1-1 A History Of The Devil And Satan In Old Testament Times
To begin at the beginning. The words Satan, Devil, demon, Lucifer, fallen
angel etc. simply don't occur in the whole of the book of Genesis. Throughout
the Old Testament, the one and only God is presented as all powerful,
without equal and in no competition with any other cosmic force. The Old
Testament makes it clear that any 'adversary' to God's people was ultimately
under the control of God Himself. All Angels are spoken of as being righteous
and the servants of God, even "Angels of evil / disaster", who
may bring destruction upon sinners, are still God's Angels carrying
out His will and judgments. God's people Israel initially held
this view; but as has so often happened to God's people, they mixed their
true beliefs with those of the world around them. The very early Jewish
rabbis spoke of the human tendency to evil [yetser ha-ra] and
the tendency to good [yetser ha-tob]. This tendency to evil they
understood as being at times personified or symbolized by "the devil":
"Satan and the yetser ha-ra are one" (1). But those
early Jewish rabbis rejected the idea that angels had rebelled, and they
specifically rejected the idea that the serpent in Genesis was satan.
At that time, "the Jewish devil was little more than an allegory
of the evil inclination among humans" (2). It is noted by the editor
of Dent's edition of the Talmud that neither the Talmud nor the Midrash
(the Jewish interpretations of the Law of Moses) even mention Satan as
being a fallen angel (3).
Surrounding Canaanite Myths
It's
been truly observed: "The Satan of later imagination is absent in the
Hebrew Bible" (4). "The early stage of Israelite religion knows no
Satan; if a power attacks a man and threatens him, it is proper to
recognize YHVH in it or behind it" (5). The Old Testament teaches that
God is all powerful, with no equal; sin comes from within the human
mind. Never is there any indication of a battle between Angels, and
Angels falling from Heaven to earth. Indeed, the Biblical record at
times makes allusions to the surrounding myths about a personal Satan
[or his equivalent] and deconstructs them. The ancient near East was
full of stories of cosmic combat, e.g. Tiamat rebelling against Marduk,
Athtar the rebel; they are summarized at length by Neil Forsyth (6).
The Old Testament stands out from other local religions by not teaching such ideas. And further,
there are a number of Biblical passages which allude to these myths and
show them to be untrue. Take Psalm 104, full of allusions to the Ninurta
myth. But the inspired writer stresses that it is Yahweh and
not Ninurta who rides a chariot "on the wings of the wind";
Ninurta supposedly struggles with the Satan figure who is in the "waters",
but in Ps. 104 it is shown that Yahweh does with the oceans or
tehom (cognate with the Akkadian Satan figure Tiamat) just what
He wishes- He's in no struggle (7). Job 26:5-14 has a whole string of
allusions to popular Canaanite myths of cosmic combat; and the point of
the passage is that Yahweh is so far greater than them that effectively
they don't exist. Thus "The Shades writhe beneath Him [a reference
to Mot, writhing as a serpent]... he strips naked Abaddon... stretches
Zaphon... by his power he stilled the Sea [a reference to the god Yamm].
By his cunning he smote Rahab. By his wind the heavens are cleared [a
reference to the Labbu myth, in which the dragon is cleared out of Heaven],
his hand pierced the twisting serpent". Compared to Yahweh, those
gods have no power, and they have been effectively 'cleared out of heaven'
by Yahweh's power- they simply don't exist out there in the cosmos (8).
Although the Gospel records do use the language of the day, it should
be noted that implicitly, Jesus is working to correct the wrong understandings.
Thus in the storm on Galilee, which would've been understood as the machinations
of the Devil, Jesus tells the sea to "shut up" (Mk. 4:37-41),
in the same terms as He told the demon to "shut up" in Mk. 1:25.
He addressed the sea directly, rather than any dragon or Satan figure.
The well known 'Lucifer' passage in Isaiah 14 is another relevant passage,
as we consider in section 5-5.
This passage is about the rise and fall of the King of Babylon- the words
satan, Angel and devil don't occur there at all. But the likening of Babylon's
king to the morning star suggests parallels with the Canaanite myths about
Athtar, the "shining one, Son of Dawn", who goes up to "the
reaches of Zaphon" to challenge king Baal, and is hurled down. Surely
Isaiah's point was that Israel and Judah should worry more about the King
of Babylon, keep their eyes on realities here on earth, rather than be
involved with such cosmic speculations which were obviously familiar to
them. It was the King of Babylon, and not a bunch of cosmic rebels, who
were tyrannizing God's people. The Babylonian power invaded Israel from
the north, down the fertile crescent. And yet "the north" was
associated in pagan thinking with the origin of the gods of evil (9).
The prophets were attempting to steer Israel away from such a fear by
emphasizing that the literal, human enemy and judge of Israel for their
sin was to come from the literal north. They were to quit their cosmic
myths and get real, facing up to actual realities in human life on earth.
This is why Ezekiel speaks of the Kings of Tyre and Egypt in language
very reminiscent of the myths about Tiamat, Mot etc.- they were to be
caught like a dragon [tannin, cp. Tiamat], cut up and bled to
death (Ez. 29:3-5; 32:2-31). Again, the point is to refocus Israel away
from the mythical beings and onto actual realities here on earth.
Situated as it is at the crossroads of so many cultures, Israel inevitably
was a state open to influence by the surrounding nations and their beliefs.
Despite so many prophetic calls to keep their faith pure, they were influenced
by the beliefs of those around them, especially with regard to other gods
and the common idea of a god of evil. These influences are summarized
in the table below.
Supernatural Beings And The Common Christian View Of Satan: Shared Aspects
(10)
Supernatural being |
Source |
Relation to Deity |
Frightening appearance |
Abode |
Association with death |
Feared by humans |
Battle or trickery involved |
Humbaba |
Mesopotamia |
Appointed by Enlil to guard Cedar Forest |
Giant monster |
Dar Cedar Forest |
Breathes fire and death |
Feared by all |
Battle with Gilgamesh |
Mot |
Canaan |
Son of El |
Demon |
Underworld god |
God of death |
Feared by all |
Baal must subdue him |
Habayu |
Canaan |
El sees Habayu in a drunken vision |
Horns and tail |
Underworld |
Connected with cult of the dead |
Feared by all |
Defiles El with excrement and urine |
Set |
Egypt |
Son of goddess Nut and god Re |
Head of black jackal-like animal; forked tongue, tail |
Storm god; dwells in scorching desert |
Associated with desert heat and death |
Feared by all |
Murders Osiris through trickery |
Ahriman |
Persia |
Uncreated |
Fearsome demon |
Underworld god |
Causes death and destruction |
Feared by all |
Perpetual battle with Ahura Mazda |
Hades |
Greece |
Son of Zeus |
Odious and ugly; fearsome |
Underworld god |
Brings death to the land; lives in land of the dead |
Feared by all |
Kidnaps Persephone and takes her to underworld |
Common Christian view of "Satan" |
|
One of the sons of God |
Horns, tail, ugly etc |
Commander of hell |
Causes death and destruction |
Feared by all |
Battles Jesus for the Kingdom; fought with other Angels |
The gods of evil in many of these ancient cultures had horns, and this
would explain where the idea of a horned Devil figure came from. Nowhere
in the Hebrew Bible is the Devil spoken of as having horns- clearly enough,
it was an import from surrounding paganism.
Deconstruction Of The Myths
The
ancient Near East was full of beliefs that the sea was somehow where
the Satan figure lived; the sea was nearly always identified with a
personal god of evil (11). The ancient Canaanite myths saw the sea as
being in revolt against the Creator. The Ugaritic texts feature Baal in
battle against the Prince of the Sea and the Judge of the River. The
Old Testament has a huge number of references to Yahweh's control over
the sea- it begins with Him gathering the waters together in obedience
to His word. "He placed a bound for the sea which it cannot pass"; and
there are is a very wide range of terms used to describe the seas /
waters under His sovereign control: "the deep", "the ocean-deep", "the
depth", "the mighty waters", "the majestic waters", "the many waters"
etc. All these are portrayed as under His control and total
manipulation at His whim- seeing He is their creator.
The
Egyptians perhaps more than any believed in the waters, especially of
the Nile, as the source of good and evil. God powerfully deconstructed
this by enabling Moses to turn those waters into blood- i.e. to
effectively slay whatever deity was supposed to live in the Nile, and
then to revert the water to how it had been (Ex. 4:9). This was surely
to demonstrate that whatever deities were associated with "the waters",
Yahweh was greater, and could slay and revive them at perfect ease. The
record of the Red Sea destruction is instructive in this regard. Later
Scripture identified the Egyptians and not the sea itself as "Rahab...
the dragon" (Is. 51:9; Ps. 89:9.10)- whereas the common view was that
the sea itself was the Satan figure. Moses' stress was that the real
adversaries / satans to Israel were people, and not some mythical
dragon figure. Even if such a figure existed, then Yahweh had destroyed
him at the Red Sea, in that He clearly could manipulate the Sea at His
whim. The conflict was between Israel and Egypt, God and Pharaoh- and
not God and some dragon in the Sea. Habbakuk, perhaps writing in a
context of Israel being influenced by pagan ideas about the Sea god,
stressed that at the Red Sea, God thrashed and "trampled Sea with your
horses" (Hab. 3:8,12,15)- as Marduk supposedly trampled the storm god,
so Israel are being told that in fact Yahweh is the one who trampled
the "Sea" god- and other Scriptures confirm this- Yahweh "Trod on the
back of Sea", i.e. the supposed Satan figure called "Sea" (Job 9:8; Dt.
33:29; Amos 4:13; Mic. 1:3; Is. 63:3). Even if such a being existed, he
had been destroyed for good by Yahweh at the Red Sea. "You split Sea...
cut Rahab in pieces... didst pierce the dragon" (Ps. 78:13; Neh.
9:11;Is. 51:9-11). Thus the splitting of the Red Sea was understood as
a splitting of the Satan figure or god known as "Sea". Several scholars
concur in the need to read the references to "Sea" in this way (12).
All this was what Moses had in mind when he sought to explain to his
people what had happened at the Red Sea- even if there were such a
being as the "Sea" god of evil, Yahweh their God had totally destroyed
him and split him into pieces. And the real 'satan' was Egypt, real men
on a real earth who posed a danger to Israel. "Thus the best known of
all ancient Near Eastern myths, the myth of the chaos-dragon, is no
longer understood as the primeval conflict between the deified forces
of nature, but as Yahweh's victory over Egypt in his delivering his
people from slavery. In a radical sense, myth is transformed in the Old
Testament... Yahweh wages war against all the forces which seek to
assert their independence over against him, whether they be the evil
propensities of the heart of man, or the nations' claim to sovereignty,
or the pride and power of the earthly kings. The world of demons is
relegated to a position of only minor importance, and in contrast to
other Near Eastern religions, man is delivered from the fear and dread
of its destructive power" (13). This was and is what is so unique about
the one true faith, from Genesis to Revelation. The world of demons and
supernatural Satans becomes irrelevant, effectively non-existent,
because of Yahweh's amazingly powerful involvement with His people. The
Bible begins early on with the comment that "God created the great sea
monsters" (Gen. 1:21). The sea was perceived in surrounding mythology
as the habitation of 'Satan' like creatures and gods. And right at the
outset of Biblical history, the point is being clarified that whatever
monsters are in the sea, God created them and is in control and they
are fulfilling His will. Hence Ps. 148:7 makes the point that the sea
monsters in the very deepest parts of the sea actually praise God. The
Hebrew Bible is as it were going out of the way to emphasize that any
such sea monsters were not part of any cosmic conflict against God;
created by Him, they praise Him and are as it were on His side and not
against Him.
In Digression 3 we'll see how one of the intentions
of Moses in the Pentateuch was the deconstruction of the Egyptian and
Canaanite myths about evil. The more we study the Old Testament, the more
apparent it becomes that this is in fact a major theme. Contemporary ideas
about Satan, demons etc. are alluded to and Israel are given the true
understanding. Take the well known command to Israel to wear a phylactery
as a reminder of the Passover deliverance from Egypt: "You shall
have the record of it as a sign upon your hand, and upon your forehead
as a phylactery, because by the strength of his hand the Lord brought
us out of Egypt" (Ex. 13:16 N.E.B.). Wearing a phylactery wasn't
a new concept; the idea "refers to amulets which were worn in order
to protect their wearers against demons" (14). So by giving this
command, Israel's God was showing His people that instead of being on
the defensive against demons, needing good luck charms against
them, they should instead replace these by a positive rememberance of
how Yawheh had saved His people from all the power of evil which was symbolized
by Pharaoh's Egypt. Rejoicing in His salvation and contantly remembering
it was intended to totally sideline the various false beliefs about demons
which were prevalent at the time.
Canaanite Dualism
Exploring
further, we discover that the gods of Canaan were in two broad groups-
good and evil. The Canaanites were dualists; they believed in Mot as
the god of the underworld, called "the angel of death" in the Ras
Shamra tablets, with various supporting monsters; over against all of
which was Baal as the god of the heavens. "The angel of death" is an
idea picked up by Moses in his account of the Passover deliverance, to
show that the Angel of death is not in fact Mot but an Angel of Yahweh,
completely under His control. For it was none less than Yahweh Himself
who slew the firstborn of Egypt (Ex. 12:11,12). Likewise it was
Yahweh's Angel who played the role of the 'Angel of death' in smiting
the Assyrian army dead (Is. 37:36). Mot was thought to have helpers,
dragons such as Leviathan who lived in the sea and rivers. Ps. 74:12-15
majestically disposes of this idea, proclaiming Yahweh to be the God
who has divided the sea, broken the heads of the dragons in the waters,
crushed the heads of Leviathan [he was thought to be a many headed
monster]. "The beasts that dwell among the reeds" of the rivers are
likewise "rebuked" by God's almighty strength (Ps. 68:30). God's hand
pierced the "crooked serpent", another form of the Leviathan myth (Job
26:13- the very phrase btn brh, the crooked serpent, appears
in the Ras Shamra texts). Notice how the past tense is used- these
beings, even if they ever existed, have been rendered powerless by God.
And of course the allusions are to what God did at the Red Sea, as if
to argue that His saving deliverance of His people is the ultimate
salvation which we should find significant.
The Old Testament describes Yahweh, the one true God, as riding through
the heavens on chariots to the help of His people Israel (Dt. 33:26; 2
Sam. 22:11; Ps. 18:10; 104:3; Is. 19:1; Hab. 3:8). But Baal was known
as the rkb 'rpt,
the one who rides upon the clouds (15). Clearly the language of Baal is
being appropriated to Yahweh. There's another example in Ps. 102:9:
"Behold your enemies, O Lord, behold your enemies shall perish; all
evildoers shall be scattered". This is almost verbatim the same as a
line on the Ras Shamra tablets about Baal: "Behold your enemies, O
Baal, behold your enemies you destroy, you annihilate your foes".
Likewise the references to Yahweh giving His voice from Heaven and His
enemies fleeing before Him (Ps. 18:13,14; 68:32,33) are references to
Baal supposedly being able to do the same, according to the Ras Shamra
texts (16). The Canaanites believed that thunder was Baal's voice as he
struggled; but it is Yahweh's voice which the Bible presents as
thunders. Jer. 23:27 laments that Israel forgot God's Name for that of
Baal- hence His appeal for them to realize that what they claimed for
Baal they actually ought to claim for Yahweh. This explains why the Old
Testament so frequently contains allusions to the Baal cult,
deconstructing them and reapplying the language of Baal to Yahweh.
This appropriation of pagan language and re-application
to the one true God is very common. Notice how Abraham did this; Melchizedek
spoke of his deity as "God most high" and "maker of heaven
and earth", and Abraham immediately picks these terms up and applies
them to his God, Yahweh (Gen. 14:19-22). Abraham sought to relate to Melchizedek
as far as he could in the terms and language which Melchizedek understood.
And this is what God does all through; the pagan language used to describe
both the good gods and the evil gods is picked up and applied to Yahweh-
in order to demonstrate that He was and is the one and only true
God, that He is responsible for all those things which the pagans
thought the other gods were responsible for. And this includes Yahweh
as source of both good and evil, blessing and disaster. Dualism was not
to be Israel's religion; their one God, Yahweh, was responsible for all.
But the pagan ideas were attractive; and thus all through the Old Testament,
the reminders are given. It would appear that whilst in captivity in Babylon,
the Jews returned to some of these myths. The Talmud records: "When
R. Dimi returned to Babylon he reported in the name of R. Johanan: Gabriel
will in the end of days arrange a chase of Leviathan" (17). Hence
I have elsewhere suggested that Isaiah and the book of Job were rewritten,
under Divine inspiration, in Babylon, along with many of the Psalms, in
order to correct these false ideas of Leviathan being a real creature
against whom God was somehow struggling.
All the allusions to Mot, Leviathan, Baal etc. are couched in terms of
God's victory over Egypt and His ultimate conquest of Babylon. God wished
to redirect attention away from these myths towards what He had concretely
done and will do in the salvation of His people from sin and concrete,
visible, human enemies, just as He had delivered them from their historical
enemies in the past such as Egypt. "In the Canaanite myths Baal smites
the Prince of the Sea and Judge of the River, the helpers of Mot, on the
head and on the neck" (18). This is precisely what we have alluded
to in Hab. 3:13,14, where Yahweh smites "the house of the wicked
[LXX "death"]" on the head and neck. But the mythical Satan
creatures are reapplied to death and "the house of the wicked"-
sinful men, whom Habakkuk's hearers personally knew; or death, the fear
of every man. Even through the mask of translation, the majesty of Cassuto's
argument on this point comes through well: "The Canaanite idea of
the victory of the god of the sky over the forces of death is transformed
among the Israelites into the concept of the triumph of the One God, the
ultimate Source of absolute good, over the principle of evil....the tradition
[wrongly] accepted by the Israelites regarding the defeat of the rebellious
creatures became a symbol of the punishment of the wicked, the foes of
the Lord and of Israel, and the delivery of the righteous" (19).
Cassuto
analyzed at great length the Ugaritic poem on Baal which was found in
the Ras Shamra texts. It describes the conflict between Baal and Mot;
and yet the Old Testament alludes to the language of the poem and
applies the characteristics of both Baal and Mot to Yahweh. Thus Ps.
68:5 speaks of Yahweh as the only Rider of the clouds, alluding to
Baal, 'the rider of the clouds'. Ps. 68:6 speaks of Yahweh as "father
of orphans and judge of widows"- another term applied to Baal in the
Ras Shamra texts. Cassuto perceived that the Old Testament is
deconstructing the pagan idea of a conflict between deities, and
instead speaks of the only essential rebellion as being of creatures
against their one Creator (20). Habakkuk 3 is full of allusion to the
Baal-Mot conflict poem. That poem speaks of how Mot and his fellow
monsters were cast into the sea by Baal, and this stanza is virtually
translated into Hebrew in Hab. 3:8: "Was Your wrath against the rivers,
O Yahweh, or your indignation against the sea, when You did ride upon
Your horses, upon Your chariots of victory?" (21). But the verse in
Habakkuk comes in the context of reflection upon Yahweh's victory over
Israel's enemies at the Red Sea. Thus the focus is being moved from the
legends about cosmic conflict between the gods, to Yahweh's victory
over real, tangible, earthly, human enemies of His people. Cassuto
comments: "In the Biblical verses the acts are attributed to the Lord,
whereas in the gentile poems they are referred to pagan deities" (22).
APPENDIX: Deconstruction
Deconstruction
is a term I'll be using often in these studies. The similarities
between the Biblical record and the surrounding myths and legends of
the contemporary peoples are being increasingly revealed. The critical
school likes to see in this evidence that the Bible is just another
myth, or is repeating pre-existing myths. My approach is that the Bible
is indeed alluding to the myths and legends which Israel would have
encountered, and showing which parts of them are true and which aren't;
and especially, showing the utter supremacy of Israel's God over the
supposed gods and demigods of other religions. The gods of the
underworld, whose characteristics were slowly merged into the classical
but mistaken images of 'Satan', are particularly singled out for
allusion and deconstruction. The point of all the allusions to them is
to deconstruct them and thus demonstrate their effective non-existence,
in that their function in human life is in fact in the hands of
Israel's God, Yahweh. Thus the Ninevites had grown up believing in
Divine heroes being swallowed alive by monsters and yet emerging alive;
and God chose to subvert that belief by making His man,
Jonah, appear alive out of the large fish in order to witness His Truth
to them. Viewed this way, the Hebrew Bible can be understood as an
extended appeal to reject pagan notions of 'Satan' figures. This theme
continues into the New Testament, whose language often alludes to
incorrect beliefs [not least in demons] precisely in order to
deconstruct them.
Stephanie Dalley has translated a text
titled "Erra and Ishum" (23), dated by its colophon to the time of the
Assyrian king Asshurbanipal. Erra was a name for the god of the
underworld. There are amazing similarities between this document and
the Biblical prophets, especially Nahum, who wrote in an Assyrian
context. Following are just a sample (page numbers refer to Dalley):
"Because they no longer fear my name... I shall overwhelm his people" (p. 290) |
Mal 1:6; Num. 14:11 |
"Woe to Babylon!" (p. 304) |
Jer. 50:27; Nah. 3:1 |
"How could you plot evil for gods and men?" (p. 301) |
Is. 45:5-7 |
"Nobody can stand up to you in your day of wrath!" (p. 310) |
Nah. 1:6 |
"Erra
became angry and set his face towards overwhelming countries and
destroying their people, but Ishum his counsellor placated him so that
he let a remnant." (p. 311) |
Ez. 6:8 etc. |
"The mountains shake, the seas surge at the flashing of your sword..." (p. 302) |
Nah. 1:5 |
"Bright
day will turn to darkness [before me]... I shall destroy the rays of
the sun; I shall cover the face of the moon in the middle of the night"
(pp. 292, 297) |
Am. 5:18; 8:9; Joel 3:15 |
"I shall sever the life of the just man... and the wicked man" (p. 298) |
"I will cut off from you both righteous and wicked" (Ez. 21:4) |
The
Biblical allusions to this language is to show that Israel's God, as
the one and only God, is the One to be feared, and not any god of the
underworld, or 'Satan' figure. This effective re-writing of texts
wasn't uncommon in the Biblical world. Wilfred Lambert has observed:
"...the ancient world had no proper titles, no sense of literary
rights, and no aversion to what we call plagiarism. Succeeding ages
often rewrote old texts" (24). And again: "The authors of ancient
cosmologies were essentially compilers. Their originality was expressed
in new combinations of old themes, and in new twists to old ideas.
Sheer invention was not part of their craft" (25). The Gilgamesh Epic
has been analyzed as evidencing "the adaptation of earlier works of
various genres, some of which are employed within their new literary
context in a manner contrary to their original intent" (26). The Bible
is doing the same- but under Divine inspiration. And my point
throughout these studies will be that it does so particularly with
reference to false, if popular, ideas about evil, sin and 'Satan'
figures. These ideas are alluded to, at times the language of the myths
about them is used and effectively quoted, in order to invert and
deconstruct those ideas. The text of the Hebrew Bible was initially
given by God for the guidance of His people Israel, a largely
illiterate group of people bombarded on every side by the myths and
legends of the societies around them. And God through His word was
speaking to those issues they faced, teaching them the true position,
and revealing those false ideas for what they really were. And so it
has been observed that "No one familiar with the mythologies of the
primitive, ancient, and Oriental worlds can turn to the Bible without
recognizing counterparts on every page, transformed, however, to render
an argument contrary to the older faiths" (27).
Notes
(1) Rabbi Simon ben Lakish in The Babylonian Talmud, Baba Bathra
16a.
(2) Joshua Trachtenberg, The Devil And The Jews (New Haven:
Yale University Press, 1943) p. 19.
(3) A. Cohen, Everyman’s Talmud (London: J.M. Dent, 1949), p.
55. The same fact is extensively noted in Roy A. Stewart, Rabbinic
Theology: An Introductory study (Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd, 1961),
pp. 81-5, 88.
(4) T.J. Wray and Gregory Mobley, The Birth Of Satan: Tracing The
Devil's Biblical Roots (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005) p. 52.
(5) Martin Buber, Moses (Oxford: Phaidon Press, 1947) p. 58.
(6) Neil Forsyth, Satan And The Combat Myth (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1989) chapter 2.
(7) This and other connections are developed in W.G. Lambert, The
Background Of Jewish Apocalyptic (London: Athlone Press, 1978).
(8) This is but a brief summary of the careful research of John Day,
God's Conflict With The Dragon And The Sea (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1985). See especially pp. 38,39. It is also the interpretation
of Marvin Pope, Job (New York: Doubleday) 1965 pp. 164-167.
(9) R.J. Clifford, The Cosmic Mountain In Canaan And The Old Testament
(Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1972).
(10) Taken from T.J. Wray and Gregory Mobley, The Birth Of Satan:
Tracing The Devil's Biblical Roots (New York: Palgrave Macmillan,
2005) pp. 92,93.
(11) Neil Forsyth, Satan And The Combat Myth (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1989) chapter 4 provides ample evidence of this.
(12) B.W. Anderson, Creation Versus Chaos: The Reinterpretation Of
Mythical Symbolism In The Bible (New York: Association Press, 1967)
pp. 98,99; F.M. Cross, Canaanite Myth And Hebrew Epic (Cambridge,
Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1973) pp. 132, 140; Marvin Pope, Job
(New York: Doubleday) 1965 pp. 67-70.
(13) James Muilenburg, The Way Of Israel (London: Routledge
& Kegan Paul, 1962) p. 45.
(14) R.E. Clements, Exodus [Cambridge Bible Commentary] (Cambridge:
C.U.P., 1972) p. 80.
(15) Umberto Cassuto, Biblical And Oriental Studies (Jerusalem:
Magnes Press, 1973) Vol. 1 p. 246.
(16) Cassuto, ibid pp. 251, 278.
(17) B. Baba Batra 74b-75a, quoted (along with other evidence
to this effect) in L. Ginzberg, Legends Of The Jews (Philadelphia:
Jewish Publication Society, 1909) Vol. 1 pp. 27,28; Vol. 5 pp.
43-46.
(18) Cassuto, op cit p. 268.
(19) Cassuto, op cit pp. 251,252.
(20) Umberto Cassuto, Biblical And Oriental Studies (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 1975) Vol. 2 p. 5.
(21) Cassuto, ibid p. 11.
(22) Cassuto, ibid p. 72
(23) Stephanie Dalley, Myths From Mesopotamia, Creation, The Flood, Gilgamesh, And Others (Oxford: O.U.P., 1991).
(24) W. G. Lambert & A. R. Millard, Atra-Khasis, The Babylonian Story Of The Flood (Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 1999) p. 5.
(25) Wilfred G. Lambert, "A New Look at the Babylonian Background of Genesis" in Richard S. Hess and David T. Tsumura, eds., I Studied Inscriptions From Before the Flood: Literary And Linguistic Approaches To Genesis 1 — 11 (Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 1994) p. 107.
(26) C. L. Seow, "Qohelet's Autobiography" in Astrid B. Beck, ed., Fortunate The Eyes That See (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995) p. 285.
(27) Joseph Campbell, The Masks Of God: Vol. 3, Occidental Mythology (New York: Viking Arkana, 1991) p. 9.
