Is “Satan� actually a competing “god�?

[Zzyzx]

.
Is “Satan� actually a competing “god�?

All we “know� about the Satan character is from the POV of Bible writers – who claim that “he� is inferior to “God� (and presumably Jesus).

Since Bible writers and promoters have a vested interest in glorifying their favorite God(s) they could be expected to bad-mouth / demean / discredit the competition.

Since there is no assurance that there is only one “god� (or three-in-one for Christendom), the opposition might be one (or more) of the thousands of proposed gods. In fact, the only “evidence� for any of them consists of unverified tales, testimonials, conjectures, opinions, beliefs.

Thus, is there any sound reason that “Satan� could not be one of the other proposed gods and be equal in “power� to the Bible God?

“The Bible says� is NOT acceptable as proof of truth in this C&A sub-forum or in this thread.

Perhaps “Satan� isn't really the “bad guy� he is made out to be by promoters of the Bible God. Maybe “he� is another one of the “gods� and is equal to the Bible God and/or Jesus – and no more bad or good (or real or unreal) than they are.

It does not seem as though God and/or Jesus are able to defeat or eliminate Satan. Wonder why?

[Blastcat]

[Replying to post 112 by catnip]

"To fun or not to fun, that is the question."
- Shakescat

The whole objective of faith is to rise above the temptations of the personality, the attribution of the needs of the body which--in scripture--is explained by Paul to be the source of sin.

OHHHHH you are against people fulfilling their physical NEEDS... yikes. I usually urge people to have as much fun as possible in life. We are different.

I have nothing against fun. I highly recommend it.

SO, why the need to RISE above temptations of personality and the needs of the body then? You don't seem consistent.

I suppose that you think I am inconsistent with some branch of Christianity, the Christian cliche? Most likely.

Wrong.

I am saying that your COMMENTS are inconsistent.

On one hand you state rather categorically that :"The whole objective of faith is to rise above the temptations of the personality, the attribution of the needs of the body which--in scripture--is explained by Paul to be the source of sin. "

And then you say :"I have nothing against fun. I highly recommend it. "

So, if I am looking at an icy cold beer that would be fun for me to drink on a hot summer day.

1. Is that a sin or not?
2. Is that in line with FAITH or not?
3. Would you recommend it or not?

I CANNOT tell by your conflicting comments.

[Blastcat]

[Replying to post 113 by JLB32168]

While I don’t agree with your conclusions about the reality of Satan, CN, I can appreciate your frustration at having salient points ignored and/or having your responses chopped up so that non-arguments are addressed.

I am one of the posters who regularly replies to almost EVERY STATEMENT made by my opponents. That's why my posts tend to be so long at times.

I quote the statement and then I write what I think about it RIGHT BELOW.

If what someone else writes is a NON-ARGUMENT... that's not my fault. I just respond to what is written, like I am doing now. I suggest that people could be MORE RELEVANT to the actual OP if they would like me to respond to THAT.

Complaining about my responses to irrelevancies is being JUST MORE IRRELEVANT and doesn't advance the discussion.

[Blastcat]

[Replying to post 120 by JLB32168]

We have been trying to explain to you over and over again why what it says in the Bible can't be a proof for what it says in the Bible. I have repeatedly answered you that we are NOT chucking out the Bible... it's just that we can't take it as proof for itself.

Catnip stated it perfectly when he said that the only mention of Satan is the Bible; therefore, we must consider what it says first. Then we might be able to see what other societies said about this Satan person (or some equivalent of it/him/her.)

Did we ever say that we should not consider it FIRST?

Did we?
Did I?

But we are free to interpret what the Bible says... everyone does it.
It's just that Christians seem to lack imagination and RESTRICT their speculations to a very narrow range of possibilities. The OP is trying to open people up to different possibilities. And in my opinion, opening is better than closing when it comes to minds.

What do you think?

You are so CLOSE...... to what I perceive to be the actual point of the OP. YES, we are merely speculating. We are talking what the Bible says and SPECULATING about it.

Okay so Satan might be the theoretical framework in which the point-like particles of particle physics are replaced by one-dimensional objects (sincere we’re speculating for the sake of speculating and not much else.)

Sure... cool!
Why not?

I bet someone could make a CASE for that !!!!

What's "God"?

They ( at least some of them do..... ) take their FAVORITE speculations as the TRUTH. And as far as critical thinkers go, that's a step too far.

And the best way to drive this home, IYO, is to just throw up speculations about anything and everything. All things are lawful.

I'm not convinced that this is the BEST way.... but Christians seem to need help with it.. so it's a way. Maybe it will be the best way for SOMEONE out there.. who knows?

And, yes, when we are making things up, all things are lawful.

It's just that when we start to make truth statements that we have to follow some rules. If you say, for example :" God is this and God is that..... " you are making a truth statement and better be prepared, at least in here, to back it up with something.

I personally think it seems like a stupid exercise but whatever blows a person’s kilt up, I guess.

The thing about thinking is ... the more one does it, the better one gets at it, and the more one sees the point of it.

[catnip]

[Replying to post 112 by catnip]

"To fun or not to fun, that is the question."
- Shakescat

The whole objective of faith is to rise above the temptations of the personality, the attribution of the needs of the body which--in scripture--is explained by Paul to be the source of sin.

OHHHHH you are against people fulfilling their physical NEEDS... yikes. I usually urge people to have as much fun as possible in life. We are different.

I have nothing against fun. I highly recommend it.

SO, why the need to RISE above temptations of personality and the needs of the body then? You don't seem consistent.

I suppose that you think I am inconsistent with some branch of Christianity, the Christian cliche? Most likely.

Wrong.

I am saying that your COMMENTS are inconsistent.

On one hand you state rather categorically that :"The whole objective of faith is to rise above the temptations of the personality, the attribution of the needs of the body which--in scripture--is explained by Paul to be the source of sin. "

And then you say :"I have nothing against fun. I highly recommend it. "

So, if I am looking at an icy cold beer that would be fun for me to drink on a hot summer day.

1. Is that a sin or not?
2. Is that in line with FAITH or not?
3. Would you recommend it or not?

I CANNOT tell by your conflicting comments.

1) It is not a sin. It does not cause any harm to anyone or to yourself to indulge in a cold beer on a hot day. It is the only time I like beer, myself.

2) Alcohol was often drunk in ancient cultures because the water made people sick, thus the watering down of the wine and even children drank it. This despite what the fundamentalist claim against alcohol. I think I have read that the ancient Egyptians drank a lot of beer.

3) Well, if you came to visit, I might offer you a beer.

1 Peter 4: 8 Above all, love one another deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins. 9Show hospitality to one another without complaining. [Berean Study Bible]

I am rather against the whole humorless, stiff-necked, holier than thou image that some apply to religion. Ick. lol And believe it or not--that IS a sin! Pride.

[Blastcat]

[Replying to post 128 by JLB32168]

I didn't say that THE purpose of he thread is to demonstrate that... I said that I could see it that way.

That you can see it that way is good enough for me because I can’t see any other purpose of this thread other than to say to state that Christian speculations might just be speculations and nothing more.

Nobody stated that.

Sometimes, people imagine too MUCH, and sometimes, people imagine too LITTLE. In any case, what they IMAGINE might not be true. So.... we should check to see if what we are IMAGINING is true or not IF the truth matters to us.

Knowing if what I believe in is true or not matters to me.

There was some song and dance about how Christians couldn’t prove that Satan wasn’t just another deity because the Hebrews might just be badmouthing one of the Canaanite deities belonging to the people they conquered. I said it might be possible but asked what evidence was there that this was the case. The response to that was something akin to “You prove that you deity or Satan or any deity exists outside your own mind and the minds of believers� and I just sort of scratched my head at the silliness of asking the initial question in the first place. Of course, there’s only so many ways to ask “What conclusive evidence is there that gods exist� so perhaps that’s why they asked it the way they did.

I'm sorry that you think it's a silly question to ask if your god is real.

You're using these terms, and I really don't know what you mean by them.

I don’t see how I can explain them any clearer so perhaps we should simply move on to bigger and better things.

Nobody can force you to participate in any debate.

This rhetorical question adds NOTHING to the discussion.

I disagree. I think it demonstrates that we’re just speculating for the sake of speculating and that’s little more than what a forensics professor would call it masterdebating. I don’t like to do it because it makes you go blind.

A medical fallacy doesn't advance the discussion.
IF you don't LIKE the subject, refrain from posting, is my suggestion.

As the originator of this thread I state that its purpose is ASK Christians and Non-Christians if the character known as "Satan" is assuredly NOT one of the competing "gods". Care to address that issue?

I did. I asked ...

Sorry, but a question doesn't answer the question.

[JLB32168]

1. It's presented AS IF it were a fact. But it's not at all a fact. It's your opinion. So, right off the bat, I have to say "Stop right there. If you say that statement is TRUE, you better be prepared to PROVE it true or forget it."

BC, we’re talking about FAITH. Shall Christians preface every post with “This is only valid if God and Satan exist as defined in the Bible, and if they don’t then all bets are off?�

• I know this question isn’t presented to me but I’m going to address it and the alleged inconsistency, which I think is erroneous.

• Catnip says, “The whole objective of faith is to rise above the temptations of the personality, the attribution of the needs of the body which--in scripture--is explained by Paul to be the source of sin.â€�
  BC says, “OHHHHH you are against people fulfilling their physical NEEDS... yikes. I usually urge people to have as much fun as possible in life. We are different.�

I inferred nothing from what CN said that implies CN thinks fulfilling physical needs is categorically wrong. One cannot infer that CN thinks the needs for food and water – or even wine *gasp* are sinful. One cannot infer that CN thinks that a married man should forever abstain from the desire to sleep w/his wife. I think it’s quite clear to any reasonable person that CN and Paul are talking about sinful things of the body – gluttony, fornication, materialism, etc.

CN, I’m speaking for you so please correct me if I’m out of line.

Back to you BK, I’m sure that CN knows that Christ (again, we’re assuming for the sake of argument that Christ existed and is what the NT says He is because I’m going to have to preface very response I make with a caveat from now on) attended a wedding and that it was rocking so great that they ran out of hooch. Christ fixed the problem by spinning up some [font=Times New Roman]Robuchon au Dôme[/font] from water. Clearly Christ had didn’t have problems with all fun. Most likely He took issue with people getting falling-down-drunk but not having a glass of wine or two and kickin' it with friends.

I am saying that your COMMENTS are inconsistent.

Someone’s “misunderstanding� strikes me as deliberate.

[catnip]

[Replying to post 123 by catnip]

I didn't say that THE purpose of he thread is to demonstrate that... I said that I could see it that way. I didn't make a TRUTH CLAIM. And, unfortunately, one of the reasons that I have to debate Christians is that all too many DO mistake their speculations for the truth. I have to deal with that kind of thinking ALL THE TIME.

Maybe you don't think that way.. but I really can't tell. You don't seem to want to clarify just what it IS you believe in, in spite of my REPETITIOUS questions, such as :

1. What do you mean by "Liberal Christian"?

In short and to explain it, it is a way of reading the scriptures. We consider time, place, culture and what the intent of the author is (and we don't believe God dictated the scriptures).

2. Do you believe in a LITERAL "God"?

I am not sure about this question. Does God sit on a throne somewhere out there? No. Is God Spirit and everywhere and in and through all things? Yes.

3. What IS the nature of this god?

I think of God as the source of all life and as pure consciousness.

And so on... You're using these terms, and I really don't know what you mean by them. I don't even really know what you mean by "Satan", frankly. I have to GUESS that you mean it's ONLY A METAPHOR.

We can tempt ourselves--we are good at temptation. We don't need any help with that at all. In the abscense of faith and reliance on God, then we allow temptation to reign in our lives. This is Satan, the collective ego/soul/psyche, the personality.

Why do you leave it up to us to GUESS your beliefs?
I don't see the point, frankly.

Because generalizing and making assumptions about anyone can be misleading. I've said that I am a Liberal or Progressive Christian before. That is all I can do. I study the ancient past, the ancient church and her teachings, etc.

It doesn't help your intelligibility.

Just as you are what you are, I am what I am.

[catnip]

• I know this question isn’t presented to me but I’m going to address it and the alleged inconsistency, which I think is erroneous.

• Catnip says, “The whole objective of faith is to rise above the temptations of the personality, the attribution of the needs of the body which--in scripture--is explained by Paul to be the source of sin.â€�
  BC says, “OHHHHH you are against people fulfilling their physical NEEDS... yikes. I usually urge people to have as much fun as possible in life. We are different.�

I inferred nothing from what CN said that implies CN thinks fulfilling physical needs is categorically wrong. One cannot infer that CN thinks the needs for food and water – or even wine *gasp* are sinful. One cannot infer that CN thinks that a married man should forever abstain from the desire to sleep w/his wife. I think it’s quite clear to any reasonable person that CN and Paul are talking about sinful things of the body – gluttony, fornication, materialism, etc.

CN, I’m speaking for you so please correct me if I’m out of line.

That is a very good explanation. Better than what I had done. Thank you.

Back to you BK, I’m sure that CN knows that Christ (again, we’re assuming for the sake of argument that Christ existed and is what the NT says He is because I’m going to have to preface very response I make with a caveat from now on) attended a wedding and that it was rocking so great that they ran out of hooch. Christ fixed the problem by spinning up some [font=Times New Roman]Robuchon au Dôme[/font] from water. Clearly Christ had didn’t have problems with all fun. Most likely He took issue with people getting falling-down-drunk but not having a glass of wine or two and kickin' it with friends.

Yes, in fact getting drunk seemed to be the norm as someone noted that the host usually passed off the poorer wines at that point in the party, and in this case, it was the best wine.

I am saying that your COMMENTS are inconsistent.

Someone’s “misunderstanding� strikes me as deliberate.

As I said, we must refrain from preconceived notions and assumptions about what others believe. It helps to maintain an open mind. Real communication, not cardboard cutouts.

[JLB32168]

Nobody stated that.

No one on this thread stated that their faith was fact/truth but that’s not stopped people from saying it so no harm done either way.

I'm sorry that you think it's a silly question to ask if your god is real.

I apologize for not being clear [*wink, wink*]. I think that rabbit trails to a question are silly. I’m glad we got to clear that up. Returning to the point “What if Satan is just another god bad mouthed by the Hebrews� – is there any evidence that Satan was regarded as a deity by the former inhabitants of Canaan?

A medical fallacy doesn't advance the discussion. IF you don't LIKE the subject, refrain from posting, is my suggestion.

But I love the sound of my voice so I’ll participate. Is there any evidence that suggests that Satan was just another Bronze Age god who got maligned by those wascawwy Hebrews?

Sorry, but a question doesn't answer the question.

I actually said, “I asked what evidence from the historical record might suggest that Satan was regarded as a deity by the conquered peoples of Canaan – one that had to be suppressed by the conquering heroes who then cast him as an inferior creature contrasted against their own deity.� The question draws attention to the speculation – if it has any foundation to it or if we’re just pulling it out of our colon.
Do you have information that Satan was regarded as a deity by the conquered peoples of Canaan – one that was maligned by Hebrews to become the Satan we understand today?
An answer to that would further the debate. [really big, toothy smile]

[Blastcat]

[Replying to post 130 by catnip]

There might be other texts with the same character in it.. but we are talking about the Bible Satan.

Only the Book of Enoch--also very Jewish. And it is more insistent that the satans (yes, plural) play a role that is subservient to God. Because of the nature of Satan as well as other biblical characters, there is no chance any information about them would be available apart from the Bible.

Well, if Satan is mentioned somewhere else than in the Bible... that's info, isn't it?

Maybe the Bible talks bad about Satan because it was a competing god. And you know... the authors didn't quite LIKE the competing god for some reason, so called it.."evil". And you know, I made all of that up IN MY MIND... It's called "speculation".

There is no use in discussing it if we remain within the confines of our imaginations. There needs to be purpose in the proposition that Satan could have been a god in another culture.

Does the OP mention anything about cultures?
The OP only asks if Satan can be a god, I think.

Christians might speculate that ALL THE STORIES ARE TRUE..

This is important: A person need not believe that the stories, myths, are true to consider them, discuss them.

I agree.
I am an atheist and I can discuss them.

But are you disagreeing with me that many Christians take their idea of "God" as real and the stories about him true?

Yes?/No?

just the way the Bible says they are.... or portrays them as being.. but that's PURE SPECULATION, too. Christians dont KNOW that the stories about Satan are true.. they just SPECULATE that the stories are true... but that doesn't mean others can't speculate DIFFERENTLY.

The point I made about the OP was that it is not an "us against them" sort of question.

The OP seems to ask a very specific question.. I didn't see any hint of "us against them" in it.

It asks us if Satan can be a god.

There is a possibility that Satan could have a prototype in another culture.

Sure, it's possible, and maybe, also likely.
The truth is that we DON'T KNOW.

Many gods are that way: the Norse Loki compares nicely to the Native American Coyote. Campbell, who wrote the Hero With a Thousand Faces and The Power of Myth, pinpointed this role in myth as "the Trickster".

Yup, so Satan can be that way maybe... that's what the OP asks.

1. If we are speculating, we don't have to look further than our imagination.

I know that you like the scientific method.

Yes I do. It's the best method that we have to find out what is most likely true about the world we live in.

Sometimes we can't use the method because there just isn't any DATA to work on. We don't have a time machine and a mind reading machine to go back and ask the authors what they really MEANT, and where they GOT their ideas from.

So all we have is speculation.

That is how all means of finding answers begin and those are usually sourced in our own informed imaginings. But there is no use in one suggesting such a speculation other than to discuss it. That necessarily means going beyond imagination and seeking out the solution.

If you have facts to bring to the discussion, we would all appreciate it. If not, all you have is speculation. You DO seem to know more about Satan than I do... Enoch, for example... I don't have a clue about that.

2. We rely on scripture as the source for our speculation. The speculation happens in our heads.
3. Right. And Christians believe all sorts of things about "God" that are not written in the Bible because his image has been enhanced through the ages in the church, in literature and in popular culture. In my opinion, that's one of the points of the debate.

Yes, I did see that. Perhaps it is a wrong assumption. If the subject is Satan having had a source apart from the Hebrew culture as a god, then it necessitates looking for a similar character. It is not impossible that this could have been the case although for the most part the Jews classified all gods from other cultures as demons.

Right.. a lot of things are lost to history and translation. That's the whole problem with this "God" business. People believe that this book character is literally true. I think that's weird, and causes problems in our world. If there WERE no problems I wouldn't really care what people believe in and how. But as it stands, religious beliefs are not always benign.

Christians merely SPECULATE about the nature of God and Satan and Christ and so on. That's why there are so many denominations of Christianity.

That may be the way you see it, however religions were not created that way and Judaism and Christianity were not created that way, either.

Of course, that's the way "I see it".

Do you disagree that different denominations have different ideas about religious beliefs? For example, you don't BELIEVE in Satan as a real being.

Yes?/no?

My point was that people form their religious beliefs subjectively. Their "faith" is just based on a bunch of interpretations and speculations.

Not facts.
Not truths.

Basically, all religions were shamanic, mystical--and the priest was a healer who put himself into a trance to find the cure or solution, to fight the demons, to guide the people.

Basically, you are speculating that.

What Jesus was teaching was that it is not just for priests, but for everyone.

I haven't a clue how that relates to anything were talking about.

Once Christianity was denuded of this purpose, especially following the Reformation, it became about theology, about God and about parsing the scriptures.

More speculation.

But it is just as real as it ever was for the person who seeks God and it is not about God for them, but about the ascent to Heaven.

Speculation.

Christians make a lot of truth claims, but they turn out to be merely speculations.

I don't disagree with you.

How could you?
You just gave us a boatload of speculations mistakenly presented as if they were FACTS !!!

They rest their case on the written scriptures and know no more about it. They insist we must believe in the scriptures, but the scriptures themselves never make that pronouncement. The scriptures tell us about faith, but that still requires practice, very ancient forms of practice that are utilized the world over in many religions. Prayer (meditation), Psalms (song), even dance, dress, symbolism, fasting and pilgrimages--these are the tools of religions.

That's again, just your opinion based on speculation. I'm sorry, catnip, but you are complaining about "them, but you are guilty of the same error yourself.

Note: I have not made one "Truth" claim in all this discussion. I have no reason to.

Then all you have done is to speculate and nothing you have said is true.
It's kinda the point of the thread, in my opinion.

Too many Christians mistake their speculations for the truth.