Satan, Chief of the Fallen Angels

From Lucifer to Satan

The Dawn of Creation tells the story of God‘s creation of the angels, and how Lucifer, the brightest of the angels, wanting to be like God. made war against God. God sent St. Michael against Lucifer and his band of angels with the war-cry Mi-kha-el, “Who is like God?” Rabbi Yeshua kicked them out of heaven, and changed Lucifer’s name to the Hebrew satan, enemy. “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven” Lk 10:18.

The Fall of Adam tells the story of Satan’s arrival in Eden as the nakhash, the fiery serpent, the twisting serpent, with venom. It also compares Adam’s response with Rabbi Yeshua‘s responses to Satan’s temptations.

The Spiritual War is the constant war between Rabbi Yeshua‘s forces and Satan’s forces over the question, “Will God or man be the organizing principle of our lives and the source of all that we need?” Satan continued his war against God’s image and likeness when he told Eve, “You will be like God, knowing good and evil” Gen 3:5.

Rabbi Yeshua told some Jews who had become corrupted, 

“You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks according to his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies” Jn 8:44.

Satan’s followers assume that, by being faithful in his service, they will share in his conquest. Not so. Satan hates God and his entire creation. He destroys every man and woman he can influence. Yet most in his service imagine that because he’s their leader he will protect them. His victory over them becomes all the greater when they realize that they have helped him to conquer them.

The Satan Detector

Rabbi Yeshua has given us a reliable Satan Detector. All men are born in God’s image Gen 1:26–27, but some freely choose to live as Satan’s image. The Satan Detector is:

You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks according to his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies Jn 8:44.

God had commanded us, “You shall not kill,” and “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.” Satan makes war against us by disobeying, and enticing us to disobey, all of the Ten Commandments. Rabbi Yeshua mentions in particular these two: Satan is a murderer and a liar Jn 8:44. Those who follow him do as he does.

God’s Image

We are God’s image: “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them” Gen 1:27.

§ 356 of all visible creatures only man is able to know and love his creator. He is the only creature on earth that God has willed for its own sake and he alone is called to share, by knowledge and love, in God’s own life. It was for this end that he was created, and this is the fundamental reason for his dignity: What made you establish man in so great a dignity? Certainly the incalculable love by which you have looked on your creature in yourself! You are taken with love for her; for by love indeed you created her, by love you have given her a being capable of tasting your eternal Good.

Satan’s Image

Murderer

Satan seeks first and foremost to murder our souls. Recall that God had commanded Adam, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die” Gen 2:16–17. When Adam ate the forbidden fruit he did not die an earthly death. God drove him out of paradise Gen 3:23–24. We are God’s image Gen 1:27; to be with God is life. To be apart from God is death, for then we are separated from our very nature. § 1035 “The chief punishment of hell is eternal separation from God, in whom alone man can possess the life and happiness for which he was created and for which he longs.” St. Augustine began his Confessions with, “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.”

He entices us to murder one another’s bodies as a way to murder our souls. When we murder we violate God’s Fifth Commandment. It is an extremely grave sin against Rabbi Yeshua, who “came that they may have life, and have it abundantly” Jn 10:10. “Have life” is the earthly life Rabbi Yeshua sacrificed for us on the Cross Lk 23:46. “Have it abundantly” is eternal life with him, which we gained when he opened heaven for us Lk 23:43.

Liar

“He was a murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks according to his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies” Jn 8:44. Lucifer had been the brightest angel of all, reflecting all of God’s superbrilliant glory back to him and to the other angels, but when he became disobedient he no longer reflected God’s light so his intense light became intense darkness. Since he was no longer the “light-bearer,” Rabbi Yeshua changed his name to satan, the accuser. “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven” Lk 10:18.

Satan lies first by concealing his own nature. Rabbi Yeshua’s principle of the weeds and the wheat Mt 13:30 helps us live side by side with others even when we agree with them on hardly anything. Modern western culture is pluralist, it also puts a high value on mutual understanding, dialogue, and compromise. However, the weeds and the wheat alone do not prepare us to deal with a real, living, spiritual, implacably hostile person bent on destroying us. We need the whole armor of God.

Satan entices us to sin by making it seem appealing until we are drawn in so far that we can’t get out on our own. Listen to Peggy Lee’s signature song, Fever 3:06 She first recorded it in 1958, a more innocent time. To seduce Christians at that time she had to appear in a relatively innocent setting.

Initially Fever sounds like just another romantic song. Then there’s a subtle hint when she alludes to the Fall of Adam at 1:06 “Everybody’s got the fever. That is something you all know. Fever isn’t such a new thing. Fever started long ago.” At 2:30 there is a stronger hint. “Chicks were born to give you fever.” Satan, always the liar, is giving us the false message of pornography. God truly created Woman ezer kenegdo, to protect us men from our propensity to sin. Finally Peggy ends the foreplay and mounts to the climax starting at 2:41, “Fever till you sizzle. But what a lovely way to burn.” At the climax 2:48 Peggy keeps repeating, “What a lovely way to burn.” Again Satan’s enticing lie. Burning in hell is agony.

Probably Peggy Lee herself did not realize that she was being used. Fever was her biggest commercial success, so it’s not surprising that she sang it again and again during her career. Most people used by the demons imagine that what they’re doing is their own idea. God, always respecting our free will, does not allow Satan to directly control us. Satan depends on our fallen nature with its tendency to wander away from our Shepherd Jn 10:11. § 1022 “At the evening of life, we shall be judged on our love.”

Fruits

Rabbi Yeshua told us, “You will know them by their fruits” Mt 7:16. If a man radiates love for God and one another and teaches according to the Magisterium, we may conclude that he is a Catholic Christian and a friend. But if he lies constantly, and his actions always oppose the Church and thereby contribute to the death of souls, we may conclude that he is under demonic influence.

Some of the best evidence is the unlikely demonic alliances. For instance, liberals always argue for the rights of single women. They even put free contraceptives for women in ObamaCare. Yet they are staunch friends of Muslims. The Quran says:  4:11 (4:11), “Allah (thus) directs you as regards your Children’s (Inheritance): to the male, a portion equal to that of two females …” A man is entitled to twice the inheritance of a woman. 4:24 (4:24) “Also (prohibited are) women already married, except those whom your right hands possess …” Many, not all, Muslims say this verse allows sex as often as they wish with slave women who are helpless to resist. 4:34 (4:34), “… As to those women on whose part ye fear disloyalty and ill-conduct, admonish them (first), (Next), refuse to share their beds, (And last) beat them (lightly) …” (Pickthal: “As for those from whom ye fear rebellion, admonish them and banish them to beds apart, and scourge them. …”) Scourge is the same word used to describe Rabbi Yeshua’s agony at the pillar. This verse allows men to hit women, the argument is over how hard. Each Muslim man decides for his own household.

Islam’s fighting verses show a far more serious divide. Liberals are deeply opposed to private citizens owning firearms even for self-defense. But Islam’s highest law prescribes Muslims to use weapons without limit for offensive use: 2:191, 2:216, 3:56, 3:151, 4:74, “4:75, 4:76,  4:89, 4:95, 4:104, 5:33, 8:12, 8:39, 8:57, 8:67, 9:5, 9:14, 9:20, 9:29, 9:39, 9:41, 9:73, 9:111, 9:123, 17:16, 18:65–81, 25:52, 47:4, 47:35, 48:17, 66:9.

If any American politician ever prescribed beheading as a method for capital punishment liberals would flood the airwaves with cries of “cruel and unusual punishment.” Muslims with Quranic support practice beheading. Yet, liberals continue to support and defend Muslims.

Wherever we see unusual pairings such as liberals and Muslims whose ideas are so diametrically opposed, we can suspect that both are in different battalions of Satan’s army and that their movements are being coordinated from below.