Quick to reject anything to do w/ Satan

[amaterasu_kami]

(Rant I posted on paganspace.)

This is one of my pet peeves. I am sure there are other members here that also find this infuriating. Especially the ones that are practicing Satanists. Some Neopagans tend to try to reject any relationship with Satan what so ever.

I simply said in a thread "Samael is awesome. Hail Satan!" and being one of those who

Comments

[_the_coyote_]

You know, a lot of traditional Christians don't see Satan as a total asshole who needs to be eliminated. Some think he's got a place, just like god does. It's just as humans, Satan isn't playing on the same team as we are. When I was younger, I remember a sermon I heard about Satan. The point was to respect what Satan did, what he place was in the universe, and to acknologe what he could do, but that he wasn't the one we were supposed to support and help as Christians. Look at the story of Job. It starts out with the devil and god just sort of hanging out, like the captains of two sports teams, making a wager over who's gonna win the next round. Several scholars also don't see Satan as an original adversary to god, but rather just to humans

[lowenmensch]

I was taught as a protestant Christian about the same thing as Shock, that Satan exists because god lets him exist, that he has a place until the end times, etc. also that he is not a deity, but a fallen angel, subordinate to god (hence the "allowed to exist" part.) Later I learned from a Jewish friend that they don't acknowledge Satan as a sentient entity, and that the Bible may be referring to 3 people/entities as Satan, but then, real theology is something almost never taught in our society. I had a Church-going relative who was struggling with a college-level theology class. I offered help, seeing as how I aced Comparative Religions, and how my husband passed a theology course at a Catholic university, and was told the class was hard because it was "theology, and not just Bible study" as if I considered Bible study to be the be-all, end all of religious education. I was on the phone and couldn't slap them, but I did inform them that one of my favorite books was "Conceptions of God in Ancient Egypt: The One and the Many." Their

[amaterasu_kami]

Well "Satan" is merely a word that means 'adversery, accuser' and is a title. This would mean just about anything could be called "satan". Last I checked on the Jewish side of things, Satan isn't considered against God. Just a unnamed angel in God's court that tends to accuse people,(according to the OT. In the later Jewish lore this angel is identified as Samael) and is the enemy of mankind. But not of God. Christian theology paints a vastly different (and imo inaccurate/unrealistic) picture of Satan to the point that he is godlike & seemingly everywhere. I think the fact that he is a "enemy of mankind" and accuses mankind in court makes people think he falls under the definition of "evil". Of course, I think people one this side of things lack the definition of "evil", because to me its not even close