In an episode of The Amazing World of Gumball, the Dad character (Richard) is debating wether or not he should go into an office building to use the vending machine, and he gets a little shoulder demon. This leads to a joke where his demon gets a shoulder angel, then that angle gets a demon, and they all start yelling at each other. Richard sees all this and delivers probably the best line ever: "I either need some food or some therapy... Mmm, chips are cheaper."
It's also one of these ideas that's soooo easy to understand, even a small child gets it. Once this idea was created, it was unstoppable, it was going to catch fire and be reused again and again and again
I find it interesting that the salt is thrown over the left shoulder, and a lot of the examples shown here depict the angel on the left shoulder instead of the devil.
Some of my favorite subversions of this: "Just Shoot Me," a devil pops up on David Spade's shoulder. Then he waits for the angel to show up, but it turns out he doesn't have one. In "Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back," a devil shows up on Jay's one shoulder, and then instead of an angel, a second devil shows up on his other shoulder, and tell him that they beat up the angel. (Later, a beat-up angel does show up.) Conan O'Brien had a running gag on his show, where a devil would show up on one shoulder, but because the angel was running late, a bear would show up on his other shoulder, telling him random things about surviving in the woods.
My favorite representation in popculture of the 'evil' demon vs the 'good' angel in someone's mind trope is in an episode of the british classic comedy Absolutely Fabulous, in which the protagonist, an ageing boomer socialite, is torn apart by the two aspects in a dream-sequence, and the angel is played by the posh English blond Marianne Faithful (Mick Jagger's girlfriend in the 60s) and the demon is played by the bohemian German darkhaired Anita Pallenberg (Brian Jones' and later Keith Richards' girlfriend in the 60s ). A brilliant and amusing piece of casting!
Lilo and Stitch the Series has fun with this trope in Mr. Stenchy when Stitch is in a moral conundrum and after the first devil appears on his shoulder, a second one shows up to agree with the first
@@Father-of-Xerxes I looked into it and you are correct! Disappointing that it's made it's way into an academic article. But yes it seems to have originated with Billy Graham of all people. I have edited that section out of the video.
@@TabletsAndTemples also did not intend that as a call out or anything like that - thank you for making such great videos and please keep up the great work!!
0:11 the concept of competing influences on the mind is not just an ancient Greek one. There are multiple traditions of philosophy of mind across global history
My fave but that ever did this was in Just Shoot Me where Finch had a small devil appear on his shoulder to tell him what to do. He keeps looking over to the other shoulder and the small devil asks him why "Isn't there supposed to be a little angle guy here to tell me to not do that?" "Is your name Finch?" "Yes" "Then don't worry about that."
In Norse mythologies, we had something that was eventually replaced with this as Christianity spread, the Vörðr, or Warden. It was a form of guardian spirit that tried to steer us clear from misfortune, often felt like that special gut feeling or sixth sense that we sometimes feel when something is off. Some were even supposed to appear before their charges, and there are mentions of the Wardens of dead people returning as revenants.
3:04 In Islam it's said that there are two angels in everyone's shoulders the one in the left notes all of your bad deeds, and the one on the right notes all of your good deeds Although none of them have a real influence on the person
@@TabletsAndTemplesWaswas is associated with jinn - not angels. What Amr is describing are the angels tasked with recording deeds, rather than the Qareen (the jinn-double of an individual who whispers waswas)
In Jewish tradition, a Good Angel and Bad Angel (we don't really have davils, just Angels with the job description of 'evil') follow each father from synagogue to his household on Shabbat night. They then judge if the household is appropriately prepared and celebrating the Sabbath and if they are, the Good Angel blesses them to have every Shabbat be held thus and the Bad Angel has to say 'amen' , and if the household isn't following the commandments of Shabbat the Bad Angel blesses the household to continue on that path and the Good Angel has to say 'amen'. Jews have many traditions and not all sects follow them all, but nearly all religious Jews sing a specific song welcoming these angels when the father comes home from prayer. It invites them in, asks them to judge us well and bids them farewell. Hope you found that interesting!
Being a general duality in our core nature. And how we perceived making morality decisions in our head. Having roughly head height characters of good and evil seems to me to be an easy visual representation of what is going on. Much like anger often has fire or steam/smoke coming out of your head, or a light source (lightbulb or heavenly Sunbeam) when you get a good idea. The older images, cam when we thought with our hearts and full body, so the images were more to that size, but as we now precieve our thoughts to be done in the brain, we now relate to our modern expectation of reality.
Great documentary! Really great job tracing this idea as far back as you could, looking at it from different angles, all within a concise video (you could have stretched this out much longer)
@@jonhanson8925 thanks so much! Yeah I know the algorithm favors longer videos at the moment, but I try to just make what I'd want to watch. Glad you liked it.
I reckon the 'standing on the shoulders' origin in persian and turish may be a quirk of translation. In english we do say 'ON his right', perhaps the turkish / persian vrsions wer translated directly as "on top of" and thus assumed to be on top of each shoulder
I think the Occam's Razor explanation is just that this was something 20th century cartoonists made up because it's a funny way to communicate the idea of a character being tempted in two different directions. I think sometimes people try too hard to find deep historic origins for things that don't actually have any.
Even if adopters of an idea may have been unaware of its historical roots, it's a type of genetic fallacy to suggest that there are no historical roots. On the contrary, It's a natural consequence of being raised in a Judeo-Christian culture with Greek influences. You'll have a bunch of religious and philosophical ideas you take for granted. For example, most people think human rights are an modern invention, but these ideas can actually be traced to Judeo-Christian teachings.
@@teehee4096 That is patently false and fallacious. Just because historical facts align with Christian apologetics, it does not make it less true. That is the genetic fallacy. Medieval Christian theologians like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas laid the groundwork for natural law and justice based on Christian teachings such as the doctrine of Imago Dei. Aquinas’ view that natural law is part of God's divine order helped shape later secular legal theories about natural rights, which formed the foundation for modern human rights. For example, Aquinas argued that human laws should be rooted in natural law, which reflects God's eternal law. This idea influenced later Enlightenment thinkers like John Locke, who adapted these concepts in developing his theories on natural rights, such as life, liberty, and property.
@@zachhecita the “root” is just the idea of angels and devils which have been around since the Bible. The video purports to offer the origins of the little cartoon angels and devils that appear on people’s shoulders but it doesn’t do a good job imo because I don’t think there is some grand ancient origin of them. They’re pretty clearly something invented for cartoons.
I'd love to know how the concept of a guardian angel developed; it seems common to both Christianity and Islam, and I'm sure there's a Greek (or maybe Mesopotamian) origin to it too!
From the production quality of this video, it seems like this channel would have a lot more subscribers. Keep up the great work man, one day you'll get up there!
Guardian angels are also mentioned vaguely in the book of Daniel. I think Old King James says guardian angel, but newer versions kind of tiptoe around it.
And lucky for me it was built around the century that I was talking about in the video. Some European fairy tale castles are actually quite modern like Neuschwanstein
Love the topic and I think you did an excellent job explaining it for 6 minutes. I do think it is silly, though, that when starting to talk about Arabic folklore that you show the Hagia Sophia - built under Justinian I of the Eastern Roman Empire. Justinian was a native Latin speaker from the Balkans, Greek was the dominant language, and they were Christians. Then, the Arabs didn’t take control later, but the Turks. So, there is very little Arabic about it
great video, very informative, but one question is still unanswered! just _who_ made that amazing cat painting at 3:53? gave me quite a laugh! i'd love to see more of their work! :D
There's similar concept in Islam, but the angel just write down your action to be judge on the judgement day. The angel on the left write your bad action, and on the right write your good action.
Surprised you didn't mention that in Greek conception, the concept of the daimon or daemon, which were "guiding spirits" for mankind and similar in concept if not the root concept for the "horses pulling the chariot" metaphor used. Considering how similar these words are to "demon," the notion of an evil spirit tempting a man into improper action is directly related here.
Could it be an emergent phenomena of how some people perceive their inner voice (that not everyone has). I've had more than a few clients talk about two voices (not angels), spatially located on their shoulders?
if i had the time (and money), id get a tattoo on my shoulders, one of Navi and one of Tatl... ...the "Zelda 64 version" of the White Wolf/Dark Wolf, in my opinion...
Most mdoern examples seem to have the side switched. Maybe they are going for a "from the perspective of the audience" sort of thing. Or maybe I'm just too nitpicky.
@jonothanthrace1530 spiritedness is like seeking after higher virtues: ego, glory, honor. Passions are lust, sex, food, drink, money power. The Greek terms are thumos (the white horse) and eros (the dark horse)
Interesting but suprised you didn't mention Yetzer tov (good inclination) and Yetzer Hora (evil inclination) the Jewish idea that every soul is influenced by these two pulling divine sources (this directly influenced Freud as well who was Jewish). The philosophy most likely predates the Christian and definitely Islamic interpretations. Very similar to the Ancient greek idea. However this was often characterised metaphorically as a good and evil voice very similar to the angels on the shoulder idea. The only main difference being an internal struggle. However this was most likely made external in art as super creepy to draw them internally although now I think about it potentially stunning if done right. The most important factor is that these inclinations are yours and a representation of you. Which to me is the strongest link to the angel and devil who usually appear as versions of the thinking just in divine drag. :)
Hey thanks for that. It certainly wasn't deliberate, it just never came up in any of the articles and discussions I read on the topic, including an academic journal article tracing its history as a rhetorical diea! But yes, looks like Genesis Rabbah is the earliest Rabbinic text that contains a discussion of divided inclinations. Most scholars would put that between 300-500CE. So I don't think it's the earliest, but yes I do wish I had known to include it.
If this isn't surprising, I'm disliking this video, reporting this video, blocking your channel, finding where you live, and consulting the angels over if the place should be burned down or not.
Of course, if you want to look in scripture, this is all man's fables. The main conflict a true Born Again Christian has in his life (one who Trusts wholeheartedly in the shed blood of Jesus Christ that washes away all our sins and Stand in the Gospel of 1 Corinthians 15:1-4 KJV) is a war between his flesh (the Old Man) and his spirit (The New Man). Both are interlocked that makes you unable to please God and Jesus. This is why Jesus died on the cross and rose again. He did all the hard work by keeping the whole Law of Moses so we, including us Gentiles, wouldn't. All have sinned and come short to the glory of God.
WOW, Dr Dre and Eminem being the origin of this trope truly is surprising
Few people know
Here's your 100th like from me.
In an episode of The Amazing World of Gumball, the Dad character (Richard) is debating wether or not he should go into an office building to use the vending machine, and he gets a little shoulder demon. This leads to a joke where his demon gets a shoulder angel, then that angle gets a demon, and they all start yelling at each other.
Richard sees all this and delivers probably the best line ever:
"I either need some food or some therapy... Mmm, chips are cheaper."
I should have used that clip in the video!
I like the line "chips are cheaper" because it's similar to a British phrase; "cheap as chips"
@@gothnerd887obviously talking about a different food, though.
This is clearly inspired by xavier renegade angel. They had a very similar scene. But honestly i wouldn't reccomend using a clio of that lmao
It's also one of these ideas that's soooo easy to understand, even a small child gets it. Once this idea was created, it was unstoppable, it was going to catch fire and be reused again and again and again
I find it interesting that the salt is thrown over the left shoulder, and a lot of the examples shown here depict the angel on the left shoulder instead of the devil.
Very interesting indeed!
Left is generally still as the evil side, it's where we get the word "sinister" meaning leftwards
It might be in how the film makers prioritize the right and left of the character vs of the viewers.
Read the Bible lol
@@ProdHymns i'd read, still dont get it. Care to point what part explsin that?
Some of my favorite subversions of this: "Just Shoot Me," a devil pops up on David Spade's shoulder. Then he waits for the angel to show up, but it turns out he doesn't have one. In "Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back," a devil shows up on Jay's one shoulder, and then instead of an angel, a second devil shows up on his other shoulder, and tell him that they beat up the angel. (Later, a beat-up angel does show up.) Conan O'Brien had a running gag on his show, where a devil would show up on one shoulder, but because the angel was running late, a bear would show up on his other shoulder, telling him random things about surviving in the woods.
My favorite representation in popculture of the 'evil' demon vs the 'good' angel in someone's mind trope is in an episode of the british classic comedy Absolutely Fabulous, in which the protagonist, an ageing boomer socialite, is torn apart by the two aspects in a dream-sequence, and the angel is played by the posh English blond Marianne Faithful (Mick Jagger's girlfriend in the 60s) and the demon is played by the bohemian German darkhaired Anita Pallenberg (Brian Jones' and later Keith Richards' girlfriend in the 60s ). A brilliant and amusing piece of casting!
Ha, in Ed Edd & Eddy, the shoulder devil and angel are his two friends instead of just miniature versions of himself.
There's a lot of modern and historic artwork packed into this six minute video! The content-to-length ratio is far outside the norm for youtube
Thank you so much!
Lilo and Stitch the Series has fun with this trope in Mr. Stenchy when Stitch is in a moral conundrum and after the first devil appears on his shoulder, a second one shows up to agree with the first
~5:50 Oh so THAT'S where the ol' "Inside you there are two wolves" meme comes from
That's it!
Except the consensus is that it didn’t actually originate with Native Americans and is better thought of as fakelore
@@Father-of-Xerxes I looked into it and you are correct! Disappointing that it's made it's way into an academic article. But yes it seems to have originated with Billy Graham of all people. I have edited that section out of the video.
@@TabletsAndTemples wait Billy Graham??? I knew it was fakelore but I had no idea it was from him - that’s borderline hilarious
@@TabletsAndTemples also did not intend that as a call out or anything like that - thank you for making such great videos and please keep up the great work!!
"There are two wolves within you ..."
Ugh, I'm so tired of cleaning up after them. It's not just that wolves can't be housebroken, they keep marking their territories
One Black the other Chinese.
One is gay, the other is gay. You are gay.
0:11 the concept of competing influences on the mind is not just an ancient Greek one. There are multiple traditions of philosophy of mind across global history
Yeah did you see the rest of the video?
I've always been interested in how that trope came to exist. It seems like the most random, wacky thing to think of, but it's in a whole lot of media.
Well thanks for watching! I had the same thought so I made this video.
My fave but that ever did this was in Just Shoot Me where Finch had a small devil appear on his shoulder to tell him what to do. He keeps looking over to the other shoulder and the small devil asks him why
"Isn't there supposed to be a little angle guy here to tell me to not do that?"
"Is your name Finch?"
"Yes"
"Then don't worry about that."
In Norse mythologies, we had something that was eventually replaced with this as Christianity spread, the Vörðr, or Warden. It was a form of guardian spirit that tried to steer us clear from misfortune, often felt like that special gut feeling or sixth sense that we sometimes feel when something is off. Some were even supposed to appear before their charges, and there are mentions of the Wardens of dead people returning as revenants.
3:04 In Islam it's said that there are two angels in everyone's shoulders
the one in the left notes all of your bad deeds, and the one on the right notes all of your good deeds
Although none of them have a real influence on the person
@@TabletsAndTemplesWaswas is associated with jinn - not angels. What Amr is describing are the angels tasked with recording deeds, rather than the Qareen (the jinn-double of an individual who whispers waswas)
ah yes my mistake, I misread. I did cover the the two angels in the Quran in the video.
In Jewish tradition, a Good Angel and Bad Angel (we don't really have davils, just Angels with the job description of 'evil') follow each father from synagogue to his household on Shabbat night. They then judge if the household is appropriately prepared and celebrating the Sabbath and if they are, the Good Angel blesses them to have every Shabbat be held thus and the Bad Angel has to say 'amen' , and if the household isn't following the commandments of Shabbat the Bad Angel blesses the household to continue on that path and the Good Angel has to say 'amen'.
Jews have many traditions and not all sects follow them all, but nearly all religious Jews sing a specific song welcoming these angels when the father comes home from prayer. It invites them in, asks them to judge us well and bids them farewell.
Hope you found that interesting!
wait but some jewish sites say that jews don't even bellieve in angels as supernatural personal beings
This video is so well edited I'm surprised you only have 8K subs tbh
Thanks, TH-cam is hard haha
That deviled egg on the windowsill, I don't know how long it's been there but you should eat that.
Being a general duality in our core nature. And how we perceived making morality decisions in our head. Having roughly head height characters of good and evil seems to me to be an easy visual representation of what is going on.
Much like anger often has fire or steam/smoke coming out of your head, or a light source (lightbulb or heavenly Sunbeam) when you get a good idea.
The older images, cam when we thought with our hearts and full body, so the images were more to that size, but as we now precieve our thoughts to be done in the brain, we now relate to our modern expectation of reality.
Great documentary! Really great job tracing this idea as far back as you could, looking at it from different angles, all within a concise video (you could have stretched this out much longer)
@@jonhanson8925 thanks so much! Yeah I know the algorithm favors longer videos at the moment, but I try to just make what I'd want to watch. Glad you liked it.
I reckon the 'standing on the shoulders' origin in persian and turish may be a quirk of translation. In english we do say 'ON his right', perhaps the turkish / persian vrsions wer translated directly as "on top of" and thus assumed to be on top of each shoulder
Yes that's my sense too, but I included it as it features in many writings on this topic.
i love when they do "the devil appears but have no clue where is the angel either"
This is an awesome video 🎉 you should cover the angel hierarchy from archangels to seraphims, and how they have been interpreted in pop culture
I think the Occam's Razor explanation is just that this was something 20th century cartoonists made up because it's a funny way to communicate the idea of a character being tempted in two different directions. I think sometimes people try too hard to find deep historic origins for things that don't actually have any.
i mean these do have historic origins, and you can trace almost every idea
Even if adopters of an idea may have been unaware of its historical roots, it's a type of genetic fallacy to suggest that there are no historical roots. On the contrary, It's a natural consequence of being raised in a Judeo-Christian culture with Greek influences. You'll have a bunch of religious and philosophical ideas you take for granted. For example, most people think human rights are an modern invention, but these ideas can actually be traced to Judeo-Christian teachings.
Human rights are not derived from Judeo-Christian teachings... that's clearly an apologetic argument.@@zachhecita
@@teehee4096 That is patently false and fallacious. Just because historical facts align with Christian apologetics, it does not make it less true. That is the genetic fallacy. Medieval Christian theologians like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas laid the groundwork for natural law and justice based on Christian teachings such as the doctrine of Imago Dei. Aquinas’ view that natural law is part of God's divine order helped shape later secular legal theories about natural rights, which formed the foundation for modern human rights.
For example, Aquinas argued that human laws should be rooted in natural law, which reflects God's eternal law. This idea influenced later Enlightenment thinkers like John Locke, who adapted these concepts in developing his theories on natural rights, such as life, liberty, and property.
@@zachhecita the “root” is just the idea of angels and devils which have been around since the Bible. The video purports to offer the origins of the little cartoon angels and devils that appear on people’s shoulders but it doesn’t do a good job imo because I don’t think there is some grand ancient origin of them. They’re pretty clearly something invented for cartoons.
I'd love to know how the concept of a guardian angel developed; it seems common to both Christianity and Islam, and I'm sure there's a Greek (or maybe Mesopotamian) origin to it too!
It's on my list!
From the production quality of this video, it seems like this channel would have a lot more subscribers. Keep up the great work man, one day you'll get up there!
Thank you! One day
Guardian angels are also mentioned vaguely in the book of Daniel. I think Old King James says guardian angel, but newer versions kind of tiptoe around it.
It was some webcomic i read where one of the characters gets two devils instead of ona and a n angel.
I like times when the devil and angel agrees
what about the recursive shoulder devils from Xavier Renegade Angel
0:14 what's the source of those angel and devil boy graphics?
@@eduardog3000 those are bespoke, animated in AE
What's the castle at 1:55?
It was just some stock footage, but apparently it is Castelul Corvinilor
@@TabletsAndTemples Thanks, and nice video
Castelul Corvinilor, Romania
I know he answered already
@@dragonluvver975 Such a beautiful castle.
And lucky for me it was built around the century that I was talking about in the video. Some European fairy tale castles are actually quite modern like Neuschwanstein
Love the topic and I think you did an excellent job explaining it for 6 minutes. I do think it is silly, though, that when starting to talk about Arabic folklore that you show the Hagia Sophia - built under Justinian I of the Eastern Roman Empire. Justinian was a native Latin speaker from the Balkans, Greek was the dominant language, and they were Christians. Then, the Arabs didn’t take control later, but the Turks. So, there is very little Arabic about it
Thanks for pointing that out, I'll double check my stock footage more closely in the future.
great video, very informative, but one question is still unanswered!
just _who_ made that amazing cat painting at 3:53? gave me quite a laugh! i'd love to see more of their work! :D
@@theodddoggo glad you liked it! The cat picture is from ~1845 by Jean Ignace Isidore Gerard
There's similar concept in Islam, but the angel just write down your action to be judge on the judgement day. The angel on the left write your bad action, and on the right write your good action.
Nice video
greatest version of angel and devil on shoulders has to be from the manga City chapter 31
Surprised you didn't mention that in Greek conception, the concept of the daimon or daemon, which were "guiding spirits" for mankind and similar in concept if not the root concept for the "horses pulling the chariot" metaphor used. Considering how similar these words are to "demon," the notion of an evil spirit tempting a man into improper action is directly related here.
I'm working on a history of Guardian Angels video as well, Daimons will come up a lot more there.
Could it be an emergent phenomena of how some people perceive their inner voice (that not everyone has). I've had more than a few clients talk about two voices (not angels), spatially located on their shoulders?
That's certainly a interesting avenue for investigation
if i had the time (and money), id get a tattoo on my shoulders, one of Navi and one of Tatl...
...the "Zelda 64 version" of the White Wolf/Dark Wolf, in my opinion...
I tought it was with faust
0:54 so it’s the Id/Ego/Superego thing.
Underrated
Thank you
Most mdoern examples seem to have the side switched. Maybe they are going for a "from the perspective of the audience" sort of thing. Or maybe I'm just too nitpicky.
Well I think the strictness of which shoulder the Devil was on is a piece of post-1800s folklore. I don't think it has any ancient roots.
I want to know what the difference between "spiritedness" and "passion" is meant to be.
@jonothanthrace1530 spiritedness is like seeking after higher virtues: ego, glory, honor. Passions are lust, sex, food, drink, money power. The Greek terms are thumos (the white horse) and eros (the dark horse)
@@TabletsAndTemples Spirituality might be a more apt term in modern English, then.
is't that platonic?
Interesting but suprised you didn't mention Yetzer tov (good inclination) and Yetzer Hora (evil inclination) the Jewish idea that every soul is influenced by these two pulling divine sources (this directly influenced Freud as well who was Jewish). The philosophy most likely predates the Christian and definitely Islamic interpretations. Very similar to the Ancient greek idea. However this was often characterised metaphorically as a good and evil voice very similar to the angels on the shoulder idea. The only main difference being an internal struggle. However this was most likely made external in art as super creepy to draw them internally although now I think about it potentially stunning if done right.
The most important factor is that these inclinations are yours and a representation of you. Which to me is the strongest link to the angel and devil who usually appear as versions of the thinking just in divine drag. :)
Hey thanks for that. It certainly wasn't deliberate, it just never came up in any of the articles and discussions I read on the topic, including an academic journal article tracing its history as a rhetorical diea! But yes, looks like Genesis Rabbah is the earliest Rabbinic text that contains a discussion of divided inclinations. Most scholars would put that between 300-500CE. So I don't think it's the earliest, but yes I do wish I had known to include it.
@@TabletsAndTemples Thanks for the response and the research into my comment :) looking forward to checking out more
The origin of a fundamental western philosophical concept is Greece?
Wierd.
😂
If this isn't surprising, I'm disliking this video, reporting this video, blocking your channel, finding where you live, and consulting the angels over if the place should be burned down or not.
Well demons angels alright
Thanks! Loved the history. You missed an awesome example though: th-cam.com/video/rIePw-Zm9Aw/w-d-xo.htmlsi=HdwPTRDzo-DsWaW6
Or better: th-cam.com/video/A1wRdpAz3oM/w-d-xo.htmlsi=0g1vR4xskuaaGqCQ
I always *find it sus,* when someone talks about Christianity & Ostensibly Christian topics, use CE/BCE instead of BC/AD.
Of course, if you want to look in scripture, this is all man's fables. The main conflict a true Born Again Christian has in his life (one who Trusts wholeheartedly in the shed blood of Jesus Christ that washes away all our sins and Stand in the Gospel of 1 Corinthians 15:1-4 KJV) is a war between his flesh (the Old Man) and his spirit (The New Man). Both are interlocked that makes you unable to please God and Jesus. This is why Jesus died on the cross and rose again. He did all the hard work by keeping the whole Law of Moses so we, including us Gentiles, wouldn't. All have sinned and come short to the glory of God.
4:54 racism jumpscare
🤮