William Blake's Satan, Sin, and Death - Satan Comes to the Gates of HellFiat Lux
"Contrary to the generally accepted belief, the most highly initiated philosophers symbolized the eternally existing state of divinity by darkness rather than by light. In all the cosmological systems of the enlightened pagans there was first darkness--an immeasurable extent of profundity which defied definition. From this darkness, which is the first God, proceeded Light, the secondary divinity. Light moved upon the face of Darkness and through its activities the world, or embodied divinity, comes into manifestation. The radiant spirits of Light set up their temporary kingdom in the midst of the darkness. But Light is finite and Darkness is infinite. In the last Age the night of oblivion descends once more upon the universe and the sovereignty of the darkness is re-established."*
As I sit here after my brief discourse with Lucifer, fine brandy and cigars at my beck and call, topnotch nymphomaniacs performing before me, it strikes me that perhaps a little explanation is warranted before the casual reader should proceed. “Lucifer” is a complicated fable with a plenitude of meaning. His association with “evil” is quite unjust as you shall see exposed below, and a great deal more besides if brave enough to continue reading. The injustice done to this great symbol of rational thought and cosmic illumination by the malicious and zealous agents of “God’s” benighted myrmidons cannot be overstated. From the Dark Ages until today, they have never stopped inventing lies about this exemplar of enlightenment. They can never stop lying because without “the devil,” organized religion would be exposed for the bankrupt and hollow sham that it is. The lies serve to scare the befuddled and blind faithful, as well as to obscure the actual evil conducted by church masters right under their superstitious noses. I appreciate their ancient racket for the control it represents, but it's clearly in the latter stages of decline.
***
It took three hours for me to find the flaw in the summoning ritual. I was forced to repeatedly and meticulously retrace each and every step in order to find it. Someone had either carelessly or deliberately inserted a typographical error in my book of Eliphas Lévi rituals. I only realized it worked when the dark mist begin to swirl about the center of my carefully crafted sacred portal. Like a tornado, it twirled, grew, and blew papers about my library. Soon there was a crackling sound, and a rippling static charge of violet hue around the center of the whirlwind. It began wobbling around an invisible axis, and then an almost blinding white light sprayed forth from the center, which dimmed almost as soon as it appeared. Seconds later I opened my eyes - all three of them - and before me was the image of a man. He stood about 7’ tall and wore a black, wide brimmed cowboy hat. His eyes flamed forth like a foundry furnace. His lovely lips were crimson and surrounded the whitest teeth anyone has ever seen. Everything else about him was cloaked with the amorphous mist that earlier had formed the miniature twister. He floated, or seemed to float, on the mysterious mist throughout our discourse.
The first words out of this mysterious creature’s mouth were, “Pleased to meet you, hope you guessed my name,” and were in perfect imitation of Mick Jagger, thus affirming that if nothing else, Lucifer has a surefooted sense of humor.
I thought it appropriate to reply in kind, so after chuckling, I said: “How the hell are you Lucifer, Lord of the Abyss? You honor me with your presence and wisdom. It is humbling to be in your presence and at your service. Your agents inform me you’ve agreed to cover all the basics for the public and to ‘tell all;’ however, your renowned honesty and humble nature lead me to see the outlines of yet another masterfully crafted piece of hyperbole, for which I heartily congratulate you.”
This remark elicited a deep rumbling sort of laughter followed by guttural snorts, and then: “Oh, stop it. Let’s get down to the interview and dispense with the obsequious chitchat. We both know the score here; and by the way, don’t make the mistake that you’re conducting anything. I conduct - period.”
“Quite right, Lord Pluto, god of the Underworld. Ah, now that title for instance, that’s as good a place to start as any - exactly how many do you have anyway?”
“O, I stopped keeping track a few millennia ago. I’m sure my infernal bureaucrats have that information on file. I could summon my Director of Intelligence, Sexuality, and Psychological Warfare, Asmodeus to obtain the lists if you want?”
“No, don’t bother. We both understand the profane filth of the world don’t have the historical and cultural grounding, to say nothing of intelligence, to even notice such references. By the way, how’s Cerberus doing these days?”
“That’s true. Ah, Cerberus! My accountant, Mammon informs me Cerberus Capital Management is profiting nicely, but unfortunately we can‘t delve too much into that publicly for obvious reasons. On the subject of names, it does get tedious and repetitive having to explain my Latin appellation. No matter how many times it is defined, the superstitious priests’ calumnies persist. As you know, Lucifer simply means light bearer. The origin stems from my habit of helping to spread knowledge amongst the few sentient beings I encounter. I am the first philanthropist. That decrepit fraud in the sky with the long white beard doesn’t like anyone knowing more than he does. His stock and trade depends on a ready supply of primitive brutes, which is why he peaked with Cro-Magnon man and tribal fetishists (never to be confused with the more enlightened sexual variety). He freely and repeatedly proclaims his jealousy in that inane book of his, hence the necessity his deluded servants always feel to besmirch my good name. You know Sauros, since you joined my team - oh, how long ago was it, anyway?”
“I was consecrated to your service at birth, but as for active dedication, well do I remember the beginning of my service. It was a glorious Beltane eve and we basked in a sea of lubricious flesh….”
“Never mind,” he sharply interrupted, and then sternly said, “let’s get back to what really matters here,” with just a hint of rebuke.
“Right you are, my Lord; you’re the star here. Word was sent to me that you’re slightly perturbed over two other alleged interviews, viz: A Brief Conversation with Lucifer by Astrochronic and that which inspired it, An Interview with Satan by Alex Heminger, both of which are available elsewhere. What is it about these obscure blogs, other than their obviously fraudulent nature, that bothered you?”
“Their vagueness and mocking tone. I rarely authorize interviews, and to have such balderdash traipsed before the public was slightly galling.”
“Is there any reason to specifically address pseudo-points made within those phony interviews?”
“Not directly. They’ll all generally be obliterated by this interview.”
“Right you are. I suppose you get asked the most about all the alleged suffering occurring on the globe. Life on earth, Yahweh’s (among many others) alleged creation, has been characterized as "nasty, brutish, and short." Many fanatics have blamed you personally for this, citing the little incident in the largely fabulous Garden of Eden. What do you say to such allegations?”
“Preposterous, primitive, deranged conspiracy theories based on the merciless smear campaign of that old rogue, ‘Yahweh;' incidentally, that’s just one of his many aliases.”
“Let’s stop here for a moment. Not to interrupt you, but exactly who or what is this character, anyway? Surely not the Biblical creator of everything.”
Snorting in disgust, “Of course not! Look, the bastard was a minor deity on Ganymede before they had to evict the little cretin.”
I gasped in amazement. “There’s life on Ganymede?!”
“There was before the eviction,” he said matter-of-factly. “Something to do with transmuting cosmic rays into the equivalent of a well-balanced diet for the silicon-based life forms there. I didn’t follow the affair that closely since there were more important things on my mind than some obscure, ungrateful Lilliputian troglodytes. Anyway, ‘Yahweh’ raised his sacrifice quotas and the Ganymede Governing Council peremptorily cancelled his contract without thinking to acquire a suitable replacement. Consequently, they all instantly solidified into rock. I understand it was a very painful demise for them. How's that for climate change? Stupid buggers. Good riddance! The multiverse generated many life forms, and we deities can’t have lesser beings interfering with our affairs that way,” he concluded with an exhilarating chuckle.
“This will raise more questions than it answers. Perhaps….”
“No, it’s instructive to explore the multiverse paradigm. Chaos gave birth to a multiverse of infinite possibilities, which is to say, anything that can happen will happen. There is infinite diversity in infinite combinations, to paraphrase one of my beloved servants. The multiverse is all that exists, will exist, can exist. There are infinite times and places for my subjects to explore and dominate - if they play their cards right.”
“A fairly simple concept to grasp, Your Majesty. It explains a lot, including suffering, to get back to my original question.”
“YOU FOOL,” he thundered, causing a 2.0 tremor. “It explains EVERYTHING!”
Don‘t panic, you can smooth this over. “I apologize for my base stupidity. Please, grant me Light to fathom your Empyreal Wisdom.”
“If I were inclined towards fairness,” he replied, with wisps of sulfurous vapor beginning to emanate from his invisible pores, “I’d chalk your wretched ignorance up to immaturity; after all, if I had to translate it into your standard earth years, I am roughly 13,464,032,345 years old. I was the first deity to hatch, so to speak. Yet that would be inaccurate. It’s not maturity you lack, but basic listening skills! For instance, right now you’re thinking about the last glassy-eyed broad you punished into a mind-shattering orgasmic trance, when you should be paying attention to what I have to say!”
She is such a lovely creature, and that far off look in her eyes - proof I sent her to that special zone. Shake the reverie off, damn it! Remember who you're speaking to here: the driving force of existence! Sensing his exasperation and growing rage, I decided to take a more apologetic, ingratiating, and pragmatic approach. “That’s true. Again, my deepest apologies. However, I think by now we’ll have lost the vast majority of our readers. Your infinite knowledge utterly confounds the useless masses - they are simply unworthy of you.”
This tactic seemed to brighten both his mood and his smoldering eyes, and the smell of sulfur quickly left the air as the vapor retreated back to its source like a film being played backwards. “Yes, they absolutely are wretched vermin, which brings us back to the bum rap I often get about suffering. What is popularly - and quite incorrectly, I might add - termed ‘Humanity’ is the purest masochism encapsulated in biological form. I know since over half the breed’s libido was engineered in my labs. Yahoo (one of my pet names for the old rogue) had a lot of meddling ideas, and inverting them systematically is a pleasure indeed. It’s a duel of sorts. He has his game, and I’ve got mine. We’re actually allies for the time being. Cosmic Chess. Don’t give me that blank look - I know you’ve heard of Pat Robertson and that Hagee piglet of mine. Don’t expect me to explain it all to you at once, my budding epopt. It will take centuries of training before you even glimpse the pathways of the multiverse, let alone are permitted to travel them at will.”
“Do what thou wilt is the whole of the Law,” I reflexively intoned.
“Very good, my faithful servant. Now, shall we press on with the interview?”
Situation defused, praise received. I breathed a sigh of relief, then shivered with a refreshingly cold delight, one infused with an adrenaline dose that palpably enhanced my neural connections. “Naturally,” I said casually. “Another calumny leveled against you has to do with a much vaunted rebellion a while back?”
“More lies. If anything, he’s the rebel. Goddamn it - I mean, I damn it - I swear the little punk can be so infuriatingly intractable at times. The alias he used on Ganymede can be translated into the human tongue as Ialdabaoth: Son of Chaos. That should clue you into his fundamental character.”
“A cursory glance at the Bible proves the maniac is possessed with an extremely unsavory temperament.”
“That would be putting it mildly. He’s a hack writer at heart: ‘The meek shall inherit the earth.’ Is that supposed to be some sort of convoluted and arcane joke?”
“Absolute rubbish, I know. What kind of weak idiot would believe that sort of thing?”
He smiled widely with a dreamy look in those flaming eyes, and replied, “The kind that must in order to sanctify their own innate masochistic tendencies. The truth of the matter is that the meek shall inherit the dirt.”
I smiled with him, and then said, “What do you say to those who believe the universe will contract back to its starting point before expanding again, thus precluding true immortality?”
“As one who has surfed black holes for sheer disport, I can honestly tell you that in the event this universe does such a thing, the multiverse has many avenues of escape.”
“So immortality is possible?”
“Of course! I’m living proof. But enough of this game.”
“Game?” I asked, puzzled.
“Don’t play dumb with me, lad. You’re talking to yourself. How else would I be able to read that submissive tramp on your mind? I don’t exist. You said it yourself in the introduction: Lucifer is a mythological symbol and nothing more! So why don‘t you go ahead and tell your readers about immortality.”
Now truly bewildered, I stutter-queried, “Talking…to…myself?”
“I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together - GOO GOO GOO JOOB!” and with that final remark, he disarticulated into curls of smoke that quickly wormed their way out the nearest window.
Then the truth flooded into me, and it was my turn to smile. “Like Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds,” I mused. Then laughter caused me to heave and tremble for a few minutes before I fell into a deep sleep. I awoke the next day fully replenished and quickly transcribed this dialogue. After feverishly finishing this little piece, I noticed that the shadows of my library had somehow lightly been etched or burned into the surfaces of the room, as if they had all been traced by a powerful centralized force. Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Chernobyl, and CERN rippled across my mind like a kaleidoscopic aurora borealis, causing a firm grin to stretch across my face - it remains there still.
*"The world was, therefore, regarded as consisting of two empires, that of light and that of darkness united in a sort of truce at the equator. These two empires continually battled against each other for the period of a Great Year at the end of which time an armistice was declared. The gods and their shadows, the demons, were then reunited. After a certain period the light was again divided from the darkness and the war continued for another age. All of this symbolism is preserved in the zodiacal mysteries which are of a vast philosophic importance when properly understood." - Manly P. Hall, The ALL-SEEING EYE Vol. 5, No. 6, March, 1931, “The City of the Gods” (emphases mine).
“LUCIFER, the Light-bearer! Strange and mysterious name to give to the Spirit of Darkness! Lucifer, the Son of the Morning! Is it he who bears the Light, and with its splendors intolerable blinds feeble, sensual, or selfish souls? Doubt it not!” - Albert Pike
***
On Immortality
Science’s ultimate goal is to control the fundamental forces of nature. Up from primeval slime, we developed tools, language, and the minds necessary to survive. We learned how to split the atom. We learned about the structure of DNA. Now we have computers, robotics, synthetic biology, genetic engineering, and nanotechnology. Thus, there is no reason whatsoever to doubt our ability to slow and ultimately reverse biological decay. Moreover, we can merge with technology and thereby stave off decrepitude and death. That will be the great Transhuman leap forward, the next evolutionary step. We must engineer our own evolutionary destiny.
If you can afford the life extension technologies of today and manage to live another twenty or thirty years, by that time science and technology will have at least advanced to the point where a further longevity boost will be obtainable, and so on to immortality. Anyone that believes otherwise is a defeatist and has defaulted on sentient existence. Such nihilistic defeatists accept suicide on the layaway plan; they might as well just do the deed today and be done with it. There will be no room for such obsolete sub-species in the Transhuman Age. See the works of Ray Kurzweil for a further elucidation.
Victoria Ab Tenebris
