One On One With Satan

A chilling and highly convincing account of possession and exorcism in modern America, hailed by NBC Radio as "one of the most stirring books on the contemporary scene."

Although there is growing concern over Satanism as a threat to American life, the topic has received surprisingly little serious attention. Recognizing this, the editors of this volume have selected papers from a wide variety of disciplines, broadly covering contemporary aspects of Satanism from the vantage points of studies in folklore, cults, religion, deviance, rock music, rumor, and the mass media.

All contributors are skeptical of claims that a large, powerful satanic conspiracy can be substantiated. Their research focuses instead on claims about Satanism and on the question...

In South Asia possession has always been broader and more diverse than in the West, where it has been almost entirely characterized as "demonic." At best, spirit possession has...

"Quite an interesting book... " --Religious Studies Review

"It is by far superior to anything else on demons we have seen in the past few years." --The American Rationalist

..". Goodman is to be commended for a stimulating and wide-reaching treatment of a compelling and much-debated subject." --Journal of Folklore Research

Rich in detail derived from the author's fieldwork and the anthropological literature, this work paints a picture of possession as one of the usually positive and most widespread of human religious experiences. It also details the ritual of exorcism,...

This book addresses the problems of adolescent Satanism from a psychological viewpoint. It includes the developmental dynamics that underlie four different types of young people who become involved in Satanism and provides an analysis of risk factors. The author critically evaluates the philosophy of Satanism through a review of The Satanic Bible, and further appraises the causes of Satanism by examining the roles of power, ritual, and dualistic thinking in young people's lives. In addition, Moriarty evaluates how communication patterns and parenting styles impact on a young person's...

American society is culturally diverse with a variety of religious denominations, sects, cults, and self-help groups vying for members. This volume analyzes nine of these groups, chosen both for their intrinsic interest and because they illustrate a variety of sociological concepts. The groups included in this study are: Heaven's Gate, Jesus People USA, the Love Family, The Farm, Amish Women, Scientology, El Nino Fidencio, Santeria, and Freedom Park. The contributors are social scientists with first-hand knowledge of the groups they examine."

No one thinks much about the Devil anymore. In fact, words like witchcraft and black magic have a strangely medieval ring to our ears. Many people even think of Satan as somehow comic -- and therefore harmless. Yet amidst the tragedy and corruption of our own century, it is ironic that many people doubt whether an active, evil force really exists. But Satan is not dead, says author Hal Lindsey; he has simply adopted a more modern style. Spiritualism, astrology, "new age" religion -- all of these and more are signs of the creeping influence of the Father of Lies in our time. In this book,...

A Benedictine living to the threshold of the Reformation period, Trithemius excelled for most of his career in the fields of monastic reform, mystical theology, and Christian Humanism, and then, suddenly, announced himself to the world as an...

"Evil the infliction of pain upon sentient beings is one of the most long-standing and serious problems of human existence. Frequently and in many cultures evil has been personified. This book is a history of the personification of evil, which for the sake of clarity I have called 'the Devil.' I am a medievalist, but when I began some years ago to work with the concept of the Devil in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, I came to see that I could not understand the medieval Devil except in terms of its historical antecedents. More important, I realized that I could not understand the Devil...

When most people talk about evil, they mean "bad people", as if evil were a psychological affliction. Yet evil is a force that mankind has reckoned with since the dawn of civilization, "Shouting at the Wolf" is a revelatory work about the existence of evil and the dark side of the occult.

Author Anderson Reed says, "With the burgeoning interest in the occult, there is a tendency towards a dangerous pollyanna attitude about its reality. New Agers like to think that they may pick and choose which elements of the occult they will deal with and leave the rest alone....