Ryan very accurately states that the pentagram has many benign uses and symbolisms among groups, but that the inverted one is also used by many groups, most notably devil worshippers. How the pentagram got there is unknown. If its representational intentions were good or evil is also unknown--I agree with Ryan that the latter is likely. This post is not about the meaning of that particular pentagram. But it does make me think about what the inverted pentagram actually represents, and it's quite complex.
First, let's talk about the upright pentagram, or pentacle--a 5-pointed star in a circle. It's is generally accepted that the 5 points represent 5 elements--fire, air, water, earth, and spirit. In symbolic diagrams about man's relationship to the Universe (or "God" if you like), the 5-pointed star is embedded in a 6-pointed star (think of the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram--"for about me flames the pentagram, and in the column stands the 6-rayed star"). What this symbolizes is man's place in the Universe--a microcosm of the macrocosm. We are but a small, self-contained piece of the Whole.
What the inverted pentagram represents, in Doreen Valiente's words, is "Spirit hidden in Matter." This has a very "loaded" history. We need to go back to the early Christian Church, and the Gnostics. Gnostics believed that the created world was corrupt--the Universe was continually created out of pairings called "aeons". However, one of these Aeons, Sophia (Wisdom), decided to create something on her own--and what she created was a being called Yaldabaoth. Yaldabaoth is synonymous in Gnosticism with Yahweh or Jehovah. Since this Being was unable to see the wider Universe, he assumed he was the only one in the Universe, and created our world. When Sophia saw this, she tried to intervene in the form of the Serpent--to show us that we really had Divine origins--but Yaldabaoth squelched that. Christ came along later to try to redeem us from the influence of Yaldabaoth.
From this belief system came the idea that all Incarnation in this world was evil. The extreme extension of this was what is now known as the Cathar Heresy--that all matter is evil, and that all human beings should refrain from procreation. Naturally the Orthodox/Catholic Church was against such a proposition (it would wipe out the human race if we all believed it), and condemned it as heresy. But from this notion came the idea that matter is evil.
Now--if we go back to the inverted pentagram--it represents Spirit hidden in Matter. So if all Matter is evil according to this way of thinking, then the inverted pentagram represents some great evil, namely the possibility of Incarnation, or descent into Matter. This is also how the Devil (from the Greek word "diabolos", meaning, "to put an obstruction in one's path"--very different from the idea of ultimate evil) came to be represented as this goat-headed figure. The Knights Templar, a Catholic religious order later accused and prosecuted as heretical, were said to worship an image called Baphomet, very much in line with our modern visual idea of "Satan" or "the Devil".
But if you look at the Baphomet image--it is both human and animal, both male and female, and has images of both day and night. Baphomet is a zoomorph--it represents all possibilities for incarnation. According to the Cathar Heresy, it would then be representing Ultimate Evil, since evil is the result of Spirit being degraded to Matter. But, as we've said, this is a heresy according to the traditional Church, and while I can't agree with them on all heresies, this seems pretty legit. Life requires incarnation. Yet somehow we've retained this notion of "evil" in our collective unconsciousness.
It may not be totally wrong for Satanists to identify with inverted pentagrams. After all, people who follow an organized "Satanism" are usually hedonists--they live exclusively for their own pleasure, and therefore they live for the strictly material. But there is a lot of what passes for "Satan worship" that is probably totally unaware of this connection. Certainly it behooves non-Satanists who may be called upon to recognize the unintended (or intended) consequences of such beliefs to understand the origins of the image.
I return again to the Tree of Life image. The Tree of Life is lighter at the top, and heavier at the bottom--heavier at the bottom because it is encased in Matter. But we need to remember that it is One Tree--it is all Divine, not just the "Spirit" part. Technically, we shouldn't separate it out at all. What is apparently separate is really unified. We shouldn't invest too much in the temporal (i.e., the material) because it dies or goes away after awhile. But that doesn't make it evil. Evil is something different--it comes from a total lack of respect for the "divinity" of others--if you don't like that idea, at least the idea that all humans are made in "God's Image". As Hannah Arendt put it (and I'm paraphrasing) -- true evil is what happens when you knock on the door of Conscience and nobody is at home.
5 comments:
I just finished watching the same episode on my tivo as well...and have personally always had a preference to the number 5 and an inherent balance it represented both figuratively (elements, forces, etc) and mathematically (golden ratio, fibonacci).
Having done some research into pentagrams as well, I also have to raise other possibilities for why this exists in the prison.
1) Older Freemason symbols used to use an inverted pentagram (sometimes depicted as forget-me-nots; 5 petal flowers with two upward). More modern versions are rotated 36 degrees. But in many older stone buildings it is not uncommon to find Freemason symbols. In a similar fashion to the Pentagram of Venus (used as an astrological symbol since early Babylon around 3000 BC)
2) Some early Christians used an inverted pentagram to represent the decent of Christ to earth, and a normal to represent ascent to heaven. In that vein I've seen some books signify that it was used to more or less signify a need for an earthly focus and need of Christ's power (pointed down) vs a point at which you would give back to Christ in worship (pointed up). In fact it wasn't commonly associated with evil till the 1300s (not that there would be many people practicing pre-1300 Christianity when this building was built...so not a likely explanation).
3) In some sects the inverted pentagram was used to signify the internal struggle against evil, and not evil itself. So it was a symbol for focusing barriers and forces on a soul so one could conquer the internal evils and attain redemption, clarity, etc (kind of fits with ideally what a prison would try to do).
Of course in the 3000-5000 years or so of civilization symbols come and go. They change meaning over time...so who knows maybe it there was a satanic warden, masonic calling card, or some obscure religious relic lost to popular culture.
Well, the PENTAGRAM the upside down one represents horns at the top with the 2 points I AM A WITCH and we do PENTACLE in our rituals and for protection THE PENTAGRAM is evil and used in black magic :)
To the anonymous poster--it may well be used in black magic, as is the image of Baphomet, but that doesn't make them "Satanic" in the modern use of the word. The whole notion of "Ultimate Evil" comes out of the same idea that matter (i.e., the flesh) is somehow evil. Black magic tends to be practiced for more material ends, not spiritual ones, hence the association. Like you, I was a practitioner (not so much currently)--not of black magic, but many other types for years (and did my graduate study on it), and there are indeed many permutations and interpretations of these symbols in different magical communities. But like the idea of "Satan", they were not intended to be symbols of evil.
Basically, the pentagram has no basis in the institution. What it reveals actually is that a lot of dark history from the state of Virginia originally and then WV has not been revealed and it obviously will not be if people still want to continue to white wash activities that may not be documented however they are known. Many thanks to Ryan and his group for showing at least part of how this was exploited to allow a few to benefit and others to be sacrificed.
Look at the image of In Assyrian and Babylonian mythology, Pazuzu (sometimes Fazuzu or Pazuza) was the king of the demons of the wind, and son of the god Hanbi. You will see the inspiration of that Baphoment nonsense of Levi. Second the inverted pentagram came from Egypt under Coptic Christianity. It represented Incantation hence used by them as incarnation of Jesus. Upright represented death and return of the soul to the Divine source more or less. Finally the idea of all Matter as evil was purely Gnostic nonsense in origin. They wanted everyone celibate and seek the end of the world as some Divine Liberation. It invaded the Church, Kabbalah as it was created in Spain originally. The inverted Cross was also not evil in origin, It represented Peter crucified upside down as a mockery of the Roman's to his comment about being crucified as his savior was no threat to him. The Satanists simply took it up to Mock" Christianity all together. Finally lets not forget Satanism really was invented by the Church. If their God is all powerful their devil simply cannot rebel. End of nonsense 101
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