The image of the serpent as the embodiment of the wisdom transmitted by Sophia was an emblem used by gnosticism , especially those sects that the more orthodox characterized as " Ophites " "Serpent People". The chthonic serpent was one of the earth-animals associated with the cult of Mithras. The Basilisk , the venomous "king of serpents" with the glance that kills, was hatched by a serpent, Pliny the Elder and others thought, from the egg of a cock. Outside Eurasia, in Yoruba mythology , Oshunmare was another mythic regenerating serpent. The Rainbow Serpent also known as the Rainbow Snake is a major mythological being for Aboriginal people across Australia , although the creation myth associated with it are best known from northern Australia.
In Fiji Ratumaibulu was a serpent god who ruled the underworld and made fruit trees bloom. In the Northern Flinders Ranges reigns The Arkaroo , serpent who drank Lake Frome empty, refuges into the mountains, carving valleys and waterholes, earthquakes through snoring. The serpent, when forming a ring with its tail in its mouth, is a clear and widespread symbol of the "All-in-All", the totality of existence, infinity and the cyclic nature of the cosmos.
The most well known version of this is the Aegypto-Greek Ourobouros. It is believed to have been inspired by the Milky Way , as some ancient texts refer to a serpent of light residing in the heavens. The Ancient Egyptians associated it with Wadjet , one of their oldest deities as well as another aspect, Hathor.
Don Stewart :: How Do We Understand the Serpent in the Garden of Eden?
In Hindu mythology Lord Vishnu is said to sleep while floating on the cosmic waters on the serpent Shesha. In the Puranas Shesha holds all the planets of the universe on his hoods and constantly sings the glories of Vishnu from all his mouths. He is sometimes referred to as "Ananta-Shesha," which means "Endless Shesha". In the Samudra manthan chapter of the Puranas, Shesha loosens Mount Mandara for it to be used as a churning rod by the Asuras and Devas to churn the ocean of milk in the heavens in order to make Soma or Amrita , the divine elixir of immortality.
As a churning rope another giant serpent called Vasuki is used. In pre-Columbian Central America Quetzalcoatl was sometimes depicted as biting its own tail. The mother of Quetzalcoatl was the Aztec goddess Coatlicue "the one with the skirt of serpents" , also known as Cihuacoatl "The Lady of the serpent".
Quetzalcoatl 's father was Mixcoatl "Cloud Serpent". He was identified with the Milky Way, the stars and the heavens in several Mesoamerican cultures. The demigod Aidophedo of the West African Ashanti is also a serpent biting its own tail. In Dahomey mythology of Benin in West Africa, the serpent that supports everything on its many coils was named Dan. Aida-Wedo, Aido Quedo, "Rainbow-Serpent" is a spirit of fertility, rainbows and snakes, and a companion or wife to Dan, the father of all spirits. Because of his association with snakes, he is sometimes disguised as Moses, who carried a snake on his staff.
He is also thought by many to be the same entity of Saint Patrick , known as a snake banisher. The serpent Hydra is a star constellation representing either the serpent thrown angrily into the sky by Apollo or the Lernaean Hydra as defeated by Heracles for one of his Twelve Labors. The constellation Serpens represents a snake being tamed by Ophiuchus the snake-handler, another constellation.
The most probable interpretation is that Ophiuchus represents the healer Asclepius. Occasionally, serpents and dragons are used interchangeably, having similar symbolic functions. The venom of the serpent is thought to have a fiery quality similar to a fire spitting dragon. In Germanic mythology , serpent Old English: The Aztec and Toltec serpent god Quetzalcoatl also has dragon like wings, like its equivalent in K'iche' Maya mythology Q'uq'umatz "feathered serpent" , which had previously existed since Classic Maya times as the deity named Kukulkan.
The Minoan Snake Goddess brandished a serpent in either hand, perhaps evoking her role as source of wisdom, rather than her role as Mistress of the Animals Potnia theron , with a leopard under each arm. Serpents figured prominently in archaic Greek myths. According to some sources, Ophion "serpent", a. Ophioneus , ruled the world with Eurynome before the two of them were cast down by Cronus and Rhea.
The oracles of the Ancient Greeks were said to have been the continuation of the tradition begun with the worship of the Egyptian cobra goddess, Wadjet. Typhon the enemy of the Olympian gods is described as a vast grisly monster with a hundred heads and a hundred serpents issuing from his thighs, who was conquered and cast into Tartarus by Zeus , or confined beneath volcanic regions, where he is the cause of eruptions. Typhon is thus the chthonic figuration of volcanic forces. Serpent elements figure among his offspring; among his children by Echidna are: Cerberus a monstrous three-headed dog with a snake for a tail and a serpentine mane ; the serpent-tailed Chimaera ; the serpent-like chthonic water beast Lernaean Hydra ; and the hundred-headed serpentine dragon Ladon.
Both the Lernaean Hydra and Ladon were slain by Heracles. Python was the earth-dragon of Delphi , she always was represented in the vase-paintings and by sculptors as a serpent. Pytho was the chthonic enemy of Apollo , who slew her and remade her former home his own oracle, the most famous in Classical Greece. Medusa and the other Gorgons were vicious female monsters with sharp fangs and hair of living, venomous snakes whose origins predate the written myths of Greece and who were the protectors of the most ancient ritual secrets. The Gorgons wore a belt of two intertwined serpents in the same configuration of the caduceus.
The Gorgon was placed at the center, highest point of one of the pediments on the Temple of Artemis at Corfu. Asclepius , the son of Apollo and Koronis, learned the secrets of keeping death at bay after observing one serpent bringing another which Asclepius himself had fatally wounded back to life with healing herbs.
To prevent the entire human race from becoming immortal under Asclepius's care, Zeus killed him with a bolt of lightning. Asclepius' death at the hands of Zeus illustrates man's inability to challenge the natural order that separates mortal men from the gods. In honor of Asclepius, snakes were often used in healing rituals. Non-poisonous snakes were left to crawl on the floor in dormitories where the sick and injured slept. The Bibliotheca claimed that Athena gave Asclepius a vial of blood from the Gorgons.
Gorgon blood had magical properties: However, Euripides wrote in his tragedy Ion that the Athenian queen Creusa had inherited this vial from her ancestor Erichthonios, who was a snake himself and had received the vial from Athena. In this version the blood of Medusa had the healing power while the lethal poison originated from Medusa's serpents.
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Olympias , the mother of Alexander the Great and a princess of the primitive land of Epirus , had the reputation of a snake-handler, and it was in serpent form that Zeus was said to have fathered Alexander upon her. He guarded it with a massive serpent that never slept. Medea, who had fallen in love with Jason of the Argonauts , enchanted it to sleep so Jason could seize the Fleece.
When not driven by horses, the chariot of the Greek sun god is described as being pulled by fiery draconic beings. In the Hebrew Bible the serpent in the Garden of Eden lured Eve with the promise of being like God, tempting her that despite God's warning, death would not be the result, that God was withholding knowledge from her. Although the serpent is identified as Satan in the Book of Revelation , [30] in Genesis the serpent is portrayed merely as a deceptive creature or trickster , promoting as good what God had directly forbidden, and particularly cunning in its deception Gen.
The staff of Moses transformed into a snake and then back into a staff Exodus 4: The Book of Numbers This copper snake according to the Biblical text is wrapped around a pole and used for healing. Book of Numbers The naga primarily represents rebirth, death and mortality, due to its casting of its skin and being symbolically "reborn". The snake represented freedom in Hindu mythology because they cannot be tamed. An origin myth explains the emergence of the name "Cambodia" as resulting from conquest of a naga princess by a Kambuja lord named Kaundinya: This leads to war between the "spirits of the air" and the Nagas: Nagas amok are rivers in spate, and the entire region is flooded.
In America some of the Native American tribes [ which? Among the Hopi of Arizona the serpent figures largely in one of the dances. The rattlesnake was worshiped in the Natchez temple of the sun and the Aztec deity Quetzalcoatl was a feathered serpent-god. In many Meso-American cultures, the serpent was regarded as a portal between two worlds.
The tribes of Peru are said to have adored great snakes in the pre-Inca days and in Chile the Mapuche made a serpent figure in their deluge beliefs. She's given a special assignment but then set up by her own agency. Start your free trial.
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How was the serpent able to enter the paradise of Eden? In Genesis three, the serpent, or snake, is an actual creature. It is not to be understood as an allegory or as a representation of some other type of creature. This was an actual being who was with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.
Scripture nowhere gives any indication for this story to be understood symbolically. How Did Serpent Speak? If the account is not an allegory, then how can we explain the ability of a serpent to speak? The Bible provides no answer. How Eve heard the serpent is not explained either, but there is no indication that she was shocked to discover this creature could communicate with her. This has led some to speculate that before the Fall, animals had ability to speak. But it is not necessary to hold this view. In the Book of Numbers we find God speaking to the prophet Balaam through a donkey.
Then the Lord opened the mouth of the donkey, and she said to Balaam, What have I done to you, that you have struck me these three times Numbers Identity Of Serpent We have a similar situation here. Though the serpent is not explicitly identified in the Book of Genesis, he is identified with Satan in the last book of Scripture.
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So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was cast out to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him. He laid hold of the dragon, that serpent of old, who is the Devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years Revelation Not Supernatural Being It does seem clear from Scripture that there was an actual serpent in the Garden-he is described as one of the wild animals that God had made Genesis 1: The serpent was not a supernatural being. In some way, Satan entered into the body of the serpent to tempt Adam and Eve.
Therefore, Satan himself is the personage behind the serpent. The serpent was the instrument the Devil used to do his bidding. Thus we can conclude that the tempter was the Devil who was disguised in the form of a snake. According to Scripture, the career of Satan, or the Devil, has been steadily going down since his creation. Originally he was created as a perfect being without any sin. Satan Cast Out At some unknown time in the past, he decided to rebel against God.
When he rebelled against the Lord this beautiful creature became the Devil or the adversary. It is clear from Scripture that God did not create the Devil. This creature became the Devil when he decided to rebel against God. Cast Out Satan was cast out of God's presence because of his sin. The Book of Job informs us that he now has some access to God's presence but only when the Lord allows it.
God Of This Age Satan is presently deceiving humankind. The Bible calls him the prince of this world, the god of this age and the prince of the power of the air. Jesus said to the religious leaders of His day: You are of your father the Devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it John 8: This deception will continue until his future judgment.
During the time of the Great Tribulation, he will be cast down to the earth Revelation After the Second Coming of Christ he will be thrown into the pit for a thousand years.
Was Satan the serpent in Genesis chapter 3?
After the thousand years, the Devil will be released for a short time. He will then be thrown into the lake of fire forever Revelation Thus will be the end of his inglorious career. More Shrewd We now come back to Genesis three.