Editor’s Note: This series on the Bible is from the book Catholicism & Scripture. Please feel free to use the series for high schoolers or adults. We will continue to welcome your questions for the column as well. Please see the contact information at the end of the column.
Special Course On Catholicism And Scripture (Chapter 16)
Having already mentioned in chapter ten some of the good people in the Bible, let us now single out some of the wicked characters. They are not the only villains in Scripture, but they have played a major role in salvation history.
Start with the rebellious angel known as Satan or the Devil, who is at the root of all the villainy in human history. Having been cast out of Heaven for refusing to serve God, Satan appears in the early pages of the Bible as the tempter of our first parents. He convinced Adam and Eve to eat the forbidden fruit by saying that doing so would make them “like gods” (Gen. 3:5). That was not true and it’s why Jesus would later describe Satan as “a liar and the father of lies” (John 8:44). Jesus would also say that He had come to Earth “to destroy the works of the Devil” (1 John 3:8).
Satan came back again at the beginning of Jesus’ public life and tried unsuccessfully to divert our Lord from His mission of saving us from our sins. Jesus had been fasting and praying in the desert for forty days when Satan tempted Him three times — to turn stones into bread, to throw Himself from the top of the Temple, and to exert power over all the kingdoms of the world. In reading about these temptations in chapter four of Matthew’s Gospel, note that Jesus rebuffed the temptations, saying to the deceiver: “Get away, Satan! It is written, ‘The Lord, your God, shall you worship and Him alone shall you serve’” (Matt. 4:9-10).
Despite this rebuff, Satan continues to influence persons and events. He persuaded Judas to betray Jesus and has sown the seeds of wickedness in the world ever since. Who else could be behind wars of destruction, the slaughter of hundreds of millions of babies by abortion, and the killing of innocent children in schools? Remember, though, that while Satan is a powerful force, who prowls about the world “like a roaring lion” (1 Peter 5:8), God is more powerful and will ultimately destroy him because of Jesus’ victory over him on the Cross on Good Friday. Nevertheless, we must pray constantly that the Father will “deliver us from evil.”
Sometimes called the wickedest woman in the Bible, Jezebel earned that title by persuading her husband King Ahab to erect shrines to the pagan god Baal, by urging the elders in Samaria to stone a man to death because he refused to sell a piece of land to Ahab, and by seeking to kill God’s prophets. She died after being thrown from a window into the street.
A former Babylonian general who reigned for forty-three years, Nebuchadnezzar was a master builder who erected the “hanging gardens of Babylon,” one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. But he was notorious for destroying the Temple and the entire city of Jerusalem, and for binding the people of Israel in ropes and chains and force-marching them 600 miles to Babylon, where they remained in exile for some fifty years.
Known for rebuilding cities and the Temple in Jerusalem, King Herod the Great ruled Judea from 37 to 4 B.C. He was also a power-mad tyrant who murdered many members of his family, including his first wife, her mother, and three of his sons. He also ordered the murder of all boy babies under two years of age in the region of Bethlehem in an effort to kill the newborn Jesus.
The wife of Herod Antipas, son of Herod the Great, Herodias sought the execution of John the Baptist because he had denounced her adulterous union with Antipas. She was married to Philip, the half-brother of Antipas, when Herod came to Rome and stole her from Philip. At a birthday party for Herod, his stepdaughter Salome performed a provocative dance that so delighted the king that he promised her anything she wanted. She consulted Herodias, who told her to ask for the head of John the Baptist on a platter (cf. Matt. 14:8). The request distressed Herod, but his pride compelled him to grant the request.
The high priest in Jerusalem from AD 18-36, Caiaphas was one of the plotters against Jesus and presided over the trial that sentenced Christ to death for claiming to be God. He brought false witnesses to testify against Jesus and, when their testimony failed, Caiaphas asked Jesus directly to state “whether you are the Messiah, the Son of God” (Matt. 26:63). Jesus replied, “I am” (Mark 14:62).
The Roman governor of Judea from AD 27-35, Pontius Pilate was asked to judge the case of Jesus after the Sanhedrin sentenced him to death for claiming to be God. Pilate knew that Christ was innocent but, after several attempts to set Him free, gave in to the crowd and ordered Jesus to be crucified.
One of the twelve apostles chosen by Jesus, Judas is infamous for betraying Jesus for thirty pieces of silver. His estrangement from Jesus actually began a year earlier when he doubted the Lord’s statement that His Body was real food and His Blood real drink. Christ at that time said, “Did I not choose you twelve? Yet is not one of you a devil?” John the Apostle said that Jesus was “referring to Judas, son of Simon the Iscariot” (John 6:70-71). Judas eventually hanged himself out of despair.
List of Answers:
CAIAPHAS
GOD
GOOD FRIDAY
HEROD
HERODIAS
JESUS
JEZEBEL
JUDAS
NEBUCHADNEZZAR
PONTIUS PILATE
SATAN
Quiz:
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