The Devil(Gr. the calumniator), in Christian theology, the sovereign spirit of evil. In the very earliest ages there appears to have been no distinct conception of any single spirit who was the embodiment of the evil principle. None of the divinities of the ancient Hindoos were supposed to exert a wholly bad influence. Their power was sometimes manifested for good, and sometimes for evil. In the post-Vedic period, though Siva the destroyer was one of the three great powers of nature, the exertion of his power was not necessarily evil. Kali, Siva's wife, and the Rakshasas, who were hostile to everything good, were gods whose nature partook of evil; but no single divinity represented in himself the evil principle. There was, however, such a divinity in the religion of ancient Persia. He was called Ahriman, and his power was represented as nearly equal to that of Ormuzd, the god of good, who reigned in heaven. Ahriman created devs and archdevs to resist the spirits that ministered to Ormuzd. The principles of this religion extended in some measure to the neighboring nation of the Chaldeans. The religion of the Semitic races was in its origin monotheistic. In it good and evil were alike caused by the supreme ruler.

The religion of the Hebrews originally formed no exception. Even the Satan of the books of Job and Zechariah (the latter at least of late authorship) is a dependent spirit, in the service of God. But during or after the captivity the Jews borrowed from the Chaldeans or from the Persians the notion of a spirit who was the antagonist of all that is good and the personification of evil. In the gospels, written by Jews, the devil is represented as tempting Jesus to worship him. In the Christian theology, and the literature inspired by it, the devil was conceived as a spirit who had once been good and had fallen. During the middle ages he was represented as having a black complexion, flaming eyes, sulphurous odor, horns, tail, hooked nails, and cloven hoofs. Such names as Devil's Dam, Devil's Bridge, etc, attest the belief in his actual interposition in human affairs. - The devil, as the ideal of evil, vice, craft, cunning, and knavery, has played a prominent part in literature. The following are examples : Fabricius, Der heilige, kluge und gelehrte Teufel (Esslingen, 1567); Musaus, Der melancholische Teufel (Tham, 1572); Velez de Guevara, El diabolo coxuelo (Barcelona, 1646); Damerval, Le livre de la diablerie (Paris, 1508); Le diable bossu, Le diable femme, Le diable pendu et dependu, Le diable d'argent, Le diable babillard (all early in the 18th century); Le diable confondu (the Hague, 1740); Le diable hermite (Amsterdam, 1741); Le Sage, Le diable boiteux (Paris, 1755); Frederic Soulie, Memoires du diable (Paris, 1842); "The Parlyament of Deuylles," printed by Wynkin de Worde (1509); "The Devill of Mascon" (Oxford, 1658); Defoe, "The Political History of the Devil, as well Ancient as Modern" (London, 1726); and Beard's "Autobiography of the Devil" (London, 1872). (See Demonology.)