From: rescorla@rtnmr.chem.yale.edu (Eric Rescorla)
Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc
Subject: Re: Is satan really evil?
Date: 18 Nov 92 16:00:14 GMT
Organization: Rescorla for himself.

In article <fVqpYAJ@quack.sac.ca.us> pharvey@quack.sac.ca.us (Paul Harvey) writes:
>In article <1992Nov17.163018.790@cs.yale.edu> 
>rescorla@rtnmr.chem.yale.edu (Eric Rescorla) writes:
>>In article <Bxv7FI.9E7@cmptrc.lonestar.org> 
>>The OT and NT both speak of a literal Satan. In the OT, he's the prosecuting
>>attorney of the divine court.
>Well, sort of. Satan is a Hebrew word, it is the word for adversary or as you
>say, prosecuting attorney. Somehow the Christians got confused, probably
>Paul, and thought Satan was a name. As the poster above says, there is no
>Hell and no Satan, Devil, Lucifer in Judaism. Judaism is pure monotheism.
Yes, I'm aware of the fact that "Satan" is a Hebrew word for "adversary",
however, the Satan, if you like, is a real individual, though subordinate
to God, and, as I say, the prosecuting attorney in God's court.

Your assertion that somehow Paul is the one who got it wrong is
simply nuts, however, and shows a complete unfamiliarity with the
Apochalyptic Eschatology. The idea of a literal "Satan" becomes much
more prevalant towards the time of Jesus, long before Paul. Jubilees,
I believe it is, refers to "Prince Mastema(lit. Hate)" who takes many
of the actions that seemed inappropriate for Yahweh to take. In specific,
he urges God to test Abraham. It doesn't have anything to do with the
Christians getting it wrong, but simply with modern Xianity being
an outgrowth of a dualistic eschatalogical tradition. I suggest you
compare the War Scroll from the DSS. Since Judaism is an outgrowth
of the Pharasaic tradition, it doesn't have this element.

>>In the NT, he is more or less the opposite of God.
>Well, now we are on rough ground. If Satan is truly the opposite of God, then
>we have dualism, not monotheism.
That's a matter of opinion. In classical Xian theology, (non Manicheist)
Satan is opposite in intentionality, but inferior in power. The claim
is that he is inferior and therefore not a God.

>The concept of Lord of the Underworld is
>Greco/Roman.
Not just Greco-Roman. Compare Gilgamesh for evidence of this.

> The concept of Lord of Light and Lord of Dark is Persian
>dualism. Paulist Christianity represents the combination of Hebrew monotheism
>plus the Greco/Roman Lord of the Underworld and God as man (Jesus) plus the
>Persian duality plus some pagan concepts like a Holy Trinity. And who said
>Paul wasn't a clever marketer.
As far as I can tell, Paul didn't sell the trinity, and hardly created
the idea of the Devil as we have him today. You really can't attribute
2000 years of Xian theology to Paul alone.

>By the way, are you aware of what the Devil's crime was? You see, God first
>created the angels, including Lucifer, and He commanded, "bow to no one but
>Me". Then He created man and He said, "Bow to man." Now, Lucifer and the
>archangels refused to bow to man. They felt it was insulting to God and they
>felt they caught God in a contradiction and perhaps He was testing them. So
>the archangels who refused to bow to man, led by Lucifer, were sentenced to
>Hell. And what is Hell? Hell is never being able to see He who they
>loved again, to never again see God. Think about it
This is all later myth. Perhaps you should see what the texts really
say before you come up with this sort of crap. For instance, Lucifer
is only mentioned in one place, Isaiah, and it's quite clear that
he is the King of Babylon, not any sort of divine figure whatsoever.

This isn't even the classical Xian myth, which is that Satan refused to
bow to God! (compare Paradise Lost). In either case, it's not grounded
in the text, and it's far from clear that it was a common belief
at the time the NT waws being written. I suggest you go back
and check the original texts to see what they really say.
-Ekr




-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Eric Rescorla, DoD#431 (Nighthawk S)              rescorla@rtnmr.chem.yale.edu
Former chemist now CM400 mechanic                 ekr@eitech.com(preferred)
                "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss."
Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc