A reply to someone who credited the "fish brain" as the root of evil.

I agree with you about the fish brain (also known as the reptilian or monkey brain to some) theory to some extent. One of my favorite sayings is Gandhi's reply to a reporter who asked him, after a tour of the modern wonders of London, what he thought of Western civilization. Gandhi replied "I think it would be a very good idea." I took that mostly to mean that appearance dosn't necessarily mean substance, despite our looking like, or agreeing with each other that we are cultured.

Similarly, it is my opinion that Satan, the name for the fallen Lucifer, is a symbolic--yet very functioning--aspect of awareness. More precisely, of the lack of awareness of higher functions and perceptions, particularly those having to do with the unitary nature of Being. Lucifer means "Light Bearer." In the scheme of things, it seems to me that the fall of "Lucifer" from Heaven is the development of the human ego. My mentor said that hell is the sense of separation. Conversely, the feeling of Unity can be called heaven. And this to me is the crux of "salvation." Salvation is the deliberate or serendipetous regaining of the feeling of Unity with the Source. It is why the religions that postulate a god seperate from a creation can only be misleading the "faithful." They who believe that are doomed mentally to found their belief in god as one irrevocably separate. How hellish is that? And there can be found the foundation of guilt. On the other hand, one who feels that the "other" is an aspect of his own impersonal Essence, though seemingly different, cannot do harm. Who would harm themselves? And thereon is founded an actually viable morality, as far as I can tell.