Wikipedia: Satanism/Talk

Imporant: before doing any writing on this topic, please see the extremely well written and researched essay on this topic at the Religious Tolerance website. It is essential reading. RK http://www.religioustolerance.org/satanism.htm

RK: That article is reasonably well written, and mostly accurate. It also spends a lot of time discussing what is not satanism. That brings up a question we need to explore concerning the satanism article here -- how much time/space/effort should we spend exploring what is not satanism but mistakenly called satanism? (Bal)

SJK: Sorry I didn't see your Nov 10 questions/comments earlier.

SJK> Balanone: You deleted the mention of the distinction between "modern" and "traditional" Satanism. Why?

Only because it's highly questionable whether there is any "traditional" Satanism. It's fairly easy to track examples of literary Satanism (eg: Huysmans' La Bas), and we can find things which various occultists like Aleister Crowley and Eliphas Levi borrowed from literary Satanism, but there's no reliable evidence that any tradition of Satanism really existed (most people now consider the claims of the Inquisition and related witch hunts to be horribly unreliable). Are you aware of any evidence which has escaped my notice?

: There are many thousands of Satanists in the USA who certainly do worship the Christian concept of Satan in this fashion...but they are not members of any organized church. As for the official organized churches that do promote worship of Satan, they have a non-Chrisitian definition of the term Satan. Thus, calling them Satanists may be misleading. Nonetheless, since they choose to call themselves Satanists, we have to call them that. They just willingly cause society to hate them because of their pervese desire to be called "Satanists". That's their choice. RK

: Are there many thousands of Satanists in the USA who certainly do worship the Christian concept of Satan? Where are they? What documentation do we have that they exist? The religioustolerance.org article you point us to above doesn't mention them. The closest they come is when they describe "There are tens or hundreds of thousands of rebellious young people in North America who briefly dabble in a form of Satanism. Their source material is often in the books by LaVey?, perhaps supplemented by writings about Gothic Satanism by Evangelical or Fundamentalist Christian authors. Sometimes, they will also include elements from books on ceremonial Magick, Wicca or other Neopagan religions in their practices." These are the "adolescents" described currently in our article here. Perhaps that can be expanded to include some of this description. But I've seen no evidence that there are thousands of people who worship the Christian concept of Satan. Can you point us to any?

: These are precisely the people I am referring to! They appear in police reports in newspapers from all states, from time to time. Their statements (when any are reported) always make it clear that their concept of Satan is definately Christian. The fact that they happen to be reading one of Anton Levay's books is of little import, because most people haven't the slightest clue of the philosophical differences between the two different Satan-concepts. When an drug taking, alcohol drinking American teenager sees a book on worshipping Satan, and decided to read from it, he is following Christian Satanism, not the highly technical pseudo-naturalistic philosophy of Anton Levay and his college educated peers. These kids are really Satanists in the classical sense of the term, and they sometimes exist in groups of 3 to 7 to over a dozen. Not many, but over the nation, they add up. I don't think that they are important in any statistical sense, but they are worth mentioning. RK

: So, would it be reasonable to add a statement like I draft below (3 paragraphs), perhaps after the discussion of traditional/modern Satanism, and before the mention of Gnostic sects?

: The philosophical and religious Satanists claim to be adamantly law-abiding, for reasons which vary by group. However, the people who are "rebellious" Satanists adopt the Christian dogma that Satan and Satanists are inherently evil, and therefore illegal activities within those groups are common.

: These latter can often be found carrying or owning books by LaVey?, but more often than not they are only slightly familiar with the philosophical contents of the books. They are more swayed by writings and legends of literary Satanism, or by writings decrying the hypothetical worst of Satanism written by Evangelical or Fundamentalist Christian authors. These are the Satanists that occasionally appear in police reports and in newspapers from time to time. Their statements (when any are reported) always make it clear that their concept of Satan is definitely Christian, rather than that of the latter two groups above. These latter Satanists sometimes gather in small groups (almost always fewer than a dozen), and are sometimes solitary (not part of any group).

: It is important to note that the theories of large networks of organized Satanists involved in illegal activities, murder, and child abuse which were floated during the SRA scare of the late 1900's has been thoroughly disproven, and such theories continue to be held only by the most extreme evangelists and fundamentalists, by those whose careers and finances benefit from maintaining such theories, and by those who believe excessively in conspiracy theories.

: Sounds very good to me! RK

SJK> Also, I've never heard of a distinction between "religious" and "philosophical" Satanism. I understand what you are getting at, but (unless I misunderstand what you are saying) a lot of people would classify "philosophical" Satanism as just a different type of religious Satanism.

Philosophical Satanists do not believe in Satan, and are often atheists. I don't see how they can be classified as religious. These are now the majority of the membership of the Church of Satan, which loudly proclaims its atheism (as do most of its members).

SJK> As for the "Rebellious Christian" type you refer to, can you point to any actual examples of them, except maybe as an overlap with the "Rebellious Adolescent"? (And, to be neutral, a lot of people would argue that all Satanists are "rebellious Christians", although they may deny it.)

Definitely there is an overlap between them and the rebellious adolescent. Many of these continue well past what most people call adolescence. There are a couple of examples that can be seen on the alt.satanism newsgroup, a number have tried to gain admittance to the Temple of Set under the wrong impression that it would be a suitable group for such people, and I've heard stories from various Pagans about such people they have run into. This is probably an open question, partly dependent on how someone defines "adolescent."

As for neutrality, there are many Satanists (a numerous minority) whose religious background is not Christian (or who have no religious background), and therefore they can't be rebellious Christians.

SJK> Also, some distinction should be made between Satanism and demonolatry. And some mention of Satanic Ritual Abuse and "psychopathic Satanists" (individuals who use satanism as a cover or excuse for criminal activity). -- SJK

Recently saw a page on demonalatry, so that's been done. Agreed: there should be an article discussing the SRA hysteria (more a hysteria and scam than anything involving Satanists). Yes, there should probably be some discussion somewhere of psychopaths and/or criminals who use satanism as a cover or excuse for their criminal activity (I'd rather they weren't called "psychopathic Satanists," since they are almost universally psychopathic criminals who just happen to use satanic trappings as part of their M-O).

I'll revisit the article from time to time, adding some of these mentions based on research (digging things out of my archives) as I figure out how to say them from NPOV.

Balanone: I agree the division into 'modern' and 'traditional' Satanists is very questionable, but it is a classificiation I have encountered several times before. Maybe we should call them "so-called 'traditional'".

Secondly, most of the Church of Satan may not view themselves as religious, but most outsiders (i.e. religion researchers) classify them as religious satanists, even though they are well aware they don't believe in a literal Satan or any other deity. The practice of magick classifies them as religious, at least according to some (though I admit not all) definitions of religion. -- SJK

I've added a statement to the article for that last point. Did I cover it adequately?

I dislike the term "so-called" (anything), unless you can also state why these so-called whatevers are not whatever. So, if there are so-called traditional Satanists, then we need to explore a) what is a traditional satanist, and b) why do or don't these people we're discussing qualify under that term.

Would something along the lines of this draft paragraph come close to explaining this?

: Some studies of satanism mention a category of "traditional satanists". However, it is questionable whether there is any "traditional" Satanism. It is fairly easy to track examples of literary Satanism (eg: Huysmans' La Bas), and various occultists like Aleister Crowley and Eliphas Levi borrowed some of their symbolism and activity from literary Satanism, but there does not seem to be any reliable evidence that any tradition of Satanism really existed (most people now consider the claims of the Inquisition and related witch hunts to be horribly unreliable).