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Sitaram · Site Admin Joined: 14 Sep 2005 Posts: 1079

In the long (5 hour) PBS (Public Television) interview of Joseph Campbell
by Bill Moyers, there is a brief segment in which Campbell relates a Sufi
tradition about Satan. God casts Satan out of heaven with a stentorian
voice saying "Begone!" and that last word of God is all Satan has to
remember God by. The idea is that Satan really loves God, and the
separation is punishment. Campbell chuckles and adds, "The last words
he hears are 'Go to Hell', and that memory is all Satan has to cling to for
eternity." I thought it was a very interesting story.

Sufi spirituality always seems to be greatly concerned with the notion of
"a beloved" and yearning after the beloved. There is one Sufi story about
a Fakir (religous ascetic), who is sitting by the roadside, begging, when he
sees another Fakir passing by in a determined fashion and a quick pace.
"Where are you going?" he calls out to the passerby, who replies "I am
going to visit with God." The first Fakir shouts "Well, ask God what he
thinks of my prayers." A few days later, our Fakir sees his fellow Fakir
returning. "Did you speak with God?" he asks. The second Fakir replies,
"Why yes, and he told me to tell you that he detests your prayers. They
are the worst he has ever heard." The first Faker jumps up and down
joyfully, laughing and shouting. "Why are you so happy?" the puzzled
traveller inquires. "Because God heard my prayers!", answers the first.
Once again, we see something beloved in the act of hearing and listening,
even if what is heard is discouraging.

My favorite line in Milton is where Satan says "Evil, be thou my good."
This devilish esthetic becomes interesting when examined in the light of
Socrates' proposition that "all by nature desire the good, and no one
willingly chooses what they consider to be not good", along with Plato's
Euthypro problem, "is the good good by fiat simply because it is what God
desires, or does God desire what is good for some inherent quality
residing in goodness (or substitute virtue, morality, holiness, or
righteousness for the word good,if you prefer).

I was a great fan of the cartoon series "Earthworm Jim". In one episode,
through some bizarre radioactive accident, Earthworm Jim spawns an evil
twin. They are about to battle to the death. The evil twin gives a speech
first, boasting essentially the boast of Milton's Satan, that he hates
everything that is good, and likes everything that is not good." So,
Earthworm Jim (who is not always the brightest of worms) reasons, "Well,
winning is good, and losing is bad, and since you like what is bad and hate
what is good, then surely I shall defeat you.) Of course, we know that our
hero, Jim, proceeds to dispatch his evil twin in no time flat.

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