Christianity is a pretty unique religion in one regard. Other religions, or systems of spirituality have concepts of "good vs evil" too, or even ultimate irredeemable "evil" deities and forces. But, in nearly all these cases, these "evil" deities sometimes *do* actually do things that can be considered good.
For example, there could be a myth, where an evil force resurrects someone's child, not because they are so nice and helpful, but because they made a bargain, or want to spite someone (or something) else or whatever.
In some myths, forces that are mostly considered to be evil did important parts of the creation of the world, for example in the greek myths. So they actually *did* achieve something good. Maybe not in a direct, or straight forward way, but in its consequences.
For faithful christians on the other hand, the devil, satan, lucifer, is not only the absolute of all evils, but any faithful soul must, under no circumstance, ever petition the antichrist, call out to a demon, or to anyone who is in "league" with the legions of hell, or anything in this vein.
While in other religions, like I said above, under some circumstances, and they might be very rare, an "evil" spirit might be employed by a human to do something - "good".
This brings us to traditional european folk stories and fairy tales, for example the famous collections by the brothers grimm.
These deal with the devil quite a lot.
Often there is a person who calls out to some "demonic" force straight away. For example, in order to cure one's children, wife, husband... or to gain worldly riches, to overcome poverty. Sometimes the devil or a minion appears to a person in need and makes an offer.
In other cases, a mysterious object or secret is the cure or object of desire. and a "wise man" or "witch" tells our troubled protagonist that the object is only to be found in the underworld, and they need to go there and face the dark forces in order to get it.
And, just like expected, dealing with lucifer in such way, or enjoying the communion of demons, is not what was expected, there is evilness attached to it, and now our protagonist is in deep trouble.
The message, at the surface is: calling out to un-christian, dark, occult forces, will lead to evil, punishment, and ultimately death.
But the story does not end here, our poor protagonist starts to think and struggle, and with the help of others (or even alone) they are able to "outwit" the devil, trick the underworld in some way, and ultimately reign victorious.
These tales seem harmless enough (they can still be pretty grimm, though), and seemingly portray a message of faith to good christian souls: stay on your course, dont talk to demons, dont look to the ground and into the underworld.
But, if we think logically about it. These protagonists actually *did* gain something. By going to these dark, infernal, whatever forces.
Yes, they barely escaped death or eternal punishment in some cases. But they were brave and clever, and now their children are cured, wealth has come to them, they are kings and queens, maybe future rulers of the world.
And none of these quite good things would have happened if they *did* nothing. If they had avoided calling out to... these forces they were warned about.
And that's not really a "good" message to faithful believers, right?
I am not sure in which way the christian scholars of those times were aware of this "dangerous" symbolism in those stories. I know that a lot of them were against the belief in mystical forces outside of what the bible allows, including fairy tales (with their stories about pixies and ghosts and witches).
but just like alcohol, gambling, and many other things, these were so popular amongst the population, that they could not really weed this out. so i guess they had to accept that those folk stories got happily passed on by the general populace, while gnashing their teeth in the shadows themselves.
Interestingly, the above mentioned "infernal logic" of those folk stories mirrors similar "logic" in traditional pagan or other religions.
for example, if you go to a shaman somewhere, and ask them if it's possible to gain something out of dealing with a "chaotic" or "infernal" force, spirit, even deity, they might say "it is possible. but you have to be really clever and cunning about it. you might have to trick them".
or a shaman might tell their listeners that, at one point in their journey through life, they *have* to encounter and deal with an unpleasant and fiery realm, unless they want to remain in their starting conditions forever.
Just like the protagonists in our fairy tales!
So it's quite possible that in those classic tales, some remnants of the pagan religions that existed in europe. before the advance of christianity, still exist.
Note: No AI has been used when writing this text
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