Who incited David to count the fighting men of Israel?
(a) God did (2 Samuel 24: 1)
(b) Satan did (I Chronicles 2 1:1)
2007-05-20 19:29:03 · 4 answers · asked by Punter 2 in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
No.
Just as we know more about God's love now than earlier in history. The Jews were learning about God more and more.
2 Samuel 24:1 states: The LORD'S anger against Israel flared again, and he incited David against the Israelites by prompting him to number Israel and Judah.
1 Chronicles 21:1 states: A satan rose up against Israel, and he enticed David into taking a census of Israel.
These books were written in different historical eras by different authors. These authors had a different knowledge of God and even different vocabularies.
Through the revelation of God through the prophets and such, the Jews were learning more and more about God over the centuries.
The change in the term reflects the changed theological outlook of Israel after the exile in Babylon, when evil could no longer be attributed directly to God.
"A satan" in Hebrew at this time in history designated an angel who accused men before God (Job 1:6-12; 2:1-7; Zechariah 3:1-2) and not the devil.
In later Judaism (Wisdom 2:24) and in the New Testament, satan, or the "devil" (from the Greek translation of the word), designates an evil spirit who tempts men to wrongdoing.
With love in Christ.
2007-05-24 18:03:28 · answer #1 · answered by imacatholic2 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Good question, have you studied Gnosticism at all ? There are several schools of Gnostic thought that believe that the 'God' of this physical realm is actually a lesser being known as the 'Demiurge', and that this entity is the original model for the 'Devil' role.
I have also given much thought to the detail of the descriptions of Moses, and his interactions with YHWH, and wondered whether Moses wasn't the role model for later versions of Lucifer.
Try this from Wiki :
[edit] Yahweh
Some Gnostic philosophers (notably Marcion of Sinope and the Sethians) identify the Demiurge with Yahweh, the God of the Old Testament, in opposition and contrast to the God of the New Testament. Still others equated the being with Satan. Catharism apparently inherited their idea of Satan as the creator of the evil world directly or indirectly from Gnosticism. Or, they may well have gotten the idea directly from the New Testament, which refers to Satan as “The God [‘ho theos’] of this age” in Second Corinthians 4:4. Also, the New Testament asserts that the “whole world lies in the power of the evil one” in 1 John 5:19. Though nowhere in the New Testament is the creator of the world or the universe identified as Satan, although Yahweh declares in Isaiah 45:7 that He “makes light and creates darkness [Hebrew "choshekh"]. Nor in the Old (see the Septuagint) or New Testament is nature or earth created by the creator referred to as evil.
2007-05-20 19:57:27 · answer #2 · answered by cosmicvoyager 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Bible says the god of this world is satan.
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2007-05-20 19:32:07 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
no... people forget, the Bible was made my Jews orignially. Biblical God can exist without satan. It's Christians who screwed it all up.
2007-05-20 19:31:58 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 1⤋