No, you can't. You can tell a falsehood without intent, but not lie. However, you can say something that's true and be lying, if your intent was to deceive.



The intent to deceive is key. It's what distinguishes a lie from a simple falsehood.

I quoted this source previously. Here a couple more I did not quote before:





That Lucifer lied (that is, told untruths with the intent to deceive) before his final decision is easy to establish. There are many ways to see this, but I'll just mention two.

First of all, consider the following:



Notice that Lucifer "deceived" angels. He did so my misrepresenting God. He lied.

How do we know he did so before his final decision? Simple. This is how he got converts to his side. When he made his final decision to rebel, he had angels already there ready to join him. Why were they there? Because of the lies he told about God's character.

Here's a second way we know he lied:



Concealing one's real purpose is a form of lying.

Regarding your quote, it looks to me like you have the page numbers wrong. There's nothing on page 495 which is talking about things before Satan's final decision. It's not until 496 that it says, "Long was he retained in heaven. Again and again he was offered pardon on condition of repentance and submission."



This is from 4SP 319:



Notice it says Satan *had* excited sympathy in his favor. Notice that this is *before* he was sentenced to banishment from heaven. Notice he was given a chance to confess his sin *after* this happened.



Regardless, it's easy to see that if Lucifer was offered pardon again and again he was given the opportunity to confess his sin again and again. To assert otherwise is nonsensical. It would mean that he could repent and submit, but not confess his sin.

Notice the wording:





It's clear that "confess his sin" stands in the same place as "repentance" in the two quotes (3SP, GC)



If nothing wrong was done, the statement that where there is no light, there is no sin, and no frown of God would be out of place, wouldn't it? Why wouldn't the angel just say, "where there is no wrong doing, there is no sin?"



OK, let's say there was a sliding scale from 0 to 100 in terms of Lucifer's thinking he was wrong, with 100 being absolutely convinced. Let's say the "I think I'm wrong" statement was at 80. (or choose some other number if you don't like this one) Then we can say the following:

a)Lucifer was doing things that were wrong, things that were sin, things that required pardon.
b)Lucifer was 80% sure he was wrong.

Would you agree to this?



This is from 4SP 317.



You would agree that this is speaking of before Satan's fall, wouldn't you?

This is from PP 39:



Notice that Lucifer was made to see what would be the result of "persisting in revolt." This means he had already been in revolt, or rebellion, before his fall.

I'm not going to reply point by point, but just analyze a paragraph from GC, which to me is a key statement for the understanding of this subject. Everything else must be harmonized with this paragraph.

"But pride forbade him to submit. He persistently defended his own course, maintained that he had no need of repentance, and fully committed himself, in the great controversy, against his Maker. {GC 495.3}

"All the powers of his master mind were now bent to the work of deception, to secure the sympathy of the angels that had been under his command. Even the fact that Christ had warned and counseled him was perverted to serve his traitorous designs. To those whose loving trust bound them most closely to him, Satan had represented that he was wrongly judged, that his position was not respected, and that his liberty was to be abridged. From misrepresentation of the words of Christ he passed to prevarication and direct falsehood, accusing the Son of God of a design to humiliate him before the inhabitants of heaven. He sought also to make a false issue between himself and the loyal angels. All whom he could not subvert and bring fully to his side he accused of indifference to the interests of heavenly beings. The very work which he himself was doing he charged upon those
497
who remained true to God. And to sustain his charge of God's injustice toward him, he resorted to misrepresentation of the words and acts of the Creator. It was his policy to perplex the angels with subtle arguments concerning the purposes of God. Everything that was simple he shrouded in mystery, and by artful perversion cast doubt upon the plainest statements of Jehovah. His high position, in such close connection with the divine administration, gave greater force to his representations, and many were induced to unite with him in rebellion against Heaven's authority." {GC 496.1}

First, the sentence "fully committed himself, in the great controversy, against his Maker" ensures that this happened after Satan's fall, after Satan's final decision. The page is correct, and Ellen White goes back and forth in her description of his fall. Please notice that the fact that the exciting sympathy in his favor of 4 SP 319 is different from the securing the sympathy of the angels of GC 496, because in the first case it refers to sympathy for the fact that he had been treated unjustly (which he thought was true), and in the second case it refers to his "traitorous designs" (of assuming the command of heaven).

Second, it's clear that his misrepresentations before his fall were different from what he did after his fall: "from misrepresentation of the words of Christ he passed to prevarication and direct falsehood". To prevaricate means "to tell an untruth; lie." So here she is referring to a direct intent to deceive. The same is true of the expression "direct falsehood." Besides, she makes very clear that there was a progression in the gravity of Lucifer's behavior from the period before his fall to the period after his fall (indicated by the expression "he passed to").


What is your basis for saying that? The only persons who knew that he had rebelled were God and he himself.

This post just treats the page number question.

Here's what you cited:



I pointed out



To which you responded:



The page is not correct. This is page 496, not page 495, unless the EGW estate online is wrong.

Here is page 495:



This is all before Lucifer's fall.

What you cited was from pp. 496-497, unless there's some difference between your source and what's on line.

Regarding the page actually being incorrect, the previous post covers that.

Please consider the following paragraph:



What Lucifer did, he did "little by little". Note that he *gradually* led the angels that he had rule over to do him service. How did he do this? By his lying representations.



This is a lying representation, spoken of here:



Here is another spot where Ellen White speaks of his "lying representations"



The lying representations were the way that Lucifer got his converts, which is made clear here:



That the "misrepresented God" is the same as the "lying representations" from (ST 6/13/95) is clear if you compare the ST quote with the DA quote (the rest of the paragraph quoted, and the next one in DA 22).

What happened is very clear. Lucifer sought to obtain service for himself, rather than to God. This is before his fall. At the same time he was "little by little" employing his powers to attract attention and praise to himself, he "gradually" led the angels to serve him instead of God.

How did he do this? By "lying representations."

The SP 317 quotation makes it clear that Lucifer was working to secure the angels to his side *before* his fall, and every account of his fall makes it clear that the way he got converts to his side was by deception.

I am aware of absolutely nothing which suggests that Lucifer acted innocently or with sincerity, or that what he did was excusable on the basis of ignorance. (If you can produce anything which suggests this, I would like to see it). Instead what I see is that from the very beginning, both heavenly angels and Christ met with him, explaining to him why his dissatisfaction was without cause. This is well before his fall.

But instead of taking heed to this counsel, he resisted it, and maintained he had no need for repentance. We see that Lucifer was offered pardon "again and again," long retained in heaven, even after his "lying representations". It should be recognized that "lying representations" included the intent to deceive. The ST passage cited above shows that EGW used the phrase in accordance with standard and correct English practice.



The chief thing that changed here was that Lucifer was out in the open. Before she wrote:



Before he rebelled openly, which he was forced to do because Lucifer's actions made it imperative that God take action to expose what he was doing secretly, Lucifer sought to hide what he was doing under a guise. God exposed him, so he could no longer operate under this guise.



EGW writes:



Also the quote from before says he was gradually bringing angels to do him service instead of God. So the process was well underway by the time Lucifer made his final decision.

Here's what happened:

a)Lucifer was filled with envy and hatred against Christ.
b)Lucifer sought to exalt himself.
c)Lucifer gradually worked to get angels to serve him instead of God (at the same time as b).
d)Christ and heavenly beings sought to show Lucifer his dissatisfaction was without cause, and warned him of what would happen if he persisted in his course.
e)Lucifer continued his work in secrecy, under a guise of reverence.
f)God had to take action to expose Lucifer's actions. God refrained from doing this as long as possible, for Lucifer's benefit, in an attempt to win him back.
g)Lucifer, being exposed, openly rebelled against God, and secured, by deception, those whom he had already excited sympathy with (also by deception, of course; how else could it have been?)
h)Other angels chose to join Lucifer in rebellion.

The most salient point in all of this is that Lucifer was offered pardon "again and again" on the condition of repentance and submission. He was also given the opportunity to confess his sin. Even if, as you suggest, this opportunity to confess his sin is referring specifically to the time of his final decision, it is ludicrous to suppose that Lucifer was not given the opportunity to confess his sin before this. He was offered pardon "again and again" on condition of what? Repentance. What does repentance entail, if not a confession of sin? That Lucifer would be offered pardon, on the condition of repentance, but not the opportunity to confess that for which he was being offered pardon simply doesn't make any sense.

The confusion arose because the reference is given having in view where the paragraph begins, not where it ends. So if you look at the quote in my last post, you will see that the reference is given as GC 495.3. Since I didn't know which part of the paragraph was located in page 495 and which was in page 496, I put the reference as 495-496.

Ellen White uses “representation(s)” and “misrepresentation(s)” to what Lucifer does both before and after his fall, which can be seen by the phrases “from misrepresentation of the words of Christ,” “misrepresentation of the words and acts of the Creator,” and “gave greater force to his representations,” from the quote of GC which I posted. So yes, he began it before his fall, but it’s clear that after his fall he began to lie deliberately.

Why do I classify his behavior before his fall as a sin of ignorance? Because of what is said in the following quote:

“Lucifer himself had not at first been acquainted with the real nature of his feelings; for a time he had feared to express the workings and imaginings of his mind; yet he did not dismiss them. He did not see whither he was drifting. But such efforts as infinite love and wisdom only could devise, were made to convince him of his error. His disaffection was proved to be without cause, and he was made to see what would be the result of persisting in revolt. Lucifer was convinced that he was in the wrong. He saw that "the Lord is righteous in all His ways, and holy in all His works" (Psalm 145:17); that the divine statutes are just, and that he ought to acknowledge them as such before all heaven. Had he done this, he might have saved himself and many angels. He had not at that time fully cast off his allegiance to God. Though he had left his position as covering cherub, yet if he had been willing to return to God, acknowledging the Creator's wisdom, and satisfied to fill the place appointed him in God's great plan, he would have been reinstated in his office. The time had come for a final decision; he must fully yield to the divine sovereignty or place himself in open rebellion. He nearly reached the decision to return, but pride forbade him. It was too great a sacrifice for one who had been so highly honored to confess that he had been in error, that his imaginings were false, and to yield to the authority which he had been working to prove unjust.” {PP 39.1}


But who said he hadn’t been given the opportunity to confess his sin before his final decision? Certainly not me. What I said is that if he wasn’t convinced he was wrong, how could he have confessed it? What I also said is that, if this was referring to his first opportunity instead of the last one, EGW would have expressed things differently. The difference in the last opportunity is that he was convinced that he was in the wrong, but chose not to admit it and not to confess it.

There's no doubt that Lucifer was deliberately lying after his fall. However, he also deliberately lied before his fall. He wasn't accidentally lying. In order to make "lying representations" he had to be lying, which is telling untruths for the purpose of deceiving. Otherwise Lucifer would have just been saying things that he thought were true, but weren't. If this is all he were doing, there would be no need for pardon.

Regarding the PP quote, isn't it clear that Lucifer became convinced little by little that he was wrong? He went from whatever doubt he originally had that he was wrong to being absolutely convinced that he was wrong. However, he had enough light to be held culpable. For one thing, God Himself, in the person of His Son, told Him He was wrong, directly, face to face.

God gives us hooks to hang our doubt on. It is not God's way to beat us into submission. He gives enough evidence for a person to make a decision. That Lucifer had this evidence is evident by the fact that God began to offer him pardon.

The fact that God offered Lucifer pardon is very significant. It means that Lucifer had enough understanding of what he was doing that:

a)He needed pardon.
b)He could accept that pardon.



If he wasn't convinced he was wrong, God wouldn't have been offered him pardon, right? The exact same argument you are making regarding his confessing his sin can be made in regard to his complying for the conditions of pardon, which were repentance and submission. How could he have repented of his sin and submitted, the conditions for pardon, if he weren't convinced he was wrong?

And yet we know that he was offered pardon "again and again." Therefore it's clear that he had enough light to be knowingly sinning, to repent, and to be pardoned.

The fact that he was acting in secret, under a guise of reverence, additionally demonstrates conclusively that Lucifer had an understanding that what he was doing was wrong. Whom was he intending to fool by his guise, by his secrecy? Certainly not God.

I'd like to get something clear in my mind. Is it your position that at no point did Lucifer deliberately sin until after he made his decision to cast off all allegiance to God?

When we meet people and they immediately tell us a lie to cover up things from the past, just like Satan does, how are we to react? To what degree is sin and lies connected?

No. God spoke to him several times, and of course since the first time, when he didn’t yet have any notion that he was wrong, God started to offer him pardon. I understand he was vacillating. At times he thought: “Maybe God is right and I’m wrong, after all,” while at other times he thought: “I can’t be wrong. My reasoning seems so logical.” By the time of his final decision, however, he was fully convinced he was wrong.


If we consider that deliberately means willfully, no, I don’t think Lucifer sinned willfully before his fall. Before his fall, he was just disputing the justice of the law. By the time of his final decision, however, he fully understood the justice of the law and refused allegiance to it. This is willful transgression.

Isn't willful transgression what we need pardon for? If Lucifer wasn't doing anything He thought was wrong, why would he need pardon?



Also I read things like this:



I'm pretty sure you'll agree that this is dealing exclusively with the time before Lucifer's fall. I note such things as:

a)His desire for supremacy returned, and envy of Christ was once more indulged.
b)He glorified in his brightness and exaltation and aspired to be equal with God.
c)Lucifer went forth to diffuse the spirit of discontent among the angels.

I wonder how these things could be seen be anyone as not willful or deliberate. Just how does one go forth to diffuse a spirit of discontent, working in secrecy to disguise one's purpose, in a manner that is not deliberate or willful? I wonder how she could have portrayed his actions any more clearly as being deliberate.

Isn't it sin to aspire to be equal with God, and to lead others to serve yourself instead of Him? Isn't it sin to indulge envy and hatred in your heart against Christ? Don't words like "indulge" depict something done deliberately?

I understand your point that Lucifer wasn't fully convinced he was wrong until later one, but not being 100% convinced you are wrong does not change willful, deliberate sin into something that is not sin, or not deliberate. I can understand the argument that Lucifer was not banished from heaven because he wasn't fully convinced he was wrong, but I don't understand why this would mean his actions were not deliberate or transgression.