We often think of heaven as a place of perpetual peace. If so, why was there a war in heaven? Are our conceptions of heaven wrong?
Christian, Mormon, Mormon Belief
Isn’t War in Heaven an Oxymoron?
Christian, Mormon, Mormon Belief
We often think of heaven as a place of perpetual peace. If so, why was there a war in heaven? Are our conceptions of heaven wrong?
Wheat & Tares 
Yes, of course, our concepts of heaven are wrong, if wrong means incomplete. We see through a glass darkly, so to speak. So very little has been revealed, and many of us use our imaginations to fill in the blanks in a way that satisfies our needs. That’s okay, as long as we and others recognize that the extrapolations are our own work.
Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, and never entered into the heart of man…
We’re told a little in the scripture about heavenly matters as a help and comfort and reminder and teacher — but there are more important earthly and neighborly matters that we need to pay attention to in this life.
The war in heaven is the genesis chapter of a simplistic good vs. evil duality philosophy. It’s for beginners. You have to start somewhere so we teach our children simple good vs bad. But is it really that black and white? Of course not, they cannot remain that concrete and interface well with the world and neither can we, we must learn to understand gray in order to become healthy adults and mature spiritual beings. While this simple concept may be eternal it is also Mosaic and it easily eclipsed by the far more nuanced (non-duality) Christian ideals given in the sermons on the mount and plain and known as the beatitudes.
The war in heaven is simply allegory for beginners.
Who says Heaven is a place of perpetual peace?
I always thought we’d hang out on clouds and play harps…..doesn’t seem very warlike to me.
What exactly did Satan do that caused a war in heaven and was beyond redemption? I know what we say, but that does not seem to hold for me anymore.
War? I think, rather, “conflict”. And immediately beyond redemption? No, I think it was a gradual path. In a nutshell:
Lucifer and Jesus both volunteer to be the one to provide a way home to heaven for us. At this point they are both on board with this whole idea of life on earth.
Jesus is chosen and Lucifer is unhappy that he’s not. He’d really like to be the one to do the job. (His statement indicates that he really likes the glory and recognition that comes from being the one in charge–likely his motivation for volunteering for the job.) He sets out to persuade others that he’d be the better choice and starts a movement to vote him in.
The vote fails by at 2/3 majority.
So, Lucifer, in an attempt to prove to the Father that he is a leader capable of starting the process as it’s been done in other worlds before, inserts himself, uninvited, into Eden and starts the necessary process, starting with the fall. He hopes it will prove to the Father that he is a good choice for the job.
To his dismay, rather than being impressed, Father is displeased with his inserting himself. The Father tells him to get out.
Lucifer, having been successful once in persuading Adam and Eve to follow his direction, attempts to do so again. (Clearly, he’s desperate to have this job.) Unfortunately for him, they’ve learned from the first experience and are not interested in a second.
So, he’s volunteered for the job and been rejected, he’s tried to get himself voted in and wasn’t, he’s tried to insert himself into the job and is told to get out, he’s tried to manipulate Adam and Eve, the two who will set the mindset for the generations to follow, a second time and they refuse.
If a human being who similarly desperately wanted a CEO job and all the power and prestige that goes with it had followed a similar track in applying for a CEO job what would be his next step? Either apply for another CEO job or create his own company and be the CEO of that. And likely, due to his anger and frustration at the clear rejection by the first company of his first, second, third and fourth attempts to become its CEO, dream of competing well enough to diminish the market share of that first company to as close to zero as possible.
There is no other company, so he sets himself up as the head of his own, motivated by a desire to prove that he’s the most successful at controlling outcomes and deep resentment that his application and attempts to control the first have been so thoroughly rejected. The virtue of the work isn’t what motivates him, it’s the high of being in charge of a successful operation. Whether the work he does is moral or immoral doesn’t matter to him at this point.
And like anyone who sets up a competitor business, the longer the competition goes on, the less likely that he will be interested in joining the organization he’s competing against. The very idea is humiliating. Unless he can bring himself to do that, and at this point it doesn’t seem likely, he’s set himself on a course of eternal opposition.
It’s a tragic story.
So I believe that the “war in heaven” was likely a “war of words”. Once Lucifer set out on his second attempt to be installed in the position he desired, there would have had to have been many charges, counter-charges, explanations, persuasions, claims, declarations, etc. etc. etc. on each side to counter the claims and information and positions disseminated and maintained by the other.
I don’t accept the premise that we can believe any of Genesis, or related simplistic stories such as the “war in heaven.” However, accepting the premise that Agency exists (we determine our character), God’s “plan” meant that we would face significant risk of failure but a small chance of becoming like God. This is not unlike placing a bet (on yourself) on a “long-shot” horse in a race. The higher the risk, the bigger the potential payoff.
Satan’s plan eliminated the risk. No Agency, no big failure, no chance of developing a mature, righteous character. Some type of promise for relative happiness (etc.?) with no risk.
We, in that we inherently/intrinsically possessed Agency, were able to make our own decision on whom to “follow” and whether or not to proceed to earth, get a “physical” body, and take our chances at working out our own “exaltation.”
With regard to Satan, “redemption” is not relevant, as with the so-called Sons of Perdition, because those–his followers/Satan/Sons had “simply” chosen not to follow/live with/believe in God, His Son, and His way. We/they had no interest in being saved/forgiven/redeemed.
The early leaders spoke of the war in heaven taking place on spiritual earth, not heaven where God resides.
“I always thought we’d hang out on clouds and play harps…..doesn’t seem very warlike to me.”
Not if you shoot arrows from the harps!
Part of the issue is that like many words in the Old Testament, they are applied too literally. If it was written for the people of its day, war was a conflict they clearly understood. We might understand it better as a conflict between good and evil. And the otehr hand, the OT has a limited vocabulary. So, a lot of dual meeetings
Guy,
It was a war and the consequences of the fallen are in a worse state than any war we have seen on this planet – those killed on earthy wars suffer a physical death, those that fell in the war in heaven suffered a spiritual death and will never get a body.
A few misconceptions that I see in reading these comments:
1) And there was war in Heaven: Michael (Adam) and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels (Revelations12:7; Johns vision).
2) There is only one plan. Some who present the Plan of Salvation erroneously suggest that Lucifer had a plan or that God entertained him for even a second. Lucifer was a rebel. He sought to ‘take away the agency of man”. He wanted the glory and wanted to do it his way. In a stark contrast, Jesus volunteered to follow God’s plan by simply saying “here am I send me” (Moses 4)
The “war in heaven” is a very clear anachronism. History shows us that the idea was developed in post-Biblical times. The kernel of the idea is the Apocalypse of John, but the battle between Michael and the dragon is in the (symbolic) future not the past. Medieval misreadings of the Apocalypse generated the idea of a war in heaven which was popularized in Anglo-American culture by Milton in the great English epic, Paradise Lost. Thus the creation of the ideas at the root of Mormon cosmology are not ancient; they can be traced historically.
I think I once heard Jared Anderson say that the Book of Revelation was not some exposition on the future, but actually referenced Nero of Rome. He said if you look at it from that perspective, it makes a lot of sense. I wish someone would blog about it, because that book just seems plain weird to me, and I don’t get it. That’s interesting to hear it referencing the future, not the past. That tells me that book is not ‘the plainest book’ (as Joseph Smith said.) Everyone misinterprets it.
Jared Anderson is right: John is speaking directly to people in his own time period about the events of his own time period and Nero — not the 21st century. john’s vision is cosmological and symbolic, not historical. My point about Michael and the dragon is that it’s clear that this symbolic vision is not recounting the past: it’s talking about a symbolic present/future where the temptor is in his last throws because he is barred from heaven and can only operate in the mortal frame for a limited, last time. Regardless of the interpretation of what that means (whether John means it to be predictive of the next couple decade of history or whether he’s speaking symbolically/theologically, he is definitely not thinking historically.)
Thank you John Hamer! That is the first time I have ever seen an explanation that makes some sense.
That being said, it still does not answer just what Satan did that was beyond redemption. Or am I to understand that the story of Satan is not true in any sense? If that is true, then I think it causes more problems than it fixes.
CEF, The initial act of rebellion (in the past) was not what was beyond redemption. What leads to his being beyond redemption is his eternally continuing (present and future), never-ending, increasingly malevolent rejection of proffered salvation through Jesus Christ combined with his delight in the misery of God’s other children that Satan ultimately decides to dedicate his existence to forever and does so, entrenching himself further and further into that determination as time passes.
Repentance is available to him. In reality God knows, to His great sorrow (He sees the end from the beginning) that Satan will never choose it.
Interesting. Thank you MB.