Is the devil evil...

[Chardok]

Because he is evil? That is to say, is he evil for the sake of being so, or is he evil because he HAS to be?

If the latter, then, what if he doesn't WANT to be evil, but is compelled to be by Divine mandate? What does that make him? Truly evil or evil because God says he is/makes him evil?


Perhaps...he doesn't THINK he's evil? He just doesn't know better...

What say you all?

[chitoryu12]

From what I understand, the Devil is evil because he turned away from God and stands for everything opposite what he represents. Unfortunately, I know particularly little about exactly what he does that makes him evil beyond giving the Master of the Universe the finger, mainly because a lot of people just call him evil because that's what they were taught, and then pass it on to others without really knowing everything about him.

[Darth Wong]

The Devil symbolizes disobedience in the Bible, not evil. But of course, in Biblical morality, disobedience is synonymous with evil.

[FSTargetDrone]

Speaking of the devil (HA!), here is a statue of him in a church, Rennes le Chateau (among several such statues in different churches in France, I believe):

[Tasoth]

I think, partially, why the devil is associated with evil is that christians have a hard time believing that their own god can be and is evil at the same time as being benevolent or what have you. Of course, but recognizing the devil as the ultimate evil and potentially on par with god means that they officially recognize another god.

[FSTargetDrone]

I think, partially, why the devil is associated with evil is that christians have a hard time believing that their own god can be and is evil at the same time as being benevolent or what have you. Of course, but recognizing the devil as the ultimate evil and potentially on par with god means that they officially recognize another god.

I'm not sure any mainstream Christian denomination understands or interprets the Devil as a "god." As the story goes, he was an angel cast out by God, but nothing I've ever been taught suggests he is in any way God's equal.

[Stark]

The devil even 'tempts' people into doing evil things, so at least half of the evil comes from the person who follows up his suggestions and deals etc.

[General Trelane (Retired)]

I think, partially, why the devil is associated with evil is that christians have a hard time believing that their own god can be and is evil at the same time as being benevolent or what have you. Of course, but recognizing the devil as the ultimate evil and potentially on par with god means that they officially recognize another god.

No, the Christian mythos generally holds that Lucifer (the devil) was once the most glorious of angels though never the equal of God. This angel rebelled and was defeated by God, and yet God allows him dominion on Earth until the Day of Judgement.

Thomas Paine sums it up in Part One of The Age of Reason:

IT is upon this plain narrative of facts, together with another case I am going to mention, that the Christian mythologists, calling themselves the Christian Church, have erected their fable, which for absurdity and extravagance is not exceeded by anything that is to be found in the mythology of the ancients.

The ancient mythologists tell us that the race of Giants made war against Jupiter, and that one of them threw a hundred rocks against him at one throw; that Jupiter defeated him with thunder, and confined him afterwards under Mount Etna; and that every time the Giant turns himself, Mount Etna belches fire. It is here easy to see that the circumstance of the mountain, that of its being a volcano, suggested the idea of the fable; and that the fable is made to fit and wind itself up with that circumstance.

The Christian mythologists tell that their Satan made war against the Almighty, who defeated him, and confined him afterwards, not under a mountain, but in a pit. It is here easy to see that the first fable suggested the idea of the second; for the fable of Jupiter and the Giants was told many hundred years before that of Satan.

Thus far the ancient and the Christian mythologists differ very little from each other. But the latter have contrived to carry the matter much farther. They have contrived to connect the fabulous part of the story of Jesus Christ with the fable originating from Mount Etna; and, in order to make all the parts of the story tie together, they have taken to their aid the traditions of the Jews; for the Christian mythology is made up partly from the ancient mythology, and partly from the Jewish traditions.

The Christian mythologists, after having confined Satan in a pit, were obliged to let him out again to bring on the sequel of the fable. He is then introduced into the garden of Eden in the shape of a snake, or a serpent, and in that shape he enters into familiar conversation with Eve, who is no ways surprised to hear a snake talk; and the issue of this tete-a-tate is, that he persuades her to eat an apple, and the eating of that apple damns all mankind.

After giving Satan this triumph over the whole creation, one would have supposed that the church mythologists would have been kind enough to send him back again to the pit, or, if they had not done this, that they would have put a mountain upon him, (for they say that their faith can remove a mountain) or have put him under a mountain, as the former mythologists had done, to prevent his getting again among the women, and doing more mischief. But instead of this, they leave him at large, without even obliging him to give his parole. The secret of which is, that they could not do without him; and after being at the trouble of making him, they bribed him to stay. They promised him ALL the Jews, ALL the Turks by anticipation, nine-tenths of the world beside, and Mahomet into the bargain. After this, who can doubt the bountifulness of the Christian Mythology?

Having thus made an insurrection and a battle in heaven, in which none of the combatants could be either killed or wounded --put Satan into the pit--let him out again--given him a triumph over the whole creation--damned all mankind by the eating of an apple, there Christian mythologists bring the two ends of their fable together. They represent this virtuous and amiable man, Jesus Christ, to be at once both God and man, and also the Son of God, celestially begotten, on purpose to be sacrificed, because they say that Eve in her longing had eaten an apple.

[Superman]

The devil supposed to bad, but how "evil" is he compared to a god who creates flawed humans and then blames them for his own mistake? If god knows the future, then he knowingly creates humans who will later burn in hell for eternity. I don't know of anything as evil as that.

[Winston Blake]

The Devil is evil because "Humans Have Always Ascribed Random, Seasonal, Natural Or Inexplicable Actions To Human Shaped Entities" [Hogfather]. There have always been good spirits and evil spirits. God is a convenient collection of all the Christian sense of goodness, so all the evilness is ascribed to the Devil. It's like inverse monotheism.

Arguments based on historical mythology ignore the fact that most Christians don't know much about the historical mythology of God. He's not Yahweh, God of the Israelites, one god among many. He's just Santa Claus supersized. He's just an amalgamation of all that is 'good', by definition.

Actually, is Christianity strictly monotheistic, if the Devil is such a major player?

[Oskuro]

If my (limited) knowledge serves me right, the figure of the Devil wasn't as prominent in Christian mythology until the "happy old times" of the Black Death and other catastrophes, wich made a lot of people wonder "why would a loving God do this?".

Since people were not buying the "we deserve it" bullshit anymore, the church decided to blame the Devil for virtually anything considered "evil", from impure thoughts, to crimes, plagues, or spoilt food.

[Elfdart]

The idea of the Devil being evil comes from Zoroastrianism, where the Good Ahura Mazda is always in conflict with the Evil Angra Mainyu. A lot of the New Testament is influenced by that religion and other Iranian mythology, including Jesus' title -King of Kings.

In the Old Testament, Satan is just one of Jehovah's henchmen sent to smite humans on earth -in Satan's case, Job. On the other hand, the Angel of Death kills off multitudes of Egyptians, especially children. If one extrapolates from this, the AoD is the higher-ranking assassin given the really important hit jobs, while Satan is just a low-level prankster. Neither can be considered "evil" unless one also considers Jehovah to be evil (which he is) since he put out the contracts on the first born of Egypt and Job's family in the first place.

[Patrick Degan]

As an aside, I find hilarious the sight of FSTargetDrone's one post on this page which features the statue of the Devil and, right beneath it in the sig space, the silhouette of Joel and the Bots pointing to it.

How apropos.

[Rye]

Satan has gone through a lot of incarnations and interpretations, but most of them aren't really evil when you look at them. Initially, when other gods were relogated to minor divinity status (i.e. angels, agents of God, rather than other gods), Satan was more of an "adversary" in a courtroom sense, i.e. the advocate whose requirement was to argue with God for how to "test" people's faith and conviction to make sure they are truly deserving of being blessed.

In Isaiah for instance, God is treated more as an all-encompassing source/governor of reality rather than the ultimate good guy as he's seen now. 45.7 has him claiming he is the architect of all light and dark, good and evil, blessing and disaster, not Satan.

Noxious spirits and evil gods have been popular too, of course, and like with the angel of death, these were usually shown to be dominatable by the head honcho god, be it Ra or whoever. Evil entities account for bad luck in handy ways and can create a good Orwellian atmosphere useful for galvanising a cause by creating invisible constant enemies that you can manipulate people into obedience through.

The more modern mythology regarding Satan and the implications to morality are fascinating. The story goes that Satan wanted better treatment for the angels compared to man, or he wanted to exalt himself to the throne and for his pride or his attempts to force his will upon God and the universe, he was cast down to rule over the world until judgement day where he and God would have a bit of a showdown and he'd lose.

Seeking recognition for angels doesn't seem exactly immoral and though he's called the prince of lies and various other things, he doesn't actually seem to lie anywhere. He doesn't kill, his "evil" is mostly defined in reference to his defiance of religious authority. The christian scriptures say that the sheep are the flock of goodness, because they're docile and obedient, meanwhile ornery goats are evil and disobedient.

At most, Satan is described as some sort of power-grabbing 80s vice president, there's nothing to suggest he has more bloodlust than God or worse morals.

[Patrick Degan]

Well, let's face it, the whole Job story gives the game away. Essentially, it's God and Satan in a pub and the Horned One says "A fiver that Job guy curses your name if you really fuck him over."

To which, in reply, God puts his cash on the bar and says "You're on."

[FSTargetDrone]

As an aside, I find hilarious the sight of FSTargetDrone's one post on this page which features the statue of the Devil and, right beneath it in the sig space, the silhouette of Joel and the Bots pointing to it.

How apropos.

[Zablorg]

Funnily enough, the banner for this page is "The Story of Satan".

And when Death was talking about his friends telling him shit about pickup lines, it had one about getting into a relationship with millionares.

Does it search for certain words then displays the appropriate banner or something?

[Durandal]

There's no record in the Bible of Satan ever inflicting any evil or harm on humans. If you list out their rap sheets, Satan is a fucking choir boy next to God. Satan is basically a projection mechanism for Christians. They project all their flaws onto the devil and say that they're going to defeat him in combat on Judgment Day. (Though the exact nature of this combat has never been explained. Will Satan come in with a bunch of tanks or something?)

[Darth Ruinus]

I seem to remember a story, I forgot where, that Satan was actually a pretty nice guy, and he and his legion of angels swore loyalty to God, and God only.

So, one day God creates people, and basically tells all the other angels up in Heaven that people are your superiors, and you shall kneel before them.

Well, Satan goes, No, I and my angels swore we would only kneel and be loyal to you, so no dice.

God gets pissed and kicks him out.

Or maybe this was Lucifer, and there is a difference between them? Oh well... crazy religion

[Darth Wong]

There's no record in the Bible of Satan ever inflicting any evil or harm on humans. If you list out their rap sheets, Satan is a fucking choir boy next to God. Satan is basically a projection mechanism for Christians. They project all their flaws onto the devil and say that they're going to defeat him in combat on Judgment Day. (Though the exact nature of this combat has never been explained. Will Satan come in with a bunch of tanks or something?)

You have to admit that blaming all of your bad deeds on Satan is a great way to get off the hook. It totally convinced Mike Huckabee to pardon a rapist who went on to murder and rape again. I guess Satan got to him again.

[Knife]

Or maybe this was Lucifer, and there is a difference between them? Oh well... crazy religion

Satan is more of a title, AFAIK. While Lucifer was just latin for lightbringer (or somesuch) which was another name for the satan character. Remember the 'Morningstar'? Same thing. You can link Samiel to that too, from even older Judeo myth.

Azaziel was a different character though, who often gets lumped in with the devil.

[Rye]

Or maybe this was Lucifer, and there is a difference between them? Oh well... crazy religion

Satan is more of a title, AFAIK. While Lucifer was just latin for lightbringer (or somesuch) which was another name for the satan character. Remember the 'Morningstar'? Same thing. You can link Samiel to that too, from even older Judeo myth.

Azaziel was a different character though, who often gets lumped in with the devil.

I have to point out that lucifer, initially was not about Satan, that was a later recombination/misappropriation of ideas. Lucifer was a roman god of the planet venus, and its use in Isaiah is in a similar capacity, it refers to the jewish version of the deity that represented the morning star (i.e. venus the planet), which has probably something to do with Athtar, the canaanite god of the morning star that has a superficially similar tale in canaanite myth, and it's pretty clear that jewish stuff is largely descendent from the canaanites.

Oh, and a fascinating god to look up is one called Melek Taus. It's the god of a still existent middle eastern religion (yezidi kurds, iirc), and its followers believe he is the "evil one" mentioned in other religions. Obviously, this has run them into some issues with muslims and christians in the past!

[speaker-to-trolls]

I think the medieval Lucifer, the fallen angel we're all familiar with, is evil in his own right. I see him as being Caesar to Gods Pompey, only he lost, so now he has to take out his frustration at having lost the chance of supreme power AND the chance to ever see paradise again by fucking with humanity.

Satan from the Old Testament I don't think can be classed as evil, at least not in the same way, as I imagine he's a construct created by God to test his children on Earth, so he really can't do anything else.

The Islamic Iblis is a more tricky case, I'm not sure exactly what he does in Islamic tradition but his fall from grace wasn't his fault as it was with Lucifer, he was kicked out of Heaven because God told him only to kneel before Himself, then told him to kneel before Adam. Iblis couldn't kneel before Adam because it would contradict his first order, but that meant he disobeyed the Almighty and was thrown out. I'm not sure he could be called evil after that, since he sounds pretty much like a sci fi supercomputer defeated by a logical paradox.

[wautd]

Just compare eachother body count and the answer should be pretty obvious

[Darth Ruinus]

I'm not sure he could be called evil after that, since he sounds pretty much like a sci fi supercomputer defeated by a logical paradox.

That sounds way cool, but you probably shouldnt tell people that their gods and deities can be compared to hyperintelligent supercomputers, it might make them angry.