Welcome to the Wikipedia Humanities Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is a transcluded archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.
If a student used the internet to download a PDF copy from a Journal that exists in hard copy, are they required to provide the URL information in the APA bibliography, or can they give the citation as though they are reading the journal in the library? 2A02:A447:A6CD:1:6CA8:E29A:6F:2A1A (talk) 11:06, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
If I was the professor, I'd want to see the bibliographic info of the print version in standard form, including volume, issue, and page numbers. If the URL of an on-line version is given, it should be an extra, not a replacement. --Lambiam23:26, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
URLs for online copies of print sources are generally considered in addition to rather than as a replacement for the standard data included in a citation. --Jayron3215:12, 5 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Is there a word for the opposite of a fallen angel? (The literal opposite, "risen devil", sounds just sinister.) I've never heard of any, which is surprising since one would expect that to be an important and common concept in a religion that values redemption. Or is that impossible? Sebastian11:47, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
SebastianHelm -- The usual Christian conception is that at first there were no devils, until some angels rebelled due to their sinful pride and wanting to rival God, and were "cast out of heaven"; but each of them can repent and be rejoined with God at any time. If you're basing your question on an idea of good and evil being equal and opposite forces, both existing since the beginning of time, then that's much more of a concept suitable to Zorastrianism, or Zoroastrian-influenced religions, rather than Christianity. AnonMoos (talk) 14:37, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for both your replies. Yes, AnonMoos, I guess I was thinking a bit dualistic, although not exactly with the idea of good and evil being equal forces, since I rather endorse the view that in the long run, there is a drift towards the good. (As shown in The Better Angels of Our Nature.) So I gather that the usual Christian conception is on the pessimistic side of the plane of perfect dualistic symmetry, in that it supposes changes towards the bad to be more prevalent than the other way? Is there a religion that's on the optimistic side? ◅ Sebastian18:16, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
No, the most prevalent Christian view is that the Christian God is supreme, and will certainly prevail in the end. There is surprisingly little about the devil in the canonical scriptures, and he mostly is presented as a kind of official advocatus diaboli (ok, this is a bit ironic ;-). Most devil lore is apocryphal or folkloristic. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:04, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
SebastianHelm -- I don't think that Christianity is "pessimistic" in the sense that things are always continually going downhill -- rather, it postulates that there was a great cataclysm or "fall" near the beginning (the expulsion of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden, and also the somewhat parallel expulsion of rebellious angels from heaven), and divine interventions to recover from this fall over thousands of years. Sorry if you prefer a non-"lapsarian" cosmology... AnonMoos (talk) 23:13, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Stephan, you're right. But AnonMoos, what I meant by "pessimistic" is the astounding fact that this view is contrary to the teachings of Jesus, only believing in brute force (see illustration), holding not even a mustard seed sized faith in winning the heart of the enemy, ruling out any possibility of any devils or fallen angels changing sides to God. Even a Minions film is more Christian, in that it allows such a change (and visualizes it with contrasting colors). ◅ Sebastian23:37, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
That painting is dated from 1697, so looking at the painter's biography the bishop responsible for it is Johann Ernst von Thun und Hohenstein. A good read, but there is a lot harsh politics beyond that theatrical Heavens commissioned work obviously. The question of the Good vs. evil has always been a stuffing of politics inside philosophy - in so far that we have pictures of it to tell.. --Askedonty (talk) 09:54, 4 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for looking that up. Good point. I chose that picture because it most dramatically illustrates my point of the "astounding fact". But maybe that wasn't such a good choice: Of couse Christianity has seen so many followers that there will be some that endorsed even such a barbaric view. What baffles me is the opposite: That there seems to be nobody who can even conceive of such a thing as the opposite of a fallen angel. ◅ Sebastian21:37, 4 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Point taken; I agree that (as Duncan and Colin proved below), there have been people who conceived of such a thing. Thank you for googling for me. Of the results, i picked this sermon. Hard as it is to parse for a profane soul such as me, it defines the official position with the determinative sentence “Christ did not die to save angels, though many of them needed salvation, but he died to save fallen man”. I fail to see how you reach the conclusion “it looks very much in conflict with Christian redemption”, though. ◅ Sebastian10:19, 5 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
While it doesn't answer your question, Rudyard Kipling's short story On The Gate does include "an unmistakable, curly-haired, bat-winged, faun-eared Imp of the Pit. But where his wings joined his shoulders there was a patch of delicate dove-coloured feathering that gave promise to spread all up the pinion. St. Peter saw it and smiled, for it was a known sign of grace". DuncanHill (talk) 16:53, 4 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
No worries, my OP wasn't limited to traditional theology. I see no need to limit one's scope to a traditional view. I will look into Duncan's and Colin's recommendations; maybe that will qualify my reply to Askedonty above. ◅ Sebastian21:37, 4 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Interesting! The article concludes the topic with “eventually all of them, even the devil, will be saved.” The pertinent section of our article on Origen (in particular the last paragraph) is equivocal about whether this illegitimate church father's interpretation included the salvation of the devil, but states that the authorities considered that a heresy.
Repentant fallen angels are not a major part of the Christian narrative cycle of Fall and Redemption, but it's not too clear that there's any real prohibition against fallen angels repenting, and it seems slightly strange to call Christianity "pessimistic" based on an obscure corner of Christianity which the great majority of Christians don't even spend any time thinking about. You can read "The Great Divorce" by C.S. Lewis (a rather short "novel") for some interesting thoughts on salvation and damnation in Christianity, presented in a vivid form which many people would call "allegorical" (though C.S. Lewis himself more or less hated that word, except when used with a very narrow and specific meaning)... AnonMoos (talk) 23:01, 9 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
