Satan
From RationalWiki
- Not to be confused with Santa.
Satan (birth name: Louis "Lou" C. Fer) is a bogeyman for grown-ups and children both. After being kicked out of heaven for telling YHWH to lighten up a little, he became God's prosecuting attorney and the Bible's foremost advocate for humanity's right to know and understand what's going on around them. Some people think that makes Satan the first humanist.
Somewhat unfortunately Satan doesn't really have a big part in the Bible - only a handful of walk-on roles - such as cameos selling fruit, tormenting Job and tempting Jesus. He has, however, had parts in many other prominent works, such as Milton's Paradise Lost, Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov and the Faust story by (in turn) Christopher Marlowe, Goethe and Thomas Mann.
In an odd parallel to the book Wicked, Satan (then called Lucifer) was born with bat-like wings, rather than the traditional dove-like ones most angels have. Despite this huge defect, which made him the object of ridicule and discrimination, he persevered, and through sheer hard work and born talent, he rose to the highest court in the world, only to come to the shocking realization that God believed that a lifetime of sinning deserved an eternity of punishment. He then rebelled against God, and eventually was exiled. (little known fact: he is one of the ONLY characters in the Bible to stand up to God and live.)
He is also the Prince of Darkness, has horns, a widow's peak and a long tail. Some Christians believed that he hasn’t got a bottom. Where that should be he has a second face. In place of an anus he has a second mouth. Defecation is a torment. His favorite color is red, as he is a commie, and his favorite number is 666, because it looks pretty as a birthmark. He is claimed by some at RationalWiki to be a pretty good hockey player - but what do they know?[citation needed] He is also a metalhead.
[edit] Q&A
You may have some lingering questions. Here, we shall answer them.
[edit] So, what's the deal with this Satan dude?
Satan/Lucifer was second in command to the big G in the Kingdom of H. 'Lucifer' is roughly translated as 'the bringer of light'; it comes from 'Lucifer son of the morning' in Isaiah 14:12, which has often been interpreted as a reference to Satan, but may in fact mean a Babylonian king who was the Jews' number one bogey man at the time. Or maybe it's ELECTRICITY[1]!
[edit] Like, why did he totally piss God off?
Lucifer decided that he was tired of being a working stiff. He had to run an army of millions of angels, got no overtime, no health benefits, and was really pissed that God hadn't even invented bars to drink in yet. He rebelled against God when he realized that God was a floating logical fallacy. There was a war in Heaven as the choirs of angels split into two factions. God and his army of noble warriors bravely fought off the horde of logic hammering at the gates and kicked them out of Heaven, where Satan and the fallen angels would be free to cause AIDS and reality television. On the plus side, this meant that they would no longer bother God. Y'know, "God"? The dude who controls everything and could have just smote the horned one at any time and place of His choosing?
[edit] Like, why did God let the Devil set up shop in Hell?
Because He is an asshole. If the shop involves hard labor[2], that's the sign God wants to enslave people. It is not clear why the work has to be done by those people when an omnipotent God can do it at a flip of His finger.
[edit] So, like, why doesn't God just click His fingers and make Satan poof into a cloud of dust, thereby stopping Old Nick from torturing or corrupting any more innocents?
Because He is a sadistic asshole to boot. And it's all part of His great, much wider plan. Besides, every good narrative needs a good villain. Where would James Bond be if Her Majesty's Government just did the sensible thing and just used highly trained snipers or well aimed cruise missiles to assassinate the bad guy rather than let 007 loose with some one-liners? Exactly.
[edit] Wait, I'm confused. Why would the Devil punish people in Hell for doing his work?
Well, technically, it's God who is punishing you by consigning you to a lake of fire for all eternity. The Devil is just following orders. Which means he isn't an arch-rebel hellbent on challenging God at all. Which is where this part of the story gets so tangled up that we rejoice that humanity has had 10,000 more years to really get to grips with this whole "character motivation" thing in narrative fiction.
[edit] Like, how do I avoid going to Hell?
Just don't book a trip to New Jersey. Zing! But you should also stay away from shellfish, taking it up the wrongun and many other things.
[edit] Okay, so I understand all that. But tell me, why do I sin? Is it Satan or is it God who causes me to sin?
Ah, what came first, the chicken or the Prince of Darkness? The fucking chicken (read: God), you moron. God created Satan and allows him to rule his dark dominion and have far more obvious influence on world affairs than He allows Himself to have. God created you. He did this in weird ways just to make sure you are sinned when you are conceived. To make it worse, He decreed that you have to obey His rules even though you never ask Him to create you.[3] One of these rules is that you must resist the temptations offered by His old roommate in favor of a life spent abstaining from fun and been a sysop at Conservapedia. Zing, zing, and double zing!
[edit] Wow, you've answered my questions with detail, wit, aplomb, and warm generosity. So what say you, is it better to serve in Heaven or reign in Hell?
They're both fictional, you idiot.
[edit] Thanks!
Don't mention it.
[edit] A bum rap
Satan is called the "Father of lies" but there is no biblical evidence (other than hearsay) that Satan ever did lie. In fact, in the Garden of Eden, when Satan tells Eve that she won't die "in the day thereof" when she eats the fruit, Satan is telling the truth, because Eve did not die until much later. Fundamentalists cover this by saying that Eve spiritually died the instant she ate the fruit. This is very much like when you sent $30 to a TV preacher for him to pray that you win the lottery. You didn't really win the lottery, but you won the lottery spiritually.
[edit] Other famous Satans
- Satan is the name of an old friend's black cat. He had green eyes, and purred a lot.
- Miroslav Šatan is a Slovak ice hockey player.
- Satan (formerly Brian Salmi) was leader of the political party neorhino.ca (formerly Rhinoceros Party) in Canada.
- The Great Satan - Iran's affectionate name for the U.S.A.
- Satan, a famous heavy metal band, who changed names often.
- Santa, Lou's dyslexic cousin.
- Jimbo Wales[4]
- The Super Devil[5]
- Satan is a peak in the Tatra Mountains.
[edit] In pop culture
Satan has appeared in many, many films, novels, and other works of fiction (like the Qur'an and the Bible). The weird thing is, you usually end up rooting for him to win. Here is Satan's speech justifying his behavior from 1998's The Devil's Advocate. The film itself is pretty good - even Keanu Reeves manages to put in a decent performance. Pacino's calling it in, though.
"Let me give you a little inside information about God. God likes to watch. He's a prankster. Think about it. He gives man instincts. He gives you this extraordinary gift and then what does he do? I swear, for his own amusement, his own private, cosmic gag reel, he sets the rules in opposition. It's the goof of all time. Look, but don't touch. Touch, but don't taste. Taste, don't swallow. [Maniacal laughter] And while you're jumping from one foot to the next, what is he doing? He's up there laughing his sick fuckin' ass off. He's a tightass, he's a sadist. He's an absentee landlord. Worship that? Never." - Satan.
In the Shin Megami Tensei series of video games, Satan and Lucifer appear as two different entities that oppose and detest each other. Lucifer represents chaos, free will and anarchy, while Satan represents law and conformity. In the "Law" path of Shin Megami Tensei II, where the player follows the will of God, the player joins forces with Satan to slay Lucifer. Upon doing so, they leave the planet along with a few chosen people. Before leaving, Satan uses a powerful laser weapon to destroy all life on Earth, following God's will. The player is then granted an audience with God, who congratulates the player on following his will. Satan then judges God, who ordered him to destroy mankind, causing the player to fight God as the final battle of the game.
[edit] See also
- Examples of Satan personally killing people
- 666 is Satan's number
- Hell
[edit] References
- ↑ Some bunch of kooks
- ↑ Like power generation/resource extraction/manufacturing of goods, what have you.
- ↑ Despite the notion that "For the wage of sin is death" (Romans 6:23), apparently there are additional penalties on top of death for additional sins.
- ↑ http://www.conservapedia.com/
- ↑ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29khjYTOLC8
