Devil's ride to pop-culture - with the help of evil commies!
Few words about Satanism:
I know some make a huge fuss about this, but for me "saatananpalvonta" and "satanismi" are the same thing. In English they are same anyway, and most of other languages as well, as far as I know.
Satanism means the worship of the Devil. Of course it's never been really popular to worship a creature who is supposed to hate humankind. Still, in the old days people believed in both God and Devil and sometimes they wanted something that was a bit wrong to pray from Saints or God. Like destroy neighbor's crops and cattle, make unwilling girl your lover and the like. So they were rites of black magic for that. Usually they felt guilty afterward. In many countries people believed in witch Sabbaths, where worshipers did nasty things with the Devil. In Finland we didn't have that dirty of imagination - in Finnish tradition, according to witchcraft trials, you just called the Devil out with special words in a crossroad or something and he would do you few favors for a bread and some butter.
I wonder whom they actually met in the crossroads. Some witty guy could have actually made a living pretending to be the Devil!
Anyway, as centuries went on, Satanism became fashionable in minuscule bohemian elite of France in late 19th Century, usually as the last attempt to be shocking and special, before returning to the Catholic Church and going to a monastery retreat. Joris-Karl Huysmans is very interesting in this matter. Some art group was called "The Satanistes". The whole decadent Fin de Siecle-thing. After that there were probably similar bored bohemians around, but Satanism didn't really play any important role in popular culture, until a writer called Dennis Wheatley decided to write a popular thriller about it.
Dennis Wheatley's first black magic-novel, "Devil rides out" began a whole trend and made him hugely popular. "Devil rides out" was written in 1930's, just before the war break out. He's a bit like Dan Brown of his period: writes badly, good vs evil, lots of action, information about occultism and totally incorrect historical stuff crammed clumsily in the middle of many chapters. Still, he is actually better writer than Dan Brown, which is not saying much. He brought the sabbaths and black masses to the wider audience, and actually did a lot of research, so his stories resemble the pre-modern writings about the subject. The satanists are suitably evil and the heroes suitably gentlemen, upper class men with country mansions, exotic kitch and "secret knowledge". The girls are pretty, men heroic and romances old-fashioned. Good read, actually!
Wheatley wrote many books on various of subjects, but his reading public was mostly after his black magic-trillers. He didn't do as well with political thrillers or historical adventures. Trough his books, black magic, Satanism and the term 'Left hand path" became part of popular culture that almost everyone knew about (at least fans of genre literature) and with the rerun of Huysmanian "lets shock the people and be special" (I mean the 1960's -1970's), Satanism gained new popularity in rock, metal, movies and comic books. Everything occult and weird, no matter how bad, became as fashionable as it had been in 1890's, but this time with an wider audience than just the tiny rich bohemian elite. Musicians from Rolling Stones to later Black Metal -bands flirted with the topic for shock value. That' s probably why Anton LaVey named his pseudo-Nietzschean religion "Satanism",* to attract celebrities - it was the most shocking thing you could do back then.**
In a way then, one thriller-writer with very old-fashioned values started a chain that leads to 18 year old, black-clad men burning churches because they "oppose the church" as the latest one explained. By change Wheatley found something that tickled the audience's curiosity and shocked them and what seemed super cool for artists types and kids. This would be funny on it's own, but it actually gets even better.
Dennis Wheatley was a reactionary right-wing author, who supported the British Fascists (he did change his mind though, when war began) and saw Communism and Soviet Union as bigger threat than Hitler. "Devil Rides Out" was first published as a serial novel in Daily Mail! The book has a very strong subtext about international politics - the Satanists are actually trying to start a new war. The "bad history" bit mentioned earlier was that Russians, because of Rasputin's evil powers, started the WWI. Wheatley wrote a whole deal of material about the connections between Satanism and Communism, as weird as it sounds now. This subtext was not part of the later Hammer-film (which I haven't seen yet)
He used Satanism and black magic to grab audience's attention, for his message, which was not about religion, but about politics of his time. For him the biggest evil on the planet, the real Devil, were the reds and he thought they were behind every movement and trend that threatened the tranquil afternoon tea in the English manor house. His last occult book was apparently about Black Power movement, not likely to be a bestseller now!
*As Church of Satan's doctrine differs so much from the actual Satanism, he should have come up with different name. But, of course, then it would have lost the shock value. I came up with a name "Archaic Temple" for my story about an evil occult group, and wouldn't claim that now only I can define what "Archaic Temple" is, if I was faced with angry worshipers on Ancient Greeks or something. For me the LaVeyan Satanism is a bit similar celebrity cult than Scientology - they even have roots in a similar place with Crowley. And they like Hollywood
**These days neo-nazism beats Satanism when you want to shock, so some metallers have started NSBM-bands. I wonder what's next
I know some make a huge fuss about this, but for me "saatananpalvonta" and "satanismi" are the same thing. In English they are same anyway, and most of other languages as well, as far as I know.
Satanism means the worship of the Devil. Of course it's never been really popular to worship a creature who is supposed to hate humankind. Still, in the old days people believed in both God and Devil and sometimes they wanted something that was a bit wrong to pray from Saints or God. Like destroy neighbor's crops and cattle, make unwilling girl your lover and the like. So they were rites of black magic for that. Usually they felt guilty afterward. In many countries people believed in witch Sabbaths, where worshipers did nasty things with the Devil. In Finland we didn't have that dirty of imagination - in Finnish tradition, according to witchcraft trials, you just called the Devil out with special words in a crossroad or something and he would do you few favors for a bread and some butter.
I wonder whom they actually met in the crossroads. Some witty guy could have actually made a living pretending to be the Devil!
Anyway, as centuries went on, Satanism became fashionable in minuscule bohemian elite of France in late 19th Century, usually as the last attempt to be shocking and special, before returning to the Catholic Church and going to a monastery retreat. Joris-Karl Huysmans is very interesting in this matter. Some art group was called "The Satanistes". The whole decadent Fin de Siecle-thing. After that there were probably similar bored bohemians around, but Satanism didn't really play any important role in popular culture, until a writer called Dennis Wheatley decided to write a popular thriller about it.
Dennis Wheatley's first black magic-novel, "Devil rides out" began a whole trend and made him hugely popular. "Devil rides out" was written in 1930's, just before the war break out. He's a bit like Dan Brown of his period: writes badly, good vs evil, lots of action, information about occultism and totally incorrect historical stuff crammed clumsily in the middle of many chapters. Still, he is actually better writer than Dan Brown, which is not saying much. He brought the sabbaths and black masses to the wider audience, and actually did a lot of research, so his stories resemble the pre-modern writings about the subject. The satanists are suitably evil and the heroes suitably gentlemen, upper class men with country mansions, exotic kitch and "secret knowledge". The girls are pretty, men heroic and romances old-fashioned. Good read, actually!
Wheatley wrote many books on various of subjects, but his reading public was mostly after his black magic-trillers. He didn't do as well with political thrillers or historical adventures. Trough his books, black magic, Satanism and the term 'Left hand path" became part of popular culture that almost everyone knew about (at least fans of genre literature) and with the rerun of Huysmanian "lets shock the people and be special" (I mean the 1960's -1970's), Satanism gained new popularity in rock, metal, movies and comic books. Everything occult and weird, no matter how bad, became as fashionable as it had been in 1890's, but this time with an wider audience than just the tiny rich bohemian elite. Musicians from Rolling Stones to later Black Metal -bands flirted with the topic for shock value. That' s probably why Anton LaVey named his pseudo-Nietzschean religion "Satanism",* to attract celebrities - it was the most shocking thing you could do back then.**
In a way then, one thriller-writer with very old-fashioned values started a chain that leads to 18 year old, black-clad men burning churches because they "oppose the church" as the latest one explained. By change Wheatley found something that tickled the audience's curiosity and shocked them and what seemed super cool for artists types and kids. This would be funny on it's own, but it actually gets even better.
Dennis Wheatley was a reactionary right-wing author, who supported the British Fascists (he did change his mind though, when war began) and saw Communism and Soviet Union as bigger threat than Hitler. "Devil Rides Out" was first published as a serial novel in Daily Mail! The book has a very strong subtext about international politics - the Satanists are actually trying to start a new war. The "bad history" bit mentioned earlier was that Russians, because of Rasputin's evil powers, started the WWI. Wheatley wrote a whole deal of material about the connections between Satanism and Communism, as weird as it sounds now. This subtext was not part of the later Hammer-film (which I haven't seen yet)
He used Satanism and black magic to grab audience's attention, for his message, which was not about religion, but about politics of his time. For him the biggest evil on the planet, the real Devil, were the reds and he thought they were behind every movement and trend that threatened the tranquil afternoon tea in the English manor house. His last occult book was apparently about Black Power movement, not likely to be a bestseller now!
*As Church of Satan's doctrine differs so much from the actual Satanism, he should have come up with different name. But, of course, then it would have lost the shock value. I came up with a name "Archaic Temple" for my story about an evil occult group, and wouldn't claim that now only I can define what "Archaic Temple" is, if I was faced with angry worshipers on Ancient Greeks or something. For me the LaVeyan Satanism is a bit similar celebrity cult than Scientology - they even have roots in a similar place with Crowley. And they like Hollywood
**These days neo-nazism beats Satanism when you want to shock, so some metallers have started NSBM-bands. I wonder what's next