What we say about Satan is often more appropriate for an evil version of an omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent God. Despite how tradition has transformed him into such a legendary cosmic villain, this image falls apart when we better consider the limits of his nature. Thus, if we want to understand Satan better, it’s necessary to explore what his nature would actually allow him to do. Just as a dog or turtle is limited by the abilities of their creature group, so too is Satan only going to be capable of what other creatures like him can do.
How can we understand Satan’s nature?
If the goal of this book is to get a true, biblical look at what the Bible says about Satan, then we can do nothing less than take the Bible seriously about everything it says about him. That requires us to read the Bible as it was meant to be – as a divinely inspired historical document. As this book continues, we must understand that the Bible…
- was written by around 40 different authors who lived in a specific time
- reflects the different writing styles of the unique authors
- is made of 66 books that were each written with a purpose in the author’s mindÂ
- came together across several generations, and those generations are reflected in the worldviews of the author/audience, historical events surrounding the text, and its place in salvation history
- is composed of a variety of genres (history, poetry, letters, and prophecy)
The Bible is certainly more than a historical document, but it’s not less. Reading the Bible through a modern worldview, or even through our traditions, bypasses the human authors God used to write this divinely inspired book. As such, we must consider what a text meant to the author and audience at the time the author wrote it. That means what we’re interpreting must be defined by contexts like author, audience, time period, and genre.
… knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. (2 Peter 1:20-21)
Understanding that God perfectly inspired human authors to write the Bible as a historical book allows us to interpret it responsibly. In a nutshell, that means that we’ll take the author seriously. If God inspired an author to write something intended to be taken literally, we will believe it is true, no matter how difficult it may be for us to accept. If the text clearly indicates that what we’re reading is meant metaphorically, such as saying “the sun rises” or “the tongue is a fire,” then we likewise take it as the author meant for his original audience to understand it.
With that in mind, what does the Bible reveal about Satan and what he can do?
Satan is a real creature
Some readers may consider this a silly statement. However, we cannot continue this discussion without making sure we’re on the same page about whether Satan is an actual intelligent being or simply a metaphor. To quote a 2009 Barna poll (emphasis mine):
Four out of ten Christians (40%) strongly agreed that Satan “is not a living being but is a symbol of evil.” An additional two out of ten Christians (19%) said they “agree somewhat” with that perspective. A minority of Christians indicated that they believe Satan is real by disagreeing with the statement: one-quarter (26%) disagreed strongly and about one-tenth (9%) disagreed somewhat. The remaining 8% were not sure what they believe about the existence of Satan.
Although Christians identifying themselves as “born again” faired better than those falling under the broad umbrella of Christianity, it’s still evident that Christians aren’t united in whether this biblical figure is a real creature or just a literary device. As Western culture continues to view the supernatural as a thing of irrational superstition, scholars even argue that it may be time to stop thinking of Satan as a real being so that we can progress toward a better world.
If I’m honest, I also recognize that readers may have reached this point in the book and question whether I even believe he’s real based on how much the traditional view has already been challenged!
For this brief section, let’s consider the genres of various texts mentioning Satan. As a refresher from our literature classes, genre simply determines the type of writing we’re looking at. Today, we read about a “raven” in a newspaper differently than in a poem by Edgar Allen Poe. Biblically, we understand that Deborah was an actual woman while “wisdom” in Proverbs 8 isn’t. In both examples, the genre we’re reading helps us determine what is literal and metaphorical. Deborah is in a book of genuine history while Proverbs is a book that heavily employs metaphor. To responsibly understand a character in the Bible, we must understand the type of writing features that character.
To that end, consider a few places featuring Satan and how genre helps us understand how the author thinks about him:
Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the LORD God had made. (Genesis 3:1)
Genesis is a book of history that never implies we should only take some parts of it literally. Instead, the events of creation and the Garden of Eden are told with the same historicity as the life of Abraham or Joseph. Thus, we should read the character of the serpent (clarified as Satan in Revelation 20:2) as an actual historical figure.
Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. (Matthew 4:1)
Like Genesis, the gospels are written as true historical accounts. Therefore, like Genesis, we should assume Matthew intends for us to take the characters he writes about seriously unless the context implies otherwise. In this case, nothing here implies Satan is anything other than a real creature.
Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. (1 Peter 5:8)
The genre of 1 Peter is “epistle,” or letter, which tends to have a more “human” tone as it blends the literal and poetic. Whenever a New Testament letter writer mentions Satan, the devil, or the evil one, they often very clearly assume they’re speaking about an actual creature. Yet, as we’ll discuss later, they frequently employ imagery to paint a specific picture of him. For example, while 1 Peter 5:8 seems to warn about a literal spiritual being, the “prowling” language may borrow from God’s conversation with Cain in Genesis 4:8. In that case, the genre allows us to see a real being (Satan) given a poetic description (lion-like behavior) instead of claiming Satan literally skulks around and tries to physically consume human beings.
And the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever. (Revelation 20:10)
Although Revelation contains some imagery, we want to be careful about over-interpreting everything in it as a metaphor if the text doesn’t imply that we should. When Revelation discusses Satan, John may use poetic language to describe him (such as drawing upon Ancient Near Eastern images of “dragons” representing chaos), but the character of Satan is always described as an actual being with real motives, actions, and a final destination. Thus, Satan in Revelation cannot be interpreted as a poetic device to represent moral evil that will one day be conquered by good, but rather as a singular evil being whom God will confine to a literal place of punishment for eternity.
More will be said in Chapter XX when we look at what some popular Bible verses about Satan are really talking about. But for now, let us continue into this book understanding that if the divinely inspired word of God discusses Satan as an actual being, we should as well. He may not be the nearly omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent god of evil we first thought he was, but he’s a real creature who has created real danger for Christians.
What is Satan?
Over time, we’ve created a good deal of mythology surrounding angels that don’t have much biblical support. We’re captivated by the strange descriptions that occasionally crop up in the Bible, and from there we imagine that angels may be as diverse as the animal kingdom. We may even imagine that Satan is a wholly unique creature who perhaps underwent a radical metamorphosis when he first rebelled against his creator.
However, we need a grounded understanding of those mysterious beings who exist in the spiritual realm if we want to understand Satan biblically.
To keep this discussion brief, let us consider everything that exists. More specifically, what types of intelligent beings do we see in the Bible? Ultimately, we see three:
- God (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit)
- Human Beings
- Angelic beings
Amongst angelic beings, we encounter some very different physical descriptions:
- When God sends angels to interact with humans, they appear as normal-looking men
- Daniel encounters one with a green body and other unique features in Daniel 10
- Cherubim protect sacred spaces (such as Eden in Genesis 3:24), carry God’s throne, and sing praises; their bodies are a composite of human and animal features as described in Ezekiel 1:5-21 (clarified as cherubim in Ezekial 10) and Revelation 4:6-10
- Seraphim stand above God’s throne and sing praises; in Isaiah 6:2-6 they are described as having six wings and likely human bodies (note that that seraphim and cherubim may describe the same angelic beings)
What’s going on here? Are these all creatures who are as different from one another as elephants are from goldfish? Consider again the groups we see in the Bible – God, human beings, and angelic beings.
It is far more likely that just as God created intelligent beings with different roles in the physical realm of Earth, He did something similar in the spiritual realm. The various instances of angelic beings don’t show us different creatures but the same creatures serving different roles. To give a human equivalent, it would be the difference between how someone dresses and acts when performing surgery compared to one welding metal parts together. They’re still the same type of creature who look and behave wildly differently based on their job. We should also remember that these beings are spirits, and thus likely don’t have a consistent form like our physical bodies do.
The Bible doesn’t actually give us a singular category for what to call these creatures. We commonly use the term “angel,” although that’s incomplete because this word is simply a job title for a heavenly messenger (similar to how every human isn’t a delivery driver, even though some serve that job and wear appropriate uniforms). For this book, I will use “angelic being” to refer to any supernatural creature God created as part of His heavenly host. That term encompasses angels, cherubim, and even rebels like Satan who, although no longer in God’s favor, still share the same essential nature of creatures like themselves.
With Satan, we actually know very little about him before his rebellion. When condemning the human king of Tyre, Ezekiel delivers God’s words and compares this man to the cherub in Eden who rebelled against God. So at the very least, it’s likely that Satan originally served the role of cherub. However, that isn’t to say he is a cherub, since we can see below how Ezekiel puts the term in the past tense:
You were an anointed guardian cherub.
I placed you; you were on the holy mountain of God;
in the midst of the stones of fire you walked. (Ezekiel 28:14)
This language would be like writing to Richard Nixon and saying “You were a president of the United States.” Nixon’s function has changed from what it once was, even though his essential nature as a “human being” would be the same as it’s always been. Likewise, Satan may have served (and looked) like a cherub before his rebellion, but today, we can only say with certainty that he’s still an angelic being.
