Ha-Satan, and Our Michael

Okay, so last time I was talking about how Angels went from being fairly colorless, faceless, and uninteresting creatures to having a real, honest-to-goodness role in religion. In a world now shaped by monotheism, they weren’t just extras in soft focus, they could be major players.

And...oddly enough...one of the first such Big Timers on stage isn’t even a good guy.

To wit, Satan.

We all know the story of Lucifer, a.k.a. Morning Star, and how he led a rebellion against God, and how Michael (who isn’t in the picture, yet) tossed him out of Heaven. But where did Satan/Lucifer/the Devil come from? I mean as a literary figure.(1)

About the image: This is a photo of Le génie du mal (Satan), a sculpture by the Belgian artist Guillaume Geefs in St. Paul's Cathedral, Liège. It is the work of the talented photographer Luc Viatour, whose webpage is https://Lucnix.be (definitely worth a visit). Mr. Viatour has been kind enough to post it to Wikimedia under the Creative Commons license (CC BY-SA 3.0 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/, via Wikimedia Commons).

You may find the photo here: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4b/Lucifer_Liege_Luc_Viatour_new.jpg. The URL for the image page is here: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lucifer_Liege_Luc_Viatour_new.jpg

Many thanks to the photographer for sharing his work.

Well, unlike Michael and the other named Angels, he shows up in the Bible relatively early -- specifically in Job 1–2 (perhaps the 6th century BCE) and Zechariah 3 (maybe 520 BCE).(2) But, in those earliest walk-ons, he is not yet “Satan”. He is “ha-satan.” That may seem like a distinction without a difference...Satan is Satan, right?

But, it *is* different. In this context, “ha-satan” is not a name. It’s a title. It means something like “adversary” or “accuser.” He isn’t fallen. He isn’t rebellious. He isn’t even evil, at least not in our sense of the word. He is simply a member of Yahweh’s council whose job it is to make the case against sinful mortals. That’s why he is in Job, where he attempts to prove (as in a court of law) that Job will desert his faith in the face of adversity. And that’s why he is in Zachariah, where he stands ready to accuse the prophet of transgressions. (2)

But then he mutates. He becomes genuinely evil. He is the source of all that is ill in the world. He is...Satan, which is now a name, not a job description. And thus we find him in 1 Chronicles 21:1, which was written sometime in the 5th century BCE, and in which he appears as a deadly threat, tempting David to order a census of Israel, an offense which will lead to a horrific plague upon the land.(3)

And his new role as ultimate evil makes a lot of sense. Remember how I said that monotheism introduced problems? And that one of them was how to account for evil in the world? If God is good, and there is only one God, and He created the universe...well, how to account for bad things? Did God create hunger and pain and disease and death? In word, ouch. That’s not a thing you want to think about.

But...Satan provides an answer. It wasn’t God that crafted all that nasty stuff. It was him.

But what *is* Satan? That, too, had an easy answer, and the religious theorists of the day soon discovered it. If, they said to themselves, we’ve decided there are Angels... messengers ...who do God’s will and convey His word to the world...what if there were bad angels? Fallen angels? Angels who had revolted against God?

Well, that would be Satan, wouldn’t it? Perfect fit! What else could you ask?

So, Satan becomes ...in a strange way...our first *named* angel. A fallen angel, but an angel.

Ah, but there’s the rub. If there is an evil angel, a fallen angel, shouldn’t there be one who balances out the scales? A good angel?

That’s the way stories work.

But, before we get to that, a couple of things have to happen. First, we have to get our exiles back to Israel, or, technically, to Judah.

And, second, we have to have quite a bit of chaos.

But more on that next time.

Footnotes:

1. Biblical literalists will of course assume that his real story is that found in the Book of Revelation and that “war in heaven” actually happened. I don’t mean to dispute their position. Here I am simply talking about how Satan came to be written of in the ways that he was.

2. He may also in Numbers 22:22 (also written in the 6th Century BCE) where in some versions of Balaam and the Angel the angel is called “Satan.” See “Satan,” Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satan

3. The King James Bible translates “ha-Satan” as simply Satan. But it isn’t that way in the original.

4. There are several fascinating things about this passage. For one thing, it is the first and only place in the Old Testament where Satan is referred to by name. Yet, when he appears here, it is clear that he is a fully formed character who will be instantly familiar to anyone reading the story. This makes me, at least, believe that he had been floating around popular religion for generations before his entrance. It is, again, the difference between the religion of the Temple or the Cathedral and the religion of the street.

For another, it isn’t clear why a census was considered such a crime against God. But, apparently people accepted it at the time.

And, finally, the same incident is recounted in 2 Samuel 24, but there it is not Satan but God who moves David to count his people, albeit with the same fatal effect.

I provide these blog postings for free. That’s fine and I’m happy to do so. But, long ago and far away, I was told that if you give away your material, that means you don’t really think it has any value.

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If you like what I write or the videos I produce, and feel you could make a small contribution to support my efforts, please go here:

https://michaeljaytucker.gumroad.com/l/lzumj

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Again, I don’t mind if you don’t. I just want to provide you with the option so that I won’t feel quite so much like I’m just tossing my works into the wind.

Either way, thanks hugely for dropping by the blog :-)

~mjt

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