Lucifer
Seemingly without exception, the figure of Lucifer is a correlate to the astronomical body Venus, as herald of the coming day (sometimes by ignorance or cultural variation changed for Mercury). Poets have occasionally embodied this wandering star (planet), but no previous god or cult existed as some Satanists assert. At best, the fertile ground for the construction of pro-Lucifer (/pro-Satanic) mythos may be found in the examination of stories pertaining either to Phosphorus or to a thematic comparable, favoured also by Satanists: Prometheus.
Christian history includes a cult called 'Luciferians' after a bishop by the name (Lucifer Calaritanus) who lived during the 4th century CE. He was a casualty of church politics, was exiled, and in
Sardinia, resumed his see, and formed a small sect called the Luciferians. These sectaries pretended that all priests who had participated in Arianism should be deprived of their dignity, and that bishops who recognized the rights of even repentant heretics should be excommunicated. The Luciferians, being earnestly opposed, commissioned two priests, Marcellinus and Faustinus, to present a petition, the wellknown "Libellus precum", to the Emperor Theodosius, explaining their grievances and claiming protection. The emperor forbade further pursuit of them, and their schism seems not to have lasted beyond this first generation.
Catholic Encyclopedia
-- http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09410b.htm
Contents
Luciferianism
Beyond the above, and prior to the late 20th century, there appears to be no 'Luciferian movement' as such.
Even so, all pre-Satanist contentions about Lucifer come down to scriptural disputes surrounding two Bible verses: Isaiah 14:12 and Revelation 22:16. As such, their examination and analysis will be helpful supplementary material in pursuit of an understanding of the contenders. Their contention pivots around either a Lucifer=Satan (Isaiah) denunciation of Lucifer (supporting the general Catholic 'Fallen Angel' mythos, or a neo-gnostic Lucifer=Jesus (Revelation) rescuing of the term as a revealer and Saviour. This is the case for Blavatsky, Spangler and the rest of the luxophiles. The positive Lucifer focus is either the 'bright light of reason' which will disclose their favoured New Age truth, or 'the coming religious hero' Maitreyya/Christ/Mahdi/etc., as from the likes of Benjamin Creme.
When it comes to the noctophilic development, like many things associated with magic, religious witchcraft, and religious satanism, the terms used begin their lives as tools of slander and condemnation by contentious cults before being taken up as rebellious badges of identity. In this case, 'Lucifer' is no different, and with what the name is associated gradually darkens as more mythic and legendary content is appropriated and legitimized through apology.
Early pro-Lucifer advocation may be found extending from Eliphas Levi and other occultists into New Age literature before a self-identified Luciferian cultus begins by proclamation.
ELIPHAS LEVI
"The first and terrible force which destroys abortions eternally was called by the Hebrews Samael; by other easterns, Satan; and by the Latins, Lucifer. The Lucifer of the Kabbalah is not an accursed and stricken angel; he is the angel who enlightens, who regenerates by fire; he is to the angels of peace what the comet is to the mild stars of the spring-time constellations. The fixed star is beautiful, radiant, and calm; she drinks the celestial perfumes and gazes with love upon her sisters; clothed in her glittering robe, her forehead crowned with diamonds, she smiles as she chants her morning and evening canticle; she enjoys an eternal repose which nothing can disturb, and solemnly moves forward without departing from the rank assigned her among the sentinels of light. But the wandering comet, dishevelled and of sanguinary aspect, comes hurriedly from the depths of heaven and fiings herself athwart the path of the peaceful spheres, like a chariot of war between the ranks of a procession of vestals; she dares to face the burning spears of the solar guardians, and, like a bereft spouse who seeks the husband of her dreams during widowed nights, she penetrates even unto the inmost sanctuary of the god of day; again she escapes, exhaling the fires which consume her, and trailing a long conflagration behind her; the stars pale at her approach; constellate flocks, pasturing on flowers of light in the vast meadows of the sky, seem to flee before her terrible breath. The grand council of spheres assembles, and there is universal consternation; at length the loveliest of the fixed stars is commissioned to speak in the name of all the firmament and offer peace to the head- long vagabond.
"'My sister,' she thus commences, 'why dost thou disturb the harmony of the spheres? What evil have we wrought thee? And why, instead of wandering wilfully, dost thou not fix thy place like us in the court of the sun? Why dost thou not chant with us the evening hymn, clothed like our- selves in a white garment, fastened at the breast with a diamond clasp? Why float thy tresses, adrip with fiery sweat, through the mists of the night? Ah, wouldst thou but take thy place among the daughters of heaven, how much more beautiful wouldst thou be! Thy face would burn no longer with the toil of thine incredible nights; thine eyes would be pure, thy smiling countenance white and red like that of thy happy sisters; all the stars would know thee, and, far from fearing thy flight, would rejoice at thine approach; for then thou wouldst be made one with us by the indestructible bonds of universal harmony, and thy peaceful existence would be one voice more in the canticle of infinite love.'
"And the comet replies to the fixed star: 'Believe not, my sister, that I am permitted to wander at will and vex the harmony of the spheres! God hath appointed my path, even as thine, and if it appear to thee uncertain and ram- bling, it is because thy beams cannot penetrate far enough to take in the circumference of the ellipse which has been given me for my course. My fiery hair is God's beacon; I am the messenger of the suns, and I immerse myself con- tinually in their burning heat, that I may dispense it to young worlds on my journey which have not yet sufficient warmth, and to ancient stars which have grown cold in their solitude. If I weary in my long travellings, if my beauty be less mild than thine own, and if my garments are less un- spotted, yet am I a noble daughter of heaven, even as thou art. Leave me the secret of my terrible destiny, leave me the dread which surrounds me, curse me even if thou canst not comprehend; I shall none the less accomplish my work, and continue my career under the impulse of the breath of God! Happy are the stars which rest, which shine like youthful queens in the peaceful society of the universe! I am the proscribed, the eternal wanderer, who has infinity for domain. They accuse me of setting fire to the planets, the heat of which I renew; they accuse me of terrifying the stars which I enlighten; they chide me with breaking in upon universal harmony, because I do not revolve about their particular centres, because I join them one with another, directing my gaze towards the sole centre of all the suns. Be reassured, therefore, beauteous fixed star! I shall not impoverish thy peaceful light; rather I shall expend in thy service my own life and heat. I shall disappear from heaven when I shall have consumed myself, and my doom will have been glorious enough! Know that various fires burn in the temple of God, and do all give Him glory; ye are the light of golden candelabra; I am the flame of sacrifice. Let us each fulfil our destinies.'
"Having uttered these words, the comet tosses back her burning hair, uplifts her fiery shield, and plunges into infinite space, seeming to be lost for ever.
"Thus Satan appeared and disappeared in the allegorical narratives of the Bible. 'Now there was a day,' says the book of Job, 'when the sons of God came to present them- selves before the Lord, and Satan came also among them. And the Lord said unto Satan, 'Whence comest thou?' Then Satan answered the Lord, and said, "From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it."'
"A Gnostic gospel, discovered in the east by a learned traveller of our acquaintance, explains the genesis of light to the profit of Lucifer, as follows: The self-conscious truth is the living thought. Truth is thought as it is in itself, and formulated thought is speech. When eternal thought desired a form, it said: 'Let there be light.' Now, this thought which speaks is the Word, and the Word said: 'Let there be light,' because the Word itself is the light of minds. The uncreated light, which is the divine Word, shines because it desires to be seen; when it says: 'Let there be light!' it ordains that eyes shall open; it creates intelligences. When God said: 'Let there be light!' Intelligence was made, and the light appeared. Now the Intelligence which God diffused by the breath of His mouth, like a star given off from the sun, took the form of a splen- did angel, who was saluted by heaven under the name of Lucifer. Intelligence awakened, and comprehended its nature completely by the understanding of that utterance of the Divine Word: 'Let there be light!' It felt itself to be free because God had called it into being, and, raising up its head, with both wings extended, it replied:' I will not be slavery.' 'Then shalt thou be suffering,' said the Uncreated Voice. 'I will be liberty,' replied the light. 'Pride will seduce thee,' said the Supreme Voice, 'and thou wilt bring forth death.' 'I needs must strive with death to conquer life,' again responded the created light. There- upon God loosened from his bosom the shining cord which restrained the superb angel, and beholding him plunge through the night, which he furrowed with glory, He loved the offspring of His thought, and said with an ineffable smile: 'How beautiful was the light!'
"God has not created suffering; intelligence has accepted it to be free. And suffering has been the condition imposed upon freedom of being by Him who alone cannot err, be- cause He is infinite. For the essence of intelligence is judgment, and the essence of judgment is liberty. The eye does not really possess light except by the faculty of closing or opening. Were it forced to be always open, it would be the slave and victim of the light, and would cease to see in order to escape the torment. Thus, created Intelligence is not happy in affirming God, except by its liberty to deny Him. Now, the Intelligence which denies, invariably affirms something, since it is asserting its liberty. It is for this reason that blasphemy glorifies God, and that hell was indispensable to the happiness of heaven. Were the light unrepelled by shadow, there would be no visible forms. If the first angels had not encountered the depths of dark- ness, the child-birth of God would have been incomplete, and there could have been no separation between the created and essential light. Never would Intelligence have known the goodness of God if it had never lost Him. Never would God's infinite love have shone forth in the joys of His mercy had the prodigal Son of Heaven remained in the house of His Father. When all was light, there was light nowhere; it filled the breast of God, who was labouring to bring forth. And when He said: 'Let there be light!' He permitted the darkness to repel the light, and the universe issued from chaos. The negation of the angel who, at birth, refused slavery, constituted the equilibrium of the world, and the motion of the spheres commenced. The infinite distances admired this love of liberty, which was vast enough to fill the void of eternal light, and strong enough to bear the hatred of God. But God could hate not the noblest of His children, and He proved him by His wrath only to confirm him in His power. So also the Word of God Himself, as if jealous of Lucifer, willed to come down from heaven and pass triumphantly through the shadows of hell. He willed to be proscribed and condemned; He pre-meditated the terrible hour when He should cry, in the extreme of His agony: 'My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?' As the star of the morning goes before the sun, the rebellion of Lucifer announced to new-born nature the coming incarnation of God. Possibly Lucifer, in his fall through night, carried with him a rain of suns and stars by the attraction of his glory. Possibly our sun is a demon among the stars, as Lucifer is a star among the angels. Doubtless it is for this reason that it lights so calmly the horrible anguish of humanity and the long agony of earth because it is free in its solitude, and possesses its light. Such were the tendencies of the heresiarchs in the early centuries. Some, like the Ophites, adored the demon under the figure of the serpent; others, like the Cainites, justified the rebellion of the first angel like that of the first murderer. All these errors, all these shadows, all these monstrous idols of anarchy which India opposes in its symbols to the magical Trimourti, have found priests and worshippers in Christianity. The demon is nowhere mentioned in Genesis; an allegorical serpent deceives our first parents."
"The Ritual of Transcendent Magic", by Eliphas Levi, 1870, pp. 177-181.
ALBERT PIKE
"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!"
"Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry", by Albert Pike, 1871, p. 321.
HELENA P. BLAVATSKY
Blavatsky and her Theosophical Society heavily emphasized a Protestant struggle portraying Lucifer as a gnostic liberator and promethean rationalist revealing and promoting her preferred New Age and Occultism ideologies.
Within her periodical 'Lucifer' numerous references were made to the positive character of Lucifer in contradistinction to a 'Satan' she "It is to bring light to 'the hidden things of darkness,' ({ICorinthians} iv. 5); to show in their true aspect and their original real meaning things and names, men and their doings and customs; it is finally to fight prejudice, hypocrisy and shams in every nation, in every class of Society, as in every department of life. The task is a laborious one but it is neither impracticable nor useless, if even as an experiment."
"...'Lucifer,' is the pale morning-star, the precursor of the full blaze of the noon-day sun-the 'Eosphoros' of the Greeks. It shines timidly at dawn to gather forces and dazzle the eye after sunset as its own brother 'Hesperos' - the radiant evening star, or the planet Venus. No fitter symbol exists for the proposed work - that of throwing a ray of truth on everything hidden by the darkness of prejudice, by social or religious misconceptions; especially by that idiotic routine in life, which, once that a certain action, ii thing, a name, has been branded by slanderous inventions, however unjust, makes respectable people, so called, turn away shiveringly, refusing to even look at it from any other aspect than the one sanctioned by public opinion. ..."
"Piously inclined readers may argue that 'Lucifer' is accepted by all the churches as one of the many names of the Devil. According to Milton's superb fiction, Lucifer is Satan, the 'rebellious' angel, the enemy of God and man. If one analyzes his rebellion, however, it will be found of no worse nat,ure than an assertion of free-will and independent thought, as if Lucifer had been born in the XIXth century. This epithet of 'rebellious,' is a theological calumny, on a par with that other slander of God by the Predestinarians, one that makes of deity an. 'Almighty' fiend worse than the 'rebellious' Spirit himself; 'an omnipotent Devil desiring to be "complimented" as all merciful when he is exerting the most fiendish cruelty,' as put by J. Cotter Morison. Both the foreordaining and predestining fiend - God, and his subordinate agent are of human invention; they are two of the most morally repUlsive and horrible theological dogmas that the nightmares of light-hating monks have ever evolved out of their unclean fancies.
"They date from the Mediaeval age, the period of mental obscuration, during which most of the present prejudices and superstitions have been forcibly inoculated on the human mind, so as to have become nearly ineradicable in some cases, one of which is the present prejudice now under discussion.
"So deeply rooted, indeed, is this preconception and aversion to the name of Lucifer - meaning no worse than 'light-bringer' (from lux, lucis, 'light,' and ferre 'to bring')
{EDITOR'S NOTE: "It was Gregory the Great who was the first to apply this passage of Isaiah, 'How art thou fallen from Heaven, Lucifer, son of the morning,' etc., to Satan, and ever since the bold metaphor of the prophet, which referred, after all, but to an Assyrian king inimical to the Israelites, has been applied to the Devil."}
- even among the educated classes, that by adopting it for the title of their magazine the editors have the prospect of a long strife with public prejudice before them. So absurd and ridiculous is that prejudice, indeed, that no one has seemed to ever ask himself the question, how came Satan to be called a light-bringer, unless the silvery rays of the morning-star can in any way be made suggestive of the glare of the infernal flames. It is simply, as Henderson showed, 'one of those gross perversions of sacred writ which so extensively obtain, and which are to be traced to a proneness to seek for more in a given passage than it really contains - a disposition to be influenced by sound rather than sense, and an implicit faith in received interpretation' - which is not quite one of the weaknesses of our present age. Nevertheless, the prejudice is there, to the shame of our century.
"This cannot be helped. The two editors would hold themselves as recreants in their own sight, as traitors to the very spirit of the proposed work, were' they to yield and cry craven before the danger. If one would fight prejudice, and brush off the ugly cobwebs of superstition and materialism alike from the noblest ideals of our forefathers, one has to prepare for opposition. 'The crown of the reformer and the innovator is a crown of thorns' indeed. If one would rescue Truth in all her chaste nudity from the almost bottomless well, into which she has been hurled by cant and hypocritical propriety, one should not hesitate to descend into the dark, gaping pit of that well. No matter how badly the blind bats - the dwellers in darkness, and the haters of light - may treat in their gloomy abode the intruder, unless one is the first to show the spirit and courage he preaches to others, he must be justly held as a hypocrite and a seceder from his own principles."
"...It is typical of the divine spirit which sacrificed itself for humanity-it was Milton's doing that it ever became associated with the devil. We are sworn enemies to popular prejudices, and it is quite appropriate that we should attack such a prejudice as this - Lucifer, you know, is tbe Morning Star - the Lightbearer...."
"...Lucifer, you know, means Light-bearer; it is typical of the Divine Spirit....
"...Lucifer is the pale, pure herald of dawn...."
"...They ought to study their Homer and Hesiod's Theogony if they would do justice to Lucifer', Eosphoros and Hesperos,' the Morning and the Evening beautiful star. If there are more useful things to do in this life than" to whitewash mythological characters," to slander and blacken them is, at least, as useless, and shows, moreover, a narrow-mindedness which can do honour to no one.
"To object to the title of LUCIFER, only because its 'associations are so dreadful,' is pardonable - if it can be pardonable in any case - only in an ignorant American missionary of some dissenting sect, in one whose natural laziness and lack of education led him to prefer ploughing the minds of heathens, as ignorant as he is himself, to the more profitable, but rather more arduous, process of ploughing the fields of his own father's farm. In the English clergy, however, who receive all a more or less classical education, and are, therefore, supposed to be acquainted with the ins and outs of theological sophistry and casuistry, this kind of opposition is absolutely unpardonable. It not only smacks of hypocrisy and deceit, but places them directly on a lower moral level than him they call the apostate angel. By endeavouring to show the theological Lucifer, fallen through the idea that
"'To reign is worth ambition, though in Hell ; Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven,'
"they are virtually putting into practice the supposed crime they would fain accuse him of. They prefer reigning over the spirit of the masses by means of a pernicious dark LIE, productive of many an evil, than serve heaven by serving TRUTH. Such practices are worthy only of the Jesuits.
"But their sacred writ is the first to contradict their interpretations and the association of Lucifer', the Morning Star, with Satan. Chapter XXII. of Revelation, verse 16th, says: 'I, Jesus. am the root ... and the bright and Morning Star ([Gk.]; 'early rising'): hence Eosphoros, or the Latin Lucifer. The opprobrium attached to this name is of such a very late date, that the Roman Church found itself forced to screen the theological slander behind a two-sided interpretation - as usual. Christ, we are told, is the 'Morning Star,' the divine Lucifer; and Satan the usurpator of the Verbum, the 'infernal Lucifer."
{EDITOR'S NOTE: "Mirvillc's Memoirs to the Academy of France, Vol. IV., quoting Cardinal Ventura."}
"The great Archangel Michael, the conqueror of Satan, is identical in paganism
{EDITOR'S NOTE: "Which paganism has passed long milleniums, it would seem, in copying beforehand Christian dogmas to come."}
with Mercury-Mithra, to whom, after defending the Sun (symbolical of God) from the attacks of Venus-Lucifer, was given the possession of this planet, et datus est ei locus Luciferi. And since the Archangel Michael is the 'Angel of the Face,' and 'the Vicar of the Verbum' he is now considered in the Roman Church as the regent of that planet Venus which 'the vanquished fiend had usurped."' Angelus faciei Dei sedem superbi humilis obtinuit, says Cornelius a Lapide (in Vol. VI. p. 229).
This gives the reason why one of the early Popes was called Lucifer, as Yonge and ecclesiastical records prove. It thus follows that the title chosen for our magazine is as much associated with divine and pious ideas as with the supposed rebellion of the hero of Milton's 'Paradise Lost.' By choosing it, we throw the first ray of light and truth on a ridiculous prejudice which ought to have no room made for it in this our "age of facts and discovery." We work for true Religion and Science, in the interest of fact as against fiction and prejudice. It is our duty, as it is that of physical Science-professedly its mission-to throw light on facts in Nature hitherto surrounded by the darkness of ignorance. And since ignorance is justly regarded as the chief promoter of superstition, that work is, therefore, a noble and beneficent work. But natural Sciences are only one aspect of SCIENCE and TRUTH. Psychological and moral Sciences, or theosophy, the knowledge of divine truth, wheresoever found, are still more important in human affairs, and real Science should not be limited simply to the physical aspect of life and nature. Science is an abstract of every fact, a comprehension of every truth within the scope of human research and intelligence. 'Shakespeare's deep and accurate science in mental philosophy' (Coleridge), has proved more beneficent to the true philosopher in the study of the human heart-therefore, in the promotion of truth-than the more accurate, but certainly less deep, science of any Fellow of the Royal Institution.
Those readers, however, who do not find themselves convinced that the Church had no right to throw a slur upon a beautiful star, and that it did so through a mere necessity of accounting for one of its numerous loans from Paganism with all its poetical conceptions of the truths in Nature, are asked to read our article "The History of a Planet." Perhaps, after its perusal, they will see how far Dupuis was justified in asserting that all the theologies have their origin in astronomy." With the modern Orientalists every myth is solar. This is one more prejudice, and a preconception in favour of materialism and physical science. It will be one of our duties to combat it with much of the rest."
"What's In A Name? Why the Magazine is Called 'Lucifer.'", 'Lucifer', Volume 1, Number 1, 1887, pp. 1-7.
And from later in the same publication:
"While the history of the other six planets, and their gradual transformation from Greco-Aryan gods into Semitic devils, and finally into 'divine attributes of the seven eyes of the Lord,' is known but to the educated, that of Venus-Lucifer has become a household story among even the most illiterate in Roman Catholic countries.
"This story shall now be told for the benefit of those who may have neglected their astral mythology.
"Venus, characterised by Pythagoras as the sol alter, a second Sun, on account of her magnificent radiance--equalled by none other-was the first to draw the attention of ancient Theogonists. Before it began to be called Venus, it was known in pre-Hesiodic theogonyas Eosphoros (or Phosphoros) and Hesperos, the children of the dawn and twilight. In Hesiod, moreover, the planet is decomposed into two divine beings, two brothers-Eosphoros (the Lucifer of the Latins) the morning, and I Hesperos, the evening star. They are the children of Astrceos and' Eos, the starry heaven and the dawn, as also of Kephalos and Eos (Theog: 381, Hyg: Poet: Astroll: 11,42). Preller, quoted by Decharme, shows Phaeton identical with Phosphoros or Lucifer (Griech: Mythol: 1. 365). And on the authority of Hesiod he also makes Phaeton the son of the latter two divinities-Kephalos and Eos.
"Now Phaeton or Phosphoros, the 'luminous morning orb,' is carried away in his early youth by Aphrodite (Venus) who makes of him the night guardian of her sanctuary (Theog: 987-991). He is the 'beautiful morning star' (Vide St. John's Revelation XXII. 16) loved for its radiant light by the Goddess of the Dawn, Aurora, who, while gradually eclipsing the light of her beloved, thus seeming to carry off the star, makes it reappear on the evening horizon where it watches the gates of heaven. In early morning, Phosphoros 'issuing from the waters of the Ocean, raises in heaven his sacred head to announce the approach of divine light.' (Iliad, XXIII. 226; Odyss: XIII. 93; Virg: AEneid, VIII. 589 ; Mythol : de la Grece Antique. 247). He holds a torch in his hand and flies through space as he precedes the car of Aurora. In the evening he becomes Hesperos, "the most splendid of the stars that shine on the celestial vault" (Iliad, XXII. 317). He is the father of the Hesperides, the guardians of the golden apples together with the Dragon; the beautiful genius of the flowing golden curls, sung and glorified in all the ancient epithalami (the bridal songs of the early Christians as of the pagan Greeks); he, who at the fall of the night, leads the nuptial cortege and delivers the bride in to the arms of the bridegroom. (Carmen Nuptiale. See Mythol: de la Grece Antique. Decharme.)
"So far, there seems to be no possible rapprochement, no analogy to be discovered between this poetical personification of a star, a purely astronomical myth, and the Satanism of Christian theology. True, the close connection between the planet as Hesperos, the evening star, and the Greek Garden of Eden with its Dragon and the golden apples may, with a certain stretch of imagination, suggest some painful comparisons with the third chapter of' Genesis. But this is insufficient to justify the building of a theological wall of defence against paganism made up of slander and misrepresentations.
"But of all the Greek euhemerisations, Lucifer-Eospqoros is, perhaps, the most complicated. The planet has become with the Latins, Venus, or Aphrodite-Anadyomene, the foam-born Goddess, the 'Divine Mother,' and one with the Phrenician Astarte, or the Jewish Astaroth. They were all called 'The Morning Star,' and the Virgins of the Sea, or Mar (whence Mary), the great Deep, titles now given by the Roman Church to their Virgin Mary. They were all connected with the moon and the crescent, with the Dragon and the planet Venus, as the mother of Christ has been made connected with all these attributes. If the Phrenician mariners carried, fixed on the prow of their ships, the image of the goddess Astarte (or Aphrodite, Venus Erycina) and looked upon the evening and the morning star as their guiding star, 'the eye of their Goddess mother,' so do the Roman Catholic sailors the same to this day. They fix a Madonna on the prows of their vessels, and the blessed Virgin Mary is called the 'Virgin of the Sea.' The accepted patroness of Christian sailors, their star, Stella Del Mar, etc., she stands on the crescent moon. Like the old pagan Goddesses, she is the 'Queen of Heaven,' and the 'Morning Star' just as they were.
"Whether this can explain anything, is left to the reader's sagacity. Meanwhile, Lucifer-Venus has nought to do with darkness, and everything with light. When called Lucifer, it is the 'light bringer,' the first radiant beam which destroys the lethal darkness of night When named Venus, the planet-star becomes the symbol of dawn, the chaste Aurora. Professor Max Muller rightly conjectures that Aphrodite, born of the sea, is a personification of the Dawn of Day, and the most lovely of all the sights in Nature ('Science of Language') for, before her naturalisation by the Greeks, Aphrodite was Nature personified, the life and light of the Pagan world, as proven in the beautiful invocation to Venus by "Lucretius, quoted by Decharme. She is divine Nature in her entirety, Aditi-Prakriti before she becomes Lakshmi. She is that Nature before whose majestic and fair face, 'the winds flyaway, the quieted sky pours torrents of light, and the sea-waves smile,' (Lucretius). When referred to as the Syrian goddess Astarte, the Astaroth of Hieropolis, the radiant planet was personified as a majestic woman, holding in one outstretched hand a torch, in the other, a crooked staff in the form of a cross. (Vide Lucian's De Dea Syrie, and Cicero's De Nat : Deorum, 3 c.23)· Finally, the planet is represented astronomically, as a globe poised above tke cross - a symbol no devil would like to associate withwhile the planet Earth is a globe with a cross over it.
"But then, these crosses are not the symbols of Christianity, but the Egyptian crux ansata, the attribute of Isis (who is Venus, and Aphrodite, Nature, also) o+ or o+ the planet; the fact that the Earth has the crux ansata reversed, +o having a great occult significance upon which there is no necessity of entering at present.
"Now what says the Church and how does it explain the 'dreadful association.' The Church believes in the devil, of course, and could not afford to lose him. The Devil is the chief pillar of the Church confesses unblushingly an advocate
{EDITOR'S NOTE: "Thus saith Des Mousseaux. 'Moeurs et Pratiques des Demons.' p. X. - and he is corroborated in this by Cardinal de Ventura. The Devil he says, 'is one of the great personages whose life is closely allied to that of the Church; and without him .... the fall of man could not have taken place. If it were not for him (the Devil), the Saviour, the Redeemer, the Crucified would be but the most ridiculous of supernumeraries and the Cross an insult to good sense.' And if so, then we should feel thankful to the poor Devil."}
of the Ecclesia Militans. 'All the Alexandrian Gnostics speak to us of the fall of the AEons and their Pleroma, and all attribute that fall to the desire to know,' writes another volunteer in the same army, slandering the Gnostics as usual and identifying the desire to know or occultism, magic, with Satanism.
{EDITOR'S NOTE: "De Mirville. 'No Devil, no Christ,' he exclaims."}
And then, forthwith, he quotes from Schlegel's Philosophie de l'Histoire to show that the seven rectors (planets) of Pymander, "commissioned by God to contain the phenomenal world in their seven circles, lost in love with their own beauty,
{EDITOR'S NOTE: "This is only another version of Narcissus, the Greek victim of his own fair looks."}
came to admire themselves with such intensity that owing to this proud self-adulation they finally fell."
Perversity having thus found its way amongst the angels, the most beautiful creature of God "revolted against its Maker." That creature is in theological fancy Venus-Lucifer, or rather the informing Spirit or Regent of that planet. This teaching is based on the following speculation. The three principal heroes of the great sidereal catastrophe mentioned in Revelation are, according to the testimony of the Church fathers - 'the Verbum, Lucifer his usurper (see editorial) and the grand Archangel who conquered him,' and whose 'palaces' (the 'houses' astrology calls them) are in the Sun, Venus-Lucifer and Mercury. This is quite evident, since the position of these orbs in the Solar system correspond in their hierarchical order to that of the 'heroes' in Chapter xii of Revelation 'their names and destinies (?) being closely connected in the theological (exoteric) system with these three great metaphysical names.' (De Mirville's Memoir to the Academy of France, on the rapping Spirits and the Demons).
The outcome of this was, that theological legend made of Venus-Lucifer the sphere and domain of the fallen Archangel, or Satan before his apostacy. Called upon to reconcile this statement with that other fact, that the metaphor of 'the morning star,' is applied to both Jesus, and his Virgin mother, and that the planet Venus-Lucifer is included, moreover, among the 'stars' of the seven planetary spirits worshipped by the Roman Catholics
{EDITOR'S NOTE: "The famous temple dedicated to the Seven Angels at Rome, and built by MichaelAngelo in 1561, is still there, now called the 'Church of St. Mary of the Angels.' In the old Roman Missals printed in 1563 - one or two of which may still be seen in Palazzo Barberini - one may find the religious service (officio) of the seven angels, and their old and occult names. That the 'angels' are the pagan Rectors, under different names - the Jewish having replaced the Greek and Latin names - of the seven planets is proven by what Pope Pius V. said in his Bull to the Spanish Clergy, permitting and encouraging the worship of the said seven spirits of the stars. 'One cannot exalt too much these seven rectors of the world, figured by the seven planets, as it is consoling to our century to witness by the grace of God the cult of these seven ardent lights, and of these sevtn stars reassuming all its lustre in the Christian republic.' (Les Sept Esprits et l'Histoire de leur Culte; De Mirville's 2nd memoir addressed to Ute Academy. Vol. II. p. 358.)"}
under new names, the defenders of the Latin dogmas and beliefs answer as follows: -
"'Lucifer, the jealous neighbour of the Sun (Christ) said to himself in his great pride : 'I will rise as high as he!' He was thwarted in his design by Mercury, though the brightness of the latter (who is St. Michael) was as much lost in the blazing fires of the great Solar orb as his own was, and though, like Lucifer, Mercury is only the assessor, and the guard of honour to the Sun.' - (Ibid.)
"Guards of 'dishonour' now rather, if the teachings of theological Christianity were true. But here comes in the cloven foot of the Jesuit. The ardent defender of Roman Catholic Demonolatry and of the worship of the seven planetary spirits, at the same time, pretends great wonder at the coincidences between old Pagan and Christian legends, between the fable about Mercury and Venus, and the historical truths told of St Michael - the 'angel of the face,' - the terrestrial double, or ferouer of Christ He points them out saying: 'like Mercury, the archangel Michael, is the friend of the Sun, his Mitra, perhaps, for Michael is a Psychopompic genius, one who leads the separated souls to their appointed abodes, and like Mitra, he is the well-known adversary of the demons." This is demonstrated by the book of the Nabatheans recently discovered (by Chwolson), in which the Zoroastian Mitra is called the" grand enemy), of the planet Venus."· (ibid p. 160.)
"There is something in this. A candid confession, for once, of perfect identity of celestial personages and of borrowing from every pagan source. It is curious, if unblushing. While in the oldest Mazdean allegories, Mitra conquers the planet Venus, in Christian tradition Michael defeats Lucifer, and both receive, as war spoils, the planet of the vanquished deity.
"'Mitra.' says Dollinger, 'possessed, in days of old the star of Mercury, placed between the sun and the moon, but he was given the planet of the conquered, and ever since his victory he is identified with Venus.' ('Judaisme mid Paganisme,' Vol. II.,p. 109. French transl.)
'In the Christian tradition' adds the learned Marquis, 'St. Michael is apportioned in Heaven the throne and the palace of the foe he has vanquished.'
"Moreover, like Mercury. during the palmy days of paganism, which made sacred to this demon-god all the promontories of the earth the Archangel is the patroll of the same in our religion." This means, if it does mean anything, that now, at any rate, Lucifer-Venus is a sacred planet, and no synonym of Satan. since St. Michael has become his legal heir?"
"The History of a Planet", 'Lucifer', Volume 1, Number 1, 1887, pp. 16-20.
And from Volume 2 of her "Secret Doctrine":
"CHAPTER XIX.
"IS PLEROMA SATAN'S LAIR?
"THE subject is not yet exhausted, and has to be examined from still other aspects.
"Whether Milton's grandiose description of the three Days' Battle of the Angels of Light against those of Darkness justifies the suspicion that he must have heard of the corresponding Eastern tradition -- it is impossible to say. Nevertheless, if not himself in connection with some Mystic, then it must have been through some one who had obtained access to the secret works of the Vatican. Among these there is a tradition of the 'Beni Shamash' -- the 'children of the Sun' -- concerning the Eastern allegory, with far more minute details in its triple version, than one can get either from the Book of Enoch, or the far more recent Revelation of St. John about the 'Old Dragon' and his various Slayers, as just shown.
"It seems inexplicable to find, to this day, authors belonging to Mystical Societies who yet continue in their preconceived doubts as to the 'alleged' antiquity of the 'Book of Enoch.' Thus, while the author of the 'Sacred Mysteries among the Mayas and Quiches' is inclined to see in Enoch an Initiate converted to Christianity (! !) (vide p. 16), the English compiler of Eliphas Levi's works -- 'The Mysteries of Magic' -- is also of a like opinion. He remarks that: 'Outside the erudition of Dr. Kenealy, no modern scholarship attributes any more remote antiquity to the latter work (the 'Book of Enoch') than the fourth century B.C.' (Biograph. and Critical Essay, p. xxxviii.). Modern scholarship has been guilty of worse errors than this one. It seems but yesterday that the greatest literary critics in Europe denied the very authenticity of that work, together with the Orphic Hymns, and even the Book of Hermes or Thot, until whole verses from the latter were discovered on Egyptian monuments and tombs of the earliest dynasties. The opinion of Archbishop Laurence is quoted elsewhere.
"The 'Old Dragon' and Satan, now become singly and collectively the symbol of, and the theological term for, the 'Fallen Angel,' is not so described either in the original Kabala (the Chaldean 'Book of Numbers') or in the modern. For the most learned, if not the greatest of modern Kabalists, namely Eliphas Levi, describes Satan in the following glowing terms: -- 'It is that Angel who was proud enough to believe himself God; brave enough to buy his independence at the price of eternal suffering and torture; beautiful enough to have adored himself in full divine light; strong enough to reign in darkness amidst agony, and to have built himself a throne on his inextinguishable pyre. It is the Satan of the Republican and heretical Milton. . . . . the prince of anarchy, served by a hierarchy of pure Spirits (! ! ) . . . . '(Histoire de la Magie, 16-17) This description -- one which reconciles so cunningly theological dogma and the Kabalistic allegory, and even contrives to include a political compliment in its phraseology -- is, when read in the right spirit, quite correct.
"Yes, indeed; it is this grandest of ideals, this ever-living symbol -- nay apotheosis -- of self-sacrifice for the intellectual independence of humanity; this ever active Energy protesting against Static Inertia -- the principle to which Self-assertion is a crime, and Thought and the Light of Knowledge odious. It is -- as Eliphas says with unparalleled justice and irony -- 'this pretended hero of tenebrous eternities, who, slanderously charged with ugliness, is decorated with horns and claws, which would fit far better his implacable tormentor -- it is he who has been finally transformed into a serpent -- the red Dragon.' But Eliphas Levi was yet too subservient to his Roman Catholic authorities; one may add, too jesuitical, to confess that this devil was mankind, and never had any existence on earth outside of that mankind.*
{EDITOR'S NOTE: "What devil could be possessed of more cunning, craft and cruelty than the 'Whitechapel murderer' 'Jack the Ripper' of 1888, whose unparalleled blood-thirsty and cool wickedness led him to slaughter and mutilate in cold blood seven unfortunate and otherwise innocent women! One has but to read the daily papers to find in those wife and child-beating, drunken brutes (husbands and fathers!), a small percentage of whom is daily brought before the courts, the complete personifications of the devils of Christian Hell!"}
"In this, Christian theology, although following slavishly in the steps of Paganism, was only true to its own time-honoured policy. It had to isolate itself, and to assert its authority. Hence it could not do better than turn every pagan deity into a devil. Every bright sun-god of antiquity -- a glorious deity by day, and its own opponent and adversary by night, named the Dragon of Wisdom, because it was supposed to contain the germs of night and day -- has now been turned into the antithetical shadow of God, and has become Satan on the sole and unsupported authority of despotic human dogma. After which all these producers of light and shadow, all the Sun and the Moon Gods, were cursed, and thus the one God chosen out of the many, and Satan, were both anthropomorphised. But theology seems to have lost sight of the human capacity for discriminating and finally analysing all that is artificially forced upon its reverence. History shows in every race and even tribe, especially in the Semitic nations, the natural impulse to exalt its own tribal deity above all others to the hegemony of the gods; and proves that the God of the Israelites was such a tribal God, and no more, even though the Christian Church, following the lead of the 'chosen' people, is pleased to enforce the worship of that one particular deity, and to anathematize all the others. Whether originally a conscious or an unconscious blunder, nevertheless, it was one. Jehovah has ever been in antiquity only 'a god among other Gods,' (lxxxii. Psalm). The Lord appears to Abraham, and while saying, 'I am the Almighty God,' yet adds, 'I will establish my covenant to be a God unto thee' (Abraham), and unto his seed after him (Gen. xvii. 7) -- not unto Aryan Europeans.
"But then, there was the grandiose and ideal figure of Jesus of Nazareth to be set off against a dark background, to gain in radiance by the contrast; and a darker one the Church could hardly invent. Lacking the Old Testament symbology, ignorant of the real connotation of the name of Jehovah -- the rabbinical secret substitute for the ineffable and unpronounceable name -- the Church mistook the cunningly fabricated shadow for the reality, the anthropomorphized generative symbol for the one Secondless Reality, the ever unknowable cause of all. As a logical sequence the Church, for purposes of duality, had to invent an anthropomorphic Devil -- created, as taught by her, by God himself. Satan has now turned out to be the monster fabricated by the 'Jehovah-Frankenstein,' -- his father's curse and a thorn in the divine side -- a monster, than whom no earthly Frankenstein could have fabricated a more ridiculous bogey.
"The author of 'New Aspects of Life' describes the Jewish God very correctly from the Kabalistic stand-point as 'the Spirit of the Earth, which had revealed itself to the Jew as Jehovah' (p. 209). 'It was that Spirit again who, after the death of Jesus, assumed his form and personated him as the risen Christ' -- the doctrine of Cerinthius and several Gnostic sects with slight variation, as one can see. But the author's explanations and deductions are remarkable: 'None knew . . . better than Moses . . . and so well as he how great was the power of those (gods of Egypt) with whose priests he had contended,' he says . . . 'the gods of which Jehovah is claimed to be the God' (by the Jews only). 'What were these gods, these Achar of which Jehovah, the Achad, is claimed to be the God . . . by overcoming them?' the author asks; to which our Occultism answers: 'those whom the Church now calls the Fallen Angels and collectively Satan, the Dragon, overcome, if we have to accept her dictum, by Michael and the Host, that Michael being simply Jehovah himself, one of the subordinate Spirits at best.' Therefore, the author is again right in saying: 'The Greeks believed in the existence of . . . daimons. But . . . they were anticipated by the Hebrews, who held that there was a class of personating spirits which they designated demons, 'personators.' Admitting with Jehovah, who expressly asserts it, the existence of other gods, which were personators of the One God, were these other gods simply a higher class of personating spirits, which had acquired and exercised greater powers? And is not personation the Key to the mystery of the Spirit state? But once granting this position, 'how are we to know that Jehovah was not a personating Spirit, a Spirit which arrogated to itself that it was, and thus became, the personator of the one unknown and unknowable God? Nay, how do we know that the Spirit calling itself Jehovah, in arrogating to itself his attributes did not thus cause its own designation to be imputed to the One who is in reality as nameless as incognizable?'" (pp. 144-145.)
"The Secret Doctrine", Volume 2, Helena P. Blavatsky, 1888, pp. 506-509.
MANLY P. HALL
Recognizing the sun as the supreme benefactor of the material world, Hermetists believed that there was a spiritual sun which ministered to the needs of the invisible and divine part of Nature--human and universal. Anent this subject, the great Paracelsus wrote: "There is an earthly sun, which is the cause of all heat, and all who are able to see may see the sun; and those who are blind and cannot see him may feel his heat. There is an Eternal Sun, which is the source of all wisdom, and those whose spiritual senses have awakened to life will see that sun and be conscious of His existence; but those who have not attained spiritual consciousness may yet feel His power by an inner faculty which is called Intuition."
Certain Rosicrucian scholars have given special appellations to these three phases of the sun: the spiritual sun they called Vulcan; the soular and intellectual sun, Christ and Lucifer respectively; and the material sun, the Jewish Demiurgus Jehovah. Lucifer here represents the intellectual mind without the illumination of the spiritual mind; therefore it is "the false light. " The false light is finally overcome and redeemed by the true light of the soul, called the Second Logos or Christ. The secret processes by which the Luciferian intellect is transmuted into the Christly intellect constitute one of the great secrets of alchemy, and are symbolized by the process of transmuting base metals into gold.
-- "The Secret Teachings of All Ages", by Manly P. Hall, 1928, p. 51.
Like the sapphire Schethiyâ, the Lapis Exilis, crown jewel of the Archangel Lucifer, fell from heaven. Michael, archangel of the sun and the Hidden God of Israel, at the head of the angelic hosts swooped down upon Lucifer and his legions of rebellious spirits. During the conflict, Michael with his flaming sword struck the flashing Lapis Exilis from the coronet of his adversary, and the green stone fell through all the celestial rings into the dark and immeasurable Abyss. Out of Lucifer's radiant gem was fashioned the Sangreal, or Holy Grail, from which Christ is said to have drunk at the Last Supper.
-- Ibid., by Manly P. Hall, 1928, p. 99.
ALEISTER CROWLEY
Before leaving the subject of Black Magic, one may touch lightly on the question of Pacts with the Devil. The Devil does not exist. It is a false name invented by the Black Brothers to imply a Unity in their ignorant muddle of dispersions. A devil who had unity would be a God.
{AUTHOR'S NOTE: ""The Devil" is, historically, the God of any people that one personally dislikes. This has led to so much confusion of thought that THE BEAST 666 has preferred to let names stand as they are, and to proclaim simply that AIWAZ --- the solar-phallic-hermetic "Lucifer" is His own Holy Guardian Angel, and "The Devil" SATAN or HADIT of our particular unit of the Starry Universe. This serpent, SATAN, is not the enemy of Man, but He who made Gods of our race, knowing Good and Evil; He bade "Know Thyself!" and taught Initiation. He is "the Devil" of the Book of Thoth, and His emblem is BAPHOMET, the Androgyne who is the hieroglyph of arcane perfection. The number of His Atu is XV, which is Yod He, the Monogram of the Eternal, the Father one with the Mother, the Virgin Seed one with all-containing Space. He is therefore Life, and Love. But moreover his letter is Ayin, the Eye; he is Light, and his Zodiacal image is Capricornus, that leaping goat whose attribute is Liberty. (Note that the "Jehovah" of the Hebrews is etymologically connected with these. The classical example of such antinomy, one which has led to such disastrous misunderstandings, is that between NU and HAD, North and South, Jesus and John. The subject is too abstruse and complicated to be discussed in detail here. The student should consult the writings of Sir R. Payne Knight, General Forlong, Gerald Massey, Fabre d'Olivet; etc. etc., for the data on which these considerations are ultimately based.)}
-- "Magick: Book Four", Part Three, Chapter XXI: Of Black Magic, Of The Main Types of Operations of Magick Art and of the Powers of the Sphinx, Section II, Aleister Crowley via Soror Virakam (Mary D'este).
Lucifer, of whom the dark ages have made the genius of evil, will be truly the angel of light when, having conquered liberty at the price of infamy, he will make use of it to submit himself to eternal order, inaugurating thus the glories of voluntary obedience.
-- Equinox Vol. I, No. 10, Aleister Crowley, p. 23.
The fallen angel is not Lucifer the light-bearer; it is Satan, who calumniated love."
-- Ibid.
By Thy most secret and Holy Name of Apophis be Thou blessed, Lucifer, Star of the Dawn, Satan-Jeheshua, Light of the World!
-- Equinox I, 4.
And Satan is worshipped by men under the name of Jesus; and Lucifer is worshipped by men under the name of Brahma; and Leviathan is worshipped by men under the name of Allah; and Belial is worshipped by men under the name of Buddha.
-- Equinox I, 5.
ALICE BAILEY
Within her "The Destiny of Nations", Alice A. Bailey provides Lucifer an association to the 3rd planetary center, identified with the Prodigal Son and Son of the Morning. This is obviously a connection to the identification of Jesus with Lucifer from Revelations 22:16.
Here is a statement from the Lucis Trust on 'Lucifer Trust':
There are comments on the World Wide Web claiming that the Lucis Trust was once called the Lucifer Trust. Such was never the case. However, for a brief period of two or three years in the early 1920’s, when Alice and Foster Bailey were beginning to publish the books published under her name, they named their fledgling publishing company “Lucifer Publishing Company”. By 1925 the name was changed to Lucis Publishing Company and has remained so ever since.Both “Lucifer” and “Lucis” come from the same word root, lucis being the Latin generative case meaning of light. The Baileys' reasons for choosing the original name are not known to us, but we can only surmise that they, like the great teacher H.P. Blavatsky, for whom they had enormous respect, sought to elicit a deeper understanding of the sacrifice made by Lucifer. Alice and Foster Bailey were serious students and teachers of Theosophy, a spiritual tradition which views Lucifer as one of the solar Angels, those advanced Beings Who Theosophy says descended (thus “the fall”) from Venus to our planet eons ago to bring the principle of mind to what was then animal-man. In the theosophical perspective, the descent of these solar Angels was not a fall into sin or disgrace but rather an act of great sacrifice, as is suggested in the name “Lucifer” which means light-bearer.
-- "The Esoteric Meaning of Lucifer" (accessed 3/12/12
http://lucistrust.org/en/arcane_school/talks_and_articles/the_esoteric_meaning_of_lucifer
DAVID SPANGLER
A modern exponent of New Age Luciferianism is David Spangler, whose "Reflections on the Christ" includes the contention that Lucifer is a partner with the Christ. Spangler is an author, was for a period a director at Findhorn, and a spiritual teacher. Joseph Carr (a fundamentalist Christian evaluating New Agers, including what they will say when the Rapture occurs!), in his "The Lucifer Connection", attempts to summarize Spangler's ideology involving Lucifer:
In his book Reflections on the Christ, David Spangler teaches that man on earth possesses an 'energy of movement' that acts as a kind of gravity that draws inward the material needed not just for physical development but spiritual as well. For his analogy, Spangler uses the demands of a baby for food and other needs for his survival. Spangler calls this inward directed force 'creative selfishness'.
Spangler further lays out his system by proclaiming that the energies called 'creative selfishness' are not just free-floating but are instead '...embodied by some being.' The purpose of that being is to collect the energies... and then channels them to humans who need them for evolutionary development. On page 36 of Reflections on the Christ, David Spangler identifies that beng as Lucifer, the '...angel of man's inner evolution.'
One of the laws of the universe tells us that, in the absence of an external ordering force, all systems dissolve from a state of greater order to a state of lesser order.
{AUTHOR'S NOTE: cites "Everyone's Guide to Theosophy", by Harry Benjamin, Theosophical Publishing, printed 1969.}
The exception to the rule is the system that is subjected to an external ordering force; such a system can move from lesser order to greater order in seeming contradiction to the universe around it.
So now enter Lucifer -- the supreme 'ordering force.' In the universe of a non-personal, immanent god-force, each planet must have its own ordering force to assure andpromote its evolution back towards the god-head, i.t. towards orderliness.
According to some New Agers {notably Alice Bailey}, Lucifer came to earth from the planet Venus 18.5 million years years ago (some sources claim 17 milliion years). He was tasked by the Hierarchy with guiding the souls of earth up the evolutionary ladder toward the god-head and godhood.
Thus, Lucifer in the New Age becomes a kind of bridge or link between man and God....
{Again quoting Spangler:} "Lucifer prepares man in all ways for the experience of Christhood and the Christ prepares man for the experience of God. Jesus said, 'As the Christ, I am the way, the truth and the life. No man goes to the Father but through me.' This is true. The avenue out of microcosmic limitation into macrocosmic wholeness., universal consciousness and attunement is through the Christ. But the light that reveals to us the presence of the Christ, the light that reveals to us the path to the Christ comes from Lucifer.'
New Agers have divorced Satan and Lucifer. Many of them believe that "Satan" is a myth invented by the church in the Middle Ages, which needed a devil to frighten the vulgar populace into obedience.
...Spangler wrote that some powerful consciousness "... became quite enamoured of" the forces and used them as a source of power over others. This discovery and misuse of the forces put the system out of balance.
The evil aspect of Lucifer was not so much from the nature of Lucifer but from man's misuse of his energies. Lucifer is said to be merely the channel of neutral energies that are used for evil by man. According to Spangler's interpretation, Lucifer feels "pain and sorrow and anguish" over human misuse of his energies....
...The job of Lucifer {again, according to Spangler} is to turn the misused energies back on man, causing all manner of pain and suffering, unil man finally learns the lesson and turns away from ... "the dark side of the Force."
Satan's place in this Luciferian process is merely a false creation of man, according to the New Age doctrine. Instead of a real being, Satan is a mere "collective thought form" that is used to explain the misuse of Lucifer's energies.
... The purpose of Lucifer is to create the inner light within man (as "light-bearer"), while the purpose of Christ is to release that light into the world. The release of inner light is said to foster inner wisdom and love, while making room for more inner light (hence increasing spiritual growth potential).
...{quoting Spangler, page 41} "Lucifer ... is completely neutral. He is an agent of God's love acting tthrough evolution."
The apparent "bottom line" for man is, according to Spangler, a "Luciferic initiation." This initiation is regarded as the doorway that must be passed to come into the presence of God. The incredible claim is that one must first become a Luciferian in order to know God! What the New Age wants of us is nothing less than Luciferic initiation ....
-- "The Lucifer Connection", by Joseph Carr, 1987 Huntington House, pp. 136-138.
And more particularly regarding this initiation:
The New Age religion will require Intiation {sic} according to {Benjamin} Creme and others.
...Creme claims that Initiation is a scientific process ... that is the most sacred ceremony of the new religion. Two of the three Initiations will occur in the physical plane in New Age temples. The third Initiation ... is said to take place in a spirit realm.
The purpose of Initiation is to help the individual (and mankind in general) enter the Hierarchy -- called by Creme "the kingdom of God" -- and get much closer to divinity than is possible in the physical plane."
...David Spangler tells us ... that entrance into the New Age requires a Luciferic initiation.
{AUTHOR'S NOTE: cites "Revelation: Birth of a New Age", by David Spangler.}
Lucifer is said to offer man wholeness and the Luciferic Initiation is acceptance of Lucifer's offer.
-- Ibid., Carr, p. 146-148.
"...David spangler states too that Christ is the same force as Lucifer and Lucifer works within each of us to bring us to wholeness as we move to the new age. The cosmic Humanist also agree that war, murder e.t.c are part of the evolutionary flow and struggle of reality."
BENJAMIN CREME
Benjamin Creme is a New Age propheticizer and avatar-herald, syncretizing several religious figures presumed to be due in the future (Mahdi, Maitreyya, Messiah, Christ, Krishna, others) and bringing news of the manifestation of the Masters to humanity, along with glimpses of the Divine Plan.
Do you accept the interpretation of Lucifer as the Fallen Angel of evil?
No, I do not. I think this is a complete misunderstanding of Lucifer by Christian teaching. The name ‘Lucifer’ means, literally, ‘light’. The word comes from the Latin root: lux, lucis — light; and fer, ferre — to bring. It means, therefore, light-bringing and is the name of the planet Venus as the morning star.
Far from being evil, it is pure light. In the esoteric teaching, Lucifer is the name for the great angelic Entity who embodies the human kingdom on the soul plane. As souls, we are each an individualized part of this great Oversoul. Difficult as it is for us to grasp, there is really no such thing as a separate soul. It does not exist.
The Christian teaching holds that Lucifer — the chief rebel angel, Satan — was thrown out of heaven for getting too big-headed and arguing with God. This is simplistic and shows a complete misunderstanding of the reality. It is also, of course, symbolic. It is symbolic of a very significant point in our human evolution which took place 18 1/2 million years ago.
-- http://www.shareintl.org/archives/M_teachings/Mt_religion.htm (accessed 3/12/12)
Alice Bailey founded the Lucifer Trust, which she later changed to the Lucis Trust -- what did she mean by Lucifer?
Lucifer is the name of a great Angel, not an upstart in heaven who revolted against God and was put down into the nether regions as the Devil....the angel who ensouls the human kingdom; every person, therefore, is a fragment of Lucifer. According to the esoteric teaching, the human souls individualized 18.5 million years ago. Lucifer, the Oversoul, diversified itself, and each fragment became individualized.
-- http://www.shareintl.org/archives/AgelessWisdom/faq_basic.htm (accessed 3/12/12)
Satan is what we call the Antichrist. ...{The forces of materiality} have the role of upholding the matter of the planet.
Lucifer is seen by Christian goups as the devil. It is nothing of the kind! Lucifer is really the name of the great angel Who ensouls the human kingdom. Every human soul is an individualized part of one great oversoul. The name of that great oversoul, which is divine, is Lucifer.
-- page 42, http://www.share- international.org/books/PDFs/BCreme_TheAgelessWisdomTeaching_May07.pdf (accessed 3/12/12)
That is what happened, and that has been misinterpreted as a fall from grace: that Lucifer was a great angel but he rebelled against God and thought he was as good as God, and so was put out of heaven. It is a story, only a story, and totally misinterpreted. It is realy the story of the incarnation of the human evoluton.
-- Ibid. p. 44
More
Other names association with this New Age vector:
William Thompson
Eklal Kueshana (Richard Kieninger): --
"Eklal Kueshana, a leader of a mystical group calling itself 'The Stelle Group' published a book called The Ultimate Frontier twenty-five years ago, revealing that Lucifer is the Head of the secret Brotherhood of spirits, the highest order one can reach in the spiritual quest. In his book he claims that up to recently only a privileged few had been accepted into this enlightened brotherhood, but that now it was open to those brave enough to walk the spiritual path. This initiation is an entrance into the Great White Brotherhood, also known variously as the great White Lodge, the Masters of Wisdom, the Hierarchy of angels around the throne."
-- http://www.spiritual-wholeness.org/churchte/newage/lucifer.htm
Marilyn Ferguson ("The Aquarian Conspiracy")???
Much more recently, we have the following which must soon come into prominence:
Chumbley ("Azoetia")
Ford ("Luciferian Witchcraft")
Picknett ("The Secret History of Lucifer and the Meaning of the True Da Vinci Code")
POP CULTURE
Black Cat in Disney's Cinderella, Evil Step Mother had the cat
