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In Our Time
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PROGRAMME INFO |
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The big ideas which form the intellectual agenda of our age are illuminated by some of the best minds. Melvyn Bragg and three guests investigate the history of ideas and debate their application in modern life. |
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PRESENTER |
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BIOGRAPHY
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| "I'm fascinated by the fact that we live in a time when so many people are doing fantastic work, and thinking in areas which it's not remotely possible for me to keep up with & and these people are prepared to talk about it. They're prepared to come on In Our Time and other programmes on Radio 4 and try and talk to the rest of us ..." |
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THE DEVIL
In the Gospel according to John he is ‘a murderer from the beginning’, ‘a liar and the father of lies’, and Dante calls him ‘the ill Worm that pierces the world’s core’. But Milton’s description of him as a powerful rebel was so attractive that William Blake declared that Milton was ‘of the Devil’s party, without knowing it’. To ordinary folk the Devil has often been regarded as a trickster, a tempter, sometimes even a figure of fun rather than of fear.
How did this contradictory character come into being? Why did it take so long for him to become an established figure in Christianity? And if the Devil did not exist, would we have had to invent him?
Contributors
Martin Palmer, theologian and Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education and Culture
Alison Rowlands, Senior Lecturer in European History at the University of Essex
David Wootton, Professor of Intellectual History at Queen Mary, University of London
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