Art of the Devil. Arturo Graf

1

Isaiah xiv, 12: “How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning.”

2

Cf. II Peter ii, 4; Jude vi.

3

Genesis vi, 1–4.

4

Moore’s Loves of the Angels and Byron’s Heaven and Earth, A Mystery.

5

Robigo (Mildew) averted the blight. Febris, the goddess of fevers, had three temples in Rome.

6

Genesis iii, 1.

7

In the form Beelzebub, this name appears only in the first three Gospels of the New Testament. In the Old Testament, the form Baal Zebub occurs four times in the first chapter of the Second Book of Kings. Baal Zebub (or Baal Zebul), “Lord of Flies,” was a Canaanitish divinity, the chief seat of whose worship was at Ekron.

8

Leviticus xvi, 7, 10–26. “And Aaron shall cast lots upon the two goats; one lot for the Lord (Yahwe, Jehovah), and the other lot for the scapegoat (Azazel).”

9

Job i, 6; ii, 1.

10

Zechariah iii, 1–2.

11

“For God created man to be immortal, and made him to be an image of his own eternity.

“Nevertheless, through envy of the devil came death into the world: and they that do hold of his side do find it.” Wisdom of Solomon ii, 23–24.

12

Isaiah xiv, 7.

13

I Peter v, 8.

14

John xii, 31.

15

Hebrews ii, 14.

16

Luke xi, 21.

17

Revelation xii, 9; xx, 2.

18

Saint Brandan of Clonfert, born in 484, died in 577 is reported to have made a voyage (the “Navigation of Saint Brandan”) in search of the terrestrial paradise and to have landed with his companions on a miraculous island in the Atlantic.

19

In the ninth book of Wolfram von Eschenbach’s Parzival (lines 1155–1164), the hermit says to the knight: “They who stood neutral while Lucifer and the Trinity were fighting, even all those angels, noble and of high estate, were made to come down to earth, to guard this very stone [the Holy Grail]; yet the stone remained pure. Nor do I know whether God at last granted them pardon or doomed them to more grievous punishment.”

20

Inferno, iii, 39–64.

21

Inferno, xxxiv, 70–81.

22

Of. the Italian and French proverbs: “II diavolo, quand’ è vecchio, si fa romito”; “Quand le diable devient vieux il se fait ermite.”

23

Inferno, xxxiv, 18. In the Inferno, it is the Giants, not the Titans, who appear as warders of the Ninth Circle of Hell (Inf. xxxi).

24

From the data given by Dante in Canto xxxiv of the Inferno, Lucifer’s height has been estimated at about 2,500 feet.

25

The Gospel of Nicodemus is one of the so-called “apocryphal writings”.

26

Inferno, xxi, 31–36.

27

Inferno, xvii, 1–27.

28

Paradise Lost, i, 423–431.

29

Inferno, xxxiii, 118–147.

30

Matthew xii, 24; Luke xi, 15. Also, Mark iii, 22.

31

Inferno, xxxiv, 28.

32

Matthew iv, 3.

33

Convito (Convivio) iii, 13.

34

Inferno, xxvii, 123.

35

Jean Bodin was one of the writers who sought to revive the prosecution of witches in the latter half of the sixteenth century. His Daemonomania was published in 1579.

36

Perhaps the reference is to Matthew x, 28, or to xii, 24–26.

37

Of. John xii, 31; xiv, 20; xvi, 11.