Where Did the Devil Come From?

Where did the Devil come from?Every religion has some concept of good and evil. Probably most atheists would say that there are good things and bad (evil) things in this universe. The Judeo-Christian scriptures, the "Bible", clearly acknowledge that good and evil exist. The Bible says that God created the universe and that everything he created was good. So, where did evil come from? The answer is . . . Love. God chose to create living beings who were capable of love so that they could love him and each other. Love, however, by definition requires free will. Love is a choice - choosing to care about and do good things for another being. Forced "love" is not love at all.

So, what does this have to do with the existence of evil and the Devil. A living being who has the freedom to love and do good also has the freedom to hate and do evil. God created two groups of beings capable of exercising free will - spirit beings called angels and human beings. The angels were created before this present physical universe was created, and some of them rebelled against God and, therefore, became evil. In 2 Peter 2:4 the bible says this, "For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but threw them into hell and locked them up in chains in utter darkness, to be kept until the judgment. . . ." (NET). At some point one of these rebelling angels rose up to be their leader. This is the Devil or Satan. The Bible is not clear about when this happened, except that it seems certain that it was before the creation of our universe.

There is a section of the book of Isaiah (chapter 14) which some have interpreted as speaking about the devil. Isaiah 14:12 is usually used:

"Look how you have fallen from the sky,
O shining one, son of the dawn!
You have been cut down to the ground,
O conqueror of the nations!" (NET)

However, if you look carefully at the whole chapter, it is clear that the writer is speaking about a human being, the king of Babylon. Look at verse 4: "You will taunt the king of Babylon with these words . . . ." (NET); also verse 22: "I will blot out all remembrance of Babylon and destroy all her people. . . ." (NET). Verse 16 makes clear that the writer is referring to a man:

"Those who see you stare at you,
they look at you carefully, thinking:
'Is this the man who shook the earth,
the one who made kingdoms tremble?' " (NET)

I am reluctant to apply this scripture to Satan when the writer so clearly says that he is referring to a man.

Some interpret Ezekiel 28:11-19 as speaking about the "fall of Satan". Two phrases are used to bolster this interpretation. The first is in verse 13: "You were in Eden, the garden of God. . . ." (NET); but this is simply saying that, as a human being, the king of Tyre was symbolically in the Garden of Eden through his ancestor Adam. The second phrase is in verse 14 where, in some translations, he is called a "guardian cherub"; but notice the translation given by the NET Bible: "I placed you there with an anointed guardian cherub". A careful reading of the passage will demonstrates that the writer was speaking of a human being, the king of Tyre: “Son of man, sing a lament for the king of Tyre, and say to him, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says. . . ." (28:12, NET)

The Bible does clearly speak of Satan "falling from heaven". When the disciples returned to Jesus from their mission and told him that they were able to subdue demons in his name, he said, "I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven." (Luke 10:18, NET) Even though Jesus was speaking in the past tense, I believe he was speaking of an event that had not yet happened. Prophets often speak of future events as if they had already happened. This event is described in more detail in Revelation chapter 12.

First, a little background. It appears that Satan still had some kind of access to heaven after his rebellion: "Now the day came when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord – and Satan also arrived among them. The Lord said to Satan, 'Where have you come from?' And Satan answered the Lord, 'From roving about on the earth, and from walking back and forth across it.' ” (Job 1:6-7, NET). Revelation chapter 12 describes a woman giving birth to a child, and a dragon attempting to devour the child. The child is caught up to safety in heaven, and the woman escapes to safety in the wilderness. Then Michael, the archangel battled with the dragon and the dragon was thrown out of heaven and down to earth, where he continued to pursue other offspring of the woman. Verse 9 clearly states that the dragon was Satan. This passage is symbolically describing the birth, death, and resurrection of Jesus. Satan was thrown out of Heaven as a result of the resurrection of Jesus. Even though he is still active today, the resurrection of Jesus was the beginning of the end for the devil.

Satan was created as a good being with free will. He chose to rebell against God and was thrown out of God's grace. This was defeat number one. He tried to defeat God's gift to fallen man, Jesus the Messiah, and he was thrown out of heaven. This was defeat number two. At the second coming of Jesus, the Devil will be handed his third and final defeat as he is thrown into the Lake of Fire for eternity (Revelation 20:10).

Scripture quoted by permission. Quotations designated (NET) are from the NET Bible® copyright ©1996-2006 by Biblical Studies Press, L.L.C. http://www.bible.org/. All rights reserved.