Demonology from the sixteenth to the twentieth century: A critical reading in Marlowe's Doctor Faustus and Taylor Hackford's "Devil's Advocate"

Human beings have always tried to give meaning to everything they experience. Concurrently, humankind felt compelled to give meaning to the purest and most natural impulses that exist within all humanity. Moreover, humankind creates a concept responsible for human perversions arising from their own basic instincts; 'demon.' Humankind assigns the pleasure principle, which is a part of human beings, to the beings 'demons' that influence and sometimes tempt them as an outside force. Human beings do not only name the concept but also blame the sins, wrongdoings, and misdeeds they commit with their own free will to the notion of 'demons.' Humankind cannot confront their actions as they are arrogant enough to point fingers while blaming someone or something else for their misdeeds. Both of the works mentioned in this thesis remark on the concept of 'demons' and try to add moral value to the audience by expressing how 'demons' tempt human beings and lead them into committing sin. On the contrary, Christopher Marlowe's Doctor Faustus, written in the sixteenth century, and Taylor Hackford's "Devil's Advocate," presented to the cinema in the twentieth century, will be examined and will provide evidence of how 'demons' essentially exist in human consciousness and are part of human beings through demonology under the scope of psychoanalysis literary device; therefore, the sole source that influences human judgment is one's own consciousness.