1. Jazmine Rogers
Western Humanities II
Writing Assignment #2
September 17, 2014
TH 8:00-9:25
Professor Wilkinson
A Deceptive Satan
As young children, whether they came from a religious background or not,
Satan has always been portrayed as a large mean figure dressed in a red suit with
devil horns and a pitchfork. In a sense, he resembled some sort of a cartoon
character. When things or people are unknown to them through their own eyes,
mans’ mind and imagination begins to wonder about things such as the physical
characteristics of Satan solely from the stories they have heard. Another thing that
was also thought about Satan as a young child was how powerful he was. In a sense,
he was portrayed in a way that his powers could somehow compete with God. All of
these prior notions about Satan tend to develop because the Bible tends to lack
information on physical characteristics of Satan, society has took it upon itself to
assume exactly how he might appear, and because of lack of knowledge of the Bible.
Within the reading of Paradise lost, John Milton goes fully in-depth about various
characteristic changes Satan experiences, the true powers that he holds, and how

2. deceptive and condemned Satan can presume to be even to the highest of angels
(The Holy Bible, 1978)
In the Bible, there were very vague references to Satan physically. Satan is
referenced in the Bible as a “bright morning star” when he was Lucifer in God’s
army. Satan was intended to be one of God’s greatest creations, which is why God
made him the highest ranked angel in his army. In a particular passage in the Bible
coming from Ezekiel 28:12,14-18, it states “Thus says the Lord God, you had the seal
of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect stone was your coverage. On the day that
you were created they were prepared. You were the anointed cherub who covers,
and I placed you there. You were on the holy mountain of God; you walked in the
midst of the stones of fire. You were blameless in your ways from the day you were
created, until unrighteousness was found in you”. This passage is saying that
regardless of Satan’s wrongful doing, he was created in the power, love, and beauty
of God but when he became unrighteous, he became blameful, revolting, and
unanointed (The Holy Bible, 1978).
Also in the Bible, the written account never spoke on how “big” Satan was
physically and mentally. In John Milton’s Paradise Lost, he takes Satan on a
downward spiral of sizes and figures. For example, Milton had compared his size to
the titans who went to war in Greek mythology as he lay on the burning lake in Book
I. From the titans, Satan then is compared to a whale. Preceding the whale, Satan
was seen as a fox as he leaped into the Garden of Eden. The fox figure then led to a
toad that is seen whispering in Eve’s ear at night. Lastly, Satan is famously known
for his appearance as a serpent that encouraged Eve to eat form the Forbidden Tree.

3. Milton used these diminishing figures to reference the irony of Satan’s power and
how it essentially does not compare to God (Milton, 2005).
One reason why Milton decided to show Satan’s size diminish was to
incorporate a simile of his power. Even though it seemed like he had such great
power when he resembled the size of a titan, God would not let that be. Therefore,
Satan continued to shrink and shrink not knowing that his powers were also losing
value and significance. The similes then turned into ironies to make one wonder if
Satan is even that great as he claims to be. In the beginning of Paradise Lost, it
seemed to portray Satan as some sort of hero because Milton loved to back track in
his story and then move forward for relevance purposes. In the beginning of the
story, it was mainly focused around Satan. Because of this, readers could interpret
that he was some sort of a hero but in reality, it was solely because he was the
protagonist at that point. But, throughout Satan’s fall and his journey to escape to
Eden, Satan was so deceptive that he even surprised himself (Wellman, 2011).
Satan wanted to make his way into Eden any way he could. He had a great
urge to go see the holy city and attempt to sabotage it by any means necessary. By
this time, Satan was becoming so full of pride and hunger to be on top that he would
go through any circumstance to reach his goals. Satan decided the he would disguise
himself to resemble a cherub to go through the holy gates to the city of Eden. As
Satan was on his way to deceive the archangel Uriel he started to think back on what
he has done from the fall to trying to sabotage Eden and in a sense, he started to
second guess his wrong doings but he did not stay in that mind set for long. Satan
felt that he was already too condemned and to prideful to even turn back and even

4. become “holy” again. As Satan approached archangel Uriel and was able to pass the
highest rank of angels, it showed how condemned Satan was that he could even
deceive the holiest of angels to believing that he is something that he is not. Satan
thought that once he had got past Uriel that he was still unrecognizable but God
recognized him and was watching his every move (Milton, 2005).
In conclusion, Satan journeyed through a life of deception, pride, and evil. He
did things throughout “the fall” that even made him question himself and his wrong
doings but he knew that if he was going to conquer the power that he was longing
for, he was going to have to turn from Lucifer and become Satan. Satan is portrayed
as various animals and figures that foretold his decreasing power and low
competitiveness when it came to God. God only let so much happen until he called
his archangel Raphael to talk some sense into Adam and forewarn him of the
deception that was coming his way. In reality, Satan already had all the respect and
holy power he needed in God’s army but he let pride, greed, jealousy, and
unrighteousness take over his mindset and he went from an angel with power to a
fallen angel steady trying to gain power (Wellman, 2011).

5. Annotated Bibliography
Milton, John, and Gordon Teskey. Paradise Lost: Authoritative Text,
Sources and Backgrounds, Criticism. New York: W.W. Norton, 2005. Print.
The Holy Bible: New International Version, Containing the Old
Testament and the New Testament. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Bible, 1978. Print.
Wellman, Jack. "Does the Bible Say What the Devil, Satan, or Demons
Look Like?" What Christians Want To Know RSS. Telling Ministries LLC., 12 May
2011. Web. 16 Sept. 2014.
*MLA Format