Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Shoshanna Walker <rosewalk AT concentric.net>]

Harold I am getting tired of all this - and it's only Monday.

It doesn't matter (to me) that the first Christians were Jews if they 
either misunderstood Torah, or didn't learn it, or started making up 
their own beliefs, nor if you quote sources that are not Torah.

There is not one example in the Jewish scriptures where any angel, 
Satan included, opposes God's will, nor of a fiction named Mastema, 
who allegedly induced God to test Abraham through the sacrifice of 
Isaac.

You are right that his job is that of tempter - he tempts mankind 
away from obedience to G-d, so that when they choose G-d over Satan, 
they are thereby elevated - and that he was the one who tempted Chava.

But some day we will all be on an elevated spiritual level, and his 
job will be over.

If you are interested in a Jewish perspective, see 
http://www.outreachjudaism.org/satan.html

Shoshanna





> "Even if an angel of G-d did give the vision to Daniel, it still came
> from G-d"  Obviously everything comes from G-d.  But if it came from
> an intermediary, it didn't come directly from G-d.  And what do you
> mean, that "otherwise the vision would be from an angel of Satan"?
> There is only G-d, and Satan is only another angel, Satan doesn't
> have angels working under him.  There are many many angels, an angel
> is a servant of G-d, and exists only to do a particular job, when its
> job is done, it ceases to exist - even Satan will no longer have a
> job to do one day.



HH: Have you ever read the Apocryphra? It reveals a Jewish concept of
Satan that is like the Christian view of Satan, which of course was a
Jewish view because the first Christians were all Jews. Here is
something from the Jewish Encyclopedia on the view of Satan in the
Apocrypha:
http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=270&letter=S

The evolution of the theory of Satan keeps pace with the development of
Jewish angelology and demonology. In Wisdom ii. 24 he is represented,
with reference to Gen. iii., as the author of all evil, who brought
death into the world; he is apparently mentioned also in Ecclus.
(Sirach) xxi. 27, and the fact that his name does not occur in Daniel is
doubtless due merely to chance. Satan was the seducer and the paramour
of Eve, and was hurled from heaven together with other angels because of
his iniquity (Slavonic Book of Enoch, xxix. 4 et seq.). Since that time
he has been called "Satan," although previously he had been termed
"Satanel" (ib. xxxi. 3 et seq.). The doctrine of the fall of Satan, as
well as of the fall of the angels, is found also in Babylonia (Schrader,
l.c. p. 464), and is mentioned several times in the New Testament. Satan
rules over an entire host of angels (Martyrdom of Isaiah, ii. 2; Vita
Adæ et Evæ, xvi.). Mastema, who induced God to test Abraham through the
sacrifice of Isaac, is identical with Satan in both name and nature
(Book of Jubilees, xvii. 18), and the Asmodeus of the Book of Tobit is
likewise to be identified with him, especially in view of his
licentiousness. As the lord of satans he not infrequently bears the
special name Samael. It is difficult to identify Satan in any other
passages of the Apocrypha, since the originals in which his name
occurred have been lost, and the translations employ various
equivalents. An "argumentum a silentio" can not, therefore, be adduced
as proof that concepts of Satan were not wide-spread; but it must rather
be assumed that reference to him and his realm is implied in the mention
of evil spirits of every sort (comp. Demonology, and Kautzsch,
"Apokryphen," Index).

>
Yours,
Harold Holmyard
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