A face do mal. A personificação do diabo nas bibliografias: Santo Antão e São Pacômio.

Abstract

The representation of evil appears in monastic literature under a constantof this type of texts: a didacticism anchored on a model of exemplary life. The need to exalt a monks goodness and holiness is a consequence of the evil´s interdiction. We will, on the following research, study the presence of evilin theChristian world-conception,within the theological and moral scope that characterized the Church (III and IV a. D.). With this aim we will detect the place of evil, as it is personified in the figure of the Devil, in the Latin texts from the period of Saint Anthony and Saint Pachomius. We pretend to identify and reflect about the passages, in the Lives of Saint Anthony and Saint Pachomius, in which the Devil is present, stressing out the aspects associated with this character. We can analyze the hagiographical text as a sourceto study the Devil, since we observe that the main characters of such works are always directly embraced in the combat against the forces of evil and its representations. Key-words: Christianity; devil; monasticism; literature; evil.