0:00

This the second part of a two-part In

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part one, I discuss the earliest mentions

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of the devil, both in the Old and New Testament

0:07

of the Christian Bible, as well as ancient

0:09

Jewish literature and

0:12

some ancient sources of inspiration that helped mold

0:14

the devil into the of the Christian God.

0:18

In two, I'll be discussing evil

0:20

entities and concepts in other cultures, many

0:22

names associated with the devil and their origins,

0:25

the many descriptions of this entity and

0:27

his infamy and pop culture

0:30

the conclusions draw from the

0:48

One sees devils than vast

0:50

hell can hold. Theseus,

0:54

Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream.

1:00

I've mentioned several contributing

1:03

cultures to role and persona the already,

1:05

the biggest of which was Persia. Zoroastrianism

1:09

Babylonian mythology not only influenced

1:13

stories found in the Bible are straight up

1:15

retellings of older myths.

1:18

Mesopotamia's the of Gilgamesh

1:21

fantastical entities such as Humbaba,

1:23

a figure terror guarded the cedar forest,

1:26

which the hero Gilgamesh had to overcome.

1:29

Ahura the the

1:32

Opposer

1:33

in an eternal struggle of good versus evil

1:35

in Zoroastrianism. fought

1:38

the goddess Tiamat, who had given birth to

1:40

dragons, in

1:43

Babylonian Enuma Elish.

1:47

Besides being the head of the Babylonian

1:49

pantheon, Tiamat whom

1:53

she wanted to rule all other gods.

1:56

was general of her army

1:58

who rebelled against Marduk.

1:59

but fell to Marduk's hand just

2:02

as his mother had.

2:04

With the blood of this malicious god and

2:06

some clay, Marduk molded

2:08

the first human, an act that could

2:11

arguably be the beginning of original sin

2:14

and the spark of evil within everyone thenceforth.

2:17

All these had a hand in

2:19

shaping the devil and later Christian theology.

2:23

But what was going on in other parts of the world?

2:25

If evil existed and threatened

2:27

humanity,

2:28

surely it wasn't just in the ancient Near

2:31

East. Let's

2:32

take a trip around the world and see who else was running

2:35

amok. Although we'll

2:37

begin off to a slow start as we stay

2:39

relatively close by heading a bit south

2:41

to those wild Egyptians.

2:48

Egyptian mythology is rich in characters,

2:50

settings, stories, and traditions.

2:53

With its portrayals and modern culture,

2:55

like the 1999 cinematic masterpiece

2:58

The Mummy starring Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz,

3:01

one could easily believe there is evil everywhere

3:03

in the mythology and a god or two in

3:05

charge of it all. The

3:07

jackal-headed Anubis weighing hearts

3:09

and feeding the unworthy to the monster Amet

3:12

is surely evocative of

3:14

something malevolent, but I'm going to save

3:16

you some time here.

3:17

It wasn't.

3:19

This pair was impartial

3:21

judgment personified, a god

3:23

who was coldly indifferent to mortals and

3:25

a chimeric rubbish bin just waiting

3:27

to snack on rotten souls.

3:30

Just two judgy boys doing their jobs.

3:32

In fact, that job was to annihilate

3:35

evil souls, so fair play

3:37

to the Egyptians, they really Shyamalan'd that

3:40

one.

3:41

A closer representation of evil would

3:43

have been Apopas, aka

3:46

Alpep,

3:46

the giant serpent who was the immortal enemy

3:49

of the sun god Ra. Every

3:51

night he tried to stop Ra's journey

3:54

in his sunboat by devouring

3:56

or giving it a hypnotic stare, and

3:58

every night, Rod-

5:59

the color red in general, a color

6:02

Egyptians associated with fire and destruction,

6:05

and another string on the corkboard to

6:07

the devil.

6:09

And his fight against Osiris's son Horus

6:11

became a legendary depiction of good versus

6:13

evil, although it was really

6:16

more Shakespearean revenge against a usurper.

6:19

However,

6:20

he is not the archfiend droid

6:23

we're looking for, as he was also depicted

6:26

helping Ra fight off Apophis

6:28

from time to time, and was worshipped

6:30

as patron god of many cities and

6:32

pharaohs due to his military

6:35

power and blessings.

6:37

Some depictions can elicit

6:39

fear in all, perhaps even distrust

6:41

and enmity, but he's far too complex

6:44

to be called the main force of evil

6:46

in Egyptian mythology. They

6:49

did have demonic

6:49

entities, although the term demonic

6:52

now carries many Christian connotations,

6:56

in the dark, lonely fringe

6:58

areas in the desert, in tombs,

7:01

in caves, Egyptians worried about

7:03

entities that were dangerous and carried

7:06

names like He of the Repulsive

7:08

Face and He Who Lives

7:10

on Escriment.

7:12

Transfigured spirits, called Aku,

7:15

and malicious spirits, variously known as

7:17

Keftyu, Jeh, and Mut,

7:20

could mess with mortals physically and mentally,

7:22

but had no leader directing them.

7:25

So evil for the Egyptians was in

7:27

a cosmic balance with good,

7:29

manifesting here and there, with and within

7:31

various entities, but it was a necessary

7:34

part of life. It also

7:36

helped keep people safe, as they knew to

7:38

stay away from the dark, dangerous spots which

7:40

were scattered all throughout the Middle East. Spots

7:43

where other cultures also saw evil

7:46

lurking,

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not the least of which was pre-Islamic

7:49

Arab religion.

7:51

If we fast forward a bit to the 7th century

7:53

CE, an entity familiar

7:56

to many of you begins to emerge in Arabic

7:58

literature.

7:59

beings of smokeless fire, jinn,

8:02

are attested in writings during this time

8:05

and while both the origins and details

8:07

of what they were and where they came from are murky,

8:10

we can at least infer that they were supernatural

8:12

beings more powerful than humans but

8:14

still mortal and something between

8:16

man and god or man

8:18

and angel in the hierarchy. People

8:22

worship them which has led to the belief

8:24

that maybe they were pagan nature deities

8:26

who became demonized by the

8:29

other Abrahamic religions and possibly

8:31

Zoroastrianism. Like

8:33

the Egyptian spirits I just mentioned, Jyn

8:36

were relegated to the dark, dismal,

8:39

dangerous places people dared not go.

8:42

They also gained a reputation for hating

8:44

mankind, being able to shapeshift

8:47

and turn invisible,

8:48

causing violence to people, and even

8:51

possessing people.

8:53

Of course, there are examples of jinn

8:55

who were benevolent and protected people,

8:58

and even falling in love with humans.

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But most people seem to view them as capricious

9:04

at best, and violent demons

9:06

at worst, living in fear

9:08

and awe of them. The

9:11

Quran, written in the 7th century

9:13

CE, mentions jinn 29

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times, explaining their creation and

9:18

culture and how they were made to worship Allah

9:20

just like humans, only they

9:23

were made first. Scholars

9:25

and theologians throughout history have hemmed

9:28

and hawed about Jyn and you can get

9:30

several different pictures of what they are depending

9:32

on the source. However,

9:35

belief that they were invisible beings

9:37

who held enmity towards humans and

9:40

could take over a person's body has led them

9:42

to be viewed as demonic.

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With the location of the people who believed these

9:47

stories, it has been postulated

9:49

that they stemmed from some of the malevolent

9:52

entities mentioned in Part 1 with

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Mesopotamian, Babylonian, and Jewish

9:57

myths.

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in Islam.

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There is a distinction between jinn

10:02

and demons. Demons

10:05

fall into two basic categories, shayateen,

10:08

or devils, and div, or

10:11

fiends.

10:13

You can really smell the Indo-Iranian

10:15

influence with that last one, as Zoroastrianism

10:18

and before that Hinduism used

10:20

the term deva. Interestingly,

10:23

the term started out as the word for a

10:25

god or deity,

10:27

then became an entity not wholly

10:30

evil but something to be rejected,

10:32

and by the time Islam got a hold of it,

10:35

it had been fiend.

10:36

Deva, Dava, Div, what's

10:39

next? David? Shit.

10:43

Anyway, Islamic demons definitely

10:45

try to lead humankind astray in their mission

10:47

to counter Allah's will

10:49

and are naturally and forever evil

10:51

beings.

10:53

A couple examples of these types of entities

10:55

are the Ma'rid, a dumb, rebellious

10:57

giant,

10:58

and Iffrit, a more cunning

11:00

and wicked type of demon,

11:02

and one often depicted in pop

11:04

culture as being able to control fire. It

11:07

makes me think of Final Fantasy VII, where

11:09

I think you can summon an Iffrit

11:12

in a spell.

11:15

With Islam, we also get centuries

11:17

of prior Abrahamic pedigree,

11:19

including what we discussed in part one

11:21

with how the figure of the devil became an entity

11:24

unto himself, and the Quran was

11:26

written with a fully fledged archfiend

11:29

called Iblis, who

11:31

controls the shayateen and divs.

11:34

Taking a huge cue from the tale

11:37

of the devil's fall from grace in 2nd

11:39

Enoch,

11:40

the Quran tells of Iblis' arrogance

11:42

and refusal to submit to man.

11:45

Surah 2, verse 34 is of particular

11:48

interest, saying,

12:01

Will

12:02

you choose him and his seed for your protecting

12:04

friends instead of me when they are

12:06

an enemy into you? Calamitous

12:09

is the exchange for evil doers.

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In this one verse, we get the act

12:15

that caused the devil's downfall and

12:17

the fun fact that he was quote unquote

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of the jinn.

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Like I said, scholars have argued all through

12:23

history on interpretations and versions of

12:26

Iblis, with some saying yes, he was a

12:28

jinn, some saying no, he was an angel, yada

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yada. In the angel

12:32

version Iblis was actually Azazel,

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a name I brought up in part one, and another

12:37

one I'm saving for some fun stuff for

12:39

later in this part.

12:41

Either way, he was sentenced to hell here

12:44

called Jehanim,

12:45

and specifically Sejin,

12:47

a prison-like place of torment at the bottom

12:49

of hell. Surah 7,

12:52

16-18,

12:53

Iblis said, Because thou hast thrown

12:56

me out of the way, lo, I will lie

12:58

and wait for them on thy straight way.

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Then will I assault them from before them and behind

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them, from their right and their left,

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nor will thou find in most of them gratitude

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for thy mercies.

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God said, Get out from this, disgraced

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and expelled. If any of them follow

13:15

thee, hell will I fill with

13:17

you all."

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The Quran skillfully ties up the loose ends

13:21

that had frayed in the other Abrahamic religions by

13:23

giving the devil motivation right out of the

13:26

gate of sweet, succulent

13:28

revenge.

13:29

Then he made a deal with Allah to be able

13:31

to impose his will on mankind,

13:34

to which Allah compromised by

13:36

letting him do it to unbelievers only.

13:39

üping in Deutera 15 36-42.

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Ible said, Ohald apostle, give me restchet

13:45

till the day the dead arw saved. God

13:48

said antioxidant obliged me till the day

13:50

of appointed.

13:52

Ible said, Oh, because thou

13:54

hast put me in the wrong, I will make

13:56

Sr. it will prove to be wrong and go elsewhere

13:59

and I will? them all in the wrong, except

14:01

thy servants among them, sincere

14:03

and purified by thy grace.

14:07

God said, This way of my sincere servants

14:09

is indeed a way that leads straight to

14:11

me. For over my servants

14:13

go authority shalt thou have, except

14:15

such as put themselves in the wrong and follow

14:18

thee.

14:19

Having said all that, there are many interpreters

14:21

and believers of the faith that take the fact that

14:23

Allah made Iblis in the first place, and

14:26

has a divine plan that allows for Iblis to

14:28

act a fool all at once, because in the end

14:30

God and goodness will prevail.

14:33

In this fatalistic sense, the devil is

14:35

an instrument of God, and there is a lot to

14:37

answer for from all parties involved. Sura 35 6

14:42

Verily

14:43

Satan is an enemy to you, so treat him

14:45

as an enemy. He only invites his

14:48

adherents that they may become companions

14:50

of the blazing fire.

14:54

Is that... is that

14:56

entrapment? Eh,

14:58

meh.

15:00

Let's expand our magnifying glass a bit and

15:02

start heading away from the Middle East. How

15:05

about we pop over to Greece and see what the

15:07

Devil looked like there?

15:12

We'll

15:13

start

15:14

underground as that's where Old

15:16

Scratch eventually ends up.

15:18

The way down Hades' town, the king

15:21

on the chromium throne, is Hades

15:23

himself.

15:25

He's not the devil.

15:27

So, let's turn back around and go back

15:29

topside. Hades,

15:32

like the devil, held dominion under the surface,

15:34

where souls could end up. He

15:36

was connected with snakes, and Hades,

15:39

like the devil, eventually could lurk

15:41

around every corner, but he wasn't the

15:43

boogeyman the devil became. Sure,

15:46

people were in no hurry to come face to face with

15:48

him, but the real fear they bore

15:51

was more for the finality of death

15:53

than the fear of being tortured in fire

15:55

and anguish forever.

15:57

from evil, he just had arresting

15:59

bitchface, and in fact was more

16:02

interested in keeping balance and judging

16:04

things fairly.

16:06

The Greeks had evil deities, but

16:08

most were all minor gods and goddesses

16:11

in charge of specific things.

16:13

Eris was the goddess of discord, Inyo

16:16

was the goddess of destruction, Apotei

16:19

was the goddess of deceit, you had

16:21

Deimos and Phobos, gods of

16:23

panic and terror respectively also

16:25

the names of the moons of Mars. And

16:27

speaking of the moons of Mars, Moros

16:29

was the god

16:30

of doom. Not sure

16:32

if he went on to become god of doom 2,

16:35

3, or any reboots. Actually,

16:37

I know he wasn't the god of doom 2

16:40

because I was. Suck it cyberdemons.

16:46

So Greece

16:47

did not have the devil and was not super instrumental

16:49

in shaping the devil we know. Personality-wise,

16:52

anyway, we'll come back to that. One could

16:54

possibly argue there are ties with the few

16:56

similarities I just mentioned for Hades, but

16:59

Greek gods were royal a-holes

17:02

out for themselves as they were made in

17:04

the image of the culture that worshipped

17:07

them. Less mythological and more philosophical

17:09

was a concept put forth by Plato

17:12

in his symposium of a type

17:14

of ethereal spirit called a

17:16

Themon.

17:17

Centuries later, Christian luminaries

17:20

would pick this term up and bastardize

17:22

it to denote beings of pure evil who

17:24

worked for the devile

17:26

and attack humans in a variety of ways.

17:28

But the original meaning, as imagined

17:30

by Plato, was that of an unseen

17:33

intermediary between man and

17:35

the gods, inherently good and

17:37

trying

17:38

to influence man to use reason and

17:40

good judgment.

17:42

Plato's student, Aristotle, expounded

17:45

on the idea, probably to everyone's

17:47

detriment by saying there were

17:49

evil Daimonese who incited

17:52

evil actions in both men and gods.

17:55

You can bet, later Christians loved

17:58

this idea as it took the heat off of the

17:59

off both God and men

18:02

and put the blame squarely on these

18:04

evil beings.

18:06

Plato also described the concept of an absolute,

18:09

perfect, capital G good

18:11

in the Republic.

18:13

But what he maybe didn't realize was

18:15

that the idea also implied

18:17

an absolute evil, which

18:20

would have been a bingo

18:20

for us in our quest to track

18:23

the devil down.

18:24

But he didn't say anything about it and the search continues.

18:29

What do Asian and Polynesian cultures

18:31

have for devilry?

18:33

Well

18:34

not much actually. The religion

18:37

of Buddhism is mostly concerned with how

18:39

to prevent suffering and evil

18:41

is born out of the greed and desire that

18:44

sometimes arises within us.

18:46

If we take the concept of evil as

18:49

just discussed with Plato, the implied absolute

18:51

antithesis of good, it's not really

18:53

a concept found in Buddhism. For

18:57

one thing, if you were to consider someone evil,

18:59

it becomes possible to justify committing harm

19:02

against them,

19:03

and that does not fly in Buddhist

19:05

teaching. The

19:07

Dhammapada, Chapter 12, Verse 165 says, By

19:11

oneself indeed is evil done. By

19:14

oneself is one defiled. By

19:16

oneself is evil left undone. By

19:19

oneself indeed is one purified.

19:22

Purity and impurity depend on oneself. No

19:25

one purifies another.

19:28

Evil is not an outside force in

19:31

Buddhism. Thus, there is no need to fear

19:33

a devil.

19:34

At least, the outside force version

19:36

of him.

19:37

A story of a divine being called Mara describes

19:40

a time where Princess Siddhartha was tempted by

19:42

three beautiful women,

19:43

possibly Mara's daughters.

19:45

Mara is kinda like the personification

19:48

of the Seven Deadly Sins, and his daughters

19:50

were trying to seduce Siddhartha to keep

19:52

him from enlightenment. They

19:54

were unsuccessful, but Mara is often pointed

19:57

to not as the devil we're after, at

19:59

least as an opponent to the Buddha.

20:03

There is, however, a hell, or

20:05

more precisely, sixteen hells.

20:08

Sixteen!

20:10

Eight hot, eight cold. You

20:12

go there according to your karma, but there is no

20:14

Lord of the Underworld to stop by and bring

20:16

you cookies from time to time. The

20:19

cookies are spiders.

20:22

The earthly realm just above the hells,

20:24

oddly enough, is the Patala Loka,

20:27

or hungry ghost realm, with beings

20:29

who perceive the world differently than humans and

20:32

wander around dark, abandoned places

20:34

seeking fulfillment. Sounds

20:36

a little familiar.

20:39

Chinese mythology has

20:41

some similar concepts about hell and plenty

20:43

of monsters, ghosts and goblins, but it's

20:46

not unlike Greek mythology with

20:48

no devil figure heading it all up. Same

20:50

with Japanese myth.

20:52

If you ever come across a translation

20:55

of the devil in Japanese with the word

20:57

Akuma, it

20:58

comes from a malevolent spirit of fire

21:00

in Japanese folklore. It's

21:03

used in place of the name Satan in Japanese

21:05

translations of Christianity, but

21:07

the actual entity is an evil, fiery,

21:10

sword-wielding, flying creature who

21:13

brings misfortune and can

21:15

be responsible for mental illness.

21:19

And just in case you're wondering, Hinduism

21:21

does not have a devil either.

21:23

There's no need, as karma keeps

21:25

things balanced.

21:28

I did find some mentions of an entity

21:30

called Papa Purusha, who

21:32

is the embodiment of all sin, though

21:35

I couldn't find an origin for him. There

21:38

is also a Kali Purusha, an

21:40

ugly and malevolent entity, not to be confused

21:42

with the goddess Kali. says

21:45

Lord Brahma created Kali Purusha

21:48

to inspire sin in people

21:50

and thus he's just doing his job

21:52

which also sounds familiar.

21:54

as

21:57

far as Oceania and Polynesian.

23:49

one

24:00

story about him will show that he

24:02

is no prince of hell. Ironically,

24:05

however, he was the father of hell,

24:07

goddess of the underworld and hellhane, and

24:10

a figure not unlike the Greek Hades.

24:13

Trolls and Draugr pepper the tales

24:16

of the Eddas and Sagas, but any mention

24:18

of THE devil in legends

24:21

comes from post-Christianization of the

24:23

culture.

24:24

Celtic myths have a similar refrain,

24:27

God's maiden man's image with bad

24:29

and tricky figures capable of help just

24:31

as much as harm. Brie

24:33

crew of the Poison Tongue is

24:35

a figure of Irish mythology of the Ulster

24:38

Cycle, and was pretty much a lowkey

24:40

clone. He just liked causing

24:42

trouble, not rebelling against

24:44

the ultimate God and deceiving mankind out

24:46

of pure unfiltered hatred. Same

24:49

with Cirdan of the Nart sagas from the North

24:51

Caucasus of Eurasia. These

24:54

European gods were complex and held

24:56

many roles, and not one was

24:59

the ultimate evil we find in today's

25:01

capital D devil.

25:04

Over in South America, the Olmec,

25:06

Toltec, Aztec, Mayan, and

25:08

Incan cultures

25:10

had plenty of gods and goddesses, but

25:12

details are still relatively unknown to

25:14

us, compared to European pantheons.

25:18

Like other cultures, there were gods of the

25:20

underworld, and evil creatures are monsters,

25:23

But these were cultures that worshipped the sun,

25:25

agriculture, the sea, in

25:27

other words more practical things. The

25:30

closest you might come to a devil figure is that

25:33

of Kaizen,

25:34

meaning God of Death and Mayan culture.

25:37

With a name that derives from the word for Fart,

25:40

he was nicknamed the Stinking One

25:42

and had control over earthquakes and

25:44

delighted in torturing the souls of evil

25:46

people in Shabalba, the underworld.

25:51

conquest by the Spanish, it

25:53

was easy to draw parallels to the Christian Devil

25:55

with this guy.

25:57

continuing a pattern you're probably already seeing.

25:59

First Nations people of North America were very

26:02

far away from a devil figure in their mythology.

26:05

In fact, good versus evil wasn't really

26:07

conceptualized the way we've seen in the Abrahamic

26:10

religions. Native Americans

26:12

lived in a kinship with nature, plants,

26:15

animals, landscape, weather.

26:17

If evil was ever discussed, it

26:19

was in terms of what a person does or ways

26:21

to unbalance that kinship they shared

26:24

with the natural world.

26:26

could be bad, and

26:27

sure you have skinwalkers, windigos,

26:29

and other monstrous beings, but

26:31

it was a path of corruption these entities

26:34

followed or came to on their own, not

26:36

the influences of a great, almost all-powerful

26:39

evil being. And in

26:41

the service of brevity, the same can be said

26:43

for most African mythologies, with a

26:45

common concept that evil comes

26:47

from humans.

26:49

So it seems the world at large has no

26:51

consensus on evil being encapsulated

26:54

in one figure.

26:56

Indeed,

26:57

just the civilizations in the ancient Near East

26:59

seem to have come to this idea. But

27:02

that's just a taste of world mythologies.

27:04

Honestly, each culture could have its own podcast.

27:07

Not just an episode, a whole show. But

27:10

there's other things for us to get to. So let's

27:12

move on to what I consider one of the most

27:14

important sections

27:16

of this episode, the

27:17

Many Names of the Devil.

27:46

Edgar, Shakespeare's

27:48

King Lear.

30:02

The term comes from a Hebrew root

30:04

relating to opposition or accusation.

30:07

If you remember,

30:08

Satan or Hasatan was a job

30:11

title, not a specific being. After

30:14

the Babylonian exile and intertestamental

30:16

period,

30:17

writers began fabricating stories using

30:20

a specific evil entity.

30:23

And since the Old Testament had opposers

30:25

already, they lazily just

30:27

attached the term to this brand new villain.

30:30

The Arabic word shayatan was

30:32

a reinterpretation of the Hebrew and

30:35

was used to mean demon or jinn

30:37

and eventually the main opponent of Allah.

30:40

Once the bible began to be translated ad

30:42

nauseam the word satan began

30:45

popping up everywhere there was a reference

30:47

to something acting against god. It

30:50

was foisted upon the public as a proper name

30:52

and once john milton got a hold of it in Paradise

30:55

Lost. It was all but sealed,

30:57

as the name the Devil went by.

31:00

The newly created Archfiend of

31:02

God in the New Testament was referred to

31:05

not only as Satan, but the

31:07

Devil, Beelzebub, Abaddon,

31:09

Belial, Lucifer, Apollyon,

31:12

and the Great Dragon. I'll

31:14

try to be quick, but thorough with these, and

31:16

I'll briefly start with the word Devil. The

31:19

Greek diabolos is where this term

31:21

started with a translation of the term slanderer

31:24

from the words dia and balen,

31:27

which together meant to throw across.

31:30

Once it got to Old English, it was diophole,

31:33

and from there, devil.

31:37

It

31:42

was used in translations wherever the

31:44

Hebrew satan was found, thus

31:47

the two became interchanging.

31:49

And like Hasatan became the Satan,

31:52

Diabolos became the Devil.

32:03

Beelzebub

32:05

This one is murky, but a fun

32:07

kind of murky. Referenced

32:09

in the Book of Kings, the name was Baal-Zebul,

32:13

a deity worshipped in the Philistine city

32:15

of Ekron and thought to be

32:17

associated with the Canaanite deity

32:19

Baal.

32:21

Just the name Baal meant Lord, and

32:23

Zebul meant heavenly mansion,

32:26

but scholars think the Israelites referred to

32:28

this deity with a derogatory pun

32:31

with the name Ba'al Zebub,

32:33

a term derived from the word for poop.

32:36

So instead of Lord of the Heavenly Mansion,

32:38

he became Lord of Poop.

32:41

Oh man, if Michael Flatley was Lord of the

32:43

Dance,

32:44

Michael Flatulensley was Lord of

32:46

the Poop.

32:48

Sorry, anyway. Since

32:51

there was a strong connection to flies with

32:53

poop, he was eventually called Lord

32:56

of the Flies.

32:58

Second

33:00

Kings

33:01

1-2, and Ahasiah fell down through a lattice

33:03

in his upper chamber that was in Samaria

33:06

and was sick, and he sent messengers

33:08

and said unto them, Go, inquire

33:10

of Baalzebub, the god of Ekron,

33:13

whether I shall recover of this disease.

33:17

It's not exactly painting Baalzebub

33:20

in any light here, let alone a

33:22

nefarious one.

33:24

It's not until we get to the pseudopographical Greek

33:26

text, The Testament of Solomon,

33:28

written in the first or second century CE,

33:31

that we find Beelzebul has

33:33

become a prince of demons who was formerly

33:36

a high-ranking angel in heaven who

33:38

inspires all kinds of sin in men.

33:41

You can clearly see the connection to our fiendish

33:44

friend the devil here. The gospels

33:46

of Matthew, Mark, and Luke mention Jesus

33:49

driving out demons by Beelzebub,

33:51

and I still can't wrap my head around what

33:53

the hell this means.

33:55

Matthew 12, 25 through 27.

33:58

And Jesus knew their thoughts.

41:59

abide.

42:01

Not to be outdone in taking a concept

42:03

and repurposing it, the New Testament

42:06

renders Abaddon and Apollyon an

42:08

entity. Revelation 9,

42:10

11, And

42:12

they had a king over them, which is the angel

42:14

of the bottomless pit, whose name in the

42:16

Hebrew tongue is Abaddon, but in the Greek

42:18

tongue hath his name Apollyon.

42:22

None of these are directly saying

42:24

this is another name for the devil.

42:26

The best you can get is Angel of

42:28

the Abyss.

42:30

I found several sources saying the apocryphal

42:33

Gnostic text Acts of Thomas,

42:35

written in the early 3rd century CE, states

42:38

Abaddon is the name of a demon or

42:40

the devil,

42:41

but I searched through several translations

42:44

of that text

42:45

and saw not one mention of Abaddon

42:48

being the devil.

42:49

There was one single mention in one version

42:52

that said, To you I speak

42:54

offspring of Gehenna and Abaddon.

42:58

Gehenna was a real place said to be cursed

43:00

and was a figurative equivalent for hell,

43:03

and as mentioned, Abaddon was a bottomless

43:05

pit. This passage is

43:08

speaking to beings from those places,

43:10

not literal children of an entity.

43:13

Belial This

43:15

is a peculiar one, as the origin

43:18

is murky and many scholars have disagreed

43:20

as to the meaning of the word.

43:23

Appearing 27 times in the Hebrew Bible,

43:25

it's been translated as either worthless,

43:29

yokeless as in throwing off the yoke

43:31

of heaven,

43:33

never to rise as in never

43:35

to do well,

43:36

sedition,

43:37

and a land from which there

43:40

is no return. There's

43:42

definitely a negative connotation with all these,

43:45

but it's a wide array of possibilities. Deuteronomy 13,

43:48

13 states, certain

43:51

men, the children of Belial are gone

43:53

out from among them and have withdrawn the

43:55

inhabitants of their city saying, let us go

43:57

and serve other gods which he have not known.

47:59

as this source of darkness,

48:02

destruction and chaos, which

48:05

just represents the primordial earth

48:07

before the gods came in and

48:09

separated things and began organizing

48:12

the whole creation.

48:15

A direct naming of the devil as the great

48:17

dragon doesn't appear into the book of revelation

48:20

written in the late first century CE.

48:23

Chapter 12 9 says,

48:26

and the great dragon was cast out That

48:28

old serpent called the devil and Satan,

48:31

which deceiveth the whole world. He

48:33

was cast out unto the earth, and his angels

48:35

were cast out with him.

48:38

And in chapter 22,

48:41

And he laid hold on the dragon, that

48:43

old serpent, which is the devil and Satan, and

48:46

bound him a thousand years.

48:49

The simple phrase, that old serpent,

48:52

effectively retconned centuries of

48:54

prior understanding forever afterward.

48:57

The serpent in the Garden of Eden thus became

49:00

synonymous with the devil and apologists

49:02

jumped on the chance to take some blame

49:05

away from Yahweh

49:06

and mankind.

49:11

Lucifer

49:13

That brings us to a big one. Maybe the

49:15

granddaddy of all misinterpretations, Lucifer.

49:19

Jason kicks it off for us.

49:21

The idea of Lucifer,

49:24

or really the name Lucifer,

49:26

comes from two different places

49:29

in the Hebrew Bible. This

49:31

is Isaiah chapters 14 to 20 and Ezekiel

49:33

chapter 28. And

49:38

what it's talking about in these

49:40

two places are

49:42

two different kings, I

49:45

think Assyria and Babylon

49:48

and I used to know the actual names of

49:51

those kings.

49:53

So in the case of Isaiah 14 to 20, It's

49:56

Sargon II and Ezekiel 20.

54:00

he's essentially trying to usurp

54:02

the great high god of

54:05

Israel, El Elyan or Yahweh

54:07

as El and Yahweh were merged.

54:10

And so you have a story of the Morning Star,

54:13

which another word for Morning

54:15

Star is Lucifer,

54:17

trying to usurp the heavenly throne

54:20

and then ultimately being cast out

54:22

by God. And this is a

54:24

story not about any angels. It wasn't

54:26

about any celestial entities.

54:29

It was about kings who had failed

54:32

and their prideful ways had ultimately

54:35

led to their downfall. But

54:37

since it was tied up with all of these

54:40

this astrological imagery and themes,

54:44

it was easy

54:46

to link that

54:48

at a later date with other

54:50

stories concerning evil

54:52

and prideful angels, such

54:55

as the ones we find in the Book of Watchers

54:58

in 1st Enoch.

55:01

The word comes from the Latin words lux or

55:04

lux, meaning light, and

55:06

fur, meaning bearing.

55:09

Together it makes light bringer, or dawn

55:11

star.

55:13

Lucifer was a godly personification

55:15

of the planet Venus, son of the goddess

55:18

of dawn Aurora, and one of the brightest

55:20

objects in the sky. Indeed,

55:23

Roman poet Catulus called

55:25

its evening aspect noctifer, or

55:28

night-bringer, as it could still be seen

55:30

as the sunset. But here

55:32

again, we see the translation bug

55:35

biting hard as the term

55:37

Lucifer found in the Bible was translated

55:39

from the Hebrew hellel ben Shechar,

55:42

shining son of the morning, a term

55:45

the ancient Hebrews used

55:47

for the planet Venus.

55:49

The Greek translation rendered the term

55:52

Hiosphoros, the Greek word

55:54

for bringer of dawn. So

55:56

you can see where the Latin term Lucifer

55:58

came from when the Bible was created.

55:59

was translated, once again,

56:02

into the Latin Vulgate around 382 CE.

56:04

This was done by one

56:05

dude, Jerome,

56:09

born in the Roman

56:12

Empire around present-day Croatia

56:14

or possibly Bosnia.

56:16

He learned Latin and some Greek

56:19

early in life, then tried to learn Hebrew

56:21

later after he converted to Christianity.

56:24

Working from the Greek Septuagint, itself

56:27

a translation of the Hebrew Bible,

56:29

Jerome translated Hiosphoros

56:32

as Lucifer.

56:34

You could also point to Origin of Alexandria 200

56:37

years later saying certain passages were

56:39

about the devil. Later

56:41

English translation kept this name instead

56:44

of its meaning

56:45

and it has caused a whole heap of

56:47

trouble. The particular

56:49

Bible passage to blame is Isaiah 1412.

56:53

How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer,

56:56

son of the morning?

56:58

How art thou cut down to the ground which

57:00

just weakened the nations?

57:03

With the popularity of the devil's fall from

57:05

heaven myth,

57:07

this one verse suddenly tacked

57:09

a whole new name onto the devil's

57:11

growing list of monikers, but if

57:13

someone had taken two damn seconds

57:16

to pay attention in a reading comprehension

57:18

class, this would never have been

57:20

considered another name for the devil.

57:23

Eight short-ass verses earlier,

57:25

the scripture is crystal clear that

57:28

this is a taunt against the current

57:30

Babylonian ruler stating

57:32

in verse 4, Thou

57:34

shalt take up this proverb against the

57:36

king of Babylon and say, How

57:38

hath the oppressor ceased? The

57:40

golden city ceased.

57:43

And this taunt continues for about 20

57:46

more verses, including the

57:48

one with Lucifer, which

57:50

obviously

57:52

was a sarcastic jab at

57:54

the Babylonian king.

57:57

Let it fit too well with the later

57:59

repurposed

1:00:01

In the middle ages, it became the name for one of the

1:00:03

seven princes of hell.

1:00:05

Appearing in 1409, the anonymously

1:00:07

written and redundantly titled The Lantern

1:00:10

of Light

1:00:11

manufactured a classification system for the

1:00:13

seven deadly sins and the demons that preside

1:00:15

over them. Mammon was

1:00:17

the name given to the demon who presided

1:00:19

over,

1:00:20

you guessed it, Lust.

1:00:23

Just kidding, it was greed.

1:00:25

And now that I'm looking over this list,

1:00:27

let's knock a couple other names for the Devil off.

1:00:31

You've heard most of these by now, funnily enough. You'd

1:00:33

think someone would have stepped in and said, hey, that

1:00:35

can't be the name of the Devil. It's

1:00:37

the name of

1:00:38

this demon. But

1:00:39

lo. So we have Maman for greed.

1:00:41

We also get Lucifer for pride.

1:00:44

Beelzebub is envy.

1:00:46

Attle left field. Satan is

1:00:48

wrath.

1:00:50

Abaddon is gluttony.

1:00:52

Belphagor is sloth. And

1:00:55

this was a Canaanite-derived entity originally

1:00:57

called Ba'al Peor, after a

1:00:59

mountain called Peor in Moab where

1:01:02

Ba'al was worshipped.

1:01:04

And lastly, we have Asmodeus

1:01:06

for Lust. Asmodeus

1:01:08

was mentioned in part 1 as the right-hand D-bag

1:01:11

of Aromon in Zoroastrianism.

1:01:14

Honestly, I

1:01:15

put him as the demon of wrath since

1:01:18

Zoroastrian cosmology listed him

1:01:20

as the demon of wrath. But

1:01:23

anyway. How about Semael?

1:01:26

Here's another one with a pedigree as strong as the

1:01:28

fall from grace story.

1:01:30

First appearing in 1 Enoch, he was a fallen

1:01:33

angel whose name meant Venom of God.

1:01:36

Jewish literature of the Second Temple period

1:01:38

had him painted all sorts of nasty, variously

1:01:41

saying that he was the serpent in Eden, he

1:01:44

was the incarnation of evil, chief

1:01:46

of all Satan's, commands demons,

1:01:48

fathered Cain, dated Lilith, ordered

1:01:50

his pizza with no sauce, and was

1:01:53

responsible for all evil brought upon

1:01:55

Israel and Judah.

1:01:57

Apocryphal writings in the first century CE

1:01:59

and beyond

1:17:59

1857 Faust Symphony,

1:18:03

and an incredible host more composers,

1:18:05

songwriters, films, shows, art and literature too

1:18:08

many to name.

1:18:10

Because of the appeal of the moral

1:18:12

dilemma involved,

1:18:13

the deal with the devil metaphor

1:18:16

has gained wide popularity from then on,

1:18:18

and no doubt helped in attaching the

1:18:20

name Mephistopheles to the devil,

1:18:23

even though

1:18:24

there is a clear distinction between the two in

1:18:26

the play. We'll

1:18:28

be revisiting Mephisto here in just a little

1:18:30

bit, but for now I'll run down through

1:18:32

some other devilish names that have

1:18:34

been conjured up, tacked on, invented,

1:18:37

and improvised over the years just

1:18:39

to give you a little cherry on top.

1:18:41

Tinibrifer or Shadowbearer. Snakey.

1:18:45

Cacodemon. Shownspeagle

1:18:48

or Pretty Mirror. The Boogie

1:18:50

Man.

1:18:50

Ragamuffin. Crooked Nose. The

1:18:52

Many-Handed One. Ribald. The Father

1:18:55

of Lies. Gentleman Jack. error,

1:18:58

dickens, dickon, lusty dick,

1:19:00

old nick, old rip, old horny,

1:19:03

old hairy, and old scratch. And

1:19:06

that's just old scratching the surface.

1:19:09

And speaking of surface, what in the world does the

1:19:11

devil look like? That's

1:19:14

almost as loaded as the names he carries.

1:19:18

Let's go through the

1:19:18

many looks for the devil over the years

1:19:21

up to and including the modern devil. of

1:19:51

course you off my list

1:19:53

but when you come knocking at my

1:19:55

door

1:19:55

fate seems to I'd give my heart

1:19:57

a twist, I'd come honey back for

1:20:02

I should hate you, but

1:20:04

I guess I love you. You've

1:20:07

got me in between the

1:20:09

Devil and the Deep Blue Sea. Quick,

1:20:11

quick, the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea. The

1:20:16

Devil has power to assume a

1:20:18

pleasing shape. Hamlet.

1:20:22

Shakespeare's Hamlet. The

1:20:26

Devil has had one hell of a costumer.

1:20:30

I've

1:20:34

described what I guess you could call the classic

1:20:37

devil look of horns, wings, red

1:20:39

skin, etc. I'll get to

1:20:41

that, but it's hardly how

1:20:43

he began or ended up.

1:20:46

Let's go back to ancient Canaan and

1:20:48

a figure I mentioned in part one, Habayu.

1:20:53

If you'll remember, he is a demon described

1:20:55

as the Lord of Horns and a Tail.

1:20:59

Other Ugaritic demons carried

1:21:01

associations with fire. At least

1:21:03

a couple were described as sea monsters

1:21:06

or giant serpents, sometimes

1:21:08

with multiple heads, as in the monster

1:21:11

Lotan, the mighty one with

1:21:13

seven heads.

1:21:15

That'll come up again. In fact, the

1:21:17

whole reason I'm bringing these examples up is

1:21:20

because the many looks of the devil all have

1:21:22

roots in these myths and legends, and

1:21:24

you can tie a string on the corkboard to

1:21:26

most of them.

1:21:28

And try and keep track of all the animal

1:21:30

imagery, as the devil has taken on

1:21:33

aspects of all kinds

1:21:34

of beasts.

1:21:37

This is likely due to the fact that it's always

1:21:39

been in the fashion to characterize one's

1:21:42

enemies in a chimeric, chaos

1:21:45

monster way, especially in

1:21:47

apocalyptic literature like the kinds

1:21:49

that were being written pre- and post-Jewish

1:21:51

exile in Babylon.

1:21:53

For example,

1:21:55

Daniel chapter 7 describes four

1:21:57

great beasts from the sea, one

1:21:59

with a

1:26:00

You start getting the art rolling in with

1:26:02

a half-man, half-goat, all-horny with

1:26:04

horns tailed troublemaker. This

1:26:08

also led to one particularly remarkable

1:26:10

instance, if you'll allow

1:26:12

a short but compelling tangent.

1:26:15

The story of Sister Magdalena of the Cross,

1:26:17

the nun who made a pact

1:26:19

with the Devil.

1:26:27

Born

1:26:27

in Cordoba, Spain

1:26:29

in 1487, Magdalena de la Cruz was

1:26:32

a nun of the Franciscan order who

1:26:34

displayed great devotion to the church

1:26:36

at a very young age and throughout

1:26:39

her life.

1:26:40

She was said to have had a vision of Jesus

1:26:42

when she was five years old, and

1:26:44

claimed to have visions repeatedly after

1:26:46

that, simultaneously gaining fame and

1:26:48

notoriety at the time.

1:26:51

Not long after, she was said to have cured

1:26:53

a man's limp and made a mute man

1:26:55

able to speak acts that were considered

1:26:58

miracles.

1:27:00

At the age of 10, according to her legend,

1:27:03

she thought herself too beautiful and that

1:27:05

no amount of covering up would atone

1:27:07

for her beauty.

1:27:09

So she did the logical thing and

1:27:11

crucified herself to her bedroom wall.

1:27:16

To

1:27:16

her, this was an act

1:27:17

of atonement.

1:27:19

She nailed her feet in and got her left

1:27:21

hand nailed before passing out from pain

1:27:24

and falling off the wall, breaking a couple ribs

1:27:26

in the process.

1:27:30

Though

1:27:32

a doctor patched her up, she wanted

1:27:34

to feel the pain as a form of penance

1:27:37

and kept removing her bandages, which

1:27:39

led to infection and near death. But

1:27:42

apparently on Easter Sunday 1497, she

1:27:46

had a vision where Jesus appeared

1:27:48

to her and She cured her and she sat

1:27:50

up in bed ripping her bandages off and screaming

1:27:53

in joy.

1:27:55

16 she whipped herself

1:27:58

in penance and claimed

1:32:06

I came across this story in the research and thought

1:32:09

it too good not to share, but the main

1:32:11

point of including it is how the imagery

1:32:13

of the devil having Seder features

1:32:16

was a prominent thing at the time, and

1:32:18

the lengths people have gone to throughout

1:32:20

history to portray this character

1:32:23

and his powers

1:32:24

are extreme.

1:32:30

Continuing with the Devil's looks, I wasn't

1:32:32

able to find a direct source saying

1:32:34

Jerome was responsible, but his

1:32:37

imagining of satyrs being demons

1:32:39

made me wonder if he also associated

1:32:41

devilish looks with that of other Greek

1:32:43

mythology. Indeed, some

1:32:46

scholars like Jeffrey Burton Russell believe

1:32:48

this to be the case, as he points out

1:32:50

in his 1977 work, The Devil, Perceptions of

1:32:54

Evil from Antiquity to Primitive Christianity.

1:32:57

Quote, The Devil's pitchfork derives

1:32:59

in part from the ancient Trident, such

1:33:02

as that carried by Poseidon, which

1:33:04

symbolizes three-fold power over earth,

1:33:07

air, and sea, in part from symbols

1:33:09

of death, such as the mallet of Charon,

1:33:13

and in part from the instruments used in hell

1:33:15

for the torment of the damned."

1:33:19

I would also love to lump in one

1:33:21

more contender for inspiration, Hades.

1:33:25

Obviously, the first figure you'd point to

1:33:27

in that mythology, though wrongly

1:33:29

as I pointed out earlier, but here you

1:33:31

have the ruler of the underworld and damned souls,

1:33:34

and lo and behold he was often

1:33:36

depicted carrying a Bident

1:33:38

or two-pronged instrument.

1:33:41

These images could very well have inspired

1:33:44

later artistic portrayals, though Jeffrey

1:33:46

Burton Russell

1:33:47

wasn't exactly convinced.

1:33:50

He went on to point out the more contemporary

1:33:52

thought that monks and church leaders

1:33:54

could simply look out their windows and

1:33:57

see the peasants shoveling hay who were

1:33:59

still there.

1:33:59

scared to death, they would be handled

1:34:02

the same way by the devil.

1:34:04

To him,

1:34:05

that inspiration made more sense than

1:34:07

the thousand-year-old influence of another culture's

1:34:09

mythology.

1:34:11

I lean toward Hades and

1:34:13

his Biden being the source personally.

1:34:17

Dante returns to us in the 14th century,

1:34:20

introducing bat-like wings in his description

1:34:22

of the devil.

1:34:24

Milton strikes back with the devil being

1:34:26

beautiful.

1:34:28

The Faust folktale also

1:34:30

helped the image of the devil with productions in the

1:34:32

17th century onward portraying

1:34:34

Mephisto wearing Renaissance clothing

1:34:37

in bright red and black silks,

1:34:39

often with red tights and

1:34:41

makeup of black hair and a Van Dyke

1:34:44

goatee.

1:34:46

Nowadays it's fashionable to portray

1:34:48

the devil as a good looking guy in a sharp suit,

1:34:51

Someone enchanting and likeable who

1:34:53

puts others at ease and charms his

1:34:55

way in and out of situations.

1:34:58

But there's not really one look

1:35:00

the devil carries anymore, as

1:35:02

you can just as easily find images of an all-red,

1:35:05

pointy-tailed, snake-tongued, two-horned,

1:35:07

bat-winged, goat-legged, van-dike-sporting,

1:35:10

trident-toting humanoid. Or

1:35:12

even all that but a horrendously ugly,

1:35:15

ogre-like face. It's

1:35:17

really up to you how you see or don't

1:35:19

see the devil.

1:35:21

One symbol appearing a lot these days, especially

1:35:24

with the modern satanic temple,

1:35:26

is the image of Baphomet.

1:35:28

This is the goat-legged, human-torsoed

1:35:30

winged figure with a goat head that

1:35:33

appears along with several other bits of iconography.

1:35:37

Many people equate it directly as a

1:35:39

representation of the devil, but of course

1:35:41

it's not.

1:35:43

The term originated around 1098 in

1:35:47

a letter from a French crusader

1:35:49

and was used as an alternate term for

1:35:52

Muhammad.

1:35:54

It's seen in several works of literature

1:35:56

in the 12th and 13th centuries, but

1:35:58

in the early 14th century.

1:39:59

right around the corner.

1:40:01

It feels like evangelicals are getting more

1:40:04

and more empowered to call anything

1:40:06

they don't like, satanic.

1:40:09

If you need examples, I offer the

1:40:11

past few years and the names

1:40:13

Lil Nas X, Sam Smith,

1:40:16

and Rihanna. These guys

1:40:18

are like professional Jimmy Rustlers. It's

1:40:20

like they're paid a commission for each singular

1:40:23

Jimmy they wrestle. It's hilarious. It's

1:40:25

also kind of sad. I hope

1:40:27

it's just me, but it seems we're edging

1:40:30

closer and closer toward the constitutional

1:40:32

church and state wall being torn

1:40:34

down in America. I guess

1:40:36

time will tell.

1:40:40

But something that has stood the test of time is

1:40:42

the devil's involvement in superstitions.

1:40:45

I can't get out of our pop culture section without

1:40:47

a few fun superstitions, so here's

1:40:53

Hang

1:40:53

a mirror by the door to keep out the devil. He's

1:40:56

so vain he'll get distracted by his reflection

1:40:58

and forget to enter.

1:41:00

If you spill salt, throw a pinch over

1:41:02

your left shoulder. From Da Vinci's

1:41:05

The Last Supper, which shows spilled

1:41:07

salt by Judas, and the folk believe that the devil

1:41:10

is always whispering in your left ear, so

1:41:12

throwing salt might hit him squaw in the eye. Cover

1:41:15

your mouth while yawning. From

1:41:18

the belief that an open mouth will allow the devil

1:41:20

to jump inside.

1:41:22

No whistling at night. From

1:41:25

the belief that it will summon the devil.

1:41:28

Don't have two mirrors facing each other.

1:41:31

From the belief that it opens a portal to hell

1:41:33

the devil can climb through.

1:41:36

Watch out for leaves turning in the wind.

1:41:39

From the belief that the devil is in that spot.

1:41:42

Never leave a woman alone during the first six

1:41:45

weeks after childbirth. From

1:41:47

the belief the devil has more power over

1:41:49

them then.

1:41:52

Don't cut off both ends of baked bread. From

1:41:55

the belief that it would cause the devil to fly over

1:41:57

the house.

1:41:59

whistle.

1:45:50

because

1:46:00

that's what serpents already do. But

1:46:03

it's meant to serve as an ideological tale for

1:46:06

where we got snakes, why these weird

1:46:08

looking lizards don't have any legs.

1:46:11

Well,

1:46:12

this is frequently depicted

1:46:14

as the earliest appearance of Satan,

1:46:16

that it's Satan in the Garden of Eden. But

1:46:19

the story never says that. It says that

1:46:22

this is a nahash, which means a serpent.

1:46:25

And it was never meant to

1:46:27

be evil.

1:46:29

And some people say, oh, well, the serpent

1:46:31

lied. But if you actually read what it

1:46:33

says, the serpent simply

1:46:35

tells them that if they eat from the tree of

1:46:37

knowledge, then their eyes

1:46:39

will be opened and they'll be given knowledge.

1:46:42

And then they eat from it and

1:46:44

they can suddenly, their

1:46:47

eyes are opened, which is a term

1:46:50

that we find frequently in the

1:46:53

wisdom literature. It doesn't mean that you're

1:46:55

blind, that you couldn't

1:46:57

see it. It means that they're blowing

1:46:59

the lid off. And so what

1:47:02

happens is the serpent tells

1:47:04

them to eat of this fruit

1:47:06

and they do, and they suddenly

1:47:09

gain more knowledge. This is a parallel

1:47:12

story to Azazel giving people,

1:47:15

you know, the skill

1:47:17

of blacksmithing and waging war and

1:47:19

cosmetics. It's just sharing

1:47:21

of divine knowledge. It's a, you

1:47:24

know, it's a Prometheus type story.

1:47:26

And he actually says, you know,

1:47:30

the command they had been told was that if they did

1:47:32

this, then on that day they would die.

1:47:35

And

1:47:35

the serpent says, well, no, you won't.

1:47:38

And of course, they don't die. They

1:47:40

continue living. And so people

1:47:42

are trying to say, okay, well, how is it that Satan

1:47:45

is like telling the truth here?

1:47:48

Well, it's because it's not Satan.

1:47:49

This is a

1:47:51

serpent deity named Nahash

1:47:54

who used to be worshipped in the Jerusalem

1:47:56

temple. and one

1:47:58

of the purposes of this God.

1:51:59

but it was the best they could do because they

1:52:02

had to explain why people

1:52:04

were still worshiping a bronze serpent

1:52:06

in the Jerusalem temple. And

1:52:09

eventually this bronze idol and

1:52:11

the worship

1:52:13

to Nahushdin was ended and the

1:52:15

idol was tossed out. And we have a

1:52:17

reference to that, I believe in

1:52:20

the story of I

1:52:22

think Hezekiah, where he

1:52:24

goes through, he institutes these reforms and take

1:52:27

a bunch of the idols out of the temple and they

1:52:29

get rid of them. And I believe they throw

1:52:31

them all in a valley and destroy them. But

1:52:34

this idea, as

1:52:37

Yahwizim became more prominent, they were getting

1:52:39

rid of these other idols. And

1:52:42

the god Nahushdin was one of the ones that

1:52:44

gets tossed out. This sort

1:52:46

of set up a sort of rivalry between

1:52:49

the priests of Nahushdin

1:52:52

and the priests of Yahweh. And

1:52:55

so, as these Nahushdun priests

1:52:58

are no longer welcome, and they either

1:53:00

have to just only worship Yahweh or

1:53:02

get out, then

1:53:05

their deity was essentially demonized.

1:53:07

And they start saying, oh, well, this

1:53:10

Nahushdun,

1:53:12

he wasn't just another

1:53:14

deity.

1:53:15

It was a false god, or in some cases,

1:53:17

he was evil. And we even find

1:53:19

references in various spots in the Bible

1:53:22

where they equate Nahushten

1:53:25

to Leviathan. And

1:53:27

they call both of them the

1:53:29

twisting serpent. And

1:53:32

so it's almost as, oh, yeah, this

1:53:34

wasn't just a God that

1:53:36

you worshiped.

1:53:38

This was like an evil agent

1:53:40

of chaos.

1:53:43

And so because of this link that

1:53:46

was essentially there

1:53:49

to disparage this one deity,

1:53:52

this serpent eventually becomes

1:53:55

linked with Leviathan

1:53:57

and thus with Satan.

1:53:59

And that's how you end up with the

1:54:03

Eden story where it's actually

1:54:05

about a bunch of people who

1:54:07

sort of get, in some ways

1:54:09

liberated. They gain new knowledge,

1:54:12

they can then go off and start civilization,

1:54:14

they understand all these things, they learn about

1:54:16

procreation, you get a whole race of

1:54:18

people because of this, their eyes are opened,

1:54:21

they have better understanding. And

1:54:23

this is how, you know, basically a bunch of monkeys

1:54:26

become humans,

1:54:28

now it's turned into the story about

1:54:31

the fall. Everything was perfect

1:54:34

and now it's all corrupt.

1:54:37

And, you know, so the

1:54:39

snake is in a way blamed

1:54:41

as the origin of evil.

1:54:44

When originally it was just a protector

1:54:46

of divine knowledge who guarded

1:54:49

the Garden of the Gods and

1:54:52

also helped you cure yourself from

1:54:54

snake bites.

1:54:58

It wasn't until the intertestamental apocryphal

1:55:01

literature that the snake is connected

1:55:03

to the devil, in particular the life of Adam

1:55:05

and Eve and the wisdom of Solomon.

1:55:09

Gerald Massadier goes on to say that the expulsion

1:55:12

story is illogical, asking

1:55:14

questions such as why would God

1:55:16

consider knowing the difference between good and evil

1:55:19

bad enough to keep it from his creation

1:55:21

when demanding the fear of God makes

1:55:23

that knowledge necessary? And

1:55:26

what motive did the snake have?

1:55:28

It just shows up, tells Eve

1:55:30

it's fine to eat the fruit and is never mentioned again.

1:55:34

And finally, if the snake was evil or

1:55:36

even the devil,

1:55:37

how did it get in the earthly paradise

1:55:40

God created and when did evil

1:55:42

come into the picture?

1:55:44

The Hebrew Bible paints God as the

1:55:46

original bad guy.

1:55:48

Isaiah 45

1:55:50

7 I form the light and create darkness.

1:55:53

I make peace and create evil. I

1:55:55

the Lord do all these things.

1:55:59

Amos Thpole.

1:56:01

Shall a trumpet be blown in the city and the people

1:56:03

not be afraid?

1:56:05

Shall there be evil in a city and the Lord hath

1:56:07

not done it?

1:56:09

First Samuel 1614 But

1:56:12

the spirit of the Lord departed from Saul,

1:56:14

and an evil spirit from the Lord troubled

1:56:17

him.

1:56:19

Gerald Massadier, making a point that stands

1:56:21

for the whole Old Testament, wrote,

1:56:23

quote, The Creator was acting

1:56:25

like a feckless despot.

1:56:27

The first book thus portrays God as

1:56:29

an angry tyrant, wrathful and

1:56:32

unjust, a stranger to the idea

1:56:34

of forgiveness who, in his ire,

1:56:36

decides to drown the whole world."

1:56:41

Any reference to Satan as the antithesis

1:56:43

to God appearing in the Old Testament has

1:56:46

been applied retroactively and ignores

1:56:48

the fact that God created him and

1:56:50

he is just following orders.

1:56:53

The bad guy Satan was created

1:56:55

to make God look better.

1:56:57

Massadier goes on to point out the oddity

1:56:59

of Jesus being tested by the devil in

1:57:01

the Gospels.

1:57:03

To him, it makes no sense for three

1:57:06

reasons.

1:57:07

That Jesus' divinity was being questioned,

1:57:10

that the devil comes across as stupid

1:57:12

testing the Son of God while knowing he would not

1:57:14

be successful,

1:57:15

and that Jesus didn't use his magical

1:57:17

powers to get rid of the devil, nor did

1:57:20

he perform a single, simple miracle that

1:57:22

would have shut the devil up then and there.

1:57:25

To Messadier, it

1:57:26

was a crappy attempt to introduce the

1:57:28

world to the devil as the ultimate evil one

1:57:31

worthy to be the opponent of God.

1:57:34

This new villain, carelessly appropriated

1:57:37

from the Essene dualism of the intertestamental

1:57:39

period,

1:57:40

acts bizarrely, arbitrarily

1:57:43

doing things to people with no

1:57:45

clear purpose other than to serve

1:57:47

as an entity to dislike.

1:57:51

Again, the need for a villain arose

1:57:53

from the unavoidable question of theodicy,

1:57:56

or the defense of God's goodness and omnipotence

1:57:59

in the view of the world. of the existence of evil.

1:58:02

And in this case, the evil perpetrated

1:58:04

by God himself.

1:58:07

It seems the answer for authors at that time

1:58:10

was to temper God's wrath and shortcomings

1:58:13

and assign them to another being. This

1:58:15

is very clear in the books of Chronicles

1:58:18

and Jubilees which sought to rewrite

1:58:20

earlier stories to make God

1:58:22

look like less of a douche.

1:58:24

Jason swoops in with a refresher.

1:58:28

So at this time, the Jewish

1:58:30

people are drifting away

1:58:33

from polytheism and into monotheism.

1:58:36

But when you do this, you run into

1:58:38

the problem of

1:58:40

explaining where evil comes

1:58:43

from. And their

1:58:45

concept of evil is a bit different

1:58:47

from people in Christianity.

1:58:50

Christianity, evil is, it's

1:58:53

basically like a wickedness, but

1:58:55

it wasn't that restricted

1:58:58

in,

1:59:00

you know, ancient Judaism. Evil

1:59:02

just meant anything bad. So

1:59:04

a natural disaster,

1:59:07

the word for disaster, for

1:59:09

calamity, for misfortune, all those,

1:59:12

it was all the same word, and it's the same word they

1:59:15

used for evil.

1:59:16

And so

1:59:18

evil didn't just mean, you know, someone

1:59:21

was plotting something wicked,

1:59:23

it could just mean that they were going to

1:59:26

do something that might inconvenience

1:59:28

you, and that maybe they're invading

1:59:30

your city, you know, or maybe

1:59:32

there's a hurricane that's

1:59:34

about to hit New Orleans, you know, that

1:59:37

is considered an evil. And it

1:59:39

doesn't mean that it comes from some supernatural

1:59:42

evil, it just means that it's bad

1:59:44

news. And so their

1:59:46

definition of evil was much more expansive.

1:59:49

But they came into this theological problem

1:59:52

with explaining where that comes from in

1:59:55

the past and in most polytheistic

1:59:58

cultures, you have

2:00:00

You know an easy way out if

2:00:02

you worship a certain deity like

2:00:04

say Hera and Something

2:00:07

bad happens. Well, you could blame that on Aries,

2:00:10

you know Oh, well, you know Aries

2:00:12

calls this army to come in here and invade

2:00:14

or whatever How festus

2:00:17

made that spark fly out of my fireplace

2:00:19

and burn down the house, you know So

2:00:22

these these things were a lot easier

2:00:25

to deal with you just blamed it on some other

2:00:27

deity and that's what people did

2:00:30

But the Jews had gotten rid

2:00:32

of all of their other deities, Moat

2:00:35

and all the others, they had been shoved aside

2:00:38

and they no longer worshiped

2:00:40

them. Some didn't

2:00:42

even acknowledge that they existed.

2:00:45

So now they have the problem, where does evil come

2:00:47

from? You know, your disaster and calamity

2:00:50

and misfortune.

2:00:51

And

2:00:52

borrowing this Persian idea would

2:00:55

definitely help because now they could blame it on someone

2:00:57

else. And we see the first

2:01:00

inklings of this popping up

2:01:02

around the time that the chronicler is

2:01:06

rewriting the books of Samuel and Kings.

2:01:10

So we have four books, First and

2:01:12

Second Samuel and First and Second Kings,

2:01:14

and this tells the story of the entire

2:01:17

Jewish monarchy, starting

2:01:19

with King Saul and going

2:01:21

all the way up to the destruction of

2:01:23

Jerusalem by the Babylonians.

2:01:25

And

2:01:27

during this whole period,

2:01:30

the whole thing gets rewritten by

2:01:32

a Levitical priest or

2:01:35

a group of Levitical priests and

2:01:38

they retell the story

2:01:40

of those four books to serve their

2:01:43

own theological purposes. And by

2:01:45

this point, the idea

2:01:47

of the Satan as a

2:01:50

a sort of scapegoat

2:01:53

begins to show up. And

2:01:56

what we have, there's a perfect example of this. this.

2:01:59

We see the first

2:01:59

telling of the story in 2 Samuel

2:02:03

chapter 24. And

2:02:05

what happens is Yahweh

2:02:08

commands David to conduct a census

2:02:11

and he does this because he's angry

2:02:13

at Israel and we're never told why, but

2:02:16

he commands David to conduct a census. David

2:02:19

does so and after he counts all

2:02:21

the people in the nation and he comes back with

2:02:23

the the final count,

2:02:25

Yahweh gets upset

2:02:27

that he conducted the census

2:02:30

as commanded.

2:02:31

So he sends the angel of death

2:02:34

to come in and kill 70,000 Israelites. David

2:02:36

then has to go to the

2:02:41

threshing floor of this one little

2:02:43

place where they process grain, conduct

2:02:45

a sacrifice, and appease

2:02:47

Yahweh. And Yahweh then

2:02:49

backs off. He recalls the Angel of Death

2:02:53

and the pestilence,

2:02:55

the disease, the plague that's

2:02:57

killing all the Israelites. It ceases

2:03:00

and everything goes back to normal.

2:03:02

When it's retold in 1

2:03:05

Chronicles 21, it tells us

2:03:09

that Yahweh didn't conduct a

2:03:11

census. A Satan

2:03:13

angel came in and told him to

2:03:15

conduct a census.

2:03:17

So

2:03:18

this lets Yahweh off the hook. He didn't

2:03:20

command it. But instead,

2:03:23

it

2:03:23

becomes a test, as

2:03:26

we find in Job, where

2:03:28

this other angel is basically

2:03:31

like, hey, David, you know, why don't you,

2:03:33

why don't you do something wrong and go conduct a

2:03:35

census, then Yahweh

2:03:37

can punish him for falling

2:03:40

for Satan's trick. And

2:03:43

so Yahweh then is essentially exonerated.

2:03:46

It lets him off the hook. He

2:03:48

didn't command David to do this.

2:03:51

He didn't want a census.

2:03:53

A Satan tested David's

2:03:56

loyalty, because

2:03:57

I guess David should have known that.

2:03:59

didn't want to sense this,

2:04:01

but instead he did what this angel told him to

2:04:04

do. And so the

2:04:06

same story is told, but

2:04:08

this

2:04:09

new figure is

2:04:11

inserted into the story to

2:04:13

let Yahweh off the hook and

2:04:16

to sort of wash his hands of it.

2:04:18

So Yahweh's actions are now passed

2:04:20

on to the actions of this other

2:04:23

figure.

2:04:24

And this is sort of

2:04:27

the origin of the Satan figure.

2:04:29

He's basically put in there to

2:04:31

take the wicked things

2:04:34

that are seen to be the works of God

2:04:37

and push them off on another character. And

2:04:41

it's sort of the beginnings of a,

2:04:45

I guess, the beginnings of a mental split. split.

2:04:48

You would have the

2:04:51

good ideas of a deity

2:04:53

and then you would have the bad deeds

2:04:56

and you need to separate them. And

2:04:58

this is where we really see the beginnings

2:05:01

of it is in this part right here where

2:05:04

the wicked actions of

2:05:06

the deity are being

2:05:08

extracted from him and

2:05:10

passed off onto another figure. Now,

2:05:13

the Satan is an evil. He was just there to

2:05:15

tempt David to see if

2:05:17

he was actually going to do the right thing

2:05:19

or not. And David failed the test. And that's

2:05:21

why the nation of Israel is punished.

2:05:24

But we do see the beginnings of that split

2:05:27

in the idea. And there's

2:05:29

actually something similar to that in Zoroastrianism,

2:05:33

where Ahura Mazda and

2:05:35

Arman were basically two versions

2:05:38

of the same great spirit, the

2:05:40

good side and the bad side, and they separate.

2:05:43

It's very similar to what we have going on in

2:05:45

there, and this serves a theological purpose.

2:05:48

You now take the first steps toward blaming

2:05:51

disaster and calamity and disease

2:05:54

on someone other than Yahweh.

2:05:56

before this we had the idea like in

2:05:58

Isaiah

2:07:59

Islam,

2:08:00

Azazel was an angel who

2:08:02

almost turned his back on heaven.

2:08:06

No, originally Azazel was

2:08:08

a place where a scapegoat

2:08:10

was sent in an old Jewish ritual

2:08:13

during Yom Kippur.

2:08:15

Detailed in Leviticus chapter 16, the

2:08:18

ritual involved two goats, one

2:08:20

of which would be sacrificed to Yahweh, while

2:08:23

the other would have a priest grab its

2:08:25

head,

2:08:25

all the sins of Israel and its people

2:08:28

over it, and send it off into the wilderness

2:08:30

or possibly toss it off a cliff. Thus,

2:08:34

the goat takes the sins with it, thereby

2:08:36

cleansing the people of the filth on their souls.

2:08:39

Hence, scapegoating, singling

2:08:41

something out,

2:08:42

and absolving yourself of blame.

2:08:46

It wasn't too much of a leap to translate

2:08:49

that idea onto a figure. like

2:08:52

it wasn't a leap to borrow stories and ideas

2:08:54

from Mesopotamia and Persia,

2:08:56

like the idea of the immortality of the soul,

2:08:58

for instance.

2:08:59

A concept going all the way back to vedism,

2:09:02

the Zoroastrian idea that a soul is immortal

2:09:05

seeped into Jewish teachings and ultimately

2:09:07

into Christian theology. Couple

2:09:10

that with some Greek influence of Orphism,

2:09:12

a wild set of religious beliefs

2:09:14

that could be its own episode, and you

2:09:16

can really see the roots of Christianity

2:09:19

forming.

2:09:20

Orphism seemed to lend the idea of good versus

2:09:23

evil, original sin, and humanity

2:09:25

trying to regain its divinity to attain

2:09:28

salvation,

2:09:29

if you'll pardon the brevity of the example.

2:09:33

I don't think we can know how much truly

2:09:35

influenced the creation of the devil as

2:09:38

a complete entity at the time, but suffice

2:09:40

it to say there were many, and even the

2:09:43

concept eventually branched off with different

2:09:45

versions taking on lives of their own.

2:09:48

Just like we discussed with the looks of the devil,

2:09:50

the idea of the devil is a chaos

2:09:53

monster,

2:09:53

a chimera of concepts straight

2:09:56

from the blender of countless theologies

2:09:58

after soaking in centuries of stor-

2:09:59

storytelling.

2:10:02

Bessadier does not mince words with

2:10:04

that in mind,

2:10:05

quote,

2:10:06

that the notion of the devil as God's enemy

2:10:09

was borrowed is certain since

2:10:11

the very idea was alien to ancient

2:10:13

Judaism. Yet it began

2:10:15

to manifest itself the moment the identity

2:10:17

of the Jewish people was threatened,

2:10:20

end quote.

2:10:22

Judaism at the time was not concerned

2:10:25

with an individual's redemption, therefore

2:10:27

there wasn't much need for a devil.

2:10:29

However,

2:10:30

Christianity became all about redemption

2:10:33

and thus needed a figure to fight against,

2:10:35

a role the devil fit perfectly.

2:10:38

To fortify their position, Jewish

2:10:40

authors had to rework the heavenly employee Satan

2:10:43

of the Old Testament into something

2:10:45

more useful that would ultimately be a

2:10:47

huge part of Christian theology.

2:10:50

Thus, God could be written as a

2:10:52

pleasant, non-rathful, non-temperamental

2:10:55

being going forward and the devil

2:10:57

gets to be the scapegoat thenceforth.

2:11:02

As Christianity developed,

2:11:04

church leaders started questioning certain

2:11:06

aspects, likely in the hopes of bolstering

2:11:08

the church's position.

2:11:10

But the Odyssey was a hot topic,

2:11:13

with perhaps the biggest question being when

2:11:16

did evil first appear?

2:11:18

Assyrian theologian Tatian wrote

2:11:21

in the 2nd century CE that the devil

2:11:23

fell from grace first which caused

2:11:26

others to fall, including man. Roman

2:11:29

Christian author Lactantius argued

2:11:31

in the 4th century CE that, quote,

2:11:34

the creative will of God desired two

2:11:36

antagonistic spirits, one as the

2:11:38

principle of good, the other as the principle of evil,

2:11:41

end quote.

2:11:42

To him,

2:11:43

God created evil from the get-go. But

2:11:46

no one could really agree when

2:11:48

the fall happened or when evil

2:11:51

came into the picture. Was

2:11:52

it before the fall? After? Because

2:11:54

of? If the

2:11:55

devil rejected God, then surely

2:11:58

that meant evil was around before him?

2:12:01

Was he the cause of it or was he the effect

2:12:03

of it?

2:12:05

It was a conundrum of pure existentialism

2:12:08

with theologians wondering whether the

2:12:10

devil's existence had preceded

2:12:12

his essence or vice versa. And

2:12:16

in trying to explain this cobbled together

2:12:18

belief, church leaders eventually

2:12:21

threw out all sorts of ideas up to

2:12:23

and including evil hierarchies and

2:12:26

demonology. With

2:12:28

the benefit of hindsight, we can observe that,

2:12:31

historically, evil has always

2:12:33

been associated with what was different.

2:12:37

Authors of the Hebrew Bible portray this

2:12:39

concept here and there, but it's

2:12:41

definitely evident in the intertestamental

2:12:44

period and after, like in the Qumran

2:12:46

literature of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Recall

2:12:49

the Sons of Light vs. Sons of Darkness on

2:12:51

the War Scroll.

2:12:52

The New Testament starts hot with this

2:12:55

concept as well, with the book of Matthew throwing

2:12:57

shade at fellow Jews who didn't agree with

2:12:59

the direction some aspects of the religion were

2:13:01

going.

2:13:03

The bigger the divide,

2:13:05

the more the devil was involved in leading one's

2:13:07

enemy astray.

2:13:09

You can find this idea all over Paul's writings

2:13:11

as well. And you can

2:13:13

clearly chart the evolution of a culture's

2:13:15

gods and goddesses becoming another culture's

2:13:17

demons and devils through historical

2:13:19

ages.

2:13:21

We see it with Baal,

2:13:23

Ashteroth, Pan, basically

2:13:25

any god that wasn't the Christian god during periods

2:13:28

of colonization.

2:13:30

It didn't just happen with Christianity though, old

2:13:32

Tibetan gods became demons

2:13:35

when Buddhism took over for example.

2:13:37

But the idea that anything different is demonic

2:13:40

is not one humanity has been able to escape,

2:13:43

sadly.

2:13:45

As mentioned in part one, Joan of

2:13:47

Arc's actions were deemed demonic. countless

2:13:50

false accusations of witches and sorcerers

2:13:52

have been leveled throughout history. The

2:13:55

Cathars, also mentioned part one, as well

2:13:57

as the Templars, were not the right flavor

2:13:59

of the

2:13:59

Christian, so had to be massacred.

2:14:02

Jews have been targeted as evil

2:14:05

since

2:14:06

pretty much forever. In

2:14:09

modern American culture, homosexuals,

2:14:11

transsexuals, and pretty much anyone who isn't

2:14:13

a straight white Christian is demonized

2:14:16

by a significant chunk of the population.

2:14:19

And if you don't believe me, believe the

2:14:21

laws that are being passed seemingly

2:14:23

each week to disenfranchise and marginalize

2:14:26

these people.

2:14:28

And today it comes from the lazy

2:14:30

demonization of political rivals.

2:14:33

Anything that isn't us, anyone

2:14:35

that thinks or acts differently than us,

2:14:38

is in league with the devil.

2:14:40

Tale as old as time.

2:14:42

And thus,

2:14:43

the devil became a political tool.

2:14:54

Even a generous analysis of

2:14:56

inter-testamental writings will show that

2:14:58

the devil was a basic way of personifying

2:15:00

one's enemies. The king

2:15:02

you don't agree with, the foreign nation

2:15:04

that is hostile to you, the boss that

2:15:06

fired you, the McDonald's worker who forgot

2:15:09

the barbecue sauce for your nuggets, they're all

2:15:11

in league with the devil.

2:15:13

But the bigger picture is that this concept could

2:15:15

be manipulated

2:15:17

by those in power.

2:15:18

Governments could rally their people by

2:15:21

pointing the foreign devil out.

2:15:24

Politicians could gain votes by

2:15:26

equating opponents with the devil. Televangelists

2:15:30

could buy private jets by scaring

2:15:32

money out of their followers, with threats

2:15:34

of the devil coming to get them if they don't send a

2:15:36

crisp, new hundred dollar bill

2:15:39

today. Not tonight, not

2:15:41

tomorrow, not when payday

2:15:43

gets here now. God

2:15:46

has blessed me with 17 cars

2:15:48

because of how hard I fight the devil.

2:15:52

And he rewards those that help

2:15:54

themselves and me. So help

2:15:56

yourself by sending a hundred...

2:15:59

Better make th-

2:15:59

$200 to me

2:16:02

today. Every dollar

2:16:04

sent is another kick on

2:16:06

that old devil's behind.

2:16:10

This is another concept you can find in

2:16:12

different cultures through history. Egyptian

2:16:15

pharaohs, post-fifth dynasty decided

2:16:18

what was evil, usually their rivals or

2:16:20

anything they didn't like. Islam

2:16:22

preached that anything that stopped short of complete

2:16:25

submission to Allah, including any

2:16:27

individuality was satanic.

2:16:29

It was either follow the law of Islam

2:16:32

or fall into the devil's clutches.

2:16:35

The Catholic Church used the devil's propaganda

2:16:37

to target its enemies and justify filling its

2:16:40

coffers.

2:16:41

The devil also served particularly

2:16:44

useful for excusing forced conversions

2:16:46

and countless massacres.

2:16:48

There is power in wielding the devil,

2:16:51

and those in power quickly pick this idea

2:16:53

up early on. Look at

2:16:56

any authoritarian government through history. If

2:16:58

they don't outright claim to be God's chosen regime,

2:17:01

they certainly claim the right to decide what is

2:17:03

good and what is evil. And

2:17:06

in a familiar refrain, anything that

2:17:08

goes against their desires is evil.

2:17:11

Theocracies are no different. Even back

2:17:13

to Zoroastrianism, priests commanded

2:17:16

a huge amount of power, sometimes up

2:17:18

to and including legislative authority, and

2:17:20

still pointed to Ar-Aman to terrify

2:17:23

the public into submission. Mesopotamian

2:17:26

priests taught that humiliation and

2:17:28

self-abasement, even in thought,

2:17:30

were the ways to achieve a sin-free life safe

2:17:33

from evil.

2:17:35

Church relationships with monarchies throughout

2:17:37

history were always strained, each side

2:17:39

jealous and paranoid of the other getting the upper

2:17:41

hand, with the devil on whoever's

2:17:44

you're not.

2:17:47

The devil was a tool, or perhaps

2:17:50

more accurately, a weapon to be wielded

2:17:52

in statecraft. As

2:17:55

Gerald Massadier shrewdly put it, quote,

2:17:58

it was politics that gave birth to

2:17:59

the devil

2:18:01

and the devil is indeed a political

2:18:03

invention."

2:18:06

So what were the effects of this invention and

2:18:09

subsequent use throughout history?

2:18:12

Nothing good, I'm afraid. Let

2:18:14

me try and break it down a bit and give examples through history.

2:18:16

First of all, connecting the devil to

2:18:19

the fall of man's story inexorably connects

2:18:21

woman to evil.

2:18:24

It wasn't a new concept, as one

2:18:26

could argue in ancient Mesopotamia women had

2:18:28

been set up to fail by the mythology such

2:18:30

as how they're portrayed in the Epic of

2:18:32

Gilgamesh.

2:18:34

Great Wisdom is displayed by some female characters,

2:18:36

including powerful goddesses, in the work, but

2:18:39

perhaps more so they are portrayed

2:18:41

as harlots, seductresses, temperamental

2:18:44

and vindictive. The

2:18:46

Essenes had terrible views on women.

2:18:49

Not only does the majority of evidence point to

2:18:51

there not even being women allowed in their community

2:18:54

at Qumran, a fact even old Pliny

2:18:56

the Elder attested in writings,

2:18:58

it also seems they held

2:19:00

zero social status and were not even

2:19:02

allowed to study scriptures.

2:19:04

And there is evidence to say they blamed woman

2:19:07

for all evil because of her role

2:19:09

in the exile from Paradise.

2:19:11

Women have had an uphill

2:19:14

battle in many religions, especially

2:19:16

the Abrahamic

2:19:18

and part of that is due to this connection to the

2:19:20

devil and evil. As

2:19:23

a political tool,

2:19:24

this excuse has been used to suppress

2:19:26

women all through history.

2:19:29

As a political tool,

2:19:31

the devil has been the impetus for the absolute

2:19:33

insanity

2:19:35

of the Inquisition, which began in

2:19:37

France in the 12th century CE

2:19:39

and lasted at least until the mid 15th

2:19:41

century.

2:19:43

We don't know how many people were murdered

2:19:46

in the name of God to fight the devil in

2:19:48

this time period.

2:19:50

But conservative estimates put the number in the hundreds

2:19:52

of thousands during the three centuries

2:19:54

inquisitions were happening all over Europe.

2:19:56

just the Spanish one, which no one expected.

2:20:01

A spin-off of this bloody campaign

2:20:03

focused on witchcraft and hunting down

2:20:05

suspected individuals directly involved

2:20:07

with the devil.

2:20:09

And who did this affect the most?

2:20:11

You guessed it, Frank Stallone.

2:20:14

Just kidding, it was women.

2:20:17

Even Fanthic was written with his gobbledygook

2:20:19

in mind.

2:20:21

Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Springer's Malleus

2:20:23

Maleficarum, The Hammer of Witches,

2:20:25

a guide written in 1486 on how

2:20:27

to torture and kill anyone suspected of being

2:20:30

in league with the devil.

2:20:31

Hell, even England appointed a cockwaffle

2:20:34

by the name of Matthew Hopkins to the role of

2:20:36

Witchfinder General in 1644.

2:20:40

And we can't forget the lunacy of the Salem witch

2:20:42

trials in 1692, in which 25 people lost

2:20:44

their lives

2:20:46

with 15 before that in a

2:20:49

New England witch hunt craze that lasted

2:20:51

from 1645 to

2:20:54

And again,

2:20:55

as a political tool,

2:20:57

church leaders gleefully promoted and

2:20:59

exploited this fear of the devil and

2:21:02

how easily it caused people to be manipulated.

2:21:06

The chains have not been moved that far in modern

2:21:08

times, unfortunately. Take

2:21:11

demonic possession, for instance, something

2:21:13

that has popped up throughout history and continues

2:21:16

to be a topic worried about even today.

2:21:19

Gerald Massadier made a good point when he

2:21:21

wrote, quote,

2:21:22

if demonic possession were at all real,

2:21:25

one would have to ask why it afflicts

2:21:27

not secretaries of state, famous

2:21:30

writers, or TV hosts, but instead,

2:21:33

only individuals of average intellectual

2:21:35

and psychological status.

2:21:37

Either that or Satan is a laughable enemy

2:21:40

who only consorts with the weak."

2:21:42

Indeed

2:21:45

it seems those who hold power are never

2:21:48

subjected to the devil's wrath,

2:21:50

but it's the church who holds power over

2:21:52

determining

2:21:53

who is possessed and who is not.

2:21:57

a political tool.

2:21:59

guise of political and marginalized enemies,

2:22:02

and the clear example here

2:22:05

is the Holocaust.

2:22:07

Religion was wielded as a tool to

2:22:09

rally Germans to the Nazi cause, and

2:22:11

even the phrase, Gottmünst

2:22:14

– God with us –

2:22:15

appeared on belt buckles of the Wehrmacht

2:22:17

soldiers.

2:22:19

Regardless of whether or not the soldiers in leadership

2:22:22

actually believed that statement, or

2:22:24

were devout at all and there is evidence

2:22:27

to the contrary,

2:22:28

religion and the fight against evil was

2:22:30

promoted.

2:22:32

And this is a sentiment we have seen echoed

2:22:34

for

2:22:35

at least the past century where

2:22:37

so much blood has been spilled

2:22:40

for a god against a devil.

2:22:43

The idea permeates everything now.

2:22:46

In 1989, Larry Jones,

2:22:48

a Boise, Idaho police officer and editor

2:22:51

of the File 18 newsletter, the

2:22:54

following in order to aid fellow officers

2:22:57

in their pursuit of justice. When

2:22:59

confronted with those criminals who are led

2:23:01

or controlled by supernatural evil beings,

2:23:04

philosophies, or motivations, traditional

2:23:07

police tools are not effective. If

2:23:09

a cop is in a head-to-head confrontation with

2:23:11

the Prince of Darkness or his troops, then

2:23:13

that cop had better have the defeater

2:23:15

of Satan on his side, as well as

2:23:18

every bit of spiritual armor and assistance

2:23:20

available. Mike

2:23:21

Warnke told me that, in his opinion,

2:23:24

the Christian police officers were the

2:23:26

best prepared to be on the cutting edge in

2:23:28

the fight against Satanic crimes.

2:23:32

The devil and his henchmen are now walking,

2:23:35

talking straw men for people like this

2:23:37

to target and an

2:23:39

excuse to act in strange, often

2:23:42

violent ways. But

2:23:44

it also excuses horrible behavior

2:23:47

and in a way lets people off the hook

2:23:49

of responsibility. Actual

2:23:51

pedophiles, serial killers, and rapists

2:23:54

are many times dismissed as satanic

2:23:56

following the will of the devil or acting

2:23:59

that way.

2:23:59

because the devil acts through them. The

2:24:02

obvious mental illness is almost brushed

2:24:04

aside in lieu of the idea that evil

2:24:06

exists and must be fought at

2:24:09

all times. And in self-fulfilling

2:24:12

prophecy fashion, legitimate

2:24:14

psychopaths and bad people embrace

2:24:16

the idea and act like they are under

2:24:19

guidance of the devil.

2:24:21

This figure has become the god

2:24:23

of bad behavior, the champion

2:24:26

of deadbeats.

2:24:33

So

2:24:34

I'll give you my opinion now,

2:24:37

and if you're here purely for

2:24:39

the academic stuff, now's the time

2:24:41

to fast forward or stop.

2:24:44

This is just opinion, there's no fact here,

2:24:47

but

2:24:47

it's an opinion formed after doing this research

2:24:49

and looking at the big picture from everything

2:24:51

you've just heard.

2:24:53

Here's your chance to pop ahead or pop

2:24:55

out if you're not interested in what I

2:24:57

think.

2:25:00

Alright, well, thanks for being interested in what

2:25:02

I think.

2:25:03

Here it is.

2:25:05

There is no devil. There never was.

2:25:08

Zoroastrians fabricated the first

2:25:10

idea of the devil. The

2:25:12

Old Testament never had a figure of evil

2:25:14

in opposition to God's will, and there

2:25:17

is clear evidence of such a concept

2:25:19

trying to be retconned into previous

2:25:21

writings. The New Testament

2:25:24

was written after Jewish writers decided they

2:25:26

needed a figure like this so that the God

2:25:28

they worshipped wasn't an almost total

2:25:30

prick.

2:25:32

Since then, the mythology of the devil

2:25:34

has exploded

2:25:35

and taken all sorts of forms, none of

2:25:37

which are real or even based on the book

2:25:40

these ideas supposedly came from.

2:25:43

The idea has been used by people

2:25:45

in power to subjugate and murder and continues

2:25:48

to be used that way. It does

2:25:50

not adequately explain why there is

2:25:52

evil in the world, nor why it would be allowed

2:25:55

by an omnipotent, supposedly

2:25:57

all-good being.

2:25:59

and mobily write, quote, Satan

2:26:02

is a theological coping mechanism, end

2:26:04

quote,

2:26:05

and that it's quote, our own fervent desire

2:26:08

to believe that ultimately good

2:26:11

triumphs over evil, end quote,

2:26:13

which keeps the fear of life from

2:26:15

being too overwhelming.

2:26:17

I think it is a coping mechanism for

2:26:20

sure.

2:26:21

On a personal level, we use the devil

2:26:23

as a lightning rod for all the bad things we

2:26:25

have little or no control over, and

2:26:27

some things we do.

2:26:29

But

2:26:30

it's fear that might need to be addressed

2:26:32

here, not a supernatural entity that

2:26:34

has been completely fabricated and

2:26:36

ship of Theseus for two millennia.

2:26:39

Fear of the unknown,

2:26:41

fear of having no control, and fear

2:26:43

of taking responsibility are what we're

2:26:46

grappling with, and blaming it all

2:26:48

on a facetious being

2:26:50

is lazy and dumb.

2:26:52

English novelist Samuel Butler had

2:26:55

a great tongue-in-cheek quote.

2:26:57

Quote, An apology for the devil.

2:27:00

It must be remembered that we have only

2:27:02

heard one side of the case.

2:27:04

God has written all the books.

2:27:06

End quote.

2:27:08

It's a satire that Butler was

2:27:10

wise enough to know,

2:27:12

for in truth,

2:27:13

man has written all the books. Man

2:27:16

has made God in his image. And

2:27:19

sadly,

2:27:20

man doesn't realize he's

2:27:22

made the devil in his image as well. I

2:27:25

have to again quote Massadier here

2:27:27

when he wrote, quote, Satan

2:27:30

has nothing to do with any of this and

2:27:32

God even less.

2:27:34

It is human idiocy alone.

2:27:38

End quote.

2:27:40

the devil a history

2:27:42

in a gigantic red

2:27:45

completely manufactured nutshell

2:28:01

And now for the mistranslations that have

2:28:03

wreaked havoc for centuries.

2:28:06

PUNS.

2:28:15

If you're

2:28:15

thirsty as hell, stop on by England's

2:28:17

premier devil-themed drinking establishment,

2:28:21

Beelzebub.

2:28:27

I hear there's a reboot of an old spaghetti

2:28:29

western where Clint Eastwood is going

2:28:32

to play the bad man with no name, pitting

2:28:34

two families against each other all for sinful

2:28:36

intentions.

2:28:38

Be on the lookout for Mephisto Full of Dollars.

2:28:46

Turn the radio dial to 66.6 for

2:28:49

all evil 70s music including hits

2:28:51

from the band Abaddon like

2:28:54

water lucifer, mamma

2:28:56

mia, and thank you for the moloch.

2:28:59

And number ones from

2:29:01

the evil latin rock guitarist satana,

2:29:04

like oye como fa there

2:29:06

of lies, evil things coming

2:29:08

our way, and of course

2:29:10

black magic woman in evil ways. 66.6 Good

2:29:13

music gone bad.

2:29:22

Speaking of music, tune in next week on

2:29:24

ECMT for the Evil Country Music

2:29:26

Awards. Featuring performances

2:29:28

by Belial Lovett, Clint Manin

2:29:31

Black, Waylon Jyn Nings,

2:29:34

Tim Plar McGraw, Samy

2:29:36

Al Kershaw, Bel Fagarth Brooks,

2:29:39

and Diablo Red Olin.

2:29:46

Hey,

2:29:49

if you made it this far, congrats and

2:29:51

thank you.

2:29:52

I have been working on this one for about 4 months

2:29:55

now.

2:29:55

As you can see, it's a massive topic and

2:29:58

truthfully, this was just the

2:29:59

surface for a lot of it.

2:30:02

I hope I gave you something to think about and

2:30:04

that maybe you learned something new along the way.

2:30:07

If you liked or at least respect the work I put

2:30:09

into it please consider leaving a 5 star

2:30:11

review on Apple Podcasts. And

2:30:13

if you go to blurryphotos.org you

2:30:15

can find links to follow the show on social media

2:30:18

and other fun stuff like

2:30:20

the link to my Twitch channel and

2:30:22

a link to audibletrial.com slash

2:30:24

blurry where

2:30:25

you can get a free audiobook download of

2:30:27

your choice if you sign up for a 30-day

2:30:29

trial membership that you can cancel any time.

2:30:32

I have several audiobooks I've narrated on

2:30:35

there and that would all help me if

2:30:37

you checked out that link and or got one of my audiobooks.

2:30:40

Just click on the little pictures on

2:30:43

the homepage.

2:30:45

Make sure to search for Hysteria51 on

2:30:47

your podcatcher to hear me and Brent Hahn

2:30:49

discussing Fortean topics with

2:30:51

a heavy dose of humor.

2:30:53

check out Quiz Quiz Bang Bang, my

2:30:55

trivia podcast, I host with my

2:30:57

wife Annie. And

2:30:59

I think that'll do it for this episode of Blurry

2:31:02

Photos. I have been

2:31:04

Devil Flora.

2:31:06

Don't stop blurring.