A Delicate Balance

Dave Brisbin 1.26.20 Decades ago, I thought it was important to challenge a Franciscan priest who said he believed that Satan was really a metaphor for our own inclination to evil. He waved me off saying that all he could do was tell me what he was convinced of; that I needed to go become convinced of what I’m convinced of. Now, decades later I am challenged for my beliefs on Satan and evil, and though there is no definitive proof from the scriptures I used then to “prove” my points, I do have a different responsibility than did the priest to at least talk a bit about them. So, is Satan “real” as we typically understand him: a sentient being dedicated to opposing God’s will and effecting our destruction? When we dig into the Hebrew scriptures from within a Hebrew context, we’re in for a shock. The scriptures present at least four different ways “ha satan,” the adversary, can be viewed, and the passages we have used to nail down our popular image of Satan aren’t even referring to such a being in the first place. The Jews who wrote our scripture believed that nothing could oppose God, which carves out a very different understanding of ha satan’s role, and they also believed in a necessary balance between each human’s inclination to evil and good. It’s in that delicate balance between our own inclinations that we can find a view of ha satan that is healthy and helpful in taking us always toward the good that is our God.