Satanism Today - An Encyclopedia of Religion, Folklore and Popular ...

280 Wicca Letters
century. It was later (1967) made into a movie by
Hammer Films (released in the U.S. under the title,
The Devil’s Bride). In the words of Jessica Amanda
Salmonson, “The Devil Rides Out [is] a minor
classic. Black magic, demonism, evil sorcerer,
ghosts, astral journeys, mummified penis talisman,
revival after death—quite a colorful item.... It
shaped many persisting beliefs about Satan
worshipers” (Salmonson 2000, website). Wheatley
contributed heavily to the notion of a Satanic
conspiracy of covert devil-worshipers that would
be so influential in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
Both directly through his own writings and
indirectly through the works of imitators, Wheatley
provided details about the diabolical underground
that “confessing ex-Satanists” would later repeat in
testimonials aimed at conservative Christian audiences.
For example, in his recent study, Raising the
Devil, Bill Ellis provides a short overview of the
career of Doreen Irvine, an early “evangelical ex-
Satanist” heavily indebted to the novelist for her
portrait of “black lodges.” Irvine gathered her
“recollections” together into a book published in
1973 as From Witchcraft to Christ. At one infernal
gathering, she described participants arriving “in
smart cars, not on broomsticks, and booked in at
hotels looking for all the world like successful businessmen
and women—which some were. This was
the new face of witchcraft—prosperous, almost
respectable—a veneer that concealed tremendous
forces of evil” (Ellis 2000, 164). This scene seems to
have been taken directly out of one of Wheatley’s
black magic novels.
Perhaps more interestingly, the British writer
also contributed to organized Satanism. As Philip
Jenkins notes, commenting on The Devil Rides Out:
“Though fictional, books like this played an indispensable
part in shaping the new occult groups
from the 1960s onwards, including real-life
Satanists” (Jenkins 2000, 144). For example, one
modern Satanist group, the Brotherhood of the
Ram, appears to have taken its name from a
fictional order in Wheatley’s The Satanist. Toward
the end of this same novel, the chief Satanist
addresses the world in a radio broadcast focused on
the theme that “the Christian heresy had inflicted
on the world many generations of senseless selfdenial,
made an unnatural virtue of celibacy, and
denied the people the joy in life which was their
birthright.” Although Wheatley’s character was
certainly not the first to voice this sentiment, and
thus not likely the first to implant the idea in Anton
LaVey’s fertile imagination, it is interesting that the
opposition between Christianity and natural
human instinct is also the core theme of The
Satanic Bible. Similarly, Wheatley’s novelistic
portrayals of Satanic gatherings may have provided
some inspiration for LaVey’s Satanic rituals.
See also Brotherhood of the Ram; Film; LaVey, Anton
Szandor
For Further Reading:
Baddeley, Gavin. Lucifer Rising: Sin, Devil Worship
and Rock’n’Roll. London: Plexus, 1999.
Ellis, Bill. Raising the Devil: Satanism, New Religions,
and the Media. Lexington: University Press of
Kentucky, 2000.
Irvine, Doreen. From Witchcraft to Christ. City, UK:
Concordia Publishing House, 1973. Published in
the U.S. as Freed from Witchcraft. Nashville:
Thomas Nelson, 1981.
Jenkins, Philip. Mystics and Messiahs: Cults and New
Religions in American History. New York: Oxford
University Press, 2000.
LaVey, Anton Szandor. The Satanic Bible. New York:
Avon, 1969.
Salmonson, Jessica Amanda. “Dennis Wheatley: Sex,
Jingoism & Black Magic.”
http://www.violetbooks.com/REVIEWS/jaswheatley.html,
2000.
Wheatley, Dennis. The Devil Rides Out. 1935.
London: Hutchinson, 1963.
———. The Satanist. 1960. London: Arrow Books,
1974.
Wicca Letters
The so-called “Wicca Letters” do for modern
witches and Satanists what the Protocols of the
Learned Elders of Zion did for Judaism. In other
words, in the same way in which the Protocols were
supposed to present the details of a Jewish plot to
take over the world, the Wicca Letters are supposed
to represent a similar outline for world domination
drafted by the Witches International Coven Council
(a nonexistent group) during a meeting in Mexico
in 1981. It was claimed that a copy of these letters
was intercepted by police. The writer Art Lyons was
said to have traced the authorship of this document
to a San Diego police “cult” expert. The letters read: