by Peter Beolingus

Created on: October 16, 2007   Last Updated: November 15, 2007

Although "Satanism" in its present form actually was born in the 14th century, the oldest superstitious/religious urges of mankind have been to appease forces of darkness. Paul Carus, in his agnostic book THE DEVIL:A HISTORY OF EVIL (1899) points out that ancient man used bloody and horrible sacrifices, often of children, to appease the unknown powers of nature. One method, burying victims alive, was designed to appease 'Mother Earth' that seemed to swallow people up in earthquakes; blood sacrifice is of course a universal. In this respect, anthropologically, "devil" worship far predates "god or God" worship.

It has taken centuries of evolution in human civilization to understand a benign aspect of the divine, but even the gods of ancient Greece were pretty fickle and cruel. Although my liberal high school religion teachers back in the 1970s told me the idea of a devil was peculiar to Christianity, it actually exists in all of the world's great religions: Hinduism has Kali, the bride of Shiva, who tramples her own consort; Buddhism has Mara Papiyan, the Tempter, who goes after Siddhartha Guatama in his early ministry the way The Synoptic Gospels describe the Temptation of Christ (500 years B.C.);the Norse religion had Loki; the Egyptians feared Seth, the personification of the deadly sirocco, or scorching desert wind, which may be the inspiration for the reference in the Psalms to "the noonday devil"; the Greeks had Typhon, the dragon who bested Zeus, and Zorastrianism had Ahriman.
The step toward ethical monotheism is the unique and lasting contribution of The Hebrews, a quantum leap forward from totally anthropomorphic deities. In the Hebrew Scriptures Satan, the adversary, figures as a chief prosecutor; in The New Testament he is much more dangerous. The Church Fathers of early Christianity saw the pagan gods of the Old Testament as fallen angels, cast out with Lucifer, who set up shop on Earth, and thus the strongest commandment to the Israelites, "Thou shall have no strange gods besides me."
As for the satanism we all associate with in popular culture, that largely began in the 14th century, which was the nadir of the Middle Ages anyway-the Hundred Years War, three claimants to the papacy, and the Black Death-but it was a reaction against the abuses of the Roman (not Spanish)Inquisition. Religious hysteria caused many innocent people to be tortured and burnt alive in the name of God; disgusted survivors, especially friends and relatives of the victims,

• 1
• 2
• Next Page >>