From: rtsumn01@ulkyvx.louisville.edu
Subject: Re: Satanism and Demon Worship
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1992 03:07:30 GMT
Organization: University of Louisville

In article <66779@cup.portal.com>, Tagi@cup.portal.com (Tagi Mordred Nagashiva) writes:
> 9209.28 e.v.
> 
> 
> Bill Ellis (the cartographer) writes:
> 
> One topic that I think ought to be discussed 
> ...is what relationship (if any) satanism ought to have to
> the universal religious-experience/validation-principle of demon worship.
> 
> 
> Response:
> 
> The original topic-line is quite simplistic.  Satanism can never be addressed
> as an 'ought-to' because it presupposes resisting authority.

Perhaps he meant "ought-to" as a suggestion rather than an imperative. As in,
"Hey, Shaitan, we ought to go to Disneyworld this summer. It'll be fun!"
 
> Bill:
> 
> Let me start by stressing that "demon" should be read in the Greek sense as
> a spirit superior in intellect and power to humans that can be contacted and
> to some extent employed as a source of information and control over the
> environment.  
> 
> 
> Response:
> 
> ***** APPLAUSE *****

How did I know you'd feel that way?  :)

I suggest that if we are using it in the Greek sense we ought to (  ;-)  ) use
the usual Greek spelling, "daemon," much as "magick" is distinguished from
"magic."
 
> Bill:
> 
> There seem to be several variations on the theme:

[list of specific types, with examples given by both Bill and Thyagi, deleted]

How about some examples in Satanism?

From my limited contact with Satanists outside myself, there seems to be a
dearth of "daemonism" in favor of "logic" and "reality."

> Bill:
> 
> I gather that many genuine satanists would disclaim all of the above as
> totally binding sources of ethical impulses.  
> 
> 
> Response:
> 
> Not I, but I don't know what a 'genuine satanist' is, either.

Leaving aside the "genuine Satanist" question for the moment, I don't see it
that way either. They are sources of "enlightenment" which may or may not
have a bearing on ethics.
 
> Bill:
> 
> But LaVey seems to give
> invoking "demons" and Enochian magick (derived from Dee's "angels") some
> credibility.  It seems that many Wiccans too would grant some validity to
> the spirits they invoke as empirically real, not just archetypes or means of
> creative visualization.
 
Wiccans and LaVey both draw on some of the same source material. So do
Catholics and Jehovah's Witnesses.

I don't think LaVey intended demon summoning in quite the same spirit (ahem). I
mean I question whether he saw demons as empirically real.

Corrections welcome.
  
> Response:
> 
> Note the connection between Wiccans and LaVey.  While I'd agree here, I'd
> also mention that true demons are not always a barrel of laughs.

I would guess you're being a little bit lighthearted here? In other words, you
aren't taking Wicca too seriously? I just want to be clear.

> Bill:
> 
> But as satanism is frequently associated with "devil worship" in the public
> eye, it seems to me that there needs to be some careful thinking on this
> topic.  Whatever the source of "spirits," it seems clear that there is some
> genuine experience behind channelling and spirit possession that seems to
> the experiencer to be empirical evidence for demons, both benevolent and
> malevolent.  I've done a lot of reading of works by Pentecostals involved in
> exorcism, and many (not all) of them seem intelligent observers who are
> witnessing something out of the ordinary that seems to justify belief in
> superhuman personalities that can infest human personalities.

Ironically my experience has shown me that Pentecostals are the ones doing all
the daemon worship; the only "demon" most Satanists believe in is themselves.
 
> Response:
> 
> Most of this is displaced repression.  In other words, the poor Christian
> represses the best parts of themself (sexual, natural, etc.) and it comes
> out in some other way without their 'permission'.  It is all part of the
> 'war on the unconscious, natural mind', which the Church has been carrying
> out for eons in an attempt to 'break' the minds of modern people so as
> to produce the type of slaves which Margaret Atwood described in her
> book, _Handmaid's Tale_.

Trust a Satanist to find an anti-religious moral in *everything*.
 
> Bill:
> 
> The problem, as I've seen it in my reading, is that the groups that are the
> most intense about defining satanists as devil worshippers are exactly those
> who are the most deeply involved in their own form of demon worship.  They
> are often aware that there are problems with the materials they receive from
> their gods (prophecies fail to come true; a certain number of parents get
> told to put their children inside ovens; prophets tell their followers to
> drink cyanide).  And they seem genuinely concerned that the satanists have
> worked out their own direct line with demons and have gotten the knack of
> getting the results they want.  

Now we are down to the heart of the question.

An amusing theory, true. I am not clear on what you want from us, however,
unless you simply wanted to give us something to think about (which I
appreciate, true, but I have the distinct impression you want more).
 
> Response:
> 
> Nicely put.  I suggest that most Western religion is psychotic in its
> separation of God and Nature (among many other divisive separations which
> serve only to move the individual who accepts their dogmas to psychosis).

This division causes them to have all these psychotic experiences with their
daemons, rather than saner ones experienced by less separated cultures?
 
> Bill:
> 
> See how *good* the pre-conversion Mike
> Warnke is at hexing his enemies and getting free drugs and sex in _The Satan
> Seller_ (and how lousy he is at keeping his marriages or his priestly
> projects together in the _Cornerstone_ expose); see how *good* the
> devil-worshippers are at committing totally undetectable murders and child
> abuse in any "survivor" story (and how lousy satan-hunters are at getting
> any tangible evidence of their crimes).
> 
> 
> Response:
> 
> Wonderful.  This is, I think, explainable by the 3-fold law of return which
> has so many Witches enslaved and cowed.

Um?

You mean that Warnke zapped his enemies as a Satanist and is now getting his
threefold returns?
 
> Bill:
> 
> As with Santa-ism, the problem with demon worship is that it doesn't work very
> well, either for good or bad.  So the temptation is for those who are trying
> to carry on with it in a fallable way to imply that the *bad* demon worshippers
> are much more successful with it, so they should be stamped out because they're
> making the duffers look bad.
> 
> Reactions?

An intriguing theory, as I said before. But why are these people seeing evil
demon worshippers everywhere in the first place?
 
> Response:
> 
> The way you've defined it here, I'd say that whether or not it 'works well'
> is a matter of perspective.  

I would think that daemon worship, whenever it is practiced, but particularly
when it is not a part of the main society, must work sufficiently, else its
practice would not continue as an unneccesary luxury.
 
> What happened to the typical 'let's summon a demon into this pentacle'
> type of occultist/teenager?  I think that Enochian stuff is INCREDIBLY
> loaded with potential.  Here is how I'd describe what such people are doing:
> 
> 1) They are objectifying a repressed subset of their mind.
> 
> 2) They are naming it and giving it personal qualities which make it
>  more approachable (much like giving Cthulhu a name gives the ILLUSION
> that S/He is somehow comprehendable).
> 
> 3) They are summoning it before their waking mind, thus bringing this
> part of their mind into the conscious arena.
> 
> 4) They are dealing with it in the best way they know how.  If there
> was truly a demon summoned, then, like in some of Robert Asprin's books,
> the mage would have to perform a 'battle of wills' in order to
> come to some resolution.  Once this resolution is concluded, the mage
> may either absorb the demon-energy or keep it objectified for as long
> as necessary.  Of course, one alternative is that the mage will be
> overcome by the demon, in which case it might make hir do something horrible,
> like MASTURBATE!  (:::hiding face:::)
> 
> 
> This is precisely what the Satanist is doing with respect to society.
> The Satanist BECOMES the Demon which the oppressive orthodoxy begins
> to summon in its ignorance.  The Satanist simply attempts to manifest
> the repressed energies.  Sometimes this can result in nasty powder-
> burns.  ;>

So the Satanist, upon summoning the demon, is more equipped to deal with the
demon because s/he has a more compatible worldview to being with? I can agree
with that.
 
> Thyagi
> ------------------------------------------------------------------
> 'Possession' is a life-long process of self-actualization.  It is
> unfortunate that many modern Americans who practice stylized Afro-religious
> paths do not recognize this.

Bill, I had no success in following up to your posts. Did you do something
funky with 'em when you posted, or is it just me?

--Semhaza