Dark Wizards of Crime
Traditional societies (which we might merely call functioning societies – as spirituality is the truest expression of nature) all adhere to a certain level of archaic magical belief. That is, religious systems which are not exempt from the infiltration of sinister powers, regardless of what trembling hippy new-agers may preach about inconsequentialism. There is always a shadow side to the hidden world.
Since the enlightenment began secularising Western societies, serious notions of religious magic have become radically trivialised, and those which aren’t trivial rarely acknowledge the threat of darker elements. Which is why the concept of sinister shamans and mystics sounds absurd to modern ears. But evil people, by nature, are rapacious and hungry to see their evil mirrored in the world.
In ancient mythical lore we hear tales of dark wizards and their control of spirits, who use them to co-opt kingdoms and rob their wealth. Rarely do we think this can become a modern-day occurrence. But now and then, through the cracks, a story escapes about the occult criminal underworld, or the dark wizards of crime. Such as the playboy who got away with $242m – using ‘black magic’. Or the drugs and human sacrifice of the Los Narcosatanicos.
These things still exist, despite our shopkeeping checklist values.
If the power of these dark arts are unreal, why do these criminal wizards gain so much wealth and success? The dark magus is a universal archetype from all cultures in the world, overlooked now as superstition by those of us blinded by our increasingly shabby technocracy. But the dark wizard still penetrates the public psyche, in stories of crime and strange gangs and groups or individuals not satisfied with the proffered modern life. It is not a matter of mythical superstitions being strictly true or untrue. They are as true as they need to be, as a tangible source of power capable of influencing material life, either by association, blood memory, invocation, fearful reputation, or self-belief.
Since the ‘psychotherapy’ has replaced the shaman or priest in society, we have lost a crucial grasp of the metaphysics of evil, much less an educated study of this specific phenomenon. Because we are told by modern psychiatrists that people who do evil are simply brain damaged or not properly educated, we never consider that they may simply have a destiny to be evil. Because none of us can escape destiny, and because life is largely a series of events which occurs to us, outside our control, we may assume a certain authored providence is at hand. And all true measures of good and evil are structured on honour, the ancient code.
We should consider the metaphysical side of destiny, that not all souls who incarnate here intend to be benevolent. They might have malevolence as a purpose, to become corrupters of the good, to be against the sacred in society, or as parasite upon the old civilization which requires change. Understanding the metaphysical hierarchy of evil requires something far stranger and more organic than a psychiatrist, it requires a priest. One with at least the willingness to explore the animalistic shadow-side of the spirit world.
