SATANA (Hebr. šātan). An invisible personal agent, the enemy of man, who leads him to perdition by turning him away from God.
The term (from the verb šātan, “to oppose, persecute,” especially by accusing: Ps. [Hebr.] 38, 21; 71, 13; 109, 4. 20. 29; Zach. 3, 1 [Septuagint ἀντιχαῖσθαι], “to obstruct” the way: Num. 22, 22. 32; cf. the abstract šītnōh, “hostility”
Gen. 26, 21, “accusation,” Esd. 4, 6) occurs nine times in the Hebrew Bible as a common noun: “adversary” in war (I Sam. 29, 4; I Reg. 5, 18; 11, 14, 23, 25), or in court (Ps. 108, 6), or one who bars the way: II Sam. 19, 23; cf. Mt. 16, 23 and Mt. 8, 33: Jesus rebukes Peter, who obstructs his path toward the cross; in I Mach. 1, 36 the fortress of Akra is erected εἰς ἀνάβολον, as a “barrier.” In three passages (Job 1-2; Zach. 3, 1-2; I Par. 21, 1) it designates the being who accuses man before God or induces him to sin; he is “the adversary” par excellence; but only in I Par. 21, 1 is it used without the article, as a proper name. Like the Septuagint, the New Testament uses the Greek term ὁ ἀνάβολος (v. DIAVOLO), which is its literal translation, but 36 times it has ὁ ἀνταγνάς (an Aramaizing ending).
The idea of S. is connected with that of God’s “judgment.” S. is the public accuser who “stands against” (ἀππαδ' al: Zach. 3, 1; I Par. 21, 1; cf. Ps. 108 [109], 6); he resembles the mezhīr 'āwān (“one who causes guilt to be remembered” in view of punishment, death) of Ez. 21, 28 sg.; 29, 16 (cf. Gen. 41, 9; I Reg. 17, 18). And since, in the theology of history of the prophets, the fortunes of a people correspond to God’s judgment upon it, the double s. (the Edomite Hadad and the Aramean Razon) whom Jahweh raises up against Solomon (I Reg. 11, 14-25) rise up, ultimately, against his sins. Beyond the vision of Michea (I Reg. 22, 19-23: Jahweh sends a “spirit of falsehood” to destroy Achab), two symbolic scenes present S. at the divine court. In the catalogue of Job (Job 1, 6-2, 7), S. appears before Jahweh together with the angels (“the sons of God”); he has extensive functions and powers: he roams the earth and spies upon men there, assailing the virtue of the righteous through temptation; Jahweh authorizes S. to proceed against Giobbe, after entrusting to him the forces hostile to life (diseases, natural calamities, human crimes), so that it is “the hand of Jahweh” that strikes Giobbe (1, 11; 2, 4). Analogous is Zachariah’s fourth night vision (3, 1-2), in which the ṣāṭān accuses, rightly, the high priest Iosua, who is guilty: but God is angered against S. angel (v.) of Jahweh, the instrument of grace, prevails (in Num. 22, 22, however, the angel of Jahweh acts as ṣāṭān). A third passage mentioning S., the instrument of divine “judgment,” is I Par. 21, 1, where S. (a proper name!) replaces Jahweh, who in the older text, II Sam. 24, 1, directly tempted David: a change due to dogmatic motives, just as Iubil. 48, 25 would later transform Ex. 4, 24. For Tobia father and son and for Sara, the affliction caused by Asmodeo brings many sufferings, but “the trial of temptation is necessary,” and Raffaele comes to free them from the demon (Tob. 12, 13-14). Originally S. is not a perverse angel; through subsequent contamination the angels who execute God’s scourges were identified with demons, beings evil by nature (J. Bonsirven, p. 239).
In the Old Testament, the ṣāṭān represents the threat of ruin hanging over man; he is the one who disturbs the relations between God and men, and in particular between God and Israel, by bringing human sins before God and obstructing the divine economy of salvation. He is conceived either as the accuser who exploits, and greedily watches for, moral guilt, or as a destructive demonic force connected with the plan of divine providence for individuals and peoples; in both cases he is subject to God, from whom he seeks to take man away (cf. Dante, Inf., XXVII, 112-29; Purg., V, 100-29: Guido and Buonconte di Montefeltro). The essentially perverse being was 'Azā'zēl, conceived as the demon of the desert, upon whom all the guilt of Israel was cast in the annual rite of expiation (Lev. 16, 8-22). The biblical S. is an entity without analogies in other religions. W. Bousset and H. Gressmann wrongly affirm its Persian origin. It cannot derive from Iran, because metaphysical dualism is wholly absent from the Old Testament; still less from the Babylonians, whose bēl dabābi is always a man (J. von Rad).
S., as the “tempter” who brings ruin upon man, first appears in the serpent that tempts Eva and ruins man (Gen. 3, 1-15), which symbolizes “evil” (Gen. 4, 7); he is connected with the dragon (v.), whom God subdues and defeats. He is akin, although in the Old Testament he
appears distinct, to the “evil spirit” (opposed to the “spirit of Jahweh,” which abandons Saul at the breaking forth of the former: I Sam. 16, 14-16; 18, 10-12; 19, 9; 26, 19; 28, 15-16), attributed to divine causality by virtue of absolute theocentrism; the “evil spirit” acts as a spirit of discord (Iudc. 9, 23), and is a “spirit of falsehood” that impels men to transgress the divine will (I Reg. 22, 19-23). To such spirits many Jews and Christians later attributed the moral corruption of humanity, holding that the “sons of God,” from whose intercourse with “the daughters of men” the impious nēphilim were born, were angels descended (fallen) from the heavenly court (Gen. 6, 2-4).
S. appears rarely in Old Testament writings. Midrashic apocalypticism (v.) abundantly filled the gap. In late post-exilic Judaism, from the third or second century B.C., S. now appears as the antagonist of God, the cause of every evil, the head of the kingdom opposed to the Kingdom of God. Besides the intention of exonerating divine justice and providence from Israel’s misfortunes, this development was fostered both by the dualistic tendency due in part to growing hatred of the Gentiles, and by the coalescing in the figure of S., which took shape by expanding, of the most ancient traditions of the serpent of Eden, the fall and union of the angels, the angel of death, and the struggle with dragons. S. absorbs the moral concept of the “evil nature” (jējer hā-ra), by which S. ruins man (Num rabbā 20; Babā Bathrā 15 a), and that of the “angel of death,” with whom he is sometimes identified (Babā Bathrā 16 a); increasingly he is the tempter and seducer, the “enemy” who inflicts upon man every physical and moral evil (Henoch 69, 4, 9). The biblical demons, such as Asmodeo, LILITH (v.), those inhabiting the desert in the form of unclean animals, the sē'rim (“hairy ones,” “goats”), the sēdhim (idd “to destroy”); cf. Assyr. sēdu, a theriomorphic genius, good or evil), the līlin, rūbīn, and rūbāth, which harm man in soul and body, are distinct from S.: in Henoch 53, 3 S. and the “angels of punishment” differ from the fallen angels and demons. S. is multiplied and becomes a generalization: the category of the many s. is formed (S. in the plural: Abiqar 3, 38, 49; Henoch 40, 8-10; etc.), subject to the one S., who in turn is subject to the “Lord of spirits” (Henoch 65, 6); in time the s. became confused with the demons.
S. is the serpent who tempted Eva (Vita Ad. 12; Apoc. Abr. 13; Apoc. Mos. 16; Apoc. Sedrach 5), out of envy (Sap. 2, 28; Sanhedhrin 59), according to Sōrā 9 and Gen. rabbā 18 out of concupiscence; Gen. rabbā 24 and 42 attribute Cain and many demons to the intercourse of S. with Eva. S. is “the serpent of the origins” (nābāš haq-qadhmōn), of whom the gāim are disciples (Siphrē 138 b). The Targumīn often introduce S. into biblical narratives, e.g., Targ. Ion. on Ex. 32, 19.
The chief of the demons is, in Henoch (10, 4, 8; 13, 1; 54, 4; 55, 4), 'Azā'zēl (or Semjaza: ibid. 6, 7), whose hosts were subjected to S. (Henoch 54, 6); 'Azā'zēl in Apoc. Abr. is the chief, while in Testam. Salom. 7, 7 he is the archangel whom the demons obey. Gadreel is the S. who deceived Eve (Henoch 69, 6). Belial (v.) is often equivalent to S., and above all Sammael, the chief of the demons in Ascensio Isaiae and Baruch gr.; after the 2nd century, Sammael takes the place of S. in the Midrašim (Gen. Rabbā 29) and in the Talmūd: “The angel Sammael, the impious one, is the chief of all the s.” (Henoch 40, 7; Deut. rabbā on 33, 1); Sammael, identified with the angel with whom Jacob wrestled (Gen. 32, 25-32), is held in check by Michael or Phanuel; he is the “angel of death” who tempted Eve (Targum Ier. 1 on Gen. 3, 6). The head of the kingdom of evil is Mastema (= S.) in Iubil., Damasc., and the “Manual” of the “Community of the Covenant” of H. Qumrān. S. was an archangel named Satanael before he rebelled against God with his angels (II Henoch 29, 4; 31, 3-6; Vita Ad. 12-16). Hosts of demons are under S.’s command (Henoch, Iubil., Testam. XII Patr.). At the end of the world S., together with his demons, will be rendered powerless or annihilated (Iubil. 23, 30; Testam. Dan. 5, Simeon 6, 6), which rules out a dualistic conception.
In the New Testament the supernatural person of S. is the centre and synthesis of the deadly empire (Hebr. 2, 14) of evil. New Testament demonology is entirely oriented toward soteriology (B. Noack). S. places himself between God and men in order to prevent their salvation; Christ, on the other hand, interposes himself as the life-giving mediator. Characteristic of the New Testament, especially of the Johannine and Pauline writings, is the idea of S.’s universal kingdom through sin and death, and the absolute antithesis between S. and Christ and between their kingdoms (flesh and spirit, darkness and light). The entire “world” (in a pejorative sense: Io. 1, 10; 7, 7; 15, 18; 16, 20; 17, 9-16; I Io. 2, 16; 5, 19; Mt. 18, 7; Gal. 6, 14) is subject to S. through the extreme sharpening of the ontological-ethical dilemma (God or nothingness, life or death, holiness or iniquity), tending toward the unity that excludes every dualism.
The biblical concept of S., stripped of its midrashic extravagances, is found again in Beelzebub ([v.]) E. Riehm connects it with the Aramaic be'el dēbahāh “enemy” (“the chief of the demons,” devil (v.), translation of hafāṭān, also called “the wicked one” (Mt. 13, 19, 38; II Thess. 3, 3; perhaps Mt. 6, 13 b), “the ancient serpent” (Apoc. 12, 9; 20, 2), “the enemy” (Mt. 13, 39), “the ruler of the world” (Io. 12, 31; 14, 30; cf. Lc. 4, 6), “the god of this age” (II Cor. 4, 4), “the ruler of the power of the air (as Beliar is called in Test. XII Patr., Levi 3), of the spirit that now works in the rebellious” (Eph. 2, 1). His innumerable host includes “the commands (al āp̄zā), the powers (al ēbōnōn), the rulers of this world of darkness, the spirits of wickedness (which fly) in the lower atmosphere (ἐν τοῖς ἐσονρανίοις)” (Eph. 6, 12; cf. Rom. 8, 38; I Cor. 15, 24), who rule those who do not belong to God (Io. 15, 19; 17, 14; I Io. 4, 4-5). Ruler of this world, S. has nothing in Jesus, who is not of the world (Io. 8, 23; 12, 31; 14, 30; 16, 11; 17, 14-16); S. cannot harm the children of God (I Io. 5, 18). S. confesses that his power is derivative (Lc. 4, 6). He is a tempter who knows how to exploit even Scripture (Mt. 4, 6) in order to seduce the Messiah; Judas is his victim (Lc. 22, 3; Io. 13, 27); Peter and the Apostles are shaken by him (Lc. 22, 31). His power is superhuman (II Thess. 2, 9), and opposes evangelization (I Thess. 2, 18). The kingdom of S. stands opposed to the Kingdom of God (Mt. 12, 26; Mc. 3, 24). But S. and his demons recognize the power of Jesus, the Messiah sent by God to destroy the works of S. and his followers (Mc. 1, 24, 34; 3, 11-15, 23-27; 6, 7; I Io. 3, 8; cf. Act. 16, 16-18), to free his disciples from the world of S. and introduce them into the Kingdom of God (Io. 15, 19; 17, 12, 14). Salvation consists in being freed from S.’s dominion (Act. 26, 18). For every evil, physical and moral, is under S.’s control. The woman who “had had a spirit of infirmity for 18 years was bound by S.” (Lc. 13, 11, 16). When the Apostles expel the demons, S. collapses (Lc. 10, 18; V. LUCIFERO).
S., who sinned from the beginning (I Io. 3, 8), is the agent of sin (Rom. 6, 12-14; Io. 8, 34), by which he makes man a slave (Io. 8, 34) and assimilates him to himself (Io. 6, 70; Judas). This slavery is maintained and strengthened through the flesh, which is man’s organic connection with the world (Rom. 7, 17-8, 13). S. uproots the seed of the divine word from man’s heart, replacing it with spurious grain, darnel (Mc. 4, 15; Mt. 13, 19, 39); his purpose is “to blind the minds of those who do not believe, so that they cannot be illuminated by the gospel of the glory of Christ” (II Cor. 4, 41), through the deceptive “wisdom of this world” (I Cor. 2, 6) and the “depths of S.” (Apoc. 2, 24). “The tempter” (ὁ παρᾶς ἄννε: I Thess. 3, 5; I Cor. 7, 5; cf. Mt. 4, 1-3) induces men to lie to God (Act. 5, 3); his method is falsehood (Io. 8, 44), and in order to seduce he “transforms himself into an angel of light” (II Cor. 11, 14). Against his seductions (II Cor. 2, 11) and assaults, against the “synagogues” of S.’s followers (Apoc. 2, 9-13; 3, 9), and against apostates who return to S. (I Tim. 5, 15), the Christian must resist and fight with the weapons of the spirit (I Pt. 5, 9; Iac. 4, 7; Eph. 6, 10-17). Christ defeated him on the cross, and he will be annihilated (Col. 2, 15; II Cor. 10, 5). God will crush the “ancient serpent” (Gen. 3, 15) beneath the feet of the faithful (Rom. 16, 22). The world of S. now wages war against Jesus and his followers, but Jesus will ultimately conquer and win the world (Io. 16, 33; 17, 21, 23); “the ruler of this world” is already condemned and “cast out” through the Crucifixion (Io. 12, 31; 16, 11);
only “a little while” remains! (Apoc. 12, 12). The Apocalypse describes the immense conflict between the two superhuman powers of God and S., with their hosts. After the definitive defeat of the Beast and the kings of the earth (Apoc. 19), S. (“the great dragon, the ancient serpent, the seducer of the whole earth”: Apoc. 12, 9) is imprisoned in the bottomless pit for 1000 years (Apoc. 20, 2); then he is released and deceives the nations, but finally he is cast into the lake of fire (Apoc. 20, 10; cf. Henoch 54, 5-6; II Pt. 2, 4).
In I Cor. 5, 4-5 and I Tim. 1, 20, the guilty person is handed over to S., who will destroy his flesh, so that the sinner may repent and his spirit be saved at the judgment. “A murderer from the beginning” (Io. 8, 44), S. kills those over whom he has power (cf. II Cor. 2, 11); this deadly function of his, annulled by the Crucified One (Hebr. 2, 14), may be connected with that of the destroying angel (Ex. 12, 23; II Sam. 24, 16; II Reg. 19, 35; Sap. 18, 25; I Cor. 10, 10 ff.). Illness or persecution, the “thorn fixed in the flesh,” is a “messenger of S.” (II Cor. 12, 7); in this too S. is an involuntary instrument of divine grace (ibid. 9), as occurred in the Crucifixion of Christ (I Cor. 2, 8).
In the Bible there is no trace of the belief, common among Babylonians and Arabs, that demons and their chief dwell in subterranean regions. S. and his spirits reside in the aerial strata (Eph. 2, 1; 6, 12), while the holy angels are in the higher spheres of heaven. S. “and his angels” were cast down from heaven onto the earth (Apoc. 12, 7-9). After traversing the other six heavens, Jesus descends to the firmament where “the ruler of this world” dwells (Ascensio Is. 10, 29; cf. 7, 9; 11, 23).
Presso i Padri, S. è «l'avversario» (ἀντιπείωνος; Clemente, Ad Cor. 51, 1; Ps. Barnaba, 2), «il malvagio» (πονηρός, id., 4); alla via del bene sono preposti gli angeli di Dio, alla via del male gli angeli di S. (id., 18). I cristiani debbono fuggire le insidie di S., capo dell'iniquo secolo (Ps. Barnaba, 18 ὁ ἄρχων καυρὸν τῆς ἀνολίας; s. Ignazio, Ad Eph. 19, 3; Ad Trall. 8, 1; Ad Smyrn. 9, 1); la Sinassi eucaristica annienta «le potenze di S.» (id., Ad Eph. 13). Sulle tentazioni e il modo di superarle: Erma, Pastor, II, Mand. 4, 3; 12, 4-5; ecc. La liturgia battesimale comportava la rinunzia a S. (Cirillo Ger., Catech. 19, mystog. 1; PG 33, 1065-76; s. Agostino, De Symb. ad catechum.; PL 40, 627-28, 637-38, 651-53, 659-61; Giov. Crisostomo: PG 49, 241-76; S. non governa il mondo; Gregorio Nisseno: PG 46, 417-30; Constit. Apost., VII, 41; F. X. Funk, I, Paderborn 1905, pp. 444-49). Su S. e la caduta degli angeli ritornano s. Giustino (Apol., I, 5; II, 5; C. Tryph., 69 e 124) e s. Ireneo (Adv. Haer., I, 10, 3; III, 23, 3; «il capo dell'apostasia»). Cristo «legò il Forte», sconfiggendo S. nella sua dimora, l'inferno (Origene: PG 14, 1052); cf. W. Bieder. Molti presentano la Redenzione come un riscatto che Cristo corrispose a S. quale «debito» di giustizia, specie s. Agostino (cf. J. Rivière). Rimane l'idea degli angeli accusatori (s. Epifanio, In laud. S. M. Delparae: PG 43, 501). Sono spesso identificati S. e la morte. S. Ireneo, Adv. Haer., V, 21, 3, e 22-24 (PG 7, 1181-88) afferma il dominio di S. sul mondo. Questo dominio spettava a S. di diritto: s. Leone M., Sermo de Nativ., 22, 3 (PL 54, 196); s. Bernardo deduce (da II Tim. 2, 26; Io. 14, 30; Mt. 12, 29; Lc. 11, 21; 22, 53) contro Abelardo «diabolum non solum potestatem sed et iustam habuisse in homines» (PL 182, 1065) dalla quale solo Gesù redime. Cf. Concilio Tridentino, sess. V (Denz-U, 788), e le trattazioni di s. Tommaso (In IV Sent., II, dist. 3-7; Sum. Theol., 1°, qq. 63-64).
Il lessico semitico postcristiano ha accolto dalla Bibbia il nome S.: arabo šajtān, siriazo sātānā, etiopico najētān. Nel Corano Šajtān e Iblis (= šakāḇoḥ) sono sinonimi; S. è talora l'angelo (unico) decaduto per non aver voluto adorare Adamo (sūrah, 2, 32), altre volte è uno dei gīnu (18, 48); fece peccare Adamo e ne inganna i discendenti, eccetto i credenti, che lo scacciano lapidandolo (2, 32-34; 15, 28-42); è il nemico dell'uomo (35, 6); i tentati da S. ricorrono ad Allāh (7, 199-201; 23, 90).
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