I think of a lot of these widely held myths (e.g. reincarnation, or even "the Antichrist") as useful metaphors for understanding the persistence of evil in human history. Iago in Shakespeare's "Othello" is another, purely fictitious but stunningly accurate, example of the psychology of pure evil--that is, of people like Goebbels, Hitler, Putin, Steve Bannon, Rupert Murdoch, Stephen Miller, and--of course--Trump himself. Filled, that is, with implacable racial hatred, deviousness, and self-loathing masquerading as self-worship (i.e. pathological narcissism).