Is Satan actually good?

[_random_]

Was God already divided into three parts before God came on Earth in human form? There is only one God, Jesus is God, God is eternal, so Jesus is eternal? I don't understand trinity.

Every articulation of the Trinity by every orthodox theologian ever is pretty clear that essence of God is undivided.

This guy murdered all of man kind except for 8 people? This guy was pleased about the smell of burning goat flesh? Commanded people to kill in his name to please him? Cutting the foreskins of innocent babies made this guy happy? I don't get it.

"Thou delightest not in burnt offerings." is a sentence I recall from reciting quite a few Psalms in my upbringing. And you're not really understanding things properly. I get the impression that you don't really care to.

Wasn't the original concept of Satan more of a tester of one's faith rather than an evil entity opposed to God? I seem to remember reading about that or seeing it in a documentary about ancient Judaism. It was something about God actually tasked Satan to try to get people to stray from the righteous path, and it wasn't until Christianity came along that the concept of Satan was changed to be a fallen angel who is now directly opposed to God and the embodiment of all that is evil.

That seems to be how Satan is depicted in the Book of Job, and that's the prevailing understanding in Judaism today, but the other concept you describe has some precedent in pre-Christian Judaism.

 

[Zack]

Proper jealousy. The sort a husband exercises towards his wife.

From the same guy who said: "The Jedi are selfless, they only care about others."

tbh I'm not really sure what the hell you're talking about in either of these posts.

And you're not really understanding things properly. I get the impression that you don't really care to.

What did you expect in this thread, dude?

 

[Krogan Doctor]

tbh I'm not really sure what the hell you're talking about in either of these posts.

Your problem, not mine. Don't advertise your ignorance.

 

[_random_]

What did you expect in this thread, dude?

I don't know. I always hold onto hope I can spark some decent religious discussion, but I guess I'll just have to wait for Ask a Theologian to get updated again for that.

 

[Berzerker]

Well obviously the fact that he brought that in but he also brought in death and suffering. Must such a wonderful fellow.

Death and suffering already existed, thats the way of the world... Adam and Eve were mortal and they remained mortal, it was God who kicked them out of the Garden denying them access to the tree of life. That was God's doing, the Serpent merely enlightened Adam and Eve about the nature of good and evil.

Remember, when God reports to his friends that Adam and Eve had become like them, he acknowledges that good and evil already existed - the man had become like the gods, knowing good and evil exist.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

Your problem, not mine. Don't advertise your ignorance.

Aaand most conceited award goes to...incidentally, the same guy badmouthing The Manifestation if Vice himself for being arrogant.

Delicious.

Sent from my ADR6350 using Tapatalk 2

 

[timtofly]

Satan cannot be good nor evil. Satan cannot even act out in a good or evil way. Why do humans keep trying to humanize everything? Perhaps she does enjoy all the worship and attention people give her.

 

[Zack]

Satan cannot be good nor evil. Satan cannot even act out in a good or evil way. Why do humans keep trying to humanize everything? Perhaps she does enjoy all the worship and attention people give her.

Wait, what? Satan's a woman?

 

[bhsup]

Wait, what? Satan's a woman?

Why not? God is.

 

[gay_Aleks]

Not to mention God can't even come close to Satan's dominance of the death metal market.

That's because you've never heard of Christian metal.

 

[timtofly]

Wait, what? Satan's a woman?

Angels are not human. They have no gender.

 

[Zack]

Angels are not human. They have no gender.

Then why use "she" and "her"?

 

[BvBPL]

Among the immortal beings, Lucifer is the only one who accepts us for who we are instead of punishing us for not following his weird moral code.

Only if you accepted his skewed understanding of humanity. To Satan, man deserves suffering not for man's actions, but merely because of the nature of man itself. To other beings we may be worthy of reward or we may not, but to Satan that's not in question at all. To Satan we are always and always will be worms whose damnation is not our fault but our natural state.

Satan is the death of choice, the absence of free will, the anti-life equation. While other immortals may set bars for our rewards or comeuppances that may or may not seem fair, at least for them the mortal choice matters. For Satan it doesn't.

 

[timtofly]

Then why use "she" and "her"?

It seemed an appropriate thing to do in this thread. Does it matter how people portray gender neutral beings?

 

[Bliss]

Satan teached us how to develop ego. To be "smart" and contest God's decisions are his legacy and the reason for our suffering.

Redemption can only be achieved with the unattachement of ego.

Enviado de meu ST25a usando o Tapatalk 2

 

[Manfred Belheim]

It's hard to tell which of you are talking about the hypothetical concept of Satan, and which of you are talking about him/her as if he/she was actually real...

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

Only if you accepted his skewed understanding of humanity. To Satan, man deserves suffering not for man's actions, but merely because of the nature of man itself. To other beings we may be worthy of reward or we may not, but to Satan that's not in question at all. To Satan we are always and always will be worms whose damnation is not our fault but our natural state.

Satan is the death of choice, the absence of free will, the anti-life equation. While other immortals may set bars for our rewards or comeuppances that may or may not seem fair, at least for them the mortal choice matters. For Satan it doesn't.

I don't think that Satan "wants" us to suffer at all. At least he has no say in the matter, it's all God's pronouncement in the first place. Satan, on the other hand, accepts than man is fallible, imperfect, and human. God is never satisfied with our impure mortal selves, that's why with him we're always being judged against that perfect period in the Garden of Eden when we weren't truly human.

If anything, Satan is the essence of free will itself: he will always welcome us, no matter what we become in our short physical lives, just as a parent will love their child no matter what they become in life, despite their mistakes and misgivings. Our immortal souls deserve no permanent rejection for the mistakes of a fallible life - a life of fallibility which God sent us to, mind you! So not only does God judge us for being human and our deviations from "impurity," he was also the one who, in his so-called "eternal love" cast us out of his presence in the first place, into that world where we are even able to make such fallible mistakes! And as we have seen, even God is capable of the vices which supposedly condemn one of us to Hell: avarice, anger, even murder, depending on how you look at it.

Remember that being "holier" doesn't get one rejected from Hell, it gets one accepted into Heaven.

So in a strange, Phillip K. Dick sort of way, Lucifer is a much better, more loving parent and much better and kinder "person" to us than God, our "actual" father and supposed "perfect being" is.

 

[Smellincoffee]

My understanding from listening to Jewish apologetics (simpletoremember.com) is that Satan is a loyal member of God's court, his quality-control man who gives human opportunities to grow spiritually by presenting them with obstacles. I like that notion, because the Christo-Islamic conception of a rebellious angel is bizaare and problematic -- why was Satan free to rebel? -- plus, it's closer to the Stoic view expressed by Seneca that if bad things happen to you, they should be looked on more as trials to be conquered than something to sit down and cry about. (Seneca, "On Providence")

So in a strange, Phillip K. Dick sort of way, Lucifer is a much better, more loving parent and much better and kinder "person" to us than God, our "actual" father and supposed "perfect being" is.

For some reason I hear you saying this in Al Pacino's voice.

 

[timtofly]

I don't think that Satan "wants" us to suffer at all. At least he has no say in the matter, it's all God's pronouncement in the first place. Satan, on the other hand, accepts than man is fallible, imperfect, and human. God is never satisfied with our impure mortal selves, that's why with him we're always being judged against that perfect period in the Garden of Eden when we weren't truly human.

If anything, Satan is the essence of free will itself: he will always welcome us, no matter what we become in our short physical lives, just as a parent will love their child no matter what they become in life, despite their mistakes and misgivings. Our immortal souls deserve no permanent rejection for the mistakes of a fallible life - a life of fallibility which God sent us to, mind you! So not only does God judge us for being human and our deviations from "impurity," he was also the one who, in his so-called "eternal love" cast us out of his presence in the first place, into that world where we are even able to make such fallible mistakes! And as we have seen, even God is capable of the vices which supposedly condemn one of us to Hell: avarice, anger, even murder, depending on how you look at it.

So in a strange, Phillip K. Dick sort of way, Lucifer is a much better, more loving parent and much better and kinder "person" to us than God, our "actual" father and supposed "perfect being" is.

Do you have proof that God is holding us to the standards of the Garden? If satan is so "for us" why is he not more actively campaigning especially in today's scientific awareness, where objective proof can be more compelling? God does not condemn us to hell, nor did he condemn satan to hell. It is human choice and satan's to go there. God gave both satan and humans the freedom to choose. Why do you think that listening to satan is any better than listening to God? God has always offered life. There would not even be a hell, if satan had not made the choice that made hell necessary. Satan wanted to live separately from God and God gave it what it wanted. Hell is not the default choice either. The default human soul's choice is to worship God, even though the nature of humans is at a constant struggle with that soul. We are not at odds with God, we are at odds with our own soul. That is the struggle we have between the knowledge of good and the knowledge of evil.

What is true is that it is easier to do what is wrong than to do what is right. However God already did what is needed, so all we have to do is accept. In the Garden there was only one hard choice to do "wrong" Doing what was right was very easy to do. Satan was so smart, that he convinced humans to make the hard unnecessary choice. Now all he has to do is sit back and enjoy the show.

Being holy does not get you any where.

 

[madviking]