Isaiah 14:12, commentary and pictures

The verse describes the downfall of Lucifer from heaven to earth after his long rebellion that shook kingdoms and held captives. Lucifer is Satan, the son of the morning and light-bearer, glorious above the angels and once closely united to the Son of God. Before sin he stood highest after Christ, next to Christ in honor and glory as first of the covering cherubs, created good, beautiful, and surpassing in wisdom and brightness. Sin began with him when pride in his beauty and wisdom and envy of Christ led him to covet supreme homage and command, to seek to ascend and be like the Most High and to rule rather than serve. Concealing his designs with doubt and false accusation against God's justice and government, he drew nearly half the angels to his side until open war broke out and he was defeated and cast out of heaven to this world.

Name Fall and Wording

How art thou fallen pictures a real fall of Lucifer from heaven, cut down to the ground or earth after weakening the nations. It is Satan's overthrow, his casting down from heaven to this earth through rebellion, and it looks forward to the time when he is left powerless on the desolate earth with no one to deceive or harm. Once the highest and most honored angel after Christ, holy and undefiled, he was created good and beautiful, but pride in his beauty and brightness led him to exalt himself, rebel against God's law, and become the enemy.

Lucifer is Satan, called son of the morning and light-bearer, glorious above the angels and closely united to the Son of God. He was next to Christ in honor, the highest in power and glory among heaven's inhabitants, the first of the covering cherubs, holy and undefiled. As the shining son of the morning he fell from an honored place in heaven through murmuring against God and envy of Christ, losing his former home, purity, standing, and place in the heavenly council and government.

To weaken the nations means his long rebellion made the earth tremble and desolate, shook kingdoms, and kept God's people captive until Christ broke his bonds and set the prisoners free. His ambition to rise above the other heavenly beings and become like God spread discontent among the angels by claiming heaven's laws imposed needless restraint and that holy angels should follow their own wills. That fall from heaven and cutting down to the ground for weakening the nations began when one exalted to high position with great opportunities and great light refused that light because it did not agree with the desires of his own heart, turned aside the counsel of the Lord, and opened the door to seductive influence.

The surrounding prophecy describes his prideful wish to ascend into heaven, to exalt his throne above the stars of God and above the other heavenly beings, and to be like the Most High and like God. His end is to be brought down to hell, to the pit, to the sides of the pit, where those who look upon him gaze narrowly and marvel that this one made the earth tremble and shook kingdoms. His exposure and the great controversy over his claims grow stronger as the close of earth's history nears.

Exalted Position Before Sin

Before sin he held the highest place after Christ, next in honor to Christ and highest in power and glory among the inhabitants of heaven, the holy and undefiled first of the covering cherubs, the son of the morning. He was once the highest and most honored angel after Christ, next in honor to Christ alone, dissatisfied only when God honored Jesus and seeking for himself the honor and command that belonged to the Son. His fall was from that exalted place, cut down from heaven to the ground when self-exaltation and jealousy of Christ led him to covet the homage due only to the Creator and to rebel against God's law.

He had been created good and beautiful by God, an angel of the highest intelligence, wisdom, brightness, skill and ability, exalted and glorious among the heavenly intelligences. Before rebellion he appeared with a mild countenance expressive of happiness, a high and broad forehead showing powerful intellect, a perfect form and noble and majestic bearing, with a special light beaming in his countenance and shining around him brighter and more beautiful than around the other angels. That superior intellectual attainment proved that knowledge alone can be a power for evil as well as good according to the direction given to it and can educate to destroy when God is not made the trust.

All his beauty and intelligence and excellence was derived from God and given by Him, his glory and wisdom and beauty received from Christ, yet he failed to recognize their source. Becoming self-exalted in his own esteem, he supposed his high position meant he could do anything he desired, coveted the honor and glory given to Christ in whom angels could see a perfect representation of God as the express image of the Father's person, and wanted the highest place and Christ's position for himself rather than to serve as light-bearer. He had been entrusted with great responsibility, including the guidance and guardianship of those heaven had committed to him, an important position as a covering cherub positioned next to Christ and entrusted with power. The ceaseless beams of glory enshrouding the eternal God rested continually upon him, and he had a place and standing in the heavenly council and government from which after apostasy he was excluded and cast out as an angel of darkness.

Pride Envy and Ambition

Sin began with Lucifer when pride in his beauty, brightness and wisdom turned him to self-exaltation, and as son of the morning, glorious above the angels and closely united to the Son of God, he wanted to ascend, to rise above the other heavenly beings and above the stars of God, to be like the Most High, to be God, and to rule heaven and the universe rather than serve as light-bearer. Though created good and beautiful as an angel of highest intelligence, the covering cherub next to Christ, he rebelled against God's law, claiming heaven's laws imposed needless restraint and that holy angels should follow their own wills, presenting his grasp for greater power and honor as a quest for liberty and a higher, freer state of existence. He wanted God's power, not His character, and his ambition and self-seeking that drew many angels to his side and brought his expulsion continued on earth to bring ruin to humanity.

Envy and jealousy of Christ moved him to covet the homage, honor, supremacy and command due only to the Creator, to desire equality with God and Christ's place next to God, to claim Christ should be second to him, and to resent Christ's rightful supremacy and pre-eminence as one with the Father before angels were created. Once the highest and most honored angel after Christ, holy and undefiled, standing next to Christ in power and glory, he was dissatisfied with God's honor of Jesus and rebelled against the Son's authority to seek that honor and command for himself. To carry out his purpose he concealed his true designs and worked deceptively to secure the allegiance and honor of angels to himself, sowing seeds of doubt by sly insinuations that Christ had assumed the place belonging to him, and when he had won many he carried the matter to God as the sentiment of many heavenly beings. He remains the leader and originator of every rebellion.

He was dissatisfied that God had not revealed all the secrets of His purposes to him and had not taken him into conference to understand them, and he disregarded what God had revealed about the work assigned to him. He challenged the need for law and warred against the law and government of God, which was the highest crime, because he was unwilling to submit to the authority of God's Son, heaven's great commander, claiming holy beings should be under no restraint, questioning God's purposes, impugning His justice, and treating Him as fallible. He stood up proudly and urged that he should be equal with God and be taken into conference with the Father, demanding that to His Son alone God would not confine His secret purposes but that all the family in heaven must yield implicit obedience only on his terms, and God answered that Satan was unworthy of a place in heaven. He stirred the angels under his command to the same discontent and bent all his powers to allure them from allegiance, so that complaints at first meeting no favor were urged again and again until those before loyal and happy were accepted and fell with him, and the same spirit now leads people to disregard God's direct commands. His rebellion showed contempt for God's authority and virtually trampled every precept of His law, making him the grand prototype of all transgressors, so that unbelief, ingratitude, apostasy, defiance and enmity only repeat the course he pursued in heaven.

His first sin was selfishness, seeking to grasp power and exalt self and in a kind of madness and insanity trying to supersede God and take God's place, and that selfish ambition is the root of all sin. In its root form it was covetousness for a higher state, which is idolatry, by which he forfeited forever the brightness and bliss of heaven, and his doom stands behind the dooms of Achan, Judas, and Ananias and Sapphira as the original fearful example of where covetousness leads. He spread that selfishness to humanity when he tempted Adam with the false claim that man could gain more than he already had and become as God Himself, sowing seeds of selfishness in the human heart. He fell because he cherished flattery, desire to obtain forbidden knowledge, and ambition for self-exaltation in wanting to be as God, and he now aims to compass the ruin of men by the same means by which he beguiled Eve, flattering them, kindling desire for forbidden knowledge, and exciting ambition for self-exaltation, as in teaching that man progresses toward the Godhead and becomes his own judge and standard.

He worshiped his own ideas and plans and demanded prerogatives no created being can have, aspiring to God's throne and seeking authority independent of God. He wove fixed ideas about his own place and influence in heaven and refused to give them up or exchange them, refusing correction and refusing to harmonize with Christ, determined to carry out his own purposes and pressing his claim to occupy the place he demanded and to be equal with Christ. When God would not concede that claim he rebelled, there was war in heaven, and he was cast out and lost his position in the heavenly courts, his stubborn course making him unacceptable to God. To take the position that one's views and ideas are never to be given up and to claim infallibility is to pattern after Lucifer. Cast to this world he carried the same idea out here by leading men to think they could be equal with God, to doubt the word of God and distrust His goodness, and, though God is a God of justice and terrible majesty, to look upon Him as severe and unforgiving, thus drawing men to join him in rebellion and bringing the night of woe upon the world.

Deception War and Expulsion

He hid his real purpose while working to win the angels to himself, using sophistry, sly insinuations, subtle suggestions and false accusations against the Son and the Father. Professing reverence, he sowed doubt about the justice and government of God, questioned His purposes and impugned His justice, and claimed that heaven's laws imposed needless restraint and that holy angels should follow their own wills. He presented his grasp for greater power and honor as a quest for liberty and a higher, freer, better government, complaining that appointing a ruler over the angels ended sweet liberty and demanded servile honor. He declared he would no longer submit to this invasion of his rights and would never again bow to Christ, but would take the honor that should have been conferred on him and be commander of all who would follow and obey him. Having first won support by urging his complaints again and again, he then carried the matter to God as if it were the sentiment of many heavenly beings, claiming the angels wanted him to take Christ's place.

He put his own dissatisfaction into angelic minds and then reported it as theirs, bending all his powers and high rank and influence to allure them from allegiance. He drew many to his side, comprising nearly one half of all the angels, until what was hidden broke open into contention to reform God's government. That open rebellion became war in heaven between his party and God and His angels, with the Son and the loyal angels arrayed against Satan and his followers.

The loyal angels under heaven's great commander prevailed, and he and his sympathizers were defeated, driven out, cast out and shut out of heaven to this world. With expulsion they lost heaven's riches, glory, peace, joy, purity, standing, honor, happiness, harmony and place in government, becoming turbulent and discordant. Then there was peace in heaven, though his rebellion and self-seeking did not end but continued on earth.

His fall came through his own disaffection and rebellion of heart, not because divine influence was withdrawn and not because anything was deficient in God's government. God's decrees and government are not responsible for sin and will be vindicated, and there was not even the shadow of justification or excuse for disaffection. No satisfactory reason can be given for envy, jealousy, evil surmising, covetousness and rebellion, for that iniquity is unexplainable; once cherished, envy and jealousy gained power that paralyzed reason and destroyed honor and loyalty.

Before expulsion all the heavenly host were summoned to appear before the Father to have each case determined, with angels marshaled in companies each under a higher commanding angel. There God answered that to His Son alone He would reveal His secret purposes, required all the family in heaven, even Satan, to yield implicit, unquestioned obedience, and declared Satan unworthy of a place in heaven. Repeated offers of pardon and opportunity to repent and submit were given to show him his course was wrong, but he refused and would not repent. He then exultingly pointed to his sympathizers and declared he was prepared to resist Christ's authority and defend his place by force of might, strength against strength, until war broke out and the disaffected were defeated and cast down to earth.

Earthly Rebellion Final Defeat

Cast to earth he set up his own rival kingdom in opposition to God, becoming prince of evil and god of this world and drawing the world to his rebellious cause. Having lost heaven's riches, glory, peace and joy, he sought revenge by leading people to undervalue heaven and turning them from it toward earthly treasures. Envy of the home given to Adam and Eve led him to seek their fall in order to gain power over them and over the earth itself. Unable to carry out his plans in heaven, he came to earth seeking to make himself as his own god, though God remains Ruler over heaven and earth. With great zeal he entered into commercialism on this earth, ensnaring all who do not stand loyal and true beside Prince Emmanuel.

His fall did not destroy his powers nor make him a beast, for he remains an angel of great intellectual power. The fallen angels retained their intelligence but lost their connection with God and their power of discernment, using what remained in opposition to God. By practice since his fall he has ever-increasing knowledge of transgression and ever-increasing energy and artfulness in using that acquired knowledge to tempt, poison thought, and hurt and destroy God's heritage. He uses his strength against heaven's government to misrepresent God as arbitrary and harsh, to deceive people, to delay and hinder God's work, and to lead others into rebellion and ruin souls. Though fallen he has not forgotten the manners of the heavenly courts and can assume them to deceive, appearing as a man or as an angel of light and speaking of heavenly things.

The prophecy looks beyond the first casting down to his final overthrow, when he is brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit, and left powerless on the desolate earth with no one to deceive or harm. There those who look upon him gaze narrowly and marvel that this one made the earth tremble, made it desolate, shook kingdoms and kept people captive. At the final judgment he remembers his fall from an honored place, that as shining seraph and son of the morning and covering cherub he lost his former home, purity, standing and place in the heavenly council. Then, forever excluded from the council where he was honored, he sees Christ honored and crowned and sees the ruin brought by murmuring against God and envy of Christ, even remembering that the honor given to Christ might once have been his.

Jesus recalled this first expulsion when He said He saw Satan fall from heaven, pointing to a defeated foe and looking ahead to final destruction and the end of evil. Christ broke his bonds to set the prisoners free, and by victory on the cross that defeat and redemption were made certain. Christ left the heavenly throne and came to earth to withstand Lucifer's power and meet him in conflict over human souls. As Satan was cast out of heaven, so he is dispossessed of dominion in hearts and minds through the preaching of the gospel, for through faith in the Word men gain the victory, the devil loses his hold, and his kingdom totters and falls before sanctified truth.

The verse belongs to the Bible's authentic history of the beginning of the world and the origin of sin, without which that history would be obscured by human conjecture and false theories. God explained Satan's fall to Adam and Eve together with warning of the danger of listening to his suggestions, leaving them free to obey God and live or to believe the tempter, disobey and perish. In that way Satan's fall begins the account of Old Testament history.

The same self-exalting principle of aspiring to ascend, to exalt the throne above the stars of God and to be like the Most High is acted out by the man of sin who exalts himself above all that is called God and sits as God in the temple of God. It is also the source of pantheistic ideas about God in nature, which may appear beautiful but lead those who accept them into darkness. His ruin came from cherishing flattery, desire for forbidden knowledge and ambition for self-exaltation in wanting to be as God, and he now aims to compass the ruin of men by the same means by which he beguiled Eve, flattering them, kindling desire for forbidden knowledge and exciting ambition for self-exaltation, as in teaching that man progresses toward the Godhead and becomes his own judge and standard.

Doctrine Warning and Application

The fall of Lucifer from heaven reveals the origin of evil, for sin began in heaven when he perverted the freedom granted to created beings and refused allegiance to God's law. He thereby became Satan, the adversary of God and holy beings, the first rebel and lawbreaker, the first apostate and the originator of apostasy, discord and sin among holy beings. His pursuit of supremacy and desire to rule introduced transgression into a holy place, showing that God's law already governed angels before human beings were created. Highly exalted next to Christ as first of the covering cherubs, holy and undefiled, he hid jealousy, envy and evil surmising until division came, worked secretly to supersede God and Christ, and at last broke into open war between his party and God and His angels, after which he was overcome and thrust down to this world and there was peace in heaven. Cast out of the heavenly courts, he remains the enemy of souls who seeks control of minds not faithfully taught about his snares, and the same spirit that brought about the great deception in heaven is at work in the world today.

His ruin proves that being once in grace is not always in grace and demonstrates the sure result of disobeying God's law. Given the highest gifts that could be bestowed on a created being as the glorious covering cherub next to Christ, he sought to be equal with God and by disobedience to the principles of duty and of God brought upon himself irretrievable ruin. His great knowledge of God and the privileges he had enjoyed made his guilt unpardonable, so that he and the rebellious angels have no hope of redemption, unlike fallen humanity. That history stands as a lesson of what failure to obey God and the gospel means, warning to subdue and control appetites and passions through divine grace and to hide in Christ as the source of all wisdom, intelligence and power.

The same ambitious, selfish and envious spirit that ruined heavenly beings ruins people today. Ambition and selfish desire ruled Lucifer when he sought the highest power and authority, wanting to be God and rule heaven, and after drawing many angels to his side and being cast out, his rebellion and self-seeking continued on earth where they brought ruin to humanity. His self-exaltation in heaven and thrusting out show that the same self-exaltation brings ruin to fallen people, and ideas governed by that sinful spirit can lead others toward similar loss and ruin. Studying the fall together with the life and teachings of Christ therefore calls for humility, earnest prayer, less self-esteem, and seeking God's wisdom to distinguish good from evil.

His fall warns those in sacred responsibility not to repeat his pursuit of supremacy by seeking to dominate fellow workers. It forbids controlling other minds, dictating what others shall do with their powers and capabilities, devising for others, claiming infallibility, and thinking one's work has no error or one's views are never to be given up, for to weave fixed ideas about one's own place and influence and refuse to harmonize with Christ is to pattern after Lucifer. He fell through his own disaffection, not because divine influence was withdrawn or anything was deficient in God's government, whose decrees are not responsible for sin and will be vindicated, so those carrying God's work on earth must likewise give no cause for disaffection and must maintain the principles of heaven. Ministers must respect appointed authority, speak only as harmonizing with the divine word, and pray for understanding hearts, while believers guard thoughts and words and humble hearts, confess sin, and subordinate the will to the divine will in dependence on God. Mere union with the church does not save, for a person is not saved until the seal of God is placed upon him and he is made complete in Christ, and thousands today are falling through self-exaltation, misusing richly endowed capabilities from ambition to be first and unwillingness to be under restraint.

The fall also warns against pride in intellect, for Lucifer was a very intelligent being in high position before becoming a rebel, proving that knowledge alone can be a power for evil as well as good according to the direction given it and can educate to destroy. Minds of superior intellectual attainments who have not made God their trust are still led captive by his power, while sanctified knowledge imparted by God is of the right quality and tells to the glory of God, and truly valuable knowledge comes from God rather than from the fallen angel or wicked people through the forbidden tree. The same proud self-exaltation leads people to rely on supposed power to do good instead of depending on God and giving Him glory, and their ruin is as certain as Satan's. That desire for supremacy entered commercialism on earth to ensnare all who do not stand loyal beside Prince Emmanuel, so that ministers who will not follow given light and depart from the faith follow the fallen angel without realizing it, and the warning extends against love of money, valuing people by wealth, commercial strife, self-will in children, and looking to human greatness, for great intellect and high position do not prevent rebellion and ambition brings certain ruin.