In ancient Jewish tradition Satan is simply an angel doing the work that God assigned to Satan to do.
The word Satan means challenger. With the idea of Satan challenging us, or tempting if you will. This description sees Satan as the angel who is the embodiment of man's challenges. This idea of Satan works closely with God as an integral part of God plan for us. His job is to make choosing good over evil enough of a challenge so that it becomes clear to us that there can be only one meaningful or logical choice.
Contrast this to Christianity, which sees Satan as God's opponent. In Jewish thought, the idea that there exists anything capable of setting itself up as God's opponent would be considered polytheistic or setting up the devil to be an equally powerful polarity to god or a demigod.
Oddly, proof for The Christian satan/devil mythology is supposedly found in the ancient Jewish texts that were borrowed to create the bible. One can’t help but wonder how Christians came up with such a fantastically different interpretation of Gods assistant Satan in their theology.
Other hints about Satan’s role in human relations can be seen if you look at the name Lucifer. It meaning in the original tongue translates as Light bearer or light bringer. Essentially the bringer of enlightenment. The temptations of the Satan idea bring all of us eventually into Gods light. Hardly the Evil entity of Christian mythology.
Love and blessings
don
2006-08-10 15:05:31
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answer #1
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answered by Anonymous
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God doesn't need Satan, and Satan doesn't need God.
They are both metaphors for human characteristics. God represents the good that exists in all people, and Satan represents the inner evil that lurks within us all. Both of these characteristics are essential in a human being. People that lack either one are sure to have problems.
Christian Mythology is just that: mythology. It is not supposed to be taken literally anymore than you would take Greek mythology literally.
LOL, next we'll see a question: "Does Zeus need Poseidon?"
2006-08-09 07:35:33
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answer #2
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answered by Anonymous
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I think the Christian God does need Satan, namely to keep the flock in line. Think about it, your a parent who has to dicipline a child who has broken a rule. Will that child learn from their mistakes if there are no concequences? Probably not. I think organized religions in general use fear and guilt to keep their followers in line, for christianity it's fear of hell and Satan.
Do we need Satan? I think the answer depends on who you are and what you believe. I don't need to believe in a negative deity, a scapegoat for all the evil in the world. Man is responsible for enough evil, I don't need to blame an imaginary guy with a pitchfork. I also think that blaming the devil when we do the wrong thing is an easy way out of taking responsibility for our actions.
2006-08-09 07:32:23
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answer #3
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answered by ravencadwell 3
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God does not kill everything. The wages of sin is death. Man as well as Satan in the form of a serpent allowed sin to enter in. God warn that death would come if man disobeyed.
Satan's time is coming soon. He will be cast into the lake of fire and then that will be cast into hell.
2006-08-09 07:11:44
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answer #4
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answered by rltouhe 6
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this could be a sort of motives that faith isn't sensible. because you have an exceptionally valid element right here. you are able to stay by applying Gods observe, yet please in no way do something that could desire to injury you. development a relationship with somebody (human or ...in any different case) who might tempt you to do issues you perceive as incorrect isn't valuable to you, nor will or no longer that is valuable to devil. you won't be able to alter devil for the greater perfect, so there could be surely no advantages from this. No, you're actually not hating God for starting to be devil. If I drew a image and you probably did no longer like it, might that recommend you do in contrast to me?
2016-11-04 05:23:51
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answer #5
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answered by shuey 4
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if you can find it, i suggest you read "the gospel according to jesus christ" by jose saramago. before everyone gets their panties in a knot, it's fiction. but it's dang good fiction.
in this book, god is a bully, a self-centered, power hungry maniac, who tricks a child (jesus) into agreeing to his grandiose plans, while the devil is a nice guy who is not evil at all, but full of human emotions and tries to help jesus understand he doesn't have to sumbit to this god. god and the devil look exactly the same, with the only difference being that god has a beard.
there is a great scene where god, jesus and the devil meet out on a lake, surrounded by fog, all three of them on a boat. jesus has learned well. he has learned that he can't sacrifice something he cares about, no matter how good the cause, that glory isn't really a good cause at all, and that he doesn't want to die for the glory of this god. and so he is trying to get out of it. god attemps to persuade him by telling jesus of all the glory that will fall on his own name. god starts listing all the martyrs and the way they died, the crusades, the inquisition, all rich with death tolls and details of how the people died, and always emphasizing that they died as a direct consequence of jesus' own death. when he is finished, the devil is so impressed he tries to make a deal with god... he says he'll go back to heaven, submit and be a good little angel, never again question god, and that way jesus won't have to die and neither will all those people. but god laughs in his face....
if there is no devil, no one needs god.
if there isn't something supernatural to fear, then there is no need for a supernatural protector, a savior. without a devil, god has no power, because you see, god's power is not over the world or even the devil. god has power only over people, and then only if they believe. and they will only believe out of fear, need.
i know right now thousands of believers are gasping and telling themselves and the screen that they believe but fear has nothing to do with it. very well, think what you will. whether you know it or not, fear is why you hang on to faith against all logic. the church knows this so well that for hundreds of years they banned Aristotle's book about laughter, because you see, if you can laugh at things, you don't fear them, and if you don't fear, the church has no hold on you.
do we need satan? only as long as we deceive ourselves into needing god. in truth we need only to understand that we are human, with all the good and bad that comes with being human. we need to accept responsibility for the bad things and enjoy the good ones, and hope that somewhere in there we'll find some balance.
2006-08-09 07:40:49
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answer #6
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answered by gwenwifar 4
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If you remember satan use to be one of gods angels (Lucifer)and in the end God will get rid of what he created including satan,the rest who have been saved will spend eternity with god in the kingdom of heaven
2006-08-09 07:13:28
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answer #7
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answered by Iceman 3
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The theory of God cannot exist without the opposite spectrum. You cannot uphold something so high and mighty without having a counterpart, its simply not possible. It provides balance in the system, and it also seems to give people an excuses when they "sin".
2006-08-09 07:13:36
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answer #8
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answered by Anonymous
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Satan raised an issue,Jehovah's allowing all of creation to learn
the lie man acted on is a lie, we can not rule ourselves, without hurting ourselves we are not gods as satan said, we can not live harmoniously independant from our creator.
2006-08-09 07:16:49
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answer #9
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answered by Anonymous
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are u out of your mind ,, without Satan there is no evil , and without evil there is not fun at all , why god create us than , because there is a evil and good , this is the world , Satan play very great rule on this life
2006-08-09 07:14:29
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answer #10
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answered by helios 2
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