by Brian Godawa
I have no problem utilizing lesser known extraBiblical mythology or legends in the Chronicles of the Nephilim in order to bring a fresh perspective to the Biblical story. But I also have no problem dismantling other well-known extraBiblical mythology and legends in order to support that same goal of fresh perspective. The Satan legend as I described it above is one of those accepted myths that I decided to avoid because, well, it really isn’t in the Bible.
I am going to follow David Lowe’s strategy and “deconstruct Lucifer” in order to rediscover Satan in a new and more Biblical light.[84] First, let me affirm that the New Testament does equate Satan with the Serpent in the Garden (2Cor. 11:3; Rev. 12:9; 20:2) so I have no quarrel with that notion. But let’s take a look at the rest of the Lucifer/Satan mythology to see if it really has Biblical merit.
The two passages that are most often used as source material for this myth are Isaiah 14:12-15 and Ezekiel 28:12-16. Let’s look first at the Isaiah passage:
Isaiah 14:12–15
“How you are fallen from heaven,
O Day Star (Lucifer), son of Dawn!
How you are cut down to the ground,
you who laid the nations low!
You said in your heart,
‘I will ascend to heaven;
above the stars of God
I will set my throne on high;
I will sit on the mount of assembly
in the far reaches of the north;
I will ascend above the heights of the clouds;
I will make myself like the Most High.’
But you are brought down to Sheol,
to the far reaches of the pit.
The context of the entire passage of Isaiah 14 is that the prophet is making a prophesy of judgment upon the king of Babylon who existed in Isaiah’s own day during the Jewish Babylonian exile. Well-meaning Christians interpret this text as a mythopoeic allusion or analogy of pride between Satan, called Lucifer, and the Babylonian tyrant.
To start with, the name Satan is nowhere in the story, but Lucifer is. The problem with this name is that we have come to consider it a proper name of a demonic entity only by tradition. As author David Lowe points out, Lucifer was actually the Latin translation for the Hebrew words Helel ben shahar, which means “Morningstar,” known to the ancients as the planet Venus.[85] In the ancient Near East, planets and stars were equated with deities and the heavenly host, so this is indeed a mythopoeic reference. But scholars have uncovered a very different narrative being referenced than the Garden of Eden. It is in fact a pagan Canaanite myth that Isaiah used to mock the pagan king of Babylon.
Scholar Michael S. Heiser definitively explains the linguistic and narrative referent of Helel ben Shahar as being the Ugaritic god Athtar from the epic Baal Cycle of myths at Ugarit. Heiser reveals that Athtar was equated with the planet Venus. Athtar sought to raise himself above “the stars of El,” a reference to the divine council or heavenly host that surrounded the high god of the Canaanite pantheon. He tried to do so by seeking to sit on the throne of Baal, referred to as “the Most High,” upon the “mount of assembly” in the north called Saphon. But Athtar was not powerful enough for the position of power and was cast to earth/Sheol.[86]
There are no versions of this Isaianic narrative applying to Satan anywhere in the Bible but there sure is one of Athtar in the Canaanite context in which ancient Jews like Isaiah lived and breathed. Isaiah was declaring judgment upon the Babylonian tyrant by using pagan myths against the pagan king as mockery.
As Norman Habel put it,
The presence of this archaic mythological imagery to describe the dwelling place of God does not imply that the Israelite writers thereby espoused the crass mythological view of reality current in the ancient Near Eastern world. Polemical and poetical considerations governed the Israelite writers’ use of imagery taken from their pagan environment.[87]
The second passage that well-intentioned Christians use to justify their belief in the Satan/Lucifer mythology is Ezekiel 28:12-15. I will focus in on the most important elements to keep this as short as possible. Similar to Isaiah, Ezekiel prophesied about the hubris and fall of the king of Tyre. Also like Isaiah, Ezekiel makes a mythopoeic reference to some narrative. In this case, I would argue it is the Garden of Eden narrative being referenced. But the difference is that whereas many Christians assume Ezekiel is equating the fall of the king of Tyre with the fall of Satan, the truth is that the prophet is actually equating it with the fall of Adam![88]
Ezekiel 28:12–16
You were the signet of perfection…
You were in Eden, the garden of God…
You were an anointed guardian cherub…
I placed you; you were on the holy mountain of God;
in the midst of the stones of fire you walked.
You were blameless in your ways
from the day you were created,
till unrighteousness was found in you…
so I cast you as a profane thing from the mountain of God,
and I destroyed you, O guardian cherub,
It was Adam who was in Eden and was blameless in his ways, not Satan. According to the Evangelical Satan legend, Satan already fell before the Garden. It was Adam who was created blameless and fell into sin and was cast out of Eden, not Satan. Satan’s name is nowhere to be found in this passage.[89]
One possible reason to presume the Satan connection here is the description of the character as an “anointed guardian cherub.” But there is a problem with this translation. Many commentators make the point that this is based upon the Masoretic text (MT) of the Bible. But the Septuagint (LXX), another authoritative Greek text of the Old Testament that is quoted by the New Testament authors and Jesus, renders those phrases “From the day that thou wast created thou wast with the cherub”[90] and “the cherub has brought thee out of the midst of the stones.”[91] Being “with the cherub” is a very different meaning than “being a cherub.” Though this is not unanimously conclusive, an increasing number of Bible scholars point to this ambiguity and likelihood of the Septuagint being the superior textual tradition here.[92] Adam was not a cherub, he was with the cherubim.
Lastly, in Revelation 12, we see the origin of the notion that one third of the angels fell to earth with Satan at his fall. The only problem is that this event did not occur before the garden of Eden in a cosmic rebellion, it happened at the birth of Jesus Christ! Revelation 12:1-6 describes an apocalyptic parable of the cosmic war of the Seed of the Serpent (a dragon of chaos) and the Seed of the Woman (Israel/the Church).[93] It describes one third of the angelic stars (Watchers?) joining Satan with the swipe of his serpentine tail. The dragon and his minions seek to devour the male seed (offspring) of the woman, but they fail and the child becomes king. And then the passage tells of a heavenly war:
Revelation 12:7–10
7 Now war arose in heaven, Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon. And the dragon and his angels fought back, 8 but he was defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. 9 And the great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him. 10 And I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, “Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God.
Most Christians believe this is a reference to Satan’s fall before the Garden of Eden incident, where he takes one third of the angels in heaven with him. But a closer look at the context reveals that this is not the case at all, but rather the opposite. The war in heaven does not happen before the Garden, it happens at the time of the incarnation of Messiah on earth! The woman (Israel) gives birth to a male child (Messiah, v. 5), who the dragon (Satan) seeks to devour (from Herod’s slaughter of the innocents all the way to the Cross). That Messiah ascends to the throne in authority af
ter his resurrection (v. 5; Eph 1:20-22), during which time that woman (Israel) flees to the wilderness (time of tribulation under the Roman Empire).
The war in heaven we see cannot be before the Garden because it says that the throwing down of Satan occurs with the coming of the kingdom of Christ! (v. 10). He is thrown down to earth and then seeks to kill the Christ (v. 13). Satan then seeks to make war with the rest of her offspring (God’s people) which we see in history.
Revelation 12 is an apocalyptic parable that is describing the incarnation of Messiah, his ascension to the throne of authority over all principalities and powers, and his suppression of Satan’s power as the Gospel goes forth into the world.
But our problems with Satan do not end there. In Enoch Primordial, I do not call Satan, Satan, but the satan, lowercase. Why? Because the Hebrew word is not an individual’s name, but a legal role meaning “accuser” or “adversary.” The satan depicted in Job 1 and 2 and 1Kings 22 is one of the divine council of heavenly host who engages in legal accusations against God and his people and sometimes carries out God’s intentions. In short, he is a kind of manipulative prosecutor whose purpose is to challenge God and his perfect law.
In Hebrew, satan is prefixed by the definite article ha which makes it translate more accurately as the satan, or the accuser. In the New Testament Greek, Satan is prefixed by the definite article ho, carrying the same result of the satan as the adversary (Rev. 12:9) or the accuser (Rev. 12:10).
So the most we can know of the satan’s work in the Old Testament is that he was the Serpent in the Garden, and he may have been a prosecuting attorney-like accuser of God’s heavenly court. I say may have been because the satan was more a role or state of being than an individual. The avenging angel who was going to strike down Balaam was described as the satan in Numbers 22:22 and verse 32 (“adversary” and “oppose”); the political opponents of king David were defined as the satan to him (2Sam. 19:22); David himself was described as a potential satan to the Philistines (1Sam. 29:4); Hadad the Edomite and Reznon, son of Eliada are both described as satans to Israel (1Kings 11:14, 23); and even God himself is described as the satan (adversary) when he incites David to take a census (1Chron. 21:1; 2 Sam. 24:1). In the Old Testament, the satan was not always the same individual, but more likely the legal office of prosecutor.
This short excursion into deconstructing Satan is the foundation for why I portrayed him as I did in Enoch Primordial, as the prosecutorial Seraph, the Serpent of the Garden, whose purpose became accusing God’s people and bringing lawsuits to God’s throne to try to foil his plans.
Covenant Lawsuit
In Enoch Primordial, the satan prosecutes a “covenant lawsuit” against Yahweh Elohim in order to buy time for the Watchers to accomplish their nefarious plans of world domination. The satan and most of the Watchers “present themselves” before the heavenly court, along with “ten thousand times ten thousand of God’s holy ones,” the divine council. God is seated on his chariot throne above the Cherubim and beneath the Seraphim, and the satan engages in his arguments against God with Enoch, the translated holy man, as defense attorney.
At first blush this may seem to the modern “enlightened” religious mind like an artificial modern construct imposed upon the ancient story. But in fact, it is organically derived from the Bible itself, which drew from the ancient suzerain vassal treaties of the ancient Near East (most likely Hittite in origin).
Whenever “the satan” is named in the Bible (meaning “the accuser,” a legal term), it is usually in the legal context of a heavenly lawsuit. In the Noah Primeval appendices, I examined the divine council in the Scriptures in detail. In passages such as Job 1 and 2, and 1Kings 22 we are told that “the sons of God came to present themselves before Yahweh,”[94] “all the host of heaven standing beside him on his right and on his left.”[95] God then asks counsel and recommendation from this multitude on what to do regarding a specific situation.[96] The heavenly beings give their opinions, God renders his verdict, and directs some of the host to carry out the sentence.[97]
The context in these passages is that of a legal body of divine beings counseling with God over justice and the satan is one of these divine beings whose role is to accuse.[98] In Zechariah 3:1-4, Joshua the High Priest stands in this divine council before God. The satan stands beside him “to accuse him” before Elohim in good legal form.
While some of these scenes are the satan initiating legal accusations against God’s people, others are litigation against pagan rulers for their own defiance of God’s universal sovereignty. In Daniel 7:9-14, we see “the Ancient of Days” seated on his throne, “and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him; the court sat in judgment” over the nations of the earth (Dan. 7:10). And in Psalm 82, God renders legal judgment upon the members of the divine council who failed to carry out justice for God upon the gentile nations they had inherited.[99] We read this Psalmic phrase used in Enoch Primordial, “God has taken his place in the divine council; in the midst of the gods he holds judgment” (v. 1-2).
Another kind of Biblical lawsuit saw Old Testament prophets as Yahweh’s prosecuting attorneys indicting Israel for breaking her covenant with God. The prophet would stand before God’s divine council and make the summons and charges against Israel before calling her to respond to the charges. Then Yahweh as judge would pronounce his verdict. One of the qualifications of a prophet’s authority to speak for God was that he had stood in this divine council (Jer. 23:18, 22).
Herbert Huffmon has pointed out examples of covenant lawsuits in Jeremiah, Isaiah, Micah, and other prophets carried out in God’s courtroom against Israel that illustrated a Biblical pattern of legal procedure:
A description of the scene of judgment
II. The speech of the plaintiff
A. Heaven and earth are appointed judges
B. Summons to the defendant (or judges)
C. Address in the second person to the defendant
1. Accusation in question form to the defendant
2. Refutation of the defendant's possible arguments
3. Specific indictment[100]
I used this basic scenario in Enoch Primordial when the satan accuses Elohim of being unjust in his own covenantal relationship with man. But I also used the ancient Near Eastern covenant formula for the document under attack in the satan’s lawsuit. This ancient formula can be seen in the form of the Biblical covenant as well. Biblical scholars have shown how God’s covenants with Israel displayed the same five or six point structure that their neighboring Hittite nation used during the Late Bronze or Early Iron Ages (1400-1200 B.C.).
It is commonly understood now that covenant texts occupy a significant proportion of Biblical composition. As Biblical scholar Eugene Merrill states,
The Covenant Code of Exodus 20-23 and the entire Book of Deuteronomy are the most outstanding examples of this type. It is quite apparent that Moses undoubtedly utilized already existing treaty formulas in the construction of biblical treaty contracts between God and individuals or God and Israel.[101]
The chart below summarizes how the book of Deuteronomy reflects five key elements of the ancient Hittite suzerain treaty as currently attested by scholarship:
Parallels Between Hittite Suzerainty Treaties & the Book of Deuteronomy[102]
Structure of Hittite Suzerainty Treaties (14th Century b.c.)
Structure of Deuteronomy,
a Hebrew “Covenant Document”
1. Preamble: “These are the words of the Great King…”
1. Preamble: (1:1–6). “These are the words which Moses spoke…”
2. Historical Prologue: The events leading up to the treaty.
2. Historical Prologue: (1:7–4:49). Events leading up to the making and renewing of the covenant.
3. Ethical Stipulations: Laws relating to the vassal’s obedience to the suzerain.
3. Ethical Stipulations: (5–26). The loyalty due to God.
4. Curses and Blessings: Contingent
upon disobedience or obedience.
4. Curses and Blessings: (27, 28). Contingent upon disobedience or obedience.
5. Divine Witnesses: Called to witness the making of the treaty (“heaven and earth”).[103]
5. Divine Witnesses: (32). The witness of “heaven and earth” (30:19; 32:1).
Whether the majority of the Pentateuch (first five books of the Bible) was written by Moses or compiled and edited in the centuries that followed him, some scholars such as Meredith Kline have argued that the entire Bible, including the early chapters of Genesis, is formulated on the model of an extended ancient Near Eastern covenant.[104]
Another well established “Tablet Theory” by D.J. Wiseman suggests that the early portions of Genesis may have even found their sources in clay tablets inscribed by those closest to the primeval events.[105] So maybe the notion of the satan referring to “discovery documents” of genealogies in Enoch Primordial is not so far fetched after all.
In conclusion, even the legal procedures and divine council found in the Bible reflect the covenant treaty structures, and city-state bureaucracy of Israel’s ancient Near Eastern pagan neighbors redeemed and applied to God’s purposes.
The Chronicles of the Nephilim
So that’s what I did in Noah Primeval and Enoch Primordial. I retold the story of these two heroes of faith, incorporating the respected Enochian tradition of the Watchers and giants, Ancient Near Eastern imagery of Azazel, Lilith, Leviathan and Rahab, cherubim and seraphim, speculation on the divine council of the Sons of God, along with other Mesopotamian mythopoeia and Biblical imagination, in order to give a theological explanation for the true origins and “partial truth” of pagan mythology. It’s all positively primeval.
