Well, okay Micheal. But then why did Jesus say this at John 14:30,
King James Bible:
"Hereafter I will not talk much with you: for the prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in me."
Personally I'm quite convinced the Devil is winning most souls at the conclusion of their lives on Earth. Surely it is the Devil and his earthly inticements at the root of our iniquity as the have nots or the have less ones among us feel the weight of Earthly life and their failure to bear up against the standards it demands, relatively speaking. Thus many are caused in despair to commit suicide rather than fully go their distance. But suicide solves nothing from a Spiritual perspective. In fact it is much more likely a setback for the Soul and furthermore an insult to our Creator Father. I believe the always imperfect Earthly circumstance is best survived by the tolerant theist who is aware of his Diabolical enemy rather than the materialistic atheist.
Okay Garry.
Let's begin with the proposition that the Bible is not history. So Jesus didn't "say" anything. The character Jesus depicted in the Gospels said a lot of things, so of which are powerful. Just so you I like Jesus in his noble aspect - that is when the authors of the Gospels have him saying stuff that is consistent with spiritual wisdom.
The Christian Devil is a composite fiction drawn from two sources. Satan is an adversary - a challenger, a tempter. He is not evil. Our closest sense of the true nature of Satan is 'devil's advocate'. The other source is from Isaiah 14:12. Here Isaiah characterises a certain human as like the morning star, falsely alleging it contests against the Sun. Isaiah knows no astronomy, nor astrology. The morning star is Venus, the herald of the coming sun, the light bringer - Lucifer in Latin. The attribution of Lucifer as the Devil is a late theological fiction. Elsewhere, as you will well know Jesus is also called the morning star - of course, the herald of light and love (Venus is associated with love).
Christians also added traditional 'pagan' characters like Pan and Cernunnos to the hybrid fiction depicted as the Devil. Now this is not to say there are not evil agents who prey upon humans and cause them to do ill to themselves and others. My concern is that by lumping them together as a fictional theological construct we cause more harm than good.By projecting an evil agent to be fought rather than engaging with an inner aspect to be transformed we miss the powerful message of Christ and turn our moral drama into a theatre in which we can see ourselves victims to a great force that requires a saving hero to rescue us. This is a rendition of Christianity that serves the institutional Church seeking conformity and passive obedience.
Christ as Saviour as a symbol for an inner process is very different to Christ the Hero who requires obedience and belief for succour. This latter notion is an invention of a corporatist faith that profits from conformity to, and compliance with, its claim to be the sole source of safety. This is the logic of insurance sales - help the believer to see a danger they did not know was there and propose a means of rescuing them by providing a service they pay for through obedience, complicity and reliance. In other words the Church creates a fictional evil agent to give it a means to claim ongoing authority and secure ongoing benefit and power.
I agree with you that a tolerant theist may be better than a materialist atheist. But if that theist believes in diabolic agents I suspect their notion of 'tolerant' might be shaded in their favour. There are, I think, superior states of awareness of, and fidelity to, the divine.