Satan, devil, lucifer, Beelzebub, Old Nick, Prince of Darkness, deuce, fiend, demon. There is a great deal of misunderstanding about this particular guy.
First lets deal with Hell or Hades. In biblical times it was a real place, a really bad place. It was were the dead people were taken by the poor that couldn't afford to pay for a proper burial, and was usually just outside the city walls. A dumping ground, that probably stunk and was full of flies and maggots. It was an awful place to go when you died, but it was a very real earthly place and had nothing to do with the fantastic imagery that has since sprung up about terrible kingdoms underneath the earth.
In biblical times Satan was the term applied to someone who challenged the faith (or a political opponent). It literally meant "challenger". The leader of the opposition in parliament is Satan. The devil is the same - the term means slanderer or accuser. If I make a statement that is contrary or challenging to the Christian faith, I am the devil or satan.
So there is no such person as the devil, and there is no fantastical underworld realm of eternal fire and torture designated hell. But such imagery is still used by religious group to control them through fear (the Rage Against the Machine song "Killing in the name" comes to mind).
Lucifer was actually the bringer of light; Venus, the evening/morning star. The worship of Venus was important to early Pagan societies for a number of reasons, one being that time could be accurately determined by following the course of Venus across the sky. But because the pagan worship of Venus was contrary to Christian beliefs, Lucifer was associated with the devil. The goat was a sacred creature in ancient Egypt, but again because this pagan belief was contrary to Christian beliefs the devil got hooves and horns. Blues music is also the work of the devil, because the Christian church prefers their own gospel music to the original African songs.
Beelzebub and Lord of the Flies (check out references to Queen of the Hairy Flies on my Zoso symbol page!) seems to come from Ba'al, which meant master or Lord in ancient Hebrew societies. There were many Ba'al, rulers over their own tribes. This was contrary to the new Christian belief of one God, and so all Ba'al (false Gods) were labelled as prophets of the devil.
Demons
Demons, however, are real. These are malevolent spirits, and they frequently manifest themselves through teenagers. Buffy the Vampire Slayer depicts her battles with the inner workings of a teenage girls mind in a dramatic way.
My argument in the Framework was that most of us are completely unaware of much that goes on in our subconscious brain. This is where the real demons live, but they tend to disappear when the light of awareness is shone on them - that's what this web site is all about!.
© In the Light, 17 September, 2009 , Disclaimer, Son of Suckerfish drop-downs from HTML dog