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THE JOURNAL of CHRISTIAN RECONSTRUCTION Symposium THE JOURNAL OF CHRISTIAN RECONSTRUCTION Vol. I Winter, 1974 No. 2 A CHALCEDON MINISTRY JL Symposium on Satanism THE JOURNAL OF CHRISTIAN RECONSTRUCTION This journal is dedicated to the fulfilment Of the cultural mandate of Genesis 1:28 and 9:1—to subdue the earth to the glory of God. It is published by the Chalcedon Foundation, an independent Christian edu­ cational organization (see inside back cover). The perspective of the journal is that of orthodox Christianity. It affirms the verbal, plenary in­ spiration of the original manuscripts (autographs) of the Bible and the full divinity and full humanity of Jesus Christ—two natures in union (but without intermixture) in one person. The editors are convinced that the Christian world is in need of a serious publication that bridges the gap between the newsletter-magazine and the scholarly academic journal. The editors are committed to Chris­ tian scholarship, but the journal is aimed at intelligent laymen, working pastors, and others who are interested in the reconstruction of all spheres of human existence in terms of die standards of the Old and New Testa­ ments. It is not intended to be another outlet for professors to professors, but rather a forum for serious discussion within Christian circles. The Marxists have been absolutely correct in their claim that theory must be united with practice, and for this reason they have been success­ ful in their attempt to erode the foundations of the non-communist world. The editors agree with the Marxists on this point, but instead of seeing in revolution the means of fusing theory and practice, we see the fusion in personal regeneration through God’s grace in Jesus Christ and in the extension of God’s kingdom. Good principles should be followed by good practice; eliminate either, and the movement falters. In the long run, it is the kingdom of God, not Marx’s “kingdom of freedom,” which shall reign triumphant. Christianity will emerge victorious, for only in Christ and His revelation can men find both the principles of conduct and the means of subduing the earth—the principles of Biblical law. The Journal of Christian Reconstruction is published twice a year. The subscription rate is $6 per year. Individual copies are $3.50 each. Copy­ right by Chalcedon, 1974. The reproduction of the Journal by any means, including Xerox or photocopying, is strictly prohibited. An exception is made in the case of citations of less than 1,000 words in manuscripts and reviews, where the source is indicated. Editorial and subscription offices: P.O. Box 368, Woodland Hills, California 91365. THE JOURNAL OF CHRISTIAN RECONSTRUCTION Vol. I Winter, 1974 No. 2 A CHALCEDON MINISTRY GARY NORTH Editor Table of Contents I. SYMPOSIUM: SATANISM EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION .................................................................. 1 POWER FROM BELOW Rousas JohTpRushdoony........................... .......................... 7 THE PERSON, WORK, AND PRESENT STATUS OF SATAN Greg L. Bahnsen.......................................................................... ’.1 1 TYPES OF SATANIC INTERVENTION F. Seth Dyrness......................................................................................44 TABLE RAISING: INTRODUCTION TO THE OCCULT David R. Ketchen..................................... 63 THE ATTITUDE TOWARD DEMONS IN THE EARLY CHURCH Diana Lynn W alzel...................................... 69 GNOSTIC DUALISM AND THE ORIGINS OF THE MEDIEVAL DEFINITION OF WITCHCRAFT Mark Wyndham......................................................................................87 THE GNOSTIC TRADITION AND RENAISSANCE OCCULTISM Thomas Molrtdr....................................................................................112 OCCULTISM: A BIBLIOGRAPHICAL ESSAY Jean' C. B la sd a le ..................................................................... 120 II. CHRISTIAN RECONSTRUCTION ECONOMIC COMMENTARY: M agic, E nvy, and E conomic U nderdevelopment Gary N o r th ......................................................................................... 149 CONTEMPORARY ART: A rt, N udity, and Innocence Rousas John Rushdoony....................................................................162 III. DEFENDERS OF THE FAITH SALVIAN THE PRESBYTER Rousas John Rushdoony....................................................................167 Table of Contents (C ont.) IV. BOOK REVIEWS T h e Seduction o f th e Spir it (by Harvey Cox) Gary N o r th ............................................................................ ..... 173 P sychic D iscoveries B ehind th e Iron C urtain (by Sheila Ostrander and Lynn Schroeder) Gary N o r th .......................................................................................175 T h e Secret L if e of P lants (by Peter Tomkins and Christopher Bird) Gary North . 178 Su pern a tu re (by Lyall Watson) Gary N o r th .........................................................................................180 T h e M orning o f th e M agicians (by Louis Pauwels and Jacques Bergier) Gary N o r th .........................................................................................184 P sychic P hotography (by Hans Holzer) Gary N o r th .........................................................................................188 P sychic and O ther ESP P arty G am es (by David Hoy) Gary N o r th .........................................................................................189 Witchcraft in the M iddle A ges (by Jeffrey Burton Russell) Rousas John Rushdoony................................................................... 190 I. SYMPOSIUM: SATANISM EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION Screwtape, that marvelous, literary creation of C. S. Lewis, writes as a senior demon to his nephew, Wormwood, concerning the work of the demonic “lowerarchy”: Our policy, for the moment, is to conceal ourselves. Of course this has not always been so. We are really faced with a cruel dilemma. When the humans disbelieve in our existence we lose all the pleas­ ing results of direct terrorism, and we make no magicians. On the other hand, when they believe in us, we cannot make them material­ ists and sceptics. At least, not yet. I have great hopes that we shall learn in due time how to emotionalise and mythologise their science to such an extent that what is, in effect, a belief in us (though not under that name) will creep in while the human mind remains closed to belief in the Enemy. The “Life Force,” the worship of sex, and some aspects of Psychoanalysis may here prove useful. If once we can produce our perfect work—the Materialist Magician, the man, not using, but veritably worshipping, what he vaguely calls “Forces” while denying the existence of “spirits”—then the end of the war will be in sight.1 Lewis pursued similar themes in his novel, That Hideous Strength, and in his little book, The Abolition of Man. What he argued, in effect, is that we should expect to see a series of attempted fusions between tech­ nological power and demonic power. The goal in both cases is control. The implicit and even explicit dualism of Kantian and post-Kantian philosophy must be overcome. The hermetically sealed realms of nou- mena and phenomena—the mysterious vs. the scientifically measurable— will not stay separate as men increase their quest for meaning through power. Men cannot help but exercise dominion (Gen. 1:28); they will do so either in the name of the God of the Bible, or else they will seek to divinize some other force, whether “high” (the laws of nature) or “low” (demonic power). Secular man in our era is now becoming episte­ mologically self-conscious; he is carrying out his presuppositions to their logical ends. As the leader of one mid-1960’s counter-culture group, The Psychedelic Rangers, put it in 1967: “The psychedelic baby eats the 1. C. S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters (New York: Macmillan, [1942] 1969), ch. 7. 1 2 THE JOURNAL OF CHRISTIAN RECONSTRUCTION cybernetic monster.” In short, he explained, his group was attempting to fuse the mystical tradition of the East (which also runs very deep in the West) with Western industrial science and technology. “We’re out to build an electric Tibet.”2 Lewis died on November'22, 1963, the same day that both John F. Kennedy and Aldous Huxley met their maker. It is interesting that the reign of piecemeal technocratic pragmatism, synjjbolized in the Kennedy administration, faded almost immediately as a cultural force. By 1965, the fate of Kennedy’s pragmatism was sealed in the jungles of Vietnam, as David Halberstam’s The Best and the Brightest (1972), has chronicled so effectively. Simultaneously, a renewed interest in the writings of Lewis and his associates, J. R. R. Tolkien and Charles Williams, hit the campuses of America. The fantasies of Tolkien, Williams’ book on witchcraft, and Lewis’ science-fantasy trilogy, became the focus of clubs throughout the nation. Unfortunately, Aldous Huxley’s world of soma drugs and tech­ nology also reared its ugly head. Mysticism and magic swept over the West, especially among the young. A new counter-culture had arrived. The rise of drugs, Eastern mysticism and philosophy, Eastern magic (the / Ching), Satanism, and other forms of occultism seemed to get off the boat with the Beatles in 1964. The occult explosion can be measured, in retrospect, by the exponential curve in books, especially paperback books, devoted to the subject. There was a time— 1963 or earlier—when only the stodgy old Mystic Arts Book Club of New Hyde Park, New York, was actively hitting the literary markets.
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