this post was submitted on 29 Mar 2026
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[โ€“] zikzak025@lemmy.world 15 points 15 hours ago* (last edited 15 hours ago) (1 children)

Just to add to the great answers already given by others, another aspect to it all is that the mythology that developed into Judaism/Christianity/Islam was originally polytheistic. The god known as YHWH/Yahweh was one of many, but had a dedicated cult (not unlike Greco-Roman deities that often had cults of their own, revering one specific god to the exclusion of others who were nevertheless acknowledged).

So in that sense, the idea of Yahweh being omnipotent and omniscient is a bit of a retcon, meant to highlight the superiority of Yahweh over other gods as his henotheistic sect gradually developed into a more zealous monotheistic religion that rejected the legitimacy of all other gods entirely

That being said, the idea of Satan as a sort of antagonist character to tempt humans towards sin did not emerge until much later either, after the aforementioned omnipotent/omniscient revision of Yahweh. It really just boils down to whatever plot contrivances were convenient for the successive works of religious fan fiction that would later come to be canonized within each Abrahamic religion.

[โ€“] daychilde@lemmy.world 1 points 2 hours ago

Worth remembering about the Gospels, which were all written decades later and served the purpose for which they were written (which was to speak to different groups at the time, which is why they all emphasized different things).