Description
Book SynopsisChildren of Lucifer explores the historical origins of Satanism, the anti-religion that adopts Satan, the Judeo-Christian representative of evil, as an object of veneration. Ruben van Luijk traces its development from a concept invented by the Christian church to demonize its internal and external competitors, to a positive (anti-)religious identity embraced to varying degrees by groups in the modern West. Van Luijk offers a comprehensive intellectual history of this long and unpredictable trajectory; a story that involves Romantic poets, radical anarchists, eccentric esotericists, Decadent writers, and schismatic exorcists, among others, culminating in the establishment of the Church of Satan by carnival entertainer Anton Szandor LaVey. Yet, he argues, this story is more than just a collection of colorful characters and unlikely historical episodes. The emergence of new attitudes towards Satan proves to be intimately linked to the Western Revolution--the ideological struggle for emancipation that transformed the West and is epitomized by the American and French Revolutions. It is also closely connected to secularization, that other exceptional historical process during which western culture spontaneously renounced its traditional gods in order to enter into a self-imposed state of religious indecision. Children of Lucifer, thus, makes the case that the emergence of Satanism presents a shadow history of the evolution of modern civilization as we know it.
Trade ReviewChildren of Lucifer is a tour de force and the best book on the historical development of Satanism out there. * Lukas Pokorny, Religious Studies Review *
Ruben van Luijk's Children of Lucifer: The Origins of Modern Religious Satanism is the most readable of a current rush of books on Satanism [it's] a highly valuable and immensely enjoyable book. * Numen *
[T]he prose is engaging and would pose little problem for those unfamiliar with the shibboleths of academia...Children of Lucifer is best at exploring the wider field of Satanic discourse, namely the interplay between literature about Satanism and more explicitly religious manifestations of Satanic practice. * Ethan Doyle White, Correspondences *
Van Luijk is an eminent specialist of the Belle Époque, and a master storyteller. All the chapters of his book about late 19th-century France are rich in details nobody else...found before him, and the story is told in such a vivid prose that even those who have no special interest in esotericism or Satanism would find the book extremely entertaining...Van Luijk's book is...indispensable for understanding the Belle Époque and the medieval and early modern precursors of modern Satanism. * Massimo Introvigne, Aries - Journal for the Study of Western Esotericism *
I recommend Children of Lucifer not only for its engrossing history, but also because Luijk engages criticallyproblematizing and theorizing througha vast oeuvre of well-known nineteenth- and twentieth-century authors, poets, philosophers, theologians, and occultists. This scope will surely appeal to graduate students, literary critics, and scholars of Christianity, Western Esotericism, and New Religious Movements. * Tarryl Janik, Nova Religio *
This book provides sweeping treatment of a fascinating and challenging theme that might well provoke its readers into rethinking the intellectual foundations of Western modernity. * Stephen W. Angell, The Journal of the American Academy of Religion *
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments Practical Indications for the Reader Introduction Chapter 1. The Christian Invention of Satanism Intermezzo 1. The Eighteenth Century: Death of Satan? Chapter 2. The Romantic Rehabilitation of Satan Chapter 3. Satan in Nineteenth-Century Counterculture Intermezzo 2. Charles Baudelaire: Litanies to Satan Chapter 4. Huysmans & Consorts Chapter 5. Unmasking the Synagogue of Satan Chapter 6. Unmasking the Synagogue of Satan (continued and concluded) Intermezzo 3. Nineteenth-Century Religious Satanism: Fact or Fiction? Chapter 7. Paths into the Twentieth Century Chapter 8. Tribulations of the Early Church Intermezzo 4. Adolescent Satanism, Metal Satanism, Cyber-Satanism Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index
