Characteristics of a Demon Haunting

[earthchick]

Are demons fallen angles? What are they in the biblical sense? Souls that somehow escaped from hell into our realm? Just curious.

Biblically speaking........when Satan got a bit too big for his breeches and thought he could be more powerful than God, he was cast out of Heaven. Satan had amassed some followers among the angels and they were cast out along with him. So yes, the demons are Satan's minions, or fallen angels. There are a couple of people on UM who try to refute that, but they have some misunderstanding of scriptures, IMO.

[Wookie McFly]

Amazingly EC, I completely agree with you. lol.

Yes, there are some... *interesting* theories out there, concerning noncanon gospels/writings but... I dunno, I tend to stick with the big Books on this. Torah, Koran, Bible, etc.

[143]

I would like more answers about possession that I can relate to, without hearing about the Bible, and passages from it.

What I need to know from an "Athiests" point of view, is why someone who can be literally minding their own business, one day become possessed.

Why was this person chosen to have this horrific event occur?

Does it involve narcotics and alcohol as being a magnet?

Does it involve an innocent person being subjected for no apparent reason?

Or

Is a possession because of something this person may have done? Something that irritated this negative force into wanting possession over their body?

I want and need more answers because I am aware of someone who has been through this. I have talked to him just days ago but would not dare ask anything about it, out of respect for his privacy. I need to know what happened, and why, because I want to feel comfortable, and be easy around him. I want to be able to sympathize with him, his wife, and his little boy, and be able to understand and not be afraid of him bringing something around me and my family.

I don't fear him, and I am comfortable talking to him, but the reason I joined this site was originally because of this, and to this day I am still confused about the whole religious aspect of it, and why it occured to someone who is not of the Christian faith.

This "possession" if you will, has been detrimental to his family and the faith between himself, his religion and his family. It has created "inner demons" and low self esteem.

What do the more advanced people who have studied this type of thing have to say? Believe me, I have been here long enough to know what sounds decent and what sounds like total BS, so, hopefully coming from someone like myself, who knows someone, or possibly who is that someone...please, try to elaborate on the more simplest of reasons why this has occured, without going into what the Bible has written.

[Wookie McFly]

Well, Becca, I have studied this quite extensively (wrote one of my theses on conceptions of evil in the western world from 500-1500 AD).

While I understand your reluctance to discuss posession within terminology of the Bible, it is difficult to do so as posession (in the terms we are discussing it) is a predominantly Christian ideology (thus, based in the Bible). However, I will attempt.

At it's most basic level, posession describes a phenomena wherein a host is 'taken over' by a malignency. This bad, wrong, or evil entity is actively using/destroying the host, very much like cancer uses a body's energy to fuel itself and destroy the healthy cells of a host.

IMO, the various religious structures of the world/history have interpreted this spiritual/ethereal attack into their own belief systems. This then suggests that there is, in fact, an inherent evil or threat in the world.

However, as I write this, there is no set rules for interpreting said attacks or posessions. Some religious structures may view it as a natural or reasonable course of nature and action, however I am not familiar enough with these interpretations to comment on them fully.

So, being posessed is not a purely Christian ailment. I think it speaks to a more direct and inherent aspect of humanity; namely that we are fragile regardless of what we may think. Anyone is susceptible to these attacks on our own weakness, no matter what our faith structure or how we make our way through this life.

To have a faith; not in christianity, islam, judaism, or any number of religions; but rather that life will work itself out in the end. This is the inherent requirement we must face if we are to lead our lives in a positive and meaningful way. Having said that, I am sure many will disagree, but this is only my opinion at this point.

Apologies for the discourse-

Wookie

[KILLUMANATI]

Becca L 143

I think you should ask your firend what happened to him, If he has a wife and Kids I'm assuming hes an adult who could handle the question.

ask him how he became Un-Possesed, and ask him what his take on the subject is.

Because if you want a un-christian answer you can find alot of them out there, Split Personality or Mutiple personality dissorder being one of the more popular, Thats the only way to take the demon out of "DEMONIC POSSESION" other then that it is what it is, and people dont like to relize that because if there is a BAD force, then that means theres a Good Force...and that of course means we need to re-evaluate our current life situations.

Not trying to Preach, dont wanna tick you off but I would be straight up with him.

[coldethyl]

The existence of multiple personality disorder is hotly contested in the psychiatric world. Please don't start trying to label demonic possession in with mental illness, K.

[distortedpandy]

To have a faith; not in christianity, islam, judaism, or any number of religions; but rather that life will work itself out in the end. This is the inherent requirement we must face if we are to lead our lives in a positive and meaningful way. Having said that, I am sure many will disagree, but this is only my opinion at this point.

Nicely put, and I agree.

[Trenner D]

To have a faith; not in christianity, islam, judaism, or any number of religions; but rather that life will work itself out in the end. This is the inherent requirement we must face if we are to lead our lives in a positive and meaningful way. Having said that, I am sure many will disagree, but this is only my opinion at this point.

Ahhhhh.....so so so agree with this.