The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (2153 page)

s
tras
.

 
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(Skt., ‘being’, ‘essence’, ‘right’). Absolute, unqualified Being in Hinduism, and thus identical with
Brahman
. In ethics it means ‘good’, in epistemology ‘true’. It is combined with
cit
and
nanda
in the basic formula
saccid
nanda
.

 
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(Heb., ‘adversary’; Arab.,
al-Shaytan
). In Jewish, Christian, and Islamic tradition, the chief enemy of God.
Judaism
In the older books of the Hebrew Bible, the word
s
t
n
is a common noun (e.g. 1 Samuel 29. 4), and is a human adversary (1 Kings 11. 14, 23, 25). Apart from the figure of the serpent in Genesis 3, there is no figure to correspond to the later tradition. This begins to emerge after the
Exile
, perhaps under
Zoroastrian
influence. In
Job
, ‘the Satan’ is a heavenly figure who tests Job, but always with God's permission (e.g. chs. 1 and 2). In the amoraic period, he becomes a significant individual. He is said to have been responsible for all the sins in the Bible (
PdRE
13. 1), and the reason for blowing the
shofar
on
Rosh ha-Shanah
is ‘to confuse Satan’ (
BRH
16b). In later Judaism (especially
kabbalah
) he becomes known by other names, e.g.
Samael
.
Christianity
The cognate term ‘the devil’ (Gk.,
diabolos
), which has become the usual word in Christian tradition, alternates with ‘Satan’ in the New Testament (see also
BEELZEBUB
). Here the Jewish picture is elaborated.
The identity of Satan as a fallen angel is asserted by Revelation 12. 7–9. The devil, ‘
Lucifer
’, fell through pride, because he would not submit to God. Satan's defeat by Christ on the cross led to ‘Christus Victor’ theories of
atonement
, revived and made important in the 20th cent., by G. Aulén: the conquest of personified evil reinforced many Christians in their resistance to totalitarian dictators.
Islam
Al-Shayt
n is, in the
Qur’
n
, the adversary. The term describes Ibl
s (Gk.,
diabolos
, ‘devil’) and his descendants as they cease to be simply rebellious
jinn
, and become subverters or tempters of humans (eighty-eight times in thirty-six chapters).