#ragnar redbeard

The supremacy of Living Manhood over devout dreaming, over literature, dogma, law and tradition must be boldly asserted and boldly maintained; as in the days of yore. 

Anton LaVey, founder of the Church of Satan, directly lifted passages from the 19th century proto-fascist book "Might Is Right" by “Ragnar Redbeard” (Arthur Desmond) and did so extensively and without credit to produce a substantial part of LaVey’s most famous and popular work "The Satanic Bible".

This has been known for a very long while, although most Satanists tend not to be aware of just how shamelessly and thoroughly this work was done.

In fact, the Church of Satan sometimes tweets out passages from Might Is Right while supposedly praising LaVey.

To have quoted LaVey there, the Church of Satan would have had to tweet just "on the other".

And this is not a stray, incidental unattributed line that LaVey could have argued his readers ought to have immediately been familiar with as a sort of homage.

This was part of a wholesale, uncredited and unacknowledged ransacking of another person’s writing in order to create another, ostensibly-original book and sell it for profit. For example, here is how much from one particular section of Might Is Right ended up making it into LaVey’s book:

This is what LaVey and his partner Diane Hegarty, who also served as his typist an editor, used to introduce people to The Satanic Bible in its opening section the "Book of Satan". This isn't in some appendix or footnote; this is the first thing people reading the book were shown.

The "Book of Satan" portion of The Satanic Bible is essentially identical to parallel lines in Might Is Right: www.diffchecker.com/ppXjtPGV/

If you strip out differences in punctuation(!) and Capitalization and compare them, it's even more shameful: www.diffchecker.com/td0vLevN/

Depending on how you want to count, about 85 percent of this opening can be identified as directly copied, which still includes Americanization of spellings, leaving words out from the original, and a handful of words substituted within much larger phrases and ideas that were retained fully intact.

Only two of the 53 statements of the “Book of Satan” appear to be original creations of LaVey and Hegarty: Book III No. 5 and Book V No. 13. Feel free to check out the full comparison for yourself here:

Mankind is aweary, aweary of its sham prophets, its demagogues and its statesmen. It crieth out for kings and heroes. It demands a nobility – a nobility that cannot be hired with money, like slaves or beasts of burden. 

“Human rights and wrongs are not determined by Justice, but by Might, disguise it as you may, the naked sword is still king-maker and king-breaker, as of yore. All other theories are lies and lures.”

Behind all Kings and Presidents– all Government and Law, Are army-corps and cannoneers– to hold the world in awe. And sword-strong races own the earth and ride the Conqueror’s Car– And Liberty has never been won, except by deeds of war. What are the lords of hoarded gold– the silent Semite rings? What are the plunder-patriots– high-pontiffs, priests and kings? What are they but bold master-minds, best fitted for the fray? Who comprehend and vanquish by– the Logic of To-Day? Cain’s knotted club is scepter still– the “Rights of Man” is fraud: Christ’s Ethics are for creeping things– true manhood smiles at “God”. For Might is Right when empires sink in storms of steel and flame;

And it is Right when weakling breeds– are hunted down like game. Then what’s the use of dreaming dreams– that “each shall get his own” By forceless votes of meek-eyed thralls, who blindly sweat and moan? No! a curse is on their cankered brains– their very bones decay: -Go! trace your fate in the Iron Game, is the Logic of To-Day. The strong must ever rule the Weak, is grim Primordial Law– On earth’s broad racial threshing floor, the Meek are beaten straw. Then ride to Power o’er foemens neck let nothing bar your way, IF you are fit you’ll rule and reign, is the Logic of To-Day. You must prove your Right by deeds of Might– of splendor and renown. If need-be march through flames of hell, to dash opponents down.

If need-be die on scaffold high– in the mornings misty gray is still For “Liberty or Death” is still the Logic of To-Day. Might was Right when Gideon led the “chosen” tribes of old, And it was right when Titus burnt their Temple roofed with gold: And Might was Right from Bunkers Hill to far Manilla Bay, By land and flood it’s wrote in blood– the Gospel of To-Day. “Put no trust in princes” is a saying old and true, “Put no hope in Governments” translateth it anew. All ‘Books of Law’ and ‘GoldenRules’ are fashioned to betray; ‘The Survival of the Strongest’ is the Gospel of To-Day. Might was Right when Carthage flames lit up the Punic foam–

And – when the naked steel of Gaul weighed down the spoil of Rome; And Might was Right when Richmond fell– and at Thermopalye– It’s the Logic of the Ancient World– and the Gospel of To-Day. Where pendant suns in millions swing, around this whirling earth, It’s Might, it’s Force that holds the brakes, and steers through life and death: Force governs all organic life, inspires all Right and Wrong. It’s Nature’s plan to weed-out man, and Test who’re the Strong.”

Today marks the release of a book of Satanic history, that of rebels who have been forgotten. Magister Kevin I. Slaughter has authored his first book, history of The Radical Book Shop of Chicago, a forgotten hub of anarchist, unionist, socialist, and communist literature. From its humble beginnings in 1914, this bookstore inspired revolutionaries and welcomed poets, novelists, roughnecks, and…