have come to believe that Satan is ego. Jesus called Satan "the prince of this world". The world is currently under the control of Satan (ego), but Satan is not king because all of his power is based on a lie. Satan is ultimately unreal, so when the truth is realized he is seen to have no power at all.
Christianity teaches that Satan was a magnificent angel who was cast out of heaven because he committed the sin of pride. Pride is the belief that you are great, that you have power and glory. This is a sin because all power and glory belongs to God and God alone. Why? Because nothing other than God actually exists, so there is nothing else to have any power. Jesus called Satan "the father of lies". This is because ego is the lie on which all other lies are built. Once you see through the ego, all the ego's illusions collapse along with it.
The tree of knowledge of good and evil that Adam and Eve ate from, represents the ego consciousness. Nothing is good or bad, but thinking makes it so. It is our tendency to label things that happen as good and bad and then our desire for good things and fear of bad things that causes all the worry and anxiety we face. Instead we meant to just allow things to happen, trusting that as situations arise our own innate intelligence (or God as some like to call it) will direct us what to do. But we don't have to get personally involved. We don't have to label it as good and bad and start fearing the bad or desiring the good. We don't have to take our failures (or our achievements) personally.
