The Satanic Bible

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The Satanic Bible Page 8

by Michael A Aquino


  culture is essential.

  Because from the perspective of the anything-

  goes amorality of post-Millennialism, the

  information-overload of Internetrality, and a blasé

  impatience with anything but hyperstimulation,

  these diatribes can seem pretty tame and simplistic.

  But even in Haight/Ashbury San Francisco

  morphing from the Beats to the Hippies, this was

  omigosh experimentality with “occult” tidbits not

  only unknown but unavailable to the general public.

  While the “occult revival” of the 1960s

  produced a scattering of New-Age touchyfeely and

  fluffybunny Wiccawitchery, classic works of magic

  and metaphysics were both rare and expensive.

  Bookstores like Fields’ in San Francisco, Gilbert’s &

  Cherokee in Hollywood, and Weiser’s in New York

  kept their Necronomica in locked glass cases, which

  one needed to be “known” to access.

  Although in the years prior to 1966 Anton &

  Diane LaVey had conducted an exclusive “Magic

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  Circle” at their San Francisco home, the Church of

  Satan was intended to be accessible to the general

  public, whose ideas of things like “Satanism” and

  “Black Magic” came from horror movies and E.C.

  Comics.

  So Anton gave weekly lectures on these

  “Lucifer” subjects, along with additional funzies like

  haunted houses, phrenology, and cannibalism. 37

  The mimeographed “rainbow sheet” handouts

  at these lectures began as expansions of paragraphs

  in the Church’s informational Monograph, and

  twelve of the most popular ones were selected for

  the Satanic Bible. 38

  The intent of the original “Lucifer” was

  dramatic and polemical: to shock readers out of

  their Sunday-school-complacency. It was a literary

  water-balloon.

  But there’s no need for that now. In keeping

  with Satan’s Foreword, the purpose of this “Lucifer”

  is to “explain reality”. If that sounds presumptuous,

  just consider how little, and carelessly, most people

  tend to think about these chapter-topics. One would

  suppose that they would be seriously important to

  humanity, but just try asking such questions [of

  those who’ve not yet read this book]!

  As you peruse the new “Lucifer”, something

  else may occur to you: that you know these answers

  already, intuitively. This, as Plato realized, is a

  characteristic of “universal truths”, as well as a

  signal that there is considerably more to human

  intelligence than incarnate education through the

  37 Diane wasn’t beyond serving audiences some exotic finger-

  food scandalously represented as actually that.

  38 “The Book of Lucifer” has rather more cachet than “Church

  of Satan Frequently Asked Questions”.

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  physical senses. He called this “recollective wisdom”

  anamnesis, and devoted one of his Dialogues, the

  Meno, to its illustration. So you are about to enjoy a

  Meno experience.

  But let’s start with a look-back at Anton’s

  original essays:

  A. “Wanted: God - Dead or Alive!”

  Assuming that most people who sought out a

  Satanic religion had a chip on their shoulder about

  conventional Judæo/Christianity, this cornerstone

  essay flings the requisite gauntlet down, establishing

  pro forma that the Church of Satan was not afraid to

  “provoke divine wrath”.

  Scant attention is paid to identifying “God”

  save as the Deistic model of a non-conscious

  “balancing force in nature” with no interest in

  human affairs.

  Therefore prayer to God is pointless, and “sins”

  are merely dictates of conventional churches for

  their own agendæ.

  Satanism thus regards “injustice” as a purely

  inter-human matter, with practical hurts being

  corrected by corresponding helps.

  Interestingly over the Church of Satan’s decade

  of experience, relatively few Satanists nursed an

  obsessive hatred of God, or even thought much

  about him/her/it. If there were hatred, it was

  usually the result of bad personal experiences in

  conventional religious affiliations.

  Accordingly there was not much interest in epic

  ceremonials to cast God down from his celestial

  throne, as in Anatole France’s Revolt of the Angels

  or Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Job: A Masque for

  - 102 -

  Dancing. Most Satanists were content just to put a

  tack or whoopie cushion on it.

  B. “The God You Save May Be Yourself”

  Following from the first essay’s Deism,

  Satanists assume the role of “God” in deciding and

  judging “good/evil” in human behavior.

  Avoiding a conceptual discussion of ethics, this

  essay just relaxes blissfully into individual

  hedonism.

  In the pre-rainbow-sheet Monograph, Anton

  called for the Church’s eventual construction of

  sybaritic “pleasure domes”, somewhere between

  Hugh Hefner’s Playboy Clubs and the elites’ gardens

  in Thea von Harbou’s Metropolis. In the early days

  of the Church, Anton enjoyed several artistic

  collaborations with Hollywood decadent Kenneth

  Anger, whose Magic Lantern Cycle of films includes

  an “Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome” to give you

  the general idea.

  C. “Some Evidence of a New Satanic Age”

  Fun is poked at Christianity’s famous “Seven

  Deadly Sins” - pride, greed, lust, envy, gluttony,

  wrath, sloth - blessing Satanists’ Indulgence in and

  enjoyment of them all. As of course do Christians,

  hypocritically whining “the Devil made me do it!”

  Continuing on the theme of hypocrisy, Anton

  denounces “safe” labels such as “humanist” and

  “white witch” as sanctimonious posturing.

  If one acts under illusions imposed by others,

  then one can plead the excuse of ignorance or

  innocence. But if one is free from such constraints

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  and engages in self-delusion, one is simply a

  hypocrite: clearly the “deadly sin” of Satanism.

  D. “Hell, the Devil, and How to Sell Your

  Soul”

  In the fourth essay Anton traced the legend of

  “the Devil” through some of its more prominent

  manifestations in Eastern and Western cultural

  tradition, punctuating the account with a list of

  seventy-seven names under which the Archfiend or

  his close approximations have been known. The

  point to be taken being that “Satan” was to be

  appreciated as something more significant than a

  mere Judæo/Christian myth.

  The following from one of the “rainbow”

  handouts, later adapted for this essay, catches its

  flavor:

  Satan, as a god, demi-god, personal savior,

  or whatever you wish to call him, was invented by

  the f
ormulators of every religion on the face of the

  Earth for only one purpose. That purpose is to

  preside over carnal, mundane, and so-called

  wicked activities and situations.

  Of course anything indulgent or gratifying of

  a physical or mental nature must be “evil”; how

  else can people be assured of feeling guilty without

  actually going out and hurting others?

  “Selling one’s soul” was dismissed as a simple

  fantasy of conventional religious paranoia. 39

  39 In 1970 this didn’t prevent my new Nineveh Grotto in

  Kentucky sending the Central Grotto in San Francisco a check

  for its initial members payable in souls, not US$. We were

  taking a chance that they’d be worth at least $13 apiece.

  - 104 -

  E. “Love and Hate”

  Conventional religions characteristically

  advocate blanket love of humanity paradoxically

  combined with a similar hatred of its sinfulness.

  This elicits guilt, obligation, penitent obedience: the

  nominal emotions being tokenexploited as rhetorical

  platitudes.

  Satanism emphasizes selectivity and clarity in

  emotional judgment and expression, indeed to the

  point of magical ritualization.

  Emotions all too easily and habitually are

  experienced so indistinctly that it has become the

  norm to treat them as social attitudes and

  relationships. This essay responds at this level of

  discourse.

  F. “Satanic Sex”

  The 1960s were also famous as a time of

  “sexual revolution”, but it was slow in starting, even

  in sordid San Francisco.

  Through the 1950s burlesque40 dives were

  piously quarantined in a one-block “International

  Settlement” on Pacific Avenue in North Beach. But

  then fingercymbalist Allen Ginsberg published his

  flagrantly fornicative poem Howl with Lawerence

  Ferlinghetti’s City Lights Beats-bookstore, while a

  half-block away on Broadway Carol Doda sent

  shockwaves across the entire country by by doffing

  her décolletage.

  40 In those tasteful times, only as far as G-string & pasties.

  - 105 -

  Anton LaVey enjoyed coining aphorisms,

  among them “sex and religion will always sell”. 41 So

  he was quick to publicize the Church of Satan with a

  “Topless Witches Revue” 42 by Doda’s Condor Club.

  But even more scandalous were the Church’s

  altars, on which the brooding Baphomet was

  udderly upstaged by a beauty in the buff. This

  particularly peeved Christian competitors with a

  2,000-years-desiccated deadguy on a torture-tree

  above their altars.

  No one had more fun than the press, as when

  one local newspaper reviewed the 1969 Satanis film

  about the Church:

  This has been a hard piece to write because

  the subject is so crazed …

  It’s a documentary. One cat in a dark suit

  and shoes with white socks says, “Yeah, before I

  joined the Satanic Church I masturbated once a

  day and was very unhappy about it. Now I

  masturbate three or four times a day and really dig

  it.” During one ritual a naked woman takes a large

  snake and rubs it over her body, up and down in

  her crotch, passing her hands over its length and

  wrapping it around her. Then she gives it to Anton,

  who’s dressed in an open-front hood with horns,

  all in black. He takes the snake over to a plump

  blonde, bound naked to a post, and proceeds to

  41 Similar Satanic sagacitickles included:

  • A bird in the hand is useless when you want to blow your

  nose.

  • Don’t ever sit on a stone bench with a glass bottle in your

  back pocket.

  • If you are a lady, do not wear patent leather shoes because

  men will see your underpants reflected in them.

  • A crowded elevator smells different to a midget.

  • Never shove your mother while she’s shaving.

  42 Starring T-witch Susan Atkins in her pre-Manson Family

  days. Cf. my The Church of Satan for the lurid details.

  - 106 -

  touch its head to various parts of her body, around

  each breast and down to the cunt. 43

  Actually outside its ritual chambers, the

  Church of Satan was scrupulously staid. Individuals’

  promiscuous proclivities were considered entirely

  their own business. 44 The result was an adult

  atmosphere in which sexual issues, should they

  occur conversationally, were considered both calmly

  and courteously.

  G. “Not All Vampires Suck Blood”

  Anton LaVey’s weekly lectures included one on

  “classic” neck-nibblers like Count Dracula and

  Barnabas Collins, but for this essay he was more

  interested in something less sanguine: humans who

  try to avoid confronting their own worthlessness by

  firmly attaching themselves to one or more creative

  personalities and seeking to control and exploit

  them thereafter.

  Such is what Anton called a “psychic vampire”,

  the defining characteristic being that the PV has no

  independent identity or accomplishments of any

  significance, and is only influential through use of

  the host.

  A PV identification is not always easy to make.

  An obvious exception would be a marriage in which

  one, the other, or both spouses subordinate

  personal, independent accomplishment to the family

  as a whole beneficiary. PV questions might apply

  43 Ogar, Richard in Berkeley Barb, March 1970. The snake was

  a pet python named Julius Squeezer.

  44 With absolute prohibition of anything involving minors or

  nonhuman animals. Julius’ appearances were carefully gentle.

  - 107 -

  only if one or both individuals should cease that

  common-interest motivation for an exclusive one.

  The same problem exists in business and

  professional relationships as well. There is normally

  some degree of benefit sharing or exchange, and

  PVism enters the picture only if the relationship

  becomes predatory.

  Anton offers no easy remedy to PV victims. The

  predation is possible only if the host is dependent

  upon the vampire’s control, which may have

  progressed to the stage of inescapable addiction.

  And of course there is the question of

  perspective: What appears to a third-party to be a

  benign relationship may be PV behind-closed-doors,

  or vice-versa.

  H. “Indulgence, Not Compulsion”

  As with psychic vampirism, the concept of

  “indulgence” is not just a question of lifestyle, but of

  its motivation and actual enjoyment or benefit.

  Imitation of an admired figure is a common

  human practice, and often may extend from

  inconspicuous personal affectations to obsessive,

  complete makeover.

  There were any number of admirers who, after

  seeing Anton LaVey in a magazine or on television,

  promptly shav
ed their heads, grew goatees, and

  dressed in black - certain that now they too were

  Satanists.

  When inviting my suggestions concerning

  applications for the Satanic Priesthood, Anton listed

  several attributes he thought preferential, then

  insisted they be kept secret:

  Naturally I wish “preference given to”

  omitted from requirement questionnaires which

  - 108 -

  are sent to aspirants. Otherwise we will have them

  running out and buying dogs they can’t stand,

  marrying spouses they can’t stand, and eating food

  they can’t stand at restaurants they can’t afford. 45

  Besides imitation, indulgence could also be

  compromised by simple insincerity. In the “rainbow

  sheet” addressing this, Anton commented:

  The Eastern mystical beliefs, which have

  been in great intellectual favor in recent years,

  have taught people to contemplate their navels,

  stand on their heads, avoid the use of labels in life,

  and discipline themselves against any conscious

  will for success so they might dissolve themselves

  into “Universal Cosmic Awareness” - anything to

  avoid good, healthy self-satisfaction or honest

  pride in earthly accomplishments.

  I am sure you have seen just as many so-

  called disciplined yogis with the inability to control

  a smoking habit as anyone else, or who become

  just as excited as a “less aware” person when an

  attractive member of the opposite sex [or in some

  cases the same sex] walks by.

  Yet when asked to explain their faith, these

  people retreat to the ambiguity characterizing

  their faith - being that no one can pin them down

  if there are no straight answers that can be given.

  Another problem with compulsion is that, if

  there is no convenient, socially-acceptable release

  for it, it can devolve into self-destructive obsession -

  sometimes to the point that it transforms the

  affectee into a maniacal [and tiresome] evangelist or

  apologist for it: a martyrdom often encountered in

  “aggrieved” religious, racial, and sexual circles.

  In 1928 Abraham Merritt wrote a novel entitled

  Seven Footprints to Satan, not about the Devil but

  rather a freakish human mastermind who modeled

  45 Letter, Anton LaVey to M.A. Aquino, January 6, 1972.

  - 109 -

  his personality and pleasures after those of the

 

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