Demons Through the Ages: Myths and Realities

What if the demons we fear are just misunderstood gods from ancient religions? Join us on Pagan Coffee Talk as we uncover the multifaceted world of demons, from their origins to their portrayal in various cultural contexts. We start with a humorous chat about "demon coffee" before diving into an enlightening analysis. Learn how East Asian traditions depict demons as animal-human hybrids with unique powers, while Western views shaped by Christian and Judaic beliefs see them as malevolent spirits. We explore how many Western demons were once revered deities, offering a fresh perspective on these enigmatic beings.

Reminisce with us about childhood fears and the terrifying realism of horror exemplified by Alfred Hitchcock's "Psycho." Our conversation wanders through the human tendency to label the inexplicable as demonic, leading to amusing scenarios like "Mighty Morphin Power Angels." Unravel historical and cultural factors that feed our fascination with demons, from attributing behaviors like alcoholism to possession, to pondering why certain ancient beliefs, like saying "bless you" after a sneeze, persist today. Grab a coffee and tune in for a blend of humor, history, and cultural insight that promises an engaging and enlightening episode.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:23

Welcome to P and Coffee Talk. If you enjoy our content, please consider donating and following our socials. Now here are your hosts, lady Abba and Lord Knight Okie dokie.

Speaker 3: 0:35

So time for another episode of Peg and Coffee Talk. Just a reminder, folks, we do have a donation button on our website and throughout most of our materials, and if you like what we're doing, please consider buying Lord Knight and I a cup of coffee. Throw in one for Lord Oswin too, because he does all the editing. He actually probably needs more coffee than we do, because at least we're keeping ourselves awake he has to consider.

Speaker 4: 0:59

This is around 4th of July. You know what he did for 4th of July.

Speaker 3: 1:02

Oh, no, oh no, but he has. He needs the coffee so he can stay awake to listen to our bullshit while he edits and all that stuff. So yeah, he needs, he needs extra coffee, but yeah, we'd, we'd really appreciate it. It's what keeps us around. It's all tax-free donation through life temple and seminary, which is the organization that brings you pagan coffee, talk and um, today this is going to be a hell of a segue. Today we're going to talk about demons coffee, I mean demon coffee, I mean that would be interesting.

Speaker 3: 1:39

Yeah, hold on I think that's the coffee that comes from that one, that cat that shits the coffee beans out and it's like the most expensive coffee in the world. And yeah, that's demon coffee in my book, because if my coffee really came from your crap, then I don't know how I feel about that. Yes.

Speaker 4: 1:58

Really, that's where you had to go.

Speaker 3: 2:00

I did. That's exactly where I had to go, but I still want to try that coffee.

Speaker 4: 2:04

But anyway.

Speaker 3: 2:06

So what is a demon? That's a great question. Whose definition are we going by?

Speaker 4: 2:11

I mean because Shit. Over in China and Japan. Their idea of a demon is completely different than ours.

Speaker 3: 2:17

Is it? I think Okay, at least it is from the animes. Oh Well, explain.

Speaker 4: 2:24

Well, most of the time, in most of the animes, they refer to these dog-cat people, or cat people, or raccoon people, where they have the ears and the tails seem to be demons, okay, but over here we're talking about malevolent spirits.

Speaker 3: 2:39

So Pikachu, yeah, is a demon, yeah, well, I guess most of the Pokemon under.

Speaker 4: 2:44

that would be demons For some reason that seems to be the realm.

Speaker 3: 2:48

Okay, but what do they do? What?

Speaker 4: 2:49

do you mean?

Speaker 3: 2:50

Well, I mean like, okay, so that's their appearance, but how else are they known?

Speaker 4: 2:54

Well, just like the-. What are their traits? What is that? The five-tailed, the nine-tailed fox that they have?

Speaker 3: 3:09

that they have uh-huh represents, tells it and will create lightning.

Speaker 4: 3:11

Oh okay, so basically the demons have particular gifts, right or traits, basically kind of like like the norse gods and all this. You had the god of thunder, you had the demon of thunder, you have the I see, I see, I see so this demon is something that's not a god but but it's not human. It's something in between, in between.

Speaker 3: 3:27

I see, so is it more, but do they also have? Okay, but it's not a ghost.

Speaker 4: 3:33

But it's not a ghost.

Speaker 3: 3:34

They have a very distinct difference between the two.

Speaker 4: 3:37

I believe so. I could be completely wrong. But then when you come over to like the United States or the Western world, right, when you come over to the United States or the Western world, all demons are classified as these malevolent spirits out to destroy you.

Speaker 3: 3:50

Hmm, okay, well, I mean. So first off, let's kind of talk about, well, that middle Right. Most of what the Western world thinks of as demons is in direct answer to Christianity and Judaism. Yes, yeah, it's based on the opposite of whatever the forces for good are in your religious text.

Speaker 4: 4:24

Right. The demons now are supposed to be the fallen angels. Right exactly that went down with satan right that followed him exactly.

Speaker 3: 4:32

So I mean it's it really is the classic battle of good. We can't acknowledge one without the other. So I do think that there has been a lot more work done in trying to identify them and trying to understand them than most people realize. Right of what are considered to be antique pagan texts that are very expensive, that you know. People pay really good money for that deal with demonology and get really specific about who the demons are and what they do, and again, you know all of that. I have a book on gods and demons that's like all. It's almost like an encyclopedia right of all of them now wait a minute and when?

Speaker 4: 5:50

when they talk about? Are these demons always bad in this context, or are they just mischief?

Speaker 3: 5:59

well, that's where it gets kind of strange. So a lot and I mean an excessive amount, of what we consider to be demons are really gods from cultures that predated Christianity, sumerians being the big ones that were villainized, that were villainized. So all of these smaller gods, lesser gods, or even some of the big bads of that time, yeah, they were converted into demons.

Speaker 4: 6:33

Kind of like how some of the Celtic deities suddenly became saints.

Speaker 3: 6:39

Yeah.

Speaker 4: 6:39

Over the years.

Speaker 3: 6:40

Yes, the years. Yes, it almost seems that for every power, for every force, that an angel or a saint or a prophet or a savior, anyone who again is a direct hand of god, there is their equivalent. Now the interesting thing is okay. So of course, by Christian standards they are all agents of the devil In other religions. Not necessarily A lot of them are autonomous. They sort of just do their own goddamn thing. They don't seem to have an agenda.

Speaker 3: 7:18

I mean that was like Legion in the Bible from the story he was just sort of like hanging out, yeah, tormenting this one little guy, all happy with himself yeah, and I think that the funny thing about demons especially again when you consider the fact that a lot of them are converted gods the very fact that we continue to talk about them and study them, and that's what keeps them around because, otherwise they would just be history, there would be, that's it.

Speaker 3: 7:49

But yet we have continued to feed them and give them a reason to stick around, and I do think that some of them have morphed. I think that what some, you know, may have started out as a mild fascination, others have become like a big deal, like and it's kind of messed up. You go why? Why are you doing that?

Speaker 4: 8:11

But there was that one, the Zuzu Pazuzu, yeah.

Speaker 3: 8:16

Pazuzu, I love Pazuzu, he's my bud.

Speaker 4: 8:19

That was hilarious.

Speaker 3: 8:20

Yeah, pazuzu was actually the Sumerian god who was supposed to be the origin of the exorcist Right. He is the statue, the little icon that they pull out of Egypt Right, who then ends up, you know, killing the priest and then traveling to the new world. It's very convoluted, but eventually he ends up in this child who spins her head around, spits out pea soup.

Speaker 4: 8:49

So let me ask some real questions. Do we actually believe in demons? There's demon possessions, and do these things actually happen? Hmm, all the crazy stuff that we hear me personally yeah I have no reason to believe that is accurate.

Speaker 3: 9:10

I have experienced nothing of the sort. I have seen nothing of the sort. I have not had an occasion to believe that one of these beings if they are in fact real, would give two shits about what you're doing. Right about jumping into someone's body and taking over and having again an agenda, because when often these agendas are predicted, they're projected as pure chaos. Yes, they're chaos. For the sake of chaos. Not too many things in nature work that way. Nope, right. And because we don't believe in the supernatural, they're, that's it. So they're either part of nature or they're not. So if they are.

Speaker 3: 9:54

But we have nothing to compare it to even a storm, a hurricane, a tornado.

Speaker 4: 10:01

They have a purpose right, I mean, but again I believe certain spiritual energies or certain spiritual beings can possess other beings. Yeah, all right. So again I believe they have to be okay, I believe there has to be a willing part there bingo, they have to be invited, yes.

Speaker 3: 10:21

So I'm not saying it's not possible, I'm just saying I've not seen it, not like that now we do believe in dark beings.

Speaker 4: 10:31

There are evil disembodied spirits out there, yes, but I don't again. I'm like you. I don't again. I'm like you. I don't see some demon army being led by Satan. Hey, you need to go out and take out Bunny, because what she's going to do something, what?

Speaker 3: 10:50

The reality to me is if demons existed in the way that they are depicted right. Be it books, pop culture, movies, whatever it is is, we would see people possessed walking the streets. Yes, we would encounter this far more regularly. Now again, what do we know? We know that mental illness over the years has been, you know, miscommunicated. We know that before science, it was misdiagnosed, as you know, a demon possession well, I mean tuberculosis was a demon possession back in the day everything was at one point.

Speaker 3: 11:27

I also think a lot of it comes from cultural intermingling, right, like? Can you imagine white europeans of scandinavian origin being introduced to some of the african gods? Right, they would have been terrified.

Speaker 4: 11:45

Right, they're big and they're scary and they're different and I hate to be this way.

Speaker 3: 11:50

The other way around the exact same too absolutely, there's a reason we get called white devil, right, you know? I mean, yeah, there are plenty of culturally, when we clash or not even clash is a bad word when we meet, interacted, yeah, anything that was wildly different. Like that we didn't like Nobody does.

Speaker 4: 12:13

But no, but again. You were also living in this area where everybody pretty much believed the same thing you did. Right, yeah All right, there wasn't a big, diverse, broad thing, a way of thinking no, but it does bring some interesting thoughts about.

Speaker 3: 12:29

I mean, like, look, biblically there aren't too many named demons. I know there are some, right, but you know, like lilith, lilith has been a huge battle forever between the pagans, the like who is she? What does she represent? Is she? Is she a demon? Is she really Adam's first wife? Was she a previous deity from a different? Yeah, like I don't. She is a polarizing figure, but a lot of people think she's a demon.

Speaker 3: 13:01

Mm-hmm figure, but a lot of people think she's a demon. And then I also kind of go what about ghost stories? What about creatures, other things that again we don't have any other way to classify them, so they just get lumped in with the demons, right? Is that really what they are?

Speaker 4: 13:20

You know, if a ghost possesses you for two seconds, are you really possessed by a demon Right?

Speaker 3: 13:25

Are vampires? Demons Are right, all these other things, werewolves are they demons?

Speaker 4: 13:31

Ghouls, whatever.

Speaker 3: 13:33

Yeah, I don't know, it's a really interesting but whatever it is, we're fascinated by it. Like, let's be honest, people are fascinated by this idea of these creatures. We love a good ghost story.

Speaker 4: 13:47

I mean, I'm sorry, but just the story of King Solomon taking demons and forcing them to build the temple.

Speaker 3: 13:55

Yeah, but that's it. We love a good ghost story. I mean, you look at modern age that walking dead, anything zombie really like. We love that.

Speaker 3: 14:07

People love to be scared yes so I cannot imagine that that is exclusively a new phenomenon. No, but what are we really trying to trigger? Fight or flight, right? Yeah, it's the adrenaline, it's that little bit of chemical hit that we get from it. Now there was a point in time where we didn't need that hit, because we were literally running for our fucking lives every day on an hourly basis we were prey or I was yeah, we, literally, we were being hunted by other things that could kill us.

Speaker 3: 14:44

Every day was a struggle, but the moment that that eases even the littlest bit, we start creating these stories and we start, you know, yeah, so I don't know. I mean, like you look at kids and you go, kids are terrified of the monster under the dark, under the bed, but they want you to tell them a ghost story.

Speaker 4: 15:10

Thank you, they want you to tell them about the monster underneath the bed.

Speaker 3: 15:14

It's like wait what? So you want to be scared? Well, no, but you what? You're going to wake me up at 4 o'clock in the morning?

Speaker 4: 15:23

No, no, no, back in the day we would watch the Friday, the 13th, alright Holy crap. Alright, now I have what? Two older sisters. So you got me my two older sisters, their friend down the road, the guy that lived next door, and we're all piling up here at our house watching Friday the 13th. It was more fun because somebody would always overreact. The girl down the road would always climb over everybody trying to get up like what he's not going to come out of the TV.

Speaker 3: 15:54

But listen, listen let me tell you it was also the taboo right, because our parents didn't want us to do it. There are two things from my childhood that still scare me to this day. One we're seeing Johnny Depp die on Friday the 13th and get dragged across that room and shredded right. And it was Johnny freaking Depp, and I know that and it's still scary. And the other was the first children of the corner. Oh my god, I have no idea why it scared me so much. I've watched it as an adult and gone. Why was I so scared of this?

Speaker 4: 16:35

uh-uh psycho freaked me out oh, yeah, as a kid psycho freaked me out, yeah because what freaks me out about it is it's so plausible.

Speaker 3: 16:44

This is something that all right. I'm sorry, that was Hitchcock's thing. Yeah, all of it was plausible Like it was.

Speaker 4: 16:50

It was yeah.

Speaker 3: 16:53

But we do tend to just go if it's not supposed to be here. Remove it Demon yeah.

Speaker 4: 17:01

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 17:01

Demon, yeah, yeah, demon, instant, instantly. You're walking me, you're walking me.

Speaker 4: 17:06

Apparently, the dog wants to go get coffee.

Speaker 3: 17:08

This is the funniest thing I've ever had. I literally just got rolled across the room by the dog. That was amazing. Okay, wow, that happened. He doesn't like this demon conversation, apparently, so I don't know.

Speaker 4: 17:33

That made me lose my train of thought. Yeah, I know right.

Speaker 3: 17:36

It's just. Oh Well, now he sounds like a demon to top it all off.

Speaker 4: 17:41

But again no, you're right. Anything anybody can explain, they find at dark sounds like a demon. To top it all off, but again, no, you're right. Anything anybody can't explain, they find it is suddenly a demon demon.

Speaker 3: 17:46

Gotta be, gotta be. What else could it be? The question really does become how did we create such a massive category? When you think about the opposite end of things, when we think about the, the good right, so you have god right at the top of the, the structure for most religions. Maybe you have angels or some sort of again like messenger, but that's it. There's nothing else. No Demons have all these subsets and categories and possibilities.

Speaker 4: 18:21

Yeah, I mean, legion alone is literally. It might as well be multiple demons shoved together.

Speaker 3: 18:27

Yes, and that's my point. So I'm going to give you an 80s reference and make you really laugh. Oh God, there's no angelic voltron equivalent. Okay, right. So legion you know we are many there's no. Like the angels, don't come together to create voltron, to take out legion, it's not a thing, and I'll form the sword. And there's the Archangel Michael flaming his way through the sky. It's not a thing. It should be. That would have been a hell of a movie, but why?

Speaker 4: 19:10

Mighty Morphin Power Angels, yeah, oh my god.

Speaker 3: 19:13

Oh my god, oh you asshole. I love that Mighty Morphin Power Angels. Oh my god, oh you asshole. I love that mighty morphin power angels. We're getting t-shirts made and that's what they're gonna say incredible, yeah, I don't, I don't get it, I don't, don't know. And I mean okay, yes, I know that, I know it.

Speaker 4: 19:33

There there are the orders right, you, you have the whole angel, the choirs of course, and those can get a little complicated, but they're not, oh, they're very complicated.

Speaker 3: 19:45

The seraphim, the cherubs, the archangels are their own classification. There's a lot.

Speaker 4: 19:49

I would have fur back to Lord Oswin, but I don't even know.

Speaker 1: 19:52

But nobody talks about it.

Speaker 4: 19:54

There's just a group of angels that carry the throne around.

Speaker 3: 19:56

Yeah, but nobody talks about them. Everybody's just like, oh, the angels and they're all to get, that's it. Demons, they're just yipes.

Speaker 4: 20:07

Dictionary volumes of difference. You can even say it to a layman and they'll even start to say, oh, what kind of demon was it?

Speaker 3: 20:12

Oh, absolutely yeah. So a lot of this really is human fascination. That's, I think, why so many of them exist. We love it, we love scary, we love weird, we love creepy. You know, we love the adrenaline hit, I mean people love horror and gore yeah, I mean and and for those who are sitting there going.

Speaker 4: 20:37

Well, I don't rubberneck yeah that's the reason you're rubbernecking. You're hoping to see yeah, something.

Speaker 3: 20:45

It's very strange, it really is. We do, we do we have again a very animalistic kind of need to interact with mortality and and yes, and blood and gore definitely do it. I mean, let's not forget, you know, the gladiator right anything, anything. Middle ages, I mean medieval, all of it, it was again people against lions and tigers. You you know how this went so I just I don't know that there's as many demons as are depicted. I also think a lot of things have been demonized throughout time.

Speaker 4: 21:27

I think a lot of people want to use it as an excuse nowadays.

Speaker 3: 21:31

For what? Behavior? Behavior Well, that's actually, yeah, an interesting thing. I mean, let's be honest, one of the things we call alcohol is what A spirit Right? And where does that come from? It comes from the fact that people used to think you would drink and you would get possessed.

Speaker 4: 21:51

Possessed by the, the spirit, the alcohol spirit.

Speaker 3: 21:54

Yeah Well, it wasn't even an alcohol spirit. It could be any spirit.

Speaker 4: 21:57

It was a spirit.

Speaker 3: 21:57

Effectively, it was a demon. Right, you were possessed and it's like wait a second, what? But we kept doing it anyway. We kept on keeping on. That's a very real thing.

Speaker 4: 22:22

There are countless religious groups and retreats and rehabs, right that? That's what it's all about. So do you think they have to keep up? People have to keep on hyping up what demons keep on doing to keep them current because again, just like we, were discussing alcoholism or being drunk was considered you were possessed, yeah, getting a cold or sick. But nowadays do we have to hype it up because, well, we figured out what caused this, so do we have to escalate?

Speaker 3: 22:47

well, that's a good question because, honestly, why do we still say bless you, you sneeze? We used to think you had a demon in you. You were possessed. That's why that happened. Why do we still say it? We know that, we know what it is. Yeah, you have a piece of dust in your nose. You have allergies.

Speaker 4: 23:03

You have a cat, you like you you have that one long hair that tickles the back of your nose like why do we still do it?

Speaker 3: 23:11

it's now, it's considered polite. That's weird.

Speaker 4: 23:15

I think for people minding your age.

Speaker 3: 23:17

We do it more out of habit but it's weird it is weird, but it's just, everyone does it out of habit I mean you can sit in a doctor's office and someone sneezes and six people go.

Speaker 4: 23:28

Bless you well, I mean for a while there we were saying gesundheit, that, but it means the same thing, I know.

Speaker 3: 23:34

Yeah, it's still. It's still a blessing to exercise the thing it's like.

Speaker 4: 23:40

What the hell imagine doing that every time somebody yawned yeah, but you hear demon stories now movies and stuff like this, and these demons do all sorts of oh yeah, oh no, they have super powers now, super trumped up demon powers I mean we're talking goku super saiyan 50 000 I don't know.

Speaker 3: 24:03

I think too I mean again culturally there's so much to unpack here, but I personally don't feel like people in craft really give two shits. No, we don't. We don't really talk about them, we don't acknowledge them, we don't work with them, we don't care. I am more concerned about a vengeful god or a deity with a chip on their shoulder than I am a demon I'm with you any day of the week.

Speaker 3: 24:39

Yeah, and I think that it's because we interact with them more we spend. I mean, that's one of the things we strive to do. Right, it's a it's striving to work with you.

Speaker 4: 24:54

Only piss off a goddess once but that's it.

Speaker 3: 24:57

When you're trying to devote yourself to spiritual time, interacting with, working, with, learning from deities, right, they're the ones you gotta worry about. And as far as you know whether or not there really is a counterbalance, well, guess what? Not our dog, not our fight. Nope, we are inconsequential on both sides of that equation and if it came down to it, we would be shoved the hell out of the corner like a six-year-old Move. You don't need to be, I don't even know if we'd get shoved.

Speaker 4: 25:34

It's just more like get ran over.

Speaker 3: 25:37

This is an adult conversation. What are you doing here Is kind of how I equate it.

Speaker 4: 25:40

I'm sorry. The forces really went to work like they want to. At the end of it it's going to be oh, I got something on the bottom, oh look there's humanity. Yeah, can you scrape that?

Speaker 3: 25:50

off? Yeah, absolutely. Why would we be the ones to fight that fight?

Speaker 4: 25:56

yeah, it makes no sense I mean, what are we gonna do?

Speaker 3: 26:01

yeah, exactly so. If yeah, because if you've got evil entity x, yeah, that's what I mean again angelic voltron, where? Yeah. I just don't see it as our fight. That is something entirely different, and I mean, there are people that still think the the war of heaven, yeah, is a thing that's happening right now and maybe it is but, how the shit would we know? We have nothing to do with it? No, yeah it is. It is no different than okay, it would. It would be like the gods interfering with a football game thank you and choosing a side why they would.

Speaker 3: 26:48

Even if it's the super bowl, they don't give a crap about the dallas cowboys, it doesn't matter, right, why would they?

Speaker 4: 26:57

you know, it just makes no sense I mean, how does this bring you more spiritual happiness and growth, just because the cowboys won?

Speaker 3: 27:05

right, exactly they're. They're just sitting there going. Oh look, they're playing a game like it doesn't. It doesn't affect them in littlest bit. I do think again, trying to, trying to keep it craft crafty. I'm just full of puns today, jesus christ we'll make that a t-shirt too.

Speaker 3: 27:27

Uh, it is worth exploring some of the the various demons because, again, they were gods at one point. So if you want to know some more about a particular faith or a prehistoric people, right, that's a good place to start. Well, and I mean it. We have to understand too. It's a topic that weirds people out.

Speaker 4: 27:54

Yeah, nobody really likes it, I mean I mean, when you come down to it, when we, when we actually come down to casting those circles and stuff like that, and if you are going to really summon a demon. I hate to be this way.

Speaker 3: 28:07

There's a lot of things you have to think about before you do this but do you, I'm gonna listen, listen, I'm just gonna be honest here, right like so if we do it, that what they consider the proper way. Okay, well, that's. Yeah, that's different. But I mean, if you're calling quarters and you need to bring in a big bad, it's possible.

Speaker 4: 28:31

Well, but again, here's again. You just said this earlier. If we're going to cast circle and start bringing in big energies, why are we going to go to a demon? We're just going to summon gods.

Speaker 3: 28:40

But that's what I'm saying. But some of the gods, as we all know, are gnarlier than others.

Speaker 4: 28:45

Yes.

Speaker 3: 28:45

And come to the table with, quote unquote, darker traits, yes. So at that point, yeah, I mean OK, ok, but you better counterbalance them, because they're gonna mow that circle down, yes, and one energy is potentially going to consume everything else, right? So that's all. Well, that is indeed an interesting topic. Me personally, I like my coffee the way I like my demons, which is Hot and black. Yes, so yeah, pour me another cup. Let's do this.

Speaker 1: 29:33

Thanks for listening. Join us next week for another episode. Pagan Coffee Talk is brought to you by Life Temple and Seminary. Please visit us at lifetempelseminaryorg for more information, as well as links to our social media Facebook, discord, twitter, youtube and Reddit.

Speaker 2: 29:51

We travel down this trodden path, the maze of stone and mire. Trodden path, the maze of stone and mire. Just hold my hand as we pass by a sea of blazing fires, and so it is the end of our day so walk with me till morning breaks. And so it is the end of our day days. So walk with me till morning.