More About the Serpent in the Garden
This started out as a reply to "Satanic Apologetics - The Garden of Eden" (in this Forum as well) but it got so long I decided it should have its own post. You should probably read the other post first before starting this one in order to have better context.
I have a long time friend that I worked with, who went on to become a rabbi. One of the things he enjoys doing is blowing holes in literalist readings of the Bible when he speaks to groups that are going to have those types in them. Like me, he's familiar with Joseph Campbell and the importance of aetiological (origin) stories in myth/religion. In the world view/explanations of the time, which is very different from our empirical science influenced world today, stories like that were needed to examplen why pain existed, why rainbows happened, how we learned about right and wrong--good and evil.
"We Jews," he says, "are magnificent story tellers, full of drama and engagement." The stories aren't meant to be literal by any means. In the Eden story, the serpent, is essentially the Jewish Prometheus, bringing to humans Knowledge from the God instead of fire from the Gods. And, once you leave Judaism and get into Christianity, whose dogma has little to do with the teachings of its namesake founder or primary apostle (Paul), you see a power structure designed to use a spiritual idea to wield power over others. These others are more than willing to give up their power in exchange for the promise of a better life after they die even though no such proof has been shown to exist.
In Judaism the serpent is nothing like the villain he's presented as in the many flavors of Christianity. And it's no coincidence that codified/dogmatized Christianity denies the two key aspects of our humanity: our Intellect and our Lust. Thus, to keep the sheep stupid and submissive, the serpent is cast a villain, as is the skepticism of Thomas's doubt in the gospels when news reached him about Jesus's resurrection. That too, is emphasized negatively because the power brokers turned Faith from being the substance of things hoped for (Hebrews 11:1) into the "the magic word the excuses you from ever having to think for yourself" (Dr. Who: Boom!). And the sheep accept this.
Christianity took the separate characters from Judaism--the serpent (Genesis), the satan (Job), Lucifer, the fallen morning star (Isiah 14:12) and the tempter devil in the desert (the gospels) and merged them into one being who stands in opposition to God and His Divine Plan (every movie and fairy tale has to have a bad guy, and this religion is no different). And again, the sheep question not, because they are trained from birth not to (talk about your grooming and indoctrination!!!).
Thus, Satanism has come to stand in opposition of dogmatized Christianity, celebrating the two things it denies most: human intellectual and critical thinking development and human sexual desire/drive. In reality--sorry/not sorry to all you blasphemy guys still stuck on your old religion, but there are actually many places that the teachings of Jesus and writings of Paul actually agree with the tenants of Satanism. Primary among them is that you are responsible for you, the decisions you make and the actions you take. As a power structure cannot have all these people thinking for themselves, so the intellectual vilifications were born: the serpent and the doubting Thomas. And to make ti stick, only the educated (i.e. church clergy and rich people) had access to the Bible prior to the 15th century, so the Word of God could be whatever they said it was...and the well trained sheep never questioned... and they still don't.
As Satanists--goats on the Left Hand Path, the road less travelled--the duty to inform is upon us. Like Morpheus in the The Matrix (1999), we need to do our best to wake the sheep up, even if they stay solely with the teachings of Jesus, that will still be a very different world for them than the power structure they are unknowingly trapped in now.
there's nothing reasonable about most of those stories when you step back and look at them. They can admire Abraham for his faith and all the drama of the will he /won't he sacrifice his son built into the story, but a god that asks you to kill your own son for him just to test your faith? Insane and sadistic. Ditto that for Job where a man is put through literal hell on earth just so God can win a bet. The problem with the sheep is they are so beholden to what they are told to believe, their ability to critically examine the framing is stunted.
Even in the modern age with Falwell's "AIDS is God's judgement on the nation that tolerates homosexuals" or Franklin Graham's "as long as there are gays in America more and more storms will be hitting the US coast." Both are sold to the shepp as evident actions of God and none think to question the framing because they are trained not to. In Falwell's case, the first group to get AIDS outside of gay males were kids with hemophilia who had no dog in the fight or understanding of what was going on. That lesbians weren't getting AIDS was ignored and no one thought that going after th kids made God look like a sadistic asshole. Same with Graham and the storms hitting the Gulf coast after his prediction. It was a self fulfilling prophecy and the sheep never questioned why the supreme being who pulled off the burning bush with Moses was incapable of hitting Castro in San Francisco or Greenwich Village in NYC or even easy target gay central that is Fort Lauderdale, and instead repeatedly hit the Mississippi-Louisiana area, taking his gay anger out on poor people living in trailers. An asshole and incompetent. So, logic has never been a part of this process. That what makes us goats different from the sheep.