Satan—Myth or Sinister Reality?

THE origin of evil has intrigued thinkers from earliest times. A Dictionary of the Bible, by James Hastings, states: "At the dawn of human consciousness man found himself confronted by forces which he was unable to control, and which exercised a baleful or destructive influence." The same reference work also says: "Early mankind instinctively sought for causes, and interpreted the forces and other manifestations of nature as personal."

According to historians, belief in demon gods and evil spirits can be traced back to the earliest history of Mesopotamia. The ancient Babylonians believed that the underworld, or "land of no return," was presided over by Nergal, a violent divinity known as "the one who burns." They also feared demons, whom they tried to appease by means of magic incantations. In Egyptian mythology, Set was the god of evil, "represented as having the features of a fantastic beast with a thin, curved snout, straight, square-cut ears and a stiff forked tail."— Larousse Encyclopedia of Mythology.

Although the Greeks and the Romans had benevolent and malevolent divinities, they had no predominant evil god. Their philosophers taught the existence of two opposing principles. For Empedocles, they were Love and Discord. For Plato, the world had two "Souls," one causing good and the other evil. As Georges Minois states in his book Le Diable (The Devil), "classical [Greco-Roman] pagan religion knew of no Devil."

In Iran, Zoroastrianism taught that the supreme divinity Ahura Mazda, or Ormazd, created Angra Mainyu, or Ahriman, who chose to do evil and thus became the Destructive Spirit, or Destroyer.

In Judaism, there was a simple presentation of Satan as God's Adversary who brought about sin. But after many centuries, that became tainted with pagan ideas. The Encyclopaedia Judaica states: "A great change had taken place . . . by the last centuries B.C.E. In this period the [Jewish] religion . . . took on many traits of a dualistic system in which God and the forces of good and truth were opposed in heaven and on earth by powerful forces of evil and deceit. This seems to have been under the influence of Persian religion." The Concise Jewish Encyclopedia declares: "Protection against d[emons] was afforded by observance of the commandments and by the use of amulets."