In Pagan Dawn: 1,525 people practising satanism. If Satan is an invention of the Catholic church, what are Satanists??? (am I missing something?)

Satanism is the name that Anton LaVey coined for his own particular brand of individuality-worship. He could have called it Bob for all it matters, but he chose Satanism.

Depends what type of Satanist they are.
Traditional Satanism and LaVey Satanism are different things.

Hi Julai,

"In Pagan Dawn: 1,525 people practising satanism."

Ye Gods, I'm sure there weren't any in my copy. It hasn't really got enough dark corners for them to lurk in properly.

"If Satan is an invention of the Catholic church, what are Satanists???"

There seem to be a number of different groupings under that category. The LaVey Fan Club Fuzi mentioned, which itself has tenuous roots in a kind of intellectual egotism that is more self-worship than anything else. A kind of 'genuine' devil-worship on the weirder fringes of Christianity which may well try its best to live up to mainstream Church propaganda. And a confused hodge-podge of folk investing varying levels of belief in it, who range from those to who are simply playing with the symbolism for thrills or shock value, to sociopaths who can't distinguish between reality and horror films and may be genuinely dangerous.

I was surprised by the numbers listed for England & Wales. In this country there were only 53 in the Census stats. Must be something in the water.

BB,

John Macintyre

So are there any satanists on this site willing to stand up for themselves?

I've met a few that are okay.

they just strike me as a rather bratty kind of atheist.

My best friend called himself a satanist for a while, and he was not disturbed and didn't lurk much I rather think he was just annoyed with stupid people and found La Vey-type satanism a bit of an outlet

He eventually decided that satanists were just as bloody stupid as the rest of us and bailed - besides he's generally a very happy type who was extremely nice to cats, so satanism never really fitted his image

Moggy

From what I've read of LaVey, he comes across as a very entertaining writer with some good points to make. Overall though, there doesn't really seem to be much more to it than Nietzschean amateur dramatics, and therefore one would have to have too much time on their hands to get particularly worked up about it.

here, here...what everyone one else said...and what i would have said...without the verbal diarrhea

I have to say I found Dr. La Vey's Satanic Bible a very refreshing read - he struck me as a very shrewd bloke. I was put off by the perchant for fancy ritual and unnecessary dressing up. I suppose you could say that about most religions though. The fan-club criticism is fair comment but ardent fans of anything, football, bands, Tim Henman (Come on, Tim!) etc, soon become tiresome to ordinary civvies by default.

I believe one of his successors (Matt G. Paradise) is a great cat lover - and quite right too.

at the risk of up setting people and remember this is only my opinion BUT
Satanism means worship of the devil. The devil is a Christian icon and so therefore has nothing to do with paganism, if you dont believe in a Christain God as most Pagans dont then you cant believe in Satan, who is a Christain perversion of the God Pan. This an old discussion on these boards but my opinion for what its worth is that Satanists become Satanists because it gives them the chance to rebel or behave in a way not normally exceptable and thats ok but it has nothing to do with Paganism and so should not be seen as such.

Thank you Niord! The arguements I've had in various places when trying to point out that a satanist is a Christian coming at it from the other direction! Not pagan, just a brat.

I think to be honest it's the name that's the problem. The teenies who are out to shock love using the word because it instantly sets them at odds from "mainstream" religion, their parents, and society generally. They use the word to denote their anti-xtian leanings, and to show that they're hoping they'll shock with what has been attached to the word "satanist" - ie, blood murders in the name of sacrifices, sex orgies and so on.

But on other forums I've chatted to Satanists who use the word only because LaVey etc coined it and they adhere to some of his principles - honouring of the ego, reliance on self, protection of your own, that kind of thing. And yes, it should be acknowledged that La Vey basically took the xtian commandments and flipped them over, but most of the Satanists I spoke to did not worship the devil in any "anti-xtian" way at all, but (if they did worship any deity at all - it wasn't that common), Set, or Lucifer. They had no truck with xtian worship, or anti-xtian worship, and saw themselves as set totally apart from any xtian theology with no connection whatsoever - other than the name.

Names always cause a problem, especially in this discussion. As has been pointed out, the "Is Satanism Pagan" discussion has done the rounds a zillion times on this forum and others out there in cyberspace. I guess it always comes down to how people define Paganism, but in general and in my opinion, no, Satanism is not a pagan path.

I totally agree with Njord and Esk. It's just a fashion thing with some people. It's a stereotype like goths and dark eyeliner and black lipstick. (no offence to you Goths).

Haven't met any Satanists, but have met true Black Magicians and a Dark Warlock. (yes they sound like rpg characters. ) They were quite scary. A bit dark for me, but fun at parties.

What on earth are they?! And how did you know they were true Black Magicians?

The best description of a black magician (for me) is someone who's every thought, action and work of magick is used only for themselves. All friends are there for their use only and enemies are obliterated. every day is spend increasing their power over themselves and others. No karmic reaction for a selfish act. Black magicians use high magick to their own ends, warlocks use wiccan and earth magick for the same.

How did i know? A feeling, a sixth sense or all of them. I've met people who said they we're and i thought they where full of it, but these two radiated negative energy like a furnace. I learn't a little about their systems and personal beliefs.

This isn't a full description or a very good one, but you get the idea. its very hard to describe them without using a label like 'evil', which i don't really believe exists, rather they we're the negative side to magick.

NC

As I recall, LaVey's use of the word "satanism" to describe his path acted partly as a filter for people who would be unwilling to keep an open mind. It's already been mentioned that it's essentially self-worship - the entire path is devised towards understanding your base human instincts and working with them rather than to overcome them. In that respect it deals a lot with shadow psychology and so on. It also contains a lot of ceremonial magic, as LaVey postulated that the best way for humans to affect psychological change was using a ritual atmosphere (true, as all ritual elements are designed to hammer things home into your unconscious).

As Rev. Nick says, LaVey was a shrewd bloke - and using such a controversial title for his path was certainly one of his more brilliant moves. Right from the outset he throws down the gauntlet by saying "if you're not willing to challenge every belief that makes you up as a human being, this club isn't for you". It's about the systematic destruction of all your moral constructs to get to the core of who you are.

Unfortunately, it does tend to pick up crazies, but all paths do to some extent. Also, there are different branches of satanism, often completely unconnected to each other.

Is Luciferianism counted as Satanism?

I'm not sure. I think Luciferianism refers to the entity Lucifer in his good guy incarnation, before the Fall or something. I really don't know enough about it to be able to say - but I'm fairly sure it takes Lucifer as it's patron deity or at least divine emanation.

Edit: Looks like I'm almost right. Luciferianism is similar to Satanism in that it encourages you to break down your ordinary moral/ethical barriers to achieve a holistic balance, but where Satanism focuses on the self, Luciferianism focuses on the divine energy of what I take to be God's "other half". That's probably not the best description, but it's the best I can think of to describe what I mean just now.

Hmm. The Temple of Set (ToS), a spinoff from the Church of Satan (CoS - Lavey's little party) claims that the philosophy of Satan simply being an ideal was a public front, and that the CoS and the ToS both actually worship and idealize a slightly different form of the classic xtian Satan, but still an actual entity, and not just an ideal.

The complication for pagans would be that the ToS worships what they feel to be an early incarnation of Satan, which is Set. In some vague way, I suppose this could make them pagans - I'm pretty sure there are some people about who take an Egyptian influence in their paths. Mind you, I won't blame them for not wanting to be associated with the ToS. Their website has a sort of odd feel to it. I mean, what's going on with this guy?

I trhink you mean that the modern day image is a pervesion of the god Pan. The Torah which itself is old, mentions Lucifer and his downfall. No Great Xian plot by designing an extra chracter there, just a continuation of one creationist theory. ( The jews perverted some of the babylonian gods though, I think Tiamat gets a mention somewhere, as does Leviathan although one of the mentions is you need to know what you're looking for) So while the perception today of Satan is that of the whole horns things , he wasn't created simply to dig at paganism, he had a place already, it just became easier knock the two together.