What we think we know about God

One of the things I constantly hope to do is to bring light to issues on which protestant Christians hold as commonplaces - those things which everyone just assumes to be fact without verifying. In some of these cases, the Truth may be just as people had assumed; however, there are certainly cases where the Truth is at best a murky subject.

For instance:

We assume that Satan was an angel who aspired to the power of God, and as a result was cast down from Heaven to Hell at some point in the past. There is even a number thrown out: that 1/3rd of the angels were behind Satan, and that they fell with him to Hell and became demons. The only Biblical passage with any implication on the origins of Satan is a statement made by Christ:

"'I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven'" (Luke 10:18, NIV).

Which means that Satan was at one point in Heaven, and implies that he was cast out of it. Where he fell to, at that time, is not made clear - we know he has the ability to walk on Earth (Matthew 4:1-11, Job 1:7) and even has the ability to return to Heaven for visits (Job 1:6). There is apparently some method by which he can return to Heaven, for Revelation speaks of a war in which Satan and his armies fight the Heavenly armies, and again Satan is cast down to Earth (Revelation 12).

But nowhere in that is Satan identified as an angel. Nor is there any place in which the demons are identified as angels. There is certainly never a place where it is identified that 1/3rd of the angels became demons.

Indeed, the only more in-depth "scriptural" reference to Satan appears to be in the Septuagint book of Esaias, which theoretically protestant Christians do not accept as Biblical canon. In that book:

"How has Lucifer, that rose in the morning, fallen from heaven! He that sent orders to all the nations is crushed to the earth. But thou saidst in thine heart, I will go up to heaven, I will set my throne above the stars of heaven: I will sit on a lofty mount, on the lofty mountains toward the north: I will go up above the clouds: I will be like the Most High. But now thou shalt go down to hell, even to the foundations of the earth" (Esaias 14:12-15. Obtained from The Septuagint Bible Online, July 15, 2008).

This is the only place it seems where the name "Lucifer" is granted to Satan. Lucifer is a commonly accepted name for Satan, however.

I think, though, that the true source of this Angelic Satan myth is Milton's Paradise Lost, which, coincidentally, names Satan's true name as Lucifer, meaning that Milton borrowed heavily from the unaccepted Septuagint texts (Of course, during Milton's time, they were canonically accepted by the church). Paradise Lost features the story forward from the time that Satan is cast out of Heaven to the time Adam and Eve are driven from the Garden of Eden. In Book V, Milton describes Lucifer's power thusly:

"The wonted signal, and superior voice
Of thir great Potentate; for great indeed
His name, and high was his degree in Heav'n;
His count'nance, as the Morning Starr that guides
The starrie flock, allur'd them, and with lyes
Drew after him the third part of Heav'ns Host:"

In that last line, it's clear where the concept "1/3rd of angels" originates from - a work of epic poetic fiction written by a Catholic only 341 years ago. Yet, it's considered "fact" by protestants simply because it's something "everyone knows" and thus no one bothers to verify. What Satan is - fallen angel, demon, or something else entirely - is not terribly important; rather, I use this example as a representation of problems I see with modern protestant teaching - that too many things are commonplaces created from sources outside of the Bible, and thus are simply unquestioned. We should always be questioning everything we believe, so that we can come to a closer understanding of the Truth every day. Sphere: Related Content