Note: In order to clarify the doctrinal statements and teachings that these passages support, where it is not directly apparent in the quote itself, I have added a summary of the teaching before the quote. These summaries are my understanding of what the author is trying to support with these quotes, not a quote from their book. Please feel free to double check the context of each of these quotes.
A. C. Peter Wagner
1. “Territorial Spirits,” Wrestling with Dark Angels, C.P. Wagner and F.D. Pennoyer, eds. (Ventura, CA: Regal Books, 1990), p.76.
TEACHING: There are many demons on Earth and they are organized hierarchically.
I do not know how many evil spirits there are around Planet Earth. One interesting set of figures comes from Friday Thomas Ajah, a Sunday School superintendent at the Assemblies of God church in Oribe, Port Harcourt, Nigeria. For years before his conversion he was a high ranking occult leader, given the name of Saint Thomas the Divine, purportedly by Satan himself. Ajah reports that Satan had assigned him control of 12 spirits and that each spirit controlled 600 demons for a total of 7,212. He says, “I was in touch with all the spirits controlling each town in Nigeria, and I had a shrine in all the major cities.”If this report is true, it would not be unreasonable to postulate that other such individuals, not yet saved, could be found in considerable numbers around the world. [Source cited: Friday Thomas Ajah, “Saved at Last,” Testimonies, Vol. 1. No. 4, August 15-30, 1985, p.6 (P.M.B. 4990, Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Ikeja, Nigeria).]
2. “Territorial Spirits,” Wrestling with Dark Angels, C.P. Wagner and F.D. Pennoyer, eds. (Ventura, CA: Regal Books, 1990), pp.85-86.
TEACHING: Evil spirits are bound to geographic territories
In attempting to apply this to world evangelization, Jacob Loewen helps us by pointing out that “In many societies throughout Central and South America the spirit deities associated with various geographical or topographical phenomena are spoken of as their ‘owners.’” Many nomads, for example, never make camp outside their own territory until they secure permission from the spirit owner. Loewen adds, “People never own the land; they only use it by the permission of its true spirit owners who, in a sense, ‘adopt’ them.” Although Loewen doesn’t say so, I would imagine that among such animistic peoples the names of these spirit owners of territories are well known. [Source quoted: C. Peter Wagner, The Third Wave of the Holy Spirit (Ann Arbor, MI: Servant Publications, 1988), p.60; and How to Have a Healing Ministry Without Making Your Church Sick (Ventura, CA: Regal Books, 1988), p.201.]
B. John Robb
“How Satan Works at the Cosmic Level”, Behind Enemy Lines (C. Kraft, ed. Ann Arbor, MI: Vine Books, Servant Publications, 1994), p. 173
Though we must be careful of constructing a theology of the spirit world based on pagan belief systems, the possibility of a hierarchy of spirits may be borne out by the perceptions of animistic peoples. Animists typically believe in a hierarchy headed by a supreme god, who is remote and unknown, and in a pantheon of lesser deities, superior spirits who exercise great power over a wide range of affairs. Beneath these are the lesser and the more immediate spirits of their ancestors, and finally, the evil spirits. The Burmese believe in nats, supernatural beings arranged hierarchically with control over natural phenomena, villages, regions, and nations. The cult of guardian spirits in northeast Thailand involves both village and regional spirits, the village ones being subordinate to the regional. In India, Hindu goddesses serve as “guardians” of villages and regions. They arc often associated with disease, sudden death, and catastrophe. Kali, goddess of destruction, is a regional deity widely recognized to exert influence over West Bengal and the Bengali people.
A missionary in Thailand believes he has identified the national principality that reigns over the whole country. It is a being known as Phra Sayarn Devadhiraj, which means “greatest of the guardian angels of Siam.” It is believed this deity has kept Thailand from being overrun by invaders. King and queen preside over a royal homage-paying ceremony, with the whole nation joining in the worship of this spirit, whose image resides on a throne in the royal palace.