Posted on 10/01/2001 9:13:50 AM PDT by betty boop
Toward an Understanding of the Enemy:
A Meditation on Satan
It truly has been said that Satan is a “myth.” The only problem with that statement is, the word “myth” has become synonymous with “false superstition” in contemporary thought and rhetoric. Thus Satan, being a “myth,” cannot be “real.” Q.E.D. End of story.
Being a Christian with a great partiality to Plato, I take issue with this understanding of the word “myth.” True, all myths are “stories,” as opposed to “facts.” But some of these stories are nonetheless true.
On the classical view, the soul, by virtue of its essential, divinely-constituted nature, has true knowledge of aspects of reality that are not susceptible to direct empirical proof (or falsification). Thus its insights cannot be spoken of in terms of ordinary language, which developed in answer to the human need to describe concrete events in physical space-time. Another language is needed to describe “intangible” entities, such as Evil – and also Soul and God for that matter -- which do not find their source in physical nature per se.
Plato consciously developed the language of the myth because he needed to find a legitimate language to articulate movements of the soul -- soul being understood as the vast complex of (1) unique, infinite spiritual essence; (2) the unconscious, conscious, and self-conscious domains of the Self; and (3) the nous (intellect or reason). To Plato, this organic complex uniquely describes the essential being of every sacred human person. (Like snowflakes, no two souls are exactly alike.) Moreover, to my knowledge, there is nothing in Christian theology that refutes this view.
Evil, being intangible -- but none the less real for all that, for clearly we have seen its effects in the hideously cruel events of September 11th -- is not a fit subject that profitably can be left to verification (or falsification) by the techniques of physical science. Thus, the language that Plato evolved to express such “intangibles” (which ultimately refer to the transcendent basis of empirical space-time reality) was the aletheia logos, the “true story” or myth. On these terms, the language of the myth is the language of the soul – and thus of all spiritual, moral, cultural, and religious development, understanding, and communication.
Satan is such a myth. Or perhaps it’s better to say, what Satan represents has inspired a vast multiplicity of myths in human historical culture. Every people of every time has confronted the problem of evil in the world. And each human society in time has developed its own myths to symbolize evil for its time. To me, the “truest myth” is the one developed in Christian theology; for this conception has “real legs,” having endured for more than two thousand years, with roots stretching back into time immemorial. To my humble way of thinking, anything that can last that long in active human imagination and action is worthy of our attention and understanding.
The Christian understanding of Evil finds its apotheosis in the symbol of Satan, also known as Lucifer, “son of the morning star,” beloved archangel of the Lord. As angel, Satan is a God-created being. He is an immortal creature, like man, formed in Divine Love. When you boil it all down, the only real, practical difference between the status of angelic and human nature is that human spiritual being incarnates (i.e., takes on physical form), but angelic nature remains discarnate or “pure” spiritual being. Both created realms are intended by God to manifest their true being within the Providential Order of their Creator, formed in Love and intended for Love.
The eruption of evil into the world first becomes possible in the divine fact that both realms -- angelic and human -- are endowed by their Creator with reason and free will. Satan “fell”; and “later,” Man fell also -- taking all of creation “down with him” when he did. What is the nature or essence of this “Fall?”
It can be summed up in the two words of Lucifer: Non serviam. Which translated, might go something like this:
* * * * * * *
“I will not serve You, Lord. I not only refuse to live in Your Order of Creation, in Your Providential Law for all the realms of being, natural and supernatural; but I will work implacably against all Law -- divine, natural, human.
“It is better for me to reign in Hell than to serve in Heaven under Your Law. And I will draw down into the Pit of Hell with me all your most beloved -- Man -- for sheer spite. Thereby I shall show You that I can use the very materials You created to fashion my rebuke and repudiation of You, to create an ‘anti-creation.’ I will therefore suck all Love and Life and Light out of Your Creation for all eternity, and shall turn each of your preciously beloved Sons into Your accuser, and make each of them the enemy of his brother. I shall achieve my victory against You by disordering their souls via unceasing attack on their minds, via appeals to their pride and vanity and selfishness and envy and anger and brute fear.
“And they will choose me in consequence, not You; for I am ‘easier’ than You (at least that is what I shall tell them; and they will believe my word). Yet am I also equally to be feared as You (and I shall spare no pains to make sure they know that).
“I take libidinous pleasure in anticipating how galling You will find their ingratitude, down through the ages. And these whom You have made for immortality in communion with You will eternally spend their lives with me instead, accusing and repudiating You and everything You have fashioned in Truth and Goodness and Beauty and Justice for all eternity. Simply because I cannot bear the thought that there is anything greater than I am in my own self-conceit. And I shall persuade all Your sons similarly. In the end, they all shall worship me, and I shall thereby secure their eternal perdition -- their perpetual state of ‘lostness’ in Your Sight. I will take all your children from you -- all of them. Thus, the victory on earth ultimately will be mine.”
* * * * * * *
This is the essence of Satan’s boundless Pride -- which properly understood, is the one, the only, truly unforgivable sin among Christians.
Anyhoot, that’s how I imagine that particular conversation went -- the Satanic Boast addressed to God, his Maker.
To get timely with these reflections, I hear cadences of the satanic boast repeated by Osama bin Laden, among others, these days. Although OBL may claim to base his actions on conscientious fidelity to the demands of the Law of God, by his works we know him without doubt to be aligned with Satan’s rebellion against the justice, love, and providence of the One God Whom all Abrahamic peoples – Jew, Christian, Muslim – revere and adore.
Benjamin Netanyahu recently said that OBL and his minions may have the will to destroy the order of the West; but he lacks the power to do it. At least so far.
On the other hand, the United States has the power to neutralize this attack on Western civilizational order; but does it have the will?
Netanyahu went on to say that this question turns on whether the United States can achieve“moral clarity” with respect to the position in which it now finds itself. For without moral clarity, our national will has no engine to drive it such that America can prevail in the long run. And this is a war that will take some time to issue in a clear victory.
Will the people unite and stay united for as long as it takes to prevail? From whence will the necessary “moral clarity” come to secure a victory for our civilizational order if not from the myth -- and not just any myth, but the classical/Christian myth of our American civilizational order? The myth that formed the minds and characters of our Founding generation, out of which they built a nation? For that is what we must defend first, it seems to me, if we hope to defend our nation, and to prevail against the satanic forces now arrayed against the United States and the West more generally.
The foregoing meditation or speculation raises certain questions, the answers to which must be left to each reader to supply for himself, according to his own best lights. Notwithstanding, these days I am comforted by an intuition that urges me to believe that the best thing we Americans can do for ourselves right now is to “Praise the Lord (and pass the ammunition).” We must trust in Him above all things, and stay vigilant and prepared for what is surely to come, given the implacable spite of our eternal Enemy and Accuser -- who has released the very hounds of Hell on America.
Then it simply becomes a matter of “keeping your powder dry,” and waiting to see “the whites of their eyes.”
What happens next, we do not know for certain in every detail. But at the end of the day, I am convinced beyond any doubt that the Will of the Lord of the Universe will be done, “on earth, as it is in heaven.” On grounds of our American myth, I take heart in the words of the Battle Hymn of the Republic: that “His Truth is marching on.” And that the America people still have what it takes to rally to this Truth.
God Bless America, Amen.
p.s.: As an aside, I say this with the sobering knowledge that Ho Chi Minh won a war against the United States on Main Street, U.S.A. -- i.e., via "changing" American "public opinion" -- and not in the jungles of Viet Nam.
And, while I most certainly do not accuse our libertarian friends of being evil (they're not), I do note the nearly word-for-word similarity between Rand's objectivism and the words you've put in Satan's mouth: I cannot bear the thought that there is anything greater than I am in my own self-conceit.
Plato consciously developed the language of the myth because he needed to find a legitimate language to articulate movements of the soul -- soul being understood as the vast complex of (1) unique, infinite spiritual essence; (2) the unconscious, conscious, and self-conscious domains of the Self; and (3) the nous (intellect or reason). To Plato, this organic complex uniquely describes the essential being of every sacred human person. (Like snowflakes, no two souls are exactly alike.) Moreover, to my knowledge, there is nothing in Christian theology that refutes this view.
This "immortal soul" opinion has led Christianity astray for nearly 2000 years. The early Christian philosophers, seeking validity from the pagan world, and attracted to his logic, bought into this view, without verifying it against scripture. Jesus Himself refutes this by saying, "Fear Him who is able to destroy both body and soul in hell fire."
This view is "annihilationism" and it is upheld by scripture. Ed Fudge has written a book called, "The Fire That Consumes" which examines the issue of eternal torment versus eternal punishment in detail, and comes to the annihilationist view point.
For those who disagree, remember, this point is not an essential point of doctrine.
Indeed. And as was so eloquently stated by a friend of mine a few days ago, God will bless America when America blesses God.
Do you really believe that God takes an active role in the lives of men here on earth?
Or do you think that we are possessed of free will, and that our actions are our own?
I cannot see how both can be true.
I am convinced that you have nailed the essence of Satan's powers though, for he worships himself and his greatest effort is to pursuade humankind to worship themselves, in individual adoration of self, in order to strike out against God the Creator. Satan's plan is to amplify and repeat endlessly the temptation to set self above God.
BTW, betty boop, I think you might want to think of reviving the Screwtape Letters, given your so similar rhetoric of ol' Screwtape in your above soliloquy.
Well MHGinTN, it was a boast: And I think, quite an empty one. What you have to say about the reality of what Satan proposes is exactly "on the money" IMHO. Thank you so much for writing. best, bb.
Or do you think that we are possessed of free will, and that our actions are our own?
You're basically suggesting that if we have free will, then God cannot take an active role in our lives.
This is clearly a false dichotomy -- it's like saying that driving the car completely precludes the possibility of asking directions.
But that particular piece of man-joke fodder is a good metaphor for the case at hand. It's not that you cannot ask directions, but that you will not. Our pride will not allow us to admit we don't know where we are, or where we're going.
The guy at the gas station might watch you go by his corner in all four directions, and he'd correctly figure you were lost. A charitable fellow might even attempt to wave you down -- and as a free-willed driver you might scornfully pass him by. Or you might stop, get directions, and make it to the wedding on time.
In a sense God is like the charitable gas attendant -- He's glad to help if you'll let Him, but He'll let you miss the wedding if you're bound and determined to do so.
I cannot see how both can be true.
I think it's less cannot see, and more will not see.
HUH?
I asked if he really believes that God takes an active role in the lives of men here on earth?
Active.... as in CONTROL.
I have met many who suggest that God DOES take an ACTIVE (hands on) role.
How does this reconcile itself with the notion of free will?
Free will leaves open the possibility of choosing to do the will of Another, does it not?
If God offers His help, I can take the gift or ignore it according to my whims. That does not preclude the possibility of the gift being offered.
Let's get to the bottom of it, OWK. Either God exists, or He doesn't. Your position only makes sense if you think He doesn't exist.
Forgiven_Sinner, I am hardly qualified to mediate a dispute concerning the differing scriptural understandings of the various confessions that make up Christianity. But I'll hazard to make a few observations. First, the destruction of the soul is what we understand as "the second death" -- the truly fatal death, for it is the removal of the soul from the Light, Love, and Consciousness of God for all eternity. This, I think, is the meaning of all-consuming hellfire that lasts forever. The person who thereby suffers "forever" must be immortal to do it. The word "perdition" takes its root from the Latin word meaning "to lose." Logically, one can "lose something" yet still "be around" in some fashion after one loses it -- to suffer for all eternity for what one has lost, as the case may be.
Second, I think it's useful to consider the historical context in which the early Church came into being. I have heard the theory that the later Schoolmen of the Church "introduced" Plato and Aristotle into Christian theology -- "inauthentic" influences that were not present in the beginning of "authentic" Christian doctrine.
Yet consider this: The Mediterranean world had been thoroughly hellenized by the time of the Coming of Our Lord. That is, Athens bequeathed to the world an intellectual and spiritual culture that dominated the Mediterranean basin; Rome helped to carry it to the ends of the then-known world. There were Greeks among the Twelve Disciples -- John and James come to mind. And Paul was a hellenized Jew. I know that Reformed Christianity tends to deemphasize the classical component of Christian theology; but the fact of the matter is the inspired men who wrote the Gospels and the Epistles at the behest of the Lord were Greek by culture: They thought and spoke like Greeks to at least some degree. Though not made fully explicit in the New Testament, the Greek intellectual inheritance -- modes of thought and reasoning -- can be seen by a sensitive reader in the Gospel of St. John in particular. These modes developed the insights of the Israelitic sources in light of the New Dispensation brought to man by Our Lord Jesus Christ.
Or at least, that is my understanding of such matters, FWIW. I'm glad for your reply, Forgiven_Sinner; and thank you so kindly for writing. best, bb.
Sure.
But that has nothing to do with the question I asked.
I asked if the poster believed that the hand of God takes an active role in influencing the earthly affairs of men. It would seem to me that if such was the case, then the concept of free will would be negated.
Your position seems to be that the existence of a historically-active God turns one into a robot. However, the ideas of an active God, and human free will, are not mutually exclusive, as you insist on making them out to be.
What you've apparently done is constructed an "either-or" strawman, whereas in reality it's not difficult to conceive of a situation where the two can co-exist quite comfortably.
As an example, consider how you take an active role in the earthly affairs of your children: it does not negate the fact that they have free will.
But again, let's cut to the chase here. Your motivation in asking the question seems to be based less on logic, than on an unwillingness to consider the possibility that human free will might not be the end-all and be-all of existence.
I can't help but notice the similarity between that position, and bb's line: I cannot bear the thought that there is anything greater than I am.
Certainly seems that way to me.
Either one has free will, or he does not. One may not have a "free will subject to over-ride by an outside entity".
If God moves (even occasionally) to stay (or encourage) the hand of his creation, then they do not have free will. Even his choice to leave his creation to act in accordance with it's own will, becomes subject to his judgement (rendering free will illusory).
No... my question was motivated by my inability to rationally reconcile the notion of an activist God, with the notion of free will.
All the periperal discussion is of your creation, not mine.
Everything that God created is good, even the bodies and souls of those who damn themselves by choosing against Him. It seems that God would not annihilate something that is good in its essence: body and soul. Rather, since God is Justice, he will allow those who choose against Him to damn themselves, sentencing themselves to eternal punishment.
OWK, to get you up to speed, the consideration here is the active role of evil in the lives of men here on earth. The title considers a level of complexity exceeding your initial exclusions.
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