What are Demons?

[Asurendra]

What are demons?

First of all, I'll state categorically that I reject the Christian notion that these entities are fallen angels. I also reject the Spiritualist belief taught by the Morris Pratt Inst. and shared by many New Agers that there is no such things as actual dark entities (except for anything male).

It is my opinion that these are the alpha-predators of the lower astral realms. It is sometimes said that these beings have never been human. I don't know for sure if that is the case and it is certainly possible. I think it is equally possible that some were once human. But my intuition says it is a mix between the two.
For example: there were multiple reports after Ted Bundy's execution that he was seen by guards. It unnerved them as he always stares at them with a mocking grin. ( http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2092970/posts ) Suppose this is correct and that to sustain himself on the astral and avoid the Second Death he engages in astral cannibalism; eventually this will destroy what humanity he may have had and mutate him into something else. Powerful but insane: this certainly sounds like many account of demons.

There is another angle to examine the demonic question. In Hinduism the Devas and in Shinto the Kami have wrathful aspects. This certainly might appear as demonic. But I don't think they could be classed as demons. The reason is that while these are displays of 'negative' and 'rebellious' emotions and actions, the beings themselves are not defined by these displays. So, simply because something acts in a negative way does not de facto mean it is a demon. This negativity is the core of the demonic being.

Finally, some believe the demons are a psychological functions within man whose energy can be harnessed for magical workings. This is true in itself but incomplete. The axiom is 'As above, so below.' Certainly this is a part of our human nature but we share it with the wider universe as well.

This could be a long thread so I don't want to write a dissertation here. I have more to say but will wait.

[msrb999]

We Muslims believe there are a separate entity who are capable of thinking and have freedom of choice, we called them jinn( You call them Demon). They can be both good and evil. They posses magical power, can shape shift, can even posses human. We believe Satan is a jinn not an angel. Angel don't have freedom of choice like human & jinn, so they are not capable of any evil. Humans are the superior of all creations.

[Ramscha]

"Demon" is a wide reaching word for me. I don´t take it as a word for some evil spirits or fallen angels or what ever. Demon is simply a synonym for "entity" as I understand it, every beeing on another plane than ours or even existing on several planes. The term itself does not refer for me to anything "good" or "evil", I reject such thinking for myself.

As the word "demon" refers to the greek term "daimon" which is also a neutral term is is just natural for me to keep this neutral status.

So but to came back what demons are for me and to make it short. As I already said it includes everything that exists on other planes or on several ones, including ourselfs, but I prefer to refer to beings as "entities" or simply as "beings" which makes it easier to deal with it in conversation without attach to any paradigm.
For those entities I prefer to look at them as energetic mirror images of what they are representing, as it would be for example for a fire ghost representing fire, to keep it simple. Of course this includes our own character, your own personal "demons" such as instincts, desires or fears.

I also think that there are "beings" or rather said "existences" which are to abstract, to complex and to enormous to catch more than a glimpse of them like the thing mirroring for example the universe or time itself.

That is just my believe or to say correctly, my working model. No rights reserved [eg]