practical relevance he saw in existing occult organizations, he decided that he would have to start
one of his own to remedy the problem.
In the early 1960s, therefore, he began to conduct “midnight magic seminars” at his home in
San Francisco’s Richmond District. By 1965 these had coalesced into a formal “Magic Circle”.
The success of this Circle prompted him to found the Church of Satan on Walpurgisnacht (April
30) of 1966, which henceforth became known as the Year I Anno Satani (AS).
Initially the Church remained a local organization. Group rituals were held Friday midnights,
while during the week Anton gave lectures and taught classes to aspiring Witches and Warlocks.
This fascinating and controversial organization won its share of publicity around the country
and abroad, and soon many curious individuals were writing to San Francisco to find out how
they too could become Satanists. In 1970 Anton published the Satanic Bible to summarize the
basic tenets of his philosophy.
The Satanic Bible did not portray Satan and his fellow dæmons as actual “supernatural”
beings, but rather as symbols and metaphors for hedonistic self-indulgence. Other religions in
general - and Christianity in particular - were not considered to be deadly foes; instead they were
mocked and dismissed as sanctimonious and hypocritical frauds.
The Satanic Bible went on, however, to promise results from the practice of simplified and
standardized magical rituals. Such rites invoked Satan as well as various other gods and dæmons
from many mythological traditions, appealing for and/or commanding their aid in curses,
seductions, cures, and the like.
There was thus an oddly-inconsistent feature to the Church of Satan’s philosophy: On one
hand it professed psychodramatic atheism, while on the other it assumed the literal existence of
dæmonic personages with the ability to hear invocations and the disposition to respond to
evocations.
By 1970 Anton LaVey and his wife Diane had begun to feel the strain of endless hospitality, so
a decision was made to cease most of the activities at their home in favor of sponsoring local
units or “Grottos” of the Church elsewhere in the United States. From 1971 to 1975 the Church
thus consisted of a San Francisco headquarters plus some five to ten Grottos in various
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metropolitan areas. The Church rose from an initial San Francisco membership of about 50 to a
nationwide average of about 300 through 1975. There was a turnover of perhaps 30% per year,
reflecting the casual, fickle attitude of many of the lower-level members.
By 1973 Grottos had been organized in San Francisco, Santa Cruz/San Jose, Los Angeles,
Denver, Dayton, Detroit, New York, Louisville, and Washington, D.C. Like the membership-at-
large, these tended to be unstable, short-lived groups, surviving and prospering only as long as a
charismatic Grotto Leader was in office.
By 1975 Anton LaVey, having presided over nine years of mercurial individuals and Grottos,
reluctantly concluded that, while the philosophy of Satanism had lost none of its popular appeal,
the Church of Satan itself was largely a failure. A small, stable nucleus of serious and sincere
devotees had indeed developed, but for the most part the Church had served to attract merely
fad-followers, egomaniacs, and assorted oddballs whose primary interest in becoming
“Satanists” lay in being able to flash their membership cards for cocktail-party notoriety. Anton
decided that the Church might as well be converted to a vehicle for his personal financial benefit,
hence in May of 1975 he announced a decision to sell the Satanic Priesthood and all higher
degrees for funds or objects of value.
Upon founding the Church, Anton had claimed for himself the titles of High Priest of Satan
and Magus of the Age of Satan. By 1969 he had begun to ordain others to the Satanic Priesthood
(the Priesthood of Mendes), and in 1970 he formalized an initiatory structure of five degrees:
Satanist I°, Warlock/Witch II°, Priest/Priestess of Mendes III°, Magister IV°, and Magus V°.
Advancement to the II° was based upon a fairly basic examination concerning the contents of the
Satanic Bible, but Anton was extremely strict concerning ordination to the Priesthood. Perhaps
twenty individuals attained the III° between 1966 and 1975, while during the same period Anton
conferred only four IV°s - one of which upon myself.
Anton’s 1975 decision to sell the degrees confounded the nucleus of sincere Satanists, myself
included, who saw in it a critical corruption of the very institution whose incorruptibility and
condemnation of hypocrisy had made it so refreshing and exhilarating.
Attempting to reform the Church was impossible; Anton had incorporated it under his
exclusive, personal control in 1971, a time when none of us had remotely anticipated his 1975
decision. Our only option was to leave. By mid-June 1975, therefore, virtually the entire
nationwide Priesthood of the Church had resigned en masse. The Church of Satan as a viable,
functional organization was dead, save that the LaVeys continued to use the corporate name and
image for private gain as a “business partnership”, a status upon which they formally agreed by
contract in 1985.
In 1988 Diane [LaVey] Hegarty sued Anton to dissolve the business and divide its assets
between the two of them, and this was so ordered by the San Francisco Superior Court on
October 28, 1991. Anton subsequently filed for bankruptcy for himself and the Church of Satan,
and the U.S. Bankruptcy Court so ordered, under the dissolution Chapter 7 of U.S. bankruptcy
law, on April 29, 1993. Legally as well as essentially and organizationally, therefore, the Church
of Satan no longer exists, though continuing attempts to exploit its name might pretend
otherwise.
As is detailed in The Church of Satan, three tensions and dilemmæ inherent in that
institution came to what might be called “critical Black Mass” by 1975. All were the inevitable, if
initially neither anticipated nor appreciated consequence of the Church’s increasing
sophistication as it evolved beyond old stereotypes of metaphysics and magic:
(1) Was the Church of Satan theistic or atheistic?
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(a) Did it believe in Satan and his fellow dæmons as actual intelligent, active,
willful entities extant in time and space? Or did it disbelieve in the
existence of such beings [along with the Judæo-Christian God], and just
use them for spooky window-dressing in rituals that were merely
imaginative psychodramas?
(b) In this same vein, was there perhaps a “two-tiered” attitude within the
Church, whereby its High Priest and Priesthood indeed privately believed
in Satan and other dæmons, while at the same time presenting to the
public an attitude of atheistic satire? Per this interpretation, ordinary
members of the Church were initially/generally treated much as the
public, yet selectively introduced to the deeper, true metaphysics as they
might show themselves capable of understanding and accepting it.
(2) The original Church of Satan in San Francisco had been inaugurated, part
seriously, part whimsically, by Anton Szandor LaVey in 1966 as largely a personal
vehicle for advertisement and profit, based upon his
colorful personality, extensive
knowledge of the Black Arts and occultism generally, and atmospheric house in
which to give lectures, hold meetings, and perform rituals. However, as over the
years the Church expanded beyond San Francisco, through individuals and groups
having little or no direct exposure to these specific original allures, it began to
become more of an impersonal institution united by common beliefs and ideas. Its
focus was indeed Satan; Anton was revered as his High Priest and Earthly deputy
only. Correspondingly the decentralized Church behaved more like a nonprofit
organization than a profitable business.
(3) The more the Church grew, and the more Anton himself became a well-known
popular icon, the more withdrawn and private he became. In part this was
understandably a reaction to years of being iconized, lionized, media-exploited, and
sometimes threatened. He simply became weary of it, exhausted by the demands of
having to constantly keep up his Mephistophelian glamor-image. Unfortunately
this reclusiveness also extended to the Church of Satan itself beyond his old,
familiar entourage in San Francisco. He gradually avoided direct contact with the
more distant membership, which had the dual consequence of forcing them to rely
more on their initiative and increasing his suspicion of their uncontrolled
independence accordingly.
These factors culminated first in Anton’s 1974 “Phase IV” policy paper to the Church, in
which the formal standing and authority of non-entourage Church officials and groups were
weakened in favor of an informal “Movement” whose preferential membership and influence
would once again be Anton’s sole decision. 3 His next, and as it turned out explosive action was to
attempt to destroy the independent significance and structure of the Church’s initiatory degree
system, by also making both the definition and the bestowal of such titles merely his personal
whim. 4
In terms of my personal involvement, The Church of Satan culminated with my June 10, 1975
letter to Anton and Diane LaVey rejecting what I regarded as their critical corruption of the
3 Appendix #116, The Church of Satan.
4 Chapter #35, The Church of Satan.
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Church of Satan, and simultaneous letter to the Church membership announcing my disavowal
of the organization controlled by them. These were followed by many other Satanists’
resignations, either immediately or after waiting to see if Anton LaVey could or would explain
and/or correct his startling policy decisions and announcements.
As copies of these resignations continued to pour into my mailbox, I realized that I was being
looked to to provide some sort of corrective/alternative course of action. Frankly I felt both ill-
qualified and ill-disposed to do this.
For the past six years the Church of Satan had seemed not only unique but indeed
metaphysically sacred to me. I had never regarded it as “just an organization” alongside which
other, similar Satanic churches could just as validly exist. Correspondingly I did not regard
Anton LaVey as simply a charismatic individual or even genius, but as the anointed personal
deputy of Satan himself. I had now spoken in my Magisterial capacity to deny both of these
legitimacies henceforth, but that was not at all the same thing as proposing to personally replace
them.
Beyond that I was grappling with intense personal shock and heartbreak. My association with
Anton and Diane LaVey had become almost as close as to my own parents, and quite obviously
the affection had been mutual. I was bitterly angry and depressed at the circumstances which
had now shattered this relationship. I could only hope that at some, probably distant future time
the LaVeys might come to understand my plight and decision, and even see it as the most
constructive course for the legacy we had all worked so hard those many years to build.
Nevertheless I had to begin thinking about some sort of “reformed Church of Satan” to
replace the corrupted one. To other Satanists I referred to the concept as a “Second Church of
Satan”, although this was only a descriptive term.
And of course the central question remained unanswered. If the Devil had indeed
consecrated the original Church of Satan [and its High Priest], how was I or anyone else to
conclude that he would now transfer this authority to a successor Church?
During my tenure in the Church I had of course practiced both Lesser and Greater Black
Magic5 , the latter much less frequently but also on at least two occasions - the Workings of the
Diabolicon and the Ninth Solstice Message - quite overwhelmingly. Yet beyond a basic
conviction that there was thus something indeed to be said for GBM as a technique, I had by and
large not aggressively explored it. Most of my Church time had been taken up with purely-
administrative responsibilities. On the magical side of things I had indulged myself only in
occasional LBM experiments and some philosophical/historical/theoretical writings in the
Cloven Hoof and personal correspondence. 6
In March 1975, however, after being advised of its existence by Priest Robert Ethel of the
Washington, D.C. Asmodeus Grotto, I tracked down a copy of Meric. Casaubon’s John Dee’s
book looked just like every magician wants a grimoire to look: big, thick, heavy, and leather-
bound. I could hardly wait to “take the original Keys out for a test drive”, and did so that very
evening at one of the old artillery batteries at Fort MacArthur where I had conducted many a Call
to Cthulhu during Army Reserve weekends with the infamous 306th Psychological Operations
5 Lesser Black Magic (LBM) is the influencing of beings, processes, or objects in the Objective Universe (OU) by
the application of obscure physical or behavioral laws. Greater Black Magic (GBM) is the causing of change to
occur in the Subjective Universe (SU) in accordance with the will. This change in the SU may cause a similar and
proportionate change in the OU. GBM involves the summoning of both intensively rational ( dianoia) and
consequently intuitive ( nœsis) concentration of thought. Part II contains a detailed discussion of these concepts.
6 This is fairly extensively documented in The Church of Satan.
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Battalion. 7 The result was nothing short of astonishing. The following day, March 9th, I jotted
down the results:
For the first Working I decided to pronounce the 19th Key, invoking ZIM (the 13th Æthyr).
Cornu required twice before any response.
Then the result: I recall coming, under hazy circumstances, to a large wooden-beamed hall in
which were seated a number of men around a table. I knew them to be the “Secret Chiefs” of the
“White” tradition of whom Aleister Crowley and others have spoken.
I suggested that I might be allowed to join them, sensing that they did not immediately
perceive my identity as a Magister Templi of the Left-Hand Path. But there was some dissent, as
though some of them were wary of me.
Finally I revealed myself as a Magister Templi. They reacted more negatively than before,
donning robes of various colors. I responded by donning my own black/blue robe, whereupon
there was a reaction by them of even stronger dislike. I responded with anger in turn.
There was a violent conflagration, the hall collapsed, and I recall nothing further. 8
This was no mere dream; it was a rational experience, perfectly clear to my normal senses. It
was very “crude”, but then I hardly expected anything polished to come of a first Working with a
new magical system. I drew no particular meaning from the sequence itself; what was significant
to me was the sharpness and clarity of the entire experience - far more so than Workings
conducted with the Crowley Keys in the Equinox or the LaVey Keys in the Satanic Bible.
I decided not to immediately mention this to Anton LaVey. It was hardly politic to recount
such an experiment to the author of the Satanic Bible, at least not until I had explored and
understood it better. Robert Ethel, who himself possessed a copy of the Casaubon volume, would
be a more suitable correspondent. Upon returning to Santa Barbara I wrote him:
In case you thought I passed right over your discovery of the Casaubon reprint mentioned in
your December letter, I did not. But it has taken me this long to locate a copy, inspect it for
accuracy, and form some preliminary conclusions concerning it.
From what I have read in the book so far - coupled with results I have obtained from an
experimental operation with one of the Keys - it is a tremendously powerful text. The secret to its
proper use lies, I believe, in the disassociation of its implications from hybrid/Cabalistic jargon.
This includes the pronouncing of the Keys themselves (which, from Mathers’ time onward, have
been spoken per the letters of the Hebrew alphabet and not according to the simple phonetics
implied by each letter in the text).
There are two general points to be considered. The first is that which I brought out in the
“Caucus Race” article in the Hoof, i.e. that Dee, Kelley, and Casaubon would have been playing
with fire [at the stake] had they not bent over backwards to couch their texts in “good Christian”
terminology. [One could say much the same for John Milton, whose Paradise Lost is an excellent
example of such lip service.]
The second point is that Dee and Kelley were themselves necessarily of a Judaic/Christian