Demonology

“ It is obvious, that, when the entire enginery of supernaturalism was organized in adaptation to the idea of the Devil, and demonology became synonymous with diabolism, the credulity and superstition of mankind would give a wide extension to that form of belief. ”

“ The ex-god—Deities demonised by conquest—Theological animosity—Illustration from the Avesta—Devil-worship an arrested Deism—Sheik Adi—Why demons were painted ugly—Survivals of their beauty.
The phenomena of the transformation of deities into demons meet the student of Demonology at every step. ”

“ It is in this spirit that I now enter upon the second division of the subject in hand, in which I shall try to indicate the chief features of the belief in demonology as it existed during the Elizabethan period. These will be taken up in three main heads: the classification, physical appearance, and powers of the evil spirits. ”

“ The last great display of the effects of the doctrines of demonology, of the belief of the agency of invisible, irresponsible beings, whether fallen angels or departed spirits, upon the actions of men and human affairs, is now to open before us. The final results of superstitions and fables and fancies, accumulating through the ages, are to be exhibited in a transaction, an actual demonstration in real life. They are to present an exemplification that will at once fully display their power, and deal their death-blow. ”

“ In the Bible certainly Satan and his hosts are rebel angels and not rival Gods. Once more undoubtedly demonology has been a source of much misery and many degrading practices. But demonology represents a natural religious instinct. It is older than the Bible. And what our religion has done, where it has been true to itself, is to purge away the noxious and non-moral superstitions. ”

“ They have, for example, a demon of the waterfall, a demon of wild-beast tracks, a demon which interferes with snares for wild-fowl, a baboon demon, which takes possession of dancers and causes them to perform wonderful feats of climbing, &c. But it is impossible to do more than deal with a few types, which will illustrate the main features of the demonology of savage, barbarous and semi-civilized peoples. ”

“ Even many learned men were induced to side with the popular opinion on the subject, and did nothing more than endeavour to reconcile it with their acknowledged systems of demonology. They taught that such heathen objects of reverence were fallen angels in league with the prince of darkness, who, until the appearance of our Saviour, had been allowed to range on the earth uncontrolled, and to involve the world in spiritual darkness and delusion. ”

“ Demons were believed (See Demonology,) to preside over herbs, trees, rivers, mountains, and animals; every member of the human body was under their power, and all corporeal diseases were produced by their malignity. For instance, if any happened to be afflicted with a fever, little anxiety was manifested to discover its cause, or to adopt rational measures for its cure; it must no doubt have been occasioned by some evil spirit residing in the body, or influencing in some mysterious way the fortunes of the sufferer. ”

“ In Europe a similar demon is said to be obtainable from a cock’s egg. In South Africa and India, on the other hand, the magician digs up a dead body, especially of a child, to secure a familiar. The evocation of spirits, especially in the form of necromancy, is an important branch of the demonology of many peoples ”

“ The rites of his dark and deadly superstition are all intended to avert evils from himself, by transferring them to others: hence the witchcraft and magic which flow naturally from the system of demonology. ”

“ There are savages without God in any proper sense of the word, but none without ghosts. And the Fetishism, Ancestor-worship, Hero-worship, and Demonology of primitive savages are all, I believe, different manners of expression of their belief in ghosts, and of the anthropomorphic interpretation of out-of-the- way events which is its concomitant. Witchcraft and sorcery are the practical expressions of these beliefs; and they stand in the same relation to religious worship as the simple anthropomorphism of children or savages does to theology. ”

“ And as I believe that a company of children left entirely to themselves would form and grow up with a language which in a very few years would be spoken fluently, 1 so I am certain that the shades of night, and fear, pain, and lightning and mystery would produce in the same time conceptions of dreaded beings, resulting first in demonology and then in the fancied art of driving devils away. ”

“ As in some shadow-pantomime, the deities and demons pursue each other in endless procession, dropping down as awe-inspiring Titans, vanishing as grotesque pigmies—vanishing beyond the lamp into Nothingness! ”

“ A few general remarks on the nature of Demonology, and the original cause of the almost universal belief in communication betwixt mortals and beings of a power superior to themselves, and of a nature not to be comprehended by human organs, are a necessary introduction to the subject. ”

“ They then begin to sing the names of various demons, as though they were chanting a litany, until suddenly they perceive that the Devil has appeared in the midst of them in the shape of some animal or other. As he would seem to be visible to them all in some mysterious way they immediately extinguish the lights, and each one of them as quickly as he can seizes upon the woman, who chances to be nearest at hand. ”

“ The demonic forms are generally natural, albeit caricatured or exaggerated. And this effort at a præternatural conception is, in this early form, by no means mere superstition; rather is it poetic and artistic,—a kind of crude effort at allgemeinheit, at realisation of the types of evil—the claw-principle, fang-principle in the universe, the physiognomies [320] of venom and pain detached from forms to which they are accidental. ”

“ At first few, as distinguished from the host of deities by exceptional harmfulness, they were multiplied with man’s growth in the classification of his world. Their principle of existence is capable of indefinite expansion, until it shall include all the realms of darkness, fear, and pain. In the names of demons, and in the fables concerning them, the struggles of man in his ages of weakness with peril, want, and death, are recorded more fully than in any inscriptions on stone. ”

“ But though their celestial origin might linger around them in some slight legend or characteristic as well as in their names, the evil phenomenon to which each was attached as an explanation assigned the real form and work with which he or she was associated in popular superstition. We therefore find in the demons in which men have believed a complete catalogue of the obstacles with which they have had to contend in the long struggle for existence. In the devils we discover equally the history of the moral and religious struggles through which priesthoods and churches have had to pass. ”

“ During the eleventh century, then, there began to spread throughout Europe a number of mysterious organizations whose adherents, in a secrecy that was all but absolute, practised obscure rites embodying their beliefs, the central feature of which was the adoration of the evil principle, the demon. ”

“ The exact technical distinction between the two terms in ecclesiastical usage may be seen in the phrase used in the decree of the Fourth Lateran Council [1] : “Diabolus enim et alii dæmones.” (The devil and the other demons) , i.e. all are demons, and the chief of the demons is called the Devil. This distinction is preserved in in the Vulgate New Testament, where diabolus represents the Greek διάβολος, and in almost every instance refers to Satan himself, whilst his subordinate angels are described, in accordance with the Greek, as dæmones or dæmonia. ”

“ On the other hand, the popular idea of the fate of distinguished sinners may be found hid under misereres, where kings sometimes appear in Hell, and in the early picture-books which contained a half-christianised folklore.
It has been observed that the early nature-deities, reflecting the evil and good of nature, in part through the progress of human thought and ideality, and through new ethnical rivalries, were degraded into demons. ”

“ It is important, therefore, that we should guard against confusing the speculative or moral attempts of mankind to personify pain and evil with the ugly and brutal demons and devils of artificial superstition, oftenest pictured on church walls. ”

“ Magic, the genesis of magical cults and ceremonies, the ritual of primitive peoples, traditional superstitions, and their ancillary lore, have been made the subject of vast and erudite studies, mostly from an anthropological and folk-loristic point of view, but the darker side of the subject, the history of Satanism seems hardly to have been attempted. ”

“ Having, however, adopted our present ideas of the devil as they are expressed by his nearest acquaintances, the witches, from the accounts of satyrs, which seem to have been articles of faith both among the Celtic and Gothic tribes, we must next notice another fruitful fountain of demonological fancies. ”

“ The degradation of beneficent beings, already described in relation to large demonic and diabolic forms, must be understood as constantly acting in the smallest details of household superstition, with what strange reaction and momentous result will appear when we come to consider the phenomena of Witchcraft. ”

“ It is through this mythologic history that the most powerful demons have been associated in the popular imagination with stars, planets,—Ketu in India, Saturn and Mercury the ‘Infortunes,’—comets, and other celestial phenomena. ”

“ The precise words of the text, as well as common sense, forbid us to believe that the images so constructed by common artisans became the habitation or resting-place of demons, or possessed any manifestation of strength or power, whether through demoniacal influence or otherwise. ”

“ As to function, the demons we shall have to consider are those representing—1. Hunger; 2. Excessive Heat; 3. Excessive Cold; 4. Destructive elements and physical convulsions; 5. Destructive animals; 6. Human enemies; 7. The Barrenness of the Earth, as rock and desert; 8. Obstacles, as the river or mountain; 9. Illusion, seductive, invisible, and mysterious agents, causing delusions; 10. Darkness (especially when unusual) , Dreams, Nightmare ”

“ The statements made concerning the fair names of the chief demons and devils which have haunted the imagination of mankind, heighten the contrast between their celestial origin and the functions attributed to them in their degraded forms. The theory of Dualism, representing a necessary stage in the mental development of every race, called for a supply of demons, and the supply came from the innumerable dethroned, outlawed, and fallen deities and angels which had followed the subjugation of races and their religions. ”

“ These classes are selected, in obedience to necessary limitations, as representing the twelve chief labours of man which have given shape to the majority of his haunting demons, as distinguished from his devils. ”

“ The fallen angels disclosed to the world unknown material substances, and various arts, such as metallurgy, the properties of herbs, incantations, and interpretation of the stars; and to women specially they revealed all the secrets of personal adornment. (5) There is scarcely any man who is not attended by a demon; and it is well known that untimely and violent deaths, which are attributed to accidents, are really caused by demons. (6) Those who go to theatres may become specially accessible to demons. ”

“ I therefore, having heard this, glorified the Lord God, and again I questioned the demon, saying: " Tell me how ye can ascend into heaven, being demons, and amidst the stars and holy angels intermingle." And he answered: "Just as things are fulfilled in heaven, so also on earth (are fulfilled) the types * of all of them. For there are principalities, authorities, world -rulers', and we demons fly about in the air; and we hear the voices of the heavenly beings, and survey all the powers. ”

“ The belief in the interference of spirits and supernatural beings in terrestrial matters, and the manifestations of their influence exerted in manifold ways—sometimes for good, sometimes for evil—had been widely disseminated from the earliest times, and we encounter them in all periods of classic antiquity. This belief in demons had become incorporated in the systems of many leading philosophers of antiquity. Now if the world were filled with demons the natural consequence was that their activity would manifest itself in various ways. ”

“ A demon—a fallen angel—evil spirit, an imp. Literally, a shade—a dark spot, moving as noiselessly and rapidly as a shadow. The many references in the New Testament to “devil,” and “devils,” should always be demons; the great multitude, so often found in one place, come from the innumerable concourse which constitute the “powers of darkness.” Shadow spirits, men and women who are controlled by these dark, shadowy imps, “love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil.” ”

“ The complexity of their symptoms produced what we call dedoublement, or a dual personality. Those possessed, claimed to be in the power of a demon, who entered their body by one of the natural passages, sporting with their person, placing itself in apposition with any place in their organism, proposing all sorts of erotic acts, natural and unnatural, whispering shameless propositions in their ears, blasphemy against God, forcing them to sign a contract with the Devil in their own blood. ”