Heaven/Hell and Satan as late developments

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  1. I’ve had this nagging question for a while; I appreciate any insight that people may shed on it. Why does God never mention Satan as a reason for why people sin in the OT. You’d think if Satan were so important in tempting people, like he is in the NT, God would’ve warned the Israelites via the Prophets… at least once!
My idea now, and I hope it’s disproven, is that Satan was a natural development from the Hebrews contact with the Zoroastrians around 200BC, because this is when the concept of Satan begins to appear in the biblical and extra-biblical literature.
  1. The same question holds for heaven/hell. There is no heaven or hell in the OT. There’s not really much of a concept of afterlife at all. Did God not think it important to tell his chosen people that their earthly choices would affect them for eternity? Or did God create heaven and hell later on? Or was Heaven and Hell an idea borrowed from another culture, the Persians, Zoroastrianism? The latter seems the most likely candidate.
Any insight appreciated.
 
Isaiah is old testament:
Down to the nether world your pomp is brought, the music of your harps. The couch beneath you is the maggot, your covering, the worm." How have you fallen from the heavens, O morning star, son of the dawn! How are you cut down to the ground, you who mowed down the nations! You said in your heart: “I will scale the heavens; Above the stars of God I will set up my throne; I will take my seat on the Mount of Assembly, in the recesses of the North. I will ascend above the tops of the clouds; I will be like the Most High!” Yet down to the nether world you go to the recesses of the pit! When they see you they will stare, pondering over you: “Is this the man who made the earth tremble, and kingdoms quake? Who made the world a desert, razed its cities, and gave his captives no release? All the kings of the nations lie in glory, each in his own tomb; But you are cast forth without burial, loathsome and corrupt, Clothed as those slain at sword-point, a trampled corpse. Going down** to the pavement of the pit**, you will never be one with them in the grave.” For you have ruined your land, you have slain your people! Let him not be named forever, that scion of an evil race!
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Isaiah 14:11-20
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werent the people aware of the creation story and how Eve was tempted to sin?Are you sure there are no references to Satans power.Would they not then be aware of Satan in their lives?
 
josesiem said:
  1. I’ve had this nagging question for a while; I appreciate any insight that people may shed on it. Why does God never mention Satan as a reason for why people sin in the OT. You’d think if Satan were so important in tempting people, like he is in the NT, God would’ve warned the Israelites via the Prophets… at least once!
My idea now, and I hope it’s disproven, is that Satan was a natural development from the Hebrews contact with the Zoroastrians around 200BC, because this is when the concept of Satan begins to appear in the biblical and extra-biblical literature.
  1. The same question holds for heaven/hell. There is no heaven or hell in the OT. There’s not really much of a concept of afterlife at all. Did God not think it important to tell his chosen people that their earthly choices would affect them for eternity? Or did God create heaven and hell later on? Or was Heaven and Hell an idea borrowed from another culture, the Persians, Zoroastrianism? The latter seems the most likely candidate.
Any insight appreciated.
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The idea of a spiritual accuser appears already in Job, believed by scholars to be the oldest book in Scripture. Indeed, it is central to that book.

Heaven and Hell were more problematic in the OT, because they apparently had no idea of a “detachable soul” to go to such places, such as the Classical philosophers taught. It took them longer to gain a notion about how human life might resume after bodily corruption.

RSW: Bravo for the Scripture passage! But methinks you need to explain how the bits you bolded do not simply mean “the grave.”

GOD Bless and ICXC NIKA!
 
josesiem said:
  1. I’ve had this nagging question for a while; I appreciate any insight that people may shed on it. Why does God never mention Satan as a reason for why people sin in the OT. You’d think if Satan were so important in tempting people, like he is in the NT, God would’ve warned the Israelites via the Prophets… at least once!
My idea now, and I hope it’s disproven, is that Satan was a natural development from the Hebrews contact with the Zoroastrians around 200BC, because this is when the concept of Satan begins to appear in the biblical and extra-biblical literature.
  1. The same question holds for heaven/hell. There is no heaven or hell in the OT. There’s not really much of a concept of afterlife at all. Did God not think it important to tell his chosen people that their earthly choices would affect them for eternity? Or did God create heaven and hell later on? Or was Heaven and Hell an idea borrowed from another culture, the Persians, Zoroastrianism? The latter seems the most likely candidate.
Any insight appreciated.
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en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satan
 
josesiem said:
  1. I’ve had this nagging question for a while; I appreciate any insight that people may shed on it. Why does God never mention Satan as a reason for why people sin in the OT. You’d think if Satan were so important in tempting people, like he is in the NT, God would’ve warned the Israelites via the Prophets… at least once!
My idea now, and I hope it’s disproven, is that Satan was a natural development from the Hebrews contact with the Zoroastrians around 200BC, because this is when the concept of Satan begins to appear in the biblical and extra-biblical literature.
  1. The same question holds for heaven/hell. There is no heaven or hell in the OT. There’s not really much of a concept of afterlife at all. Did God not think it important to tell his chosen people that their earthly choices would affect them for eternity? Or did God create heaven and hell later on? Or was Heaven and Hell an idea borrowed from another culture, the Persians, Zoroastrianism? The latter seems the most likely candidate.
Any insight appreciated.
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#1
Our actions either make us like God, or like the devil who rejected God. To reject God is to be like the devil. True that the representation of the devil does evolve. In the time of Jesus, “Hades” was popular because of the Greek influence. But its just a more appropriate description that is understood in the context of the time. Even God wasn’t called God in the past. Not that God changed, just how we reference Him.

#2
Heaven and Hell was created on the First Day when God separated light from darkness. Heaven isn’t a popular concept with Judaism mainly because they can never get to heaven. Only Jesus opened the way to heaven.
 
ConstantineTG said:
#1
Our actions either make us like God, or like the devil who rejected God. To reject God is to be like the devil. True that the representation of the devil does evolve. In the time of Jesus, “Hades” was popular because of the Greek influence. But its just a more appropriate description that is understood in the context of the time. Even God wasn’t called God in the past. Not that God changed, just how we reference Him.

#2
Heaven and Hell was created on the First Day when God separated light from darkness. Heaven isn’t a popular concept with Judaism mainly because they can never get to heaven. Only Jesus opened the way to heaven.
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Thanks. You make some good points in #1. However, #2 is more problematic. The Jews didn’t talk about heaven b/c God never apparently told them about it. Notice, never once did God mention a place of eternal reward if they followed the law. Likewise, God never threatened them with hell. All rewards and punishments were to be had in this world.

This leaves two options: Option 1: scripture is man-made, reflecting the normal dispersion of ideas through cultures. Option 2: God had some kind of reason for why he never bothered to mention arguably the most important bit of knowledge – that of an eternal afterlife. I suppose apologists would want to focus on what wisdom would be behind such an omission and likewise counter the cultural transmission (meme) thesis.

Personally, these issues have always bothered me because they belie a very human text and throw doubts on the idea of inspired scripture.
 
josesiem said:
  1. I’ve had this nagging question for a while; I appreciate any insight that people may shed on it. Why does God never mention Satan as a reason for why people sin in the OT. You’d think if Satan were so important in tempting people, like he is in the NT, God would’ve warned the Israelites via the Prophets… at least once!
My idea now, and I hope it’s disproven, is that Satan was a natural development from the Hebrews contact with the Zoroastrians around 200BC, because this is when the concept of Satan begins to appear in the biblical and extra-biblical literature.
  1. The same question holds for heaven/hell. There is no heaven or hell in the OT. There’s not really much of a concept of afterlife at all. Did God not think it important to tell his chosen people that their earthly choices would affect them for eternity? Or did God create heaven and hell later on? Or was Heaven and Hell an idea borrowed from another culture, the Persians, Zoroastrianism? The latter seems the most likely candidate.
Any insight appreciated.
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Divine revelation is revealed as it is needed and as the people are ready for it.
Maybe in the mind of God they needed to be prepared. The Saducees and Pharisees held different thological positions on resurrection. And if they did resurrect, from where and to where? Any idea of another world besides their immediate one, seemed to be outside of their knowledge. It seemed to be vague. The ideas of heaven,hell,satan were
not a part of their material world. Their ideas of death were uncertain, except that it happened. They were interested in this world, the one they knew, and looked for a Messiah to restablish them in this world. And they prayed to a God who would help them be safe and prosper. They believed in God, his attributes, his promises to them, but so much that we know was not known yet especially about things outside their world.
This is what appears to me from reading the old testament with regard to the above.
 
I noticed an assumption I held:

If x is was not revealed early or in the beginning of God’s revelation to His people, x is unlikely to be true. IOW, for x to be true, it must have been revealed early.

Framing the argument like this makes it appear weak. Clearly, God doesn’t need to reveal everything in the beginning. Relationships develop over time. Revelation, the revealing of knowledge, also takes time to unfold.
 
josesiem said:
  1. I’ve had this nagging question for a while; I appreciate any insight that people may shed on it. Why does God never mention Satan as a reason for why people sin in the OT. You’d think if Satan were so important in tempting people, like he is in the NT, God would’ve warned the Israelites via the Prophets… at least once!
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Because it’s a cop-out. When God confronted Adam and Eve, Adam blamed Eve and Even blamed the serpent. By ignoring Satan, God is focussing on the personal responsibility and growth of the people without tempting them to say “the devil made me do it”.
  1. The same question holds for heaven/hell. There is no heaven or hell in the OT. There’s not really much of a concept of afterlife at all. Did God not think it important to tell his chosen people that their earthly choices would affect them for eternity? Or did God create heaven and hell later on? Or was Heaven and Hell an idea borrowed from another culture, the Persians, Zoroastrianism?
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[BIBLEDRB]Genesis 5:23-24[/BIBLEDRB]
This is a supernatural reward.
 
I agree that there is very little about heaven or hell in the OT, in fact many ancient Jews - and many Jews today - did not believe in an afterlife. This is why the Sadducees quized Jesus about marriage in the afterlife (see Mark 12, Matthew 22) - they were trying to show that there is no afterlife. My understanding is that many Jews in Jesus’ time did believe in an afterlife, but I think that there is some dispute over how widespread the belief was and when it first became widespread.
 
The Ancient Jews believed in Sheol which was the abode of the dead, it didn’t operate quite like heaven or hell as Christ had not unlocked the gates of heaven yet. The righteous were considered to dwell in Abraham’s Bosom aas is described in the discussion of Lazarus and the rich man. The way I view scripture is that it can be likened to a conversation where you may not know everything that the other person is thinking but you find out more and more over time, that doesn’t mean that they weren’t always aware of it just because they tell you at a later time, so God reveals things to us over time and we can go back and see how the ideas and concepts were alluded to and foreshadowed earlier on. For instance when David’s son dies he mourns and says “I shall go to him, but he shall not come to me” which can be seen as a subtle reference to the afterlife. Another reference is considered to be how Moses talks about seeing the great land in the future. I think a reason that the devil is not mentioned until later on is because as someone posted above he could have been a copout, but also because the Jews had to focus on worshipping and devoting themselves to God and not paying attention to other supernatural forces. There is discussion of evil spirits though at places in the Old Testament outside of the devil
 
I’ve heard that the Satan in Job functions more like God’s chief prosecutor, this is why God and Satan are hanging out peacefully at the beginning of the book.
  1. The “Satan” is not the devil, but a sort of prosecutor / secret police chief that functions in God"s court to point out to God possible problems–see Unferth / Poseidon. Satan in Zech. 3:1 is called “the accuser”
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stjohns-chs.org/english/bible/job.html
 
josesiem said:
  1. The same question holds for heaven/hell. There is no heaven or hell in the OT. There’s not really much of a concept of afterlife at all.
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I would disagree. ‘Forever’ and ‘everlasting’ are spoken of alot in OT, eg heaven,
Psalm 61:1 Hear my cry, O God; attend unto my prayer.
2 From the end of the earth will I cry unto thee, when my heart is overwhelmed: lead me to the rock that is higher than I.
3 For thou hast been a shelter for me, and a strong tower from the enemy.
4 I will abide in thy tabernacle for ever: I will trust in the covert of thy wings. Selah.
5 For thou, O God, hast heard my vows: thou hast given me the heritage of those that fear thy name.
6 Thou wilt prolong the king’s life: and his years as many generations.
7 He shall abide before God for ever: O prepare mercy and truth, which may preserve him.
8 So will I sing praise unto thy name for ever, that I may daily perform my vows.

Psa 145:1-2 I will extol thee, my God, O king; and I will bless thy name for ever and ever. Every day will I bless thee; and I will praise thy name for ever and ever.

Psa 23:6 Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever.

example Ps 61.4, for a person to abide in the LORD’s tabernacle forever, the LORD needs to be forever, which is clear from many verses in OT, he needs an eternal tabernacle which is implied in the verse, and the person needs to be in some form of abiding/existence forever (olamim)…this is heaven…dwelling in the Father’s ‘house’…

Joh 14:2 In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places…
the LORD sits at throne in his tabernacle/temple in heaven
Psalm 11:4 The LORD is in his holy temple, the LORD’S throne is in heaven:

I don’t believe heaven (shamayim) in these verses means low earth orbit or something like that…so a heavenly abode with God forever, to me seems clear…
 
It has come to be understood that satan does not appear in Job and Zechariah as “the devil” but as a sort of adversarial angel who points out the flaws in humans because he is identified without a proper noun so he isn’t given the name satan but is just identified in a general way at the accuser or the satan. I think that these incidences may serve as types or more vague references that can be understood better in light of the New Testament. I think that perhaps the devil is emphasized more in the New rather than the Old Testament because for the Jews God was showing Himself to be the only God who is ultimately soveriegn over all beings, so there was no necessary need to place a heavy emphasis on dissenting angels and such, but when Jesus comes to us in the Gospels He is reconcling man’s fallen self with God and part of this is pointing out the enemy of man which is satan. Another thing to keep in mind is that it seems that a lot of understanding and concepts that appear in the Bible are under the surface and appear cryptically or intermittently so I think more is going on than what one can find just in the text. Is. 14 and Ez. 28 are often times seen as references to the devil along with the other passages that identify him by name in the Old Testament. Unlike common mythology the Bible doesn’t set out to explain everything in systematic terms for every to easily understood like humans would expect from their human books. I would be interested to hear more people’s take on this though.
 
Hebrews 1:1-2 “In times past, God spoke in partial and various ways to our ancestors through the prophets; in these last days, he spoke to us through a son, whom he made heir of all things and through whom he created the universe…”

It is indeed true that the understanding of Satan developed and views of the afterlife were somewhat in flux in the Old Testament. God’s revelation, as pointed out in the Letter to the Hebrews, was not complete until Jesus Christ.
Even though some OT verses reference praising God forever there are also verses that clearly have no view of heaven or resurrection (Is 38:18; Ps 6:6; Ps 30:10)

Even when resurrection appears in the Old Testament it is a typically a resurrection of the righteous with no eternal punishment for the wicked outside of not being resurrected.

However, by the time of Jesus, most of our Christian ideas were being debated amongst various Jewish factions. There is little evidence in the Gospels and writings of Paul that anything Jesus said about the afterlife was considered novel by the Jews of the time.
 
josesiem said:
Thanks. You make some good points in #1. However, #2 is more problematic. The Jews didn’t talk about heaven b/c God never apparently told them about it. Notice, never once did God mention a place of eternal reward if they followed the law. Likewise, God never threatened them with hell. All rewards and punishments were to be had in this world.

.
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If the law could save souls and get them to heaven, we wouldn’t need Jesus. The law was temporary until Gods plan come into view. Scripture also talk about Jesus decending and teaching the souls in prison (bosom of abraham? prophets?) Did the gates of heaven and hell opened after Jesus? or when he gave the keys to st peter?
 
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