_Angels and demons_

...
CELESTIAL AND NONCELESTIAL FORMS: RELATIONSHIPS OF BELIEFS
IN ANGELS AND DEMONS TO VIEWS OF THE COSMOS
...
_Relationship to views of a tripartite cosmos._
In the biblical, Hellenistic (Greco-Roman cultural), and Islamic
worlds of thought, the terrestrial realm was a world in which
man was limited by factors of time, space, and cause and effect.
The celestial realm, generally composed of seven heavens or
spheres dominated by the seven then-known planets, was the realm
of the divine and the spiritual. The subterrestrial realm was
the area of chaos and the spiritual powers of darkness. At the
highest level of the celestial sphere was the ultimate of the
sacred or holy: *e.g.*, Yahweh, the God of Judaism, whose name
was so holy it should not even be spoken; Bythos, the unknowable
beginning beyond beginnings of Gnosticism; the heavenly Father
of Christianity, known through his Logos (the divine Word, or
Reason, Jesus Christ); and Allah, the powerful, the almighty,
and the sublime God of Islam.
In order to reveal the purpose and destiny of man -- the highest
being of the terrestrial realm -- the ultimate of the celestial
sphere enabled man, according to such views, to come to a
knowledge of who he is, what is his origin, and what is his
destiny through celestial messengers -- angels. The message,
or revelation, was usually focussed on the identity of the
source of the revelation -- *i.e.,* the ultimate being -- and on
the destiny of man according to his response. Because of a
cosmic rift in the heavenly sphere prior to the creation of the
world or the annoucement of the revelation, angels, depending on
their relationship to the Creator, might attempt to deceive man
with a false revelation or to reveal the truth about man's true
nature (or identity), origin, and destiny. Angels who attempted
to pervert the message of the ultimate celestial being in order
to confuse man's understanding of his present boundary situation
as a terrestrial being or his destiny as a superterrestrial
being -- though not always termed demons -- are malevolent in
function. Included among such malevolent angels are the devil
of Christianity and Judaism or Iblis (the Devil) of Islam, who,
in the form of a serpent in the biblical story of the Garden of
Eden -- according to later interpretations of the story -attempted to disrupt man's understanding of his creaturely
boundaries, or limitations. He did this by tempting man to eat
of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil so that
he might become like God (or the divine beings of the heavenly
court). In Zoroastrianism, the Evil Spirit (Angra Mainyu, later
Ahriman) attempted -- through subservient spirits such as Evil
Mind, the Lie, and Pride -- to deceive terrestrial man so that
he would choose a destiny that was subterrestrial -- punishment
in a chasm of fire.

In the aftermath of the 16th-century Copernican revolution

(based on the theories of the Polish astronomer Copernicus),
in which man's view of the cosmos was radically altered -*i.e.,* the Earth was no longer seen as the centre of the
cosmos but, instead, merely as a planet of a solar system that
is a very small part of a galaxy in an apparently infinite
universe -- the concepts of angels and demons no longer seemed
appropriate. The tripartite cosmos -- heaven above, Earth in
the middle, and hell below -- appeared to be an anachronism.
With the emergence of modern Western psychology and psychoanalytical studies in the 19th and 20th centuries, however,
the underlying principles of beliefs in angels and demons have
taken on new meanings. Many Christian theologians have found
some of the concepts of psychoanalysis helpful in reinterpreting
the meanings underlying primitive and traditional beliefs in
angels and demons. The tripartite cosmos was re-mythologized
into a tripartite structure of personality -- the superego (the
restrictive social regulations that enable man to live as a
social being), the ego (the conscious aspects of man), and the
id, or libido (a "seething, boiling cauldron of desire that seeks
to erupt from beneath the threshold of consciousness"). Thus,
demons -- according to this reinterpretation -- might well be
redefined as projections of the unregulated drives of man that
force him to act only according to his own selfish desires,
taking no account of their effects on other persons. From a
social point of view, demons might also be defined as the
environmental and hereditary forces that cause man to act, think,
and speak in ways that are contrary to the well-being of himself
and his community. A modern French writer, Denis de Rougeont,
has mainted in his book _The Devil's Share_ that the devil and
the demonic forces that plague the modern world can be well
documented in modern man's return to barbarism and man's
inhumanity to man. In the 2nd century AD, Clement of
Alexandria, a Christian philosophical theologian, pointed toward
a psychological interpretation of demonic forces by stating that
man was often captivated by the inner appetitive drives of his
passions and bodily desires. The Freudian "myth" of the human
personality and other psychological studies have thus initiated
a new dimension in the study of angels and demons. Medieval
iconography, which graphically depicted angels and demons as
hybrid creatures that often defied even the most vivid
imaginations of the persons who viewed them, has been supplanted
by psychological, psychoanalytical, and modren mythological
symbolism coupled with theological reflection.
_Relationship to views of a dualistic cosmos._ In religious
traditions that have viewed the cosmos in a dualistic fashion,
such as Gnosticism, angels were believed to be celestial beings
who controlled certain spheres through which a soul was to pass
as it freed itself from the shackles of its material existence.
Knowledge of these angels and their names was a necessary
prerequisite for achieving eventual union with the ultimate
spiritual reality. Included among various lists of the seven
angels ruling the seven planetary spheres are Gabriel, Adonai
(Lord), Aariel (lion of God), and others. The angel of creation
of the world of matter, Yahweh (sometimes called the Demiurge,
the Creator), was evil, in the Gnostic view, not only because he
was the Creator but also because he tried to keep spiritual men
from knowing their true origin, nature, and destiny.

Manichaeism, a dualistic religion founded in the 3rd century AD

by Mani, an Iranian prophet, like Gnosticism divided the world
into two spheres -- Goodness (Light) and Evil (Darkness). These
two principles are mixed in the world of matter, and the object
of salvation is to unmix the material and the spiritual so that
one may achieve a state of absolute goodness. Highest in the
celestial hierarchy are the 12 light diadems of the Father of
Greatness and the Twelve Aeons, the "firstborn" -- angelic figures
that are divided into groups of threes, surrounding the Supreme
Being in the four quarters of the heavens. Because the Devil,
the Prince of Darkness, desires the advantages of the Kingdom of
Light, in an ensuing battle between the celestial forces Light
and Darkness are mixed, and the world of matter and spirit is
created. Unaware of his spiritual nature and constantly tempted
by the demons of the Prince of Darkness, man is evnetually led
to understand his true nature through the activity of angelic
beings called the Friends of the Lights and the Living Spirit
and his five helpers: Holder of Splendour, King of Honour, Light
of Man, King of Glory, and Supporter....
TYPES OF ANGELS AND DEMONS
...
_Malevolent beings._ Malevolent beings -- demons, fallen angels,
ghosts, goblins, evil spirits in nature, hybrid creatures, the
*daevas* of Zoroastrianism, the *narakas* (creatures of hell) of
Jainism, the *oni* (attendants of the gods of the underworld) in
Japanese religions, and other such beings -- hinder man in achieving
a proper relation with God, the spiritual realm, or man's life
situations. Some angels are believed to have falled from a
position of proximity to God -- such as Lucifer (after his fall
called Satan by early Church Fathers) in Judaism, Christianity,
and Islam -- because of pride or for attempts to usurp the position
of the Supreme Being. In their fallen condition they then attempt
to keep man from gaining a right relationship with God by provoking
men to sin. Some medieval scholars of demonology ascribed to a
hierarchy of seven archdemons the seven deadly sins: Lucifer (Pride);
Mammon (Avarice); Asmodeus (Lechery); Satan (Anger); Beelzebub
(Gluttony); Leviathan (Envy); and Belphegor (Sloth). Besides
tempting men to sin, the fallen angels, or devils, were believed to
cause various types of calamities, both natural and accidental.
Like the demons and devil spirits of nature in primitive religions,
the fallen angels were viewed as the agents of famine, disease, war,
earthquakes, accidental deaths, and various mental or emotional
disorders. Persons afflicted with mental diseases were considered
to be "demon possessed."
Though the functions of demonic figures, like those of fallen angels,
is of major significance, the nature of demons has been of concern
to theologians and persons infused with popular piety. Like angels,
demons are regarded as spiritual, noncorporeal beings, but they have
been depicted in religious iconography as hybrid creatures with
horrifying characteristics or as caricatures of idols of an opposing
religion. In the early church, for example, there was a belief that
pagan idols were inhabited by demons. The horrifying aspects of
demons have been represented in the woodcuts of medieval and Reformation artists and in the masks of shamans, medicine men, and priests

of primitive religions -- either to frighten the believer into

behaving according to accepted norms or to ward off ritualistically
the power of the demonic forces loose in the terrestrial or profane
realm....
VARIETIES OF ANGELS AND DEMONS IN THE RELIGIONS OF THE WORLD
...
Over against the bounteous immortals, who helped to link the spiritual
and the material worlds together, was the counterpart of the Holy
Spirit, namely Angra Mainyu, the Evil Spirit, who later became the
great adversary Ahriman (the prototype of the Jewish, Christian and
Islamic Satan), and the daevas, who were most likely gods of early
Indo-Iranian religion. Allied with Angra Mainyu against Ahura Mazda
were Akoman (Evil Mind), Indra-vayu (Death), Saurva (a daeva of
death and disease), Nanhaithya (a daeva related to the Vedic god
Nasatya), Tauru (difficult to identify), and Zairi (the personification of both *ahuras* and daevas). Among the other demonic
figures is Aeshma (violence, fury, or the aggressive impulse that
consumes man) -- who may well be the demon Asmodeus of the book of
Tobit, Az (Concupiscence or Lust), Mithrandruj (He Who Lies to
Mithra or False Speech), Jeh (the demon Whore, created later by
Ahriman to defile the human race), and many others....
Under the influence of Zoroastrianism, Satan, the adversary,
probably evolved into the archdemon. Other demons included
Azazel (the demon of the wilderness, incarnated in the scapegoat),
Leviathan and Rahab (demons of chaos), Lilith (a female night
demon), and others....
Demonology experienced a renewal in Christianity that probably
would have been acceptable in Zoroastrianism. Satan, the archenemy
of the Christ; Lucifer, the fallen Light Bearer; and the originally
Canaanite Beelzebub, the Lord of Flies (or, perhaps, Beelzebul,
the Lord of Dung), mentioned by Jesus, are all devils. The concept
and term devil are derived from the Zoroastrian concept of *daevas*
and the Greek word *daibolos* [sic] ("slanderer" or "accuser"),
which is a translation of the Jewish concept of Satan. As a singular
demonic force or personification of evil, the devil's chief activity
was to tempt man to act in such a way that he would not achieve his
supraterrestrial destiny. Because demons were believe to inhabit
waterless wastelands, where hungry and tired persons often had
visual and auditory hallucinations, early Christian monks went into
the deserts to be the vanguard of God's army in joining battle with
the tempting devils. They often recorded that the devil came to them
in visions as a seductive woman, tempting them to violate their vows
to keep themselves sexually pure, both physically and mentally....
Angelology and demonology in Islam are closely related to similar
doctrines in Judaism and Christianity.... Demons... contend for
control of men's lives, the most prominent being Iblis (the Devil),
who tempts mortal man, or Shaytan, or Satan....
_Encyclopedia Britannica_, by Encyclopedia Britannica Inc, 1995;
pp. 408-12.