Thursday, September 3, 2009

Rev 9, 5-10 They had power to harm people

(Rev 9, 5-10) They had power to harm people

[5] They were not allowed to kill them but only to torment them for five months; the torment they inflicted was like that of a scorpion when it stings a person. [6] During that time these people will seek death but will not find it, and they will long to die but death will escape them. [7] The appearance of the locusts was like that of horses ready for battle. On their heads they wore what looked like crowns of gold; their faces were like human faces, [8] and they had hair like women's hair. Their teeth were like lions' teeth, [9] and they had chests like iron breastplates. The sound of their wings was like the sound of many horse-drawn chariots racing into battle. [10] They had tails like scorpions, with stingers; with their tails they had power to harm people for five months.

(CCC 391) Behind the disobedient choice of our first parents lurks a seductive voice, opposed to God, which makes them fall into death out of envy (Cf. Gen 3:1-5; Wis 2:24). Scripture and the Church's Tradition see in this being a fallen angel, called "Satan" or the "devil" (Cf. Jn 8:44; Rev 12:9). The Church teaches that Satan was at first a good angel, made by God: "The devil and the other demons were indeed created naturally good by God, but they became evil by their own doing” (Lateran Council IV (1215): DS 800). (CCC 392) Scripture speaks of a sin of these angels (Cf. 2 Pt 2:4). This "fall" consists in the free choice of these created spirits, who radically and irrevocably rejected God and his reign. We find a reflection of that rebellion in the tempter's words to our first parents: "You will be like God (Gen 3:5)". The devil "has sinned from the beginning"; he is "a liar and the father of lies (1 Jn 3:8; Jn 8:44)."

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