How did the serpent of Eden become Satan?
Introduction: “the satan” in the Hebrew Scriptures While it may strike one who has grown up reading the Bible and/or listening to biblical preaching as obvious that the serpent in the garden of Eden was Satan, things are not quite so straightforward as they may at first appear. [1] Satan himself is a character who evolves throughout the Christian canon of Scripture. The Old Testament never makes the link between Eden’s snake and the satan of e.g. the book of Job. The “heavenly satan” of the OT acts only with God’s approval. Notions of Satan as the personification of evil opposing God’s rule as his adversary or enemy are ideas not found in the OT. Extrabiblical Jewish literature portrays different satanic figures (e.g. 1 Enoch ’s Semjaza; Qumran ’s Belial, etc.). The complex parallels and differences between these figures make it impossible to provide a well-honed argument positing a clearly defined linear history of Satan’s emergence as personified evil and the arc
