| Title: | Demon |
| Original Title: | Démon |
| Volume and Page: | Vol. 4 (1754), pp. 820–821 |
| Author: | Edme-François Mallet (biography) |
| Translator: | Steve Harris [San Francisco State University] |
| Subject terms: |
Modern history
Ancient history
Literature
|
| Original Version (ARTFL): | Link |
| Rights/Permissions: |
This text is protected by copyright and may be linked to without seeking permission. Please see http://quod.lib.umich.edu/d/did/terms.html for information on reproduction. |
| URL: | http://hdl.handle.net/2027/spo.did2222.0000.735 |
| Citation (MLA): | Mallet, Edme-François, and Jean-François Marmontel. "Demon." The Encyclopedia of Diderot & d'Alembert Collaborative Translation Project. Translated by Steve Harris. Ann Arbor: Michigan Publishing, University of Michigan Library, 2007. Web. [fill in today's date in the form 18 Apr. 2009 and remove square brackets]. <http://hdl.handle.net/2027/spo.did2222.0000.735>. Trans. of "Démon," Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, vol. 4. Paris, 1754. |
| Citation (Chicago): | Mallet, Edme-François, and Jean-François Marmontel. "Demon." The Encyclopedia of Diderot & d'Alembert Collaborative Translation Project. Translated by Steve Harris. Ann Arbor: Michigan Publishing, University of Michigan Library, 2007. http://hdl.handle.net/2027/spo.did2222.0000.735 (accessed [fill in today's date in the form April 18, 2009 and remove square brackets]). Originally published as "Démon," Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, 4:820–821 (Paris, 1754). |
Demon. The name given by the ancients to certain spirits or genies, that they believed appeared to humans to render them service or to do them harm. See GENIE.
The idea of demons originated with the Chaldeans; from there it expanded to the Persians, Egyptians and Greeks. Pythagoras and Thales were the first to introduce demons to Greece. Plato embraced this idea and extended and clarified it beyond any of his predecessors. By demons , he meant spirits inferior to the gods, but superior to men; spirits which lived in the middle region of the air and which undertook communications between the gods and men; carrying offerings and prayers to the gods and announcing the will of the gods to men. They recognized only things that were good and well-done. But his disciples, were later too embarrassed to correct him on the origin of evil, also adopted other demons, the enemies of men.
This new opinion was no less revolting to reason than the necessity of evil in the overall order of things. Because in supposing (as one was obliged to do) a superior being upon whom these spirits were dependent, how could this being have left them the freedom to destroy creatures that he had destined for happiness? This was an abyss for human intelligence into which religion alone was able to carry the torch.
There is nothing more common in rural theology than good and bad genies. This superstition came to the Israelites from the Chaldeans; but by demons they did not mean the devil or an evil spirit. The word is not used in this last sense except by evangelists and some modern Jews.
The English author Gale has tried hard to show that the idea of demons arose after that of the Messiah. The Phoenicians called them baalim . They recognized a supreme being which they called Baal or Moloch ; but beyond that they included under the baalim some inferior deities which are so often mentioned in the Old Testament. The first demon of the Egyptians was Mercury or Thoth. Gale cites many similarities among the different functions attributed to demons and the Messiah. [1]
Notes
1. This article is Mallet’s direct translation from Chambers’ Cyclopedia, http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/HistSciTech/HistSciTech-idx?type=browse&scope=HISTSCITECH.CYCLOSUB, except for the third paragraph which was written by Marmontel.