Satan and Lucifer in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam

History Of Satan

Since the very dawn of civilization, the battle between good and evil has been part of the mythology and interconnected philosophies of human beings. From the Epic of Gilgamesh to the battles between Egyptian Gods, to the words of the Koran and the Bible, conceptions of the battle of good and evil abound in popular, philosophical, legal, and religious literature. Many theologians and scholars have tried to argue the creation of evil. They question if God created it or if man and his perversion of the good created the absence of "goodness," and therefore the necessity of evil. Add to this the human capacity for a sliding scale of evil (e.g. deception, lust, greed, avarice), and we have an epitome of the human condition.

In fact, one of the most predominant symbols in many world religions is that of a man and a woman, created in the image of God, bound to the teachings of that God, with the directive to mate and populate the earth. Symbolically, this is the way most cultures understood the way that humans came to live upon the earth. Within the context of the Qur'an and the Bible, the basic story tells of Adam (in Hebrew meaning dust or mankind) created from God, and Eve (living one) created from a part of Adam as the first man and woman to live on earth, in an idyllic place called, "The Garden of Eden." Representing evil or Satan, a serpent invades this holy garden, tempting Eve, and thus brought the concept of evil into the world (Farley, 1990, intro).

Further, Adam and Eve have two sons, Cain and Abel, and by allowing evil (original sin, etc.) into the world, Cain, through jealousy, kills Abel, thus explaining the manner in which humanity is flawed. There are, however, some very basic differences between the explanation and interpretation of the Adam and Eve story between Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. In brief, Adam and Eve (representing mankind) were created on Earth in a place made for them by God called the Garden of Eden (Genesis 2:8). For Islam, Man was created in Janna (Paradise) and then banished to earth later (Qur'an 2:36). The Bible tells that God took 6 days to create the world, and each day had a specific creation hierarchy, similar in the Qur'an -- but in the Bible, mankind was created to live in harmony with the "beasts," (Genesis 1:29-30), but to devour cattle and survive by predation (Qur -- an 6:142, 16:5). All which is designed to form the basic structure of the manner in which humanity exists and why there is a place called Earth.

This leads to why there is evil (sin) on earth. In the Bible, mankind has access to the entire garden (earth) with the exception of the "Tree of Knowledge," usually thought to represent the idea of good and evil, and the explanation for the dichotomy between the two.

And the Lord God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die"(Genesis 2:16-17). In Islam, though, there is not a "Tree of Knowledge," but a "Tree of Eternity," which may or may not be linguistically identical, but has similar properties of giving life (Qur'-an 7:20). Further, the Qur'-an has no symbol for Satan/Evil in a serpent, but uses both the metaphor of nakedness and shame to understand certain structural aspects of society (Qur'an 2:34, 7:19).

To explain original sin, the Bible indicates that the Serpent tempted Eve:

The serpent enticed Eve, denying she would die. "You will not surely die," the serpent said to the woman. "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." (Genesis 3:1-5). and, in the Qur'an:

Satan enticed Adam and his wife. 'But Satan whispered evil to him: He said, "O Adam! Shall I lead thee to the Tree of Eternity and to a kingdom that never decays?" 'Then began Satan to whisper suggestions to them & #8230; He said: "Your Lord only forbade you this tree, lest ye should become angels or such beings as live forever." (Qur'an 20:120, 7:20-21).

And, after disobeying God's orders, both texts indicate that there is just punishment from God. This "just punishment," explains a hierarchy, as well as why humans must toil, why sickness exists, and the quintessential question -- why is there evil in the world? for, after the fall, Adam and Eve are banned from Eden, set to work the fields and toil, and there would forever be part of the Earth that would not support life (Genesis 3:23-24, 3:17-19). The Qur'an, however, does not mention banishment, death is not the ultimate enemy, and negativity (bad things) is part of Creation, not a separate, recreated concept (7:20). While the Bible says that as descendants of Adam, all are born with a sinful nature (Psalms 51:5; Romans 3:23), the Muslim view is that man is born innocent. Qur'an refers to sin as 'earned' (4:111, 6:120, 24:11) (Catchpool, 2002).

It is with the basic concept of humanity, though, that a most interesting comparison exists. In Judaic tradition, Adam is likely to have been created as both man & woman (at least spiritually, but possibly a hermaphrodite as well). Adam was lonely, though, so God created Eve from Adam, symbolically linking the two genders together, but not the concept of original sin (Jews Believe in the Satan, and Not in the Devil, 2003). Symbolically, then, what is clear is that there needed to be a clear explanation for creation, for the "things" on earth (beasts, weather, natural resources, etc.), as well as a believable "story" to support the idea of people spreading from the original source, speaking different languages, and while having free-will, having the conceptualization of evil in the world.

Origins of the Concept of Satan -- the term Satan is actually from the Hebrew, "the accuser," or in Arabic Shaytan,"the adversary." Looking at the terms for both, the term itself is really an antagonism from the basis of Abrahamic religions. If there is an ultimate good, then there must be an adversary or opposite of the light. However, over the centuries, the term has been embellished and has taken on new meanings, some of which have moved from the adversarial religious symbol to the embodiment of pure evil.

The conception of the evil one, though, the Devil, also has roots in similar theology and concepts. In Ancient Greek the term diablolos meant "slanderer or accuser." This is one of the more common views of the Devil - a personification of evil and enemy of God and humanity. The Devil can be seen as the absence of good -- the nature of the "anti." The Devil is typically associated with all manner of infidels, heretics, and unbelievers -- and psychologically has been a way to conceptualize an enemy so that the humanity of the individual is snatched away. Some beliefs see the Devil as a manifestation of evil spirits, of all that can go wrong on the natural earth, even as an allegory that represents a crisis of belief, or turning from the path of tradition, and even at times for those who simply disagree with the status quo. This personification of evil is as old as societies -- and continues on into the contemporary mythos as the archetype of evil. Ironically, the term is bandied about so that we have the "Axis of Evil," former President Regan calling the Ayotolla Khomeni the "Devil," and in turn, the Ayotolla referring to Regan as "The Great Satan" (Keene, 1986).

The idea of the Devil, or evil incarnate, is, like Good, a system. It is at once part of human tradition and culture, and provides a way to explain certain events, as well as allow for there to be a side of temptation. Evil can be a distortion in moral and philosophical thought, something as tangible as the deeds of the Nazi party, or simply a way to explain further genocide and the way humans can even conceive something so vast and horrible that the only possible way it could exist within the human psyche is for some outside force to hold control (Muchembled, 2003).

The concept of evil as the antithesis of good comes to us between three and five thousand years BC with the Sumerian Civilization of Mesopotamia. In the Epic of Gilgamesh, we find the explanation for evil, the fact that the God's had the power of good and evil over humans, and the power to punish with the Great Flood story. But what is interesting about the evolution of not only this mythos, but the conception of the Devil is that we can trace archaeologically a movement from numerous Gods (upwards of 600) and no truly evil one; through the gradual build-up of civilization and urbanization, a lessening of the number of Gods and a juxtaposition of good and evil as light and dark -- opposites in the battle for humanity. These Gods subjugated humans in a way that never happened in other primitive river-valley cultures yet seemed to follow a political will as the concept evolved. This finally culminates in the marriage between the God of Above, Nergal, lord of Summer, Growth and Heat; and the Goodness of the Below, Ereshkigal, queen of the underworld, Winter, the Cold, and of Death. We now have opposites, attracted, and yet polarized in deed, action, and even interpretation (Messadie, 1996, 90-7).

This conception then seems to flow mythologically out of the Middle East into other cultures; we have the trickster, the shadow, the evil one, and even the unknown. However, considering the geographical location of the Abrahamic religions, it is logical that there would be a cross-over from the archetype that would manifest itself within these religious traditions.

Satan in Judaism -- in traditional Judaic thought, there is no conception of the Devil in the same way as in Christianity or Islam. The Toranic tradition holds that it is the adversary, the obstacle, or the prosecutor, that embodies not the antithesis of God, but another player in the large role of the Universe, with God as the ultimate Judge. This tradition appears as "ha-satan" in Number 22:22 and Samuel 29:4.

Thus, for Judaism, there is a difference between an evil one and part of the duality of God. Judaic tradition rejects any idea that conflicts with the one true God (indivisible) because anything else precludes a total monotheistic viewpoint. Some of the cultures in the Ancient World, even contemperaneous with the early Jews, held that there was a God in heaven above who continually battled with a God of the underworld, or hell, for humanity and the promulgation of good vs. evil (e.g. The Greek Zeus/Hades paradigm).

One way to understand this major difference is in the way the Hebrew language refers to God, and the way there is a complexity of terminology. For most of the Bible, God is referred to as Elohim, which could mean God, Gods, or goodlike, or idol god. When this was translated, though, the meaning is not as ambiguous:

And God spoke all of these words, saying,

I am the Lord thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt,

Out of the house of bondage,

Thou shalt have no other gods before me (Exodus 20:1-3).

Now, if we simply replace the translations with the Hebraic word Elohim, we find something a bit different:

And Elohim spoke all of these words, saying,

I am the Lord thy Elohim, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt,

Out of the house of bondage,

Thou shalt have no other Elohim before me (Exodus 20:1-3).

This complexity about God (gods, idols, etc.) is central to the view that there is no duality; no yin/yang, no upper or lower. This, to Jews, is not monotheism. Ha-Satan is, in essence, a being (not a Fallen Angel) who acts like a prosecuting attorney in God's Court. This Prosecutor, as far back as Genesis, is a tempter, but in a way that is not evil, but that points out to God the many flaws of humanity. Ha-Satan has no power or authority; he may cajole, tempt, or influence; but no real power without God's will. This is also obvious in the story of Job and the way Ha-Satan psychologically plays the drama so that humans appear to be weak and wanting (Wray and Mobley, 2005).

Note, for instance, the dialog between Ha-Satan and God -- in which Satan must ask for permission to conduct a drama against Job to prove a point:

And the Eternal said unto < he>Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that fears God, and eschews evil? And still he holds fast his integrity, although thou < he Satan> moves me against him, to destroy him without cause. And Satan answered the Eternal, and said, Skin for skin, yea, all that a man hath will he give for his life. But put forth thine hand 's hand now, and touch his bone and his flesh, and he will curse thee to thy face. And the Eternal said unto Satan, Behold, he is in thine hand; but save his life (Job 2:3-6)

However, in a greater contextual framework, we can see that there might be not only a religious, but a moral problem with this viewpoint. If Elohim controls all things, for instance:

I am the Lord, and there is no other

I form light and create darkness,

I make weal and create woe,

I the Lord do all these things (Isaiah 45: 6-7)

Where does evil come from then? Why do bad things happen? If there is but one God who controls everything, then traditionally we have a conundrum. Too, within the Old Testament, there are other Gods mentioned (Baal, Astartek and Molech), all of whom later become synonymous with Satan. Indeed, when one analyzes the Ha-Satan in the Old Testament, one finds that it is predominantly after the Exile, after the triumph of monotheism, that Ha-Satan begins to appear with regularity, not as the arch-opponent of God, or the embodiment of evil, but as a cosmic Adversary -- the great skeptic, if you will, and one who is not responsible for human suffering, but revels in the ability to "prove" that humankind is weak and wanting (Wray and Mobley, 39). In no way does this change the ultimate hierarchy of the power of God, it simply adds another player that has a role to play in the cosmic drama.

As a sort of transitory set of texts, however, the Hebrew Apocrypha, while not necessarily accepted as scripture by much of Judaism, there is a new interpretation of Satan, represented as the one who brought death into the world ("But by the envy of the devil, death came into the world," Book of Wisdom II:24). Other parts of the Apocrypha contain references to a being cast out of heaven and a being who knew the difference between right and wrong and choose that which was sinful:

And I threw him out from the height with his angels, and he was flying in the air continuously above the bottomless (2 Enoch 29:4).

The devil is the evil spirit of the lower places, as a fugitive he made Sotona from the heavens as his name was Stanail, thus he became different from the angels, but his nature did not change his intelligence as far as his understanding of righteousness and sinful things (2 Enoch 31:4).

The Apocrypha was regularly used by the Hassid Jews of the 17th and 19th century; those particularly in Europe. There Satan was Baal Davar, a name that goes back to Babylonia, and he was an angel cast out of heaven for refusing to obey the will of God (Davidson, 1967, 67). For most of Judaic tradition though, Ha-Satan remains part of the cosmic court, part of the natural order of things; he rules nothing, he has no power, he simply is, and any temptations humans may face are not the result of Satanic influence, but of human fallability and choice (Kelly, 2006, 20-24).

Satan in Christianity- the Christian concept of Satan is multidimmensional, and not really a single paradigm, but an amalgamation of a number of different traditions, mostly taken from the Jewish tradition and the pagan cultures of the Mediterranean, then combined with literary extrapolations from the Middle Ages. For mainstream Christianity, the Devil, Lucifer, is Satan. He is a part of Heaven, a fallen angel who rebelled against God; was embodied in the "serpent" in the Book of Genesis and caused original sin, and therefore the need for Christ's coming and eventual redemtion. Christians see Lucifer as the embodinement of evil. This is where the idea of Satan in Christianity becomes ambigious -- for some, Satan is literal; for some more metaphorical. In fact, most of the history of the Christian Satan over the last millenium is a combination of a Medieval and post-Medieval reading of the scriptures combined with popular mythology and embellished for literary and cultural purposes (Russell, 1986). This may be based on a bit of the Book of Revelations which refers to the deceiver and "the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan" (Rev: 12:9, 20:2).

There is somewhat of a progression in the Christian Bible that helped the tradition of the evil one progress through the ages. We know there is an allusion in Genesis, God rebukes the serpent casting him out of paradise, "And I will put enmity between thee and the woman and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head and thou shall bruise his heel" (Genesis 3:14-15). Yet, this same adversary challenges God in Job.

In the New Testament Luke sees "Satan fall like lightning from heaven" (10:18), and in opposition to the goodness of God, Matthew notes "Then cometh the wicked one" (13:19). But the idea of Satan is less pure evil and more symbolic of taking the path against God. However, there are numerous incidents of demonic possession in the New Testament. Luke saus Satan entered Judas before Judas' betrayal (Luke 22:3) and Jesus cast out demons or evil spritsin Mark 5:1-20.

However, for most fundamentalist religions, or conservative bents, it is the Satan of Revelations that epitomizes the modern concept of good vs. evil. According to Christian teaching, Satan will wage a final war against Jesus -- the final battle between good and evil. Some see Satan as triumphing as the Anti-Christ, ruling for 1,000 years at which time the Earth will be cleansed of all evil and sin will be no more (Revelations 21:1-4).

This may, however, be more symbolic in that philosophically there must be opposition for balance to occur. This occurs in numerous cultures; yin/yang, light/dark, good/evil, day/night and is consistent with Ancient cosmology as well as seasons, human emotions (happiness/anger or sadness, etc.). Philosophers have debated for centuries if indeed it was possible to have one without the other, and it appears that Christian teachings buttress the argument that it is not.

However, it is really not the Lucifer of the New Testament that is the devil as we know it in Western popular culture. To understand this development we must first understand that the Middle Ages were far more than the transitory period between Roman times and the Renaissance (Modern Times). Instead, after about 1000 the growth of literacy led to a huge shift in cultural attitudes, including a burgeoning growth of both self-consciousness and critical awareness of a more intellectual approach to the universe. Of course, theology was the basis for all thought, philosophy, and law; but scholasticism developed in which the monestaries became the seats of learning and a more dialectical approach to the philosophical problems of Christianity ensued (Dougherty, 2009). This added yet a third tradition to thinking about evil -- Scripture, tradition, and now reason -- analysis of scripture.

Scholars believe that his new emphasis on reason actually changed the way the Devil was viewed. Instead of relying of pure mysticism and heresay, the new scholastics, in their quest to understand the power of the universe, constructed "elaborate rational superstructures upon weak epistemological bases -- upon inexact observations of nature…. Resulting with a detailed, but insecure, diabology" (Russell, 169). Certainly, this tradition paved the way to the next majore view of evil, and of Hell -- namely Dante's Divine Comedy.

Beasied being a treatise on the socio-political climate of the time, Dante used the concept of Hell and Satan to explain human imperfection and a way to see another organization within the temporal world. Dante parodies the Trinity in the three parts of Satan, but also paints a mythology that became truth for many, and certainly part and parcel of modern popular culture. Satan in Dante's works is quite familiar to the modern individual: demonic, able to possess a human's free will, lizard like but able to pretend, a liar, thief of sould, and the archenemy of God and all that is good in the universe (Anderson, 2010, 365-75).