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24/7 · 07-24-2007, 04:42 PM

In continuation:

The Jews lived under these religious influences for over 200 years, well past the closing of the Old Testament going into the time of the Greek domination of the area who conquered the Persians. Around this time, Jewish writings began to appear that showed heavy influence of Persian religious ideas and concepts. For the Jews, the Persian concept of good and evil, embodied in two separate entities was very appealing. It allowed the idea of only “good” to apply to God while evil and all things bad could be pinned on an evil one, a concept that was not found in Jewish theology. With the driving influence of Persian Zoroastrianism, the Satan of Jewish theology took on a whole new identity. He no longer would be God’s court prosecutor, someone under God’s control, someone used by God to carry out disaster. Now, Satan would be the embodiment of evil, the evil one, separate from God, having his own kingdom, powers to tempt, kill and destroy, no longer under the control of God. This evolution developed over a 500 year period from the days in Babylon all the way through to the Greeks and into the New Testament. By this time, we read far more about Satan (the devil) than we do in the Old Testament. At no point in the Old Testament is Satan EVER associated with the serpent in the Garden of Eden, but by the intertestamental period, Jewish theologians, with Babylonian and Persian influences instilled, were slowly making such connections despite any evidence to that effect. By New Testament times, we have the writer of Revelation referring to him as the Great Dragon, something we NEVER read in the Old Testament. In fact no matter how hard you look, you will not find any great messages on Satan in the Old Testament, no descriptions, no warnings, no prophets warning the people to beware of him or even God detailing his actions. You have to wait until you get to the New Testament to even gain an idea of the concept many people today cling to.

So as we can see, the concept of Satan evolved in Jewish theology over time and the Jewish ideas were in turn borrowed by Jewish Christians and incorporated into their writings (what we call the New Testament), which were then passed on to European Christians (who edited the Jewish writings for their purposes) and Arab Muslims. Those two faiths were responsible for imposing their will and religion upon much of the world from Africa to northern Europe and Indonesia to North and South America. What some of you believe today about Satan can be directly traced back through them, then back to the ancient Jews and then back to the Babylonians and Persians. So when you walk around blaming Satan for this and that or referring to people as “the devil” and so forth, you now should be more aware of what you are really talking about.

07-24-2007, 04:42 PM	#2 (permalink)
24/7 Registered User Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: SoFla Posts: 70 Credits: 39	In continuation: The Jews lived under these religious influences for over 200 years, well past the closing of the Old Testament going into the time of the Greek domination of the area who conquered the Persians. Around this time, Jewish writings began to appear that showed heavy influence of Persian religious ideas and concepts. For the Jews, the Persian concept of good and evil, embodied in two separate entities was very appealing. It allowed the idea of only “good” to apply to God while evil and all things bad could be pinned on an evil one, a concept that was not found in Jewish theology. With the driving influence of Persian Zoroastrianism, the Satan of Jewish theology took on a whole new identity. He no longer would be God’s court prosecutor, someone under God’s control, someone used by God to carry out disaster. Now, Satan would be the embodiment of evil, the evil one, separate from God, having his own kingdom, powers to tempt, kill and destroy, no longer under the control of God. This evolution developed over a 500 year period from the days in Babylon all the way through to the Greeks and into the New Testament. By this time, we read far more about Satan (the devil) than we do in the Old Testament. At no point in the Old Testament is Satan EVER associated with the serpent in the Garden of Eden, but by the intertestamental period, Jewish theologians, with Babylonian and Persian influences instilled, were slowly making such connections despite any evidence to that effect. By New Testament times, we have the writer of Revelation referring to him as the Great Dragon, something we NEVER read in the Old Testament. In fact no matter how hard you look, you will not find any great messages on Satan in the Old Testament, no descriptions, no warnings, no prophets warning the people to beware of him or even God detailing his actions. You have to wait until you get to the New Testament to even gain an idea of the concept many people today cling to. So as we can see, the concept of Satan evolved in Jewish theology over time and the Jewish ideas were in turn borrowed by Jewish Christians and incorporated into their writings (what we call the New Testament), which were then passed on to European Christians (who edited the Jewish writings for their purposes) and Arab Muslims. Those two faiths were responsible for imposing their will and religion upon much of the world from Africa to northern Europe and Indonesia to North and South America. What some of you believe today about Satan can be directly traced back through them, then back to the ancient Jews and then back to the Babylonians and Persians. So when you walk around blaming Satan for this and that or referring to people as “the devil” and so forth, you now should be more aware of what you are really talking about.