atrociously inadequate by Satanic standards.
Above HL on Aquinas’ hierarchy is Divine Law
(DL), the revealed dictates of El, which HL is
supposed to incorporate and emulate. Above this is
NL, in which humans participate to the extent they
are assumed to be OU constitutions. Atop all this is
Eternal Law (EL), which consists of El’s private
motives and habits for being the sadistic creep that
he is.
In the non-El reality of Satanism, DL does not
exist, because, as Belial notes in the Diabolicon, the
Black Flame endows humanity with its own absolute
prerogative to assign values, including morality
(Good/Evil). NL remains the neteru-established
order of the OU, which does not include morality
[except to the extent that an argument can be made
for ecological balance & regularity being de facto
moral]. EL describes the arbitrary will of the neteru
to be as they are, which is obviously beyond human
concern.
So if HL is incompetent and DL nonexistent,
the Satanist is responsible for ascertaining and
upholding an authentic, compromised standard of
justice: what Plato sought in his Republic Dialogue
as the Agathon.
This is why it is so much more difficult to be a
Satanist than a profane, vulgar human. And why
Satanists are so extraordinary painstaking about
workings that judge and affect others.
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6. Consequences
Whether a ritual is a ceremony or a working,
LBM or GBM, its purpose is to replace ambiguity &
aimlessness into a focused, effective concentration
of intelligence & energy which, once set in motion,
cannot be stopped - in some cases, indeed, even by
the casting-magician personally. Hence the Black
Magical adage: Be certain this is really what you
want, because there is no turning-back.
The “King Midas”, or more contemporarily Dr.
Seuss’ Bartholomew & the Oobleck warning too:
Beware of “unintended consequences”. Preset
careful limits on your workings, lest you conjure
dæmons easier to invite in than to invite out.
7. Black Mass
a. Satanic Rituals:
Missa Solemnis
The “backstory” of the Missa Solemnis Black
Mass in the Satanic Rituals is recounted in
documented detail in my Church of Satan, but can
be summarized here:
The concept of an anti-Catholic Black Mass
originated with J-K. Huysmans’ sensationalurid
potboiler la-Bas125, purporting to expose sordid
125 Huysmans, Joris-Karl, La-Bas (Down There). New York:
Dover, 1972. Actually French Catholics were having
deluridlicious “Black Mass” fantasies about Palladists, who
were a trendy version of non-antiCatholic, non-
babycannibalistic Rosicrucianism. But who cared?
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Satanism among decadent Parisian elites of the late
19th Century. 126
Once the Church of Satan got started,
therefore, Anton LaVey began to be pestered for a
YouKnowWhat, despite the fact that as an ex-Jew he
didn’t harbor any particular passions against
Catholicism.
But there was one Satanic Priest who did:
Wayne F. West, a defrocked Catholic priest in
Detroit. Wayne’s hatred of Christianity in general,
and Catholicism in particular, approached the
pathological, and he was only too happy to take the
Catholic High Mass and rework it into a version that
left la-Bas’ in the dust.
I, assisted by Irish professor Priest James
Moody, was invited to celebrate its premiere
performance at the Central Grotto.
To say that my prudery was “challenged” is an
understatement. I immediately telephoned Diane: “I
can’t possibly do this!” She giggled, clearly not
surprised. “Feel free to edit it.”
So Jim and I got through it with our clothes on
and dignity intact. The only mishap was my
overenthusiastic use of the incendiary flashpowder
in an unmentionable place, eliciting a yowl from her
and a burst of laughter from the assemblage, the
High Priest & Priestess not excluded.
So when it came time to include the Black Mass
in Anton’s Satanic Rituals, there was no way it was
126 This same play has run continuously on Blasphemous
Broadway over the centuries; only the cast has changed - from
Jews to Freemasons to Popists to anarchists to Mormons to
socialists to Nazis to Communists to Satanists to Muslims to
illegal aliens to Illuminati ...
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going to be West’s XXX masterpiece. The PG-13 one
appeared instead. 127
b. Room 101
The [more precisely a] Black Mass is in a class
by itself. Indeed it’s not intrinsically either White or
Black Magic; it’s more of an emotional enema to
permit magic to be commenced.
Within Western cultures, in which Judæo/
Christianity remains the prevalent religious
preconditioning, resistance to and rejection of these
chains occasionally requires the formality and
intensity of a disintoxication ritual: the Black
Mass.
The purpose of any Black Mass is to purge
participants or onlookers of any preconditioned
superstitions to which their enslavement is beyond
reasoned discourse, as a consequence of old
superstitions or indoctrinations.
Once one has seen his sacred cows trampled
upon with impunity, he will never again feel the
same fear of them, no matter how pro forma he
recognizes the desecration to have been:
The liberation of the human mind has never
been furthered by dunderheads; it has been
furthered by gay fellows who heaved dead cats into
sanctuaries and then went roistering down the
highways of the world, proving to all men that
doubt, after all, was safe - that the god in the
sanctuary was finite in his power and hence a
fraud. One horselaugh is worth ten thousand
127 If you just can’t stand it, the unexpurgated WW original is
reproduced as Appendix #7 of my The Church of Satan. Shame
on you!
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syllogisms. It is not only more effective; it is also
vastly more intelligent. 128
Substantially more chillingly George Orwell
illustrates a secular version of the Black Mass in
1984, wherein the magician O’Brien forces his
subject Winston Smith to “trample upon the sacred
cow” of his love for Julia. Although Winston
recognizes that unendurable psychological terror
was used on him, he nonetheless finds himself
unable to recapture his original illusion of self-
sacrificial love for her.
Julia, put through a similar “Black Mass”
incorporating differently-personalized elements of
emotional impasse,
experiences the same disruption
of her illusions:
“Sometimes,” she said [to Winston], “they
threaten you with something - something you can’t
stand up to, can’t even think about. And then you
say, ‘Don’t do it to me, do it to somebody else, do it
to so-and-so.’ And perhaps you might pretend,
afterwards, that it was only a trick and that you
just said it to make them stop and didn’t really
mean it. But that isn’t true. At the time when it
happens, you do mean it. You think there’s no
other way of saving yourself, and you’re quite
ready to save yourself that way. You want it to
happen to the other person. You don’t give a damn
what they suffer. All you care about is yourself.”
“All you care about is yourself,” he echoed.
“And after that you don’t feel the same
toward the other person any longer.”
“No,” he said, “you don’t feel the same.” 129
128 Mencken, H.L., “The Iconoclast” in Prejudices: Fourth
Series. New York: Knopf, 1924, pages #139-40.
129 Orwell, George, 1984. New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co.,
1949, page #240.
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In 1984 every “Room 101” ritual was tailored to
each subject’s personal, unique “sacred cow”.
Similarly each religious Black Mass is
configured to dispel the most crippling terrors of
the indoctrinated faith. Hence a Black Mass for a
Mormon would be quite different from that for a
Muslim or Buddhist.
The Black Mass principle was brought forward
into the “mind-control brainwashing” of Cold War
conspiracy theory by John Frankenheimer’s
Manchurian Candidate (1962), in which a Korean
War soldier has been “brainwashed” to obey
commands upon seeing the Queen of Diamonds
playing card:
Raymond Shaw (Laurence Harvey): They
can make me do anything, Ben, can’t they?
Anything.
Major Bennett Marco (Frank Sinatra): We’ll
see what they can do, and we’ll see what we can
do. So the red queen is our baby. Well, take a look
at this, kid: 52 of them! 52 red queens and I are
telling you it’s over. The links, the beautifully
conditioned links are smashed as of now because
we say so. We’re busting up the joint, we’re
tearing out all the wires. We're busting it up so
good all the queen’s horses and all the queen’s
men will never put old Raymond back together
again. You don’t work any more. That’s an
order. Anybody invites you to a game of solitaire,
you tell them sorry, buster, the ball game is over.
It is important to note that a Black Mass in no
way seeks to re-indoctrinate its subject with any
other belief-system; it is a chain-breaking
experience only.
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B. Chamber
The term “chamber” usually brings to mind a
room or hall customized for ritual purposes and
activities: Wall-mounted Sigil of Baphomet behind
an altar large & stable enough to contain not only
instruments but a “living altar” perched atop,
seating & open working areas, and accessories as
needed [such as sound system].
There is nothing wrong with a traditional
chamber, but what’s important here is that you
understand exactly what its function is: first, to
provide a human sensory disconnect between the
realm of physical stimulus/response reality and one
in which the physical senses are either muted or
controlled by inputs of your own decision, such that
they all serve to focus and enhance the mental state
you wish to attain and sustain.
Secondly the sensation that whenever you are
in the chamber, the outside world is set aside and
everything now surrounding you, reflecting you,
represents your SU. wherein you are the controlling
deity.
This does not change for rituals in which others
are present as participants or guests, except as you
may decide to modify aspects of the chamber
environment for them. This may be as simple as just
the inclusion of additional chairs, or as complex as a
redesign, time rescheduling, etc. As always, where
others are concerned, their respect for the sanctity
and reality of the chamber is vital; if anyone falters,
he must exit immediately to wait elsewhere.
An amusing personal experience will serve to
illustrate the importance of chamber atmosphere
establishment. My first visit to the LaVey home in
1969 was to hear one of Anton’s public lectures.
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These were given in the main ritual chamber, where
audience-chairs had been set up. Interestingly
ordinary folding chairs are so incidental that their
presence or absence is not a significant atmospheric
disruption.
Entering the room, I was immediately struck by
its creation of a SU utterly divorced from “normal
San Francisco” - just beyond the shuttered windows,
but suddenly a universe away. It was exciting but
also disturbing; I was suddenly cast adrift in a
“magical elsewhere” in which I had no foothold, no
sensory reassurances of a “comfort distance”. This
lecturer might enter, wave his hand, and transform
us all into rabbits! Yes, an absurdity here/now, but
not there/then.
My frantic search for “normalcy” now landed
my gaze on the Wurlitzer organ console ... and there,
sitting unobtrusively on it, was one of the sculptured
glass ashtrays from the Franciscan restaurant on
Fisherman’s Wharf.
The spell was shattered, and I breathed a sigh
of relief. The infamous Anton Szandor LaVey might
be an incarnate fiend from Hell, but he was human
enough to abscond with a souvenir ashtray. I knew I
would leave the lecture alive [and with small pink
ears instead of large furry ones].
As you conceive and create your own ritual
chamber(s), you will become well-aware of the
atmospheric-disconnection, particularly if you have
the space to set it completely apart from normal
rooms or areas. Even if it shares space, the
commencement of a ritual will accomplish this
proportionately.
You will also notice how very alien this is to the
atmosphere of any conventional church, which
might as well be a schoolroom or concert hall.
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As a Black Magician you will also learn
something else about consecrated Satanic ritual
chambers: they don’t like being violated. Any
profane person who intentionally or accidentally
enters will get that feeling often described as
“someone walking on your grave” - and leave with a
shudder. 130 No, profane churches don’t get this perk
either; enjoy!
C. Instruments
The original Satanic Bible discusses various
&nb
sp; implements traditionally used for concentration,
emphasis, and ritual stage-demarcation: candles,
sword, bell, Black Flame, Baphomet emblem, not to
mention the SB itself if you forget yourself at a
crucial moment and need to look something up in a
hurry (!).
As indeed with the chamber itself (a “large
instrument”), specific items are up to you; feel free
to ad/delete as feels right.
Again a suggestion from my own and others’
experience: Don’t even bother with generic/mass-
produced anythings. Craft it yourself, receive it as a
magical gift, or discover it under magical
circumstances. In addition to the magical meaning
these have for you, if consecrated for magical use,
130 This is a function of the Khabit MindStar emanation,
Chapter #13.C.3, page #196. The Khabit has the capacity to
impress an OU locale with a T- or L-Field “signature”: what
humans actually encounter as “ghosts”, “haunted houses”, etc.
The Khabit is unique in that it can “disconnect” from the core
MindStar for such distant activities. It is for this same reason
that a Khabit-encounter can be dangerous; unlike a Ka, it is
not a seat of personality, hence does not distinguish friend
from foe in a “signature” vigilance.
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they also carry the “signature” of your MindStar if
passed meaningfully to someone else. 131
D. Attire
Ritual dress once again varies with both
personal style and the flavor of the ritual to be
performed. As previously, respect for the underlying
dignity of all Satanic ritual is axiomatic. This does
not always translate to tuxedos and evening gowns,
but duly to good taste, cleanliness, and pride.
The 1966-75 Church of Satan had a simple but
strict dress code for formal rituals, such as the
Satanic Mass or ceremonies of baptism or
Priesthood ordination:
Robes were black, with blue & purple trim for
the IV° & V° respectively.
2” Baphomet medallions of the individual’s
degree color to be worn on dignified, discrete chains,
uncluttered with any other device.
The Baphomet colors were: Satanist I° red,
Witch/Warlock II° white, Priest/Priestess III° black,
Magister/Magistra IV° blue, and Magus/Maga V°
purple.
Anton LaVey officially ended the Church’s
initiatory-degree system in 1975, simultaneously