the following is an excerpt from a critique of the Lancea Sanctum donated to the Sacramento Chapterhouse by Brother Racula..

- - -

Now let us consider 'Dark Miracles.' What is Theban Sorcery? From where does it come from? What are its implication on the Kindred condition?

2nd Sanguinaria 5: 4-6

4. So Daniel stayed with the Theban Legion, and preyed upon them at night, and brought them bad dreams. 5. And he found that the Damned of Thebes knew certain rituals, and could wreak certain dark miracles, and he allied himself with the Damned of Thebes, who gladly accepted the teachings of Longinus. 6. And thanks to Daniel's preaching, many of the Damned were Sanctified in Thebes, foremost among them Penelope and Valentinus, Michael and Hostilinus the Numidian. But Daniel could not perform the miracles of Thebes, although he prayed that he might be able to.

Theban Sorcery is claimed by the Lancea Sanctum to be a divine gift of blood magic to be employed in the service of God's message. We must examine the phenomena itself and how it was transmitted to the Faithful. There are two versions by which Theban magic is brought into the Church. Above we see the simpler, older version that is found in 2nd Sanguinaria. Daniel travels to Egypt and preaches to and converts Kindred in and around the city of Thebes who already possessed 'certain Dark Miracles' or Blood Sorcery. It is clear in verse 6 that Daniel did not possess the 'dark miracles' before his arrival or after his initial conversions.

What does 2nd Sanguinaria tell us? It tells us that Theban Sorcery was not initially a divine gift for the Sanctified. The passage explains how a pre-existing practice was absorbed and that the 'dark miracles' were approved by Saint Daniel. What does this mean for the Church? It raises a question. If Daniel accepted blood sorcery practitioners and their dark rituals, why then does the Church rail against other forms of blood magic as evil? In short, under 2nd Sanguinaria, you cannot. There is no theological basis to bar further iterations of blood magic from entering the Sanctified.

Because of this, Monachus or Pseudo-Monachus created a second, more detailed and expanded version. In this second telling, we are told that Monachus and his followers have Theben Sorcery revealed to them by the angel 'Amoniel of the Dominions' as gifts from The Lord and that these gifts must be kept away from non-believers. This explanation presents three problems; revisionist text, the principle of Angelic Sin and the nature the sorcery.

Let us begin with the issue of revisionist text. Monachus or Pseudo-Monachus writes that the angel Amoniel appeared and delivered the Faithful unto the caves holding the Theben mysteries. Amoniel appears repeatedly in the Testament as Amoniel and 'Amoniel of the Dominions.' This can be seen in two lights. The first, as happens in the Quran, is that there are actually separate angels named Amoniel. The second possibility is that there is only one angel, which seems to be the intent of the writers and general consenses of the faithful. So 'Amoniel of the Dominions' is both the deliverer of Blood Sorcery as well as a guide to Longinus in his apocrypha works. First let us look at the name Amoniel. This name is in keeping with Hebraic Angelology as the suffix '-el' is used with the name. I would recommend Sang Cho's Lesser Deities in the Ugaritic Texts and the Hebrew Bible for a fuller understanding of Angelology. Next we examine 'of the Dominions.' 'Of the Dominions' comes from the Second Hierarchy of Angels. This grouping of angel is responsible for the sovereignty of lands and nations. So we know the Angel of Thebes, if not Egypt, is the one entrusted with delivering the Sorcery to the Faithful.

However the usage of 'of the Dominions' points to revisionism. Monachus could not have used that title for Amoniel before the late 4th century. De Coelesti Hierarchia was the first text to recognize and codify the hierarchy of angels in the 5th century by the Pseudo-Dionysius writers. It must be noted that De Coelesti Hierarchia was originally thought to be written contemporary to Saint Paul by Dionysius however Italian scholars in the Middle Ages proved the text was actually written three centuries after Saint Paul. This second version either creates Amoniel or after the 4th century, at the very least, goes back and changes Amoniel to give him further authority and power. We also know that as an angel 'of the Dominions' Amoniel could not have been the conduit for further ritual revelations unless the revelations all occurred in Thebes or Egypt. The De Coelesti Hierarchia states angels do not stray from their assigned spheres.

Now let us address the principle of Angelic Sin. What do we mean when we say Angelic Sin? Angelic Sin is the action and consequence that sundered angels from the presence of God and changes them to Fallen Angels. Fallen Angel is synonymous with Demons in the West, though this is not always the case in Eastern Christian variants. We have the broad outline of this in Genesis 6:4 and in greater detail in Enoch 6-11 and again in the fragments of Enoch: Book of Giants. Some Sanctified scholars postulate that the 'Watchers' of Enoch are the antediluvian progenitors of the origin the Kindred. This theory is an expansion on early Christian Greek writers linking the 'evil spirits' of that era that survived the destruction of the Giants and the Flood to the Greek concept of 'daimon.'

But let us return to Angelic Sin. The cause of Angelic Sin was when the 'Sons of Heaven' or 'Watchers', looked upon the 'Daughters of Man' and fell in love with or lusted after them. The Angels or Watchers (in the Enoch source) swore oaths and traveled down to the earth and entered unto women and had relations and children. When the Angels habituated with women, they shared hidden knowledge with their wives and with their children. All the sorceries(all forms of magic), the solution of sorcery (it is believed by scholars that alchemy is meant), medicine, astronomy, metalworking, jewel crafting, make up and certain other knowledge. These hidden wisdoms caused upheaval and man turned to violence, debauchery and sin. We must pause here to carefully point out that use sorcery and magic is traced back to Angels rebelling against the Will of God and revealing forbidden knowledge. Nowhere in any other divinely inspired scripture does The Lord provide or detail the conveying of any arcane instruction. The miracles carried out by his prophets was power given directly to the individual and the individual was not able to teach those blessings to another.

So we have established that the delivery of sorcery is against the will of God and as a consequence those who deliver it are punished. The next question is how does this apply to the Sanctified? Sanctified scholars will charge, 'Why does Enoch matter?' They will say this magic is meant solely for the Sanctified and only kine are forbidden from magic. This argument ultimately falls short because of the third problem posed by blood magic. We know blood sorcery or magic predates the Camarilla, before the birth of Longinus. We know that the Faithful were specifically told to guard this knowledge from non-believers. What does that say about it? It means that the learning and use of that sorcery is not predicated on faith in God. If the power was truly divine in nature then God would only empower those who were true of faith. In the Old and New Testaments we see no other point in which power bestowed by God to his servants could be transferred to or taught to others. How can a power divinely given be God used against the Will of God?

This text is available in the private library to all Dragons. Feel free to post any IC reactions or thoughts in this thread.


Chrisie Max Heinz Chase Ankers AethrDav Bigpaw Tracy Burns Sabeleth