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50 free The Devil trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
The Devil is not one figure but dozens: the accuser in Job, the tempter in the Gospels, the dragon in Revelation, Iblis who refused to bow, the destructive spirit of Zoroastrianism, the goose on the primordial ocean, and the charming negotiator who bought Faust's soul. This quiz moves through the word's Greek origin, the first religion to invent a supreme evil spirit, the Bible's scattered references, the Quran's account, Jewish apocrypha, Mandaean and Balkan mythology, Beelzebub's Philistine roots, the Faust legend, and what Dante, Luther, Spinoza and Kant made of him. Every answer is explained, so you come away knowing where each idea came from.
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Q 01The word 'devil' comes from the Greek diábolos, which means what?
Slanderer
Latin borrowed it as diabolus, the Old English turned that into dēofol, and Middle English shortened it to devel.
Q 02The Hebrew word śāṭān was originally a common noun meaning what?
Adversary
It came from a verb meaning to obstruct or oppose, and was applied to human opponents as readily as heavenly ones.
Q 03Which religion was the first to develop a demonology headed by a supreme spirit of evil?
Zoroastrianism
Its founder argued evil was a principle entirely separate from God, the first known dualistic cosmology.
Q 04In the religion founded by Zarathustra, what is the 'destructive spirit' called?
Angra Mainyu
In Middle Persian the same figure is Ahriman, who is limited to space and time and will be defeated at the end of the world.
Q 05Zarathustra urged his followers to abandon the devas and worship which god alone?
Ahura Mazda
Spirits of the older belief systems that did not align with the new sole deity were recast as demons.
Q 06The Zoroastrian destructive spirit is blamed for toads and which other creature?
Scorpions
Everything evil or painful in creation is his doing, while his opponent creates only what is good.
Q 07The prophet Mani founded Manichaeism in the third century under which dynasty's rule?
The Sasanian Empire
Its doctrine of Two Principles and Three Moments held that good and evil were once separate, are now mixed, and will be separated again forever.
Q 08In a German folktale, the devil builds a bridge for the first soul to cross. What do people send over first?
A dog
The story swaps the deceived giants of older pagan tales for a devil, a pattern common from the 4th to 12th centuries.
Q 09The dualist Cathars were destroyed by the Catholic Church in which campaign?
The Albigensian Crusade
Most of what is known about them survives only in the writings of the critics who wiped them out.
Q 10Which 1215 gathering affirmed the devil was created good but turned evil by his own will?
The Fourth Lateran Council
A few University of Paris theologians argued the opposite in 1241, that God created the devil without his own decision.
Q 11In a Balkan creation story, God meets a goose on the eternal ocean. What is the goose's name?
Satanael
The goose claims to be 'the god of gods', fetches mud from the sea floor, and later tries to assault God and is thrown into the abyss.
Q 12In a Siberian Tatar myth, God and his first creation take the form of which birds?
Ducks
The second bird, identified with Erlik Khan, turns against God and is punished with his own kingdom in the underworld.
Q 13Which Buddhist figure tempts the Buddha with a celestial army and a vision of beautiful maidens?
Māra
Unlike Satan, he is not a rebel against a good creator but a symbol of conditioned existence itself, resisted through enlightenment.
Q 21In 2 Corinthians, Paul warns that Satan often disguises himself as what?
An angel of light
The Epistle to the Hebrews adds that he holds the power of death but is defeated through the death of Jesus.
Q 22In the Book of Revelation, the dragon 'called the devil, or Satan' wages war against whom?
The archangel Michael
The dragon falls, and its resemblance to Leviathan links it back to the Old Testament's chaos monsters.
Q 23Where does Dante's Inferno place the Devil?
At the bottom of hell
The placement follows Neoplatonic thinking: the Devil is the point most remote from God, to which all sin is drawn.
Q 14Which creature from the Garden of Eden is traditionally identified with the Devil?
The serpent
Revelation's dragon is explicitly 'called the devil, or Satan', and that identification was read back onto Genesis 3.
Q 15The 'rising star' cast down for trying to ascend to the gods comes from which culture's myth?
Babylonian
The passage in Isaiah 14 became the basis for the name Lucifer, Latin for the morning star.
Q 16In which biblical book does Satan wager that a righteous man loves God only because he is blessed?
Job
Satan destroys the man's family, health, servants and flocks, yet he refuses to condemn God.
Q 17In the temptation of Christ, what does the devil offer Jesus?
All the kingdoms of the earth
Because Jesus does not dispute the offer, some read the passage as implying the gospel writers believed the kingdoms really were his to give.
Q 18According to John 13:2, the Devil entered which disciple before a betrayal?
Judas Iscariot
Luke 22:3 tells the same story, and John 8 goes further, calling the Pharisees 'offspring of the devil'.
Q 19Accused of casting out demons by the devil's power, how did Jesus reply?
A house divided against itself will fall
The exchange appears in all three synoptic gospels, and the phrase later became a staple of political speechmaking.
Q 20The First Epistle of Peter compares the prowling devil to which animal?
A roaring lion
The verse, 1 Peter 5:8, describes him 'looking for someone to devour'.
Q 24Martin Luther's list of devils includes Asmodeus, who first appears in which scripture?
Tobit
Luther thought greater devils incited heresy and unbelief while lesser ones handled greed and fornication.
Q 25Who was the first Anabaptist to suggest, around 1540, that the Devil was only an allegory?
David Joris
The view found a small but persistent following in the Netherlands.
Q 26Which 20th-century theologian taught that Christians must reject belief in a literal devil?
Rudolf Bultmann
He saw it as part of formulating an authentic faith for the modern world.
Q 27Some Gnostic texts call the creator of the material world by which devil's name from Jewish writings?
Samael
The Apocryphon of John and On the Origin of the World demonize the creator as an inferior impostor deity.
Q 28What is the proper name of the devil in Islam?
Iblis
Shaitan is the broader term for forces of evil; the proper name refers to one specific being.
Q 29According to the Quran, the Islamic devil is 'one of the' what?
Jinn
The term can cover all sorts of invisible beings, which is why scholars long debated whether he was an angel.
Q 30Out of pride, the Islamic devil refused to prostrate before whom?
Adam
He was condemned to Hell but granted his request to lead humanity astray, knowing the righteous would resist.