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"And another portent appeared
in heaven ; behold , a great red
dragan, with seven heads and ten
horns, and seven diadems upon his
heads. His tail swept down a third of
the stars of heaven, and cast them to
the earth. And the dragon stood be–
rore the woman who was about to
bear a child, that he might devour
her child when she brought it forth;
she brought forth a mate child, one
who is to rule all the nations with a
rod of iron, but her chi ld was caught
up to God and to his throne" (Rev.
12:3-5, RSV) .
Jesus knew what Satan looked
like- both in a n ea rlier , beautiful
state, and in a later, more grotesque
and ugly condition. He is called a
"serpent" and a "dragon," as well as
"the cherub that covereth" in the
Bible.
When the prophet Ezekiel saw
the strange creatures covering God's
throne (Ezek. 1) he knew that they
were cherubs. Most people bel\eve
cherubs appear as naked babes with
cupid's bows and arrows. Few real–
ize that cherubs appeared to men in
ancient times; that sorne of them
were known from the time of Adam
until Noah as the guardians of the
garden of Eden. When God placed
two cherubim with " fiaming
swords" there to guard the way to
the tree of life, they
remained
there
from that day until the destruction
of Eden in the F lood. Remember,
that means about one-sixth of all
recorded history- a considerable
time!
Cherubim were able to manifest
themselves as lions, oxen, men, and
eagles- or as an aggregate of all
four. These huge spirit creatures
were preserved in stone as the
"winged bulls of Bashan" on an–
cient Assyrian kings' palaces. In
1975 a wooden bull with a man's
head overlaid in gold was recovered
from ruins of a great ancient Syrian
civilization believed to be contem–
poraneous with ancient Sumeria.
Search the great museums of Brit–
ain, France, Germany, and Egypt,
and you will see hundreds of exam–
ples of the worship of " the host of
the heavens" as gods in the form of
men with eagles' heads (common in
the inscriptions of ancient Egypt,
and in Egyptian tombs), winged
bulls featuring the heads of roen
The
PLAIN TRUTH
January
1978
and lions' claws, and other assorted
mixtures ofthese four.
The tales of the children of Noah,
all of whom had seen those cheru–
bim, repeated down through time
gave rise to the mythologies about
winged dragons, fiying serpents
whose mouths breathed tire, which
guarded mysterious castles filled
with fabulously valuable treasures
a t the top of craggy mountains.
Giants and their mythical treasures,
St. George and the Dragon, the
winged fiying serpent which was
worshiped by the Incas and Aztecs
(Quetzalcoatl, meaning "llying ser–
pent")- these are all mythological
tales endlessly repeated and embel–
lished, stemming from human en–
counters with cherubim.
When God told Moses to deco–
rate the interior of the tabernacle in
the wilderness with "cherubim,"
Moses didn't ask God, "What do
they Iook like?" He knew, especially
since he had come from a back–
ground of the royal courts of Egypt.
The Real Satan
Jesus knew exactly wha t to expect
when He encountered Satan. He
knew Satan didn't appear as a funny,
mischievous man in a weird red body
stocking complete with pointed ears,
a spear-tipped tail, and a trident in
hand .He knew Sa tan could appear as
a man, oras a cherub, oras a winged
llying serpent.
What
is
a "dragon," after all , but
a "winged llying serpent"? When
the devil appeared to Adam and
Eve, they weren't at all startled to
see a strange-looking creature hav–
ing serpentine, dragon-like form
(but probably standing upright , like
a tyrannosaurus) speak to them in
audible voice, for they had no stan–
dard of comparison. The fact tha t
God, using serpents as a
type
of
Satan, cursed the serpent and
from
that time
decreed he was to crawl on
bis belly in the dust of the earth
strongly indicatés there were serpen–
tine creatures that stood upright
prior to that time.
Jesus knew that He was meeting
one ofthe most powerful spirit beings
in the universe; He knew that He
would have to stand the test of the
most appealing, magnetic, powerful
personality on earth; that He was
going to match wits with one of the
vilest, most subtle, most clever, most
cun ning, and superbly (if per–
vertedly) intelligent creatures in the
universe! He knew that humanly, of
Himself, He didn't have the strength
and will to overcome a spiri t being of
such power. He would need super–
human strength, spiritual strength
from a righteous source, and the very
help of the Father Himself, as well as
the power of friendly angels, in arder
to prevail.
That's why He fasted for so long!
The Bible says Christ "learned by
the things which He
su.ffered,"
and
Christ intended to come to prove
that weaknesses can be overcome
with enough help from God!
The Confrontatlon Beglns
Read the account of Jesus' con–
frontation with Satan just prior to
the beginning of His ministry. The
story is revealed in the fourth chap–
ter of the book of Matthew. "Then
was Jesus led up of the Spirit into
the wi ldemess to be tempted of the
devil" (Matt. 4: 1).
When Jesus was "led up of the
Spirit" it is obvious that He had been,
by His "sixth sense" of awareness of
the spirit world, in such close commu–
nication with His heavenly Father
through prayer that He knew that it
was time fo r thi s great con–
frontation- the supreme battle of
wi lls between the fallen archangel
Lucifer and the One who was coming
to unseat this Satan and qualify to be
the world ruler. (Perhaps Christ had
received either a very vivid dream, a
vision,oreven heard an audible voice
from an angel. Or He might have just
"sensed" it was time.)
Jesus, with His brilliant mind and
the outpouring of God's Holy Spirit
"without measure," no doubt knew
the Scriptures as no man before or
since! He was, after all, the "Word
personified," as it were, and so was
very thoroughly aware of the bibli–
cal examples of fasting just prior to
a great crisis or a great event. He
knew fhat Moses had fasted 40 days
and 40 nights prior to receiving the
Ten Commandments on Mount
Sinai. He knew about Elijah's 40
days and 40 nights of fasting, and
knew this would also be required of
Him in order to utterly divest Him–
self of any reliance whatsoever upon
(Continued on page 41)
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