Funny thing about the Devil...

[Zeddicus]

Biblical theories aside, I've always thought the tale of Lucifer as the fallen angel one with great potency. I've always been interested in the small mistakes people have made when copying the Scripture - morphing it slightly, twisting it... True, it may be a misrepresentation of divine words, but it exemplifies a lot about a culture. Myths thus created may well surpass (not from a religious point of view) the original yarns.
I feel this is especially true for the account of Lucifer's fall. What happened here is something often observed: a story somehow appealing to people goes to lead a life of it own. Isn't it remarkable even those who have never read a Bible, or aren't even Christians, know (more or less) why Lucifer is such a loathed and dreaded name?
There is an excellent play by Vondel (17th century Dutch playwright) dealing with Lucifer's fall and the reasons why he would have engaged in rebellion - essentially out of spite and vanity, and yet Lucifer's fall has a tragic aspect. He is not seen as a foul fiend consumed by darkness and evil, he hesitates to fight the established authorities - and heaven is not without blame, either.

Incidentally, "lucifer" is the Dutch word for a match (the one you light a fire with).

 

[luminum]

Was "Damian" stigmatized by The Omen or was that already a stigmatized name?

 

[jaime1987]

http://www.lilithgallery.com/library/index.html

just thought id post this....i apologise for hijacking a lucifer thread, and making it into a lilith one lol......but i found it really interesting, and it highlights the OTHER perceptions of lilith...and states that practically all religions have a version of lilith somewhere along the line ... for instance, it says that mesopotamian beliefs regarded her as a fertility goddess.

xxxxx

 

[jaime1987]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lilith_(magazine)

also .. with reagrds to what i said about lilith being regarded as a figurehead for feminism by some jews........Lilith magazine is a jewish womens feminist magazine....a bit strange to name such a magazine after someone they regard as a "monster"....?

not to say all jews regard lilith in this way, but its just interesting that there are those who do.

it just goes to show that religion IS a lot to do with personal beliefs, and differing interpretations.

xxxxx

 

[jaime1987]

*bump*
hehe

 

[luminum]

So, just for the record, is there any record of God's secret name and why is the secret name and calling out secret names a big issue? What is behind that?

Oh and yes, it is the delicious Emma in my sig

 

[CGHJ]

So, just for the record, is there any record of God's secret name and why is the secret name and calling out secret names a big issue? What is behind that?

Oh and yes, it is the delicious Emma in my sig

There is no actual complete record of God's supposed secret name, it was lost when the temple was destroyed. We have the letters, what are commonly represented as JHVH, but the vowels are left out so we have no idea how it was actually pronounced.

The secret name is a big issue because in the old days before God was all powerful, you could control a genie and/or invoke magic through use of the secret name. There's an old talmudic story that says Jesus was basically a troublemaker who stole the secret name and used it to work magic. It's almost like Harry Potter style. That's one of the reasons I don't put much stock in religion.

 

[leshe]

.

The faithful will go to their graves swearing it is totally "the word of God," though, and with no proof whatsoever, actually, plenty of common sense evidence to suggest that it was all made-up.

.

Funny how Solomon thought the fear of the Loed is the beginning of all wisdom, I guess we will all find out at the end of the line who was right between you and him.

 

[turtle]

It would be nice to blame things on some kind of Devil, wouldn't it?

We were grown here to mitigate random harms and natural evils, but we have instead created evil of our own.

Well, we're relative children. We have to learn better and do better.

We. Us. Not God, not some 'Devil', Us. It's our mess and its our job to clean it up.

We are God's hands, God's heart and mind on this Earth. We feel because God wants to feel, we care because God cares, we understand so that we may help.

-D

 

[Kulindahr]

It would be nice to blame things on some kind of Devil, wouldn't it?

We were grown here to mitigate random harms and natural evils, but we have instead created evil of our own.

Well, we're relative children. We have to learn better and do better.

We. Us. Not God, not some 'Devil', Us. It's our mess and its our job to clean it up.

We are God's hands, God's heart and mind on this Earth. We feel because God wants to feel, we care because God cares, we understand so that we may help.

-D

Good point!
Too many people assign too much to the devil, forgetting how much we ourselves do to screw things up, and how evil we actually are. I think it's a way of avoiding responsibility.

 

[eywsoon]

Read the creation story part in Anne Rice's "Memnoch the Devil" and it will challenge any traditionally-held thoughts you may have had about the Devil.

Angels, Archangels, Fallen Angels....they all help to create a wonderful and interesting mythology. But how it all plays out inside each of us is the real mystery and the place of any revelation.

 

[Green_Man_007]

In the Etruscan "Gospel of Aradia," the God Lucifer is the Goddess Diana's twin brother. Diana snuck into Lucifer's bed one night and after seducing him, conceived the Goddess Aradia, who became champion of the Strega religion

Of course, Christians demonized the name Lucifer, as they did with Ashtoreth (correlative to Asherah/Ishtar/Isis) and other pagan deities

 

[Green_Man_007]

Jehovah's Witnesses blame Dante for the non-Biblical stories about Lucifer, while Joseph Campbell (author, Power of Myth ) points to Zoroastrian dualism, to which the Hebrews were coincidentally exposed in Babylonian captivity prior to any mention of supernatural evil.