DEVIL

(Yunanca köken — orijinale bakınız.), lit. one " who accuseth us before God day and night." (Rev. xii. 10.) The word bears the same sense as Satan, and is applied in the New Testament to the evil principle, the adversary of man referred to throughout the books of the Old and New Testament under various names and titles, as Satan, Lucifer, Belial, A polly on, Abaddon, the Man of Sin, the Tempter; and described as an angel who fell from heaven with many inferior spirits, being cast down from thence by God for his pride and rebellious spirit. From that time he is said to have had permi ion to try and tempt mankind, in which he succeeded in the persons of our first parents, thereby introducing sin and sorrow into the world. He is represented in Job and Zechariah as standing in the presence of the Lord, seeking permi ion to tempt men. It is manifest that the character herein attributed lo the Devil is identical with lhatof the Evil Principle in the Gnostic and Manic he an philosophy, and in the oriental system of religion generally; excepting, indeed, that the scriptures always maintain the inferiority of the evil to the good; but it may also be reasonably inferred that it was held by the Jews anterior to their captivity in Babylon, and the contact into which they then came with the Magian superstitions. Although the serpent who tempted Eve in Paradise is not expre ly said to be this Satan or Devil, nor is he at all mentioned by name by Moses, yet the character of the Evil Principle is there vividly delineated; he is characteristically mentioned in the Psalms, the Book of Job, and the Chronicles. DEVISE, or [s. 348]