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This article deals with the concept of sexuality in Christian demonology. ==The sexuality of demons== To Sumerians, Babylonians, Assyrians, and Jews there were male and female demons (Jewish demons were mostly male, although female examples such as Lilith exist). In Christian demonology and theology the matter of the sexuality of the demons is not clear. Traditional demons of Christianism, such as Satan, Beelzebub, Asmodeo or Belial are invariably assigned a male gender in religious and occultist texts. This is true also for succubi, who despite taking a female shape to copulate with men, are often thought of as male nonetheless.〔(Sebastian Michaelis, "The admirable history of the posession and conuersion of a penitent woman" )〕 The Testament of Solomon,〔(Testament of Solomon )〕 an early treatise on demons of Judeo-Christian origin, presents the demon Ornias, who assumes the shape of a woman to copulate with men (though in other versions he does it while in the shape of an old man〔(James Charlesworth (ed.), The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: Apocalyptic literature and testaments )〕). After meeting him, king Solomon asks Beelzebub if there are female demons, suggesting a difference between male shapeshifting demons (incubi/succubi) and genuine female demons. Similarly, angels in Christianism have also masculine genders, names and functions. For example, the Grigori, led by Azazel, descended on Mount Hermon and copulated with earthly women out of lust, having children with them. John Milton in Paradise Lost, specifies that although demons may seem masculine or feminine, spirits "Can either Sex assume, or both; so soft And uncompounded is thir Essence pure". Nonetheless, these feminine shapes may be just temporal disguises to deceive people, just as at one point Satan takes the shape of a toad. Everywhere else demons are described as male, and Satan is the father of Death with Sin, a female spirit. Adam explicitly states that all angels of heaven are masculine: " O! why did God, Creator wise, that peopled highest Heaven With Spirits masculine, create at last This novelty on earth, this fair defect Of nature, and not fill the world at once With Men, as Angels, without feminin;" Demons may variously be considered male or female, but the general view is that they are masculine and feminine, while not actually being of either sex. This is the general view of the angels as well, who are generally considered sexless. Gregory of Nyssa (4th century), as well as Ludovico Maria Sinistrari (17th century), believed in male and female demons, or at the very least demons having male and female characteristics. Other conceptions posit that beings of spiritual substance are gender-transcendent or otherwise non-gendered; the experience of a demon as having gender and directional sexual tendencies would be the result of the purposes of the demon in tempting, deceiving, or otherwise harming human targets. It is of note that although God is predominantly experienced and self-revealed as male in the Hebrew Scriptures and Christian New Testament, the Hebrew Scriptures and their Greek translation - the Septuagint - contain feminine allusions to God (e.g., "El Shaddia" referring to breast, hence a nurturing image; "Lady Wisdom", often paralleled to the Word of Gospel of John chapter 1, whose incarnated form is Jesus; the Holy Spirit has feminine references, etc.) although this is due to the Hebrew word form of "wisdom" being a feminine word, hence a masculine personification would not make sense for literary purposes. The notion that God is then gender-transcendent but self-revealed as male for purposes of revelation could also carry over to angels and demons.. By supporting the idea that demons could rape women and sexual relationships with them were painful, Nicholas Remy assigned a sadistic tendency to their sexuality. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Sexuality in Christian demonology」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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