Satan

VIEW:30 DATA:01-04-2020
contrary; adversary; enemy; accuser
Hitchcock's Bible Names Dictionary


SATAN
1. In the OT.—The term Satan is Hebrew and means ‘adversary.’ In the earlier usage of the language it is employed in the general sense of ‘adversary,’ personal or national: (cf. e.g. Num_22:22, 2Sa_19:22, 1Ki_5:4; 1Ki_11:25 etc.). In such passages no trace of a distinct being designated ‘Satan’ is to be seen. Such a being meets us for the first time in the OT in the prologue (chs. 1 and 2) of the Bk. of Job, in the person of one of ‘the sons of God’ who bears the title of ‘the Satan.’ Here Satan appears as a member of the celestial council of angelic beings who have access to the presence of God. His special function is to watch over human affairs and beings with the object of searching out men’s sins and accusing them in the celestial court. He is thus invested with a certain malevolent and malignant character; but it is to be observed that he has no power to act without the Divine permission being first obtained, and cannot, therefore, be regarded as the embodiment of the power that opposes the Deity. In Zec_3:2 essentially the same view of ‘the Satan’ is presented. But in 1Ch_21:1 (‘And Satan stood up against Israel, and moved David to number Israel’) the personality of this being is more distinct: he appears now as ‘Satan’ (a proper name without the article), the tempter who is able to provoke David to number Israel. This is the Chronicler’s (4th or 3rd cent. b.c.) reading of the incident which in the earlier narrative (2Sa_24:1) is ascribed to the direct action of God Himself. Here (in Chron.) the work of Satan is apparently conceived of as more or less independent of, and opposed to, the Divine action.
2. In the extra-canonical literature of the OT.—In the later (apocryphal) literature of pre-Christian Judaism the dualistic tendency becomes more pronounced—a tendency powerfully affected by Persian influence, it would seem, which is also apparent in the development of an elaborate Jewish angelology and demonology. This is most clearly visible in the apocalyptic literature. In the oldest part of the Bk. of Enoch (chs. 1–36), dating, perhaps, from about b.c. 180, the origin of the demons is traced to the fall of the angelic watchers, the ‘sons of God’ who corrupted themselves with the ‘daughters of men’ (Gen_6:1 f.). It was from the offspring of these sinful unions—the ‘giants’ or nephîlîm—that the demons were sprung. Of these demons the Asmodæus of the Bk. of Tobit (Tob_3:8; Tob_3:17) seems to have been regarded as the king (Bab. [Note: Babylonian.] Pes. 110a). The name Asmodœus (or in Heb. Ashmedai) has plausibly been connected with the ancient Persian Aeshma daeva, i.e. ‘the covetous or lustful demon’; in its Hebrew form it suggests the meaning ‘destroyer’ or ‘bringer of destruction,’ and this demon may be intended by ‘the destroyer’ of Wis_18:25 and by the Apollyon (= ‘Destroyer’) of Rev_9:11. In the latest part of the Bk. of Enoch, however, the so-called ‘Similitudes’ (chs. xxxvii–lxxi), which perhaps dates from about b.c. 64, ‘the fallen watchers’ (and their descendants) are carefully distinguished from the Satans, who apparently belong to ‘a counter kingdom of evil’ which existed before the fall of the watchers recorded in Gen_6:1, the latter, in consequence of their fall, becoming subject to the former. Apparently these ‘Satans’ are ruled by a single chief, who is styled ‘Satan’ in one passage (Enoch 54.6). ‘Their functions were threefold: they tempted to evil (69.4, 6); they accused the dwellers upon earth (40.7); they punished the condemned. In this last character they are technically called “angels of punishment” (53.3, 56.1, 62.11, 63.1)’ (Charles).
In the Bk. of Wisdom (Wis_2:24 : ‘by the envy of the devil death entered into the world’) we already meet with the identification of the Serpent of Gen_3:1-24 with Satan, which afterwards became a fixed element in belief, and an allusion to the same idea may be detected in the Psalms of Solomon 4:11, where the prosperous wicked man is said to be ‘like a serpent, to pervert wisdom, speaking with the words of transgressors.’ The same identification also meets us in the Book of the Secrets of Enoch (? 1st cent. a.d.), where, moreover, satanology shows a rich development (the pride, revolt, and fall of Satan are dwelt upon). Cf. art. Fall.
The secondary Jewish (Rabbinical) Literature which is connected with the text of the OT (esp. the Targums and the Midrashim) naturally reflects beliefs that were current at a later time. But they are obviously connected closely with those that have already been mentioned. The Serpent of Gen_3:1-24 becomes ‘the old serpent’ who seduced Adam and Eve. The chief of the Satans is Sammael, who is often referred to as ‘the angel of death’: and in the Secrets of Enoch he is prince of the demons and a magician. It is interesting to note that in the later Midrash one of the works of Messiah ben-Joseph is the slaying of Sammael, who is ‘the Satan, the prime mover of all evil.’ In the earlier literature his great opponent is the archangel Michael. The Rabbinic doctrine of the ‘evil impulse’ (yetser ra’), which works within man like a leaven (Berak. 17a), looks like a theological refinement, which has sometimes been combined with the popular view of Satan (Satan works his evil purpose by the instrumentality of the ‘evil impulse’).
3. In the NT.—In the NT, Satan and his kingdom are frequently referred to. Sometimes the Hebrew name ‘Satan’ is used (e.g. Mar_3:26; Mar_4:15 etc.), sometimes its Greek equivalent (diabolos: cf. our word ‘diabolical’), which is translated ‘devil,’ and which means ‘accuser’ or ‘calumniator.’ In Mat_12:26-27 (cf. Mat_10:25) Satan is apparently identified with Beelzebub (or Beelzebul), and is occasionally designated ‘the evil one’ (Mat_13:19; Mat_13:38 etc.; so, perhaps, also in the Lord’s Prayer: ‘deliver us from the evil one’). Some scholars are of opinion that the name Beelzebub means not ‘fly-god’ but ‘enemy’ (i.e. the enemy of God). He is called the ‘prince of the devils (or demons)’ in Mat_12:24, just as Sammael, ‘the great prince in heaven,’ is designated the ‘chief of Satans’ in the Midrash.
The demonology that confronts us in the NT has striking points of contact with that which is developed in the Enochic literature. The main features of the latter, in fact, reappear. The ‘angels which kept not their first estate’ (Jud_1:6, 2Pe_2:4) are the angelic watchers whose fall through lust is described in Enoch 6–16. Their punishment is to be kept imprisoned in perpetual darkness. In Enoch the demons, who are represented as the evil spirits which went forth from the souls of the giant offspring of the fallen watchers, exercise an evil activity, working moral ruin on the earth till the final judgment. In exactly the same way the demons are described in the NT as disembodied spirits (Mat_12:43-45, Luk_11:24-26). The time of their punishment is to be the final judgment (cf. Mat_8:29 : ‘Art thou come hither to torment us before the time?’). They belong to and are subject to Satan. As in the Book of Enoch, Satan is represented in the NT as the ruler of a counter-kingdom of evil (cf. Mat_12:26, Luk_11:13 ‘if Satan cast out Satan, how shall his kingdom stand?’); he led astray angels (Rev_12:4) and men (2Co_11:3); his functions are to tempt (Mat_4:1-12, Luk_22:31), to accuse (Rev_12:10), and to punish (1Co_5:5 : impenitent sinners delivered over to Satan for destruction of the flesh). It should be added that in the Fourth Gospel and Johannine Epp. the lesser demonic agencies disappear. Opposition is concentrated in the persons of Christ and the devil. The latter is the ruler of this world (Joh_16:11), and enslaves men to himself through sin. The Son of God is manifested for the express purpose of destroying the devil’s works (1Jn_3:8).
Both in St. Paul (cf. Rom_16:20, 2Co_11:2-3) and in the Apocalypse Satan is identified with the Serpent of Gen_3:1-24. It is also noteworthy that St. Paul shared the contemporary belief that angelic beings inhabited the higher (heavenly) regions, and that Satan also with his retinue dwelt not beneath the earth, but in the lower atmospheric region; cf. Eph_2:2, where ‘the prince of the power of the air’ = Satan (cf. also Eph_6:12 and Luk_10:13 ‘I beheld Satan fallen as lightning from heaven’). For Satan’s rôle in the Apocalypse see art. Eschatology. Cf. also art. Devil.
4. The attitude of our Lord towards the Satan-belief.—Our Lord, as is clearly apparent in the Synoptic tradition, recognized the existence and power of a kingdom of evil, with organized demonic agencies under the control of a supreme personality, Satan or Beelzebub. These demonic agencies are the source of every variety of physical and moral evil. One principal function of the Messiah is to destroy the works of Satan and his subordinates (Mar_1:24; Mar_1:34; Mar_3:11-12; Mar_3:15 etc.). Maladies traced to demonic possession play a large part in the Synoptic narratives (see Devil, Possession). In the expulsion of demons by His disciples, Jesus sees the overthrow of Satan’s power (Luk_10:13). The evil effected by Satanic agency is intellectual and moral as well as physical (Mar_4:15, Mat_13:19; Mat_13:33; cf. 2Co_4:4). That our Lord accepted the reality of such personal agencies of evil cannot seriously be questioned; nor is it necessary to endeavour to explain this fact away. The problem is to some extent a psychological one. Under certain conditions and in certain localities the sense of the presence and potency of evil personalities has been painfully and oppressively felt by more than one modern European, who was not prone to superstition. It is also literally true that the light of the gospel and the power of Christ operate still in such cases to ‘destroy the works of darkness’ and expel the demons.
G. H. Box.
Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible
Edited by James Hastings, D.D. Published in 1909


("adversary".) Four times in Old Testament as a proper name (Job_1:6; Job_1:12; Job_2:1; Zec_3:1, with ha-, the article); without it in 1Ch_21:1; 1Ch_21:25 times in New Testament; the Devil also 25 times; "the prince of this world" three times, for Satan had some mysterious connection with this earth and its animals before man's appearance. (See DEVIL.) Death already had affected the pre-Adamic animal kingdom, as geology shows. Satan had already fallen, and his fall perhaps affected this earth and its creatures, over which he may originally in innocence have been God's vicegerent, hence his envy of man his successor in the vicegerency (Gen_1:26; Gen_3:1-14). "The winked one" six times; "the tempter" twice. "The old serpent, the devil, and Satan, who deceiveth the whole world" (Rev_12:9; Rev_20:23). In Job his power is only over outward circumstances, by God's permission. Instead of being a rival power to good and God, as in the Persian belief as to Ormuzd and Ahriman, he is subordinate; his malicious temptation of David was overruled to work out Jehovah's anger against Israel (2Sa_24:1; 1Ch_21:1).
As the judicial adversary of God's people he accuses them before God, but is silenced by Jehovah their Advocate (Zec_3:1-2; 1Pe_5:8; Psa_109:6; Psa_109:31; 1Jn_2:1-2). The full revelation of "the strong man armed" was only when "the stronger" was revealed (Luk_11:21-23). He appears as personal tempter of Jesus Christ. (See JESUS CHRIST.) The Zendavesta has an account of the temptation in Eden nearest that of Genesis, doubtless derived from the primitive tradition. Christ's words of Satan are (Joh_8:44), cf6 "ye are of your father the devil; he was a murderer (compare as to his instigating Cain 1Jn_3:9-12) from the beginning and abode not in the truth. When he speaketh a lie he speaketh of his own, for he is a liar and the father of it." He is a "spirit," "prince of the powers of the air," and "working in the children of disobedience" (Eph_2:2). "Prince of the demons" (Greek), at the head of an organized "kingdom" (Mat_12:24-26), with "his (subject) angels."
They "kept not their first estate but left their own habitation"; so God "hath reserved them in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day" (Jud_1:6). Again "God spared not the angels, but cast them into hell (Tartarus, the bottomless pit: Luk_8:31; Rev_9:11), and delivered them to chains of darkness" (2Pe_2:4). Their final doom is Tartarus; meanwhile they roam in "the darkness of this world"; step by step they and Satan are being given up to Tartarus, until wholly bound there at last (Revelation 20). "The darkness of this world" (Eph_6:12) is their chain. They are free now to tempt and hurt only to the length of their chain; Rev_12:7-9 describes not their original expulsion, but a further step in their fall, owing to Christ's ascension, namely, exclusion from access to accuse the saints before God (Job_1:11; Zechariah 3). Christ's ascension as our advocate took away the accuser's standing ground in heaven (compare Luk_10:18; Isa_14:12-15).
Pride was his "condemnation," and to it he tempts others, especially Christian professors (Gen_3:5; 1Ti_3:6). As love, truth, and holiness characterize God, so malice or hatred (the spring of murder), lying, and uncleanness characterize Satan (Joh_8:44; 1Jn_3:10-12). Disbelief of God is what first Satan tempts men to (Genesis 3); "IF Thou be the Son of God" was the dart he aimed at Christ in the wilderness temptation, and through human emissaries on the cross. Also pride and presumption (Mat_4:6). Restless energy, going to and fro as the "roaring lion"; subtle instilling of venom, gliding steadily on his victim, as the "serpent" or "dragon"; shameless lust (Job_1:7; Mat_12:43); so his victims (Isa_57:20). He steals away the good seed from the careless hearer (Mat_13:19), introduces "the children of the wicked one" into the church itself, the tares among and closely resembling outwardly the wheat (Mat_13:38-39).
His "power" is that of darkness, from which Christ delivers His saints; cutting off members from Christ's church is "delivering them to Satan" (1Co_5:5; 1Ti_1:20; Act_26:18; Col_1:13). The Jews might have been "the church of God," but by unbelief became "the synagogue of Satan." His "throne" opposes Christ's heavenly throne (Rev_4:2; Rev_2:9-10; Rev_2:13). He has his "principalities and powers" in his organized kingdom, in mimicry of the heavenly (Rom_8:38; 1Co_15:24; Col_2:15; Eph_6:12). He instigates persecution, and is the real persecutor. He has "depths of Satan" in opposition to knowledge of "the deep things of God" (Rev_2:24); men pruriently desire to know those depths, as Eve did. It is God's sole prerogative thoroughly to know evil without being polluted by it. Satan has "the power of death," because "the sting of death is sin" (1Co_15:56); Satan being author of sin is author of its consequence, death. God's law (Gen_2:17; Rom_6:23) makes death the executioner of sin, and man Satan's "lawful captive."
Jesus by His death gave death its deathblow and took the prey from the mighty; as David cut off Goliath's head with his own sword (Mat_12:29; Luk_10:19; Isa_49:24; 2Ti_1:10; Psa_8:2; Heb_2:14). "Christ ... through death ... destroy (katargeesee, "render powerless") him that had the power of death." Satan seeks to "get an advantage of" believers (2Co_2:11); he has "devices" (noeemata) and "wiles" (methodeias, "methodical stratagems") (Eph_6:11), and "snares" (1Ti_3:7), "transforming himself (Greek) into an angel of light," though "prince of darkness" (2Co_11:14; Luk_22:53; Eph_6:12). "Satan hinders" good undertakings by evil men (Act_13:10; Act_17:13-14; Act_3:8-10), or even by "messengers of Satan," sicknesses, etc. (2Co_11:14; 2Co_12:7; 1Th_2:18; Luk_13:16). Satan works or energizes in and through antichrist (2Th_2:9; Rev_13:2) in opposition to the Holy Spirit energizing in the church (Eph_1:19). The wanton turn aside from Christ the spouse after Satan the seducer (1Ti_5:11-15).
The believer's victory by "the God of peace bruising Satan" is foretold from the first (Gen_3:15; Rom_16:20). The opposition of Satan in spite of himself will be overruled to the believer's good, the latter thereby learning patience, submission, faith, and so his end being blessed, as in Job's case. Man can in God's strength "resist Satan" (Jas_4:7); by withholding consent of the will, man gives Satan no "place," room or scope (Eph_4:27). "The wicked one toucheth not" the saint, as he could not touch Christ (1Jn_5:18; Joh_14:30). Self restraint and watchfulness are our safeguards (1Pe_5:8).
Translate 2Ti_2:26 "that they may awake (ananeepsosin) ... being taken as saved captives by him ("the servant of the Lord", 2Ti_2:24; autou) so as to follow the will of Him" (ekeinou; God, 2Ti_2:25): ezogreemenoi, taken to be saved alive, instead of Satan's thrall unto death, brought to the willing "captivity of obedience" to Christ (2Co_10:5). So Jesus said to Peter (Luk_5:10), cf6 "henceforth thou shalt catch [unto "life" (zogron)] men." Satan in tempting Christ asserts his delegated rule over the kingdoms of this world, and Christ does not deny but admits it (Luk_4:6), "the prince of this world" (Joh_12:31; Joh_14:30; Joh_16:11; 2Co_4:4; Eph_6:12). Satan slanders God to man (Gen_3:1-5), as envious of man's happiness and unreasonably restraining his enjoyments; and man to God (Job_1:9-11; Job_2:4-5).
Satan tempts, but cannot force, man's will; grace can enable man to overcome (Jas_1:2-4; 1Co_10:13; Jas_4:7, etc.). Satan steals the good seed from the careless hearer (Jas_1:21) and implants tares (Mat_13:4; Mat_13:19; Mat_13:25; Mat_13:38). Satan thrusts into the mind impure thoughts amidst holy exercises; 1Co_7:5, "come together that Satan tempt you not because of your incontinency," i.e., Satan takes advantage of men's inability to restrain natural propensities. Satan tempted Judas (Luk_22:5; Joh_23:27), Peter (Luk_22:31), Ananias and Sapphire (Acts 5). Augustine's (De Civit. Dei, 22:1) opinion was that the redeemed were elected by God to fill up the lapsed places in the heavenly hierarchy, occasioned by the fall of Satan and his demons.
Fausset's Bible Dictionary
By Andrew Robert Fausset, co-Author of Jamieson, Fausset and Brown's 1888.


Sa'tan. The word itself, the Hebrew, satan, is simply an "adversary", and is so used in 1Sa_29:4; 2Sa_19:22; 1Ki_6:4; 1Ki_11:14; 1Ki_11:23; 1Ki_11:25; Num_22:22-23; Psa_109:6. This original sense is still found in our Lord's application of the name to St. Peter in Mat_16:23. It is used as a proper name or title only four times in the Old Testament, namely, (with the article), in Job_1:6; Job_1:12; Job_2:1; Zec_2:1, and without the article in 1Ch_21:1. It is with the scriptural revelation on the subject, that we are here concerned; and it is clear, from this simple enumeration of passages, that it is to be sought in the New Testament, rather than in the Old Testament.
I. The personal existence of a spirit of evil is clearly revealed in Scripture; but the revelation is made gradually, in accordance with the progressiveness of God's method. In the first entrance of evil into the world, the temptation is referred only to the serpent. In the book of Job, we find, for the first time, a distinct mention of "Satan," the "adversary," of Job. But it is important to remark the emphatic stress laid on his subordinate position, on the absence of all, but delegated power, of all terror and all grandeur in his character. It is especially remarkable that no power of spiritual influence, but only a power over outward circumstances, is attributed to him.
The captivity brought the Israelites face to face with the great dualism of the Persian mythology, the conflict of Ormuzd with Ahriman, the co-ordinate spirit of evil; but it is confessed by all that the Satan of Scripture bears no resemblance to the Persian, Ahriman. His subordination and inferiority are as strongly marked as ever. The New Testament brings plainly forward the power and the influence of Satan. From the beginning of the Gospel, when he appears as the personal tempter of our Lord, through all the Gospels, Epistles, and Apocalypse, it is asserted, or implied, again and again, as a familiar and important truth.
II. Of the nature and original state of Satan, little is revealed in Scripture. He is spoken of as a "spirit" in Eph_2:2; as the prince or ruler of the "demons" in Mat_12:24-26; and as having "angels" subject to him in Mat_25:41; Rev_12:7; Rev_12:9. The whole description of his power implies spiritual nature and spiritual influence. We conclude, therefore, that he was of angelic nature, a rational and spiritual creature, superhuman in power, wisdom and energy; and not only so, but an archangel, one of the "princes" of heaven.
We cannot, of course, conceive that anything essentially and originally evil was created by God. We can only conjecture, therefore, that Satan is a fallen angel, who once had a time of probation, but whose condemnation is now irrevocably fixed. As to the time, cause, and manner of his fall, Scripture tells us scarcely anything; but it describes to us distinctly, the moral nature of the evil one. The ideal of goodness is made up of the three great moral attributes of God ? love, truth, and purity or holiness; combined with that spirit, which is the natural temper of the finite and dependent, we find creature, the spirit of faith. We find, accordingly, opposites of qualities are dwelt upon as the characteristics of the devil.
III. The power of Satan over the soul is represented as exercised, either directly, or by his instruments. His direct influence over the soul is simply that of a powerful and evil nature on those, in whom lurks the germ of the same evil. Besides this direct influence, we learn from Scripture, that Satan is the leader of a host of evil spirits, or angels, who share his evil work, and for whom, the "everlasting fire is prepared." Mat_25:41. Of their origin and fall we know no more than of his.
But one passage Mat_12:24-26 ? identifies them distinctly with the "demons," (Authorized Version, "devils"), who had power to possess the souls of men. They are mostly spoken of in Scripture in reference to possession; but in Eph_6:12, find them sharing the enmity to God and are ascribed in various lights. We find them sharing the enmity to God and man, implied in the name and nature of Satan; but their power and action are little dwelt upon in comparison with his.
But the evil one is not merely the "prince of the demons;" he is called also the "prince of this world" in Joh_12:31; Joh_14:30; Joh_16:11, and even the "god of this world," in 2Co_4:4; the two expressions being united in Eph_6:12. This power, he claimed for himself, as the delegated authority, in the temptation of our Lord, Luk_4:6, and the temptation would have been unreal, had he spoken altogether falsely.
The indirect action of Satan is best discerned, by an examination of the title, by which he is designated in Scripture. He is called, emphatically, ho diabolos, "the devil". The derivation of the word in itself implies only the endeavor to break the bonds between others, and "set them at variance;" but common usage adds to this general sense, the special idea of "setting at variance by slander." In the application of the title to Satan, both the general, and special senses, should be kept in view.
His general object is to break the bonds of communion between God and man, and the bonds of truth and love, which bind men to each other. The slander of God to man is best seen in the words of Gen_3:4-5. They attribute selfishness and jealousy to the Giver of all good. The slander of man to God is illustrated by the book of Job. Job_1:9-11; Job_2:4-5.
IV. The method of satanic action upon the heart itself. It may be summed up in two words ? temptation and possession. The subject of temptation is illustrated, not only by abstract statements, but also by the record of the temptations of Adam and of our Lord. It is expressly laid down, as in Jas_1:2-4 , that "temptation," properly so called, that is, "trial," is essential to man, and is accordingly ordained for him, and sent to him by God, as in Gen_22:1. It is this tentability of man, even in his original nature, which is represented in Scripture as giving scope to the evil action of Satan. But in the temptation of a fallen nature, Satan has a greater power. Every sin committed makes a man, the "servant of sin" for the future, Joh_8:34; Rom_6:16, it, therefore, creates in the spirit of man, a positive tendency to evil, which sympathizes with, and aids, the temptation of the evil one. On the subject of possession, see Demoniacs.
Smith's Bible Dictionary
By Dr. William Smith.Published in 1863


signifies an adversary or enemy, and is commonly applied in the Scriptures to the devil, or the chief of the fallen angels. By collecting the passages where Satan, or the devil, is mentioned, it may be concluded, that he fell from heaven with his company; that God cast him down from thence for the punishment of his pride; that by his envy and malice, sin, death, and all other evils came into the world; that, by the permission of God, he exercises a sort of government in the world over subordinate apostate angels like himself; that God makes use of him to prove good men, and chastise bad ones; that he is a lying spirit in the mouth of false prophets and seducers; that it is he, or his agents, that torment or possess men, and inspire them with evil designs, as when he suggested to David, the numbering of the people, to Judas to betray his Lord and Master, and to Ananias and Sapphira to conceal the price of their field; that he is full of rage like a roaring lion, and of subtlety like a serpent, to tempt, to betray, to destroy, and involve us in guilt and wickedness; that his power and malice are restrained within certain limits, and controlled by the will of God; in a word, that he is an enemy to God and man, and uses his utmost endeavours to rob God of his glory, and men of their souls. See DEVIL and See DEMONIACS.
Biblical and Theological Dictionary by Richard Watson
PRINTER 1849.


Among the angelic spirits of the unseen world there are those that are evil, though the Bible nowhere records how they fell into such a condition. The chief of these evil angelic spirits is one known as the adversary – the adversary of God, his people, and all that is good. The Hebrew word for ‘adversary’ is satan, which later became the name used in the Bible for this leader of evil (Job_1:6). He is also called the devil (Mat_4:1-12; 1Jn_3:8; Rev_12:9), the prince of demons (Mat_9:34; Mat_12:24; see also BEELZEBUL), the prince of this world (Joh_12:31; Joh_14:30; Joh_16:11), the god of this world (2Co_4:4), the prince of the power of the air (Eph_2:2), the evil one (Mat_13:19; Eph_6:16; 1Jn_2:13; 1Jn_3:12) and the accuser of the brethren (Rev_12:10; cf. Job_1:6-12; Zec_3:1).
God’s rebellious servant
We should not think that Satan is in some way the equal of God, one being a good God and the other an evil God. God alone is God (Isa_44:6). Satan is no more than an angelic being created by God. There are good angels and evil angels, Satan being chief of the evil ones (Mat_25:31; Mat_25:41; Eph_6:12; Jud_1:9; Rev_12:7-9; see ANGELS; DEMONS). God, however, is above all and over all.
Also there are not, as it were, two kingdoms, a kingdom of good where God is absolute ruler and a kingdom of evil where Satan is absolute ruler. Satan is not a sovereign ruler but a rebel. Like all created beings, he is under the rule and authority of God and he can do his evil work only within the limits God allows (Job_1:12; Job_2:6; cf. Rev_20:2-3; Rev_20:7-8). He is still the servant of God, even though a rebellious one (Job_1:6-7; Job_2:1-2; Zec_3:1-2). In spite of the evil he loves to do, he is still fulfilling God’s purposes, even though unwillingly (Job_1:9-12; 1Ki_22:19-23; cf. Joh_13:2; Joh_13:27; Act_2:23; 1Co_5:5; 2Co_12:7; 1Ti_1:20).
This does not mean that God tempts people to do evil. It is Satan, not God, who is the tempter (Gen_3:1-6; 1Ch_21:1; Mat_4:1-11; 1Co_7:5; Jam_1:13). God desires rather to save people from evil (Mat_6:13; 1Co_10:13). Yet God allows them to suffer the troubles and temptations that Satan brings in life, for through such things he tests and strengthens their faith (Jam_1:2-3; Jam_1:12; cf. Heb_2:18; Heb_5:8-9; see TEMPTATION; TESTING).
Satan is hostile to God and fights against God’s purposes (Mat_4:1-12; Mar_8:31-33). But in the long run Satan cannot be successful, because Jesus Christ, by his life, death and resurrection, has conquered him and delivered believers from his power (Mat_12:28-29; Luk_10:18; Joh_12:31; Joh_16:11; Act_26:18; Col_2:15; Heb_2:14-15; 1Jn_3:8). (Concerning Jesus Christ’s conquest of Satan see KINGDOM OF GOD.)
Enemy of the human race
Although Jesus has conquered Satan, the world at present sees neither Jesus’ conquest nor Satan’s defeat. God allows evil angels to continue to exist just as he allows evil people. He has condemned them but not yet destroyed them. The world will see Jesus’ conquest and Satan’s defeat in the great events at the end of the age, when Christ returns in power and glory (Rev_20:10).
In the meantime Satan continues to operate (Mat_13:24-26; Mat_13:37-39). He opposes all that is good and encourages all that is evil. At times he works with brutality and ferocity (1Pe_5:8; Rev_2:10), at other times with cunning and deceit (2Co_2:11; 2Co_11:14; 1Ti_3:7). He works not only through people who are obviously evil (Act_13:8-10; Eph_2:1-3; 1Jn_3:10; 1Jn_3:12; Rev_2:13), but also through those who appear to be good (Mar_8:33; Joh_8:44; Act_5:3; Rev_2:9; Rev_3:9).
Satan causes people physical suffering through disease (Luk_13:16; 2Co_12:7; see DISEASE), and evil spirits (Mar_3:20-27; Mar_7:25; Act_10:38; see MAGIC; UNCLEAN SPIRITS). He brings mental and spiritual suffering through the cunning of his deceit and temptations (1Co_7:5; 2Th_2:9-10 : 2Ti_2:24-26). Above all, he wants to prevent people from understanding and believing the gospel (Mat_13:19; 2Co_4:4).
Christians, because they have declared themselves on the side of God, may at times experience Satan’s attacks more than others. They have a constant battle against Satan, but they do not fight entirely by their own strength. Certainly, they must make every effort to resist Satan and avoid doing those things that will give Satan an opportunity to tempt them (Eph_4:27; Jam_4:7), but God gives Christians the necessary armour to withstand Satan’s attacks (Eph_6:11-13).
Just as Satan opposed Jesus in his ministry, so he will oppose Jesus’ followers in their ministry (Joh_8:42-44; Act_13:10; 1Th_2:18). But through the victory of Jesus, they too can have victory (Luk_10:17-18; Luk_22:31-32; Rev_12:10-11).
Bridgeway Bible Dictionary by Don Fleming
PRINTER 1990.


sā?tan (שׂטן, sāṭān), ?adversary,? from the verb שׂטן, sāṭan, ?to lie in wait? (as adversary); Σατᾶν, Satán, Σατανᾶς, Satanás, ?adversary,? διάβολος, diábolos, ?Devil,? ?adversary? or ?accuser,? κατήγωρ, katḗgōr (altogether unclassical and unGreek) (used once in Rev_12:10), ?accuser?):
I. DEFINITION
II. SCRIPTURAL FACTS CONCERNING SATAN
1. Names of Satan
2. Character of Satan
3. Works of Satan
4. History of Satan
III. GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS
1. Scripture Doctrine of Satan Not Systematized
2. Satan and God
3. Satan Essentially Limited
4. Conclusions
LITERATURE

I. Definition.
A created but superhuman, personal, evil, world-power, represented in Scripture as the adversary both of God and men.

II. Scriptural Facts Concerning Satan.
1. Names of Satan:
The most important of these are the Hebrew and Greek equivalents noticed above. These words are used in the general sense justified by their etymological significance. It is applied even to Yahweh Himself (Num_22:22, Num_22:32; compare 1Sa_29:4; 2Sa_19:22; Psa_109:6, etc.). The word ?Satan? is used 24 times in the Old Testament. In Job (Job_1:6 f) and Zec (Job_3:1 f) it has the prefixed definite article. In all cases but one when the article is omitted it is used in a general sense. This one exception is 1Ch_21:1 (compare 2Sa_24:1), where the word is generally conceded to be used as a proper name. This meaning is fixed in New Testament times. We are thus enabled to note in the term ?Satan? (and Devil) the growth of a word from a general term to an appellation and later to a proper name. All the other names of Satan save only these two are descriptive titles. In addition to these two principal names a number of others deserve specific enumeration. Tempter (Mat_4:5; 1Th_3:5); Beelzebub (Mat_12:24); Enemy (Mat_13:39); Evil One (Mat_13:19, Mat_13:38; 1Jo_2:13, 1Jo_2:14; 1Jo_3:12, and particularly 1Jo_5:18); Belial (2Co_6:15); Adversary (ἀντίδικος, antı́dikos), (1Pe_5:8); Deceiver (literally ?the one who deceives?) (Rev_12:9); Dragon (Great) (Rev_12:3); Father of Lies (Joh_8:44); Murderer (Joh_8:44); Sinner (1Jo_3:8) - these are isolated references occurring from 1 to 3 times each. In the vast majority of passages (70 out of 83) either Satan or Devil is used.

2. Character of Satan:
Satan is consistently represented in the New Testament as the enemy both of God and man. The popular notion is that Satan is the enemy of man and active in misleading and cursing humanity because of his intense hatred and opposition to God. Mat_13:39 would seem to point in this direction, but if one were to venture an opinion in a region where there are not enough facts to warrant a conviction, it would be that the general tenor of Scripture indicates quite the contrary, namely, that Satan's jealousy and hatred of men has led him into antagonism to God and, consequently, to goodness. The fundamental moral description of Satan is given by our Lord when He describes Satan as the ?evil one? (Mat_13:19, Mat_13:38; compare Isaiah's description of Yahweh as the ?Holy One,? Isa_1:4 and often); that is, the one whose nature and will are given to evil. Moral evil is his controlling attribute. It is evident that this description could not be applied to Satan as originally created. Ethical evil cannot be concreated. It is the creation of each free will for itself. We are not told in definite terms how Satan became the evil one, but certainly it could be by no other process than a fall, whereby, in the mystery of free personality, an evil will takes the place of a good one.

3. Works of Satan:
The world-wide and age-long works of Satan are to be traced to one predominant motive. He hates both God and man and does all that in him lies to defeat God's plan of grace and to establish and maintain a kingdom of evil, in the seduction and ruin of mankind. The balance and sanity of the Bible is nowhere more strikingly exhibited than in its treatment of the work of Satan. Not only is the Bible entirely free from the extravagances of popular Satanology, which is full of absurd stories concerning the appearances, tricks, and transformations of Satan among men, but it exhibits a dependable accuracy and consistency, of statement which is most reassuring. Almost nothing is said concerning Satanic agency other than wicked men who mislead other men. In the controversy with His opponents concerning exorcism (Mar_3:22 f and parallel's) our Lord rebuts their slanderous assertion that He is in league with Satan by the simple proposition that Satan does not work against himself. But in so saying He does far more than refute this slander. He definitely aligns the Bible against the popular idea that a man may make a definite and conscious personal alliance with Satan for any purpose whatever. The agent of Satan is always a victim. Also the hint contained in this discussion that Satan has a kingdom, together with a few other not very definite allusions, are all that we have to go upon in this direction. Nor are we taught anywhere that Satan is able to any extent to introduce disorder into the physical universe or directly operate in the lives of men. It is true that in Luk_13:16 our Lord speaks of the woman who was bowed over as one ?whom Satan has bound, lo, these eighteen years,? and that in 2Co_12:7 Paul speaks of his infirmity as a ?messenger of Satan sent to buffet him.? Paul also speaks (1Th_2:18) of Satan's hindering him from visiting the church at Thessalonica. A careful study of these related passages (together with the prologue of Job) will reveal the fact that Satan's direct agency in the physical world is very limited. Satan may be said to be implicated in all the disasters and woes of human life, in so far as they are more or less directly contingent upon sin (see particularly Heb_2:14) On the contrary, it is perfectly evident that Satan's power consists principally in his ability to deceive. It is interesting and characteristic that according to the Bible Satan is fundamentally a liar and his kingdom is a kingdom founded upon lies and deceit. The doctrine of Satan therefore corresponds in every important particular to the general Biblical emphasis upon truth. ?The truth shall make you free? (Joh_8:32) - this is the way of deliverance from the power of Satan.
Now it would seem that to make Satan pre-eminently the deceiver would make man an innocent victim and thus relax the moral issue. But according to the Bible man is particeps criminis in the process of his own deception. He is deceived only because he ceases to love the truth and comes first to love and then to believe a lie (2Co_1:10). This really goes to the very bottom of the problem of temptation. Men are not tempted by evil, per se, but by a good which can be obtained only at the cost of doing wrong. The whole power of sin, at least in its beginnings, consists in the sway of the fundamental falsehood that any good is really attainable by wrongdoing. Since temptation consists in this attack upon the moral sense, man is constitutionally guarded against deceit, and is morally culpable in allowing himself to be deceived. The temptation of our Lord Himself throws the clearest possible light upon the methods ascribed to Satan and The temptation was addressed to Christ's consciousness of divine sonship; it was a deceitful attack emphasizing the good, minimizing or covering up the evil; indeed, twisting evil into good. It was a deliberate, malignant attempt to obscure the truth and induce to evil through the acceptance of falsehood. The attack broke against a loyalty to truth which made self-deceit, and consequently deceit from without, impossible. The lie was punctured by the truth and the temptation lost its power (see TEMPTATION OF CHRIST). This incident reveals one of the methods of Satan - by immediate suggestion as in the case of Judas (Luk_22:3; Joh_13:2, Joh_13:27). Sometimes, however, and, perhaps, most frequently, Satan's devices (2Co_2:11) include human agents. Those who are given over to evil and who persuade others to evil are children and servants of Satan (See Mat_16:23; Mar_8:33; Luk_4:8; Joh_6:70; Joh_8:44; Act_13:10; 1Jo_3:8). Satan also works through persons and institutions supposed to be on the side of right but really evil. Here the same ever-present and active falseness and deceit are exhibited. When he is called ?the god of this world? (2Co_4:4) it would seem to be intimated that he has the power to clothe himself in apparently divine attributes. He also makes himself an angel of light by presenting advocates of falsehood in the guise of apostles of truth (2Co_11:13, 2Co_11:15; 1Jo_4:1; 2Th_2:9; Rev_12:9; Rev_19:20). In the combination of passages here brought together, it is clearly indicated that Satan is the instigator and fomenter of that spirit of lawlessness which exhibits itself as hatred both of truth and right, and which has operated so widely and so disastrously in human life.

4. History of Satan:
The history of Satan, including that phase of it which remains to be realized, can be set forth only along the most general lines. He belongs to the angelic order of beings. He is by nature one of the sons of Elohı̄m (Job_1:6). He has fallen, and by virtue of his personal forcefulness has become the leader of the anarchic forces of wickedness. As a free being he has merged his life in evil and has become altogether and hopelessly evil. As a being of high intelligence he has gained great power and has exercised a wide sway over other beings. As a created being the utmost range of his power lies within the compass of that which is permitted. It is, therefore, hedged in by the providential government of God and essentially limited. The Biblical emphasis upon the element of falsehood in the career of Satan might be taken to imply that his kingdom may be less in extent than appears. At any rate, it is confined to the cosmic sphere and to a limited portion of time. It is also doomed. In the closely related passages 2Pe_2:4 and Jud_1:6 it is affirmed that God cast the angels, when they sinned, down to Tartarus and committed them to pits of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment. This both refers to the constant divine control of these insurgent forces and also points to their final and utter destruction. The putting of Satan in bonds is evidently both constant and progressive. The essential limitation of the empire of evil and its ultimate overthrow are foreshadowed in the Book of Job (chapters 38 through 41), where Yahweh's power extends even to the symbolized spirit of evil.
According to synoptic tradition, our Lord in the crisis of temptation immediately following the baptism (Mt 4 and parallel) met and for the time conquered Satan as His own personal adversary. This preliminary contest did not close the matter, but was the earnest of a complete victory. According to Luke (Luk_10:18), when the Seventy returned from their mission flushed with victory over the powers of evil, Jesus said: 'I saw Satan fall (not ?fallen?; see Plummer, ?Luke,? ICC, in the place cited.) as lightning from heaven.' In every triumph over the powers of evil Christ beheld in vision the downfall of Satan. In connection with the coming of the Hellenists who wished to see Him, Jesus asserted (Joh_12:31), ?Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out.? In view of His approaching passion He says again (Joh_14:30), ?The prince of the world cometh: and he hath nothing in me.? Once again in connection with the promised advent of the Spirit, Jesus asserted (Joh_16:11) that the Spirit would convict the world of judgment, ?because the prince of this world hath been judged.? In Hebrews (Heb_2:14, Heb_2:15) it is said that Christ took upon Himself human nature in order ?that through death he might bring to nought him that had the power of death, that is, the Devil.? In 1Jo_3:8 it is said, ?To this end was the Son of God manifested, that he might destroy the works of the Devil.? In Rev_12:9 it is asserted, in connection with Christ's ascension, that Satan was cast down to the earth and his angels with him. According to the passage immediately following (Rev_12:10-12), this casting down was not complete or final in the sense of extinguishing his activities altogether, but it involves the potential and certain triumph of God and His saints and the equally certain defeat of Satan. In 1Jo_2:13 the young men are addressed as those who ?have overcome the evil one.? In Rev_20:1-15 the field of the future is covered in the assertion that Satan is ?bound a thousand years?; then loosed ?for a little time,? and then finally ?cast into the lake of fire.?
A comparison of these passages will convince the careful student that while we cannot construct a definite chronological program for the career of Satan, we are clear in the chief points. He is limited, judged, condemned, imprisoned, reserved for judgment from the beginning. The outcome is certain though the process may be tedious and slow. The victory of Christ is the defeat of Satan; first, for Himself as Leader and Saviour of men (Joh_14:30); then, for believers (Luk_22:31; Act_26:18; Rom_16:20; Jam_4:7; 1Jo_2:13; 1Jo_5:4, 1Jo_5:18); and, finally, for the whole world (Rev_20:10). The work of Christ has already destroyed the empire of Satan.

III. General Considerations.
There are, no doubt, serious difficulties in the way of accepting the doctrine of a personal, superhuman, evil power as Satan is described to be. It is doubtful, however, whether these diffificulties may not be due, at least in part, to a misunderstanding of the doctrine and certain of its implications. In addition, it must be acknowledged, that whatever difficulties there may be in the teaching, they are exaggerated and, at the same time, not fairly met by the vague and irrational skepticism which denies without investigation. There are difficulties involved in any view of the world. To say the least, some problems are met by the view of a superhuman, evil world-power. In this section certain general considerations are urged with a view to lessening difficulties keenly felt by some minds. Necessarily, certain items gathered in the foregoing section are here emphasized again.

1. Scripture Doctrine of Satan Not Systematized:
The Scriptural doctrine of Satan is nowhere systematically developed. For materials in this field we are shut up to scattered and incidental references. These passages, which even in the aggregate are not numerous, tell us what we need to know concerning the nature, history, kingdom and works of Satan, but offer scant satisfaction to the merely speculative temper. The comparative lack of development in this field is due partly to the fact that the Biblical writers are primarily interested in God, and only secondarily in the powers of darkness; and partly to the fact that in the Bible doctrine waits upon fact. Hence, the malign and sinister figure of the Adversary is gradually outlined against the light of God's holiness as progressively revealed in the providential world-process which centers in Christ. It is a significant fact that the statements concerning Satan become numerous and definite only in the New Testament. The daylight of the Christian revelation was necessary in order to uncover the lurking foe, dimly disclosed but by no means fully known in the earlier revelation. The disclosure of Satan is, in form at least, historical, not dogmatic.

2. Satan and God:
In the second place, the relationship of Satan to God, already emphasized, must be kept constantly in mind. The doctrine of Satan merges in the general doctrine concerning angels (see ANGEL). It has often been pointed out that the personal characteristics of angels are very little insisted upon. They are known chiefly by their functions: merged, on the one hand, in their own offices, and, on the other, in the activities of God Himself.
In the Old Testament Satan is not represented as a fallen and malignant spirit, but as a servant of Yahweh, performing a divine function and having his place in the heavenly train. In the parallel accounts of David's numbering of Israel (1Sa_24:1; 1Ch_21:1) the tempting of David is attributed both to Yahweh and Satan. The reason for this is either that 'the temptation of men is also a part of his providence,' or that in the interval between the documents the personality of the tempter has more clearly emerged. In this case the account in Chronicles would nearly approximate the New Testament teaching. In the Book of Job (Job_1:6), however, Satan is among the Sons of God and his assaults upon Job are divinely permitted. In Zec (Job_3:1, Job_3:2) Satan is also a servant of Yahweh. In both these passages there is the hint of opposition between Yahweh and Satan. In the former instance Satan assails unsuccessfully the character of one whom Yahweh honors; while in the latter Yahweh explicitly rebukes Satan for his attitude toward Israel (see G. A. Smith, BTP, II, 316 f). The unveiling of Satan as a rebellious world-power is reserved for the New Testament, and with this fuller teaching the symbolic treatment of temptation in Gen is to be connected. There is a sound pedagogical reason, from the viewpoint of revelation, for this earlier withholding of the whole truth concerning Satan. In the early stages of religious thinking it would seem to be difficult, if not impossible, to hold the sovereignty of God without attributing to His agency those evils in the world which are more or less directly connected with judgment and punishment (compare Isa_45:7; Amo_3:6). The Old Testament sufficiently emphasizes man's responsibility for his own evil deeds, but super-human evil is brought upon him from above. ?When willful souls have to be misled, the spirit who does so, as in Ahab's case, comes from above? (G. A. Smith, op. cit., 317). The progressive revelation of God's character and purpose, which more and more imperatively demands that the origin of moral evil, and consequently natural evil, must be traced to the created will in opposition to the divine will, leads to the ultimate declaration that Satan is a morally fallen being to whose conquest the Divine Power in history is pledged. There is, also, the distinct possibility that in the significant transition from the Satan of the Old Testament to that of the New Testament we have the outlines of a biography and an indication of the way by which the angels fell.

3. Satan Essentially Limited:
A third general consideration, based upon data given in the earlier section, should be urged in the same connection. In the New Testament delineation of Satan, his limitations are clearly set forth. He is superhuman, but not in any sense divine. His activities are cosmic, but not universal or transcendent. He is a created being. His power is definitely circumscribed. He is doomed to final destruction as a world-power. His entire career is that of a secondary and dependent being who is permitted a certain limited scope of power - a time-lease of activity (Luk_4:6).

4. Conclusions:
These three general considerations have been grouped in this way because they dispose of three objections which are current against the doctrine of Satan.
(1) The first is, that it is mythological in origin. That it is not dogmatic is a priori evidence against this hypothesis. Mythology is primitive dogma. There is no evidence of a theodicy or philosophy of evil in the Biblical treatment of Satan. Moreover, while the Scriptural doctrine is unsystematic in form, it is rigidly limited in scope and everywhere essentially consistent. Even in the Apocalypse, where naturally more scope is allowed to the imagination, the same essential ideas appear. The doctrine of Satan corresponds, item for item, to the intellectual saneness and ethical earnestness of the Biblical world-view as a whole. It is, therefore, not mythological. The restraint of chastened imagination, not the extravagance of mythological fancy, is in evidence throughout the entire Biblical treatment of the subject. Even the use of terms current in mythology (as perhaps Gen_3:1, Gen_3:13, Gen_3:14; Rev_12:7-9; compare 1Pe_5:8) does not imply more than a literary clothing of Satan in attributes commonly ascribed to malignant and disorderly forces.
(2) The second objection is that the doctrine is due to the influence of Persian dualism (see PERSIAN RELIGION; ZOROASTRIANISM). The answer to this is plain, on the basis of facts already adduced. The Biblical doctrine of Satan is not dualistic. Satan's empire had a beginning, it will have a definite and permanent end. Satan is God's great enemy in the cosmic sphere, but he is God's creation, exists by divine will, and his power is relatively no more commensurate with God's than that of men. Satan awaits his doom. Weiss says (concerning the New Testament representation of conflict between God and the powers of evil): ?There lies in this no Manichaean dualism,... but only the deepest experience of the work of redemption as the definite destruction of the power from which all sin in the world of men proceeds? (Biblical Theology New Testament, English tanslations of the Bible, II, 272; compare G.A. Smith, op. cit., II, 318).
(3) The third objection is practically the same as the second, but addressed directly to the doctrine itself, apart from the question of its origin, namely, that it destroys the unity of God. The answer to this also is a simple negative. To some minds the reality of created wills is dualistic and therefore untenable. But a true doctrine of unity makes room for other wills than God's - namely of those beings upon whom God has bestowed freedom. Herein stands the doctrine of sin and Satan. The doctrine of Satan no more militates against the unity of God than the idea, so necessary to morality and religion alike, of other created wills set in opposition to God's. Just as the conception of Satan merges, in one direction, in the general doctrine of angels, so, in the other, it blends with the broad and difficult subject of evil (compare ?Satan,? HDB, IV, 412a).

Literature.
All standard works on Biblical Theology, as well as Dictionaries, etc., treat with more or less thoroughness the doctrine of Satan. The German theologians of the more evangelical type, such as Weiss, Lange, Martensen (Danish), Dorner, while exhibiting a tendency toward excessive speculation, discern the deeper aspects of the doctrine. Of monographs known to the writer none are to be recommended without qualification. It is a subject on which the Bible is its own best interpreter.

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
PRINTER 1915.


Sa?tan (the adversary or opposer). The doctrine of Satan and of Satanic agency is to be made out from revelation, and from reflection in agreement with revelation.
Besides Satan, he is called the Devil, the Dragon, the Evil One, the Angel of the Bottomless Pit, the Prince of this World, the Prince of the Power of the Air, the God of this World, Apollyon, Abaddon, Belial, Beelzebub. Satan and Devil are the names by which he is oftener distinguished than by any other, the former being applied to him about forty times, and the latter about fifty times.
The word Satan occurs in its specific sense as a proper name in Zec_3:1-2, and in Job 1-2. See also 1Ch_21:1. When we pass from the Old to the New Testament, this doctrine of an invisible evil agent becomes more clear. With the advent of Christ and the opening of the Christian dispensation, the great opposer of that kingdom, the particular adversary and antagonist of the Savior, would naturally become more active and more known. The antagonism of Satan and his kingdom to Christ and his kingdom runs through the whole of the New Testament.
Devil is the more frequent term of designation given to Satan in the New Testament. With one or two exceptions, which go to confirm the rule, the usus loquendi of the New Testament shows this term to be a proper name, applied to an extraordinary being, whose influence upon the human race is great and mischievous (Mat_4:1-11; Luk_8:12; Joh_8:44; Act_13:10; Eph_6:11; 1Pe_5:8; 1Jn_3:8; Rev_12:9). In the original this name is given exclusively to the prince of evil spirits, never to these spirits themselves, who, in connection with demoniacal possessions, are almost always termed 'demons'?a distinction which the Authorized Version has failed to observe.
We determine the personality of Satan by the same criteria that we use in determining whether Caesar and Napoleon were real, personal beings, or the personifications of abstract ideas, viz., by the tenor of history concerning them, and the ascription of personal attributes to them. All the forms of personal agency are made use of by the sacred writers in setting forth the character and conduct of Satan. They describe him as having power and dominion, messengers and followers. He tempts and resists; he is held accountable, charged with guilt; is to be judged, and to receive final punishment. On the supposition that it was the object of the sacred writers to teach the proper personality of Satan, they could have found no more express terms than those which they have actually used. And on the supposition that they did not intend to teach such a doctrine, their use of language, incapable of communicating any other idea, is wholly inexplicable.
The class of beings to which Satan originally belonged, and which constituted a celestial hierarchy, is very numerous: 'Ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him' (Dan_7:10). They were created and dependent (Joh_1:3). Analogy leads to the conclusion that there are different grades among the angels as among other races of beings. The Scriptures warrant the same. Michael is described as one of the chief princes (Dan_10:13); as chief captain of the host of Jehovah (Jos_5:14). Similar distinctions exist among the fallen angels (Col_2:15; Eph_6:12). It is also reasonable to suppose that they were created susceptible of improvement in all respects, except moral purity, as they certainly were capable of apostasy. As to the time when they were brought into being, the Bible is silent; and where it is silent, we should be silent, or speak with modesty. It is probable, that as they were the highest in rank among the creatures of God, so they were the first in the order of time; and that they may have continued for ages in obedience to their Maker, before the creation of man, or the fall of the apostate angels.
The Scriptures are explicit as to the apostasy of some, of whom Satan was the chief and leader (Jud_1:6; 2Pe_2:4). Those who followed him in his apostasy are described as belonging to him. The company is called the devil and his angels (Mat_25:41). The relation marked here denotes the instrumentality which the devil may have exerted in inducing those called his angels to rebel against Jehovah and join themselves to his interests. As to what constituted the first sin of Satan and his followers, there has been a diversity of opinions. Some have supposed that it was the beguiling of our first parents. Others have believed that the first sin of the angels is mentioned in Gen_6:2. The sacred writers intimate very plainly that the first transgression was pride, and that from this sprang open rebellion. Of a bishop, the apostle says (1Ti_3:6), 'He must not be a novice, lest, being puffed up with pride, he fall into the condemnation of the devil.' From which it appears that pride was the sin of Satan, and that for this he was condemned. This, however, marks the quality of the sin, and not the act.
The agency of Satan extends to all that he does or causes to be done. To this agency the following restrictions have been generally supposed to exist: it is limited, first, by the direct power of God; he cannot transcend the power on which he is dependent for existence?secondly, by the finiteness of his own created faculties?thirdly, by the established connection of cause and effect, or the laws of nature. The miracles, which he has been supposed to have the power of working, are denominated lying signs and wonders (2Th_2:9). With these restrictions, the devil goes about like a roaring lion.
His agency is moral and physical. First, moral. He beguiled our first parents, and thus brought sin and death upon them and their posterity (Genesis 3). He moved David to number the people (1Ch_21:1). He resisted Joshua the high-priest (Zec_3:1). He tempted Jesus (Matthew 4); entered into Judas, to induce him to betray his master (Luk_22:3); instigated Ananias and Sapphira to lie to the Holy Ghost (Act_5:3); hindered Paul and Barnabas on their way to the Thessalonians (1Th_2:18). He is the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience (Eph_2:2); and he deceiveth the whole world (Rev_12:9).
But his efforts are directed against the bodies of men, as well as against their souls. That the agency of Satan was concerned in producing physical diseases the Scriptures plainly teach (Job_2:7; Luk_13:16). Peter says of Christ, that he went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed of the devil (Act_10:38).
It is, no doubt, true that there are difficulties connected with the agency ascribed to Satan. But objections are of little weight when brought against well-authenticated facts. Any objections raised against the agency of Satan are equally valid against his existence. If he exists, he must act; and if he is evil, his agency must be evil. The influence exerted by wicked spirits no more militates against the benevolence of God, than does the agency of wicked men, or the existence of moral evil in any form. Evil agents are as really under the divine control as are good agents. And out of evil, God will cause good to come. He will make the wrath of devils as well as of men to praise him, and the remainder He will restrain.




The Popular Cyclopedia of Biblical Literature
by John Kitto.


Satan
The Scripture term for the chief of fallen spirits, and the arch-principle of evil. The doctrine of Satan and of satanic agency is to be made out from revelation, and from reflection in agreement with revelation. The obscurity of the subject need not deter us from a candid investigation of it.
I. Scripture Names or Titles of Satan. — Besides Satan, he is called the Devil, the Dragon, the Evil One, the Angel of the Bottomless Pit, the Prince of this World, the Prince of the Power of the Air, the God of this World, Apollyon, Abaddon, Belial, Beelzebub. “Satan” and “devil” are the names by which he is oftener distinguished than by any other, the former being applied to him about forty times and the latter about fifty times. See each term.
Satan is the Hebrew word שָׂטָן, satan', transferred to the English. It is derived from the verb שָׂטִן, which means “to lie in wait,” “to oppose,” “to be an adversary;” hence, the noun denotes an adversary, or opposer. The word in its generic sense occurs in 1Ki_11:14 : “The Lord raised up an adversary (satan; Sept. σατάν) against Solomon,” i.e. Hadad the Edomite. In the 23d verse the word occurs again, applied to Rezan. It is used in the same sense in 1Sa_29:4, where David is termed an adversary, and in Num_22:22, where the angel “stood in the way for an adversary (satan) to Balaam,” i.e. to oppose him when he went with the princes of Moab. See also 2Sa_19:22, 1Ki_5:4; 1Ki_11:25 Psa_109:6, where the Sept. has ἐπίβουλος, ἀντικαίμενος, διάβολος, etc. In Zec_3:1-2, the word occurs in its specific sense as a proper name. “And he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan standing at his right hand to resist. And the Lord said unto Satan, The Lord rebuke thee, O Satan.” Here it is manifest, both from the context and the use of the article, that some particular adversary is denoted. In Job_1:2, the same use of the word with the article occurs several times. The events in which Satan is represented as the agent confirm this view. He was a distinguished adversary and tempter. See also 1Ch_21:1. In all these latter passages the Sept. has σατάν, and the Vulg. Satan. When we pass from the Old to the New Test., this doctrine of an invisible evil agent becomes more clear. With the advent of Christ and the opening of the Christian dispensation, the great opposer of that kingdom, the particular adversary and antagonist of the Savior, would naturally become more active and more known. The antagonism of Satan and his kingdom to Christ and his kingdom runs through the whole of the New Test., as will appear from the following passages and their contexts: Mat_4:10; Mat_12:26; Mar_4:15; Luk_10:18; Luk_22:3; Luk_22:31; Act_26:18; Rom_16:20; 2Co_11:14; Rev_2:13; Rev_12:9. Peter is once called Satan, because his spirit and conduct, at a certain time, were so much in opposition to the spirit and intent of Christ, and so much in the same line of direction with the workings of Satan. This is the only application of the word in the New Test. to any but the prince of the apostate angels. In the New Test. the word is σατανᾶς, followed by the Vulg. Satanas, except in 2Co_12:7, where σατᾶν is used. It is found in twenty-five places (exclusive of parallel passages), and the corresponding word ὁ διάβολος in about the same number. The title ὁ ἄρχων τοῦ κόσμου τούτου is used three times; ὁ πονηρός is used certainly six times, probably more frequently, and ὁ πειράζων twice.
Devil (Διάβολος) is the more frequent term of designation given to Satan in the New Test. Both “Satan” and “devil” are in several instances applied to the same being (Rev_12:9), “That old serpent, the devil and Satan.” Christ, in the temptation (Matthew 4), in his repulse of the tempter, calls him Satan; while the evangelists distinguish him by the term “devil.” Devil is the word διάβολος transferred from the verb διαβάλλω, “to thrust through,” “to carry over,” and, tropically, “to inform against,” “to accuse.” He is also called the accuser of the brethren (Rev_12:10). The Hebrew term Satan is more generic than the word devil, at least by its etymology. The former expresses his character as an opposer of all good; the latter denotes more particularly the relation which he bears to the saints, as their traducer and accuser. Διάβολος is the uniform translation which the Sept. gives of the Hebrew Satan when used with the article. Farmer says that the term Satan is not appropriated to one particular person or spirit, but signifies an adversary, or opponent in general. This is to no purpose, since it is also applied to the “devil” as an adversary in particular. There are four instances in the New Test. in which the word “devil,” diabolos, is applied to human beings. In three out of the four it is in the plural number, expressive of quality and not personality (1Ti_3:11; 2Ti_3:3; Tit_2:3). In the fourth instance (Joh_6:70), Jesus says to his disciples, “Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil?” This is the only instance in the New Test. of its application to a human being in the singular number; and here Dr. Campbell thinks it should not be translated “devil.” The translation is, however, of no consequence, since it is with the use of the original word that this article is concerned. The obvious reasons for this application of διάβολος to Judas, as an exception to the general rule, go to confirm the rule. The rule is that, in the New Test. usage, the word in the singular number denotes individuality, and is applied to Satan as a proper name. By the exception, it is applied to Judas, from his resemblance to the devil, as an accuser and betrayer of Christ, and from his contributing to aid him in his designs against Christ. With these exceptions, the usus loquendi of the New Test. shows ὁ Διάβολος to be a proper name, applied to an extraordinary being, whose influence upon the human race is great and mischievous (Mat_4:1-11; Luk_8:12; Joh_8:44; Act_13:10; Eph_6:11; 1Pe_5:8; 1Jn_3:8; Rev_12:9). SEE DEVIL.
The term “devil,” which is in the New Test. the uniform translation of διάβολος, is also frequently the translation of daemon, δαίμων, and daemonion, δαιμόνιον. Between these words and διάβολος the English translators have made no distinction. The former are almost always used in connection with demoniacal possessions, and are applied to the possessing spirits, but never to the prince of those spirits. On the other hand, διάβολος is never applied to the daemons, but only to their prince, thus showing that the one is used definitely as a proper name, while the others are used indefinitely as generic terms. The sacred writers made a distinction, which in the English and most modern versions is lost. SEE DEMON.
II. Personality of Satan. — We determine this point by the same criteria that we use in determining whether Caesar and Napoleon were real, personal beings, or the personifications of abstract ideas, viz. by the tenor of history concerning them, and the ascription of personal attributes to them. All the forms of personal agency are made use of by the sacred writers in setting forth the character and conduct of Satan. They describe him as having power and dominion, messengers and followers. He tempts and resists; he is held accountable, charged with guilt; is to be judged, and to receive final punishment. On the supposition that it was the object of the sacred writers to teach the proper personality of Satan, they could have found no more express terms than those which they have actually used. To suppose that all this semblance of a real, veritable, conscious moral agent is only a trope, a prosopopoeia, is to make the inspired penmen guilty of employing a figure in such a way that, by no ascertained laws of language, it could be known that it was a figure — in such a way that it could not be taken to be a figure, without violence to all the rhetorical rules by which they on other occasions are known to have been guided. A personification protracted through such a book as the Bible. even should we suppose it to have been written by one person, is altogether anomalous and inadmissible. But to suppose that the several writers of the different books of the Bible, diverse in their style and intellectual habits, writing under widely differing circumstances, through a period of nearly two thousand years, should each, from Moses to John, fall into the use of the same personification, is to require men to believe that the inspired writers, who ought to have done the least violence to the common laws of language, have really done the most.
But there are other difficulties than these general ones by which the theory of personification is encumbered. This theory supposes the devil to be the principle of evil. Let it be applied in the interpretation of two or three passages of Scripture. “Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil” (Mat_4:1-11). Was Jesus tempted by a real, personal being? or was it by the principle of evil? If by the latter, in whom or what did this principle reside? Was it in Jesus? Then it could not be true that in him was no sin. The very principle of sin was in him, which would have made him the tempter of himself. This is bad hermeneutics, producing worse theology. Let it also be remembered that this principle of evil, in order to be moral evil, must inhere in some conscious moral being. Sin is evil only as it implies the state or action of some personal and accountable agent. Again: “He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth: he is a liar and the father of it” (Joh_8:44). With what propriety could these specific acts of guilt be charged upon an abstraction? An abstraction a murderer! a liar! Seriously to affirm such things of the mere abstraction of evil is a solemn fiction; while to assert them of a fallen angel, who beguiled Eve by falsehood, and brought death upon all the race of man, is an intelligible and affecting truth.
It would be a waste of time to prove that, in various degrees of clearness, the personal existence of a Spirit of Evil is revealed again and again in Scripture. Every quality, every action, which can indicate personality, is attributed to him in language which cannot be explained away. It is not difficult to see why it should be thus revealed. It is obvious that the fact of his existence is of spiritual importance, and it is also clear, from the nature of the case, that it could not be discovered, although it might be suspected, by human reason. It is in the power of that reason to test any supposed manifestations of supernatural power, and any asserted principles of divine action which fall within its sphere of experience (“ the earthly things” of Joh_3:12). It may by such examination satisfy itself of the truth and divinity of a Person or a book; but, having done this, it must then accept and understand, without being able to test, or to explain, the disclosures of this divine authority upon subjects beyond this world (the “heavenly things,” of which it is said that none can see or disclose them, save the “Son of Man who is in heaven”).
It is true that human thought can assert an a priori probability or improbability in such statements made, based on the perception of a greater or less degree of accordance in principle between the things seen and the things unseen, between the effects, which are visible, and the causes, which are revealed from the regions of mystery. But even this power of weighing probability is applicable rather to the fact and tendency than to the method of supernatural action. This is true even of natural action beyond the sphere of human observation. In the discussion of the plurality of worlds, for example, it may be asserted without doubt that in all the orbs of the universe the divine power, wisdom, and goodness must be exercised; but the inference that the method of their exercise is found there, as here, in the creation of sentient and rational beings is one at best of but moderate probability. Still more is this the case in the spiritual world. Whatever supernatural orders of beings may exist, we can conclude that in their case, as in ours, the divine government must be carried on by the union of individual freedom of action with the overruling power of God, and must tend finally to that good which is his central attribute. But beyond this we can assert nothing to be certain, and can scarcely even say of any part of the method of this government whether it is antecedently probable or improbable. Thus, on our present subject, man can ascertain by observation the existence of evil — that is, of facts and thoughts contrary to the standard which conscience asserts to be the true one, bringing with them suffering and misery as their inevitable results. If he attempts to trace them to their causes, he finds them to arise, for each individual, partly from the power of certain internal impulses which act upon the will, partly from the influence of external circumstances. These circumstances themselves arise, either from the laws of nature and society, or by the deliberate action of other men. lie can conclude with certainty that both series of causes must exist by the permission of God, and must finally be overruled to his will. But whether there exist any superhuman but subordinate cause of the circumstances, and whether there be any similar influence acting in the origination of the impulses which move the will, this is a question which he cannot answer with certainty. Analogy, from the observation of the only ultimate cause which he can discover in the visible world — viz. the free action of a personal will — may lead him, and generally has led him, to conjecture the affirmative; but still the inquiry remains unanswered by authority start.
The tendency of the mind in its inquiry is generally towards one or other of two extremes. The first is to consider evil as a negative imperfection arising, in some unknown and inexplicable way, from the nature of matter, or from some disturbing influences which limit the action of goodness on earth; in fact, to ignore as much of evil as possible, and to decline to refer the residuum to any positive cause at all. The other is the old Persian or Manichaean hypothesis, which traces the existence of evil to a rival creator, not subordinate to the Creator of good, though perhaps inferior to him in power, and destined to be overcome by him at last. Between these two extremes the mind varied through many gradations of thought and countless forms of superstition. Each hypothesis had its arguments of probability against the other. The first labored under the difficulty of being insufficient as an account of the anomalous facts, and indeterminate in its account of the disturbing cause; the second sinned against that belief in the unity of God and the natural supremacy of goodness, which is supported by the deepest instincts of the heart. But both were laid in a sphere beyond human cognizance; neither could be proved or disproved with certainty.
The revelation of Scripture, speaking with authority, meets the truth and removes the error inherent in both these hypotheses. It asserts in the strongest terms the perfect supremacy of God, so that under his permission alone, and for his inscrutable purposes, evil is allowed to exist (see, for example, Pro_16:4; Isa_45:7; Amo_3:6; comp. Rom_9:22-23). It regards this evil as an anomaly and corruption, to be taken away by a new manifestation of divine love in the incarnation and atonement. The conquest of it began virtually in God's ordinance after the fall itself, was effected actually on the cross, and shall be perfected in its results at the judgment day. Still Scripture recognizes the existence of evil in the world, not only as felt in outward circumstances (“ the world”), and as inborn in the soul of man (“ the flesh”), but also as proceeding from the influence of an evil spirit, exercising that mysterious power of free will, which God”s rational creatures possess, to rebel against him, and to draw others into the same rebellion (“ the devil”).
In accordance with the “economy” and progressiveness of God”s revelation, the existence of Satan is but gradually revealed. In the first entrance of evil into the world, the temptation is referred only to the serpent. It is true that the whole narrative, and especially the spiritual nature of the temptation (“ to be as gods”), which was united to the sensual motive, would force on any thoughtful reader the conclusion that something more than a mere animal agency was at work; but the time had not then come to reveal, what afterwards was revealed, that “he who sinneth is of the devil” (1Jn_3:8), and that “the old serpent” of Genesis was “called the devil and Satan, who deceiveth the whole world” (Revelation 12:9; 20:23).
Throughout the whole period of the patriarchal and Jewish dispensations, this vague and imperfect revelation of the source of evil alone was given. The Source of all Good is set forth in all his supreme and unapproachable majesty; evil is known negatively as the falling away from him; and the “vanity” of idols, rather than any positive evil influence, is represented as the opposite to his reality and goodness. The law gives the “knowledge of sin” in the soul, without referring to any external influence of evil to foster it; it denounces idolatry, without even hinting, what the New Test. declares plainly, that such evil implied a “power of Satan.”
The book of Job stands, in any case, alone (whether we refer it to an early or a later period) on the basis of “natural religion,” apart from the gradual and orderly evolutions of the Mosaic revelation. In it, for the first time, we find a distinct mention of Satan, the adversary of Job. But it is important to remark the emphatic stress laid on his subordinate position, on the absence of all but delegated power, of all terror, and all grandeur in his character. He comes among the “sons of God” to present himself before the Lord; his malice and envy are permitted to have scope, in accusation or in action, only for God's own purposes; and its is especially remarkable that no power of spiritual influence, but only a power over outward circumstances, is attributed to him. All this is widely different from the clear and terrible revelations of the New Test.
The captivity brought the Israelites face to face with the great dualism of the Persian mythology, the conflict of Ormuzd with Ahriman, the coordinate spirit of evil. In the books written after the captivity we have again the name of Satan twice mentioned; but it is confessed by all that the Satan of Scripture bears no resemblance to the Persian Ahriman. His subordination and inferiority are as strongly marked as ever. In 1Ch_21:1, where the name occurs without the article (“ an adversary,” not “the adversary”), the comparison with 2Sa_24:1 shows distinctly that, in the temptation of David, Satan”s malice was overruled to work out the “anger of the Lord” against Israel. In Zec_3:1-2, Satan is ὁ ἀντίδικος (as in 1Pe_5:8), the accuser of Joshua before the throne of God, rebuked and put to silence by him (comp. Psa_109:6). In the case, as of the good angels, so also of the evil one, the presence of fable and idolatry gave cause to the manifestation of the truth. SEE ANGEL. It would have been impossible to guard the Israelites more distinctly from the fascination of the great dualistic theory of their conquerors.
It is perhaps not difficult to conjecture that the reason of this reserve as to the disclosure of the existence and nature of Satan is to be found in the inveterate tendency of the Israelites to idolatry — an idolatry based, as usual, in great degree, on the supposed power of their false gods to inflict evil. The existence of evil spirits is suggested to them in the stern prohibition and punishment of witchcraft (Exo_22:18; Deu_18:10), and in the narrative of the possession of men by an “evil” or “lying spirit from the Lord” (1Sa_16:14; 1Ki_22:22); the tendency to seek their aid is shown by the rebukes of the prophets (Isa_8:19, etc.). But this tendency would have been increased tenfold by the revelation of the existence of the great enemy concentrating round himself all the powers of evil and enmity against God. Therefore, it would seem, the revelation of the “strong man armed” was withheld until “the stronger than he” should be made manifest. In the New Test. this reserve suddenly vanishes. In the interval between the Old and New Test. the Jewish mind had pondered on the scanty revelations already given of evil spiritual influence. But the Apocryphal books (as, for example, Tobit and Judith), while dwelling on “daemons” (δαιμόνια), have no notice of Satan. The same may be observed of Josephus. The only instance to the contrary is the reference already made to Wisd. 2, 24. It is to be noticed also that the Targums often introduce the name of Satan into the descriptions of sin and temptation found in the Old Test., as, for example, in Exo_32:19, in connection with the worship of the golden calf (comp. the tradition as to the body of Moses, Deu_34:5-6; Jud_1:9). SEE MICHAEL. But, while a mass of fable and superstition grew up on the general subject of evil spiritual influence, still the existence and nature of Satan remained in the background, felt, but not understood.
The New Test. first brings it plainly forward. From the beginning of the Gospel, when he appears as the personal tempter of our Lord, through all the Gospels, Epistles, and Apocalypse, it is asserted or implied, again and again, as a familiar and important truth. To refer this to mere “accommodation” of the language of the Lord and his apostles to the ordinary Jewish belief is to contradict facts and evade the meaning of words. The subject is not one on which error could be tolerated as unimportant, but one important, practical, and even awful. The language used respecting it is either truth or falsehood; and unless we impute error or deceit to the writers of the New Test., we must receive the doctrine of the existence of Satan as a certain doctrine of revelation. Without dwelling on other passages, the plain, solemn, and unmetaphorical words of Joh_8:44, must be sufficient: “Ye are of your father the devil. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abides (ἕστηκεν) not in the truth.... When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own, for he is a liar and the father of it.” SEE DEMONIAC.
III. Natural History. —
1. Of the original nature and state of Satan, little is revealed in Scripture. Most of the common notions on the subject are drawn from mere tradition, popularized in England by Milton, but without even a vestige of Scriptural authority. He is spoken of as a “spirit” in Eph_2:2; as the prince or ruler of the “daemons” (δαιμόνια) in Mat_12:24-26; and as having “angels” subject to him in Mat_25:41; Rev_12:7; Rev_12:9. The whole description of his power implies spiritual nature and spiritual influence. We conclude, therefore, that he was of angelic nature, a rational and spiritual creature, superhuman in power, wisdom, and energy; and not only so, but an archangel, one of the “princes” of heaven. SEE ARCHANGEL.
The class of beings to which Satan originally belonged, and which constituted a celestial hierarchy, is very numerous: “Ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him” (Dan_7:10). They were created and dependent (Joh_1:3). Analogy leads to the conclusion that there are different grades among the angels as among other races of beings. The Scriptures warrant the same. Michael is described as one of the chief princes (Dan_10:13); as chief captain of the host of Jehovah (Jos_5:14). Similar distinctions exist among the fallen angels (Col_2:15; Eph_6:12). It is also reasonable to suppose that they were created susceptible of improvement in all respects except moral purity, as they certainly were capable of apostasy.
2. As to the time when they were brought into being, the Bible is silent; and where it is silent, we should be silent, or speak with modesty. Some suppose that they were called into existence after the creation of the world; among whom is Dr. John Dick. Others have supposed that they were created just anterior to the creation of man, and for purposes of a merciful ministration to him. It is more probable, however, that as they were the highest in rank among the creatures of God, so they were the first in the order of time; and that they may have continued for ages in obedience to their Maker, before the creation of man, or the fall of the apostate angels.
We cannot, of course, conceive that anything essentially and originally evil was created by God. We find by experience that the will of a free and rational creature can, by his permission, oppose his will; that the very conception of freedom implies capacity of temptation; and that every sin, unless arrested by God”s fresh gift of grace, strengthens the hold of evil on the spirit till it may fall into the hopeless state of reprobation. We can only conjecture, therefore, that Satan is a fallen angel, who once had a time of probation, but whose condemnation is now irrevocably fixed.
3. The Scriptures are explicit as to the apostasy of some, of whom Satan was the chief and leader. But of the time, cause, and manner of his fall, Scripture tells us scarcely anything. It limits its disclosures, as always, to that which we need to know. The passage on which all the fabric of tradition and poetry has been raised is Rev_12:7; Rev_12:9, which speaks of “Michael and his angels” as “fighting against the dragon and his angels,” till the “great dragon, called the devil and Satan,” was “cast out into the earth, and his angels cast out with him.” Whatever be the meaning of this passage, it is certain that it cannot refer to the original fall of Satan. The only other passage which refers to the fall of the angels is 2Pe_2:4, “God spared not the angels, when they had sinned, but having cast them into hell, delivered them to chains of darkness (σειραῖς ζόφου ταρταρώσας παρέδωκεν), reserved unto judgment,” with the parallel passage in Jud_1:6, “Angels, who kept not their first estate (τὴν ἑαυτῶν ἀρχήν), but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day.” In these mysterious passages, however, there is some difficulty in considering Satan as one of the rest, for they are in chains and guarded (τετηρημένους) till the great day; he is permitted still to go about as the tempter and the adversary, until his appointed time be come. This distinction, nevertheless, may be due to Satan”s eminence among his fellows. Those who adhered to Satan in his apostasy are described as belonging to him. The company is called “the devil and his angels” (Mat_25:41). The relation marked here denotes the instrumentality which the devil may have exerted in inducing those called his angels to rebel against Jehovah and join themselves to his interests. Aside from these passages. we have still to consider the declaration of our Lord in Luk_10:18, “I beheld (ἐθεώρουν) Satan, as lightning, fall from heaven.” This may refer to the fact of his original fall (although the use of the imperfect tense and the force of the context rather refer it figuratively to the triumph of the disciples over the evil spirits); but, in any case, it tells nothing of its cause or method. There is also the passage already quoted (Joh_8:44), in which our Lord declares of him, that “he was a murderer from the beginning,” that “he stands not (ἕστηκε) in the truth, because there is no truth in him,” that “he is a liar, and the father of it.” But here it seems likely the words ἀπ᾿ ἀρχῆς refer to the beginning of his action upon man; perhaps the allusion is to his temptation of Cain to be the first murderer — an allusion explicitly made in a similar passage in 1Jn_3:9-12. The word ἕστηκε (wrongly rendered ‘abode' in the A.V.) and the rest of the verse refer to present time. The passage therefore throws little or no light on the cause and method of his fall. Perhaps the only one which has any value is 1Ti_3:6, “lest being lifted up by pride he fall into the condemnation (κρίμα) of the devil.” It is concluded from this that pride was the cause of the devil”s condemnation. The inference is a probable one; it is strengthened by the only analogy within our reach, that of the fall of man, in which the spiritual temptation of pride, the desire”; to be as gods,” was the subtlest and most deadly temptation. Still it is but an inference; it cannot be regarded as a matter of certain revelation.
How Satan and his followers, being created so high in excellence and holiness, became sinful and fell is a question upon which theologians have differed, but which they have not settled. The difficulty has seemed so great to Schleiermacher and others that they have denied the fact of such an apostasy. They have untied the knot by cutting it. Still the difficulty remains. The denial of mystery is not the removal of it. Even philosophy teaches us to believe sometimes where we cannot understand. It is here that the grave question of the introduction of evil first meets us. If we admit the fact of apostasy among the angels, as by a fair interpretation of Scripture we are constrained to do, the admission of such a fact in the case of human beings will follow more easily, they being the lower order of creatures, in whom defection would be less surprising.
4. In his physical nature, Satan is among those that are termed spiritual beings; not as excluding necessarily all idea of matter, but as opposed rather to the animal nature. The good angels are all ministering spirits, πνευματα (Heb_1:14). Satan is one of the angels that kept not their first principality. The fall produced no change in his physical or metaphysical nature. Paul, in warning the Ephesians against the wiles of the devil, tells them (Eph_6:12) that they contended not against flesh and blood, mere human enemies, but against principalities and powers; against the rulers of the darkness of this world; against spiritual wickedness in high places, in which the contrast is between human and superhuman foes, the latter being spiritual natures, or spirits, in opposition to flesh and blood (Rosenmüller, ad loc.). Satan is immortal, but not eternal; neither omniscient nor omnipresent, but raised high above the human race in knowledge and power. The Persian mythology in its early stage, and subsequently the Gnostics and Manichaeans, ranked the evil principle as coeval and coordinate, or nearly so, with God, or the good principle. The doctrine of the Jewish Church always made him a dependent creature, subject to the control of the Almighty. By the modifications which Zoroaster subsequently introduced, the Persian angelology came more nearly to resemble that of the Jews. Some have ascribed to Satan the power of working miracles, contending that there are two series of antagonistical miracles running through the Bible. To the miracles of Moses were opposed those of the Egyptian magicians; and to those of Christ and his apostles, the signs and wonders of false prophets and Antichrists the divine and the satanic. Olshausen maintains this view, as do some of the older commentators (Biblischen Commentar. 1, 242). The evidence in support of such a belief has not been sufficient to procure for it general acceptance (see Rosenmüller and Calvin on Mat_24:24; 2Th_2:9; Hengstenberg, Egypt and the Books of Moses, ch. 3; also Rosenmüller and Bush on Exodus 7). With a substantial presence in only one place at one time, yet, as the head of a spiritual kingdom, he is virtually present wherever his angels or servants are executing his will.
5. Scripture describes to us distinctly the moral character of the Evil One. This is no matter of barren speculation to those who, by yielding to evil, may become the “children of Satan” instead of “children of God.” The ideal of goodness is made up of the three great moral attributes of God — love, truth, and purity, or holiness — combined with that spirit which is the natural temper of a finite and dependent creature, the spirit of faith. We find, accordingly, that the opposites to these qualities are dwelt upon as the characteristics of the devil. In Joh_8:44, compared with 1Jn_3:10-15, we have hatred and falsehood; in the constant mention of the “unclean” spirits, of which he is the chief, we find impurity; from 1Ti_3:6, and the narrative of the temptation, we trace the spirit of pride. These are especially the “sins of the devil;” in them we trace the essence of moral evil and the features of, the reprobate mind. Add to this a spirit of restless activity, a power of craft, and an intense desire to spread corruption, and with it eternal death, and we have the portraiture of the spirit of evil as Scripture has drawn it plainly before our eyes.
More particularly, Satan's character is denoted by his titles, Satan, Adversary, Diabolos, False Accuser, Tempter, etc. All the representations of him in Scripture show him to have unmixed and confirmed evil as the basis of his character, exhibiting itself in respect to God in assuming to be his equal, and in wishing to transfer the homage and service which belong only to God to himself; and, in respect to men, in efforts to draw them away from God and attach them to his kingdom. The evil develops itself in all possible ways and by all possible means of opposition to God, and to those who are striving to establish and extend his dominion. The immutability of his evil character precludes the idea of repentance, and, therefore, the possibility of recovering grace. “He possesses an understanding which misapprehends exactly that which is most worthy to be known, to which the key fails without which nothing can be understood in its true relations — an understanding darkened, however deep it may penetrate, however wide it may reach. He is thereby necessarily unblessed; torn away from the center of life, yet without ever finding it in himself; from the sense of inward emptiness, continually driven to the exterior world, and yet with it, as with himself, in eternal contradiction; forever fleeing from God, yet never escaping him; constantly laboring to frustrate his designs, yet always conscious of being obliged to promote them; instead of enjoyment in the contemplation of his excellence, the never satisfied desire after an object which it cannot attain; instead of hope, a perpetual wavering between doubt and despair; instead of love, a powerless hatred against God, against his fellow beings, against himself” (Twesten).
IV. Satan's Power and Action. — Both these points, being intimately connected with our own life and salvation, are treated with a distinctness and fullness remarkably contrasted with the obscurity of the previous subjects.
The agency of Satan extends to all that he does or causes to be done. To this agency the following restrictions have generally been supposed to exist: It is limited, first, by the direct power of God; he cannot transcend the power on which he is dependent for existence; secondly, by the finiteness of his own created faculties; thirdly, by the established connection of cause and effect, or the laws of nature. The miracles, which he has been supposed to have the power of working, are denominated lying signs and wonders (2Th_2:9). With these restrictions, the devil goes about like a roaring lion.
His agency is moral and physical. First, moral. He beguiled our first parents, and thus brought sin and death upon them and their posterity (Genesis 3). He moved David to number the people (1Ch_21:1). He resisted Joshua the high priest (Zec_3:1). He tempted Jesus (Matthew 4); entered into Judas, to induce him to betray his master (Luk_22:3); instigated Ananias and Sapphira to lie to the Holy Ghost (Act_5:3); and hindered Paul and Barnabas on their way to the Thessalonians (1Th_2:18). He is the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience (Eph_2:2); and he deceiveth the whole world (Rev_12:9).
The means which he uses are variously called wiles, darts, depths, snares, all deceivableness of unrighteousness. He darkens the understandings of men, to keep them in ignorance. He perverts their judgments, that he may lead them into error. He insinuates evil thoughts, and thereby awakens in them unholy desires. He excites them to pride, anger, and revenge; to discontent, repinings, and rebellion. He labors to prop up false systems of religion, and to corrupt and overturn the true one. He came into most direct and determined conflict with the Savior in the temptation, hoping to draw him from his allegiance to God, and procure homage for himself; but he failed in his purpose. Next, he instigated the Jews to put him to death, thinking thus to thwart his designs and frustrate his plans. Here, too, he failed, and was made to subserve the very ends which he most wished to prevent. Into a similar conflict does he come with all the saints, and with like ultimate ill success. God uses his temptations as the means of trial to his people, and of strength by trial; and points them out as a motive to watchfulness and prayer. Such are the nature and mode of his moral influence and agency.
But his efforts are directed against the bodies of men, as well as against their souls. That the agency of Satan was concerned in producing physical diseases the Scriptures plainly teach (Job_2:7; Luk_13:16). Peter says of Christ that he went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed of the devil (Act_10:38). Hymenaeus and Alexander were delivered to Satan, that they might learn not to blaspheme (1Ti_1:20), where physical suffering by the agency of Satan, as a divine chastisement, is manifestly intended.
The power of Satan over the soul is represented as exercised either directly or by his instruments. His direct influence over the soul is simply that of a powerful and evil nature on those in whom lurks the germ of the same evil, differing from the influence exercised by a wicked man in degree rather than in kind; but it has the power of acting by suggestion of thoughts, without the medium of actions or words — a power which is only in a very slight degree exercised by men upon each other. This influence is spoken of in Scripture in the strongest terms as a real external influence, correlative to, but not to be confounded with, the existence of evil within. In the parable of the sower (Mat_13:19), it is represented as a negative influence, taking away the action of the Word of God for good; in that of the wheat and the tares (Mat_13:39), as a positive influence for evil, introducing wickedness into the world. Paul does not hesitate to represent it as a power permitted to dispute the world with the power of God; for he declares to Agrippa that his mission was ‘to turn men from darkness to light, and from the power (ἐξουσίας) of Satan unto God,' and represents the excommunication, which cuts men off from the grace of Christ in his Church, as a “deliverance of them unto Satan” (1Co_5:5; 1Ti_1:20). The same truth is conveyed, though in a bolder and more startling form, in the epistles to the churches of the Apocalypse, where the body of the unbelieving Jews is called a “synagogue of Satan” (Rev_2:9; Rev_3:9), where the secrets of false doctrine are called “the depths of Satan” (Rev_2:24), and the “throne” and “habitation” of Satan are said to be set up in opposition to the Church of Christ. Another and even more remarkable expression of the same idea is found in the Epistle to the Hebrews, where the death of Christ is spoken of as intended to baffle (καταργεῖν) ‘him that hath the power (τὸ κράτος) of death, that is, the devil;' for death is evidently regarded as the ‘wages of sin,' and the power of death as inseparable from the power of corruption. Nor is this truth only expressed directly and formally; it meets us again and again in passages simply practical, taken for granted as already familiar (see Rom_16:20; 2Co_2:11; 1Th_2:18; 2Th_2:9; 1Ti_5:15). The Bible does not shrink from putting the fact of satanic influence over the soul before us in plain and terrible certainty.
Yet, at the same time, it is to be observed that its language is very far from countenancing, even for a moment, the horrors of the Manichean theory. The influence of Satan is always spoken of as temporary and limited, subordinated to the divine counsel, and broken by the incarnate Son of God. It is brought out visibly, in the form of possession, in the earthly life of our Lord, only in order that it may give the opportunity of his triumph. As for himself, so for his redeemed ones, it is true that “God shall bruise Satan under their feet shortly” (Rom_16:20; comp. Gen_3:15). Nor is this all, for the history of the book of Job shows plainly, what is elsewhere constantly implied, that satanic influence is permitted in order to be overruled to good, to teach humility, and therefore faith. The mystery of the existence of evil is left unexplained; but its present subordination and future extinction are familiar truths. So accordingly, on the other hand, his power is spoken of as capable of being resisted by the will of man, when aided by the grace of God. “Resist the devil and he will flee from you” is the constant language of Scripture (Jam_4:7). It is indeed a power to which “place” or opportunity “is given” only by the consent of man's will (Eph_4:27). It is probably to be traced most distinctly in the power of evil habit — a power real, but not irresistible, created by previous sin, and by every successive act of sin riveted more closely upon the soul. It is a power which cannot act directly and openly, but needs craft and dissimulation in order to get advantage over man by entangling the will. The “wiles” (Eph_6:11), the “devices” (2Co_2:11), the “snare” (1Ti_3:7; 1Ti_6:9; 2Ti_2:26) “of the devil” are expressions which indicate the indirect and unnatural character of the power of evil. It is therefore urged as a reason for “soberness and vigilance” (1Pe_5:8), for the careful use of the “whole armor of God” (Eph_6:10-17); but it is never allowed to obscure the supremacy of God's grace, or to disturb the inner peace of the Christian. “He that is born of God keepeth himself, and the wicked one toucheth him not” (1 John 5).
Besides his own direct influence, the Scriptures disclose to us the fact that Satan is the leader of a host of evil spirits, or angels, who share his evil work, and for whom the “everlasting fire is prepared” (Mat_25:41). Of their origin and fall we know no more than of his, for they cannot be the same as the fallen and imprisoned angels of 2 Peter 2 and Jud_1:6; but one passage (Mat_12:24-26) identifies them distinctly with the δαιμὀνια (A.V. “devils”) who had power to possess the souls of men. The Jews there speak of a Beelzebub (Βεελζεβούλ), “a prince of the daemons,” whom they identify with, or symbolize by, the idol of Ekron, the “god of flies”, SEE BEELZEBUB, and by whose power they accuse our Lord of casting out daemons. His answer is, “How can Satan cast out Satan?” The inference is clear that Satan is Beelzebub, and therefore the demons are “the angels of the devil;” and this inference is strengthened by Act_10:38, in which Peter describes, the possessed as καταδυναστευομένους ὑπὸ τοῦ Διαβόλου; and by Luk_10:18, in which the mastery over the daemons is connected by our Lord with the “fall of Satan from heaven,” and their power included by him in the “power of the enemy” (τοῦ ἐχθροῦ; comp. Mat_13:39). For their nature, SEE DAMON.
They are mostly spoken of in Scripture in reference to possession; but in Eph_6:12 they are described in various lights, as “principalities” (ἀρχαί), “powers” (ἐξουσίαι), “rulers of the darkness of this world,” and “spiritual powers of wickedness in heavenly places” (or things”) (τὰ πνευματικὰ τῆς πονηρίας ἐν τοῖς ἐπουρανίοις); and in all as “wrestling” against the soul of man. The same reference is made less explicitly in Rom_8:38 and Col_2:15. In Rev_12:7-9 they are spoken of as fighting with “the dragon, the old serpent called the devil and Satan,” against “Michael and his angels,” and as cast out of heaven with their chiefs. Taking all these passages together, we find them sharing the enmity to God and man implied in the name and nature of Satan; but their power and action are but little dwelt upon in comparison with his. That there is against us a power of spiritual wickedness is a truth which we need to know, and a mystery which only revelation can disclose; but whether it is exercised by few or by many is a matter of comparative indifference.
But the evil one is not only the “prince of the daemons,” but also he is called the “prince of this world” (ὁ ἄρχων τοῦ κόσμου τούτου) in Joh_12:31; Joh_14:30; Joh_16:11, and even the “god of this world” (ὁ θεὸς τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου) in 2Co_4:4; the two expressions being united in the words τοὺς κοσμοκράτορας τοῦ σκότους τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου, used in Eph_6:12. (The word κόσμος, properly referring to the system of the universe, and so used in John 1, is generally applied in Scripture to human society as alienated from God, with a reference to the “pomp and vanity” which make it an idol [see, e.g., 1 John 2]; αἰών refers to its transitory character, and is evidently used above to qualify the startling application of the word θεός, a “god of an age” being of course no true God at all. It is used with κόσμος in Eph_2:2.) This power he claimed for himself as a delegated authority in the temptation of our Lord (Luk_4:6), and the temptation would have been unreal had he spoken altogether falsely. It implies another kind of indirect influence exercised through earthly instruments. There are some indications in Scripture of the exercise of this power through inanimate instruments, of an influence over the powers of nature, and what men call the “chances” of life. Such a power is distinctly asserted in the case of Job, and probably implied in the case of the woman with a spirit of infirmity (in Luk_13:16), and of Paul's “thorn in the flesh” (2Co_12:7). It is only consistent with the attribution of such action to the angels of God (as in Exo_12:23; 2Sa_24:16; 2Ki_19:35; Act_12:23), and, in our ignorance of the method of connection of the second causes of nature with the supreme will of God, we cannot even say whether it has in it any antecedent improbability; but it is little dwelt upon in Scripture in comparison with the other exercise of this power through the hands of wicked men, who become “children of the devil,” and accordingly “do the lusts of their father.” (See Joh_8:44; Act_13:10; 1Jn_3:8-10; — and comp. Joh_6:70.) In this sense the Scripture regards all sins as the “works of the devil,” and traces to him, through his ministers, all spiritual evil and error (2Co_11:14-15), and all the persecution and hindrances which oppose the Gospel (Rev_2:10; 1Th_2:18). Most of all is this indirect action of Satan manifested in those who deliberately mislead and tempt men, and who at last, independent of any interest of their own, come to take an unnatural pleasure in the sight of evil doing in others (Rom_1:32).
The method of his action is best discerned by an examination of the title by which he is designated in Scripture. He is called emphatically ὁ διάβολος, “the devil.” The derivation of the word in itself implies only the endeavor to break the bonds between others and “set them at variance” (see, e.g., Plato, Symp. p. 222 c, διαβάλλειν ἐμὲ καὶ Α᾿γάθωνα); but common usage adds to this general sense the special idea of “setting at variance by slander.” In the New Test. the word διάβολοι is used three times as an epithet (1Ti_3:11; 2Ti_3:3; Tit_2:3), and in each case with something like the special meaning. In the application of the title to Satan both the general and special senses should be kept in view. His general object is to break the bonds of communion between God and man, and the bonds of truth and love which bind men to each other to “set” each soul “at variance” both with men and God, and so reduce it to that state of self will and selfishness which is the seed plot of sin. One special means by which he seeks to do this is slander of God to man and of man to God.
The slander of God to man is seen best in the words of Gen_3:4-5 : “Ye shall not surely die: for God doth know that in the day that ye eat thereof your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.” These words contain the germ of the false notions which keep men from God, or reduce their service to him to a hard and compulsory slavery, and which the heathen so often adopted in all their hideousness, when they represented their gods as either careless of human weal and woe or “envious” of human excellence and happiness. They attribute selfishness and jealousy to the giver of all good. This is enough (even without the imputation of falsehood which is added) to pervert man's natural love of freedom till it rebels against that which is made to appear as a hard and arbitrary tyranny, and seeks to set up, as it thinks, a freer and nobler standard of its own. Such is the slander of God to man, by which Satan and his agents still strive against his reuniting grace.
The slander of man to God is illustrated by the book of Job (Job_1:9-11; Job_2:4-5). In reference to it. Satan is called the “adversary” (ἀντίδικος) of man in 1Pe_5:8, and represented in that character in Zec_3:1-2; and more plainly still designated in Rev_12:10 as “the accuser of our brethren, who accused them before our God day and night.” It is difficult for us to understand what can be the need of accusation, or the power of slander, under the all-searching eye of God. The mention of it is clearly an “accommodation” of God's judgment to the analog of our human experience; but we understand by it a practical and awful truth, that every sin of life, and even the admixture of lower and evil motives which taints the best actions of man, will rise up against us at the judgment to claim the soul as their own, and fix forever that separation from God to which, through them, we have yielded ourselves. In that accusation Satan shall in some way bear a leading part, pleading against man, with that worst of slander which is based on perverted or isolated facts; and shall be overcome, not by any counterclaim of human merit, but “by the blood of the lamb” received in true and steadfast faith.
But these points, important as they are, are of less moment than the disclosure of the method of Satanic action upon the heart itself. It may be summed up in two words — temptation and possession.
The subject of temptation is illustrated, not only by abstract statements, but also by the record of the temptations of Adam and of our Lord. It is expressly laid down (as in Jam_1:2-4) that “temptation,” properly so called, i.e. “trial” (πειρασμός), is essential to man, and is accordingly ordained for him and sent to him by God (as in Gen_22:1). Man's nature is progressive; his faculties, which exist at first only in capacity (δυνάμει), must be brought out to exist in actual efficiency (ἐνεργείᾷ) by free exercise. His appetites and passions tend to their objects, simply and unreservedly, without respect to the rightness or wrongness of their obtaining them; they need to be checked by the reason and conscience, and this need constitutes a trial in which, if the conscience prevail, the spirit receives strength and growth; if it be overcome, the lower nature tends to predominate, and the man has fallen away. Besides this, the will itself delights in independence of action. Such independence of physical compulsion is its high privilege; but there is over it the moral power of God's law, which, by the very fact of its truth and goodness, acknowledged as they are by the reason and the conscience, should regulate the human will. The need of giving up the individual will, freely and by conviction, so as to be in harmony with the will of God, is a still severer trial, with the reward of still greater spiritual progress if we sustain it, with the punishment of a subtler and more dangerous fall if we succumb. In its struggle the spirit of man can only gain and sustain its authority by that constant grace of God, given through communion of the Holy Spirit, which is the breath of spiritual life.
It is this tentability of man, even in his original nature, which is represented in Scripture as giving scope to the evil action of Satan. He is called the “tempter” (as in Mat_4:3; 1Th_3:5). He has power (as the record of Genesis 3 shows clearly), first, to present to the appetites or passions their objects in vivid and captivating forms, so as to induce man to seek these objects against the law of God “written in the heart;” and next, to act upon the false desire of the will for independence, the desire “to be as gods, knowing” (that is, practically, judging and determining) “good and evil.” It is a power which can be resisted, because it is under the control and overruling power of God, as is emphatically laid down in 1Co_10:13; Jam_4:7, etc.; but it can be so resisted only by yielding to the grace of God, and by a struggle (sometimes an “agony”) in reliance on its strength.
It is exercised both negatively and positively. Its negative exercise is referred to in the parable of the sower, as taking away the word, the “engrafted word” (Jam_1:21) of grace, i.e. as interposing itself, by consent of man, between him and the channels of God's grace. Its positive exercise is set forth in the parable of the wheat and the tares, represented as sowing actual seed of evil in the individual heart or the world generally; and it is to be noticed that the consideration of the true nature of the tares (ζιζάνια) leads to the conclusion, which is declared plainly in 2Co_11:14, viz. that evil is introduced into the heart mostly as the counterfeit of good.
This exercise of the tempter's power is possible, even against a sinless nature. We see this in the temptation of our Lord. The temptations presented to him appeal, first, to the natural desire and need of food; next, to the desire of power, to be used for good, which is inherent in the noblest minds; and, lastly, to the desire of testing and realizing God's special protection, which is the inevitable tendency of human weakness, under a real but imperfect faith. The objects contemplated involved in no case positive sinfulness; the temptation was to seek them by presumptuous or by unholy means; the answer to them (given by the Lord as the Son of Man, and therefore as one like ourselves in all the weakness and finiteness of our nature) lay in simple faith, resting upon God, and on his word, keeping to his way, and refusing to contemplate the issues of action, which belong to him alone. Such faith is a renunciation of all self confidence, and a simple dependence on the will and on the grace of God.
But in the temptation of a fallen nature Satan has a greater power. Every sin committed makes a man the “servant of sin” for the future (Joh_8:34; Rom_6:16); it therefore creates in the spirit of man a positive tendency to evil, which sympathizes with, and aids the temptation of the evil one. This is a fact recognized by experience; the doctrine of Scripture, inscrutably mysterious, but unmistakably declared, is that, since the fall, this evil tendency is born in man in capacity, prior to all actual sins, and capable of being brought out into active existence by such actual sins committed. It is this which Paul calls “a law,” i.e. (according to his universal use of the word) an external power “of sin” over man, bringing the inner man (the νοῦς) into captivity (Rom_7:14-24). Its power is broken by the atonement and the gift of the Spirit, but yet not completely cast out; it still “lusts against the spirit” so that men “cannot do the things which they would” (Gal_5:17). It is to this spiritual power of evil, the tendency to falsehood, cruelty, pride, and unbelief, independently of any benefits to be derived from them, that Satan is said to appeal in tempting us. If his temptations be yielded to without repentance, it becomes the reprobate (ἀδόκιμος) mind, which delights in evil for its own sake (Rom_1:28; Rom_1:32), and makes men emphatically “children of the devil” (Joh_8:44; Act_13:10; 1Jn_3:8; 1Jn_3:10) and “accursed” (Mat_25:41), fit for “the fire prepared for the devil and his angels.” If they be resisted, as by God's grace they may be resisted, then the evil power (the “flesh” or the “old man”) is gradually “crucified” or “mortified” until the soul is prepared for that heaven where no evil can enter.
This twofold power of temptation is frequently referred to in Scripture as exercised chiefly by the suggestion of evil thoughts, but occasionally by the delegated power of Satan over outward circumstances. To this latter power is to be traced (as has been said) the trial of Job by temporal loss and bodily suffering (Job 1, 2), the remarkable expression used by our Lord as to the woman with a “spirit of infirmity” (Luk_13:16), the “thorn in the flesh.” which Paul calls the “messenger of Satan” to buffet him (2Co_12:7). Its language is plain, incapable of being explained as metaphor or poetical personification of an abstract principle. Its general statements are illustrated by examples of temptation. (See, besides those already mentioned, Luk_22:5, John 23:27 [Judas]; Luk_22:31 [Peter]; Act_5:3 [Ananias and Sapphira]; 1Co_7:5; 2Co_2:11; 1Th_3:5.) The subject itself is the most startling form of the mystery of evil; it is one on which, from our ignorance of the connection of the first cause with second causes in nature, and of the process of origination of human thought, experience can hardly be held to be competent either to confirm or to oppose the testimony of Scripture.
It is of no avail that there are difficulties connected with the agency ascribed to Satan. Objections are of little weight when brought against well-authenticated facts. Any objections raised against the agency of Satan are equally valid against his existence. If he exists, he must act; and if he is evil, his agency must be evil. The fact of such an agency being revealed as it is, is every way as consonant with reason and religious consciousness as are the existence and agency of good angels. Neither reason nor consciousness could by itself establish such a fact; but all the testimony they are capable of adducing is in agreement with the Scripture representation on the subject.
On the subject of demonical possession (q.v.) it is sufficient here to remark that although widely different in form, yet it is of the same intrinsic character as the other power of Satan, including both that external and internal influence to which reference has been made above. It is disclosed to us only in connection with the revelation of that redemption from sin which destroys it — a revelation begun in the first promise in Eden, and manifested in itself at the atonement in its effects at the great day. Its end is seen in the Apocalypse, where Satan is first “bound — for a thousand years,” then set free for a time for the last conflict, and finally “cast into the lake of fire and brimstone ... for ever and ever” (20:2, 7-10).
V. Traditions. — According to the Mohammedans, who have derived their account from Jewish traditions, Satan, or, as they sometimes call him, Eblis, was an archangel whom God employed to destroy the Jinns or Genii, a race intermediate between men and angels, who tenanted the earth before the creation of Adam. In riches, power, and magnificence, the pre-Adamite sultans of the Jinns far surpassed any height to which monarchs of the human race have attained; but the pride with which such glories inspired them filled them with impiety, and their monstrous crimes at length provoked the wrath of the Omnipotent. Satan was then commissioned to destroy them; he exterminated the greater part of the perfidious race, and compelled the rest to seek refuge in the caves beneath the mighty Kaf, or mountain framework which supports the universe. This victory filled Satan with pride; and when God, after the creation of Adam, required all the celestial intelligences to worship the new being, Satan and his adherents peremptorily refused, upon which he was driven from heaven, and the faithful angels threw great stones at him to accelerate his flight. Hence the common Mohammedan saving, “God preserve us from Satan who was stoned!” In revenge for this misfortune, Satan resolved to procure the expulsion of our first parents from paradise; but when he presented himself at the gate of the garden, he was refused admittance by the guard. On this he begged each of the animals, one after another, to carry him in, that he might speak to Adam and his wife; but they all refused him except the serpent, who took him between two of his teeth and thus carried him in. See D'Herlelot, Biblioth. Orientate, s.v. SEE SUPERSTITION.
VI. Literature. — Lists of works on this subject are given by Danz, Theol. Wörterbuch, s. vv. “Satan,” “Teufel;” Darling, Cyclop. Bibliogr. Colossians 1384. 1680 sq.; and Malcom, Theolog. Index, s.v. See also Tweedie, Satan as revealed in Scripture (Edinb. 1862); Snope, Satanic Influence (Lond. 1854); Cowan, idem (ibid. 1861); and the monographs referred to under SEE DAEMON; SEE DEVIL; SEE POSSESSED.

CYCLOPEDIA OF BIBLICAL, THEOLOGICAL AND ECCLESIASTICAL
press 1895.





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