😈 Satan¶

Estimated time to read: 7 minutes

Has power¶

I've got some unorganized notes and excerpts on this idea that Satan has supernatural power to influence mortality; once those notes get cleaned up, I'll post them here. Check back later!

Controls water (I guess)¶

This revelation was received by the Prophet Joseph Smith on the bank of the Missouri River, McIlwaine’s Bend, on 12 August 1831. The Prophet wrote:

“On the 9th, in company with ten Elders, I left Independence landing for Kirtland. We started down the river in canoes, and went the first day as far as Fort Osage, where we had an excellent wild turkey for supper. Nothing very important occurred till the third day, when many of the dangers so common upon the western waters, manifested themselves; and after we had encamped upon the bank of the river, at McIlwaine’s Bend, Brother Phelps, in open vision by daylight, saw the destroyer in his most horrible power, ride upon the face of the waters; others heard the noise, but saw not the vision.

“The next morning after prayer, I received the following: D&C 61.” (History of the Church, 1:202–3.)

— The Lord Has Blessed the Land and Cursed the Waters, Doctrine & Covenants Student Manual

Right, OK.

That somehow became “Satan controls water”.

Why then, do we:

Pray to God instead of Satan for rain?
Get completely immersed in Satan's element for baptism?
Have bodies made of 70% water?

Origin¶

How Stuff Works¶

The first mentions of Satan appear in the Hebrew Bible, from which much of the Christian Old Testament is derived. However, there’s a lot of uncertainty among religious scholars regarding what the authors meant when the word “Satan” appears in the Old Testament. The definition can vary depending on how the Biblical Hebrew term for Satan (שָּׂטָן‎‎) is translated and interpreted. In some cases, the term simply means “opponent” or “adversary” and clearly indicates a human figure, not a supernatural one. In other cases, it suggests Satan is “the accuser,” or part of a heavenly legal system. There is no consensus on which references to Satan indicate human adversaries and which ones indicate a supernatural enemy of God (source: Stokes). While the concept took many forms over the centuries, the idea of Satan representing an outsider who opposes established values is the common thread woven through all his incarnations.

The Christian New Testament contains a much clearer evolution of Satan as a single, supernatural evil being in opposition to God. He often appears at God’s behest, to test humans so they display their true faith (source: Farrar and Williams). This version of Satan is sometimes referred to as “the Satan of the Scriptures.”

However, even in the New Testament there is a great deal of confusion about who Satan is. Scholars must look closely at different translations of the Hebrew and Aramaic words for “evil one” or the proper names of certain demons, like Abaddon, Beelzebub or Belial, and try to guess whether they refer to Satan or a more generic evil in context. When referencing the Bible solely, it’s difficult to determine what Satan looks like, where he came from or what his goals might be.

— How Satanism Works, The Origins of Satan, howstuffworks.com

Wikipedia Excerpts¶

Hebrew Bible¶

The Hebrew term śāṭān (Hebrew: שָׂטָן) is a generic noun meaning “accuser” or “adversary”, and is derived from a verb meaning primarily “to obstruct, oppose”. In the earlier biblical books, e.g. 1 Samuel 29:4, it refers to human adversaries, but in the later books, especially Job 1-2 and Zechariah 3, to a supernatural entity. When used without the definite article (simply satan), it can refer to any accuser, but when it is used with the definite article (ha-satan), it usually refers specifically to the heavenly accuser, literally, the satan.

The word with the definite article Ha-Satan (Hebrew: הַשָּׂטָן hasSāṭān) occurs 17 times in the Masoretic Text, in two books of the Hebrew Bible: Job ch. 1–2 (14×) and Zechariah 3:1–2 (3×). It is translated in English bibles mostly as ‘Satan’ (18x in Book of Job, I Books of Chronicles and Book of Zechariah).

The word without the definite article is used in 10 instances, of which two are translated diabolos in the Septuagint. It is translated in English Bibles as ‘an accuser’ (1x) but mostly as ‘an adversary’ (9x as in Book of Numbers, 1 & 2 Samuel and 1 Kings).

1 Chronicles 21:1, “Satan stood up against Israel” (KJV) or “And there standeth up an adversary against Israel” (Young’s Literal Translation) Psalm 109:6b “and let Satan stand at his right hand” (KJV) or “let an accuser stand at his right hand.” (ESV, etc.)

The word does not occur in the Book of Genesis, which mentions only a talking serpent and does not identify the serpent with any supernatural entity. The first occurrence of the word “satan” in the Hebrew Bible in reference to a supernatural figure comes from Numbers 22:22, which describes the Angel of Yahweh confronting Balaam on his donkey: “Balaam’s departure aroused the wrath of Elohim, and the Angel of Yahweh stood in the road as a satan against him.” In 2 Samuel 24, Yahweh sends the “Angel of Yahweh” to inflict a plague against Israel for three days, killing 70,000 people as punishment for David having taken a census without his approval. 1 Chronicles 21:1 repeats this story, but replaces the “Angel of Yahweh” with an entity referred to as “a satan”.

— Satan, Hebrew Bible

Serpents in the Bible: Eden¶

There is a debate about whether the serpent in Eden should be viewed figuratively or as a literal animal. According to one midrashic interpretation in Rabbinic literature, the serpent represents sexual desire; another interpretation is that the snake is the yetzer hara. Modern Rabbinic ideas include interpreting the story as a psychological allegory where Adam represents reasoning faculties, Eve the emotional faculties, and the serpent the hedonic sexual/physical faculties. Voltaire, drawing on Socinian influences, wrote: “It was so decidedly a real serpent, that all its species, which had before walked on their feet, were condemned to crawl on their bellies. No serpent, no animal of any kind, is called Satan, or Belzebub, or Devil, in the Pentateuch.”

— Serpents in the Bible, Eden