satan

Tyler Huckabee 1-10-2024
The image shows a scene from "The Devil's Advocate," where one white man is looking over the shoulder of another white man in a suit, who is looking out a window.

From The Devil's Advocate

THE DEVIL IS irresistible horror bait, the central figure in some of the best scary movies ever made. A tour through Satan’s oeuvre finds plenty of examples of an outside force of evil, such as Al Pacino’s diabolical attorney tempting Keanu Reeves in The Devil’s Advocate (1997) or Elizabeth Hurley’s sensual temptress raising hell for Brendan Fraser in Bedazzled (2000). These movies generally have the theological heft of a Carman music video, but occasionally, Hollywood tries an angle on Satan that’s a bit more sophisticated, spooky, and, ultimately, instructive. Take, for instance, John Carpenter’s low-budget 1987 box-office flop Prince of Darkness. 

The movie follows professor Howard Birack (Victor Wong) and his students as they investigate a mysterious green ooze in a monastery’s basement. The team discovers that the slime is the literal embodiment of Satan, a twisted take on the consecrated host. While we get a brief glimpse of a giant red figure with black fingernails, Prince of Darkness doesn’t focus there. Instead, the danger is far more immediate. Anyone exposed to the slime is possessed by its essence, transformed into a mindless murderer. The true adversary remains in the shadows, sowing mistrust and division. The only thing our heroes can attack is each other.

Karyn Wiseman 3-01-2017

Image via a katz/Shutterstock.com

According to several sources, the number 40 is used almost 150 times in the Old and New Testaments. Some examples: Jesus was tempted in the wilderness for 40 days and 40 nights. There were 40 years of wilderness-wandering for the Jewish people fleeing bondage in Egypt. Noah and his family were in the ark for 40 days and 40 nights of the flood. There were 40 days and 40 nights of fasting while Moses was on Mount Sinai. Jonah was given 40 days to convert the people of Nineveh. Saul, David, and Solomon reigned 40 years each. 

Suzanne Ross 2-20-2017

Shortly after the election, President Donald Trump’s adviser Steve Bannon, in the context of a conversation about liberal politicians and the media’s failure to perceive the new political realities, told The Hollywood Reporter that “darkness is good.” He went on to say, “Dick Cheney. Darth Vader. Satan. That’s power. It only helps us when [liberals and the media] get it wrong. When they're blind to who we are and what we're doing."

Jason Byassee 8-12-2015

DarZel / Shutterstock 

The gospel messes with your tenses and moods (among other things)

Abby Olcese 7-07-2015
Screenshot from 'South Park' trailer / YouTube

Screenshot from 'South Park' trailer / YouTube

As Jenna Barnett wrote yesterday in "The Devil We Know," the way Christians have thought about the devil has changed over time — and continues to change. The same is true of pop culture where a long fascination with depictions of the afterlife has led to some diverse and enduring depictions of Hell, demons, and even the devil himself. More recently, popular versions of demons and the devil have been particularly creative, from exploring Satan’s retirement to demented sock puppets. Here are just a few — six, to be precise — of the devils’s most loved (and hated) portrayals in books, movies, T.V., and beyond.

1. The Devil (Faust / Doctor Faustus)

One of literature’s most popular depictions of the devil, this version of the prince of darkness has gone on to inspire countless recreations in film, T.V., theater, and music. Beginning life as a German legend, then the subject of plays by Christopher Marlowe and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Doctor Faustus (or Faust) is the story of a scholar who sells his soul to the devil for the ability to practice magic. The devil as a shrewd dealer of desires can also be found in the music of Robert Johnson, stage productions like Damn Yankees, and T.V. shows like Supernatural, among countless other examples.

Appears in: Literature, Theater (Faust, Doctor Faustus)

Jenna Barnett 7-06-2015
StainedGlass

Image via /Shutterstock.

As a ten-year-old suburbanite, I saw a black dog stumble through the cul-de-sac without a collar and named him “The Devil.”

I remember a couple years later deciding I was wrong — that the devil was bearded, gendered, nocturnal, and afraid of my prayers.

I think about the devil differently now. I think less about bearded imps and more about the incarnations of evil I see around me: racist shootings, the disrespected bodies of women, dusty nukes.

The devil has evolved and morphed throughout Judeo-Christian history as well, going from absent, to messenger, to adversary, to the evil commander in an eschatological battle, to metaphor, to the Broadway sock puppet described in Stephanie Sandberg’s “Devils We Know” (Sojourners, July 2015). In many ways, the devil’s role in scripture is as changing and fascinating as the devil’s role in pop culture.

Brian Truitt 7-17-2014

World’s top exorcists form a supergroup in “The Devilers.” Image courtesy Matt Triano/Dynamite Entertainment

There’s never a better time for a bunch of holy avengers than when all hell actually breaks loose.

The Dynamite Entertainment series The Devilers debuts Wednesday as an action-packed supernatural comic book full of demonic beasties, big-picture philosophies, and heroes that have to put religious differences aside in order to save Vatican City – and the world – from being turned into brimstone.

“When suddenly it’s ‘Oh that is a giant hellmouth that opened up in front of me,’ that changes your beliefs,” said series writer Joshua Hale Fialkov (The Bunker, The Life After), who’s doing the The Devilers alongside artist Matt Triano.

Adam Ericksen 5-22-2014
Dunster House White Tower and Red Dome at Harvard, Jorge Salcedo / Shutterstock.

Dunster House White Tower and Red Dome at Harvard, Jorge Salcedo / Shutterstock.com

How do you defeat Satan?

That was the question the University of Harvard had to answer last week when the Harvard Extension School’s Cultural Studies Club planned a satanic “Black Mass” at the university.

The Harvard community, led by Harvard president Drew Faust, was outraged by the Black Mass. Faust addressed the situation by stating, “The ‘black mass’ had its historical origins as a means of denigrating the Catholic Church; it mocks a deeply sacred event in Catholicism, and is highly offensive to many in the church and beyond.” Although Faust was offended by the planned event, she defended the right of the Cultural Studies Club to proceed with the black mass. “Nevertheless, consistent with the University’s commitment to free expression, including expression that may deeply offend us, the decision to proceed is and will remain theirs.”

The Archdiocese of Boston also responded with outraged offense. Cardinal Sean P. O’Malley claimed, “Why people would want to do something that is so offensive to so many people in the community, whether they’re Catholic or not, it’s very repugnant.”

As a Christian, I understand the outrage. After all, the black mass mocks the Eucharist, one of the most holy events in Christianity. But, before we fester in our animosity toward the Satanists, I want to encourage us to take a step back and analyze this event from the angle of mimetic theory.

Adam Ericksen 3-07-2014
Courtesy Imagine Dragons

Dan Reynolds, lead singer of Imagine Dragons, deals with his demon in their "Demons" video. Courtesy Imagine Dragons

“Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.”

Thus begins the spiritual drama of Lent, the forty days before Easter that commemorates Jesus’ wilderness experience. No human, not even Jesus, can escape the temptation of the devil.

Just before Jesus was led into the wilderness, he was baptized in the Jordan River by John. As the Gospel of Matthew reports, when Jesus emerged from the water “a voice from heaven said, ‘This is my Son, my Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.’”

Jesus’ identity as God’s Son had always been true, but he received confirmation of his relationship with God at his baptism.

Roma Downey 2-20-2014

Actress Roma Downey plays Jesus’ mother Mary in ‘The Bible’ drama documentary. RNS photo courtesy History Channel.

Tired of cursing the darkness, my husband Mark and I wanted to shine a light. To do this, we set up a production company called LightWorkers Media. The Bible miniseries, born out of this intention and released last year, grew so popular that we were able to make it into our Jesus film, Son of God.

The Bible series was in its third week when Jesus began to appear on the big screen. There was great excitement that Jesus was coming, with our trailers, various talk shows and even Twitter buzzing with anticipation.

He was beautiful and strong and kind and compassionate. His presence uplifted and encouraged people. It was everything we had hoped for.

Joy Moore 2-10-2014

(Ase / Shutterstock)

INVITATIONS COME. Yet an expressed desire for your presence does not guarantee your willingness to show up. Invitations require a response. Some responses indicate significant commitment beyond “just showing up.” A summons may first entail an RSVP indicating a commitment to actually take an active part in the opportunity.

Such is the case for the people of God. Invitations arrived inviting God’s people to be witnesses to the power and presence of a particular God and to become a people who practice justice and favor kindness—peculiar expectations for an ancient culture, for any culture. A requirement of this sort unsettles the status quo of cultural mores where religion represents polytheistic attributions to a type of celestial Santa Claus or divine ATM, or where religion has been privatized—set aside from public prophetic witness to meditative reflection in the privacy of our own homes with occasional festive gatherings. Such genie-worship and privatization results in a deafening silence among the people of God. As Pope Francis put it recently, “a privatized lifestyle can lead Christians to take refuge in some false forms of spirituality.”

The promises that God calls us to are promises that Michael Frost, in Exiles, calls dangerous. They accompany dangerous memories that make a dangerous critique of society.

Over the next five weeks, the invitations extended in these texts indicate more than increasing the head count of seekers of spirituality. They require a response that signifies a commitment to participating in a community whose primary purpose is to expose the dangerous promise of God.

Adam Ericksen 10-25-2013
Illustration of the Holy Spirit flame, AridOcean / Shutterstock.com

Illustration of the Holy Spirit flame, AridOcean / Shutterstock.com

I first heard about the Strange Fire controversy when my Twitter feed started tweeting up a storm on Monday. The drama centered on a confrontation between two conservative mega church pastors, John MacArthur and Mark Driscoll. Most of my Twitter friends are theological liberals, and we liberals love it when our conservative brethren get in fights.

Woo-hoo! A scandal! 

This scandal, like most scandals, was overblown. Driscoll says that MacArthur and his people were “gracious that they let me on campus at all.” What was Driscoll doing “on campus?” He crashed MacArthur’s conference on the Holy Spirit called Strange Fire to meet with people and hand out free copies of his upcoming book, A Call to Resurgence, which has a chapter on the Holy Spirit. Conference officials told Driscoll he had to stop, and so he did. Driscoll’s books ended up in the hands of conference officials. The drama between the two has to do with whether Driscoll gave the books as a gift to the conference or if conference officials confiscated them.

Like all scandals, the drama distracts us from what really matters, which is the conference theme. The work of the Holy Spirit is vitally important for Christians, yet the Holy Spirit is usually treated like the ugly stepchild of Christian doctrine. (No offense to ugly stepchildren.) I think MacArthur radically misunderstands the Holy Spirit. The conference website provides an overview of its mission, which will help me explain his misunderstanding:

Adam Ericksen 5-22-2013
John Piper's Tweet

John Piper's Tweet

Many of my liberal friends never call themselves “Christians.” Their hesitancy is usually a reaction against conservative Christians who, let’s face it, are an embarrassment to the name. You know what I’m talking about – those who make crazy claims like natural disasters occur because God is angry at homosexuals. And then there are those who use phrases like, “legitimate rape.

Influential pastor John Piper provides the latest example. While most of my friends on Facebook and Twitter lamented the devastation wrought by the Oklahoma City tornado, Piper decided to show off his biblical acumen with this tweet:

"Your sons and daughters were eating and a great wind struck the house, and it fell upon them, and they are dead." -Job 1:19

Piper’s tweet is a bit ambiguous. His reference to Job doesn’t say that God caused the tornado, but Piper has historically claimed that God causes these types of disasters. In fact, this wouldn’t be the first time Piper has tweeted something so theologically insensitive. A few years ago Piper claimed God caused a tornado in Minnesota because God was angry at homosexuals. Piper’s god is a fickle Cosmic Jerk.

Caleb Bell 3-19-2013
Satan in the miniseries “The Bible.” Photo courtesy of The History Channel

Satan in the miniseries “The Bible.” Photo courtesy of The History Channel

The producers of History Channel’s The Bible fended off claims Monday that the actor who plays Satan in the miniseries resembles President Barack Obama.

Executive producers Mark Burnett, who created Survivor, and his wife, the actress Roma Downey, described the comparisons as “utter nonsense.”

“Both Mark and I have nothing but respect and love for our President, who is a fellow Christian. False statements such as these are just designed as a foolish distraction to try and discredit the beauty of the story of the Bible,” according to a statement from Downey, who starred in the television show Touched by an Angel.

Mehdi Ouazaani, the Moroccan actor who portrays Satan, has played satanic roles prior to his work on The Bible, the statement said.

The social media sphere blew up with the comparison Sunday night, which was touted by  conservative commentator Glenn Beck, among others.

Christian Piatt 2-20-2013
Garden of Eden depiction, Robynrg / Shutterstock.com

Garden of Eden depiction, Robynrg / Shutterstock.com

(I was invited to take part in a debate about hell at a university recently, but unfortunately, the dates don’t work with my schedule this time. But since it’s an interesting topic, and one about which many folks have questions, I thought I’d share a couple of short essays I’ve written on the subject.) 

While Jonathan Edwards wasn’t the first to preach about hell and condemnation, his ‘Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God’ sermon in 1741 crystallizes the beginning of a modern movement in the church. Edwards employed fear of punishment as a primary means for conversion and doctrinal adherence. Meanwhile, his congregants fainted in the aisles and clung to the pews to avoid being dragged down into the abyss.

We can argue day and night about whether fear-based theology is effective, biblically accurate, or even necessary. But it’s worthwhile to consider where our contemporary ideas about hell and Satan even come from.

Today, we’ll begin with Satan; we’ll save hell for tomorrow.

A Catholic priest has suggested that Satan may have driven accused killer James Holmes to open fire at a Colorado cinema, continuing the religious debate over a shooting that claimed 12 lives and wounded 58 more. 

“Was he demon possessed? Maybe. It happens,” the Rev. Dwight Longenecker wrote on Patheos, where the Catholic priest from Greenville, S.C., is a columnist.

Religious leaders and public figures have sparked some of the most heated discussions in the wake of the tragedy as they have offered various explanations for the violent outburst and spiritual guidance for dealing with it.

Julie Clawson 10-01-2010
We have all heard the old saying that Satan's greatest ploy is to get people to stop believing in him.
Jarrod McKenna 4-21-2010

This video clip by The Work of The People is going to upset a lot of people.

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