Based on the numerous questions coming to me on this subject, I decided to go back to it for the benefit of many. So, we want to look at;

Who actually is Lucifer?

Who was Isaiah 14 referring to?

What is the nature of the war that took place in heaven?

When was Satan cast down? How many times and passages do the word or name Lucifer appear in the scriptures?

Is Lucifer the same as Satan, the dragon?

How many times was Satan referred to as being cast down? Etc.

These are some of the questions we intend to answer in this study.

John 12:27-33 “²⁷Now is my soul troubled; and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour: but for this cause came I unto this hour. ²⁸Father, glorify thy name. Then came there a voice from heaven, saying, I Have both glorified it, and will glorify it again. ²⁹The people therefore, that stood by, and heard it, said that it thundered: others said, An angel spake to him. ³⁰Jesus answered and said, This voice came not because of me, but for your sakes. ³¹Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out. ³²And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me. ³³This he said, signifying what death he should die.”

Revelation 12:7-10 “⁷And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels, ⁸And prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven. ⁹And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world, he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him. ¹⁰And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night.”

Isaiah 14:12-14 “¹²How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art

thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! {O Lucifer:

or, O day star} ¹³For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my

throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the

congregation, in the sides of the north. ¹⁴I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High.”

Consider these ORACLES as it relates to these Nations and their kings.

Isaiah 13:1-14:23 – against Babylon

Isaiah 14:24-27 – against Assyria

Isaiah 14:28-32 – against Philistia

Isaiah 15-16 – against Moab

Isaiah 17 – against Damascus

Isaiah 18 – against Cush

Isaiah 19 – against Egypt

Isaiah 20 – against Egypt & Cush

Isaiah 21:1-10 – against Babylon

Isaiah 21:11-12 – against Edom

Isaiah 21:13-17 – against Arabia

Isaiah 22 – against Jerusalem

Isaiah 23 – about Tyre

Isaiah 24 – portrait of judgments

A careful look at Isaiah 14 from chapter 13 shows it was a DIRGE. Meaning a song of lamentation, especially one that is meant to accompany a funeral. Basically, it was the funeral service song of king Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon.

We can understand this passage better if we read it from a simpler translation like the Good News Bible, so let us see it here.

“Dashed down from the highest prosperity to the lowest misery.”

Isaiah 14:1-21

^“1The Lord will once again be merciful to his people Israel and choose them as his own. He will let them live in their own land again, and foreigners will come and live there with them. ²Many nations will help the people of Israel return to the land which the Lord gave them, and there the nations will serve Israel as slaves. Those who once captured Israel will now be captured by Israel, and the people of Israel will rule over those who once oppressed them.

The King of Babylon in the World of the Dead ³The Lord will give the people of Israel relief from their pain and suffering and from the hard work they were forced to do. ⁴When he does this, they are to mock the king of Babylon and say:

“The cruel king has fallen! He will never oppress anyone again! ⁵The Lord has ended the power of the evil rulers ⁶who angrily oppressed the peoples and never stopped persecuting the nations they had conquered. ⁷Now at last the whole world enjoys rest and peace, and everyone sings for joy. ⁸The cypress trees and the cedars of Lebanon rejoice over the fallen king, because there is no one to cut them down, now that he is gone! ⁹The world of the dead is getting ready to welcome the king of Babylon. The ghosts of those who were powerful on earth are stirring about. The ghosts of kings are rising from their thrones. ¹⁰They all call out to him, ‘Now you are as weak as we are! You are one of us! ¹¹You used to be honored with the music of harps, but now here you are in the world of the dead. You lie on a bed of maggots and are covered with a blanket of worms.'” ¹²King of Babylon, bright morning star, you have fallen from heaven! In the past you conquered nations, but now you have been thrown to the ground. ¹³You were determined to climb up to heaven and to place your throne above the highest stars. You thought you would sit like a king on that mountain in the north where the gods assemble. ¹⁴You said you would climb to the tops of the clouds and be like the Almighty. ¹⁵But instead, you have been brought down to the deepest part of the world of the dead. ¹⁶The dead will stare and gape at you. They will ask, “Is this the man who shook the earth and made kingdoms tremble? ¹⁷Is this the man who destroyed cities and turned the world into a desert? Is this the man who never freed his prisoners or let them go home?” ¹⁸All the kings of the earth lie in their magnificent tombs, ¹⁹but you have no tomb, and your corpse is thrown out to rot. It is covered by the bodies of soldiers killed in battle, thrown with them into a rocky pit, and trampled down. ²⁰Because you ruined your country and killed your own people, you will not be buried like other kings. None of your evil family will survive. ²¹Let the slaughter begin! The sons of this king will die because of their ancestors’ sins. None of them will ever rule the earth or cover it with”

(Good News Translation)

Isaiah 14:1-23 is therefore God’s deliverance of His people. Isaiah warned that the kingdom of Judah would be taken into captivity by Babylon in;

Isaiah 5:11-13 “¹¹Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning, that they may follow strong drink; that continue until night, till wine inflame them! ¹²And the harp, and the viol, the tabret, and pipe, and wine, are in their feasts: but they regard not the work of the LORD, neither consider the operation of his hands. ¹³Therefore my people are gone into captivity, because they have no knowledge: and their honourable men are famished, and their multitude dried up with thirst”

Isaiah 6:9-12 “⁹And he said, Go, and tell this people, Hear ye indeed, but understand not; and see ye indeed, but perceive not. ¹⁰Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed. ¹¹Then said I, Lord, how long? And he answered, Until the cities be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man, and the land be utterly desolate,

¹²And the LORD have removed men far away, and there be a great forsaking in the midst of the land.”

Isaiah.11:9-11 “⁹They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea. ¹⁰And in that day there shall be a root of Jesse, which shall stand for an ensign of the people; to it shall the Gentiles seek: and his rest shall be glorious. ¹¹And it shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord shall set his hand again the second time to recover the remnant of his people, which shall be left, from Assyria, and from Egypt, and from Pathros, and from Cush, and from Elam, and from Shinar, and from Hamath, and from the islands of the sea.”

Isaiah 11:11 (NIV) “In that day the Lord will reach out his hand a second time to reclaim the remnant that is left of his people from Assyria, from Lower Egypt, from Upper Egypt, from Cush, from Elam, from Babylonia, from Hamath and from the islands of the sea.” where “Shinar” is Babylon; Isaiah 39:6 “Behold, the days come, that all that is in thine house, and that which thy fathers have laid up in store until this day, shall be carried to Babylon: nothing shall be left, saith the LORD”

And this happened in 586 B.C.

Jeremiah 20 “³And it came to pass on the morrow, that Pashur brought forth Jeremiah out of the stocks. Then said Jeremiah unto him, The LORD hath not called thy name Pashur, but Magormissabib. ⁴For thus saith the LORD, Behold, I will make thee a terror to thyself, and to all thy friends: and they shall fall by the sword of their enemies, and thine eyes shall behold it: and I will give all Judah into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall carry them captive into Babylon, and shall slay them with the sword. ⁵Moreover I will deliver all the strength of this city, and all the labours thereof, and all the precious things thereof, and all the treasures of the kings of Judah will I give into the hand of their enemies, which shall spoil them, and take them, and carry them to Babylon. ⁶And thou, Pashur, and all that dwell in thine house shall go into captivity: and thou shalt come to Babylon, and there thou shalt die, and shalt be buried there, thou, and all thy friends, to whom thou hast prophesied lies.”

Jeremiah prophesied that the Captivity would last for seventy years. Then Babylon would be judged and the Jews permitted to go home (Jeremiah 25:1-14).

Jeremiah 25 (MSG) “⁷You refused to listen to any of this, and now I am really angry. These god-making businesses of yours are your doom.” ⁸The verdict of God-of-the-Angel-Armies on all this: Because you have refused to listen to what I’ve said, ⁹I’m stepping in. I’m sending for the armies out of the north headed by Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, my servant in this, and I’m setting them on this land and people and even the surrounding countries. I’m devoting the whole works to total destruction — a horror to top all the horrors in history. ¹⁰And I’ll banish every sound of joy — singing, laughter, marriage festivities, genial workmen, candlelit suppers. ¹¹The whole landscape will be one vast wasteland. These countries will be in subjection to the king of Babylon for seventy years. ¹²Once the seventy years is up, I’ll punish the king of Babylon and the whole nation of Babylon for their sin. Then they’ll be the wasteland. ¹³Everything that I said I’d do to that country, I’ll do — everything that’s written in this book, everything Jeremiah preached against all the godless nations. ¹⁴Many nations and great kings will make slaves of the Babylonians, paying them back for everything they’ve done to others. They won’t get by with anything.” God’s Decree.

This brought about the final siege of the city, which was at length taken and completely destroyed (B.C. 586).

Zedekiah was taken captive, and had his eyes put out by order of the king of Babylon, who made him a prisoner for the remainder of his life. He survived his recovery of mental illness for some years, and died B.C. 562, in the eighty-third or eighty-fourth (84) year of his age, after a reign of forty-three (43) years and was succeeded by his son Evil-merodach after a reign of two years.

Accomplished – counting from the time that the Jews were carried away in the time of Jeconiah or Jehoiakim. 2 King 24:15 & 16.

Desolations – This was fulfilled by Darius, the king of Persia, Daniel 4:31. Of these seventy Nebuchadnezzar reigned thirty six (36) years (2King 25:27), Evil-merodach thirty two (32) years and Belshazzar at least two (2) years (Daniel 8:1).

Babylon fell under Cyrus at the head of the combined armies of Media and Persia.

Cyrus = “King of Persia” (Elam) who was conqueror of Babylon, and issued the decree of liberation to the Jews (Ezra 1:1 & 2). In the year B.C. 559 he became king of Persia.

He aided his uncle Cyaxares (called “Darius the Mede” in the Bible) in conquering Asia Minor, and afterwards their joint forces captured Babylon and overran the Assyrian empire.

Cyrus was a great military leader, bent on universal conquest. Babylon fell before his army (B.C. 538) on the night of Belshazzar’s feast (Dan. 5:30), and then the ancient dominion of Assyria was also added to his empire.

The great kings of the earth had only oppressed the Jews. Cyrus was to them as a “shepherd” (Isaiah 44:28; 45:1). God employed him in doing service for his ancient people

So, the capture of Babylon by Darius/Cyrus would be good news to the Jews: for it would mean the end of their exile and bondage. And this is exactly what Isaiah 14 is all about.

It is clear from the passage that Isaiah 14, reading from chapter 13, that it was nothing more than the story of the fall; of the king of Babylon. In fact is simply the song of lamentation. So, understand that the picture in Isaiah 14:1-23 is that of a mighty monarch whose pride has brought him to destruction. Isaiah described the king’s arrival in sheol, the world of the dead, where the king’s wealth, glory, and power vanished. The dead kings already in sheol, the departed world of the dead, stood in tribute to him.

Isaiah 14:9 “The grave below is all astir to meet you at your coming; it rouses the spirits of the departed to greet you — all those who were leaders in the world; it makes them rise from their thrones — all those who were kings over the nations” (MSG)

Isaiah 14:9 “The grave below is all astir to meet you at your coming; it rouses the spirits of the departed to greet you — all those who were leaders in the world; it makes them rise from their thrones — all those who were kings over the nations.” (NIV)

But it was all a mockery. Death is the great leveler; there are no kings in the world of the dead.

“Lucifer” (verse 12) is Latin for “morning star” and suggests that this king’s glory did not last very long. The morning star shines but is soon swallowed up by the light of the sun.

To be continued…