Submitted 1 day ago by Nyxias@fedia.io to nostupidquestions@lemmy.world
Okay so Lucifer obviously upset his sky-daddy, is demoted from being an angel permanently, is cast down to rule an entire sector of the afterlife called Hell which we come to know where all damned souls go after they die.
What is the logic of God practically awarding Lucifer an entire realm for him to rule on his own and nearly contest God's power?
That's like imprisoning someone to home confinement when they live in a mansion.
Wow there’s a lot of bad faith answers in here. Just because you’re upset about Christianity doesn’t mean giving a terrible uninformed answer is helpful.
As for the general answer to your question (no longer a Christian, but did missions work for many years), the predicate of Christianity is that God created everything in the world. Therefore, by basic extension, everything’s place in that world is to worship its creator (and not itself), because worshipping God in this paradigm is its fundamental natural purpose. Not doing so is a perversion of that purpose and leads to dissonance in your soul, sin, etc.
Satan did it first, and as some commented, was the first to be in this realm of far from God by worshipping himself instead of his creator. Like anyone with a terrible addiction, you tend to want to get other people to support that addiction, so humanity is easy game (Adam and Eve). In this sense Satan is like the older sibling teaching bad habits to newer siblings.
Taking this further into the future, you now have Satan and humans who will be occupying this space of “God not being there”. In that time, if none of you are God, it stands to reason that the strongest will prevail, i.e. the angel who got you to sin in the first place. The bible doesn’t paint too much about him explicitly in regards to his role in hell. This idea of Satan just not being part of the harmony of putting god at the center explains the strange way that he and God still have a conversation in thr book of Job since hell is rejection of God from the self, not the other way around. What we can infer from other parts of the Bible about his role, like the numerous examples of human sacrifice and other degenerate activities for “false gods” the picture of Satan is that he hungers to use humanity to make himself a God and that he’s a lot stronger than us were he to do it (hence the idea that he rules hell).
The last little bit on this is at the book of revelation. In the end, the prophecy is that Satan and humans are thrown into a lake of fire. There is no governorship here. This is the final judgement where all who are irredeemable are destroyed. The period of rule most Christians probably got the idea you asked about is from earlier in revelation when the righteous are raptured and the earth is run by Satan (again, not on purpose, but by consequence of being the strongest). Ultimately though, his fate ends up being destruction, not rule. So for a while, he has apparent power by nature of being more capable, cunning, and self-serving over others who have rejected God and therefore have none of the one things he cannot surmount.
You asked a good question, with a very interesting answer. A lot of very naive atheists seem to like to Google bible passages and then forget that there is such a thing as internal consistency. In a paradigm like Christianity, you need to start with it’s fundamental postulates and walk from there. Not project your own completely different viewpoint onto it and act smug when they don’t match. At the very least, Christianity is a centuries old story with some interesting internal consistencies and comments of human nature. There’s a whole fascinating side discussion of this stuff on whether or not Satan is being given the same long grace period that humanity is to accept God.
the final judgement where all who are irredeemable are destroyed.
From where do you get the part about destruction?
It is my understanding that they all will just be thrown out, where there are no good places anymore, because the current heaven and earth are destroyed, and new ones are built, but they cannot go in there.
Revelation 20:7-15 details the final judgement and lake of fire.
Revelation 20:14 NIV [14] Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death.
The concept of hell does not appear in scripture, it is a Hellenist addition. The concept of Hades ruling the underworld was preserved as “Satan and Hell” as Judeo-Christian terminology spread.
In actual scripture, “Satan” is a being who stands before gods throne slinging accusations and slanders against god’s people. The concept of hell does not exist at all, and every time you see the word in an english Bible it is an intentional mistranslation from one of a handful of other words that have more specific and nuanced meanings, usually “the grave.”
Jesus observed and taught a form of pharisaic Judaism that believed in an eventual “resurrection and judgement of all people.” The righteous would be given a fresh start in a new creation but everyone else would be destroyed by cleansing fire, dead and gone forever. This “burned away like trash” imagery eventually infected the traditional Hellenist imagery of a “cold dark” underworld and turned it into a place of flaming, volcanic, undying torment.
Too cool for God.
the bible says satan causes illness but then god causes the firstborn to die, causes plagues, and so on.
the bible says god is good but god is a judgemental ass who raped a woman and impregnated her, and who forces suffering onto people.
God is an absentee landlord and Lucifer is a fan of man
I prefer some of the Gnostic interpretations of Lucifer, or Satan, where he attempts to introduce knowledge (gnosis) to Adam and Eve by way of the forbidden Fruit of Knowledge in an effort to ‘awaken’ them. Meanwhile, God the evil Demiurge does not want Adam and Eve to truly know what lies beyond Him, forcing Satan out.
God is the real evil! Satan doesn't rule hell, God does. Even more contradictions!
"Spread love and love thy neighbor...NOW BURN IN HELL!!"
Yeah, why does God have to be judgemental, mannn… It’s not like people do horrific things like enslaving (what God punished the egyptians for after literally 9 warnings) genocide, rape(a sin of Sodom and Gomorrah) cause illness or hoard money. /s
Also, Mary did literally consent and then praised God.
Luke 1:35, 38
And the angel answered her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy—the Son of God.
And Mary said, “Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.” And the angel departed from her.
Luke 1:46-49
And Mary said, “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant. For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for he who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is his name.
Also
while satan welcomes all who come to his realm, to better themselves. Are you literally getting your theology from Hazbib Hotel? Satan hates you. He despises you more than any human has hated anybody. He is a resentful prick who wants to drag you down with him because his shitty coup failed. Satan doesn’t rule hell. He’s suffering there and jealous that he wants to deprive mankind of heaven.
Didn’t god create rape, genocide, disease, etc… by definition? Or he can’t do anything about that?
Also I’m not sure if a teenage girl can consent when it’s the god of the universe. Pretty wild power dynamics there.
In the book of Job, Satan is depicted more like a friendly prosecutor or advisor to God than an enemy. He and Yahweh are like frat bros torturing the poor schmuck.
Satan means "Accuser", in the book of Job he is trying to convince God that humans are too wicked and corrupt to deserve all the gifts God gives us, and and that people only pretend to love God because we expect something in return.
Modern Christian mythology is a mashup of a lot of things. A scholar would be required to really unpack a lot of it, but consider that much of what we think of as lore, motivation, and character are newer additions. Dante’s Inferno probably has more influence on our ideas about Lucifer and Hell than the Bible.
Once you start unpacking these old stories with a post-modern mindset, the logic of it quickly stops making sense.
A modern Christian might opine that Lucifer is a prisoner of Hell but not a genuine threat to the power of their Almighty God. He’s not awarded this position. He’s lost God’s grace and dwells outside of his love - the worst punishment imaginable in the mind of some Christians.
The more important question:
Why do humans continue to believe in utterly moronic fictional BS?
Hmm the way Satan is portrayed in the old testament is like a prosecutor for God. The New testament mentions a few characters sort of like that. The whore of Babylon, Lucifer, the dragon, etc.
I have always been sort of open-minded about the idea of Lucifer,because the people who always seem to want you to hate him and have bad things to say about him/her, always seem to be exactly the types of people I dont like. Considering the Catholic Church for example, ruled over a slave infested hellhole of public torture and execution and brainwashing, I kind of feel like Lucifer is probably the good guy since they hate him/her so much. Idk tho. Not really that religious anymore.
From my understanding hes just the first prisoner, not actually the leader of hell
I think it’s just Hollywood style engaging story telling. Who cares what any books have to say about Satan. Write some dichotomy and conflict into the story, and people can’t get enough of it.
it depends on what you consider to be Canon. personally, I think the Bible doesn’t say much about it because the Bible is a boring piece of shit. but Milton’s Paradise lost is pretty interesting. He’s the leader of a failed revolution basically and that’s how they all got banned
Let us not forget that according to the Bible, angels do not have free will. It is pretty clear that humans are the only beings in all of existence to have such a thing. Angels are just extensions of God’s will. So Lucifer could not rebel of their own volition, that they did so was God’s will. If humanity’s free will were to mean anything, they had to be tempted and forced to choose, had to have bad guys.
Well they need someone there; if you just exile people to hell without a plan you end up with Australia.
Satan doesn’t rule hell. In fact, Satan is the one who suffers the most in hell.
Then he must’ve gotten a sweet sentencing deal because he vacations on earth all the time. Or does that count as work release?
Satan isn’t in hell yet. I’m not sure if hell really exists in it’s final form yet. It is all related to eschatology.
As if ANY religion makes sense. Don’t try to find one, either just accept the nonsense (they call it faith) or don’t. You are NOT supposed to question that.
I question my religion all the time.
Okay, bear with me for just a second. There’s a cartoon called “Hazbin Hotel”, which it told from the point of view of Satan (Lucifer’s) daughter. In her version of their origin story, Lucifer gave humanity free will. But because humans are, well, all over the place, this allowed for evil to exist. Which lead to the creation of hell as a place to put these evil souls.
As Lucifer’s punishment, he was sent to rule over hell, so that the only outcome he would ever see for giving humans free will was humans turning evil. Over & over again for all eternity.
Yes it’s a cartoon. But I thought it was very elegant here.
Hazbin hotel isn’t based on the Bible at all. Except from the basic character inspired by Satan, Adam and Eve, Heaven, etc. but it’s portrayal of events aren’t even remotely what Christians believe. Even the characters of Satan are very inaccurate if you’re expecting it to be based off of Christianity
Hazbin Hotel fucking sucks and is made for edgelord teens of today.
Says the person asking about satan ruling hell. Lol. Okay, kiddo.
LOL :rolleyes:
I think its kind of a matter of interpretation? The “why” is that he either refused to bow before men (who he thought of as beneath himself), or, the less fun option, he just didn’t follow daddy’s wishes and got sent to the corner.
As for his “award”, that too is kind of…opaque. One way to interpret hell is as the absence of creation, as in literally outside of Yhwy’s world of creation. So either a new second world for unworthy creations to go when they end, or just literally a void of nothing, because to be removed from God’s world should be to be removed from reality.
Ideas about hell being a place where the unrighteous are tortured largely come from later, non-canonical stories, with the biggest name easily being Dante’s Inferno (which itself seemed to be largely about the author taking jabs at people from his own era that he didn’t like or agree with iirc).
I’m not a scholar on the subject tho, so take it with a grain. This is just what I’ve heard, and I’m quite sure that I’ve heard some incorrect and half-true things before.
So either a new second world for unworthy creations to go when they end…
Hey, cool! It’s The Isle of Misfit Immortals.
Satan ruling Hell
From where exactly have you got this idea?
A few disclaimers. Im not a believer nor super knowledgeable about any specific interpretation. There are many interpretations and here is one.
Hell is supposed to be bad because its disconnected from god. Before satan all was god and in withdrawing his being it made a second place. Also satan is immortal so its possible he can’t be killed which is why god was so worried about adam and eve eating from the fruit of eternal life. Eating the apple of good and evil allowed some of mankind to be evil enough to not be allowed in gods prescence so are in the only other place. Satan being powerful and there from the get go easily controls the place.
Trump hadn’t been born yet.
The way I understand it the whole Lucifer/Satan thing is a mistranslation.
Satan just means “challenger” and he is just an angel that has been ordered by God to troll humans.
Lucifer is an angel that got cast out.
Wasn’t he just cast down?
That he became the ruler of hell is because of his own skills.
It’s all nonsense anyway, but it makes sense in the context of God and Satan battling for control of heaven. It was a close war, and there was no end in sight, so God says, fine! You can take this region of heaven and rule it however you want, just leave us alone, and we’ll do the same.
That’s not what happened in Christian theology.
Kyrgizion@lemmy.world 1 day ago
It’s Christian fanfic. There is surprisingly little about Hell in actual scripture, definitely not the “hell” we’ve come to expect from modern media.
blaue_Fledermaus@mstdn.io 1 day ago
And even on Dante's Inferno Satan is just another prisoner, not a ruler.
AbouBenAdhem@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Yeah—Milton’s Paradise Lost seems closer to the modern conception.
Bonifratz@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
Yup. As far as I’m aware most Christians would disagree with the notion that Satan rules hell, and it’s not a doctrine in any major denomination.
AwesomeLowlander@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
Doubt. Most Christians have never read the Bible, and their understanding comes from pop culture.
affenlehrer@feddit.org 1 day ago
I believe in the scripture there’s mostly talk about weeping and gnashing of teeth, right?
ICCrawler@lemmy.world 1 day ago
The weeping and gnashing of teeth isn’t even explicitly hell.
It’s just a general separation from God. Which you could call a Hell, but it’s not explicitly stated as a product of that realm which is Hell.