A little while ago I delivered a lecture on "Superstition," in which,
among other things, I said that the Christian world could not deny the
existence of the Devil; that the Devil was really the keystone of the
arch, and that to take him away was to destroy the entire system.
A great many clergymen answered or criticised this statement. Some of
these ministers avowed their belief in the existence of his Satanic
Majesty, while others actually denied his existence; but some, without
stating their own position, said that others believed, not in the
existence of a personal devil, but in the personification of evil, and
that all references to the Devil in the Scriptures could be explained
on the hypothesis that the Devil thus alluded to was simply a
personification of evil.
When I read these answers I thought of this line from Heine: "Christ
rode on an ass, but now asses ride on Christ."
Now, the questions are, first, whether the Devil does really exist;
second, whether the sacred Scriptures teach the existence of the Devil
and of unclean spirits, and third, whether this belief in devils is a
necessary part of what is known as "orthodox Christianity."
Now, where did the idea that a Devil exists come from? How was it
produced?
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.
Along the banks of the Ganges wandered the Asuras, the most powerful
of evil spirits. Their business was to war against the Devas--that is
to say, the gods--and at the same time against human beings. There,
too, were the ogres, the Jakshas and many others who killed and devoured
human beings.
The Persians turned this around, and with them the Asuras were good and
the Devas bad. Ormuzd was the good--the god--Ahriman the evil--the devil
--and between the god and the devil was waged a perpetual war. Some of
the Persians thought that the evil would finally triumph, but others
insisted that the good would be the victor.
In Egypt the devil was Set--or, as usually called, Typhon--and the good
god was Osiris. Set and his legions fought against Osiris and against
the human race.
Among the Greeks, the Titans were the enemies of the gods. Ate was the
spirit that tempted, and such was her power that at one time she tempted
and misled the god of gods, even Zeus himself.
These ideas about gods and devils often changed, because in the days of
Socrates a demon was not a devil, but a guardian angel.
We obtain our Devil from the Jews, and they got him from Babylon.
The Jews cultivated the science of Demonology, and at one time it was
believed that there were nine kinds of demons: Beelzebub, prince of the
false gods of the other nations; the Pythian Apollo, prince of liars;
Belial, prince of mischief-makers; Asmodeus, prince of revengeful
devils; Satan, prince of witches and magicians; Meresin, prince of
aerial devils, who caused thunderstorms and plagues; Abaddon, who caused
wars, tumults and combustions; Diabolus, who drives to despair, and
Mammon, prince of the tempters.
It was believed that demons and sorcerers frequently came together and
held what were called "Sabbats;" that is to say, orgies. It was also
known that sorcerers and witches had marks on their bodies that had been
imprinted by the Devil.
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.
So, it was believed that people by the aid of the Devil could assume any
shape that they wished. Witches and wizards were changed into wolves,
dogs, cats and serpents. This change to animal form was exceedingly
common.
Within two years, between 1598 and 1600, in one district of France, the
district of Jura, more than six hundred men and women were tried and
convicted before one judge of having changed themselves into wolves, and
all were put to death.
This is only one instance. There are thousands.
There is no time to give the history of this belief in devils. It
has been universal. The consequences have been terrible beyond the
imagination. Millions and millions of men, women and children, of
fathers and mothers, have been sacrificed upon the altar of this
ignorant and idiotic belief.
Of course, the Christians of to-day do not believe that the devils of
the Hindus, Egyptians, Persians or Babylonians existed. They think that
those nations created their own devils, precisely the same as they
did their own gods. But the Christians of to-day admit that for many
centuries Christians did believe in the existence of countless devils;
that the Fathers of the church believed as sincerely in the Devil and
his demons as in God and his angels; that they were just as sure about
hell as heaven.
I admit that people did the best they could to account for what they
saw, for what they experienced. I admit that the devils as well as the
gods were naturally produced--the effect of nature upon the human brain.
The cause of phenomena filled our ancestors not only with wonder, but
with terror. The miraculous, the supernatural, was not only believed in,
but was always expected.
A man walking in the woods at night--just a glimmering of the
moon--everything uncertain and shadowy--sees a monstrous form. One arm
is raised. His blood grows cold, his hair lifts. In the gloom he sees
the eyes of an ogre--eyes that flame with malice. He feels that the
something is approaching. He turns, and with a cry of horror takes to
his heels. He is afraid to look back. Spent, out of breath, shaking
with fear, he reaches his hut and falls at the door. When he regains
consciousness, he tells his story and, of course, the children believe.
When they become men and women they tell father's story of having seen
the Devil to their children, and so the children and grandchildren
not only believe, but think they know, that their father--their
grandfather--actually saw a devil.
An old woman sitting by the fire at night--a storm raging without--hears
the mournful sough of the wind. To her it becomes a voice. Her
imagination is touched, and the voice seems to utter words. Out of these
words she constructs a message or a warning from the unseen world. If
the words are good, she has heard an angel; if they are threatening and
malicious, she has heard a devil. She tells this to her children and
they believe. They say that mother's religion is good enough for them.
A girl suffering from hysteria falls into a trance--has visions of the
infernal world. The priest sprinkles holy water on her pallid face,
saying: "She hath a devil." A man utters a terrible cry; falls to the
ground; foam and blood issue from his mouth; his limbs are convulsed.
The spectators say: "This is the Devil's work."
Through all the ages people have mistaken dreams and visions of fear for
realities. To them the insane were inspired; epileptics were possessed
by devils; apoplexy was the work of an unclean spirit. For many
centuries people believed that they had actually seen the malicious
phantoms of the night, and so thorough was this belief--so vivid--that
they made pictures of them. They knew how they looked. They drew and
chiseled their hoofs, their horns--all their malicious deformities.
Now, I admit that all these monsters were naturally produced. The people
believed that hell was their native land; that the Devil was a king, and
that lie and his imps waged war against the children of men. Curiously
enough some of these devils were made out of degraded gods, and,
naturally enough, many devils were made out of the gods of other
nations. So that frequently the gods of one people were the devils of
another.
In nature there are opposing forces. Some of the forces work for what
man calls good; some for what he calls evil. Back of these forces our
ancestors put will, intelligence and design. They could not believe that
the good and evil came from the same being. So back of the good they put
God; back of the evil, the Devil.