Existance of Satan

Captain Jackson said:

I'm just wondering if any liberal Christians deny the existance of Satan. When I was a liberal Christian I did not believe that an entity by the name of Satan existed, nor do I believe this not.

Even if Satan does exist, I seriously doubt that he would have any of the powers that evangelical Christians claim he has.

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Many liberal Christians do not think that Satan is an individual entity, as a literal interpretation of scripture would lead us to believe. Most liberal theologians I have read usually do not talk much of Satan or the Devil. There is an exception, however, and he was indeed an exceptional theologian, Helmut Thielicke. Thielicke believed that Satan is a part of us, that he is inside of us and that his temptation is from inside. Thielicke says that it is Jesus himself that points this out to us clearly as he is tempted while alone in the wilderness. This illustrates to us that the problem is within us, as has been pointed out up-thread, we have the choice to do evil ourselves the temptation that others may put on us is nothing. It is the internal temptation by Satan that causes men to do evil.

phaedrus said:

"And there was war in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. But he was not strong enough, and they lost heir place in heaven. The great dragon was hurled down, the ancient serpent call the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him." (Rev. 12:7-9)

Ok, this is highly metephorical, that does not mean the Devil is not real. I like stories like 'The Devil and Danial Webster', and 'Faust', but these are stories. The Devil in the NT is not some parable, he is a powerfull fallen archangel up to no good in a big way. It the height of foolishness to ignore such a profoundly evil individule. Maybe I'm wrong and its just the monster under your bed, maybe not.

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"he is a powerfull fallen archangel "

Actually he was a charubim, but thats splitting hairs

But Satan is also mention as a true being when he tried to tempt Jesus. Ezekiel 28:11-19 describes satan VERY well also.
Then in Job1:7-12 & Job 2:1-7

TScott said:

Many liberal Christians do not think that Satan is an individual entity, as a literal interpretation of scripture would lead us to believe. Most liberal theologians I have read usually do not talk much of Satan or the Devil. There is an exception, however, and he was indeed an exceptional theologian, Helmut Thielicke. Thielicke believed that Satan is a part of us, that he is inside of us and that his temptation is from inside. Thielicke says that it is Jesus himself that points this out to us clearly as he is tempted while alone in the wilderness. This illustrates to us that the problem is within us, as has been pointed out up-thread, we have the choice to do evil ourselves the temptation that others may put on us is nothing. It is the internal temptation by Satan that causes men to do evil.

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"Thielicke believed that Satan is a part of us, that he is inside of us and that his temptation is from inside."

Yeah it's called our own flesh, which has nothing to do with satan. We are naturally evil and once we can over come our flesh, then satan and his cronies give us hell. Don't confuse lust of the flesh with an attack from a demonic influence.

xtxArchxAngelxtx said:

"Thielicke believed that Satan is a part of us, that he is inside of us and that his temptation is from inside."

Yeah it's called our own flesh, which has nothing to do with satan. We are naturally evil and once we can over come our flesh, then satan and his cronies give us hell. Don't confuse lust of the flesh with an attack from a demonic influence.

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Heavens no! Here, in his own words is what Thielicke means: "..we think how Jesus had to go into the desert, into solitude, to be tempted, and not -- as seemed obvious -- into the world of sinful, seductive opportunities. That was a hint to us of the meaning of temptation. For we saw that the secret of temptation is the temptability of man. This secret lies in man himself, not outside him, not for instance in his opportunities for sinning. In him yawns the abyss, even if he leaps over it a thousand times. He is tempted by theft because he is a thief, even though in fact he does not steal. He is tempted to kill because he is a murderer, even though in fact he does not slay his brother.
So the possibility of our being tempted to lie, to thieve, to be adulterous, proves us to be lying creatures. We cannot change this fundamental constitution of our life, even if we fight for truth and against lies with every nerve of our body and soul. The temptation to lie remains; the abyss yawns within us; sin lies in wait in implacable desire. That is the awe-inspiring lesson of the temptation. ‘Wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?’ (Rom. 7.24).

Here becomes plain the last and most profound marvel of Jesus’ temptation, the incomprehensible marvel that we must worship: that he was tempted without sin. This is the marvel that raises him above us and does not allow his being to be exhaustively defined by saying that he is simply the brother who shares our suffering. Because he is tempted as we are, he has probed our lowest depths. But because this temptation was not a sign that an abyss yawned within him, and that Satan lay hidden in him somehow already -- because this temptation came upon him, the pure, the sinless one, and he passed through it, untouched, as later through the mob that wished to seize him; because of all this, he is the Lord over temptation, the royal victor.

Sinless and yet tempted -- that is, as we see now, a riddle which our intellect will never grasp -- a marvel before our eyes, a divine profundity, like all that meets us in Jesus.

So we see him, amidst his lowliness and brotherhood with man, highly exalted above all humanity, which is impure even in temptation. We see him exalted as the Lord who has trodden sin under his feet, as the high priest who is more than all priests of the race of man, in their fallenness into sin and death.

Thus we have a double consolation:

Because Christ is our brother, we are not alone in our temptation. He suffers it with us, down to the lowest depths which Satan has conceived.

And because he is the Lord, who stands in the purity of heaven beyond all sin, we may pray him to keep w from temptation. We are certain of his love to all eternity. Christ not only marches on our right hand against death and devil; but he upholds us, too, from his height, because he is the Lord.

The knowledge that we are sheltered by his power gives us that peace which the world cannot give or take away from us. How uncertain is the peace which the world gives! Perhaps it is the quiet achieved by those who believe they have unveiled the meaning of world history, and resign themselves to it in peace, because they have found a resting-point in the flux of outward appearances; or perhaps it is the uninterested indifference of those who take it as it comes. But the peace of Jesus, which the world cannot give or take away, is the peace of that double certainty that Christ is Lord of the events which surge about us -- and is Lord, too, of that depth in the stream of human events which we found to be temptation, as hanging between God and Satan. And it is the peace given by the other certainty, that even in that event, and even in those depths Christ is with us."

Satan - no

Evil - yes



God is ominscient, omnipotent, omnipresent and omnibenevolent. This I believe.

God knew about "satan's" rebellion and about the "temptation in the Garden of Eden" before the universe was created; yet God allowed those things to happen?

Then God created evil and Satan. This I do not believe.

covenant914 said:

Satan - no

Evil - yes



God is ominscient, omnipotent, omnipresent and omnibenevolent. This I believe.

God knew about "satan's" rebellion and about the "temptation in the Garden of Eden" before the universe was created; yet God allowed those things to happen?

Then God created evil and Satan. This I do not believe.

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I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.--Isaiah 45:7

I don't necessarily disagree with you, C914, but it appears that Isaiah does, or the God that is talkng to Isaiah at least.

Yeah it's called our own flesh, which has nothing to do with satan. We are naturally evil and once we can over come our flesh, then satan and his cronies give us hell. Don't confuse lust of the flesh with an attack from a demonic influence

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I somewhat agree.

First we have to understand God's plan for human kind. Men are not ushered into being for the purpose of being saved or lost, but to give God glory, God manifestation, not human salvation is the purpose of the Eternal. by "God manifestation" i mean that we were created with the purpose to serve God's plan for us. We disobeyed God, and our very nature changed from being very good to being prone to the thoughts and lusts of the flesh.

Genesis 3:6 And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.

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compare that to

1 John 2:15 Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
1 John 2:16 For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.

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So, we are to not love the world and all the lusts that are in it. In this way, we can manifest the attitudes that God intended us to have.

TScott said:

I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.--Isaiah 45:7

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Why does God create evil? to declare that his ways are just, and not our ways. It is all about upholding God's Righteousness.

The Bible is quite clear about the existence of a fallen angel of some former repute in heaven called Satan (accuser). It appears that he abused his office as accuser and his desire to proudly rise higher than the throne of God would in the end dispossess him of even his place in heaven.

Satan is not even the second most powerful being in the Universe after God - the Archangel Michael has more power for example and other angels imprison various other rebel angels or perform earth shattering missions in the future. He forms the main voice however of the case for an alternative to God weak though it is. In this his existence is a feature of human choices in a fallen world.

I think it is a mistake to set the existence of Satan against our own responsibility for the sins of our own flesh. The devil can use our weaknesses to further his agenda if only we were not protected by our relationships with Christ. As human beings we have choices between good and evil. When we choose the good we choose the grace and mercy that God gives but the more we choose the evil the more we open ourselves up to being a tool for evil.

An Iraqi friend of mine became a Christian in University. He told me he believed in the existence of the devil long before he believed in the existence of God. Reason was it was clear to him that there was an intelligence to the wrong things that happened in the world. When sorrows came they came in batallions not as single spies as if directed by a sort of Stalin or sadam hussein of the spiritual realm. In our own lives bad things often happen all in one big batch at a time when we are already vulnerable for other reasons. The devil plays a vicious game of cards with events in our lives but in the end he is only a pawn of deeper purposes than his own.

I believe in the existence of Beelzebub because the Bible tells of him but also from experience. He acts with intelligence and deep spite to do his best to spoil and ruin our chances of heaven and heavenly blessing but he cannot destroy those whom Christ has chosen, since in Christ he has a met a foe whose deeper magic of the cross has overthrown him and consigned him to his future in hell.

I'm just wondering if any liberal Christians deny the existance of Satan. When I was a liberal Christian I did not believe that an entity by the name of

Satan existed, nor do I believe this not.

Even if Satan does exist, I seriously doubt that he would have any of the powers that evangelical Christians claim he has.


I dont know how to do the quote thingy, but im replying to that post

If Satan doesn't exist, Who did Jesus come to save us from?? Whose power was overthrone by death on the cross? You can't call yourself a Christian and deny that Satan exists. If you do, you're calling God a liar.

ashlee said:

If Satan doesn't exist, Who did Jesus come to save us from?? Whose power was overthrone by death on the cross? You can't call yourself a Christian and deny that Satan exists. If you do, you're calling God a liar.

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Satan does exist Ashlee, but not in the form you believe him to be. Satan is equivelent to the serpent like thinking found in Genesis 3.

The devil or "Satan" is really just the personification of sin. It is reasonable to say that Satan is not actually a litteral being or entity but rather personification of something that is bad. Satan has the power of death. what else has the power of death? Sin.

the bible.

study it.

Satan is not The Devil. The only passage that refers to the fall of Satan is in the book of Revelations, which is a book of God's prophecies and visions revealed to John on the island of Patmos which refers to the end times, before the battle of Armageddon.

and, obviously, since that war has not yet been fought, the event in which Michael and his angels throw Satan out of Heaven has not yet happened. the only reason people believe Satan is the devil is because it has been popular tradition, but a review of the Bible shows us this is false.

it's important to point out that the Old Testament authors knew nothing of A Devil, per se, but they did know of the existence of fallen angels. however, nowhere in the original Hebraic form of the Bible does it ever mention Satan. In the book of Job, where we see the conflict between "Satan", God, and Job, the original context was "ha-satan", not Satan.

ha-satan is hebrew for "an adversary". this connotes not a name, but an office, a title. ha-satan is an adversary, an angel serving God used to, apparently, tempt and test mankind. ha-satan at the time was not a fallen angel or a devil, because he presents himself before God along with the rest of God's angels. devils and fallen angels do not have to "check in" with God.

Satan is not The Devil. He never has been, he's not even fallen at this moment, it's safe to assume he's still one of God's angels serving Him in heaven. He will be fallen, however, before the battle of Armageddon when Michael and his angels throw him out of Heaven. at this point, he inhabits the body of the man who is to be the Antichrist.

read the bible, it's in there. break away for a moment, if you will, from what man might tell you, and read the word as it was originally written in its divine, inspired form.

one more thing to point out.

i'm expecting to see posts referring to Satan as Lucifer being cast down in the book of Isaiah.

let me pose a challenge:

show me but one place in the Bible that equates Lucifer and Satan.

nowhere in the Bible does it ever mention that Lucifer and Satan are the same entity. Lucifer isn't even an angel, fallen or otherwise. the passage in Isaiah that refers to the "fall of Lucifer" is in fact referring to the fall of a Babylonian king that persecuted the people of Israel. you can ask any biblical scholar and they'll agree on this.

Lucifer was erroneously equated with Satan due to a mistranslation of "ha-satan" by St. Jerome, an early church father of the 4th century.

if Lucifer and Satan are the same, then if Lucifer was thrown out in pre-Christian times, then how can he be thrown out of Heaven AGAIN before the battle of Armageddon? God readmitts his fallen angels to Heaven?

Lucifer = metaphorical reference to King Herod.

Satan = angel who will fall before the battle of Armageddon.

ha-satan = hebrew form of "an adversary", an angel of God used to test mankind.

Lucifer, or lucifuge means 'light bringer'. How can Lucifer have anything to do with Herod, when was Herod ever a 'light bringer' or have i suddenly misread the bible.

What does "Lucifer" mean? "Bearer, Bringer of Light", right? But in what language?

*Ding* Latin.

What was the original language in the Old Testament scriptures?

*Ding* Hebrew.

So, then, how did a latin term find its way into a hebrew document?

The Latin name "Lucifer" was applied by later Church fathers translating the text from hebrew and greek to latin.

The original Hebraic manuscript used the hebrew phrase "heleyl, ben shachar", which, translated, means "shining one, son of dawn."
this phrase applies to Venus as it appears as a morning star. it represents the babylon king because he was once a "bright light" of Babylon who, because of his evils, "faded". In the Septuagint, a 3rd century BC translation of the Hebrew scriptures into Greek, it is translated as "heosphoros" which also means Venus as a morning star. every biblical scholar i've encountered understands the metaphorical representation of the "Lucifer" phrase as meaning the fallen Babylong king.


there's an irony that exists to those who equate the "morning star" as Satan, because the same phrase is used to represent Jesus in 2 Peter 1:19, and Revelation 22:16.

i'm pressed on time at the moment so i can't elaborate on the subject the way i'd like, but if you still have any questions or see any problems, i can expound on the subject more tonight.

are you saying no form of the devil or satan exists at the moment?

this reminds me of a line from the film the usual suspects ,i think it was something like 'the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world that he didn't exist.'

(Joh 8:44 KJV) Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.

i tend to think satan or the devil is the author of sin and those who serve sin serve it's creator.
we are now saved from sin and now abide in the love of God ,we live to help bring others from sin reborn in the love of God and now serving Him.

Yes, I am saying that no Devil exists at the moment.

However, I do believe wholeheartedly in fallen angels. Genesis CH. 6 talks about a score of angels who rebelled from God to cohabit (sleep with) the daughters of men, to whom giants were born.

however, The Devil as a singular entity opposed to God, is nowhere in the Old Testament listed. nor was he in the New Testament until the 4th century. if you read the writings of early church fathers of the 2nd and 3rd century, no mention of The Devil is made. The Devil was essentially born in the 4th century after Jerome and other church fathers made the mistake of taking the original Hebrew term "ha-satan", which means AN adversary, not THE. an adversary is an office, which according to context clues in the Bible is an office of an angel serving God, not opposed to God. the "ha-satan" was edited. the "ha", or "an" was taken away, and the "s" was capitalized. doing so created a central entity that could be used to create the dichotomy of good vs. evil. creating The Devil was a tool that was used to scare man into the faith (although, to me, a score of fallen angels is a lot scarier than one). Nowhere in the original Hebrew form of the Bible is The Devil ever mentioned. after the 4th century, poets and playwrights took this new devil and glamourized him. why was there never a Devil in any of the former plays, poems, or epics? We don't see the Devil until the time of Dante, Milton, etc. it all started from a mistranslation, then was carried on through the mainstream media which has carried it on until today.

look at the original word as it was inspired by God, and from that, show me a reference to The Devil. (notice, I capitalize The Devil. the original hebraic form does mention fallen angels in two instances - in Genesis where they found the women of earth appealing and bore children unto them, and in Revelations where Michael and his angels throw Satan, still in angel in Heaven, out of Heaven along with his rebel army).

sorry don't agree ,i don't think God created angels to beable to have sex in the flesh.
they were heavenly beings not human ,who says they can reproduce never mind reproduce with a human.
i think the sons of God were holy men followers of God ,just like it refers to those who follow God in the new testament.

(Gen 6:1 KJV) And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them,
(Gen 6:2 KJV) That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose.

the very next verse seems to confirm what i say.
i think so anyway.

(Gen 6:3 KJV) And the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years.

(Gen 6:4 KJV) There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown.

Godly men had sex with daughters of men ,unGodly men i presume.
they then brought forth mighty men ,but these men were evil being not of God.

in verse 6:3 He's talking of His spirit not always striving with these men who lived till great ages who were Godly men.

ashlee said:

If Satan doesn't exist, Who did Jesus come to save us from?? Whose power was overthrone by death on the cross? You can't call yourself a Christian and deny that Satan exists. If you do, you're calling God a liar.

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LOL I love it whenever someone says something like that.

Ktistes said:

i tend to think satan or the devil is the author of sin and those who serve sin serve it's creator.
we are now saved from sin and now abide in the love of God ,we live to help bring others from sin reborn in the love of God and now serving Him.

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Yet Christians still sin. Why does "being saved from" sin not outwardly change them?
I see no difference, in terms of good works, between a Christian, an atheist or a Buddhist (etc)