existed before one was born and will exist after a body has died. An occultist .... schools continue to reproduce this a
THE THIRTEEN ON HERMETIC SATANISM
The Thirteen Initiatory Institution for Hermetic Satanism http://hermeticsatanism.com
On Hermetic Satanism
Digital Publishing House
Satanic Press
Published 2016 by Satanic Press Version 1.0.13
© The Thirteen, 2015-2016
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means without permission from the Publishers.
CONTENTS INTRODUCTION
5
SATAN
7
THE SELF: ME
9
SATANISM
14
PENTAGONAL CODEX
15
SATANIC KEYSTONES
17
Occultism
18
Darkness
20
Passionarity
22
Deification
24
The Progress
26
ANTI-PATTERNS
28
THIRTEEN
29
4
INTRODUCTION
S
atanism embraces and synthesizes aspects of occult knowledge historically attributed to dark and sinister deities, such as Seth & Apep, Shiva & Kali, Ahriman & Az and, in modern days, to Satan. Thus, Satan is the ultimate summa daemonium within the whole scope of post-modern culture, much outside common monotheistic religions. Satanism as worldview strongly advocates non-dualism. Satanists do not limit their conquests neither to “spiritual” side of things, nor to “mundane”, neither to “cosmic” nor “anti-cosmic”, they basically do not adhere to such (and many other) false divisions! From this point of view, the multiverse is a whole, both known and yet unknown, both beautiful and ugly, conquered or yet unconquered; it is Satan's own realm and satanists’ rightful territory to expand into and reign over. The means for this occult expansion are provided by the well known hermetic fact that microcosm is like macrocosm, and thus men are as gods, if we look deep enough into the Great Abyss within. This vision is successive to many initiatory teachings of the past and modernity, especially ancient dark cults and mysteries of Mesopotamia, Egypt and Greece; Shaivism, Vamachara, Tantric Buddhism, Taoism, Zen etc. Hermetic Satanism adopts and evolves ideas of Friedrich Nietzsche (on transcending limitations of human nature), Aleister Crowley (Thelema as the Law of the Will), Julius Evola (renovation of occult Hermeticism), Austin Osman Spare (ecstatic self-gratification), Anton S. LaVey (Satan as a new cultural symbol). As an initiatory occult organization “The Thirteen” practices the described form of non-dualistic, hermetic Satanism. We use “thirteen” as a meme with vast cultural meaning linked to Satanism and pointing to otherness, irregularity and sinister matters. Furthermore, “thirteen” by its occult meaning signifies certain aspects of dark arts, alchemy, astronomy and theurgy – the topic we describe in some details in this book. “The Thirteen” 5
shares many common methods and views with Ur Group, Cultus Sabbati, Temple of Set, Dragon Rouge etc. But notwithstanding all similarities it is the first occult organization redefining Satanism as not just a “rational belief” or a dark gnostic cult, but as a natural non-dualistic worldview, philosophy and
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HERMETIC SATANISM
SATAN
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ur vision of Satan combines Egyptian, Ancient Mesopotamian & Mediterranean cultures, oriental traditions (Shaivism, Vamachara, Tantric Buddhism, Taoism) along with a post-modern scientific worldview. In this regard, we bring occult understanding of Satan beyond common theistic-atheistic dichotomy: Satan is neither a demiurge-creator nor the primal creation, but the primordial current of emergence, evolution, progress, flowing from the very dark roots outside any intrinsic existence*, passing through dependent origination of the existent and directed towards fractal individuation within the multitude of evolving intelligence. As the Princeps of individuation he is the highest individuality of the multiverse itself, and in this sense we see him as a deity and accept his existence. But at the same time, Satan is empty of intrinsic existence: his nature is dependently arisen from the whole multiplicity of things that exist in the world. The described approach helps to understand Aleister Crowley's vision of mystic’s Atheism as one of the highest, though misunderstood approaches that one can take on religion.
* absence of intrinsic existence and dependent origination (also simply called emptiness, voidness, vacuity, thusness etc) – is a translation from sanskr. Śūnyatā.
We understand it closely to views in Tibetan Buddhism. The simplest definition was given, for instance, by Dalai Lama 14th in The Universe in a Single Atom: The Convergence of Science and Spirituality:
“
According to the theory of emptiness, any belief in an objective reality grounded in the assumption of intrinsic, independent existence is simply untenable. All things and events, whether ‘material’, mental or even abstract concepts like time, are devoid of objective, independent existence ‹…› Things and events are ‘empty’ in that they can never possess any immutable essence, intrinsic reality or absolute ‘being’ that affords independence. 7
”
Since Satan's image synthesizes and crystalizes the whole multitude of dark deities throughout the whole history of mankind, we prefer a henotheistic approach to Satanism. In practice it means that Satan (by whichever name the practitioner knows him) becomes the “center of gravity” for the fractal multiplicity of Dark Pantheon of deities, and different daemonic deities (in fact, seen as his avatars) can assume the leading role in an ecstatic invocation or occult work according to the situation that requires their presence. As above, so below: a deep look into the inner Self (a personal equivalent of Satan) reveals and teaches how to work with the same inner polyphony, the inner multiplicity of the Dark Pantheon. This represents Satanism as a path for initiatory occult development.
8
THE SELF: ME
I
n a human’s inner world, rich and diverse, there is no single commanding center. On this, modern psychology agrees with the ancient Eastern teachings like Buddhism, Hinduism and Taoism. The conscious ego gives the delusion of a commanding center, but in reality it is a mere observer that reflects on its surroundings, a traveler in a small boat of focused attention in the vast sea of impressions. However, despite the absence of an obvious commanding center, our psyche does have a center of gravity, located deep inside. This center of gravity is multiple by its nature, with so many facets that it becomes very hard to identify it. The ego is just a small part of this center of gravity – and being the part that we comprehend more easily, it is often mistaken for the whole. This is much like a dream, where the hero (=the ego) slays the monsters, but fails to comprehend that these monsters are his own fears and hopes, and that he, along with all other parts of the dream, is a proxy of the dreamer himself. The dreamer exists and is very real, although his reality is on a different, deeper level than that of the subjects of his dream. In a similar way, our deeper inner Self exists and is the real driving power behind the choices we make and, more generally, behind the patterns of our life. Any development and personal growth would mean improving and synchronizing the way that the Self works, empowering the Self to interact better with all its (ours) integral parts (such as ego) and with the surroundings. From the scope of occult, the Self, which we also name after an ancient Sumerian term “ME”, is the subject of the sinister alchemical Great Work (opus magnum), the result of this Work and the very process of the Working. Although the Self is a concept that has many parallels in various cultures, our approach is somewhat unique. We see ME as a non-homogenous system consisting of two major parts united in the labor of Love (in Crowleyan meaning) and possibly a legion of minor parts. The two major parts are very unlike each other and are known as Nature and Will, Mercury and Sulfur, and 9
under many other names and guises, such as perhaps ka and ba of the ancient Egyptians or p’o and hun in Taoism. These two major parts are not intermixed into homogeneity, but interact while having plenty of empty space between them, like for example the Planets and the Sun. In addition, multiple swarms of minor planets, asteroids and comets could symbolize the third component of ME, also known as Salt and by many other names. This symbolic example blends alchemy, astrology and theurgy. It also illustrates the idea of non-locality, fractality of ME, its multiplicity, since many different objects are viewed as parts of the same essential force. Besides, planets can be viewed hermetically as more than just physical bodies – Venus is alchemical Copper, passionate love, number 6 and many other wonderful things. Ancient Sumerians believed that the ME of the deities are multiplied by their temples, priests and offerings. In the same way, bits of our ME project into everything we do in our lives – our deeds, books that we write and artifacts that we craft, people that we influence, places that we are fond of and ideas that we support. In fact, when a Magician dies, his ME (not ego or human psyche) can persist through death, being transformed by it and continue to affect the world as a part of human culture, as a ME of a deity. Thus, an occultist is not a simple mortal: as above so below, and men are like gods. To take the astronomical analogy one step further, men are at the same time fractal parts of godly entities, and also gods in their own right – in the same way as our solar system along with many other solar systems is a part of our Galaxy. Think of planets moving around the Sun – and at the same time Sun moving around the Black Hole that is the center of our Galaxy. And the Galaxy is moving too, with a breathtaking speed, around larger centers of gravitation and so on. The comparison of an expanded ME with the singularity of a black hole is not accidental. While the surface of a developed human psyche resembles an analogy of the Solar System, with a polytheistic Olympic pantheon of deities patronizing the surface of our emotions, passions and energies (the classical antique Greco-Roman pantheon which lends names to our solar system planets is a good example), the deeper layers of human psyche are much darker. It was discovered by post-jungian psychologists, such as James 10
Hillman or Miller David (see for instance The New Polytheism, Harper & Row, 1974), that once we remove monotheistic oppression from psyche and allow the inner polyphony to appear from the underneath, we can start to approach in awe the mysterious, dark, numinous Self, which is another guise for what we call ME. By its nature, this Self is antinomian towards social standards, as it contains both the conscious and the non-conscious, known and unknown, acceptable and not acceptable by the society. It is unique, personal and unlike any other, but at the same time trans-personal and links to the collective unconscious levels. It is inside and outside; it is more than one thinks that he is. Thus, such Self is fearful for the uninitiated, because it can devour social personas identified with a human ego. At the same time such Self grants humans a deeper, deified existence in return for overcoming the fears. Thus, for example, Stanton Marlan, a post-jungian psychologist, speaks of the Self as the “Black Sun” in human psyche (however, “Back Hole” would be even a better analogy). When viewed as the power behind any true initiation, ME is viral, expansionistic and infiltrating. As a serpent that seeks and charms its prey, it attracts and mesmerizes. Nietzsche suggested: find the courage to look into this Abyss once and it will look back at you for all eternity. While a person's first approach to ME is often accompanied by chaos and confusion (see, for instance, the rich imagery for alchemical nigredo), one can learn to work with the inner polyphony and multiplicity of Pandaemonium and hence introduce a henotheistic approach described above. Many aspects of ME, both in microcosm and macrocosm, were well understood by oriental religions and described as Atman-Brahman unity, as Tao or as anatman. For instance, ME is the root of its own existence – remember the alchemical “in order to make gold, you must have gold”. ME can be anything it Wills to be, but it does not exist or manifest independently of all the other things: it is empty in the Buddhist sense, as it lacks intrinsic existence. In terms of quantum physics, we could call this superposition of multiple states, resolved into a definite state only by an observer, but stateless when remains unobserved. Hence, ME is invoked by dependent generation – a process of cause and effect which enslaves the profane, but frees and deifies 11
the initiate. An apophatic “neti neti” (“neither this, not that”) search for ME brings ultimately the same results as the opposite, confirmative approach, since the transcendent ME is beyond both existence and non-existence, beyond object/subject or observer/observable dichotomies. The described approach can be seen as an illustration for Aleister Crowley's vision of mystic’s Atheism as one of the highest, though misunderstood approaches that one can take on religion. Being transcendent, ME at the same time is very natural and very much “of this world” – because there is no “other” world. This is what Buddhists (like Nagarjuna) mean when saying that nirvana is not really different from samsara. The mysterious ME does not have beginning, nor does it have an end. It existed before one was born and will exist after a body has died. An occultist should live by ME, live as ME, reveal and manifest it, multiply and strengthen its aspects. In an alchemic sense, an occultist takes a very natural and common, all-encompassing thing with limitless potential, materia prima – and by applying his Will, turns it into a complexity of evolved materia finita. The nature of ME does not change with time, but ME plays in joy (compare to concept of lila in Hinduism) and evolves, like a growing child. The ability of ME to evolve is really important and often misunderstood, especially by the Westerners that are trying to follow Eastern doctrines. Yes, deities are able to evolve and evolve indeed – and so do people – otherwise it would be a very dull world. Any god incapable of evolution, falsely promoting himself as an “Absolute”, would also “castrate” his own creative ability. Similar to celestial bodies, manifestation of ME is governed by rhythm and synchronicity and has a certain vector of movement. There are rhythms, cycles and patterns that repeat themselves on various levels in the process of evolvement towards higher complexity. These repetitions do not copy each other, nor are they random. Development and its phases (such as nigredo, albedo and rubedo, if we take the alchemic approach) is spiral rather than stagnant and cyclical, and each mahapralaya (the great dissolution at the end of any Great Work) signifies the start of a more complex, beautiful and wonderful Great Work. One huge contribution of the West and, notably, Nietzsche to the old religious debate is the clear understanding of this urge of 12
Nature to evolve and surpass itself, to become more than it is. This is the essence of LIFE, while some traditionalist societies read it backwards and call it EVIL, as was emphasized by Anton LaVey. This is the root of the sinister in Satanism: we dare to say that everything has to evolve.
13
SATANISM
S
atanism is a worldview, a philosophy and practical occult system naturally emerging from the understanding of Satan and the Self described in the previous chapters. Satanism has a non-dualistic nature, taking the world as a whole, without separating “spiritual” and “non-spiritual” matters, without introduction of a monotheistic god of any kind (creator, demiurge, either good or evil) but rather with a fractal Pantheon of dark deities (Pandaemonium), understood in quite an agnostic or buddhist sense, as we describe Satan above. The deities of the Dark Pantheon could be seen not only theistically, but also non-theistically: as profound laws of Nature; laws of evolution towards higher fractal complexity and intelligence. Thus, Satanism stands outside of k(q)abbalistic or gnostic (dualistic) currents; it embraces the Hermetic holistic approach, combined with postmodern philosophy. From a hermetic point of view, the things above are like the things below; in this sense Satanism becomes a Self-theism, understanding the Self as a Satan of the inner world, but again, not as a monotheistic center, but as a polyphony of the internal Pandaemonium. 14
PENTAGONAL CODEX
A
s a philosophy and worldview, Satanism is based on five interconnected principles that we call Pentagonal Codex. These principles are the direct result of both Satan's nature and qualities of the Self.
1.
Ultimate Individualism. Evolving individuality – the Self, its Nature and Will – has the supreme value. This is the principle of the sovereignty of the Self: there is no law above the unfolding Will of the Self; there is no truth above its evolving Nature. No authorities or dogmas can diminish this principle or proclaim any objective absolute truth.
2.
Initiatory Development. Individualism leads to the evolvement of the Self into a deific form, much beyond biological, social and psychological restrictive bounds of the mundane life. Such deific form can be described as an everevolving complex nonlocal system. Initiation frequently takes violent and extreme forms; this is a gradual and non-linear process, a “crooked path” as an endless, branching fractal spiral rather than a fixed sequence.
3.
Using Passion. Flaming passions are the moving force for the development, as they give energy for the radical transformation. Denying and submerging passions damages one’s wholeness. Forbidden fruits are to be experienced and enjoyed; even negative emotions are important: they should lead to new achievements, resulting in pleasure and becoming tools for the development.
15
4.
Hermetic Interconnectedness. Our individuality (microcosm) exists within a larger world (macrocosm) and they are strongly interconnected. The Self is able to evolve only by manifesting its Will both upon the inner and the outer world. Thus, Satanism strongly opposes solipsism, as well as out-of-the-reality pipe dreaming or “we'll do it in the other world” esoteric fantasies.
5.
Dignity of the Self. Development is the emergence of new patterns grounded on the present and the past, on the Nature of the Self. Thus, to remain an integral being one has to be true with his own Self: this is the root of deific dignity. Moreover, while Satanism opposes religious morality and implies disruption of existing status quo, satanists stay consistent in their decisions, taking responsibility for their actions.
Pentagonal Codex are the values of Satanism; they are a natural development of the ideas of Friedrich Nietzsche, Julius Evola, Aleister Crowley, Osman Spare and Anton LaVey, as well as of many ancient and oriental great thinkers.
16
SATANIC K EYSTONES
S
atanism is not a mere philosophy or worldview; it is also a living practice. It is a crooked path of initiatory development curling around five consequent Satanic Keystones: occultism, Darkness, passionarity, deification and the progress. Each of these keystones we will describe in a form of brief essay.
17
OCCULTISM Occultism is a set of methods for obtaining information and acting in the area of unknown or partly unknown. While science is a method for getting statistically-verified knowledge (with technology as its application), for the sake of reliability and robustness science sacrifices everything else. Thus, scientific approach, being effective in minimizing risks of failures, becomes highly inefficient when you are desire extreme progress in a limited time, need swift decisions and take rapid actions in a dark territory, willing to take a high risk. That is why occult method has a place on the crooked path of dark development, where extremely risky self-development practices are required*. No action in the field of dark arts and on the path of deific individuation is possible without the occult method, which consists of mysticism (as a way of comprehending unknown and irrational) and magic (as a way of acting upon it). Historically, European occult traditions have been repressed by the Christian cults. These cults have opposed any natural knowledge for millennia, which led to significant degradation of occultism comparing to its ancient hermetic roots. The occult sphere became completely detached from the scientific progress of the last centuries and now is frequently understood as an aggregate of self-contained dogmas. While esoteric knowledge of ancient priests and philosophers in Sumer, Egypt, Greece etc. were derived from their observations on nature, scholasticism and monotheism created a strong current towards imaginable “other realities” (dualism, Gnosticism). Those days it was a reaction to the monotheistic oppression: if you have no rights to discover and improve the nature (since it is “created by impeccable god“), your only option is to attribute your studies to another realm. Such oppression is in the past now, but many modern “occult” and “esoteric" * of course using the power of science and technology when the progress makes it possible 18
schools continue to reproduce this approach and are left out of touch with the reality. As The Thirteen we take another approach: we re-shape the occult tradition by merging its ancient roots from different cultures (of Ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt and Greece; Shaivism, Vamachara, Tantric Buddhism, Taoism, Zen, etc) with post-modern worldview and state of the art in science. Thus, we see alchemy as an extension of complexity science, projecting natural laws, patterns of emergence and non-linear evolution onto initiatory practice of self-development; we see numerology as generic patterns within time series of the natural phenomena ("the music of the spheres"). We see astrology as an occult extension of astrophysics and cosmobiology, based on the known data regarding the influence of lunar cycles, solar and planetary magnetic fields, cosmic radiation etc. on psychological and biological state of humans and processes of emergence in complex self-evolving systems. But again, we do not limit ourselves by strict scientific (statistically-proven) knowledge, but extend it using sympathetic analogies into the area of unknown, taking the risks of mistakes for the sake of further stimulated selfdevelopment progress, in the same way as was done by ancient priests or Renaissance genii. All these represent our own approach to modern occult knowledge and practice, which is a crucial, integral and organic part of nondualistic hermetic Satanism. No “another realities” are required when our own reality remains mainly unexplored. An occult approach requires an openness to the unknown, ability to work with one’s own fears and a strong will towards development without compromises. Altogether these have to drive individuation beyond the limitations of human nature, towards deification and, according to hermetic link between micro- and macrocosm, lead the progress beyond current limitations of the mundane.
19
DARKNESS Darkness is an implicate nonlocal foundation for everything, the emptiness behind the existent and the source for depending arising for the myriads of things that constitute world. By saying that Darkness is an “implicate nonlocal foundation”, we refer to the modern ontological understanding of the physical reality as, for instance, described in the works of David Bohm. However, it should be noted that physical theories can change, while deepest layer of the reality according to agnostic view can not be comprehended or described by any theory. Thus, Darkness is the phenomenal world empty of intrinsic existence in the Buddhist sense (see the teachings of Prasangika and Svatantrika schools of Mahadyamaka Mahayana Buddhism or Vajrayana schools for Tantric Buddhism in Tibet, such as Gelug) and Darkness is the nature of such emptiness (sunyata). Thus, Darkness is not a place or some other world, or something “behind” the physical Universe; rather, it is a non-local (i.e. being present in everything, from quarks and dark matter to stars and living beings) source for dependent origination, emergence and self-organization of the dynamic Universe (or even multiverses, as a more correct term). At the very basic level Darkness can be understood as unknown and socially unacceptable (the otherness). Such otherness might be illustrated in a historical sense: from ancient times shamans, magicians and other initiates were living on the edge of society, both in direct and indirect sense: they were not following common moral and social rules; their dwellings were located at the edge of villages and cities (see for example the meaning of the term “hedge riders”). This marginality was not self-contained; unlike many modern marginal dark subcultures these people indeed influenced the top of their societies – by advising and even anointing the rulers; holding a court and performing other key roles. It was so, until mages and sorcerers had become feared and hunted by the society... Thus, the way to go beyond usual limitations of any kind (social, human, moral etc.) requires being opened to the otherness. 20
Psychologically "the other" is attributed to the dark, shadow parts of human psyche; hence it is represented in culture in form of dark imagery, projected into socially marginal phenomena etc. This labels Darkness as sinister, antinomian and forbidden. Unknown, non-understandable, irrational invoke fear – an evolutionary mechanism of self-protection for any biological being. Fear feeds stress, which should lead to an action, and if the action was successful – to an adaptation and evolvement (compare to “What does not kill me, makes me stronger” by F. Nietzsche). Unlike animals, with social development humans lost the ability to transform fear and stress into a proper action; hence stress became devastating distress, provoking chronic diseases (“diseases of civilization”), leading to premature death. Historically many human societies choose to solve this problem by avoiding the unknown – evoking some sociological equivalent of psychological repression; repression right up to auto-da-fé. The result was simple: no stress – no development; deprivation from the unknown led to general weakness and degradation, both of individuals and society. Thus, for the modern society and culture, sinisterness has become an equivalent for the otherness of Darkness, and any proper initiatory and occult work in the eyes of majority looks sinister, “satanic”, evil. But such Evil is the real root of the Live, the force for expansion and progress; instead of avoiding stress one should seek to face the unknown and transform it into a proper initiatory action. Thus we emphasize: Darkness does initiate and Darkness is the only source of initiation. However, Darkness goes far beyond psychological, social or cultural meanings of sinister things; we would like to repeat, that Darkness is not a simple marginality or a subculture, not a substance or a place. In fact, it can't be defined, its verbal descriptions are always apophatic: everything that can be said of it is a lie and is not true. Initiatory process implies discovery of important properties of Darkness, such as qualities of Taoistic xuan tao, Buddhistic sunyata and santana; quantum non-local (non-)existence etc. Darkness cannot be comprehended by the mind in any rational way: its properties are “non-qualities”; only initiatory interaction with it is possible. Such an interaction represents a crucial part of occult work and, in the result, leads to the deification. 21
PASSIONARITY Passionarity is the Will desiring to be embodied (incarnated) in Nature. Such desire is in fact an expansion of the Self; it is also called alchemic projection and represents the triumph of the opus magnum. Facing Darkness causes initial shock and chaos, but as time passes, the initiated starts to feel a tranquil satisfaction – a potent sense arising from the internal Darkness. Alchemy claims in this regard: nigredo is followed by albedo. However, such satisfaction is just a stage of a proper occult work. On a much profound level, a strong Will should arise from the dark abyss, from the understanding of its own emptiness (sunyata and xuan tao, briefly described above). Such Will is grounded in passion, multiple ambivalent emotions, arising from unconsciousness, directed towards expansion. This passion requires to develop the Self further; to project its Will upon the world; it manifests in what alchemy calls rubedo: a work in royal purple, a triumph of the Will united with the Nature in an act of Love. While opus magnum is a multi-staged process with nigredo, albedo and rubedo as its integral parts, the seeds of passionarity can be felt from the very beginning, at least by those, who feel their satanic nature. The whole opus is not a sequence, but rather a fractal spiral, with main stages not only repeating each other on a new level, but also being nested into each other. Thus, even initial awakening of the own Self and discovery of one's Will quickly manifests as passionarity, for instance in form of desire to evolve. Passionarity works in both directions: into the deep of microcosm – the world inside, and outside, into macrocosm – our culture & civilization. The climax for such passionarity is deification. Passionarity is strongly connected with the other Satanic Keystones. Speaking figuratively, the Will, awakened from Darkness, develops throughout the occult initiatory work towards the desire for deification. According to Hermetic principles, a deity we are seeking to 22
become cannot be separated from the world: it is a deity of the world, not outside of it. As Satan sometimes is titled the Prince of this World and as pagan deities were rulers for the world of man, the same way a deity evolving as a result of opus magnum has to influence, change and define the world, human culture and civilization. Our culture is our environment, and we can not develop without changing it. Thus, passionarity can be called the expansionistic projection of the Will. Individuation is a process contrary to suicidal and self-destructive behavior, which is quite frequent among so-called “dark” cults and their adherents. While initiation might sometimes significantly impact the human psyche and lead to destructive trends we would like to emphasize: self-destruction is unacceptable in Satanism. Initiation might be only mistakingly seen as contradictory with self-preservation; this contradiction becomes superficial if we look at the dynamic process of initiation. While in order to expand the occultist takes initiatory risks and puts at stake the sense of wholesomeness, undergoing what is called philosophical death, strong passionarity forces satanist to stand up and rebuild himself each time. Thus, we regularly shatter our worldview to pieces, but gain back renewed.
23
DEIFICATION Individuation – the development of the Self – is one of the most important values in Satanism. The process of individuation implies discovery and development of a person’s potential to its fullest – even beyond limitations of the human life itself. Being rooted in Darkness, an occultist is able to continue his existence into a non-local form, much beyond the life of human ego and mortal psyche; transforming the individual Will into a quality and force of nature, becoming a novel deity, a part of the fractal Pantheon. How this can be possible? The complexity of the topic does not allow one to describe it in a brief essay, and, in fact, it could be only comprehended through a proper initiatory practice. Some samples can be taken from the self-generation practices in Tantric Buddhism or from Taoist alchemists, who practiced methods that strengthen the body as much as the consciousness, seeking to live longer and healthier lives and ultimately to transcend physical mortality. This desire to preserve the Self and to transcend personal limits is the link between the Oriental alchemy of immortality and the Western alchemy of the Philosopher’s stone. It is also the same passion that fuels the trans-humanists who are looking forward to cyborgization and fusing the human mind with a computer. On a significantly simplified level, deification could be also illustrated by cases from the human history. The deification of heroes is a well-known phenomenon: most of the deities, even those embodying abstract notions and natural phenomena, are rooted in the names and images of heroes and high priests of the past – like physical laws or math theorems are named after scientists who had discovered them. Deeds that transcend the limits of common understanding tend to have an effect that goes beyond mere social recognition: humans become deified and have a mythology built around them. With this in mind, let us remember the hermetic homo factor deorum est: deities are created by men. Since the lives of such deified people were 24
shaped by more generic principles that they embodied – Death, Love, War etc. – they was also seen as embodiment of these principles in flesh. Those people not only become deities in their own right, but also are seen as avatars of other, more established deities, like in a fractal. In a process of theurgy, the world around those people was also changing according to the principles that they embodied. Satanism offers occult and real-world ways for such theurgy, the work of deification. A fully developed potential is embodied in an occultist’s deeds and changes the world in many ways. These deeds become non-local, i.e. they become a self-sustaining power partially independent of the physical entity of the occultist. For example, Jack Parsons was an influential occultist, whose path towards individuation and immortality included major contributions to rocket science and space exploration. These contributions have helped to keep his name, his views and his Will alive until now. Just like occultists use symbols and sigils to direct energies, individuation needs to be embodied and anchored in something material and needs to have practical results that affect the world on a greater scale. Flying spaceships are indeed such a practical result, something that will live on. However, as we said in the beginning, the real deification being grounded in a social heritage and impacting on civilization goes much beyond that.
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THE PROGRESS The path to deification is based on how the person impacts the real world. Progress, both in science & technology and as a development of humanitarian arts, can also be viewed as a path of the collective Great Work for humanity. It is an attempt to change the nature of things and create new things that have never been before. Telephones are no less an achievement than telepathy and robots are not inferior to golems. Literature, paintings and music masterpieces can bring exaltation and insights no worse than meditation and religious texts. By their nature, sciences and arts are often perceived as a sacred and sinister activity in myths and in everyday life. Many key cultural inventions are attributed to rebellious and darker deities, such as for example Prometheus and the Fallen. One aspect of individuation that is often overlooked is the broadness of the person’s views, the capacity to comprehend complex things, to notice the system that is behind the details. This quality is often confused with education, intellect or experience, but it is somewhat different. In order to develop this quality, the antique and Renaissance occultists were following a cross-disciplinary approach and looked on the world as a whole, from many angles at once. They liked to mix philosophy and politics, sciences and arts, leisure activities and war. In a similar way we could view Aleister Crowley’s pursue of achievements in mountain climbing, chess or poetry. Occult and scientific research have exactly the same roots: curiosity and desire for knowledge, the call for investigation of the mysteries of the multiverse and for stepping into an unknown territory, in order to transform and create. We highly value progress, technological or of other kinds, since it is the main tool for humanity to expand its horizons, both inner and outer, as a whole. Space travel or cyborgization, genetic engineering or post-Jungian psychology, metal music or gothic novel... results of any scientific research or sincere artistic activity empower individuals and give them more opportunities to expand their Will in the World and within themselves. 26
There were times when science, arts and magic were just three names for the same creative activity, and such understanding was self-evident. When ancient priests observed the night sky, the planets and stars were perceived by them at the same time as deities, omens, symbols and as practical tools e.g. for the farmer's calendar so as to harvest more grain, or for the sailors to find their way at sea. When ancient mathematicians made their discoveries, they were looking at the same time at the mystical meaning of numbers, their visual geometric and acoustic musical significance and at their practical applications for e.g. architecture and trade. There was no true magic without scientific application and no true science without magical insight. This ancient hermetic view, “the music of the spheres”, was lost in the Middle Ages, reestablished briefly in the Renaissance era (with such figures as Leonardo da Vinci), but unfortunately was lost again in the modern days. Too much specialization has damaged the ability of scientists, artists and magicians to study the interconnections and all implications of what they are doing. Thus, we feel it is important to work on the restoration of this wholesome view of the world. From the initiatory point of view, progress is a direct projection of the passionarity: embodying the Will for the evolvement into the world leads to the development of world itself. Progress is just a macrocosmic equivalent for the evolving complexity of the Self on its way towards deification; the fall into the depths of the Self has to be accompanied by the rise of civilization towards the stars.
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ANTI-PATTERNS
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here are some practices and beliefs that block human capacity to develop or lead to significant failures in the occult path. We call such things antipatterns that should be avoided. These are: stigmatization, overcentralization and enclosing. Stigmatization of dark, unknown, irrational elements leads to counter-initiation; any monotheistic religion is a common example of this. Another issue with monotheism is related to claims about “the only true god” and “the only truth” – we call it anti-pattern of overcentralization. Overcentralization opposes multiplicity, fractality and complexity of the real world. Last, but not least: any human must maintain the proper link with the environment, a form of feedback. Such feedback will not allow us to become detached from reality: “pipe dreaming“ is a common disease between so-called esotericists and magicians. Dogmatization (another unfortunate property of many religions), inability to hear others, to see the consequences of one's own actions and take responsibility leads to an inability to adapt and fails development. We name this anti-pattern enclosing, and we strongly oppose it in both practical and dogmatic sense. These anti-patterns are the result of different forms of psychological repression, thus they diminish the ability to interact with Darkness, and thus make proper initiation and occult work impossible.
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THIRTEEN
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e already have emphasized that Satanism means development of the Self – much beyond any restrictions and bounds of the common life. However, development is frequently misunderstood as an “endless cycle”. Such vision is rooted in ancient observations on the daily and annual cycles of the Sun and planets; through the past centuries it has become a tradition (see for instance the concept of the cyclic pralaya in Hinduism): it prevailed in the Middle Ages and it is present in modern cultural imagery. In this regard, modern esotericism frequently takes twelve as a symbol for such closed cycle (twelve months, twelve hours of the clock, twelve Zodiacal sings) or completeness (the twelve apostles, twelve Olympic gods, twelve knights of the round table or twelve members of the jury). To oppose this “meme” of the cyclic development and twelve as its symbol, we add another step to the cycle, breaking Ouroboros and unwrapping into an endless exponential spiral. This is a fractal spiral of development towards complexity, where the end becomes a totally new beginning, materia finita becomes materia prima of a new Great Work and not of the same one. And to be precise, the Sun during its annual path in fact crosses 13 (not 12!) celestial constellations, which are not equivalent but have a different size: the concept of 12 equal Zodiacal signs is simply contrived. There are also 13 lunar months in a calendar year: twelve of Lunar months are complete and the thirteenth is “incomplete” – it crosses the boundary between years and continues into a new year. This strongly signifies the “spiral” nature of time, rather than a cyclical return to the previous status quo. Thereby, thirteen become a numeric symbol for natural and real development, which has the form of a repeated spiral process, not a cyclical closing. It is also important that the collective unconscious felt such significance of 13 and already attributed a rich cross-cultural meaning to this number, linked with the moon, women’s magic, omens, etc – well in line with the cultural background of Satanism (see Frazier, King of the Bean, and the Festival of 29
Fools and Thompson, The thirteenth number: Then, there/here and now. for a review). Here are some examples: ꩜
Hades, the dark god of the underworld, was sometimes considered as the 13th Olympian god. Also, at times a mortal that has ascended to immortality, like Dionysus or Hercules, was considered as the 13th Olympian god. This approach emphasizes the potential of human heroes for deification.
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The number 13 is associated with Loki, the trickster of the Norse pantheon, who engineered the murder of god Balder and arrived as an uninvited 13th guest at his funeral feast.
꩜
The end of the Mayan calendar’s 13th baktun was superstitiously feared as a harbinger of the apocalyptic 2012 phenomenon.
꩜
A common western belief is that Friday the 13th is an unlucky day; a fear to have 13 guests at a party; to live on the 13th floor; to take the 13th bus etc.
꩜
There are 13 menstrual cycles and 13 Lunar months in a solar year. Women menstruation and moon cycles are associated with witchery and considered “unclean” in many cultures from ancient times till our days.
꩜
According to Christian beliefs, Judas – the “13th apostle” – handed Jesus over to the Roman government, which led to the crucifixion.
Thus, thirteen becomes a great cross-cultural symbol, not directly related to any specific tradition or anti-tradition (while 666 is clearly attributed to Christianity and anti-Christianity only). It also has an important natural, astrological meaning (see about the Lunar cycles above) and becomes a perfect symbol for Satanism as a post-modern, natural, cross-cultural phenomenon.
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