomeing a dominant theme. Yahweh was being asked questions. The claim of Christians is we can point to the Bible and say, no where does it blame God for evil. I've never understood this logic. But Evil needed to be explained in particular with Job, trying to explain the suffering of Israel. From God's rib we made his opposite.
I'm not so much opposed to the development of Satan as by Christians who not only project their image of God unto everyone, but also Satan. Paul was a Hellenized Jew which means he accepted pagan ideas and certainly understood them. It's clear the man had issues with himself as he constantly berates and belittles himself as bad. Christianity has taken ha-satan to infer the Devil can recieve worship as it is almost equal to God. The continuation of Paul became one of temptation, not service moving from suffering to sin. The conclusion is the dualism of good and evil which is the elaboration of monotheism. However the Hebrew religion never had this concept.
The first concept we have of evil of a comic nature comes from the Persian's. Keep in mind, ancient religions were not based on love or salvation or similar ideas we hold today. We like to believe Christianity is pure and we hold the belief Judaism fathered us. This may shock some, but you need to understand Christianity has it's own historyy, as does Judaism, as does God. We have to accept early religions borrowed freely from one another through contact, invasion, conquest, trade, travel, and cultural interaction, something we don't want to consider in these times now that religions are established. This isn't intended to be a criticism, but we don't want to consider our belief of evil is more in line with early Persain beliefs then being in line with the Hebrew theme of God (thought), when it is not.
It is Christianity that gave Satan its form. In all seriousness if Jesus was a devote Jew and believed in Hebrew things, then how could he believe in something contrary to it, especially in his own words, when he said he did not come to destroy the Torah. In this context the idea of Satan would be. After Jesus in baptized, Satan (is sent?) immediately tests Jesus. Here the use of ha-satan is employed as servant, like in Job, ha-satan can be seen to test Jesus to make sure he is ready for the task ahead. This would be consistent with the theme of the OT whereas the NT is not.
It's interesting Judaism never fully embraced the pure concept of evil, whereas Christianity has. Our Evil and God seem more in line with mid-eastern thought and of Greek and Roman paganism. Zorastrianism with the first known religion that had the concept of a "total good" God opposed by total evil. The religion embraces a lot the Hebrews came to adopt but that goes beyond this discussion.
What's important to understand is most ancient Religions were not to survive and so we arrogantly assume they contributed nothing when in fact the reverse is ture. Religion is layered. Religion was a matter of empires long ago and they moved across territories and time, and all the concepts included traveled with them which we built on.
Man has always believed invisible beings were around him even from his beginning. I hear Christians marvel at their religion (as all belief systems do) saying the fact it exists proves it's true. But Christians have no deep sense of their own history. I would think we'd take grater pride in ourselves. But at the same time if we do, we'll see how we changed. As a rule, religion can't remain pure and will always take into itself adoptions and be infuenced and bias. We always draw on the past, and on opinions of theologians long dead that lock us in virtual ideas. As a Christian, I understand we all are locked into what we believe, as is true of any religion, becuase if we reject any part of our belief, we must abandon the whole. But as an agnositc I am open to various ideas and realistically could accept Jesus as God for example if he could be properly explained. Somtimes I do get tired of all claiming to know God and it's difficult to maintain a balance of neutrality.
Last edited by lemmex : 12-21-2006 at 08:07 PM.
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