Sigil of Baphomet

The white-on-black rendition of the Sigil of Baphomet

The Sigil of Baphomet is the official insignia of the Church of Satan, founded 1966.[1][2][3][4] The sigil has been called a "material pentagram" representational of carnality and earthly principles.[5] The Church describes the symbol as the "...preeminent visual distillation of the iconoclastic philosophy of Satanism."

While the eponymous Baphomet had been depicted as a goat-headed figure since at least 1856, the goat's head inside an inverted pentagram was largely popularized by the modern Church of Satan.

Origins

The 1897 illustration with "Samael" and "Lilith" text

The depiction of an inverted pentagram with a goat's head, paired with five Hebrew letters at the pentagram points, first appeared in the 1897 book La Clef de la Magie Noire by French occultist Stanislas de Guaita. The Hebrew letters spell out Leviathan (לויתן), the ancient serpent from the biblical Chaoskampf, while the 1897 symbol is further augmented by the text "Samael" and "Lilith". With the pentagram inverted, matter is ruling over spirit, a condition associated with evil. In his book, de Guaita also illustrates an upright pentagram with the Pentagrammaton (יהשוה) at the vertices of the pentagram: an esoteric version of the Hebrew name of Jesus, Yeshua (ישוע), by adding the letter shin (ש) in the middle of the Tetragrammaton divine name Yod-He-Vav-He (יהוה).[citation needed] The lower four points represented the four elements of the material world, while the uppermost point represented spirit ruling over matter. As influenced by the 19th-century French occultist Éliphas Lévi, an inverted pentagram represents materiality while an upright pentagram accordingly symbolizes holiness.

20th and 21st centuries

Vector image illustration with "Samael" and "Lilith" text

This symbol was later reproduced in A Pictorial History of Magic and the Supernatural by Maurice Bessy.[6] Anton LaVey, founder of the Church of Satan, acquired Bessy's book during his research into the "black arts". LaVey adapted the symbol from Bessy's book, with the "Samael" and "Lilith" text removed. This version was drawn by LaVey and attributed to "Hugo Zorilla" (a pseudonym used by LaVey in some of his art).[7]

In the formative years of the Church of Satan, this particular version of the symbol was utilized on membership cards, stationery, medallions, and most notably above the altar in the ritual chamber of the Black House. The complete graphic now known as the Sigil of Baphomet first appeared publicly on the cover of The Satanic Mass album in 1968, then on The Satanic Bible cover in 1969,[4] and first named as such in The Satanic Rituals book in 1972.

In addition to the Church of Satan, there are other Satanic organizations that also use the Sigil of Baphomet as a logo, such as Joy of Satan Ministries and the Satanic Temple.

See also

References

  1. ^ Hurst, Janet (15 August 2014). Extraordinary Goats: Meetings with Remarkable Goats, Caprine Wonders & Horned Troublemakers. Voyageur Press. ISBN 9780760345658.
  2. ^ Davies, Owen (2010). Grimoires: A History of Magic Books. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-959004-9.
  3. ^ "The History of the Origin of the Sigil of Baphomet and its Use in the Church of Satan". Church of Satan. Retrieved 2024-07-30.
  4. ^ a b Lewis 2001, pp. 20–21.
  5. ^ Petersen, Jesper Aa. (2014). "Carnal, Chthonian, Complicated: The Matter of Modern Satanism". In Lewis, James R.; Petersen, Jesper Aa. (eds.). Controversial New Religions (2nd ed.). New York: Oxford University Press. p. 417. ISBN 978-0-19-515682-9.
  6. ^ Original French: Histoire en 1000 images de la magie, 1961; first English translation in 1964.
  7. ^ Partridge, Christopher (2006-06-20). The Re-Enchantment of the West, Vol 2: Alternative Spiritualities, Sacralization, Popular Culture and Occulture. A&C Black. ISBN 9780567041234.
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