Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Lucifer ???

Lucifer is a name frequently given to Satan/devil in Christian belief. This usage stems from a particular interpretation, as a reference to a fallen angel, in Isaiah 14:3-20, that speaks of someone who is given the name of "Day Star" or "Morning Star" the word in Latin for “Day Star” is Lucifer. The same Latin word is used of the morning star in second Peter 1:19 and elsewhere with no relation to Satan. But Satan is called Lucifer in many writings later than the Bible, notably in Milton's Paradise Lost.” In Latin the word Lucifer means Light Bringer and is a name for the planet Venus in its dawn appearance.


The use of Lucifer as a name for Satan was popularized in Dante’s “Inferno” and Melton’s Paradise Lost.”  The word “Day Star” in Isaiah 14  refers to the King of Babylon and in Ezekiel 28 regarding the king of Tyre.  


 Most modern English versions of the Bible (including the NRSV, NIV, NASB, NJB, and ESV) render the Hebrew word as "day star", "morning star" or something similar, and never as "Lucifer", a word that in English is now very rarely used in the sense of the original word in Hebrew, though in Latin "Lucifer" was a literal translation.  


The Lucifer myth was transferred to Satan already in the pre-Christian century Jewish books of Enoch and the Life of Adam and Eve. In them Lucifer is described as having been one of the archangels. Because he contrived "to make his throne higher than the clouds over the earth and resemble 'My power' on high", Satan was hurled down, with his hosts of angels, and since then he has been flying in the air continually above the abyss.


However, it was among Christian writers that the identification of "Lucifer" with Satan had its greatest fortune. Tertullian ("Contra Marrionem," v. 11, 17), Origen ("Ezekiel Opera," iii. 356), and others, identify Lucifer with Satan, who also is represented as being "cast down from heaven."

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