# Why is the devil so fucking incompetent? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 23, 2005, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-devil-so-fucking-incompetent/309589 "2005-06-23T19:59:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2005, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-devil-so-fucking-incompetent/309589/41 "2005-06-25T17:05:32Z")
> [@Not A Tame Lion](#): > > Probably the primal antecedant for all of these stories is the Book of Job, though Job does not in fact make a deal with Satan, but is merely the victim of a bet between Satan and the Lord. Not as old as Job, but older than most other examples mentioned here, is the story of Jesus’s temptation by Satan in the wilderness (found in Matthew 4 and in Luke 4). Satan does offer what might be described as a “deal with the devil” (enough so that this is one possible source for the idea in later fiction), though Jesus doesn’t take him up on it. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2005, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-devil-so-fucking-incompetent/309589/42 "2005-06-27T14:45:14Z")
> [@](#): > > Quote: > Originally Posted by CalMeacham > The granddaddy of these all is Stephen Vincent Benet’s “The Devil and Daniel Webster”… > Uh, not quite. I think that Goethe’s “Faust” predates most if not all of these examples, including Benet. And Goethe’s work was based on earlier stories that dated back into the Medieval period. Marlowe wrote a play called “Doctor Faustus” based on the same archetypal story; that would have been a few years prior 1600 (Marlowe was nearly a contemporary of Shakespeare). Probably the primal antecedant for all of these stories is the Book of Job, though Job does not in fact make a deal with Satan, but is merely the victim of a bet between Satan and the Lord. And even there, you probably have some stories in other myth systems which predate the Bible but have the same motif. > > So this stuff goes way back. The details change, but the broad outlines tend to remain the same. I shoulda been clearer – TD&DW was the grandaddy of modern “try to beat the Devil at his bet” genre. In earlier stories the protagonisty doesn’t generally think he’s got a clever slant on beating the Devil. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2005, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-devil-so-fucking-incompetent/309589/43 "2005-06-27T15:00:46Z")
> [@Snooooopy](#): > > I’ve never read the story, but I’ve read jokes that used this as the premise. By any chance, does one of the wishes go something along the lines of “Scare me half to death”? Not exactly. Hint: The story first appeared in **Playboy**. 🙂 He wished to marry a beautiful woman whose sexual appetite was as strong as his own. ---
**Author:** ![Dan\_Norder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4af34b/32.png) [@Dan\_Norder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dan_Norder)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-devil-so-fucking-incompetent/309589/44 "2005-06-28T03:20:00Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > I shoulda been clearer – TD&DW was the grandaddy of modern “try to beat the Devil at his bet” genre. In earlier stories the protagonisty doesn’t generally think he’s got a clever slant on beating the Devil. Actually, no, that’s completely wrong. There are TONS of earlier stories where the protagonist has a clever slant to beat the devil. British folklore had a lot with various Jack trickster characters (including a no less famous name than Jack o’ the Lantern, back in his original incarnation), and there’s a long tradition of Jewish magicians and Catholic priests making deals with the devil and prevailing because of their knowledge of clever legal/religious loopholes to the contracts. ---
**Author:** ![Snooooopy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ee7513/32.png) [@Snooooopy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snooooopy)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-devil-so-fucking-incompetent/309589/45 "2005-06-28T03:24:12Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > Not exactly. Hint: The story first appeared in **Playboy**. 🙂 What a coincidence! The jokes I was referring to were on the Party Jokes page! (I believe one of the randier versions involved wishing for ONE testicle to disappear.) ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 12:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-devil-so-fucking-incompetent/309589/46 "2005-06-28T12:15:06Z")
> [@](#): > > Actually, no, that’s completely wrong. There are TONS of earlier stories where the protagonist has a clever slant to beat the devil. British folklore had a lot with various Jack trickster characters (including a no less famous name than Jack o’ the Lantern, back in his original incarnation), and there’s a long tradition of Jewish magicians and Catholic priests making deals with the devil and prevailing because of their knowledge of clever legal/religious loopholes to the contracts. Interesting. Cite? I’ve never heard of these. ---
**Author:** ![Humble\_Servant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/47e85d/32.png) [@Humble\_Servant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Humble_Servant)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-devil-so-fucking-incompetent/309589/47 "2005-06-28T14:28:33Z")
I’m not sure what **Dan Norder** is referring to, **Cal** , but it made me think of the [Golem of Prague](http://www.pantheon.org/articles/r/rabbi_loeb.html) story, which is a Frankenstein prototype. Per the thread title on incompetency: “You shall pay for that as well as your other blunders. Meanwhile I enclose a little booklet, just issued, on the new House of Correction for Incompetent Tempters. It is profusely illustrated and you will not find a dull page in it.”–that’s from The Screwtape Letters. ---
**Author:** ![Tracy\_Lord](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@Tracy\_Lord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tracy_Lord)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-devil-so-fucking-incompetent/309589/48 "2005-06-28T23:34:10Z")
Well, “Rumpelstiltskin” is an obvious one, and I hazily remember another fairytale in which an English lass named Daisy pulls something of the same trick on, if not _the_ devil, an evil/trickster demon or spirit. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-devil-so-fucking-incompetent/309589/49 "2005-06-28T23:38:58Z")
> [@Fear the Turtle](#): > > The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist Especially when he keeps such a [visible profile](http://www.rnc.org/). ---
**Author:** ![NDP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ndp/32/55_2.png) [@NDP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NDP)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-devil-so-fucking-incompetent/309589/50 "2005-06-28T23:48:14Z")
> [@Tracy Lord](#): > > Well, “Rumpelstiltskin” is an obvious one, and I hazily remember another fairytale in which an English lass named Daisy pulls something of the same trick on, if not _the_ devil, an evil/trickster demon or spirit. If we’re talking fairy tales, I recall reading about an early version of the “Red Riding Hood” story (one that doesn’t end happily for Red, BTW) in which the wolf is pretty obviously Satan in disguise. ---
**Author:** ![Dan\_Norder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4af34b/32.png) [@Dan\_Norder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dan_Norder)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2005, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-devil-so-fucking-incompetent/309589/51 "2005-06-29T01:04:23Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Interesting. Cite? I’ve never heard of these. The stories are spread out all over. I don’t know if there’s one good solid cite for the phenomenon in general (wouldn’t surpise me if it’s one of the standard numbered foklore motiffs though), but here are some to try: Jack o’ the Lantern is written about lots of places. Googling for “Jack tricks Devil” will find some, though lots of really crappy sites get in the way (I swear, Google has been really sucking as a good search engine for information versus trying to buy something for quite a while now). While making one of those famous pacts with the Devil, Jack convinces the Devil to climb a tree (I forget why exactly, and Google isn’t helping) and marks the trunk with symbols of the cross so the Devil can’t climb back down. Devil promises that Jack won;t go to Hell after he dies. Unfortunately, just being banned from Hell doesn’t get you into Heaven, so he has to wander the world as a spirit. And this actually ties into much older motiffs on men being forced to wander the world forever for some misdeed, like Cain, the moon in the Moon, Buttadeus (sp?), the Wandering Jew, etc… see G.K. Anderson’s _The Legend of the Wandering Jew._ The figure of Jack (in various guises) was a notorious trickster in foklore of the British Isles, the gypsies, and so forth. Jack the Robber, Jack the Tinker, Jack the Giant Killer (based directly on the old Oedipus versus the Cyclops story, usually with new details) and many others. Jack the Robber (or the Master Thief or etc.) could trick anyone out of anything, and often gets tied up eventually tricking the devil too. (F.H. Groome’s _Gypsy Folk-Tales_ has a lot of these stories, but then they are in tons of other books too. The Devil specific ones are here and there.) D. Oldridges’ _The Devil in Early Modern England_ has a bunch of these stories too. I believe the famous Mother Shipton was a popular literary witch figure who tricked the devil many times. Plus there was some guy (unnamed?) who makes a deal with the Devil, who wants to castrate him as part of the deal, so afterwards the man sends his wife dressed up as him saying that he (really she) already did it so the Devil wouldn’t have to, shows the lack of parts needing to be cut off (I shouldn’t have to explain this part) and then farts on Satan for his trouble. Lots of others. This is probably your fastest way to dig up a bunch in a single book (at least from the ones I’ve read anyway). Tracy Lord is right to bring up Rumplestiltskin, as some of the variants more explicitly show the Devil as the antagonist there, like “Duffy and the Devil.” I think the Devil there is given the task of digging up tin with a wooden shovel, or combing a beach until x amount of gold comes from the sand or something. Or I may be conflating more than one story. As far as religious figures tricking the devil, these are all over too. Catholic saints, Protestant ministers, Jewish rabbis and mystics… hell, probably everywhere with other religious variants. For Jewish, see Howard Schwartz’s collections (since I think those are probably the only major works on Jewish folklore I read… well, maybe some others). _The Devil and Daniel Webster_ was just an update on a theme that’s as old as dirt. ---
**Author:** ![Tracy\_Lord](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@Tracy\_Lord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tracy_Lord)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2005, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-devil-so-fucking-incompetent/309589/52 "2005-06-29T02:40:21Z")
> [@Dan Norder](#): > > Tracy Lord is right to bring up Rumplestiltskin, as some of the variants more explicitly show the Devil as the antagonist there, like “Duffy and the Devil.” _snaps fingers_ “Duffy and the Devil!” That’s the one I was thinking of. Not Daisy. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![easy\_e](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/eb8c5e/32.png) [@easy\_e](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/easy_e)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2005, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-devil-so-fucking-incompetent/309589/53 "2005-06-30T00:43:29Z")
> [@Dan Norder](#): > > Jack the Giant Killer (based directly on the old Oedipus versus the Cyclops story, usually with new details) Is that supposed to be Odysseus, or is there some story of Oedipus meeting a Cyclops? Or is it Oedipus vs. the sphinx? ---
**Author:** ![Dan\_Norder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4af34b/32.png) [@Dan\_Norder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dan_Norder)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2005, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-devil-so-fucking-incompetent/309589/54 "2005-06-30T01:00:41Z")
> [@easy e](#): > > Is that supposed to be Odysseus Yup, I pulled out the wrong O name as I was atyping away like a madman. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-devil-so-fucking-incompetent/309589.md?page=2)