I hope it is OK for me to add the below quote from a post by Ryan on AT. I thought it added well to this thread. Ryan being the author of the NOAS Sinister Deck.
A Very Very Brief History of the Sinister Tarot:
Around 1980, a U.K. based Satanic group called the Order of Nine Angles [ONA] surfaced into the public view with its teachings forming a strong reaction against the practice of modern Satanism as was then being espoused by the Church of Satan and the Temple of Set.
The Primary difference between the groups was that a) the ONA held that a Septenary-Based Cosmology was at the heart of the Sinister/Satanic Tradition as opposed to later Jewish Corruptions via Qabllah and systems that relied on different numbers and distorted this original tradition beyond recognition. And b) that the nature of Satanism according to the ONA was truly evil, heretical, and much more than what the public groups of COS/ToS had been teaching it was – in effect, terrifying the latter with their powerful exposition of the “Sinister Tradition”.
The Sinister Tarot was conceived by an individual who joined the Order in the 80’s using the pseudonym ‘Christos Beest’ [CB]. As is the function of all Initiates, CB added to the Sinister Tradition by introducing a variety of new mediums to share what was originally shared via a private oral tradition. Just one of these mediums involved music – another, the Sinister Tarot. During his involvement with the ONA, CB produced 21 Major Arcana cards over a number of years based on his insights and experiences – incorporating much of the Sinister Tradition within them. Later he produced a series of Court Cards but a full set remained unfinished. It was rumoured that his small number cards, if they existed, contained images of still living members of ONA [a notoriously secretive group] and for that reason were a risk to produce to the public eye. The Sinister Tarot of CB remains unfinished – or at least, unpublished.
And so the Sinister Tarot remained incomplete. Not – a problem – insofar as the Major Arcana were considered to be the crux required for meditation on archetypes and a full deck unnecessary. That was until another young individual named R. Anschauung [That’s me] joined the ONA in 2000 and decided to undertake a project [creating one’s own Sinister Tarot is part of the Tradition] to complete a full deck of cards and bring to life the depictions given in NAOS, the magical guide of the Order. Departing from his familiar occult style [which was more similar to Archetypia] – an attempt was made to paint and depict 69 cards and to self-publish them for the use by future adherents of the Order. The NAOS DECK as it came to be called – was completed around 2003 when 18 decks were printed up for private distribution.
To date [2008] – it remains the only known completed [Full Deck] Sinister Tarot designed for the ONA.
Last edited on Tue Feb 9th, 2010 12:50 pm by CastleCrest
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