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

26 Belphegor
directing the tolling toward the four cardinal
points of the compass. This is done once at the
beginning of the ritual to clear and purify the air
of all external sounds, and once again at the end of
the ritual to intensify the working and act as a
pollutionary indicating finality” (137).
See also Church of Satan
For Further Reading:
Chevalier, Jean, and Alain Gheerbrant: The Penguin
Dictionary of Symbols. London: Penguin, 1996.
LaVey, Anton Szandor. The Satanic Bible. New York:
Avon, 1969.
Belphegor
Belphegor, Lord of the Opening, was, according
to cabalists, once an angel of the order of principalities,
but later became a god of licentiousness
in ancient Moab. In hell, Belphegor is the demon
of inventiveness, and when called upon, appears
in the likeness of a young woman. According to
the Dictionnaire Infernal, by De Plancy, Belphegor
was hell’s ambassador to France, and Victor Hugo
concurs with this in The Toilers of the Sea, placing
Belphegor in Paris. In John Milton’s Paradise Lost,
Belphegor is a variant for Nisroc, whom he
describes as “of Principalities of the Prime.” One
story describes how the devils of hell were upset
to hear about the existence of some couples on
earth who were apparently happily married.
Belphegor was sent on a mission to investigate,
but soon discovered in his searches that the
rumor was groundless.
See also Demons; Milton, John
For Further Reading:
Davidson, Gustav. A Dictionary of Angels Including
the Fallen Angels. New York: Free Press, 1967.
Ronner, John. Know Your Angels: The Angel Almanac
with Biographies of 100 Prominent Angels in
Legend and Folklore, and Much More.
Murfreesboro, TN: Mamre, 1993.
The Beyond
A 1981 film about the old theme of the portal to
the underworld where the dead go. The belief in a
passage from the earth to the underworld goes
back at least as far as the ancient Greeks, who
believed there was a specific place, Lake Avernus,
where the dead passed into Hades. In this film, the
portal to the underworld is located under an old,
run-down southern mansion. When the spirits
become disturbed, they terrorize the hotel guests.
Other movies about the entrance to the underworld
are: Amityville 3D, The Amityville Horror,
Highway to Hell, The Gate, The Sentinel, The
Devil’s Daughter, and many animated cartoons.
Alice in Wonderland also depicts a portal to an
underworld through which Alice falls.
Beyond the Door
A young woman living in San Francisco discovers
she is going to bear Satan’s child. Given the headturning
and other lame effects, it seems that this
1975 film was intended to be a blend of Rosemary’s
Baby and The Exorcist.
Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey
Following an exorcism, Bill and Ted are sent into
an adolescent hell from which they escape through
a portal of flames. This 1991 comedic fantasy is
comparable to Alice in Wonderland with a heavy
metal theme.
Bishop Auckland Case
In 1993, accusations of Satanic ritual abuse were
leveled against four families in Bishop Auckland,
UK. The case started with a teenage male who had
been convicted of child molestation. After being
sent away to a medical center for treatment, two of
his five victims began to accuse various adults who
lived close to each other in this middle-class residential
suburb. Eventually, four of the children
began to claim that they had suffered sexual abuse
during Satanic rites in an attic. They further
claimed that they had been drugged and had their
pictures taken. A local minister, who seems to have
been the ultimate source of these accusations, had
even prompted the children to act out their abuse.
These rituals supposedly included having rats bite
the children during sexual acts in which “devil
clothes” were worn. It was later discovered that
much of the imagery used describe the abuse—
such as the children’s statements about being