Jesus’ response to Peter - ‘Get thee behind me Satan for you are a scandal to me’ - is, I guess, a key text for the ‘impersonalist’ school of interpreting Satan. Jesus is speaking to Peter - in the most obvious reading of the text- and Peter has momentarily taken on the role of the Adversary. It is also often noted that this text specifically relates Satan to ‘scandals’ - or ‘stumbling blocks’.
Well, we’re a bit of a resistant lot over here in the States I guess. I mean, we still refuse to get on board with switching to the metric system. “Cultural Stubbornness”, perhaps, if I may coin a term… 
There’s some good food for thought on this line of discussion over at Richard Beck’s blog. experimentaltheology.blogspot.com/
In the sidebar there is a link to a series of articles under the heading: Series/ essays based on my research; Satan as a functional theodicy. Also the series (several individual links to posts under this heading) Demons and the Powers.
Melchi - I think that’s excellent stuff on Beck’s blog, absolutely 
Will take time to read it more closely. I know Johnny has an interest in arguments against Calvinism and I thought Beck’s piece on theodicy and personality really got down to basics about this (so if you are listening/reading here Johnny - go and have a look).
All the best
Dick
Richard Beck’s blog is absolutely brilliant Melchi – and the comments debate is great too. The section on the Powers is spot on and very relevant to this discussion. Richard also has really insightful things to say about subjects like the Armenians and freewill (relevant to Johnny’s current debate about Calvinism).And there is a very fine blog essay on Paul’s concept of flesh/body that is super relevant to a discussion I think we need to have here about ‘The World, the Flesh, and the Devil’. Richard’s essay is at the following page of his site -
experimentaltheology.blogspot.co … x-and.html
I think we need to have this discussion because I know it is a topic of confusion and real torment that comes up often in the Introduction threads. It is very good that we Universalists take the trouble to unpack and detoxify the doctrine of Hell. However there are other terrifying and related doctrines – similarly based on bad translations of the Bible and poor understanding of context and tradition – that drive good men and women, especially younger ones, to despair. And a big one has to be the idea that sexual desire, and feeling at home in our human bodies is at the roots of sin, full stop. This belief can lead to twisted patterns of desire, sexual obsession, cruelty, and hypocritical self righteousness. Challenging it in no way condones and encourages impersonal sexual promiscuity – indeed quite the opposite can be the case).
Other good resources suggested in our discussions on Sin and the Satanic, if you are interested in rethinking things, have been –
Derek Flood’s The Rebel God blog (very good on the Christus Victor theme and on the social dimension of sin). It was first recommended by Paidion and has been endorsed by Rev. Drew. You can find this at
Jeff the Agnositc has recommended Stephen Jones’s website which is beautifully clear about the doctrine of Original Sin. You can find this at -
gods-kingdom-ministries.org/ … cfm?CID=25
Rev. Drew has pointed to the site of Richard Vincent that gives a very clear contrast between the Eastern and Western views of Sin and Salvation. You can find this at –
theocentric.com/theology/gos … death.html.
I’ve mentioned Rene Girard on this thread. I find Girard’s reading of scripture compelling – but I don’t expect the world to agree with me. My one criticism is that perhaps one way of reading him emphasises human sinfulness to the extent that it obscures the doctrine that we are all still made in God’s image – but this is being addressed by people working from his insights and developing them in new directions; also he sees mythology in a purely negative light, when it sometimes can have a positive function in my view. However, he is a humble man and has been anxious to encourage debate about his ideas – although he has some followers who see him as the be all and end all. If you are interested in Girard – who is especially good on the subject of Satan and Scandal - you can find out more from the following site of the Lutheran minister Paul Nuechterlein
girardianlectionary.net/index.html
(see especially part 1 of Nuechterlin’s essay ‘My core oncvictions’.
Finally, Margaret Barker – who has done exciting work on the traditions of IFst Tmepl Judiasm/Hebraism has a website at –
margaretbarker.com/Papers/default.htm
(She is currently an adviser to the Orthodox Patriarch of Constantinople because the Orthodox Church preserves some of the Temple traditions in its liturgy in her view.
All the best
Dick
There are some corresponding ideas at The mythology and the bible thread Mythology and the Bible
One I didn’t post, is that the word demon, comes from daimon. The original word daimon meant worship of the dead, or hero worship, deification of dead men.
This is relevant, at least how I see things 
Also this
Putting those 3 studies together are how I’ve come to the conclusions I have:
Demons are men, gods are men, the beast is our adamic nature, lucifer is adam (our adamic nature).
I still hold out that there may be an actual being satan, and actual demons. The scriptures are multi-layered, but knowing that I struggle with myself, not necessarily something “out there” has given me more victory and hope than ever before. To me the spiritual inward application is the most important layer.
Thanks for all the links to related information ! Looks like I have some fun reading ahead!
I think that Satan is indeed an individual though even more personified with all the descriptions that came with it. I mean, there is no one being that will fully describe Satan but it is a collection of how people see bad things. This means that there is no real measure of who is, but only what he does.
Judging from the scriptures, it can pretty much be a personified description of something bad.
I think regardless of which way you see it, the spiritual truths are there for the understanding. My opinion is that seeing Satan as an individual being has a tendency to create serious problems and errors in understanding, but it is not necessarily so in every case. The key to the truth is believing all of the (carefully examined) scriptural witness, not just what fits our notions of how we think it is.
Yet another great topic, and more reason for me to keep reading all the great thoughts here.
For me, it’s difficult to separate the concept of the has’satan into distinctive theological and psychological entities. If, in and of ourselves, we read every Biblical account of the Tempter, Accuser, Deceiver, Evil One, etc., and discuss it, we will all have some degree (from small to widely varying) of difference of the person or personification of whom or what ‘Evil’ is.
That isn’t to say that most of us can’t agree on ‘what is evil’ in the world we view. I would have an impossibly difficult time of agreeing with anyone that could say that the conscription of children to fight any kind of war is not purely and simply evil. The same with many other things that happen in the world ( “She deserved it because of the way she was dressed/acted/etc.”)
Evil exists. Anyone that can’t see that simple fact is either ignorant of reality/seared in their heart, or psychologically incapable of coming to terms with the extension of their own natural emotions. Whether we view that as a person, or a personification, or just an ‘anti-ideal’ depends a lot on our own experiences in life. I can’t say which position is truly correct, but I will give my opinion that it is too easy for we humans to take a personification of what we feel to be “evil” and project that onto some group. If you disagree with my last sentence, I’d invite you to come over, and sit down and watch some good-old American-style politics with me this year! 
btw, thanks everyone for your continued input on this thread.
blessings,
Sherman
Beck’s blog post for today has some interesting thoughts on this topic.
I think I’m starting to simply lean towards answering this question with, “both.”
Yes, I saw that blog post, and it caused me to think about this topic again. I am beginning to wonder if truly non-personal things are sometimes given personification to aid our human understanding. It seems that Jesus used parables partly to illustrate the concepts that he was trying to communicate by using familiar devices that were recognizable to the listeners of his day. It may very well be that satan is referred to in scripture (sometimes, not always) as a personal being, because that is an easier concept for us to grasp. It may be that the reality is that satan falls into the category of an impersonal principality or power, and is not properly a being at all.
More specifically, the serpent in Genesis.
Because Paul considered satan the prince of the power of the air, ruler of hosts of wickedness in the heavenly realms, the spirit that now works in the sons of disobedience, I have to conclude that there is a hostile entity of a personal nature, a parrallel perhaps of Michael or Gabriel, but not some omnipresent evil, but rather an instigator, accuser, troublemaker, organizer, accuser, confusor, enflamer of the carnal impulses of mankind, such as the lust of the eyes the lust of the flesh, the pride of life- the lusts of the flesh and the pleasures of the mind.
if we consider that Paul was responding in some primitive way to describe psychological and spiritual principles that were beyond his ability to understand, that we now having the benefit of time and education or whatever, it certainly diminishes what he represented himself as- one who had the full counsel of God, the mind of Christ, a wise master builder. I think Paul was a foundation stone and way ahead of us in every way.
For me if Satan is not a person, being, entity- renders parts of the scripture as myth, for instance the mount of temptation, a clearly personal interaction occuring in the spirit between Jesus and the devil. Even if one was to say the mount of temptation was a vision, it isnt narrated that way.
it also calls into question (as i see it) the veracity of the narrative and the narrators(holy men moved of God-peter) and leads us into this opinion that the scriptures are more a composite of the mythological understanding bearing these ancient wisdoms about God that we can interpret as opposed to no scripture is given to any mans personal interpretation(again peter)
It also places the gospels in a mythological fog- this is just my opinion, because their is no place in the word where there is any indication that these miraculous and supernatural interactions with spirits or demons and the devil himself- even Jesus speaking about the fire prepared for the devil and his angels in Mt 25.
Imo it is a person, but not a human person, a celestial being, who exists more in the tone of the scriptural narrative, which i take at face value. To me this is different than the detailed speculative mythology that a lot of folks have created from interpretations of prophecies like the one agaisnt the king of Tyre, some of which may be true, or not- they are not directly spoken but are interpretations.
Imo it is a person, but not a human person, a celestial being, who exists more in the tone of the scriptural narrative, which i take at face value. To me this is different than the detailed speculative mythology that a lot of folks have created from interpretations of prophecies like the one agaisnt the king of Tyre, some of which may be true, or not- they are not directly spoken but are interpretations
Yes, Jesus certainly thought that Satan was a being so if Jesus was wrong about this, what else was he wrong about. Also it really isn’t so airtight that the so called Lucifer chapters in Isaiah and Ezekial are really about Satan.
I’ve only skimmed this long thread, and so perhaps someone may have brought up this question before:
If Satan is not a person, then who tempted Jesus in the desert? I don’t see how a personification could tempt anyone. Jesus didn’t have evil within Himself, and so what was the source of the temptation while He was in the desert?
George MacDonald answered that, I believe. He was tempted not by evil, but a form of less good. He covers in in his Unspoken Sermons. As to whether he states the devil is a personal being or not, it doesn’t really matter in my opinion. The point is, Jesus was tempted by less forms of good. The Bible also said that Jesus had to ‘learn obedience’ so the theory of no evil being in him doesn’t necessarily mean that he wasn’t tempted to do evil, just that he had never committed evil.
I agree that Jesus was first tempted with less good. I don’t see what that has to do with personification or person/being. Also, for Jesus by His own standard, (to him whom much is given much is required) “less good” would be “missing the mark” which i s the definition of sin as I understand it- also seeing that “evil” begins when we withdraw from the intentions of God- first for our own good because we can(turn these stones into bread), then because we want a little glory and to prove we are somebody in God(If you are the son of God throw yourself down), and finally, to withdraw from the purpose of God (sacrificial love) for the purpose of obtaining dominion( bow down to me and i will give you the thrones of the world)- the last of which, if not the first two- is surely a temptation to evil- idolatry and servitude to a false spirit in exchange for dominion over men and the glories of earthly power- a certain evil, way past “less good” imo, whether or not one regards satan as a personification or a being.
James 3:14 But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your heart, do not be arrogant and so lie against the truth. 15 This wisdom is not that which comes down from above, but is earthly(turn these stones into bread), sensual(throw your self down from this pinnacle), demonic(bow down to me and I will give you dominion).
To me Satan is created and is evil. It is debatable how he became evil but in Jude he fought with Michael the Angel over Moses buried body and so again we have a specific instance in which Satan is depicted as a being of some sort.
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