SATAN & EVIL 

     The idea that evil infiltrates a creation deemed "good" and a humanity – declared "very good" – is resistant to simple explanation. To this day there is scholarly debate over whether Genesis should be framed with an emphasis on "evil" at all. On its face, there doesn't seem to be a singular answer to the question of the origin of evil in Genesis. Here, as with other matters, the scripture offers the possibility of different explanations. If what we see in the serpent is evil incarnate, then it is significant that God made it emerge from within God's created order. This conundrum has generated millenia-long theological debates because of Genesis 1 and 2's unequivocal assertion that God's created Order is “good” in every respect. And the biblical opposite of "good" – Chaos – appears as pre-existent material that isn't destroyed but transformed and controlled by divine partition. God limits Chaos, but doesn't banish it. The first creation of light does not banish darkness forever, but is distinguished from it and controlled through regular alternations of day and night. So how do we understand biblical evil?

Whatever may be said theologically, we have to consider the possibility that is may not the best point of departure for interpreting Genesis 2–3. The narrative logic of the Eden story could be suggesting that the snake is simply one of the animals, with what it insinuates in its conversation a narrative device to externalize what was already in her mind as she considered the tree and its fruit. As for the man, God gives him a command that he already appears to possess the capacity to ignore. In Hebrew, it is possible to understand the phrase “good and evil” (tov va-ra) as a "merism:" a figure of speech whose opposite extremes imply everything between them. Whereas the Hebrew ra ("evil") could be conflated with the Latin yfil – the Middle English word from which we derive the English evil –  its original Hebrew meant, more simply and colloquially: bad – without the dark moral overtones for which the modern "evil" is virtually unique. Historically, though, Christian theologians have been indifferent to the moderating possibilities this translation might offer. 

The meaning of ra (רַע) at its core is simply the opposite of "good" (tov). Depending on context, ra can mean "wickedness," "harm," "misfortune," "trouble," or "hurt"— it doesn't always imply moral depravity, but often something simply negative or undesirable. This is important because "bad" does not necessarily suggest a motive or an adversary – a "bad" harvest or "bad" accident doesn't have an antagonist—but evil does. The Hebrew ra on its own does not and did not have the demonic connotations that our "evil" has in English. Here's an example of much tamer usage:

This theological framework left no room for an independent source of evil outside God's sovereignty. Pre-exilic Israel did not embody all evil in a central figure. In the entire Old Testament there is no figure like this – even the śāṭān. Israelites would have been willing to recognize the serpent of Genesis as a possible representation of an evil influence but would not have seen this single being as the source of all evil. In fact, the author of Genesis seems to intentionally underplay the role or identification of the serpent. This may in fact be a deliberate choice if the serpent is meant to be evoke the oceanic associations of a disempowered Chaos⇆Dragon like Tiamat. 

It is a striking fact that nowhere in the Hebrew Bible is any serpent referred to with the word most likely to describe it: a rāša‘, or, "wicked creature." Where rāša‘ is applied to people in the scriptures it is characteristic of arrogance, pride, and vainglorious bluster. They are brazen, insolent, derisive, and contemptuous of others. They plot evil even in bed and scheme against the innocent. They are enamored of injustice and deliberately pervert the administration of justice by means of bribery. Their speech is deceitful and duplicitous, mendacious, fraudulent and treacherous. They abuse another’s friendship, repaying good with hate. One might think this would be the epithet applied to the serpent in Genesis. But it's not. 

The serpent is instead described as "cunning" (‘ārūwm). In the Bible, people characterized as ‘ārūwm conceal what they feel and what they know (Prov 12:16, 23). They esteem knowledge and plan how to use it in achieving their objectives (Prov 13:16; 14:8, 18); they do not believe everything that they hear (Prov 14:15); and they know how to avoid trouble and punishment (Prov 22:3; 27:12). They are shrewd and calculating, willing to bend and torture the limits of acceptable behavior but not to cross the line into illegalities. They may be unpleasant and purposely misleading in speech but are not out-and-out liars (Josh 9:4; 1 Sam 23:22). They know how to read people and situations and how to turn this to their advantage. A keen wit and a rapier tongue are their tools. And although a few characteristics of the evil person (rāša‘) are similar to those of the shrewd one (‘ārūwm), the two are not the same. By describing the serpent as ‘ārūwm, the Genesis author was signaling to the audience to attend carefully to the use and misuse of language in the story that is about to follow; to scrutinize closely what is said and what is omitted.

Which is all to say that the serpent offering the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil has a wide range of interpretive possibilities, and it would be a mistake not to acknowledge them amidst the thrilling expediency of seeking Satan in the serpent of Genesis. 

A Short History of The Śāṭān

In the earliest strata of the Old Testament, the śāṭān – meaning "the Adversary" or "the Accuser" – is a title, not a name. This linguistic distinction is crucial for understanding Satan's original function in biblical theology. Surprisingly, "the śāṭān" was a role given even to “the Angel of the Lord” in Numbers 22:22 (∼500 BC). Even more jarring, where the Book of Samuel depicts God in anger against Israel inciting David to carry out a census (2 Sam. 24:1; ∼630 BC) the Chronicle's post-Exile revision of the same passage changes this account to read "Śāṭān stood up against Israel, and incited David to number Israel" (1 Chronicles 21:1; ∼400 BC). The earlier Book of Job (∼600 BC) presents the Divine Council of God with Yahweh as sovereign ruler surrounded by angels (called "sons of God") participating in the governance, judgment, and execution of divine decrees. The śāṭān is one of these angels. He is God's prosecutor, whose job it is to question and test the faith of humanity (Job 1–2; Zech 3:1–2). Job's portrayal presents the śāṭān as an integral part of this divine administration—a quality control agent provocateur, of sorts, who plants oppressive ideas in mortal minds. The Book of Zechariah (∼520 BC) similarly depicts the śāṭān standing before the Angel of the Lord to accuse Joshua the High Priest, further reinforcing this prosecutorial role. Notably, only in 1 Chronicles 21:1 does the Old Testament use "Satan" as a name without the definite article of "the" before it, marking one of the first steps in Satan's gradual transformation from role to personality. 

The first time a character corresponding to our modern definition of "the devil" appears is in the (extra-biblical) Book of Noah (6th century BC), which typified the growing apocalypticism and ethical dualism on the rise during the Babylonian Exile. During this time of foreign occupation and cultural exchange Jewish theological concepts underwent substantial evolutions in their interactions with Persian and Greek thought. New origins of evil were proposed that starkly contrasted with that of the human origin of sin in Genesis. The Book of Noah is one such story, presenting a supernatural origin of evil in which humanity appears more as a victim than a transgressor. 

The story tells of a group of angels, led by one named Asa'el or Semeyaza, who descend to earth to marry human women. From these unions, monstrous giants (the nefilim of Genesis 6) were born who preyed on humanity. God imprisons the fallen angels and their leader in the underground darkness. The giants devoured the resources of the earth and then cannibalized each other, but their immortal souls remained on earth as demon spirits. In this way the Book of Noah explained the origin of demons without attributing their creation to God.The leader of these rebel angels is the first "dim image" of the devil, and the text as a whole constitutes the first instance of these radically new ideas that had infiltrated Jewish thinking, including the belief in a soul destined for judgment after death, with different fates for the just and unjust—a departure from the traditional Hebrew concept of Sheol, the underworld where all souls went unjudged. 

The serpent-as-Satan theory also gained prominence during this time. Other devilish figures emerge, like Belial (another name for Satan), the "angel of darkness" and "spirit of wickedness" who opposed the "prince of light" and "spirit of truth." There was a growing tendency to view Satan as the leader of forces opposed to God. The Book of Enoch (∼250 BC), also features elaborate angelologies of the fallen angels and their leader. And it is there in 1 Enoch where we find the first explicit connection of the serpent to a spiritual entity. The first time he shows up, though,  it isn't Satan but instead the fallen angel Gadriel who "leads Eve astray." Perhaps more surprising are the traditions that associate Gadriel and not Satan with the introduction of sin into the world. Gadriel's name means "wall of God" or "God's fence," which still draws upon the themes in Genesis of violating divine boundaries. These stories were in dialogue with each other. Gadriel would instruct humanity in weapons, armor and warfare – yet another Genesis theme connected to the Fall and the Chaos cascade into war and Death. This is also an echo of the progression from Eve to Cain (the first murderer) to Tuval-Cain – Cain's seventh generation descendent and creator of the first weapons of war. This Hebraic genealogy is significant because the number seven is understood to signify "completion," and Tuval's verb form (metavel) means "the one who perfects." Thus the ancient Jewish sages understood Tuval-Cain to be "Cain Perfected" – the one who "perfected the arts of Cain." 

The earliest “Eve is to blame” explanation doesn't show up until a century later, in the pre-Christian apocryphal book Ecclesiasticus (180 BC), also known as Wisdom of Jesus Ben Sirah). Ben Sirah was a sage from Jerusalem who dismissed the rebel angel myth, writing that when an impious person curses Satan, he is only cursing himself. For Sirach, "Satan" is merely a metaphor for humanity's own evil instincts, and death is a consequence of Eve's sin, not a devil's actions. This was the common Jewish view, and such alternative origin stories of evil faded from Jewish writings after the first century CE, even as they remained popular in growing Jewish-Christian churches. 

The Israelite evolution of understanding evil had begun in the eighth century BC, when the prophet Amos insisted misfortune comes only from God. This was an anti-polytheistic polemic that negated the power of demons. Two centuries later Ezekiel and Genesis's "P" source radicalized Amos's view, reducing all evil to divine punishment for breaking the Law, acknowledging demons and reinterpreting impurity as a neutral, created force that became evil only through human transgression. But that posed a challenge to strict monotheism, because darkness and evil would then be outside God's creation. Writing around this time, Second Isaiah addressed this by declaring that God created darkness as well as light (Isa. 45:7). This safeguarded monotheism but raised the problem of God creating a negative element. 

During the century before Jesus's birth, Jewish interpretations of evil had been influenced for hundreds of years by Persia and Greece. Essene Jews were now proposing that from the beginning God had created two opposing spirits: a prince of light and a prince of darkness. The devil was a being created evil by God, given power over all who are assigned to his dominion – a radicalization of Second Isaiah's teaching that God is the creator of darkness. Later texts continued to refine this interpretation. 

With the Wisdom of Solomon (∼50 BC) we see the earliest explicit link between the serpent and Satan, making him the archetype of Death, and attributing sin to humanity's "distorted thoughts". The apocalyptic literature from this time solidifies Satan's identity as God's cosmic adversary and the ultimate source of evil in the world. A century later, when the New Testament's earliest writings were being composed (∼50 CE), Satan had acquired numerous titles previously unknown in earlier Jewish tradition. These included "the devil" (diabolos), "the evil one," "ruler of this world," "prince of the power of the air," "Beelzebub," and "god of this world." This proliferation of titles indicates Satan's expanded role in the cosmological understanding of early Christianity. The Gospels portray Satan as the tempter of Jesus (Matthew 4), the opponent of God's kingdom, the source of sickness and demonic possession, "a murderer from the beginning" and "a liar and the father of lying." In Revelation, Satan is depicted as "the great dragon," "that ancient serpent," and "the deceiver of the whole world." The early church will come to refer to him as the Enemy of God, the Black One and the Arch-Fiend.

Notably, in Revelation 12:10, his identity as the prosecutor general of the divine courtroom is reemphasized – he is "the accuser of our brothers and sisters, who accuses them before our God continually" – which Jesus had resurrected to reappropriate as contrast to his Holy Spirit, which he describes as the parakletos – "the advocate" – otherwise known as "the counsel for the defense." It can also be translated "one called to the side of another," "helper," or "comforter," but the allusion is clear. The Holy Spirit defends against the spirit of accusation and condemnation, interceding and testifying on behalf of the children of God. While Satan seeks to condemn as prosecutor, Jesus represents his Holy Spirit as the defense counsel.