As an atheist, I am occasionally accused of being in league with Satan. Since I believe Satan to be a fictional character, the merits of the accusation hold little weight. The intent behind it, however, can't be mistaken, and is far less defensible. All I've done is point out that I believe them to be wrong, but apparently that's enough to be judged an evil person. To be fair, it at least provides a distraction from the typical expression of my deserving an eternity of torture and punishment for a crime an ancestor of mine supposedly committed several thousand years ago.

I suspect, however, that the majority of people don't fully understand the character of Satan as he is presented in the Bible, Torah and Qu'ran. Satan's crimes in those books are incredibly mild. Those crimes appear to boil down to four: he tempts people like Adam and Eve and King David, he acted as a prosecuting lawyer, he killed Job's family and he rebelled against God. Let's examine those.

Satan, we are told, tempts people into sin. He doesn't force them, mind you, just tempts then. Most notoriously, he tempted Adam and Eve into eating from the forbidden tree. So this tree must have been something like the Tree of Evil, Murder and Incest, right? No, wait, it was the Tree of Knowledge. Call me crazy, but when did knowledge become a bad thing? Similarly, Satan incited King David to conduct a census. I suppose our prime minister might agree, but I wouldn't categorize Statistics Canada among the great evils of our time.

Along a similar line, while I have my own hesitancies about the legal profession, I would not categorize lawyers as evil, certainly not all of them. Specifically, I would be hard-pressed to fault prosecuting lawyers who work for comparatively little pay and provide a valuable service to the community. Moreover, Satan appears to be doing so at God's behest, so it's hard to blame him for it.

The only specific crime Satan may have committed is the murder of Job's family and slaves. It is the fire of God and bandits that kill his slaves and a great wind kills his family, so it's unclear whether it is God or Satan or both behind it. For the sake of argument, however, let's blame Satan for the death of 60 people, give or take, with the acknowledgement that God fully supported it. That still pales in comparison to the nearly two and half million deaths we know of that we can directly attribute to God, a figure which is likely 10 times greater.

Satan also led a rebellion against God. It failed, God being omniscient and omnipotent after all, and we are given no indication that it led to any bloodshed or that any atrocities were committed. I'm sure God couldn't have been happy about it, but it doesn't really rise to the level of evil, just misguided ambition.

In short, I'm being accused of being in a league with a fictional character who really isn't that bad, especially in comparison. If I might offer a suggestion, next time you might want to compare me to Voldemort, Darth Vader, Sauron or Dracula — those are bad guys with some teeth.

David Brandow is an atheist who researches atheism and theism as a hobby. He can be reached for comment at david.brandow@gmail.com .