DEMON (Ilk.
do In on, of uncertain etymology, often derived from SactikOat, d nious divide: ultimately connected with Sul,;vai, didomti, Lat. dare, (la, to give, from Gk. /1(//ino, to know. Skt. fifISM, wise, but best connected, perhaps, if for *(Samgcm,, •dasi-mo», with hat. tares, tutelary deities, Ski. dux, to perish). In popular usage, an evil spirit or fiend. but in allusion, to the classics a tutelary deity or a goOling. The development of the demon-coneept is an interesting one. In Homeric usage the word denotes an indeterminate god. and often. by euphemism, a hostile divinity. In Ilesiod, however, the souls of the departed are called demons, and „Eschylus in the Persians makes Atossa apply the term to her deified hus band, Darius. Herein seems to lie the original meaning of the word, especially if the etymo logical connection with the Latin far is sound. Denoting at first the ghosts of the benignant dead who, when duly propitiated, confer boons on those who observe their cult, and later godfings of the (lead and hence a vague deity in general, and even fate, the concept entered by the time of Socrates and Plato upon its meaning of guardian spirit. In this sense Socrates called his indwell
ing genius omnOvor, and he fancied that it spoke within him to restrain him. but never to impel him. The sense of the word which is the most common one is a Jutheo-Christian develop ment. In the reaction of Christ's teachings against the Grxco-Roman civilization which ruled Palestine at that period, the deities of the gen tiles became the devils of the dud:ea-Christian faith. In the New Testament, therefore. demon always has a had sense. The spread of Christian ity carried the use of the word with it. and demon thus became a synonym of devil. fiend, and maleticient spirit in general. See DE moN 01.0(,V.