Why did Satan (and Melkor) Fall From Heaven?

The Origin & Fall of Angels according to Scripture, the Church Fathers, C.S. Lewis, and J.R.R. Tolkien

One of the most popular questions I’ve been asked (just as much from adults as children) is: “Why did Satan fall from heaven?” and “If he was created good in heaven, why did he rebel against God?” These are not easy questions to answer, but they are important ones since they describe how evil entered into our world and hijacked the original glory God had intended for us. Let’s first turn to Scripture and then we will jump into the Fathers of Christian Fantasy (J.R.R. Tolkien & C.S. Lewis).

Sacred Scripture

In Luke 10:17-19, Jesus makes a direct reference to the ‘Fall of Satan’ but he doesn’t give us elaborate details:

“17 The seventy (disciples) returned with joy, saying, “Lord, in your name even the demons submit to us!” 18 He said to them, “I watched Satan fall from heaven like a flash of lightning. 19 See, I have given you authority to tread on snakes and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy; and nothing will hurt you.”

In the Book of Revelation (Chapter 12:7-9), we are given a few more details:

“And war broke out in heaven; Michael and his angels fought against the dragon. The dragon and his angels fought back, 8 but they were defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. 9 The great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him…”

Something clearly happened in heaven to cause disunity and war between the angelic hosts. We do not know the exact cause from the Scripture passage, but Satan’s behavior likely had something to do with St. Michael, one of the chief angels, casting him out of the heavenly court with the other fallen angels.

Of course, God did not create Satan as evil or ill. This is an impossibility for God since he is All-Good and All-Holy. The Book of Wisdom reminds us that God did not create evil or death:

“God did not make death, and he does not delight in the death of the living. For he created all things so that they might exist; the creatures of the world are wholesome and there is no destructive poison in them… But the ungodly by their words and deeds summoned death; considering him a friend, they pined away and made a covenant with him, because they are fit to belong to his company” (Book of Wisdom 1:13-16)

Satan was made completely good, but he was endowed with ‘free-will’ or the power to create and choose his own future just like human beings. Many of the church fathers point to pride being his chief vice, and that he wanted to rise above all other created creatures in order to sit at the right hand of God (a place reserved for Christ at His Incarnation and Ascension). Where did the fathers see Satan’s motives? One important passage comes from Isaiah 14:12-14 which states:

12 How you are fallen from heaven, O Day Star, son of Dawn, How you are cut down to the ground, you who laid the nations low! 13 You said in your heart, “I will ascend to heaven; I will raise my throne above the stars of God; I will sit on the mount of assembly on the heights of Zaphon; 14 I will ascend to the tops of the clouds, I will make myself like the Most High.”

In the passage, you can see how Satan is depicted as a fallen star and not just any star. He is compared to the bright, morning star or day star which is Venus. This means that he was a chief angel (archangel) among the angels and even, perhaps the highest angel before his fall (perhaps a Seraphim or Cherubim). Biblical scholar, Dr. Scott Hahn, breaks down this possibility in my interview with him here (60 second clip).

In Scripture, not only Satan, but all of the angels are closely associated with stars:

“His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth.” (Revelation 12:4)

We will see more connections between the stars and angels in the Creation stories of Narnia and Middle Earth shortly, but let’s look at one more passage in Scripture used by the church fathers about Satan:

“You were the signet of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. You were in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone was your covering, carnelian, chrysolite, and moonstone, beryl, onyx, and jasper, sapphire, turquoise, and emerald; and worked in gold were your settings and your engravings. On the day that you were created they were prepared. With an anointed cherub as guardian I placed you; you were on the holy mountain of God; you walked among the stones of fire. You were blameless in your ways from the day that you were created, until iniquity was found in you. In the abundance of your trade, you were filled with violence, and you sinned; so I cast you as a profane thing from the mountain of God, and the guardian cherub drove you out from among the stones of fire. Your heart was proud because of your beauty; you corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor. I cast you to the ground” (Ezekiel 28:13-17).

So his pride to be like God was his ultimate downfall, but he also began to have a distorted pride in the beauty and glory that he already possessed.

The Origin of Angels in Narnia & Middle Earth

Both C.S. Lewis and J.R.R Tolkien were inspired by the Biblical, Patristic (the Fathers), and Medieval worlds of Christianity when they created their Christian fantasies of Narnia and Middle Earth. In their own Creation stories, they applied an ancient notion that the angels sang Creation into existence, which derives from Job 38:7.

“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?… when the morning stars sang together and all the heavenly beings (sons of God) shouted for joy?”

Job 38 is beautiful passage describing how God formed His Creation into being, which included the song of angels. The phrase, ‘sons of God,’ is often a clear reference to angels in Scripture, and ‘morning stars’ can be an allusion to the ‘chief angels’ who are greater than the ‘lesser stars.’

So how do Narnia and Middle Earth connect with singing stars? In both of these mythologies, they are sung into existence by angelic choirs. C.S. Lewis describes Aslan ‘chanting’ Narnia into existence in the book ‘Magician’s Nephew.’ He writes,

“In the darkness something was happening at last. A voice had begun to sing… It was, beyond comparison, the most beautiful noise he had ever heard. It was so beautiful he could hardly bear it… the voice was suddenly joined by other voices; more voices than you could possibly count. They were in harmony with it, but far higher up the scale: cold, tingling, silvery voices… One moment there had been nothing but darkness; next moment a thousand, thousand points of light leaped out—single stars, constellations, and planets, brighter and bigger than any in our world. There were no clouds. The new stars and the new voices began at exactly the same time. If you had seen and heard it… you would have felt quite certain that it was the stars themselves who were singing, and that it was the First Voice, the deep one, which had made them appear and made them sing… It was a Lion. Huge, shaggy, and bright it stood facing the risen sun. Its mouth was wide open in song and it was about three hundred yards away.”

Lewis’ connection with angels (‘the new voices’), and the stars is unmistakably clear. Although Aslan is doing the creating, the choir is co-creating with him in harmony. It is in the middle of all of this beautiful creating that the White Witch, ‘Jadis,’ crash lands into unpolluted Narnia from another world and begins her work of temptation.

In the Creation narratives of Middle Earth (The Lord of the Rings), J.R.R. Tolkien is much more direct in connecting the fall of Satan with the fall of Melkor, one of the greatest of the singing angels. Tolkien writes,

“But now Iluvatar (i.e. God) sat and hearkened, and for a great while it seemed good to him, for in the music there were no flaws. But as the theme progressed, it came into the heart of Melkor (i.e. Satan) to interweave matters of his own imagining that were not in accord with the theme of Iluvatar (God); for he sought therein to increase the power and glory of the part assigned to himself… being alone he had begun to conceive thoughts of his own unlike those of his brethren.”

Before Iluvatar (God) had created Earth, he created ‘lesser gods’ or angels who created harmonious song. Unfortunately, one of the angels, who was chief among them, began to isolate from the others with his own creative thoughts. So far, there is nothing clearly ‘sinful’ until Melkor introduces disharmony into the original song.

“Some of these thoughts he now wove into his music, and straightway discord arose about him, and many that sang nigh him grew despondent, and their thought was disturbed and their music faltered; but some began to attune their music to his rather than to the thought which they had at first.”

Each time Melkor began to introduce something disruptive into the Great Song, Iluvator was patient and corrected the patterns. However, there reached a point of no return for Melkor when he began to sing an entirely new melody and pattern that could no longer be harmonized.

“Then the discord of Melkor spread ever wider, and the melodies which had been heard before foundered in a sea of turbulent sound… the discord of Melkor rose in uproar and contended with it, and again there was a war of sound more violent than before, until many of the Ainur (the Angelic Choir) were dismayed and sang no longer, and Melkor had the mastery… The other had now achieved a unity of its own; but it was loud, and vain, and endlessly repeated; and it had little harmony, but rather a clamorous unison as of many trumpets braying upon a few notes. And it essayed to drown the other music by the violence of its voice…”

In this turbulence and violence, Melkor eventually separated himself from the other Ainur (Angels) and began to set up his own kingdom upon the earth which he coveted.

“When therefore Earth was yet young and full of flame Melkor coveted it, and he said to the other Valar: ‘This shall be my own kingdom; and I name it unto myself!… Now Melkor began the delving and building of a vast fortress, deep under Earth, beneath dark mountains…”

His kingdom eventually began to pollute this pristine Paradise with hatred, sickness, and violence.

“The evil of Melkor and the blight of his hatred flowed out thence, and the Spring of Arda was marred. Green things fell sick and rotted, and rivers were choked with weeds and slime, and fens were made, rank and poisonous, the breeding place of flies; and forests grew dark and perilous, the haunts of fear; and beasts became monsters of horn and ivory and dyed the earth with blood.”

Conclusion

As Christians, what are we to make of all of this? What does the angelic world have to do with our own? Even though angels do not have bodies nor inhabit the biological realm like we do, they can choose to live according to virtue or vice as well as harmony or disharmony with God. Satan chose vice and allowed his pride and jealousy to overwhelm the harmony of the angelic choir. Once exiled from the court of heaven, he began to spread his turbulence and violence to Adam, who was chief among the animals. It was through his temptation, that Adam fell from his original glory and lost sight of his own personal meaning and destiny. He became blind and his mind (nous) was darkened. Like Adam, our only hope is to be made alive by the New Adam, our Lord Jesus Christ who brings us grace and forgiveness in our time of need. Only He can bring about a harmonious song in the universe again!

We will discuss the Fall of Adam more in our next post.

Be entirely His until the Day,

-Kyle