© fra Necros
While the author did not explain the meaning of the painting, the viewer might sense the invitingness behind something seemingly horrific and formidable.
“I have seen the dark universe yawning – where the black planets roll without aim, where they roll in their horror unheeded, without knowledge, or lustre, or name. … Oh, great was the sin of my spirit, and great is the reach of its doom; not the pity of Heaven can cheer it, nor can respite be found in the tomb: down the infinite aeons come beating the wings of unmerciful gloom.” – H. P. Lovecraft, Nemesis
Why would one choose to revere Satan as their master, to see him as their God? By adoring, worshiping, and deifying Satan, one dedicates their reverence and love towards an archetype who unveils all aspects of reality, emphasizing the challenging and most painful sides of manifestation. Therefore, Satan is a deity who presents us with the potential to find Truth, which can only be pursued by understanding that which transcends conventional awareness.
The apparent existence of suffering and evil in this wholeness of being is presented through an assortment of dark masks. The challenges presented by these masks exist within us all; they are initiatory challenges for us to overcome. Students of the authentic path may very well sense and have faith that after we can see behind these masks, we can find the most worthwhile thing a human being can reach for. In order to uphold this kind of conviction, the adept has to realize the conclusion of the absoluteness of everything. Everything has to represent and be part of one whole. Nothing can exist outside of this whole. But is it ever possible to understand everything belonging to this whole with our limited senses?
“This sole divine life is behind good and evil, light and darkness; it transcends the antithesis; it is the bottomless void in which all is immersed; it is the unmanifested from which everything is manifested; it is the absolute and includes all contraries. This absolute is responsible for the potentiality for manifesting evil, as it is responsible for manifesting good.”1
Cosmic horror is the challenge the adept can overcome when facing all the dirt, filth and undesirable, excluded and repulsive. Why is the world evil? Putting aside or accepting evil on a whim is a mistake. And for an occultist, blindly bypassing these challenges and not carefully and devoutly working through them will result in pathological half-truths that would inevitably need to be worked through and purified sooner or later. When we understand that Unity must abide by its own laws in accord with its harmony, we know that the absolute can’t be pointless, mindless or without meaning.
But, our own divisive, dualistic, conceptualizing perception, which is tied to material, can clearly see that even if the laws of the absolute are genuine, we still must be honest with ourselves when we face the world. Our experience seems to be defined by violence and rupture, diverging from harmony, and we know this is obvious and real based on our experience. In light of this experience, we still should not sink into despair in the face of this cosmic madness. It’s a mistake to conclude that the absolute could break its own laws. In the transcended perspective of the wholeness of the absolute, evil does not exist. Yet, in the human experience, evil is real, and thus we can’t escape the challenge of it. This rational conclusion of unity and evil can have a sacred meaning for a satanist, a promise of meaning behind the paradox — Satan’s invitation to explore and finally, even if through aeons, to unveil. We know reality is beyond our (for now) limited comprehension. It transcends ideas and dualism; it is the all-encompassing presence of divine archetypes. And Satan, sublime master, the challenger, lord of the world, is the most sacred of them all.
” … As ethical human beings, we can understand that it requires great abnegation for one to renounce everything in order to give their creative power to beings that they love, beings yearning to learn and evolve, letting them abuse it in their ignorance. …The virtue and wisdom possessed by our terrific lord of the world, Satan, is given for others to direct and master. …We have been given this planet of Earth as a training school, and we, as the virtuous beings of this world, represent that virtue of our planetary deity, Satan.“2
We don’t see the evil of the world as the work of Satan, nor that suffering would manifest based on the will of any high deity. Satan is not evil. Our form of satanism recognizes that we can’t have faith in any delusional form of a benevolent god, and we don’t accept any concept of the absolute working maliciously, bound to time and space. As the absolute transcends everything, it is the cause of all evil, but it is only seemingly malicious, and never in the perspective of all-encompassing unity. Satan is the holder of Truth, who presents it behind all aching, imbalanced, and misguided phenomena. Our task is to go through this challenge, to realize the secrets of the spirit so that we can evolve through righteousness and compassion.
Thus, we can understand that the conviction of the satanist requires utmost love and devotion to this deity, who is the most beautiful and sublime essence. Satan works through paradoxes, never directly presenting their bright face to us. But, in secret, this brightness caresses us while we make an effort to seek the Truth.
1. Pekka Ervast, Pahan voittaminen – Tämä ainoa jumalainen elämä on sekä hyvän että pahan takana, sekä valon että pimeyden takana; se on kaikkien vastakohtien yläpuolella; se on pohjaton kuilu, johon kaikki uppoutuu; se on se ilmenemätön, josta kaikki on vain ilmennystä; se on absoluutti, ja se sisällyttää itseensä kaikki vastakohdat. Siis se absoluutti on syypää pahan mahdollisuuteen niinkuin hyvänkin.
2. Pekka Ervast, Ibid – ..Me voimme ymmärtää inhimillisinä, siveellisinä olentoina, että suuri on sen kieltäymys, jonka käskystä ja rakkaudesta niitä olentoja kohtaan, joiden täytyy kehittyä, pitää kieltäytyä kaikesta, antaakseen ainoastaan luovan voimansa, ja antaakseen tuon kaiken toisten, verraten tietämättömien väärinkäytettäväksi. ..Se hyvä, se viisaus, joka on meidän maapallomme loistavalla, alkuperäisellä johtajalla, maapallon planeettahengellä eli Saatanalla, se viisaus ja tieto annettiin hänen puolestaan toisten hallittavaksi ja ohjattavaksi.
…Me olemme saaneet tämän maapallon kehityskouluksemme, ja hyvinä olentoina edustamme omalta osaltamme sitä hyvää, mikä on maapallon planeettahengessä, Saatanassa
(translations by Frater Necros)
Salome 