Can the satanic temple really be considered authentic satanists? I BARELY consider the church of satan as such.

Both just use satan as a symbol. In my opinion, you don't have to be a theistic satanist to be authentic, but you AT LEAST have to believe in black magick. Even if all you think satan is is just an archetype, you at least have to do some ritual, or something satanic.

The satanic temple are just progressives, at the end of the day. And this isn't a slam against progressives, because the politics of the church of satan are also pretty lame; they essentially ayn rands objectivists, mixed with philisophical hedonism. At least they do magick tho.

To me, the authentic satanists are the temple of Set. Their claims are that there was a historical exodus from egypt, and that the hebrews as well as other groups, took the diety Set (god of darkness) and incorporated it into their theology. Basically, Set is the true inspiration for satan. I don't really know if this is true; and I doubt anyone really does... it's just a theory. But it is authentic.

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robingoodfellow · M

If you ever see film footage of Anton LeVey and The Church of Satan it's all rather silly and innocuous. There's nothing really going on there except a lot of harmless sexual activity.
The concept of Satan as we know it an amalgamation of ancient dieties that the Christian Church labeled as the Satan of the Bible, in an effort to get the people to stop looking to them and accept them as evil. Because up to that point even though the people were bringing Christianity into their homes they weren't doing it excluding the Old Ways. They were creating a kind of hybrid Pagan - Christianity. You can still see this in the oldest churches of Europe where images of Christ sit next to images of Pagan Gods.
The Church didn't want that so they demonized anything having to do with the Old Ways.

BRUUH

@robingoodfellow I appreciate" your comment and appreciate you participating. I'm pretty sure you're wrong tho. when you say "The concept of Satan as we know it an amalgamation of ancient dieties that the Christian Church labeled as the Satan of the Bible" I think this is wrong. Satan first appeared in the book of Job; before the christian church existed. Idk what you mean by "the satan we know today". I do agree the imagery we have of satan comes from dantes inferno and middle aged depictions.

I agree the church of satan was just people having fun for the most part. They also did black magick, tho. They had teachings too that were inherently egoism and hedonism with libertarianish individualis,.

robingoodfellow · M

@BRUUH yes Satan, of course, is the fallen angel of the old testement. What he became to the world, through Christianity, is akin to images like these:

Except these aren't Satan. They're images of the Gods Pan and Cernunnos. Dante also took his inspiration from images like these.
Before Abrahamic religion took over Europe and the British Isles ,Gods like these are who the common people took into their homes and lives. Christianity swept through the land, and this is all very well documented, but the people were hesitant to give up these old Gods. So the church told the people these Gods are actually Satan. And he's deceiving you. The church began to persecute those who refused to give them up, labeling them witches and devil worshippers. Satan became a bastardization of these Old Gods. And right up to today that's the image we have of him.
As a Pagan myself I've read up a ton on the history of all this. Feel free to pm if you ever want to discuss.

SatanBurger · 36-40, F

@robingoodfellow That's what I've always thought too.

BRUUH

@robingoodfellow That's really good information, thanks!

Tbh it's debatable if there is a fallen angel of the Old Testament. Isiah:14 is the verse most people use, but in context it may be reffering to the king of babylon, who was called venus; which in latin is lucifer.