The Temple of Set I Read online

  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

  - 18 -

  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?

  - 19 -

  (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.

  - 20 -

  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

  Actions With Spirits, a 1659 facsimile reprint, at a little occult store in San Pedro, California. The

  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.

  - 21 -

  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