Is Satan the personification of mankind's desires for evil?

Question

In ancient times Satan is the one who tempted man, caused trouble, etc.

In modern times we realize we do these things to ourselves or simply the victim of circumstance.

Discuss...

Answer 1

No. he's not real.  

Answer 2

Satan still tempts man.. but man in ancient times still caused his troubles.  IE- King David etc.

There are times that I am under some heavy attacks by Satan, and there are times I do things to myself to cause me harm.

Answer 3

Well, "God" is as well.  

Answer 4

Not true... In ancient times Satan was the one sent to tempt and to test  man and man's comitment to God.

Satan does not "make" man commit evil acts nor does he "create" evil but rather he tests mans desire to do good over evil in the footsteps of god. We have always had free will to choose which path to follow and it is god's decision to allow us this free will and his decision to allow Satan to test mankind.

In modern times this remains true, we are still tempted to evil but this doesn't mean that we have to do it.  

Answer 5

Satan is the personification of his own desires for evil.

Satan is not just that demon dude. He is a standard like communist, capitalist, democratist......

Satan is a satan, you are not Satan but you can be a satan.

Get what I mean?

Answer 6

No Satan is just the metaphoric stick to the metaphoric carrot of heaven. It is a tool for control, if you don't behave and do as we tell you then this nasty evil creature will spend eternity torturing and punishing. Talk about the punishment not fitting the crime.

Lets not forget the easy back door it provides, it was not me it was Satan, this mythical entity that moved through me to do evil. The same evil that was actually my secret desire. Complete nonsense.

A contradiction and a tool for control.

Answer 7

you could consider that which you term Satan to represent or be representative of sin - and consider sin, likewise, to be synonymous with unconsciousness (typefied by anxiety, guilt, anger, fear) - hence sinners should be forgiven, and shown truth, if one wishes to seek it.

Answer 8

I agree that Satan is the personificatin of mankind's desire for evil. And the world is full of Satan... I believe that both of my parents are Satan and the Devil, and that so are all of my friends.  

Answer 9

Evil is an invention of man...

a measure of one's moral relativity to another.

*****

If you look at it this way... there's no such things as "evil"

Humans are part of the animal kingdom... we act just like animals... we KILL to survive.

WE don't hurt our own species just like animals...

but it's just that some people like to hurt other humans...

just like some animals kill their babies (e.g. lions) for power and survival.

Answer 10

He generally represents the vices we try to avoid, as god represents the virtues we strive for. Creating a simple pro/con system of morality makes it a lot easier to know you're moving in the right direction.

Answer 11

He's more a sort of fictional character, like Hannibal Lector, or Father Christmas, or Jesus.

Answer 12

Your dead wrong... You don't seem to read the Bible!

Job 9:23 (NIV) When a scourge brings sudden death, God* (*NOT SATAN, but God!) mocks the despair of the INNOCENT.

Job 9:17 (NIV) He* (*God… NOT SATAN, but God!) would crush me with a storm and multiply my wounds FOR NO REASON.

Lamentations 3:37-38 (KJV) Who is he that saith, and it cometh to pass, when the Lord commandeth it not? OUT OF THE MOUTH OF THE MOST HIGH PROCEEDETH NOT EVIL AND GOOD*? (*Preachers lie, they say that “God is GOOD”, but not firstly EVIL…(read it again! FIRST: EVIL… and then “good” as a teaser!)

Exodus 4:11 (NIV) The Lord said to him, “Who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or mute? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the Lord? (Isn’t the Bible God so nice to tell us so we don’t have to blame the Devil all the time?)

Amos 3:6 (KJV) Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid? shall there be evil in a city, and the lord hath not done it?

Proverbs 16:4 (NIV)  The LORD hath made all things for himself: yea, EVEN THE WICKED* (*The Devil or any compassionate human being who doesn’t believe in God?) FOR THE DAY OF EVIL. (No Heathen religion in the Western World is as wicked as the Bible religion! I don’t even want to talk about Islam! Christians made up in their minds what Christianity ought to be in spite of what’s written in the Bible!)

Ruth 1:20-21 (NIV) “Don't call me Naomi,” she told them. “Call me Mara, because the Almighty has made my life very bitter. I went away full, but the Lord has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi? The Lord has afflicted me; the Almighty* (*NOT SATAN, but God!) has brought misfortune upon me.”

Proverbs 1:26-28 (NIV) I* (*God NOT SATAN, but God!)  in turn will laugh at your disaster; I WILL MOCK WHEN CALAMITY OVERTAKES YOU* (*God is taking advantage of any calamity like a forthcoming California Earthquake to convey a “message” that some Christians don’t get!) - when calamity overtakes you like a storm, when disaster sweeps over you like a whirlwind, when distress and trouble overwhelm you. Then they will call to me but I will not answer; they will look for me but will not find me.

Jeremiah 11: 14 "Do not pray for this people nor offer any plea or petition for them, BECAUSE I* (*God) WILL NOT LISTEN WHEN THEY CALL TO ME IN THE TIME OF THEIR DISTRESS*. (Nothing scares primitive religious people more than the idea that their God doesn’t listen to them!  It still works today! The Christian idea that this whimsical God always listens to them is wishful hoping that the chances are just right that God will answer on the spot, otherwise he will POSITIVELY answer, but later!)  

Romans 9:11-15   Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad–in order that God's purpose in election might stand: not by works but by him who calls–she was told, “The older will serve the younger.” Just as it is written: “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”  What then shall we say? IS GOD UNJUST? NOT AT ALL!* (*Saint Paul says so… because he is telling you!)  For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”* (*the Christian clergy guarantees you all the opposite that God is no respecter of persons!)

Malachi 1:4  (NIV) Edom* (*Esau) may say, "Though we have been crushed, we will rebuild the ruins."  But this is what the LORD Almighty says: "They may build, but I will demolish. They will be called the Wicked Land, A PEOPLE ALWAYS UNDER THE WRATH OF THE LORD* (*How would you like to be one of them? No FREE WILL FOR YOU! NO Salvation, either! God doesn’t like you for ever just for the heck of it!)

Isaiah 45:7 (KJV) I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and CREATE EVIL: I the LORD* (*NOT SATAN) do all these things.

Job 42:11 (KJV) Then came there unto him all his brethren, and all his sisters, and all they that had been of his acquaintance before, and did eat bread with him in his house: and they bemoaned him, and comforted him over ALL THE EVIL that the LORD* (*NOT SATAN!) had brought upon him:* (*God had a plan to have ALL of Job’s children slaughtered! He gave Job some new ones later on after all that… Isn’t God so wonderful?! Life is so cheap as far as the Bible God goes!)

When was the last time that a Christian blamed God for any of his/her misfortune? I bet you they credit Satan for their misfortunes!  They are offending the Bible God!!! SHAME ON THEM CHRISTIANS…!!! “As for me and my house, “IN GOD WE TRUST” for all of our misfortunes!!! (Am I catching the Bible religion or what?) Christianity is worse than any wild pagan religion involving human sacrifice!  No wonder that the only way to pacify this whimsical sadistic God is by sacrificing his Only Begotten son in human form… after he was properly beaten to a pulp and tenderized, thoroughly marinated in Roman spit, and crucified as a “spotless Lamb of God!” How “Heathenly” primitive can you still get in today’s society…???  Europe is waking up of the Dark Ages far ahead of us here in America! I guess that Religions will still be in effect until our IQ and common sense improve to a decent level… Hey, are we still evolving, or what?  The Bible writers were very silly to credit their idea of a God with so much EVIL when they could have done a better job blaming the Devil all along…! They would have kept me fooled to this day, too!

Answer 13

No, Satan is an individual, an angel who rebelled against God.  God permits Satan to influence humans, but humans still have free will to resist.

There's no difference between "ancient times" and "modern times" in this regard, but at the end of time Satan will be confined to h**l with all those who have made the choices 'he' made.

Answer 14

i believe satan is the cause of all sins. =]

i hate satan.  

Answer 15

No.  Jesus didn't have any desires for evil, but Satan still tempted him.  God didn't have any desires for evil, but in the first chapter of Job Satan still talks to Him.

Answer 16

Yo, Emp:

Satan is the excuse men invented for God's failures.  It's that simple.

It was almost impossible for those who invented god, to believe that, having made him  the creator of EVERYTHING that is created, he could also be responsible for having created evil.  So men invented a contrasting mythology...based loosely on the Persian doctrines of duality (brought back from the Hebrew exile)...Good vs. Evil, Light vs. Darkness,  God vs. Satan.  It was a natural progression.  There was NO SATAN with a capital "s" in Early Jewish theology.  It was up to Christianity to invent the big SATAN.

Men, contrary to bible thumping indoctrination, are NOT born with evil propensities....they are NOT born into sin, because of the failing of some mythical first parent.  And man certainly does not DESIRE evil.  That thinking is the result of describing evil as merely 'moral' evil, and forgetting about 'natural' evils.   That is akin to saying man desires AIDS or TSUNAMIS or Earthquakes or Brain Tumors.

If you want a concise, but convincing, precis on the origins of SATAN, try Charles Panati's: "Sacred Origins of Profound Things".....

go on from there to "God and Evil" -Contemporary Perspectives in Philosophy.  Edited by Nelson Pike.

Or click on to A. T. Overstreet and read his masterful report: "Are Men Born Sinners?" -Thirteen Reasons Why the Doctrine of Original Sin is False.

THEY will remove the 'scales' from anyone's eyes. LOL

Edit:

Bold Eagle makes a very salient point that is also echoed by Panatti.....The 'ancient'  Jews needed no Satan to explain evil...they had YAHWEH, whose every other act was EVIL personified.  How else explain his delight in slaughtering EVERYONE who would not cater to his vanity, and egomania, including millions of innocent women and children??

Edit:

B Knott:

While Bahai presents itself as a 'belief system' based on the 'brotherhood' of all men and women, it is, in its teachings on human sexuality, as rabidly homophobic as Fundamentalist Christianity.  It, literally, contradicts it's own Major claim to inclusion and tolerance. Give it a better look-see, before you commit.  Unless, of course, you agree with it's homophobic propaganda. Believe me, it took almost a year of intense study of Bahai before I uncovered the underlying (and sometimes overt) homophobia in the writings of Baha'u'llah.....and nothing changed under the leadership of Abdu'l'baha. Their claims to a 'higher morality' did not preclude the same intolerance and bigotry that infect almost every Scriptural belief system.

Answer 17

No, Satan has his own identity and existence. He must have fell from an exalted position for he has many different kinds of created beings that fell with him.  

Answer 18

Nope!  Satan is the personification of mankind's stupidity and desire to let others control them and play with their minds by instilling fear in them

Answer 19

Satan never exsisted to do any of that! SOME of mankind is responsible for the evil things SOME of mankind do and not a fictitious fable.

Answer 20

DUH, the weirdo who wrote the bible obviously had the 'evil' side of humanity in mind...

Answer 21

Never thought about it like that but what your saying is true if you that Satan true.

Answer 22

if you wanna listen to the beast we all have within then your headed down a dark path

Answer 23

Let me guess, you read one of my answers and thought you could get away with borrowing things I have been saying. There is a word for that. Blandishments. (Imitation is the sincerest form of ....) Bet you thought I was going to say plagiarism, didn't you? Well, I would have if I knew what the word plagiarism means. But I digress.

OK, on a serious note, that is exactly what I have been saying, and if you want I will go back and find some examples for you. Well, almost exactly. Actually what I put was it is the name given for man's selfish or earthly nature, and yes, it was also used as an explanation for an unfortunate happenstance. As far as sin, any and all sins can be attributed to someone being selfish. If you are not sure or think I am wrong, put it in additional details and I will try to remember to check back and I will demonstrate it for you. ANY sin. Any at all.

In a similar manner, evil does not exist any more than cold does. It is simply the lack of good, just as cold is a lack of heat and dark is a lack of light. I think maybe we should share other thoughts.

I nearly closed but thought of one further thing. Let's assume that there is a God and He is all-powerful. And by definition, if there is a God, that is true. Given that, how could Satan have any real power? If God created Satan, then Satan has only the power God gave him. Could not God take that power back at any time? Sure puts a different spin on some of the Bible stories, does it not? Maybe they are meant as allegory after all.

By the way, I am a former Southern Baptist turned staunch atheistic Agnostic and now even more staunch member of the Baha'i Faith (founded 1844).

If it is time for world peace, then it is time for the Baha'i Faith.