The devil is a person?

[Renton]

Throughout Christian history, the one known as the "devil", "Satan", or various other titles is personify--made to sound like a person. Yes, this being is even personified as a person in the Bible. But then again, depending on your belief, the Bible is filled with symbolism (religious truths used through the symbolic literature) as it was written by Jews and early Christians for Jews and early Christians who used many symbols in stories and philosophy.

Anyways, is the devil really a person? Or...is "it" more a state of being? A state of negativity toward what is righteous. A state of turning away from God. Does this "devil" have to be an actual being who speaks our words and appears in flesh? Or is this devil more of a state of existence or a state of mind?

Maybe the reason the devil is personify is to show similarity to humans--we being people of faults and prone to temptation.

What is your take on the matter?

 

[BobW188]

The devil, Satan, is an archangel who used his God-given free will to rebel. He is thus concious and sentient and can be said to have a personality but, as an angelic being he is spirit. Like the angels of Heaven, he and his minions can appear as though embodied but they are not in their essence confined to or defined by a physical body as we are. I'd say your other definitions are incorporated in this. I suppose it could be said that, though he is not a person, he can be personified. In fact, in using the word "he" that's exactly what I've done.

 

[timlamb]

The devil, Satan, is an archangel who used his God-given free will to rebel. He is thus concious and sentient and can be said to have a personality but, as an angelic being he is spirit. Like the angels of Heaven, he and his minions can appear as though embodied but they are not in their essence confined to or defined by a physical body as we are. I'd say your other definitions are incorporated in this. I suppose it could be said that, though he is not a person, he can be personified. In fact, in using the word "he" that's exactly what I've done.

Yep! A created being this Lucifer, (Lucy to his friends).

 

[ebia]

The devil, Satan, is an archangel who used his God-given free will to rebel. He is thus concious and sentient and can be said to have a personality but, as an angelic being he is spirit. Like the angels of Heaven, he and his minions can appear as though embodied but they are not in their essence confined to or defined by a physical body as we are.

What makes you think this?

 

[RMDY]

Throughout Christian history, the one known as the "devil", "Satan", or various other titles is personify--made to sound like a person. Yes, this being is even personified as a person in the Bible. But then again, depending on your belief, the Bible is filled with symbolism (religious truths used through the symbolic literature) as it was written by Jews and early Christians for Jews and early Christians who used many symbols in stories and philosophy.

Anyways, is the devil really a person? Or...is "it" more a state of being? A state of negativity toward what is righteous. A state of turning away from God. Does this "devil" have to be an actual being who speaks our words and appears in flesh? Or is this devil more of a state of existence or a state of mind?

Maybe the reason the devil is personify is to show similarity to humans--we being people of faults and prone to temptation.

What is your take on the matter?

That is like questioning whether the Holy Spirit is a person. Satan is merely an Angel who sinned and therefore does terrible things. He is jealous of God, and since we are created in God's image, He hates us, especially since we will be one day elevated above him in honor.

Angels are very real, and the Devil is not some cartoon-like spanish-looking dude that wears red spandex and has a pitch fork. There is an allusion to him somewhere in Isiah.

 

[ebia]

That is like questioning whether the Holy Spirit is a person.

Hardly. Scripture has a lot to say about the Holy Spirit, all of it consistant. Scripture only occasionally mentions Satan and portrays him quite differently in different places but usually as the accuser (which is what the name means) - not as evil personified, let alone as an angel (fallen or otherwise).

Satan is merely an Angel

Says who, excepting tradition?

who sinned and therefore does terrible things. He is jealous of God, and since we are created in God's image, He hates us, especially since we will be one day elevated above him in honor.

Angels are very real, and the Devil is not some cartoon-like spanish-looking dude that wears red spandex and has a pitch fork. There is an allusion to him somewhere in Isiah.

Trouble is Isaiah doesn't mention Satan. Isaiah is talking about a Babylonian King, which it talks about as the Morning Star - translated into Latin as Lucifer. About all one has to go on is Luke 10:18 (a figurative verse) and a lot of tradition.

 

[Emmy]

Dear Renton. The devil/Satan is the personification of all Evil. Jesus saw Satan fall from the sky, and we think of Satan as the chief of, and over, all Evil. Satan is the adversary of God, God is Love and Satan is all which is Not Love. I say this humbly and with love, Renton. Greetings from Emmy, your sister in Christ.

 

[Zecryphon]

Hardly. Scripture has a lot to say about the Holy Spirit, all of it consistant. Scripture only occasionally mentions Satan and portrays him quite differently in different places but usually as the accuser (which is what the name means) - not as evil personified, let alone as an angel (fallen or otherwise).



Says who, excepting tradition?


Trouble is Isaiah doesn't mention Satan. Isaiah is talking about a Babylonian King, which it talks about as the Morning Star - translated into Latin as Lucifer. About all one has to go on is Luke 10:18 (a figurative verse) and a lot of tradition.

ebia, to answer your question about who says Satan is a real live being. Scripture says it here:

Job 1:6 Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan also came among them.
Job 1:7 The LORD said to Satan, "From where have you come?" Satan answered the LORD and said, "From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking up and down on it."

and here as well, the devil is talked about by Jesus as being a real being:

1Jn 3:8 Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.

There are other references in scripture as well.

 

[ebia]

ebia, to answer your question about who says Satan is a real live being. Scripture says it here:

I wasn't so much querying that, as querying what we can say with certainty about him, though it does need noting that Job is a story exploring the problem of suffering - a character in a story does nothing to show that anyone actually exists.


If Satan is a real, identifable, individual being then the bible seems remarkably inconsistent in how he is portrayed. On the other hand, if he is a figure of speech then that isn't a problem.

 

[RMDY]

Hardly. Scripture has a lot to say about the Holy Spirit, all of it consistant. Scripture only occasionally mentions Satan and portrays him quite differently in different places but usually as the accuser (which is what the name means) - not as evil personified, let alone as an angel (fallen or otherwise).



Says who, excepting tradition?


Trouble is Isaiah doesn't mention Satan. Isaiah is talking about a Babylonian King, which it talks about as the Morning Star - translated into Latin as Lucifer. About all one has to go on is Luke 10:18 (a figurative verse) and a lot of tradition.

Both the book of Job and Zecharah have scenes featuring Satan.

 

[ebia]

Both the book of Job and Zecharah have scenes featuring Satan.

Indeed they do, but the image they portray isn't a good fit to most of what people have said about him in this thread.

 

[timlamb]

I don't think scripture messes around with who Satan was in the beginning or who he is in the end time, the one for whom the Lake of Fire was created.

 

[Adoniram]

If Satan is a real, identifable, individual being then the bible seems remarkably inconsistent in how he is portrayed. On the other hand, if he is a figure of speech then that isn't a problem.

I guess one could say the same thing about God. The way he is described varies a great deal, wouldn't you say? Sometimes creator, sometimes destroyer; giver of life, taker of life; he who judges sinners and saves them too. But, God is more than a "figure of speech." The OP was asking whether the devil was an actual being as opposed to an abstract concept, and though the Bible may describe him in various ways, it's treatment of him is always that of a real and evil being.

 

[timlamb]

I guess one could say the same thing about God. The way he is described varies a great deal, wouldn't you say? Sometimes creator, sometimes destroyer; giver of life, taker of life; he who judges sinners and saves them too. But, God is more than a "figure of speech." The OP was asking whether the devil was an actual being as opposed to an abstract concept, and though the Bible may describe him in various ways, it's treatment of him is always that of a real and evil being.

Well said!!

 

[ebia]

I guess one could say the same thing about God. The way he is described varies a great deal, wouldn't you say?

There's a degree of variation, but there's so much material that the overarching meta-narrative shows us where the consistancy is. In the case of Satan we only get a handful of short mentions and they are starkly different. It's pretty much impossible to form a coherent image that's consistant with the character we see in Job and Zechariah, and the character we see in Matthew (say). I don't find that to be the case with God himself.

The usual Christian image seems to me to involve mostly tradition, at best consistent with what we see in the N.T., and completely at odds with how he is portrayed in Job and Zechariah. I even noticed a commentary that references Zechariah in a way that is completely at odds with what Zechariah actually says but as though it says what the N.T. says.

But, God is more than a "figure of speech." The OP was asking whether the devil was an actual being as opposed to an abstract concept, and though the Bible may describe him in various ways, it's treatment of him is always that of a real and evil being.

Is it? It's quite hard to tell the difference when one has so little to go on.

 

[champuru]

ebia, may i ask how satan differs between Job and Zech. and Matthew?

 

[ebia]

ebia, may i ask how satan differs between Job and Zech. and Matthew?

Read Job in particular without bringing preconceptions from the N.T. to it and it should be obvious. Here Satan is not evil in person, but simply the accuser that his name means.

 

[RMDY]

Indeed they do, but the image they portray isn't a good fit to most of what people have said about him in this thread.

I disagree. In the book of Job, Satan is in the presense of God with Angels.

In Zechariah, Satan is in the presense of God amongst angels.

The book of revelation also says Satan will be cast into hell with all his angels.

 

[RMDY]

Read Job in particular without bringing preconceptions from the N.T. to it and it should be obvious. Here Satan is not evil in person, but simply the accuser that his name means.

Just because the O.T. doesn't give every detail about Satan does not mean Satan isn't evil or sinful.

 

[RMDY]

Read Job in particular without bringing preconceptions from the N.T. to it and it should be obvious. Here Satan is not evil in person, but simply the accuser that his name means.

Furthermore, I'd like to point out that were not talking about whether Satan is sinful or not but something you questioned regarding Satan: You asked if "the devil really a person? Or...is "it" more a state of being?"

So I provided the book of Job and Zachariah as two examples why Satan is a person and not a state of being.