If we examine the heathen world, we shall find that the deception by which Eve fell was the same by which they plunged into abominable idolatries. Pride, the exaltation of self to the place of Deity, results in degradation; for “pride goes before destruction,” and “when pride cometh, then cometh shame.” Paul also is authority for the statement that when one is “lifted up with pride,” he is in danger of falling “into the condemnation of the devil” (1 Timothy 3:6).
The heathenism of Plato’s day is a type of all heathenism. It was he who first systematized the so-called philosophy of the heathen. One of the cardinal points of Plato’s philosophy was the theory of the immortality of the soul, which sprang directly from the idea that the soul of man is itself supreme, and a part of God. We quote the following concerning his teaching: —
“There is no doctrine on which Plato more frequently or more strenuously insists than this, —that soul is not only superior to body, but prior to it in point of time, and that not only as it exists in the being of God, but in every order of existence. The soul of the world existed first, and then it was closed within material body. The souls, which animate the sun, moon, and stars, existed before the bodies, which they inhabited. The pre-existence of human souls is one of the arguments on which he relies to prove its immortality.”—Prof. W. S. Tyler, of Amherst College, in Schaff-Herzog Cyclopedia.
By the following quotation from Priestly’s “Heathen Philosophy,” it will be seen that this doctrine of the pre-existence of human souls, upon which Plato built his doctrine of their immortality, is in reality a claim that the soul is self-existent, or, in other words, that each soul is a god: —
“‘Every soul,’ he says (Phoedrus) ‘is immortal. That which is always in motion is from eternity, but that which is moved by another must have an end.’ Accordingly he maintained the pre-existence as well as the immortality of the soul; and in the East these two doctrines always went together, and are always ascribed to Pythagorus; the soul and the body being supposed to have only a temporary connection, to answer a particular purpose. ‘The soul existed,’ he says (Dr. Lea, lib. 10), ‘before bodies were produced, and is the chief agent in the changes and the management of the body.’ Agreeably to this doctrine, Plato maintained that all the knowledge we seem to acquire here is only the recollection of what we know in a former state.”
The heathen philosophy, therefore, was simply a deification of the human. The mind of man was made the “lord of itself and all the world beside,” a part of God, and consequently answerable only to itself. Now what was the result of this self-exaltation? The apostle Paul gives the answer. Speaking of the heathen, he says that they were without excuse, —
“Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things. Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonor their own bodies between themselves; who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever” (Rom. 1:21-25)
“Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools.” Pride, which caused the fall of Satan, was at the bottom of their degradation. To be sure they had knowledge, and made great progress in the arts, but they attributed whatever knowledge they had to their own innate superiority. They looked within for everything, and began to worship themselves, because in their conceit they couldn’t imagine anything else in the universe so worthy of worship as themselves. Thus that which they did know contributed to their folly, because they cut themselves loose from the only source of wisdom. The light that was in them became darkness, and the darkness was very great. Now read a further consequence of their claim that they possessed the attributes of Deity: —
“And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient; being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding, covenant-breakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful; who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them” (Rom. 1:28-32).
Quotations from history might be given to any extent, to show that the first chapter of Romans accurately describes the moral condition of the ancient heathen world; but historical quotes are not necessary to our present purpose. We merely wish to show that the working of the spirit of antichrist is the same in all ages of the world; that since the elevation of man to an equality with Deity, by claiming for him inherent immortality, was the cause of the moral ruin of the ancient heathen, the same thing in this age will result in the same way. Compare the quotation in the preceding paragraph with Gal. 5:19-21, and it will be seen that the two lists of sins are almost identical, and that when men became so swelled up with pride that they fancied themselves gods, and thus cut themselves loose from God, the abominable practices into which they fell were simply the outcroppings of their own human nature which they were worshiping instead of God.
But there are only too great opposing forces, —Christ and antichrist, —and when men cast off their allegiance to God, they necessarily enlist under the banner of Satan. And so while the heathen were exalting self, they were in reality worshiping the devil. It could not be otherwise. In harmony with this conclusion, are the words of Paul: “But I say, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God; and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils” (1 Cor. 10:20). The psalmist, also, describing the apostasy of the Israelites, says that they “were mingled among the heathen, and learned their works. And they served their idols, which were a snare unto them. Yea, they sacrificed their sons and their daughters unto devils” (Ps. 106:35-37). From Lev. 17:7 and Deut. 32:15-7, also, we learn that when the Jews forsook the Lord, and practiced heathen worship, they sacrificed to devils.
Heathenism everywhere, and in all ages of the world, is simply some form of devil worship. The ancient heathen, like modern Spiritualists, consulted with “familiar” spirits, as we learn from Deut. 18:9-12: —
“When thou art come into the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee, thou shalt not learn to do after the abominations of those nations. There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, or that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch, or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer. For all that do these things are an abomination unto the Lord; and because of these abominations the Lord thy God doth drive them out from before thee.”
The most noted of these places where the ancients consulted with familiar spirits were the oracles of Apollo, at Dodona, Delphi, and Trophonius, in Greece. The priests and priestesses, who conveyed the message of these oracles to the people, would in these days be called mediums, clairvoyants, etc. It is well known that the philosopher Socrates had a familiar spirit, a demon, without whose advice he would do nothing.
From the Gospel in All Lands (September, 1887) we take the following extract concerning the religion of the inhabitants of Java:
“The native Javanese . . . are Mohammedans as much as anything. In former times they were Buddhists and Brahmins. They worship their ancestors, and seem to have gathered something from every system of religion with which they have come in contact. The number of the spirits worshiped is almost without limit. In nearly every place there is a patron spirit to whose influence the good or bad fortune of the village is ascribed.”
Concerning the religion of the inhabitants of Ceylon, the same authority says: —
“Buddha has a multitude of followers among the Cingalese. But mild and moral as his doctrines are, they have failed ‘to arrest man in his career of passion and pursuit,’ and many of his so-called followers have stolid indifference to religion of any form. ‘Yet, strange to say, under the coldness there are superstitious fires whose flames overtop the icy summits of Buddhist philosophy, and excite a deeper awe in the mind of the Cingalese. Hence it demon-worship, their earliest form of religion, is still extant. Devil-priests, on every domestic occurrence, and in their calamities, are called in, and their barbarous ceremonies performed. Devil-dancers are implicitly relied upon in times of sickness, and before the patient they personate the demon which is afflicting him, and spend the night in performing fiendish rights, and in the morning exorcise the demon and go away with the rich offering, praying that the life of the sufferer may be spared. Buddhist priests connive at this worship, and even practice it, because they cannot suppress it.”
Like the Javanese, Chinese, also, as is well known, worship their ancestors, and their gods, like those of the heathen of Greece and Rome, are simply deified dead men and women, whose fame is thus perpetuated. Anybody who has been in a Chinese “Joss House,” has seen, among the images of supposed ancient heroes and sages, a “good devil” and perhaps a “bad devil,” whose favor must be gained, or whose wrath propitiated; and one can scarcely pass through a street in a Chinese village without seeing burning papers which are designed to drive the evil spirits away. And so if all the nations of heathendom were passed in review, it would be seen that the Scripture writers were correct in their statements that the heathen sacrifice to devils.