What is the Devil???
In christian mythology, the devil is the fallen angel Lucifer. Apparently there was a palace coup in heaven, & Lucifer, previously one of god's chief consigliore, was on the wrong end of it. He was banished to an bad place & tempts mankind to evil.
Dark evil. He is not just a nature spirit party boy like Dionysus, who liked to tipple the good natural wine & have a good orgy. No, Satan comes from a very dark place.
But something's wrong here. If god is all powerful, all knowing, all loving, how come Lucifer is still around. God wasn't a very good executive not to know his relationship with his head honcho would end so badly, That's not all knowing. Why didn't he off him. "Lucifer, You lost the coup & we're going to terminate you with prejudice"
Or is this all a plot. Maybe they just pretended to have a falling out & have a secret deal. "Listen, Luc, You do the dirty work & help me preserve deniability. As a reward I'll give you god like powers". Maybe Satan is god's Jungian shadow.
Actually destruction, which we call evil from our human perspective, is part of reality. In the East they have Brahma, the creator, Vishnu, the preserver, & Shiva, the destroyer, all are essential parts of creation.
Actually Shiva doesn't do the destruction alone. He gets together with his girlfriend, Shakti, & they do a dance that tramples creation under their feet. Shakti is his power. (The woman always gets the blame for anything bad that happens)
So the devil may be a part of god's vast eternal plan--creation, continuance, destruction.
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Feel free to reply to any comment by clicking the "Reply" button.Judaism did not have a devil before the contact (conquest by) the Persian/babilonians.
The serpent of paradise was just a serpent, the concept of this dark god came from zoroastrism where the good and the evil gods are equal, but their powers are pumped by the followers.
So Judaism absorbed this concept, and created an evil god, but as the principle of Judaism is that there is only one god and all comes from him, the evil god cannot be an equal, it must be a lower class god, so they created this archangel creatures that are the next powerful thing after god, and said that the devil is as powerful as possible being after god because even amongst the archangels he was the biggest/favorite one.
In genesis the serpent and the men felt at the same time, and together they brought the evil to this world (not entering in the philosophical discussion about the real source of evil if YHWH is the source of everything).
Pedrohbds
Level 7
Sep 12, 2019
1
actually judaism still does not have a devil. the serpent isn't the devil, in judaism. it's just a talking snake, weird enough, but not the devil. there is no fallen angel, no devil at all, in judaism. there is ha-satan in the book of job, but that's a title, ha- being "the" and satan (sah TAHN) being a title similar to "prosecuting attorney." he's not a god or anything like a god. he's an employee.
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@genessa when I say a god I am talking about of divinity/supernatural being.
But I agree with you that is not defined as evil but more like an observer.
But as far as i remember there is the talk about spiritual battles, enemies, the lion that roar but cannot touch a chosen by god etc... Now I can be mixing old and new testament, it is being a while since I stopped studying those stuff.
@Pedrohbds ha-satan isn't described as divine or supernatural, or as not those things. he is ill-defined. all he has is his title, really, and it isn't an observer, but a prosecutor. as for mixing up old and new testaments, remember that the old testament is not the hebrew bible. they bear definite similarities, to the extent that many people think they're the same, but they're not. example (of many): in isaiah, the proper translation of a particular word is "maiden" as there is a hebrew word meaning "virgin" and the one in that book isn't that word. christians retranslate it as "virgin." hallelujah, instant miracle that didn't used to be there! so i can't vouch for what, regarding ha-satan, is in the old testament. but there is no devil in the hebrew bible -- which i have never studied, so i can't tell you anything about lions lol
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@genessa erros in translation are always there, that is why any serious study must go to the original or certify that the original meaning is correct in the translation.
I know they are different, but the histories and traditions on the old testament are at least some variations of what was practiced plus some romanticized historical register (and was in the interest of the church at the time). So at least for the costumes and religion variations you can us ethe old testament. Plus I never had on my hands the Hebrew book, I wish to some day be able to read it.
@Pedrohbds mmm, not just errors. deliberate changes. errors too, i'll grant you!
here, if you want, this is my fave (yeah, i'm an atheist, and i still have a favorite biblical text; go figure!) [mechon-mamre.org] if you were raised christian, you may notice some differences i don't know about, even if you haven't studied for a while (as i say, i never did).
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p.s. i also don't know that everything in the hebrew bible is a matter of practicing; a lot of it is a bunch of rules, but most of it isn't, right? anyway, enjoy!
)Zoroastrianism is said to be the world's oldest religion. This whole dichotomy between good & evil (Ahriman & Ahoramazdah) that seeped into Judiasm & Christianity came from them. The Parsees in India still practice it.
If YHWH is the source of everything, & in christian mythology, god is all powerful, all knowing, all loving, where did evil (the devil) come from. This involves Theodisy, which involves a contradiction between the supposed nature of god & the reality of the world. If god is all those things, how come we have suffering & injustice. We have industrial scale killing & maiming in wars, good people getting cancer, & sociopaths becoming billionaires on Wall St...
So god is not all powerful & has to put up with a lot of nonsense, or not all knowing & just doesn't know, or not all loving & just doesn't care.
We are the ones who determine if things are good or bad for us from our own perspective. An earthquake or tornado may kill people, but they are just natural phenomenon not caring about our concerns..
Maybe god's supposedly infinite conscouusness is not the same as our limited consciousness. Perhaps god is beyond such dualities as good & evil. perhaps to god it is all the same whether we live, suffer, die.
People rebel against this concept. They want the good parent in the sky who will protect them from evil.. But what we want is not necessarily what is. Get over it.
And if they are truly enemies...why does God seem to make wagers with him using humans as chips?
Nakedterror
Level 6
Sep 12, 2019
0
Perhaps they're frenemies. They look like like a couple of sports book fans who really went at it in the temptation of christ & such
Turns out, God at first had a whole cabinet of angels surrounding HIm. He only selected the best angels. They all gave total obedience to God but one day, one of the angels did not praise the Lord fast enough and out the angel went. More and more angels were expelled from the inner circle of angels. Sometimes God brought in new angels only to see those angels cast aside. In the end, it was just God and his kid, Jesus. Sad.
yamaha45701
Level 7
Sep 11, 2019
2
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