I was asked on Instagram if Father’s (Demon Sanctuary) design is based on a webcomic The Devil Is a Handsome Man.
A good question! And the answer is no.
Father’s design is based on multiple things:
19th century romantic era Lucifer
Classic Lucifer and Fallen Angel symbolism (note how his chest mark forms the cross of Saint Peter)
My own spiritual world view and life style
Jeffrey Burton Russell’s history books about the Devil, God and the evil in Western religions (esp. Lucifer - The Devil In the Middle-Ages)
My own guardian angel I met when I had a remarkable out of body experience (accidentally though, just realized the connection a few days go)
Bogomils’ medieval (heretic) theory of the Devil - God’s second son - and how he created the earth being the God of The Old Testament
Islam’s Iblis and Zamakhshari’s medieval (heretic) theory that Iblis was right when he refused to bow down to humans when Allah asked him to.
From these, Bulgarian Bogomil’s theory of Satanael, Lord Satana, as God’s second son, has affected Father’s creation the most. Here’s a direct quote of Satanael and Bogomils’ theory - which, if gotten enough support, would be now be how we view the Devil in Western religions - from Burton Russell’s book “Lucifer - The Devil In The Middle-Ages:
“Diabology was central to Bogomil thought. For the absolute dualists, the Devil was a god of darkness and evil independent of God of goodness and light. For the mitigated dualists, the Devil was subordinate for the God yet still exercised enormous and quasi-independent powers over the earth. According to one view, the true God , a God of spirit very remote from this material cosmos, has two sons, the elder being the Devil and the younger being Christ. The elder son, Satanael, existed before Christ. Created good like all the other angels , he was highest in merit and sat at the right hand of the Father as the Lord’s steward. But Satanael was an unbjust steward and grew dissatisfied with his subordinate position. In his pride he longed to set his throne as high as God’s and to this purpose he rebelled. (—) As a result of their (angels’) rebellion God thrust Satanael and his followers out of heaven. Wandering in the void, the Devil determined to make a new world in which to reside. Aping God’s creation, he declared that “Since God made heaven and earth, I will now make a second heaven like a second God.”
This “second heaven” is this cosmos. Satanael, creator of the universe where he live, is the Creator God of The Old Testament, for any entity perverse enough to create this material world with its grossness, misery, and suffering, must be evil. The Devil, who was Moses’ master, composed the Pentateuch himself, and the whole Old Testament was inspired by Satan (though some Bogomils accepted the divine inspiration of Psalms and the prophets). Surveying his own creation and finding it satisfactorily repellent, Satanael proceed to make a sentinel being, Adam, which he fashioned out of earth and water. But when he stood the thing upright, Satanael was annoyed to find it defective. Life was trickling out from Adam’s right foot and forefinger as a shape of a serpent. Satanael breathed spirit into Adam but again it trickled out, this time becoming the serpent itself.
Desperate, Satanael was obliged to turn to his old enemy, the Lord, for assistance, begging him to help create humankind and promising him that if he cooperated he would be allowed to share their governance. The Lord, wishing to fill up the ranks of the angels depleted of the story of the ancient rebellion, agreed. (—)
The purpose of this (—) story if to illustrate the central point of Bogomil anthropology: the human soul, a creation of the true, good God, is trapped in the human body, which is the creation of Satanael, the false god, who tricked the Lord into helping him and now hold the soul prisoner in a disgusting and defile body.”
Rest of the story goes that God helped Satanael create Eve. Satanael, as a serpent, slept with Eve and they had two children, a son Cain and a daughter Calomena. Later, Eve had a son with Adam, Abel, whom Cain killed. God took away Satanael’s divine power to create as a punishment for introducing murder to the world through his son Cain but left Satanael to rule the world as he saw the best. This lead to him being the evil god of The Old Testament, until Jesus arrived with the real word of the good God on the earth, creating the New Testament - which is the world and teachings of the true God - and banished Satanael out from the world, down to hell. In this war, Satanael lost his title El meaning Lord, and is now known as Satana.
Bogomils rejected the Old Testament, Moses, Jerusalem, Christian belief systems - like Jesus dying - and all physicality. Only the soul was true and everything else was a handicraft of Satanael.
All Jeffrey Burton Russell’s books are wonderful and interesting, sharing so much information about different religious groups and their ideology, and how all those theories affected religious views of modern era. A big recommendation if you enjoy history, religious history, medieval belief systems and want to get inspiration for world building.