The Epic History of Good and Evil

Before someone can really even attempt to understand Satanism, they'd first have to understand what Satanists opinions are on history. I will attempt to disclose them at length in this essay. Unlike other essays, when I wrote this one I was just going to use references at the end. It might be true that my method used in later chapters is a bit clunky at times, but it makes referencing the materials easy for me, and it saves those truly interested in it the time from having to flip around a book. I later on went and rewrote this essay for a book format, and decided to keep some of the sources listed at the bottom, while newer sources are listed on the top. Also, I read a comment about one book in which the person complained, "there's no footnotes, and we all know what those kind of books are." Thus, this chapter's for you bud.

Reading Carl Sagan's, "The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark", there is a theme to it, despite other areas where Sagan flounders, that is quintessential of Satanism. That is that if we want to properly view the Universe, we have to stop believing in the supernatural. The problem is getting the people to reject irrational explanations and resort a social and intellectual means that can be quantified and evaluated, put under scientific scrutiny. The problem with this World isn't so much that we don't know what is true, for it is not the truth itself which sets you free. It is the ability to discover what is the truth that makes us free. The dilemma of mankind has always been in figuring out how to give people that ability.

One of those problems was identified by Socrates, so long ago:

"When the citizens hold a meeting to appoint medical officers or shipbuilders or any other professional class of person, surely it won't be the orator who advises them then. Obviously in every such election the choice ought to fall on the most expert."

The unfortunate problem is that many people who are delving into the realms of politics, religion, economics, etc., (wave to Jerry Falwell), are not qualified. The world of religion should remain with a great big chasm between the affairs of the State. That's not to say that the people of the state can't be religious, but that the religion of the state should not be the state itself. As Joseph McCabe, Mark Twain, and Socrates knew, clergymen aren't good at much else.

John Boswell, The New Republic, March 18, 1985 v192 p. 38, tells us in a book review of Lucifer: The Devil in the Middle Ages, on the subject of the importance of Satan:

"This is not to suggest that later generations of Christians invented the devil to fill a psychological need. No matter how much he may embarrass modern Christians, the devil was indisputably real to Jesus and the early church.... He has loomed so large in the Western imagination not because he is so crucial to Christian theology, then, but because he is so needed by Christian people..."

On the subject of scapegoating:

"Indeed, as Lucifer eloquently documents, the devil was often given the attributes of minorities (e.g., blackness), who then seemed even more threatening because they were "diabolical"..... The tendency to project evil seems to me an ineradicable part of human nature's good as well as its bad. Projecting greed as the predominant character of Jews, or promiscuity of gay people, or laziness of blacks, or sorcery of ugly women, has always been harmful for both subject and object."

An important book on the subject is Malcolm McGrath's book, "Demons of the Modern World". He says that modern cultures have differential values between the physical World, operated by mechanical laws and phyics, and a different World of interior perspective, a symbolic universe of our own creation. The important point he notes is that this is not a natural distinction, (fitting in nicely with the bi-fold consciousness theory), but that this distinction must actually be taught, and generally this occurs in childhood. Interestingly, the World of demons seems to have been initially started in Mesopotamia much the same as a child draws pictures of his nightmares. This distinction often breaks down dramatically during stress, which leads to demon hallucinations.

As Hypatia said:

“Fables should be taught as fables, myths as myths, and miracles as poetic fancies. To teach superstitions as truth is a most terrible thing. The mind of a child accepts them, and only through great pain, perhaps even tragedy, can the child be relieved of them.”

As far back as her days went, she understood that people had a hard time making the differentiation. I find it probable that during the Middle Ages, where the average mentality was at about the level of a small child, this is exactly the case, as even the artwork from the period relates a very grim and distressful feeling. As Averroes wrote, "Theologians are not competent to interpret the doctrines contained in the prophetically revealed law. For this, reason must be employed." Let's follow this twisted tale back to its origins and see what it leaves us with.

The Dark Ages: Demons, Daemons, Daimons, and Weirdo's

Let's start our look with Satan's helpers, the "demons". By the strictest etymological connection, the link is in Greece. The word we now call "Demon" comes from the Greek word "Daimon", (daemon in Latin). Daimons were intermediates, and sometimes mediators, between the Gods and men. They were also guardians of sacred things, and possessed great intellect. In this sense, the term "daimon" means "replete with knowledge." Phil Cousineau gives a definition of daimons as "the divine presense within". Something that Socrates had explained by quoting Plato, how we are set free by philosophy, dialogue, drinking, socializing, beauty, love, appreciation, and wonder, that takes us out of "the gloom of our cave of ignorance." The daimon isn't just the information, it's the beauty of the information and how it is transmitted.

The ancient Greeks didn't have only one type of daimon, they had both good and bad ones, which were termed 'eudemons' and 'cacodemons.' Cacodemons is derived from the Greek term kakos meaning "malign, atrocious". They are personal daimons that seek to misinform the person. The other is derived from the Greek "eu" meaning "good", "happy", or "well". In fact, the term to describe Socrates was as a Eudaimonist, someone who believes that the highest ethical goal is happiness and personal well-being. The word "eudaimonia" translated fully can be noted as "happiness", "fulfillment'', or "a flourishing life''.

Even just the word "daimon" itself is not limited to one thing, variently it can be translated as "divine power", "fate", or "god." (Variently, depending upon which words it was grouped with.) The extent to which beings could be called a "daimon" included heroes who had been deified. Good daimons were considered guardian spirits, giving guidance and protection to the ones they watched over, including the areas they habitated. Bad daimons were considered the ones who led people astray, or into bad situations. The philosopher Socrates said he had a lifetime daimon, one that always warned him of danger and bad judgement, but never actually directed his actions. He said his daimon was more accurate than omens of either watching the flights of birds, or reading their entrails, which were two well-known and used methods of divination in his day. What Socrates really meant in the Apology was that he had a "voice of conscience''.

The word daimon didn't carry any implications by itself, it was a neutral term, and was sometimes employed as a literary device synonymous with "theos" or God. It was also applied to a guardian, or a departed soul. The concept of good/bad daimons was rooted in animism, humans were being pulled in an epic battle between spirits leading him to the right way, and spirits leading him to the wrong way.

In changing to a new linguistic variation, the Latin word was "dæmon". The general rule, as Latin degenerated through the Middle Ages, was that the diphthongs ``æ'' and ``oe'' (a diphthong is two vowels placed together) became ``e''. Thus once the double vowel groupings were dropped, the word leftover was "Demon".

Now we have at least a basis for what the word actually means, how did it start getting changed into being an evil thing? The reason was that the existence of pagan gods was not usually denied by the Church Fathers, such as Augustine. After all, the Old Testament repeatedly outlines that there are more Gods than YHVH, so how could they? Obviously though, these pagan Gods couldn't be the real God, so what were they? Originally, they came to the conclusion that these were "inner" demons, more or less, but as time went by, they started to theorize that they were fallen angels, who lied to their followers about their real origins.

Clement of Alexander (circa 150-213 CE) was the first major Christian writer to claim that the gods of other religions were demons: "The verdict of the prophets is that the gods of all the nations are images of demons." (Saint Clement, "Exorcism to the Greeks," quoted in G. Messandé,"The History of the Devil", p. 262)

Since there was only one God, they then theorized that anything not from this one God was a fallen angel, which applied from the highest Olympian God, to the smallest fountain nymph. Of course, this naturally included the dæmones of the pagans. From this, we later on adduced that ``demon'' was really just slang for ``fallen angel, the inhabitants of Hell.'' In "Church History", Mar 2001, Vol. 70 Issue 1, p19" an article appears by David Brakke which illustrates the ponit:

"(It) may seem instinctually right to attribute the monastic interest in demons to the lower sophistication and pagan backgrounds of many Egyptian monks ("folklore"), demonology-that is, sustained theoretical reflection on the nature and activities of demons--was an intellectual endeavor that engaged the interests of precisely the philosophers who functioned as spiritual guides in antiquity's elite academic milieu. Within the Egyptian tradition, Origen and the Valentinians most extensively developed understandings of how demons challenged the person attempting to make spiritual progress."

"In Antony's teaching, elements of Origenist and Valentinian thought are most apparent as demons emerge as principles of differentiation resistant to the ascetic's return to an original unity of "spiritual essence." In the Letters of Ammonas, we are able to observe a monastic teacher creating a demonology that responds to crises in the spiritual development of his disciples and that justifies one form of the monastic life as superior to others. Stressing the need for complete isolation in one's cell, Paul of Tamma considers demons to have been rendered weak by the power of God; human beings represent a far greater danger to the monk's virtue."

"In its basic elements Antony's demonology is indebted to that of Origen. All created beings, including angels, heavenly bodies, human beings, and demons, originated in a lost unity, from which they fell due to their "evil conduct." Antony speaks of the resulting diversity of creatures in terms of the "names" that God assigned to them--archangel, principality, demon, and the like--based on the quality of their conduct, and thus Antony echoes Origen's discussion of such names in Book I of First Principles. The devil and his demons, "since their part is in the hell to come," plot against human beings: "they want us to be lost with them." Their means of attack are diverse, and thus monks require "a heart of knowledge and a spirit of discernment" to recognize their "secret evils"

Other authorities, such as the The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th ed., 2000, p. 10759, relate how late it was that demonology actually popped up.

"In general, the more civilized pagan societies came to consider demons as powerful, supernatural beings who lacked the dignity of gods and who, depending on the circumstance, might be either benevolent or malevolent in their dealings with men. Some demons, like the Greek Pan, were nature spirits; others were guardians of the home or fields or watchers over travelers; still others were spirits of disease and insanity or dream spirits. Some demons were considered to be intermediaries between men and the gods. It was not until the development of late Hebraic and Christian thinking that demons came to represent the unqualified malevolence so common in European demonology of the 16th and 17th cent. This period was a high point in the study of demons, in the speculation on their nature, number, and specific fiendishness. The list compiled in 1589 by a demonologist named Binsfield was considered to be highly authoritative"

There's some other facts that have to be taken into consideration for the development of demons. It appears that demons may have had real life counterparts. They were motivated by racist and nationalistic propaganda.

History Today, Feb 2000 v50 i2 p. 45, "Monsters and Christian Enemies" by Debra Higgs Strickland:

"Interestingly, Ethiopians were often idealised as a pious and `blameless' people in the writings of the ancient Greeks, such as Homer. But in European Christian eyes, Ethiopians were monstrous' principally owing to their black skin, which was considered a demonic feature. Black was a colour associated with evil, sin, and the devil, especially in patristic writings. For example, in another vivid Christian application of the physiognomical theory, St Jerome stated that Ethiopians will lose their blackness once they are admitted to the New Jerusalem, meaning that their external appearance will change once they become morally perfect.

On a far less spiritual plane, black African physiognomical features were considered ugly by white European Christians, who often compared black people to apes or demons. For example, Marco Polo, writing near the end of the thirteenth-century, had only this to say of the inhabitants of Zanzibar:

"They are quite black and go entirely naked except that they cover their private parts. Their hair is so curly that it can scarcely be straightened out with the aid of water. They have big mouths and their noses are so flattened and their lips and eyes so big that they are horrible to look at. Anyone who saw them in another country would say they were devils....."

Pejorative images of Jews abound not only in illuminated manuscripts but also in public art, including monumental sculpture, wall painting, stained glass, and liturgical objects. It may be assumed, therefore, that nearly everyone saw this imagery, which formed part of a much larger literary, political, and theological propaganda campaign designed to discredit both Jews and Judaism.....

A depiction of Saracens (Muslims) warring against Christian knights from a fourteenth-century copy of the Romance of Godefroi again reveals the consistency with which Christian artists portrayed non-Christian enemies with distorted physiognomy and dark skin as a sign of their rejected status. The Saracens in this image are identifiable by their characteristic headbands. Their shields and trappers feature profile Ethiopian heads and wild boars, which to contemporary viewers were equally evocative of wild savagery. "

This now gives us an idea of what the basis for demons was, which was racism and ethnocentricity. Other reports give the same basic details, 1. To be fair, it wasn't just racism, but anytime a group needed to be properly villified, the important key for scapegoating, the word demon popped up and they were now scourges which needed to be relinquished from the Earth.

"Fear is an artist -- a sculptor -- a painter. All tribes and nations, having suffered, having been the sport and prey of natural phenomena, having been struck by lightning, poisoned by weeds, overwhelmed by volcanoes, destroyed by earthquakes, believed in the existence of a Devil, who was the king -- the ruler -- of innumerable smaller devils, and all these devils have been from time immemorial regarded as the enemies of men... Of course these devils were all made by the people, and in these devils we find the prejudices of their makers. The Europeans always represent their devils as black, while the Africans believed that theirs were white."

Robert Ingersoll, "The Devil"

What this made happen was a whole elaborate pantheon of "demons", who entered into a new study of "demonology". A "demon" had a far range of names and meanings, since it was just anything that was outside of the Christian Bible. This took the form of people who would write about the details of hell, and more importantly, the inhabitants. Also included were lists of ways to summon them, or to coerce them into doing your bidding. Some of these authors said they were doing this for the service of good Christians, so that they might know whom their enemies were. More of them were motivated by greed, they would use ritualistic magick to get the use of the powers of a demon.

The sources proceed to built upon each other, and became highly detailed. Within these texts, traditions, and grimoires, we find out there's an elaborate hierarchy in Hell. It was filled with a rigid caste system of Dukes, Counts, Grand Dukes, Presidents, Chancellors, and other assorted authority figures. We find in this hierarchy a structure that would rival the infrastructure of even the most rigid of authoritarianism systems. All of these beings were given very specific names, descriptions, habits, habitations, and purposes. For whomever was going into the realm of demonology, there was a specific demon to chose from, not only in purpose, but in ranking and power. You could pick one for divination, one for getting the girl of your sexual fantasies, and still another one for finding treasure. For virtually any purpose you could think of, there was a demon that was just right for your magical utilization and level of demonstrable power.

A fact that will become important later on is that in the early part of the Middle Ages, the Church was skeptical of demonologists, and the traditions of ritual magick. However, they did not deny the existence of demons or any other part of mythology, after all, their earliest saints and martyrs obviously did, but they were suspicious of anyone claiming supernatural powers. The Church thought that anyone who spent their time trying to conjure demons, consort with them, and gain their powers needed to be carefully supervised. However, so long as they weren't heretics, (going against the Church), and gave money to God and the Church for performing these acts, the Church was entirely happy.

Strangely though, this started to change once the Middle Ages gave way to the Renaissance; especially as inquisitors and other authorities who were already familiar with the traditions of ritual magic, began to have to deal with the supernatural practices of peasants in remote, backward areas. The usual case would be something along the lines of hexing your neighbors goat. This kind of rural folklore and superstition persisted even in the USA in the 1950's. A more recent case may be made by a girl getting suspended from school because her teacher was sick, and the teacher blamed the girls use of magick. For what are considered to be fairly obscure reasons, discussed a bit in later chapters, Churchmen began to actually believe these claims to magickal powers; which, within the orthodox Christian paradigm scheme, could only be explained by the actions and considerable effects of the various demons.

This was the beginning of the "Burning Times", an European episode of strange proportions, which was a shameful and criminal episode, though the amount of people actually killed has been greatly exaggerated. (Reliable estimates range from 50,000, the low-end, to 300,000, the high end, with about 100,000-150,00 being the most often agreed upon denominator). This created a golden era of demonology where everyone formulated books to talk about the enemy, what his followers did, etc. Gradually, society became more and more well-educated, and the people started to lose their interest in demonology. There's more to this story than what I've just discussed, but I'll leave that to later chapters.

The most intriguing aspect of demonology is that it is full of asserted facts, all of which are incredibly detailed, and consistent between books, yet there is no basis for it whatsoever. So how did all of this come together? A good portion of it was because these people were actually academics, and they knew and read each others' work. Some simply from being familiar with the material, others from direct copying, made it work into an easy pattern of repetition between books. Another is the fact that most of it was just a reinterpretation of pagan schema's, the overall design kept the same only with that "demonic" twist added to it. I.e. a water nymph in paganism wouldn't end up becoming the Grand Duke of hell. However, more interesting than all of that is the basic fact that a large portion of it was just made up arbitrarily.

For anyone who is interested in learning how this works, you have to observe and study poets, junk scientists, UFO junkies, politicians, role-playing gamers, Alternate World Books, vampire books, conspiracy theorists, demonologists, and people in similar areas that require the knowledge to know how to properly make things up, and how to successfully borrow from others writings. It has been said that, "Good writers are inspired by the best, Great writers steal from the best." We find in this a common and repeated pattern within all of the various workings throughout our time and the ancients. Even what were considered to be the "oldest" of writings were just indited accounts of popular verbal stories.

Equally important to this equation is understanding what happens after these things have been put forth, and how the ideas then spread, (or sometimes fail to), among the members of the relevant community. In fact, even when new information is put forth, if it is not spread through the community at an effective rate, the old idea will stay hang around and it'll become a myth. This is why this book ironically has been written, because many things which have been exposed in other books are still being passed about. Likewise, understanding this helps explain why rumors and other useless trash is well-known, but real information seems very hard to get from people.

We have now examined minor traces of the history of angels and demons, and where they came from. Now, we shall get to the heart of the matter before elaborating more on history.Within the Platonist tradition, "every daimonion is something between a god and a mortal" (Symp. 202E). This would seem to display the idea that a "demon" is an intermediate rank, located somewhere between God and man. In the Bible, we are left with this curious notion.

1 Corinthians 6:2-3 "Do ye not know that the saints shall judge the world? and if the world shall be judged by you, are ye unworthy to judge the smallest matters? Know ye not that we shall judge angels? How much more things that pertain to this life?"

The implication here would seem to say that even though Angels are of higher ranking in terms of power/might, humans rank higher in terms of God's worth. The Christian authors used the word pneuma to do describe this. Roman authors also found that they had a problem in trying to find the correct word for this creature. Cicero used the word lares, (defied ancestors) in substitution for daimons, and Apuleius used the word "genius" (a guardian angel) for the word daimon. Because of the reoccurring difficulty in determining what exactly could be used to connect the word "daimon" with other known words, Apuleius decided the wisest idea would be to change the word to "daemon" and "daemones". He uses this word 120 times in his writings.

Dr. Franz Winkler's "For Freedom Destined":

"In ancient times the secrets of man's true nature, and of the forces that determine his fate, were contemplated in the great temple universities of paganism all over the civilized world. Though men were fully aware of the important role that heredity plays in the shaping of the physiological and psychological organism of a human being, they did not think that the innermost core of the human being was the product of purely biological forces. This innermost core, called by the Greeks the entelechy or daemon of man, was credited with qualities unique to the individual, apart from the characteristics of the body he inhabited. The concept of entelechy corresponded roughly with the Judaeo/Christian concept of an immortal soul."

Ancient History, the Biblical Days:

Now, what we obviously find here is an extreme difficulty in expressing the differences between ideas in the supernatural. Everyone had a different idea of what the "supernatural" was, (obviously, supernatural meaning "above natural" or above what we can perceive), so the constant wall of problems that later scholars had to deal with was describing things, "in Biblical terms", when it obviously was referring to more than one set group of ideas and beings. To look even further, we must look into the civilizations that inhabited Mesopotamia and Syria. These two locations shaped the concepts of demons and the devil most directly.

As is typical of mythology, it is mostly aetiological, (or etiological), that is to say, the ancients had to figure out why something was happening. In the case of demons, that was the ancients trying to figure out what caused you to get sick, weak, etc. In the history of what causes diseases, we see gods and demons (Mesopotamia), evil thoughts from the enemy (Egypt), sin in a previous life (India), and lack of Harmony with the universe (China). Since it is fairly obvious that the most influential group upon Hebrew traditions is Babylonian, at least prior to the Persians, that's where we shall start.

The "demons" of Mesopotamia were generally mean spirits, but they were also lower than the actual gods in both dignity and power. Though they were generally evil, they also could be very beneficial. The Babylonians had an established ranking system, which distinguished the rank and purpose of the spirits. Demons were created by the gods with human bodies and animal/bird heads. They could be either evil or good. Monsters were a mixture of animals and birds. The demons were thought to be generally mean, but they were only that way because of a lack of other things to do. It seems a bored demon was the thing to be scared of most. The demons personified some force of nature in several cases, while in others, they seemed to be the sort of thing that a child draws from his nightmares. In the Mesopotamian tradition you could find Utug, the Dweller of the Desert waiting to take you away if you wandered to far; Telal, the Bull Demon; Alal, the destroyer; Namtar , Pestilence; Idpa, fever, etc.

There were demons for every occasion, just like in the Middle Ages. There were spirits for plagues, graveyards, nightmares, headaches, and many other common problems. One of the most frightening ones was Lilitu or Ardat Lili, the Mesopotamian prototype of Lilith revamped in later Jewish rabbical thoughts, who would roam around at night attacking men as a succubus, or by drinking their blood.

"From time immemorial, man has felt himself to be confronted with evil supernatural beings, and his weapon against them has been the use of magical rites. Spirits lurked everywhere...Night was ruled by demons of evil, of the desert, of the abyss...But the sages of ancient civilizations knew also that good spirits existed, ever ready to come to the rescue of the afflicted..."

Kurt Seligmann, The History of Magic And The Occult

To defeat Lilith, another demon Pazuzu, would be placed with a talisman enchantment, and he would run her away. Pazuzu himself was far from friendly, a personification of the harsh south winds, whose roar would shake mountains, (think of a wind blowing really hard and the sound it makes.)

Another prominent figure in the development of the Western structure of the demons was the Zarathushtra in Iran, right before the 600 BCE mark. The idea that they had was the duality in existence, that evil manifests itself as a principle separate from the "divine" or good. Zoroastrianism is recognized as the first religion to promote duality in existence, that there are two independent principles of separate origins, from which we get "good" and "evil". From this, we derive the idea that because everything that exists is not from one principle, (what most religions would call "God"), neither principle has absolute power, thus "good" and "evil" are on equal footings. This was actually somewhat of a sacrifice play.

By giving up the idea that God was omnipotent, Zoroastrianism did preserve the belief in the absolute benevolence of God, a problem Christianity has never tackled. The original clash that brought this about was the conflict between the ahuras, the Elder Gods, and the Daevas. In Iran, the ahuras overthrew the daevas, and the leader of the ahuras became the High God. The High God was named "Ahura Mazda" the God of Light. Meanwhile, the daevas were dropped down to the lowest rank, transforming into an evil spirit, (what we now call a demon), and they became minions of Ahriman, the Lord of Darkness. The daevas had to lose their superior position obviously, if Ahura Mazda was to be made to the level of the "Supreme God". As author Gerald Messandé in :"The History of the Devil" puts it: "The framework of the three monotheisms [Judaism, Christianity, Islam] had been erected. The Devil's birth certificate was filled out by an Iranian prophet."

(This type of "carnality" in turning older religions into new ones is rather common in most religions. All the big ones, Hinduism, Christianity, Zoroastrianism, Islam, and Judaism, have this central theme of vilifying other deities to support their new pantheon, or monotheism in these cases. It's the easiest way to gain converts. Simply declare another religions good gods your evil gods.)

Even though there were various systems of demonology predating the Greeks, they were the first to question the origin, nature, and exist of evil, in the strictest philosophical terms. These questions were posed based upon their myths and legends, most of which were strongly derived from the ancient Eastern cultures nearby. There was not much distinction at this time between "Theos" (God) and "daimon" in the writings of Homer. More important than that, there was a lack of any singular dictated principle having the attachment of "evil" to it, so what would be attached to this role, and should anything even be attached to this role?

The only principles of either good or evil at this time of mythology are dictated from Zeus, the one God. All the other Gods, or "lesser" Gods, were manifestations of him. More important than the pantheistic design, was the recognition of the fact that all the Gods displayed varying amounts of both good and evil qualities in their myths. Even further than that, they both possessed ouranic (heavenly) and chthonic (underworld) characters, the latter being more often associated with evil. Brenk notes that in Homer's Odyssey, "the daimon acts very much like a god, except that it tends to be unidentifiable and evil".

The big question must be asked then. "How did the impersonal and powerful force in Homers epics become the evil demon of modern times?" As Brenk points out, the concept of a supreme power ruling the World had become firmly establish by the time of the early Imperial period. What was left over was an extreme multitude of Gods and Goddesses, all of whom had to be placed in a specific category and hierarchy. As in the earlier case of Zoroastrianism and the battle between the ahuras and the daevas, the lesser divinities had to be relegated to the ranks of daimones, which was now associated with a lesser spirit between mankind and the Gods.

When we turn towards Homer's writings, we find that a "daimon" has no visible shape, mind, or history. This Homeric "daimon", which can affect the mind and dreams, can be responsible for either good things or bad things. The exact usage of this is defined in later literature periods.

The first of these periods is directly after Homer (Circa 800 BCE), where Hesiod writes about the five successive races of mankind: The golden, silver, the bronze, the heroic, and the iron. He states that the "golden races" live in the form of "benevolent daimons". This golden race is a specific privilege given to them by Zeus. Hesiod further establishes a ruling order, upon which he placed the Olympian Gods at the highest realm. The stream then trickled downhill, with the good spirits of the "upper order" followed by the bad ones of the lower order. The Greeks worshipped all of these groups, and for good reason. They figured they could place blame on the spirits of the lower order, thereby exonerating the Gods and demons who belonged to the "Good" side of the pantheon. A Platonist from the First Century C.E. states that Hesiod was the first to distinguish between the daimones and the Gods, and the very first to distinguish between the good and bad ones. The two depart ways in theological ways after this, because Plutarch believed that daimones are really the souls of those who died.

Another important addition by Plutarch is that he made the introduction of demons as an intermediary. Plutarch states in his dialogue, "On the Cessation of Oracles" that the Gods all communicated through daimones. These daimones could then punish the guilty, sustain the oracles, and supervise sacrifices. Most of this came from the "Symposium" in the Platonic texts, which states that a daimon is an intermediate spirit. To add a little bit of math to the equation, (what good gematria lover couldn't have a little math?), Xenocrates states that a geometrical expression can be used in the realm of the daimones. He said that an isosceles triangle is related to the intermediate nature of the daimons, and this idea was very much enjoyed by Plutarch, who had tons of lunar demonology.

Plutarch further asserted that the great oracles of the ancient world were losing their power and prestige. He said that the gods are not responsible for the oracle shrines, but rather, the minor deities (daemons), who grow old and die after many centuries. In order to prove his theory, Plutarch tells the story about the death of the Great Pan, a famous and powerful daemon:

"As for the death of daimones, let me relate the words of a person who was not at all gullible or given to sensationalism. The father of Aimilianos the orator, whom some of you heard, was Epitherses, a fellow citizen of mine and my schoolteacher. He said that once while about to sail to Italy, he embarked on a freighter heavily burdened with passengers and goods. Around evening as it approached the Echinades Islands, the wind dropped and the ship began to drift near the Paxoi. Almost everyone was awake and some who had finished eating were still drinking wine. Suddenly from the Isle of Paxoi they heard a voice and someone calling out "Thamous," to the amazement of all. The name of the pilot, an Egyptian, was Thamous, but most on board were unaware of it. Twice he was called, but did not answer. But the third time he responded to the caller, who said, raising his voice, "When you get near Palodes, bring the news to them that the Great Pan is dead."

Epitherses related the astonishment of the witnesses, and their discussion on whether to obey the command, or avoiding unnecessary involvement, to leave the matter alone.

In these circumstances Thamous reached the conclusion that if the wind kept up, he would sail past quietly, but if there were no wind and the sea were calm, he would report what he had heard. As he got near Palodes, with neither breath nor swell, Thamous stood on the stern, and facing land said the words just as he had heard them: "The Great Pan is dead." He barely got the words out of his mouth when an enormous groan was heard, not just of one person, but of a multitude, mixed with cries of surprise. Since quite a few were present, the word quickly spread at Rome, and Thamous was summoned to the Emperor Tiberius, who was so convinced of the account that he became interested in learning about Pan. The classical scholars at the court, who were numerous, thought it most probable that he was the son of Hermes and Penelope."

This inquiry into the specific nature and concepts of evil continued on for many centuries, with great thinkers such as Plotinus, Porphyry, Iamblichus, and so on. It was through philosophical reflection that a general view of good and evil was obtained. Moral evil was viewed as a "transgression of proper limits" and it usually expressed itself as hubris, or arrogant pride. We can see this in the writings of St. Jerome equating Lucifer to evil, for the exact same thing.

The development of ancient demonology led to the development of the concept of the Devil. Originally, the daimones were morally ambivalent, sort of like the gods. Then they were separated into two different groups, one having a higher order of good daimones, and a lower order of evil daimones. Eventually, the semantic change led to a vocabulary change and the good spirits were called angels and the evil spirits demons. Finally, the lower and the upper daimones started having specific categories, so there was an angel and a demon for everything. This systematic demonology developed in the New Testament and it became a part of the European tradition.

Now, we come to the greater question. "What are the demons and who is the Devil?" Russell states that:

"The Devil is a metaphor. Even as such he is not to be dismissed, for we have no access to absolute reality and must always rely upon the metaphors that our minds manufacture from sense observations, reason, and unconscious elements". (2)

If we therefore state and demonstrate that demons and the Devil are only metaphors or personifications of evil, then there must be an alternative way of understanding evil. These metaphors have not worked, since, as the Gnostics astutely asserted long ago, people like to turn events known only in the science of their religion, and turn them into an easy to identify story. (The story of Jesus from the Essenes, versus the story of the New Testament). These overly literal personifications have been detrimental for the most part, serving only as a shield from the conflicts of society in the higher order and processes. Metaphor is a fancy slang for myth, and as David Leeming, Campbell, and Jung point out, not understanding our myth's is at our own peril. "It is no good casting out devils. They belong to us, we must accept them and be at peace with them" D.H. Lawrence (British Novelist), Pheonix, 'The Reality of peace'.

(2: Russell, in order to edge himself out from controversy I'd imagine, has taken absurd lengths to criticize Satanism and in particular, the Temple of Set. He knows, very well, that his work is anti-Christian and that it paints a stronger image for Satanism than against it. His information on the Temple of Set is highly inaccurate and misleading, and was firmly rebutted by Michael Aquino. He also stated several inaccurate things about the Church of Satan as well.)

Angels and Demons, two sides to the same coin. .

Okay, what we now must realize is where the idea of angels and demons came from. What we must establish is that the Hebraic idea for angels and demons didn't come until much, much later than the Bible would have us believe.

It is impossible to speak of the "Jewish" religions without knowing the tremendous influences that the Assyrian, Canaanite, and Babylonian empires played upon it. So, now that we know this, let's look a bit more into demonology. It should be noted for this discussion what I am referring to as "demons" were not actually called "Demons", it was more of a vague and general reference to spirits at large. These spirits later on became determined as what was a "demon" and "angel".

The very first ideas in these old religions dealing with Demons, is the notion that demons are part of an animalistic belief system. These tainted traces can be found through the speaking serpent, which has speech, mentality, and a purpose, in Genesis III. Nowhere is it mentioned that this serpent had anything to do with Satan, or rather, the "idea" of Satan. Also the anointing that Jacob placed on the stone, to which he attributed his wonderful dream, the narrative in Numbers 22: 22-34 presupposes a belief in the vocalized power of animals, through the narrative that gives speech to an otherwise mute animal. The entire Assyrian and Babylonian religions are full of demonism. The Ionian religion divided its spirits into good and bad classes, and to these classes and groups, names were given. Though the group that a "demon" belonged to was given a name, the actual "Proper" demon was not given a name.

It's not until later on that these demons become so individualized that they received individual names. This appears in the Hebrew representation, where the early writings depicted demons without any proper names or classes. (For instance, the unnamed "evil spirit" which tormented Saul, I Samuel 16: 14-15, and the "evil spirit", which came by divine commission between Abimelech and the Shechemites, Judges 9: 23).

From here, we find the mysterious angel of "Satan". At this time and representation, the devil apparently belonged to God's company, or at least was admitted to his presence. We'll discuss this later, (the subject is on demons and angels, not Satan specifically yet). The next two personified spirits we run into are Azazel, and Asmodeus, who emerge as personified spirits, who possessed names only in the late (post-exilic) literature, greatly influenced by the Persians.

Turning to the Arabic religions, demons swarmed in the regions of air, earth, and water, constantly lying in wait, lurking for the unwary. The magic and incantations of Arabic folklore are of the same level and lucidity as those of Babylonia, where the belief in demonology is easily found.

The characteristics that the demons took on where much like the demons of the in the other areas. These beings possessed powers which were greatest during the nighttimes, and they were responsible for all different kinds of problems of the flesh. They caused disease, famine, aberration of the mind, perverseness. Through their mastery of the atmosphere they cause storms, through their power over water they bring floods, they enter the bodies of human beings, and particularly, women and children, causing fatalities in child-bearing and infancy. They could be kept at bay by using a variety of rituals, including the use of drugs and herbs, and by incantations and charms. (The later Jews used the shema, "Hear, O Israel" of Deuteronomy 4 as a protection).

Yet in spite of all this, they may be welcomed by the individual, and become so at home in this person that he virtually becomes one of them. In accordance with their perceived perverse nature, the demons were usually found residing in places that were shunned by normal people. They were found throughout the deserts, in ruins and cities destroyed by enemies, graveyards, in miasmatic morasses, and places of equal social placement. The demonology exhibited by both the Old and the New Testament exemplify this type of personification, with people who are social outcasts being possessed by demons, some of whom have the ability to predict the future.

The most numerous references to demons appear in the periods following depressions, whenever a natural disaster has struck, causing an enforced contact with the demonism of the Babylonians, Persians, and the invading Arabs. To the intelligent observer shifting through all these references, it again becomes apparent that the exact connotations of the spirits become hard to intelligently discern from the rest. These spirits were regarded as "Not of flesh and blood" Ephesians, 6:12, yet they ate, drank, reproduced, and could be wounded and/or killed. They had the same overall carnality that mankind had, filled with lusts and passions, (Tobit 6:14).

In certain respects, they were above the powers of the mere mortals, in that they could transform themselves into various shapes, and even pose as angels of light, (they're just that good), II Corinthians 9, 14. What are usually not talked about are their origins. They came down as elemental spirits in the common belief of the people, and their number is added to, as the souls of the dead become regarded as malignant. When angelology developed, the angels that were then considered "fallen" were added onto the number of the demons. So, from this, we see that in the early portion of the Hebraic religion, the demons are not accounted for, but in the later books, especially the Book of Enoch, the demons are largely derived from this episode.

In Genesis 6: 1-4, we gain the first conceptions of fallen angels. Although this idea is not specifically cited in the Bible, this is the general assumption. In this same region, demonology developed pari passu with angelology. What developed from this was a demonarchy with Satan, which featured archdemons, the equivalent of archangels, at the godhead, who were opposed to the hierarchy of God and his archangels. This idea left its traces in some of the Eastern literatures.

The word daimon was introduced into the Biblical sphere through the Septuagint as a translation of the two Hebrew words sa'ir (pl. se'irim) and shedh (pl. shedhim; cf. Assyr. ahedu). The other word bearing likeness to this was the Greek "daimon", originally a word showing neutral signification. It is also found in Se'irim and Phoenician inscriptions, and possibly Shedhim. In the etymological link for this word, it is thought to be connected with "Shaddai", one of the patriarchal names for the various Canaanite Gods. It also lends itself to the Arabic sa'id, sayyid, " lord ").

In Isaiah, 8: 21, regarded as exilic or later, the reference is to the desolate site of Babylon; where repulsive creatures and dancing se'irim are to abide. The conception is evidently that of hairy goat-like creatures, not unlike the satyr or Pan of Greek myth. Some variations of the rabic jinn are also represented as having something along the lines of the same form (Wellhausen, Heidentum, pp. 151-152). This representation is a parallel reflected in Isaiah 34: 14, also exilic or postexilic, in which the sa'ir cries " to his fellow", in Edom, which has become a waste inhabited by wolves and by the night monster, the literal translation amounting to a "Night-hag". Traces of ancient demon worship are found by the passage Leviticus 17: 7, which forbids sacrifice to the se'irim, here mentioned as the objects of worship.

What exactly this worship is would be hard to determine. Throughout popular lore, demons could be controlled and used for their masters wishes, (hence the popular genie/djinn of the lamp), but that's only one possibility. It may also have been simple aversive, the desire to avoid the wrath of these spiritual creatures. By giving specific offerings, their retributions could be avoided. It is significant that the purpose of the entire passage is to proscribe sacrifice in " the open field ", apart from the dwelling-place. This may mean the desert, or any one of the other numerable fields where evil spirits were assumed to abode.

Similar in purport is Deuteronomy 32: 17, where the fathers are said to have sacrificed to ahedhim, and in which case sons and daughters were the offerings presented. It is questionable whether these two cases are mere invidious comparison of false gods to demons (W. von Baudissin, in Hauck-Herzog, RE, vi. 4), since this comparison is not met again for several centuries, possibly not until apostolic times. (Which raises up the question of how late Deuteronomy was actually written).

The entire provenience of the passages, and the ideas connected, are best suited by the supposition that offerings thereof are from an aversive character are here referred to. That it was not the heathen deities being called demonic names, but actual demons, which were conceived as objects of worship. The possible renascence of totemistic practices (probably under the influence of Arabic immigration) suggested by Ezekiel 8:10, and Isaiah 66:17 is in favor of this conclusion.

Lilith is one famous persona who found its' way into the Bible. There can be no doubt of the Babylonian origin of this word. The god of Nippur was known as En-lil, " lord of spirits " (see BeBrroxie, VII., 2, § 2), and the Assyrian Ulu, lilutu had the signification "spirits." The Semitic lilatu, " night," may be compared, and the female "Lilith" is named in the cuneiform inscriptions as an attendant of 4. Other ones are Namtar, the deity of plagues (see Hebrew Beayr.oxra, VIL, 2, § 8). In the late Demonic literature, "Win" means "female", and Lilith herself bears no slight part in the legend. She was conceived as living in the desert whence she emerged to make her attacks. A kindred conception is that of Proverbs, 30:15.

Azazel is the name of a demon whose home is in the desert, whose character and aims are opposed to those of Yahweh. The name has not yet yielded to investigations on the aide of Hebrew philology, and is unique as being the one element of this character entering into the ritual of the Hebrews, probably from Persian contact.

Asmodeue, mentioned as Tobit, is either derived from Persian sources, or is a literary imitation of a Persian conception. Heylel , the " day star, fallen from heaven," is interesting as an early instance of what, especially in pseudepigraphy literature, became a dominant conception,, and one that was of fallen angels. Naturally, I'm begging the question because almost all of the Old Testament is pseudopigraphy, but I'm referring to the later period of it.

The Septuagint translates by daimonia the elilim of Psalm 95:5 (A. V. and R. V. " idols," R. V. margin " things of naught "), probably rendering aright the conception of the author of this late psalm. It is not improbable that behind the "pestilence" and "destruction" of Psalm 91:6, there are animistic conceptions of mischief-working demons, and that they are not mere personifications. A belief closely akin to that in demons is referred to in the obh, " familiar spirit," of I Sam. 28: 7. This is in direct line with connecting the belief of the early Hebrews, which is that the surrounding nations are the teraPhim), the best explanation of which relates them to ancestral spirits that are sought among the graves (cf. Deut. 26:14).

Etymologically connected with teraphim is the word rephaim, " giants," and this again connects the Hebrews with the beliefs of other peoples who speak of earlier inhabitants of their land as still remaining, though in the shape of elves, dwarfs, and fairies. (Unless you want to translate that whole Nephilim story literally). In the Assyrian tongue the words utukku and ukimmu designated both a class of demons and also the spirits of the dead, and they are compared with zaki*u, " wind," the recalling the " spirits " mentioned above as unclassified (cf. Heb. rush). The idea which underlies that of the rephaim is insubstantiality, and ruhim becomes a late Jewish word for demons. The Hebrew popular belief in demons is attested further by the many injunctions against sorcery which appear in the legislative and prophetic utterances. In ethnic custom, one of the universally employed means of averting the harmful action of demons is the use of the magic word or act. The fact that the people needed this admonition so constantly speaks more strongly for the abiding belief in demons than the few specific references which are found.

In "The Anchor Bible Dictionary", we find this about Satan being influenced by the Persians:

"To summarize, it is clear that references to *satan*, either by that name or by a surrogate, are much more extensive in apocryphal/pseudepigraphical literature than in the OT. More than likely, exposure to Persian religion and its Zoroastrian-based dualism provided some of the stimulus for the more pervasive demonology in these Jewish writings."

Islam Theology

Djinn, Genie, Jinn, Jann, Jinun, jin, jan, Genii, whatever, were believed to be creatures that are half-human and half-demon, existing from pre-Islamic times. In the earliest mythos, they were various spirits of nature that caused madness in humans. They have several similarities with humans, they could reproduce, they have the same bodily needs, and they die. Although they die, their (natural) life span is longer. The Arabic word "jinn", which translates into the word "spirit", is usually used to convey the image of neutrality. They were originally spirit guardians, somewhat the Arabian equivalent to European faeries, made from either fire or air. God gave Djinn a soul, whose final disposition is dependent upon the choice made by each Djinni.

Some of the jinni serve Allah, while others do not. Here I would like to quote the Qu'ran,

"Some of us (Djinn) are righteous and some of us are otherwise; we follow different ways. We know that we cannot frustrate Allah's design in the earth, nor can we frustrate it by flight. When we heard the call to guidance, we believed in it."

The Arabs believed that the jinni would usually take the form of an ostrich, or would ride on one of them. Jinni's can do either good or evil, and are mischievous. In myth's, they often enjoy punishing humans for doing things against them, even unintentionally. From this, accidents and diseases are usually considered to be their handcrafts. They are made of either fire or air, and can assume either animal or human form. They are almost everywhere, in inanimate objects, air, animals, flame, under the Earth, in human form, possessing a human, etc.

As mentioned above, Djinn have souls and can accept salvation or side with evil. Some Djinn are very devout Muslims, and are said to be rulers of land under a human overlord. More strict forms of Islam hold the Djinn in suspicion, due to their magical nature and secrecy. The djinn were also the chasers of the sun, an ancient Babylonian belief in worship of Allah and his consort Allat, where they would do a pilgramage and throw rocks to chase away the demons/djinn from the sun.

Lucifer and other odd things:

Lucifer is one of those interesting things in the Bible that no one really knows how it got there, so much puerility must be imployed to counteract it. The original name in Greek for "Lucifer" was "Phosphor", both meaning, "Light-bearer", or "Bringer of light". This is perhaps the most clumsily woven part of the Christian story. Phosphor is the personification of the morning star, and it is also he who "brings in the day".

Another name is "Phosphoros", from the Greek words phôs (light) and phoros (bearer). It is from this meaning that the element, phosphorus, gets its name.

Here's some references to Phosphor.

"O morning star, farewell!
My love I now must leave;
The hours of day I slowly tell,
And turn to her with the twilight bell, --
O welcome, star of eve!"
Sweet Phosphor bring the day,
Whose conqu'ring ray
May chase these fogs, --- sweet Phosphor bring the day

Quarle's rendering of Psalm xiii.

Fairest of stars, last in the train of night,
If better, thou belong not to the dawn ---
Sure pledge of day, that crown'st the smiling morn
With thy bright circlet ! --- Morning Hymn.

What is actually being talked about is the Planet Venus. Another Greek God of the same origin is that of Hesper, or Hesperos. He was the god of the Evening Star (the Planet Venus). He was depicted as a white-winged god crowned with a starry oreole - a male version of Astraia. In vase-paintings usually only his face was shown shining in the heavens. With Phosphor and Hesper, we need to understand this.

"'The Eosphoros (Dawn-bringer, i.e. the Morning-star) and Hesperos (Evening-star) are one and the same, although in ancient times they were thought to be different. Ibycus of Rhegium was the first to equate the titles." -Greek Lyric III Ibycus Frag 331 (from Scholiast on Basil, Genesis)

One source which does talk about this more fully is John J. Robinson in "A Pilgrim's Path", p. 47-48 explains:

"To find the answer, (to why Lucifer, a Latin name is in a Hebrew Bible), I consulted a scholar at the library of the Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati. What Hebrew name, I asked, was Satan given in this chapter of Isaiah, which describes the angel who fell to become the ruler of hell?

The answer was a surprise. In the original Hebrew text, the fourteenth chapter of Isaiah is not about a fallen angel, but about a fallen Babylonian king, who during his lifetime had persecuted the children of Israel. It contains no mention of Satan, either by name or reference. The Hebrew scholar could only speculate that some early Christian scribes, writing in the Latin tongue used by the Church, had decided for themselves that they wanted the story to be about a fallen angel, a creature not even mentioned in the original Hebrew text, and to whom they gave the name "Lucifer."

Why Lucifer? In Roman astronomy, Lucifer was the name given to the morning star (the star we now know by another Roman name, Venus). The morning star appears in the heavens just before dawn, heralding the rising sun. The name derives from the Latin term lucem ferre, bringer, or bearer, of light." In the Hebrew text the expression used to describe the Babylonian king before his death is Helal, son of Shahar, which can best be translated as "Day star, son of the Dawn." The name evokes the golden glitter of a proud king's dress and court (much as his personal splendor earned for King Louis XIV of France the appellation, "The Sun King").

The scholars authorized by ... King James I to translate the Bible into current English did not use the original Hebrew texts, but used versions translated ... largely by St. Jerome in the fourth century. Jerome had mistranslated the Hebraic metaphor, "Day star, son of the Dawn," as "Lucifer," and over the centuries a metamorphosis took place."

Lucifer was one of the most beautiful stars in the sky, but in the language of Isaiah, what was meant was that Lucifer always comes before the Sun, or it signals the sun's "chariot', per mythology.

"Erigenia [Eos] bare [to Astraios] the star Eosphorus (Dawn-bringer), and the other gleaming Astra (Stars) with which heaven is crowned." -Theogony 378

"And as a star moves among stars in the night's darkening, Hesperos, who is the fairest star who stands in the sky." -Iliad 22.317

"Hesperos, bringing everything that shining Eos scattered, you bring the sheep, you bring the goat, you bring back the child to its mother. [Hesperos] the fairest of all astera (stars)." -Greek Lyric I Sappho Frag 104

"We waited for the Dawn-Star (astera meinamen), air-roaming (aerophoitas), white-winged (leukopteryga) fore-runner of the sun." -Greek Lyric IV Ion of Chios Frag 745.

David Grinspoon, Venus Revealed, p. 17, tells us that: "The origin of the Judeo-Christian Devil as an angel fallen from heaven into the depths of hell is mirrored in the descent of Venus from shining morning star to the darkness below. This underworld demon, still feared by people in many parts of the world, is also called Lucifer, which was originally a Latin name for Venus as a morning star."

SATAN:

Gene D. Matlock, India Is the Real Jewish and Christian Holy Land, lays out a somewhat interesting charge. Traditionally, most of the development of Satan is claimed in the realm of the Egyptian/Mesopotamian lands. He claims that India is the real home of it all.

"Satan Was Really a Saintly Indian King. In Chapter II, I explained that Satana was in reality a Gujarati city-state that lost a war to the Seunas or Zionists. The name of this city was probably derived from that of a Jaina king and founder of a small Jaina sect. We are wrongly taught that a holy man named Mahavira founded Jainism. He was in reality a later reformer. Jainism itself existed millenniums before Mahavira was born. No one really knows exactly when Mahavira lived. I believe that he achieved his enlightenment around 1000 B.C. Some years after his death, a pious Jaina king named Satan-ikas (Satan of Kasi?) began expounding his own version of Jainism. He succeeded in getting only 11 converts. They distinguished themselves from other Jainists by wearing blood-red robes and occasionally bull-horn headresses. Because the sect was (and still is) so very small, it was probably rejected by Jainists as demoniacal and heretical. In those days, the different Indian sects often fought one another, as, indeed, their non-Indian descendants do even today. Over the centuries, this saint and his red clothing evolved to the red-colored monster that the TV preachers use to scare fanatical Christian fundamentalists and convince them to unload their bank accounts and wallets.

The following are the "evil" teachings that this "Satan" used to ensnare innocent victims:

If Satan-ikas were to return to see what he has become in the minds of Baptist preachers and Jehovah's Witnesses, he'd truly be saddened to learn that he is remembered as The Great Tempter - the man that everyone loves to hate. The preachers need not worry much. Very few people have ever fallen into the clutches of Satan-ikas.

"The Sanskrit/Kashmiri word for "devil" is exactly as in English: dev-il (condition of being a devil). The amazing similarities between English and Sanskrit prompted Indian historian A. K. Mazumdar to write, "English is essentially Rig-Vedic Sanskrit in disguise." (The Hindu History; p. 349.) (3)

Like most cases, whether something was "from India" or "from Egypt" is still a raging debate, but though there may be a somewhat small link in India, the real link in this case is greater in Egypt. However, let's not make the mistake of believing that the current Satan is one figure. In reality, he's a system of characters from across the globe, a conglomeration of Sumerian to Greek and apocolyptic Jewish beliefs. The first, and most important, was from Egypt, where he was called Set. The name for Set was "Set-Anup" or "Set-An". Some scholars have even derived the name Satan from Set-Hen, a cult title meaning the Majesty of Set. I don't believe the Set-An, Set-Anup theorems, for simple reason. The worship of Set, or perhaps, more appropriately, the idea of what Set was, transformed under the Chaldean empire to the worship of "Shaitan", moving from there, we get the name "Satan", by easiest linguistic derivations, while retaining the same meaning. It's perhaps possible to postulate that Set-Hen or Set-An was the original term used, which then transformed to the Akkadian language, but I think that a direct link is hard to find. The Set-An connection might carry-over in Chaldean, as the name Seth with the syllable "an", from Chaldean "ana", or heaven, makes "Satan". This wouldn't be surprising in early Egyptian tradition.

In any case, the actual name "Shaitan" means "to oppose, to accuse", the same definition given for "Satan" in modern terminology. The God Shaitan was a dragon. Another spelling of Shaitan is sheitan; and in the Arabic language, it's Shaytan. In Islamic myth, this is an unbelieving class of jinn ("spirits"). It is also given as the name of Iblis, the devil, when he is performing demonic acts. In the system of evil jinn, outlined by the Arab writer al-Jahiz, the shaitans are identified simply as unbelieving jinn. Folklore, however, describes them as exceptionally ugly creatures, either male or female, capable of assuming human form, even though their feet always remain hooves. They eat excrement and use disease as their weapon. They are said to exist on the borderline between light and darkness. Indian and Syrian shaitans are described as the strongest of their class. The exact nature of the shaitans, however, is difficult to determine. Historically, among the pre-Islamic Arabs, they functioned as familiars, or Greek daimons, providing inspiration for soothsayers and poets.

(3: That was based on somewhat outdated phonological methods, however.)

In the stories of Solomon, the shaitans seem to be no more than particularly knowledgeable jinn. In the Qur'an, however, they assume the role of devil, an obvious borrowing from Judaic tradition. While they are not necessarily evil, they belong to the hordes commanded by Iblis, the devil, who is also called in Arabic ash-Shaytan. Together, he and the shaitans whispered evil suggestions into men's ears, but had no real power over men. It is said that they are as close to men as their blood, but the shaitans can only tempt, and their success depends on their ingenuity.

(Footnote 1: Gregory Herek, Religious orientation and prejudice: A comparison of racial and sexual attitudes. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 13, 334-44., Michael Argyle, Psychology and religion : An introduction, Karen Armstrong, The Gospel according to woman : Christianity's creation of the sex war in the West. List taken from an article provided by Daniela Kramer).