If God created everything, why did he create Satan??? (prophets, faith, punished)
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A similar question is, Why did God create anything AT ALL?! You can't answer this logically, can you?
God knows things that you don't. This is at least how anybody believes in God. He has a reason for everything. It may not be simple enough for our little brain to grasp.
just guessing, an experiment with free will on a non human, after all he was an angel, one of high rank no? sheer speculation, got nothing to back up this thought at all. my chin is sticking out i am an open target.
I don't completely know the whole story. You could find Milton's version of it though. Lucifer was called the light bearer. He started out as an angel. Angels are created being by God. Thus, God created Lucifer or Satan as some people call him.
Some time in whatever story you read, Lucifer gathered a few of his angels and rebelled against God. God cast him and the rebellious angels out of heaven and they created their own place and made a home there.
As for why He created Satan/Lucifer, God wouldn't have much of a purpose if there were no evil in the world. God supposed to be the ultimate and infinite good. Without the ultimate evil there can't be good. It's like a light and dark sort of thing. You can't have one without the other. (I really hope I didn't step out of Christianity there.)
God wouldn't have much of a purpose if there were no evil in the world. God supposed to be the ultimate and infinite good. Without the ultimate evil there can't be good. It's like a light and dark sort of thing. You can't have one without the other. (I really hope I didn't step out of Christianity there.)
Please describe for me how, on any day in your life when everything was great and nothing bad was happening, you managed to enjoy the experience.
Please explain how god's purpose could not be the happiness and security of his beloved creatures, and to create an environment where they can enjoy him continually. Oh, wait ... that is conveniently in the future and beyond the veil, it's called "heaven". Where, by your line of reasoning, we will all be mindless robots, unable to have free choice, and unable to enjoy anything because of the absence of evil.
Don't mind me. I'm just going to distill the most accurate posts in this thread so that we actually get a legitimate picture of "Satan" in order to either answer the OP's question or determine whether it's even a valid question:
Quote:
Originally Posted by justme58
The very first verse in the OT that mentions satan is:
1Ch 21:1 And Satan(7584) stood up against Israel, and provoked David to number Israel.
H7854 שׂטן śâṭân saw-tawn'
From H7853; an opponent; especially (with the article prefixed) Satan, the arch enemy of good: - adversary, Satan, withstand.
H7853 שׂטן śâṭan saw-tan'
A primitive root; to attack, (figuratively) accuse: - (be an) adversary, resist.
The word is transliterated from the Hebrew word sawtawn or sawtan. Drop the "w's" and there is your word satan.
A couple of translations has this correct:
(CLV) And there stands up an adversary against Israel, and persuades David to number Israel,
(NET) An adversary1 opposed2 Israel, inciting David to count how many warriors Israel had.3
(YLT) And there standeth up an adversary against Israel, and persuadeth David to number Israel,
But notice that in the Latin Vulgate, the same word appears verbatim.
(Vulgate) consurrexit autem Satan contra Israhel et incitavit David ut numeraret Israhel
Lucifer is not satan either but that is another discussion.
This is the only passage in the bible that mentions Lucifer. In Christian tradition, this passage is proof for the fall of Lucifer.
However, it is more probable that this passage is an allusion to a Canaantie or Phoenician myth about how Helel, son of the god Shahar, sought the throne of the chief god and was cast down into the abyss because of this. Evidence for this theory comes from an Ugaritic poem about two divine children, Shachar (dawn) and Shalim (dusk), who were born as the result of the intercourse of the god El with mortal women. That would make El, Elyon, and Shahar members of the Canaanite pantheon and the "mount of meeting" is the abode of the gods, which corresponds to Mount Olympus in Greek mythology. Unfortunately, this is just speculation as archaeologists have not uncovered any Canaanite sources that describe Helel ben Shahar or a revolt against Elyon.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Nikk
Satan is the name used in the bible refering to Lucifer after his fall. So, God did not create Satan, he created an Angel called lucifer who rebelled
(Referring to the contents of the above post
Quote:
Originally Posted by InsaneInDaMembrane
This is one of the BIGGEST lie (via misinterpretations) that have come down through history Nikk. It is patently false unless one prefers a blatant disservice to the scriptures.
Quote:
Originally Posted by justme58
Tere are so many rebuttals to this myth.
See post #10 and the links to articles explaining the real lucifer. Even satan is a myth.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Fred314X
This is the part of the OP's question that's caused all the problems. I mean, there's no Satan mentioned in MY Bible. The word does crop up--but it is a word and not a name. Hebrew (or, more accurately, Aramaic) for "the accuser." And that does not indicate a particular individual.
Consequently, since there isn't actually a Satan, he (or it) would not have been created in the first place.
As has been pointed out - the idea of Satan as a diabolical entity who was once an angel of light has a history that is far from simple. The ancient Israelites certainly did not believe in some evil entity called Satan. The word was used as a noun in the Hebrew Bible, and also as a sort of title. The "angel" or "divine messenger" that God sent to stand in the path of the donkey-riding Balaam was called his "satan". One of the main characters in the prose-framework of the Book of Job was a servant of God called "the satan". His role was that of a prosecuting attorney or a spy who kept an eye on possibly rebellious subjects. He was not portrayed as evil, and his actions were always dictated by God himself. Certainly not the same "Satan" as moderns portray him - running around willy-nilly and doing whatever he wanted. If those people who still believe that the serpent of Genesis 2-3 was "Satan" considered his description in the Hebrew Bible, it would be inconceivable that he would have been allowed to dupe the humans. That brings up a whole host of other thorny problems: if there is a diabolical entity known as "Satan", then why does God permit him to do the horrible things we attribute to him? And why did he need permission from God for his actions in Job?
These issues can easily be resolved by seeing that the term "satan" slowly evolved in Jewish thinking. The first definite reference to "Satan" as an actual identified being - without the definite article "the" - appears in Chronicles, as was pointed out above in the first quoted post. That we know this idea was late is because Chronicles was composed very late, and is a retelling of Israelite history. If you look at the passage that Chronicles is retelling, you will find that it was not "Satan" who induced David to take a census:
The wrath of Yahweh [God] was kindled against Israel again, and he incited David against them, saying, "Go count Israel and Judah".
(2 Samuel 24:1, AB 9)
The Chronicler was uncomfortable with attributing David's bad actions to Yahweh - so he attributed them to a being now personalized as "Satan". This is important, because it demonstrates the need for a "Satan". In the complex issue of theodicy (why is there apparant innocent suffering if God is all Good, Powerful and Knowing) that had exercised the minds of various Biblical writers, Apolcalyptic writers envisioned an answer to suffering that would serve most readers until the end of time: even if you are good, you will still suffer because there are evil forces at work in the world who are directly against God's Will. That is why innocent people suffer. But don't worry! Some day, God will finally decide to kick these evil forces' butt and set things right again. All those innocent people who suffered will be resurrected after death, and the wrongs that happened to them treated as just a test of faith.
This is the Apocalyptic answer to the Theodicy problem. "Satan" was necesarry to this vision, and he was transformed from a simple Hebrew word with connotations of "adversary" and "accuser" to a full-blown diabolical entity in warfare with God. But this creates problems of its own, as the OP asked: If God created everything, why did he create Satan? We have seen plenty of apologetic answers to this question in an effort to absolve God of any wrong-doing in this matter. But truly - if God DID created everything, and "Satan" is included among it, then it was a pretty rotten decision. Most people assume the Book of Job is about patience, but Job was the most impatient person who ever lived. Once you get past the first two chapters and get into the poetry, you find a very blasphemous man accusing God of Divine Injustice and Misrule. God never denies that he is responsible for the suffering of the innocent, and never blames "the satan" either. That character is conspicuously absent from the Poetic section, and the ending of the story. He states that "job spoke what is right concerning me" - as opposed to Job's friends who did everything in their power to defend God from the charges. The only answer God gives Job is basically - "Hey, man, are you as mighty as me? No? Ok - zip it." He thus fulfills Job's fear that if he were to ever take God to court, that since God is God he would just use his mighty power to stifle any attempts at getting Justice.
So how many of you are Job's friends - willing to defend God against charges that he, himself, claimed were entirely true? It seems much simpler to understand that the concept of "the satan" evolved into a theological need explaining the suffering of the innocent and the wicked - it gets God off of the hook for the very things he admitted to in the Book of Job.
So the current normative Torah view, is that G-d created an "angle" called HaSatan, to do His bidding. All of the angles, including HaSatan, do not have free will, and only do what is asked of them. So if Satan comes knocking on your front door, you should ask yourself, what does G-d want from me? Those two are totally in cahoots.
So the current normative Torah view, is that G-d created an "angle" called HaSatan, to do His bidding. All of the angles, including HaSatan, do not have free will, and only do what is asked of them. So if Satan comes knocking on your front door, you should ask yourself, what does G-d want from me? Those two are totally in cahoots.
Like two pals, playing the world's greatest practical joke on the world.
"Don't worry, God - I got this one for you. I'll take the Fall."
"Thanks, buddy. I've got a reputation to uphold, ya' know."
Like two pals, playing the world's greatest practical joke on the world.
"Don't worry, God - I got this one for you. I'll take the Fall."
"Thanks, buddy. I've got a reputation to uphold, ya' know."
Exactly!
To think there's an equally powerful evil force to the good force that G-d is, well, that smacks of gnosticism. Certainly not Judaism. Funny how Paul copied the gnostics on this point when he created Chrstianity - and people continue to mistakenly think that Chrstianity's roots are in Judaism. And particularly since Paul was born a gentile and died a gentile.
Without the ultimate evil there can't be good. It's like a light and dark sort of thing. You can't have one without the other.
Nonsense! With an omnimax deity you can have anything you want! You see, an omnimax deity could easily devise a way for his 'creations' to only know and experience good without having to experience bad. It would be the easiest of thing to do for something that allegedly created all we see.
...and if you can't have good without bad, how the hell are you gonna manage in this heaven that you think you are going to?
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