Ever since I transitioned this project from being primarily a blog to being primarily a podcast, I’ve been using the tagline, “Exploring the Bible, Christianity, and other religions and sacred texts through the lens of Satanism in order to reinvent religion for myself.” Aside from some of the early creative and constructive work, I’ve mostly emphasized the exploration part of that tagline, but this episode and the next will be focusing more on the invention aspect. My intention here is to construct a sketch of a Satanic theology, and to that end, I’ll be discussing what theology means, both in general and in relation to the specific source I’ll be drawing from; discussing some of the potential qualities that a Satanic theology would have; and offering some preliminary results. A proper and complete Satanic theology would be better suited to something the length of a book, and perhaps that’s a book that I’ll write one day, but given the space available to me here, I’ll have to confine myself to a more limited collection of ideas. I’ll also be introducing the approach I’ll be taking next episode, which will likewise be a theology, but a very different one and much more experimental in character.

This episode is available in video format on YouTube

Transcript (with citations and references) available at asatanistreadsthebible.com

This episode begins a three-episode series that will explore the foundations of Satanic religion, as I understand it. Each episode will concentrate on a different aspect of Satanism and will be written in a different style. This one will be somewhat like my typical essays, especially those that focus most closely on Satanism and philosophy of religion, and here I’ll be exploring the religious philosophy of one of my most significant influences, the American philosopher William James.

This episode is available in video format on YouTube

Transcript (with citations and references) available at asatanistreadsthebible.com

Matters of personal will, independence, and autonomy are central to Satanic thought. The central principle of Satanism is opposition, and, in my interpretation, opposition to hegemony, which often entails opposition to presumed authority.

This episode is available in video format on YouTube

Transcript (with citations and references) available at asatanistreadsthebible.com

I want to know why Islam has been so successful, seemingly more so than any other modern religion, in convincing people to abandon this world for some other world and to construct what remains of them in this life around what awaits them in the next. I would know, is this truly what Muhammad intended? As much as I have fallen in love with the mystical Sufi poetry of Rumi and Hafez, and as much as I respect Islam’s singularity of vision, I see this religion as one of the greatest fonts of nihilism in the modern world. Is this nihilism reflected in the religion’s sacred texts? Are these texts misunderstood and misrepresented in Islam as Christian and Jewish texts are in their respective religions?

Transcript available at https://asatanistreadsthebible.com/a-satanist-reads-the-quran/

Video version available at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCo1avyQsMpFL4u4XtaW3SXw/featured

What I’m going to say next, I say without an ounce of hyperbole: rational argumentation is the most important of all human skills, because rational argumentation forms the basis not only for critical thinking, which is of paramount importance, but for affecting the world and shaping it to one’s ends.

This essay is also available as a podcast on anchor.fm and other platforms.

Transcript (with links and citations) available at asatanistreadsthebible.com

What does it mean that I went to war for a country where this kind of person—a fellow American citizen and one among those whose rights I literally swore to defend with my life—does not feel safe? Does not feel free?

Video available at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCo1avyQsMpFL4u4XtaW3SXw

Transcript (with sources) available at https://asatanistreadsthebible.com/

Last week, I opened my essay with a description of the murder of George Floyd by the police officer Derek Chauvin by way of introducing the ongoing political unrest in the United States that was instigated by Floyd’s murder, and that by way of introducing a White House photo shoot at St. John’s Episcopal Church in Washington, D.C., which took place in the midst of the protests and which, for me, exemplifies the relationship between Christianity and white supremacy in this country. This week, I’ll be turning to my roots as a propaganda analyst for the United States Army and examining that photo shoot—and the video montage it was used to create—in further detail, analyzing it as United States government propaganda using the methods in which I was trained.

Stop by the transcript at asatanistreadsthebible.com for links to references used in this episode.

Racial hegemony and police violence in America are inextricable from religion, and Satanism, while not necessarily partisan in either direction, is necessarily political. Christianity cannot be disentangled from American politics, and so neither can Satanism.  

Visit asatanistreadsthebible.com for a transcript of this essay with complete citations and references.

What is the ego? What is the self? How is it that we can gratify, intensify, or encourage the self without knowing and understanding what it is?

I’m not certain where I first arrived at the idea of observing the Ramadan fast, although it likely came up during my research over the past couple years. Primarily, it was a simple matter of curiosity, as is the case with many things in my life, so I approached it as a sort of spiritual experiment. I didn’t have any specific outcomes in mind, but I thought that it might serve as a means of structuring my life and imposing order on a world that presently seems more chaotic than usual, and as well, an opportunity to take a break from some of my favorite indulgences.

A transcription of this episode, with citations and references, is available at https://asatanistreadsthebible.com/