What interest had the Devil in defeating himself? If he could have prevented the betrayal, then Christ would not have been crucified. No atonement would have been made, and the whole world would have gone to hell. The success of the Devil would have been complete. But, according to this story, the Devil outwitted himself.
How thankful we should be to his Satanic Majesty. He opened for us the gates of Paradise and made it possible for us to obtain eternal life. Without Satan, without Judas, not a single human being could have become an angel of light. All would have been wingless devils in the prison of flame. In Jerusalem, to the extent of his power, Satan repaired the wreck and ruin he had wrought in the Garden of Eden.
Certainly the writers of the New Testament believed in the existence of the Devil.
In the eighth chapter it is said that out of Mary Magdalene were cast seven devils. To me Mary Magdalene is the most beautiful character in the New Testament. She is the one true disciple. In the darkness of the crucifixion she lingered near. She was the first at the sepulcher. Defeat, disaster, disgrace, could not conquer her love. And yet, according to the account, when she met the risen Christ, he said: "Touch me not." This was the reward of her infinite devotion.
In the Gospel of John we are told that John the Baptist said that he saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and that it abode upon Christ. But in the Gospel of John nothing is said about the Spirit driving Christ into the wilderness to be tempted by the Devil. Possibly John never heard of that, or forgot it, or did not believe it. But in the thirteenth chapter I find this:
"And supper being ended, the Devil having now put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray him."...
In John there are no accounts of the casting out of devils by Christ or his apostles. On that subject there is no word. Possibly John had his doubts.
In the fifth chapter of Acts we are told that the people brought the sick and those which were vexed with unclean spirits to the apostles, and the apostles healed them. Here again there is made a clear distinction between the sick and those possessed by devils. And in the eighth chapter we are told that "unclean spirits, crying with a loud voice, came out of them."
In the thirteen chapter Paul calls Elymas the child of the Devil, and in the sixteenth chapter an account is given of "a damsel possessed with a spirit of divination, who brought her masters much gain by soothsaying."
Paul and Silas, it would seem, cast out this spirit, and by reason of that suffered great persecution.