DEVIL WORSHIP

DEVIL WORSHIP The Old Dragon

By Geifodd ap Pwyll

In conventional religion, it is the illusion of certainty which keeps people chained; "I know this because the Bible tells me so," "I know that because the Koran says so," etc. It is the folly of religion that it is built upon speculations of cosmic reality which are dogmatically asserted to be objective facts, without any evidence. And such a mentality leads to cognitive stagnation. Any attempts to subvert such stagnation (as in "playing Devil's advocate") are met with fierce and irrational tribalism. By challenging the "certainty" of the Bible, you are not just "blaspheming against God"; you are threatening (and, more importantly, TEMPTING) the quarantined imagination with the prospect of the Unknown. In their attempts to tame, sanitize, and "exorcise" the Unknown, most human animals cling to their petty dogmas and doctrines; for it is the "illusion of certainty" which keeps the Demons at bay (or so they think). In the most extreme forms of this phenomenon, we find such explicitly dangerous manifestations as militaristic theocracy and "jihad." Such it has been since humans first found time to wonder what happens to the Sun after it sets each evening.

But the Old Dragon, in His might, rises from the limitless depths and sneaks into the minds of human critters, putting all sorts of weird and unforseen thoughts into their imaginations. He does this through all manner of things; He communicates to us through the natural world, through animals, through our families, our friends, our televisions, our computers, our radios. Perhaps He even gets to us through the shades of the dead. Either way, He plants thoughts in our minds, sowing the seeds of discord and dissent; ever tempting us to question what we hold to be certain. His interest is in subverting any and all notions of cosmological certainty, and to continually remind us that, although knowledge is power as they say, knowledge is *fluidic*. By having the "ideological rug" swept from under our feet, we are forced into a process of continuous re-orientation with ourselves and all things. And this continuous re-orientation, though maddening, allows for mutation, selection, and evolution; for only the thoughts and worldviews which are best adapted to the ever-changing circumstances of reality may survive His intervention.

Those who hand the end of the rug to our chthonic Rug-Puller and invite Him to work His will upon us may be initiated into ever higher levels of wisdom; for only by accepting the fluidic nature of human knowledge, and only by constantly testing the limits of such, may our intellectual power be made to evolve. But those who attempt to banish the Old Dragon with inane incantations to their petty gods of "revealed truth" become lost in their frustration. They may be in the majority, and they may have the sympathy of whatever norms are currently in place; but it is always those few who hand the end of the rug to the Rug-Puller who determine the majorities and the norms of the future. The Old Dragon is only destructive and "evil" to those who cling desperately to their speculations of "absolute certainty"; to the seeker who constantly lusts to shed his own self-created light upon the mysteries of this world, the Dragon is nothing short of divine.

And whether we believe in or worship the Old Dragon or not is inconsequential to Him; in fact, it serves His purposes all the more smoothly if we do not. Some of us just can't help ourselves. :-)

Devil Worship