Here There Be Monsters
Here there be Monsters
By Pete Garcia
Author’s note: Originally written on November 13, 2013, I have released this several times without any major revisions. However, I have decided to expand on it a little and give some free press to Terry James’s new book (to which I have contributed again) called Lawless. It is due to be released on November 2, 2020. My contribution is a chapter called, “New Old Ways: Ancient Paganism gets a Technological Facelift.” I am in the process of finishing my own fiction novel, HoBo, and should be released in the spring (Lord Willing!).
“For dust you are, And to dust you shall return.” – Genesis 3:17-19
For nearly six thousand years, man has unsuccessfully been trying to reverse the effects of the divine curse by chasing after spirituality (regaining immortality) and technology (reducing toil) in the hopes of defeating the ultimate enemy, death. Thus, in every generation, certain men would rise up who sought the deeper mysteries of life apart from God. Many were true seekers who were either unsatisfied with the status quo of religion and philosophy, or were unsatisfied with their wealth and looked for thrills money could not buy. Still, evil found its way to draw in many with its dark allure. They sought forbidden power through forbidden wisdom in an attempt to gain power.
These individuals and groups stretch back into antiquity to the days before Noah’s flood. If you dig deep enough, you will find that they all end up chasing after the same satanic scheme of…‘ye shall be as gods’ (Gen. 3:4). However, in attempting to unlock the mysteries of the universe for their selfish gain, they ended up unlocking a lot more than what they bargained for.
In the OT, the term sons of God meant the Angels and Adam…, as they were direct creations of God. However, in the NT, the term ‘sons of God’ were also applied to the regenerated believer, who, through the Holy Spirit, becomes a new, direct, creation in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17). According to Job 38:6-7 the angelic sons of God were present at creation and have a deep understanding of how God created our physical universe, thus, it is extremely plausible that those angels who rebelled with Satan, sought to corrupt humanity with that knowledge.
According to the non-canonical book of First Enoch, the Ante-Diluvians (pre-flood peoples) received the forbidden knowledge firsthand from the fallen angelic ‘watchers’ (or sons of God-Gen. 6:1-4). This proverbially opening of ‘Pandora’s Box,’ caused the divine judgment of a global deluge, which threatened to wipe out all of humanity, had Noah not been a righteous man.
The Beginning
“You were the anointed cherub who covers;
I established you;
You were on the holy mountain of God;
You walked back and forth in the midst of fiery stones.
You were perfect in your ways from the day you were created,
Till iniquity was found in you.” – Ezekiel 28:14-15
When Lucifer rebelled against God, he convinced a third of the angelic host to rebel with him (Isaiah 14:12-21, Ezekiel 28:11-19, and Revelation 12). His rebellion came just after Creation but before Adam and Eve entered into the Garden of Eden (or possibly in conjunction with their creation). Either way, Satan had already fallen when confronting Eve in the form of a serpent. Satan’s physical interaction with them, as with God, leads one to the logical conclusion that before the flood, there were little to no barriers preventing the physical interaction between the spiritual and the physical realms.
Genesis 6 tells us that certain wicked, angelic spirit beings and humans co-mingled. How exactly this occurred, we do not know. However, we do know that angels can appear in the form of humans (Gen. 19:3-4; Hebrews 13:2) and do certain things that humans do, like eating. Although we accept that they can eat, we often do not get bogged down into the details of whether angels have fully in-tact digestive systems. For the sake of argument, we will assume that when they take on the form of a man, they are human-like in every sense of the word.
Satan attempted to circumvent the divine curse God put on him with the protoevangelium (Gen. 3:15). As Satan understood it, someone would come out of the race of men who would destroy him; therefore, he sought to stop that from happening. Thus, he charged 200 angels (again, according to the non-canonical Book of First Enoch) with the task of physically intermingling with humans (see Gen. 6:1-4, 1 Peter 3:19-20, Jude 1:6) to thoroughly corrupt mankind both genetically and spiritually.
It was self-preservation that drove these fallen angels to physically couple with human women. However, it was wickedness that they (fallen angels) taught mankind forbidden knowledge. Thus, the divine punishment via the Noahic Flood was designed to wipe out both the genetic corruption on the earth as well as their history. However, it did not erase the memory of the survivors (Noah and family).
The memory of this very real pre-flood Nephilim (the fallen ones, giants, demigods, gods, etc.), would become the foundation for almost all post-flood mythology. However, it was more than the reality of their presence that was damaging. It was the knowledge that they passed along to humans even after the flood, vice Noah’s sons and daughters-in-law that remained corrosive and passed from generation to generation. So if before the flood, there was no barrier between the physical and the spiritual, it is reasonable to assume that after the flood, there would be barriers between the two.
Yet, there may remain places in the world where the barrier seems to be “thinner” than in other places. This is why Mt. Hermon (modern-day Syria/Lebanon); Gobekli Tepe, Turkey; Stonehenge, England; Chichen Itza, Mexico; Giza, Egypt, Babel, and other spiritual gateways are still found around the world. This is not to say that all of those megalithic structures were pre-flood construction, but that the geographic locations themselves are of significance.
So what was this forbidden knowledge the fallen angels’ passed to humans? According to non-canonical books (Enoch, Jasher, etc.) that the unsealed mysteries were that of alchemy, weaponry, seduction arts (cosmetics, jewelry, spells), immortality, and dark summoning magic. This knowledge began to grow like cancer amongst the human race and served as a wedge to separate mankind from God. This forbidden knowledge was like a growing shadow that began to cast its darkness upon every culture until it eventually blanketed the world with darkness.
Religions
“For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls; for it is the blood that makes atonement for the soul.” – Leviticus 17:11
Throughout post-flood history, there was an endless parade of bloody regimes, usually with the latter almost always being worse than the former. These largely pagan cultures incorporated cruel forms of worship that usually hinges around human sacrifice. The Canaanites, Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Egyptians, Druids, Gaul’s, Celts, Mayans, Aztecs, Romans, Hindus, etc. all viewed human sacrifice as a means to appease the god(s). But why?
Because Satan’s lies are the most effective when he mixes truth with error. He uses God’s concept for atonement, but redirects to whom those pagan cultures appealed too. While society today might look back and scoff at these primitive cultures as being barbaric, yet, those ancient pagans have nothing on the new pagans. Human secularism is essentially the new religion of the 20th-21st centuries.
Human secularism is a religion without a god, and abortion is its new altar. To date, the abortion industry globally has killed upwards of 1,549, 873, 849 (1.5 billion) babies on the altar of human convenience. However, evolved we like to think we have become as a species; there has always been a drawback to the Antediluvian “pre-history” times. The reason is simple; dark principalities and forces under allegiance to Satan, keep reminding people of it.
They remind those enthralled in the occult and esoteric beliefs that humans once lived for centuries, which, before the flood, was true. They remind the seekers of hidden knowledge that the physical and spiritual realms were once unhindered, which, again, is true. They were unhindered, and according to Revelation, will become unhindered again after the Rapture of the Church.
These maleficent forces cruelly play on humanity’s desire for long life and supernatural power, by offering to show them paths to immortality through esoteric enlightenment. In reality, and just like those doomed pre-flood peoples, these dark powers will show them wickedness that ends in their eternal destruction and damnation. They want people to believe that the lost cities of old, where demigods ruled the land, was some kind of ‘golden age.’ In reality, it was a nightmare, enshrouded in unbelievable violence, wickedness, and terror.
The mythos of the antediluvian age would become the canon to the Chaldeans, Babylonians, Persians, Greeks, and later Romans. These all would share in the pantheon of gods, who changed names but never changed identities. However, with the rise of Christianity and the collapse of the Roman Empire, we see these once, mainstream pagan religions move underground and out of everyday life.
Nevertheless, paganism, in the form of Gnosticism, tried fiercely to infect the early church with its half-truths to change its trajectory. It failed then, largely due to the diligence of the apostles, the disciples of the apostles, and the early church fathers have seemingly, here in the 21st-century, finally taken root. It was in the 20th-centuries that eastern mysticism began to make headways into western civilization in the form of philosophy, yoga, meditation, education practices, and lastly, entertainment. It is here in this final stage of the church (e.g., the seven churches) that the Laodicean Age church has embraced its poisonous teachings.
Lest I forget, religions (both orthodox and heterodox) have produced many of their own monsters. From Islamic Jihad to the Roman Catholic Inquisitions (Torquemada anyone?), to cults like Scientology and Jim Jones. Religion is a powerful tool that can be used for terrible evil.
Secret Societies
Most of western civilization was in varying stages of disorganization and even collapse from the 5th-century through the 11th. Islam had been ascendant on the eastern front. The north had been given over to the various Russ and Nordic barbarian tribes. Christendom had largely been reduced to papal fiefdoms throughout central and southern Europe.
Roman Catholicism, as a system of belief, is categorically not Christian. However, there were within its geographical boundaries, remnants of true believers. It was during this time that Roman Catholicism began clamping down on anything; pagan, Jewish, or Christian that would not bend the knee to the pope.
It was around the time of the 14th-century that we begin to see a new practice of syncretism in the form of secret societies begin to emerge on the scene. The Knights Templars, the Rosicrucians, the Illuminati, Freemasons, Theosophical Society, Thelema, and Bohemian Grove; these groups began incorporating many different ancient pagan cultural ideas and blended them into something new.
The hunt for hidden/forbidden wisdom began with each esoteric group promising deeper insights into other dimensions outside of our own, by returning to the ancient ways. Yet, for all the smoke and mirrors these groups put forth, all they ended up doing was repackaging old practices. While numerically insignificant to the world at large, what is significant about these small groups is the number of world leaders and scientists involved in them.
Entertainment
On the mainstream (non-religious) side, technology was affording civilized societies the ability to escape into entertainment through books and later, movies. While Mary Shelley’s 1823 book Frankenstein was an early example of the new horror genre, the scary things that go bump in the night had long been kept alive through folklore, religions, and plays. Now they had a new medium in which to terrorize their audiences.
The first ever-recorded horror film ever was by the Lumière brothers in 1895 entitled Le Squelette Joyeux. It was a simple short clip of a marionette skeleton dancing around. The next, Le Manoir Du Diable (The Devil’s Castle) in 1896, topped out at three minutes. The most famous of the early horror films was the 1922 German expressionist vampire film, Nosferatu.
From Universal Studios’ 1930s-1940s productions of the old classics like The Wolfman, Frankenstein, and Dracula), are tame by today’s standards (e.g., Saw, It and Hereditary). Since then (1930s), around 90,000 horror movies have been produced. This equates to only 18% of all movies ever-produced (500,000). However, when you add in the occult, the ultra-violent, pornographic, and science fiction, the percentage easily tops over the 60% mark. Needless to say, technology in the 20th-century has unlocked man’s imagination in a way unseen since the days of Noah.
Interestingly, Science Fiction, as a genre, really took off after the 1947 Roswell Incident happened in New Mexico. This was also around the same time as Israel’s 1948 rebirth as a nation. This newfound popularity prompted an explosion into the fascination with the Science Fiction not only as a form of entertainment but also, religion (Scientology, Gaia), as well as scientific endeavors (CERN, NASA, etc.). Sci-Fi had effectively moved man’s focus off the earth, and into the cosmos.
Nevertheless, as the 20th century progressed, horror movies increasingly began moving audiences away from the traditional monsters and toward the newer genre of men becoming the monsters with such titles as Romero’s Night of the Living Dead and Hitchcock’s Psycho. In addition, since that time as a nation, we have been increasingly exposed to more brutal and more graphic forms of entertainment. From movies, music, books, and later video games, we have become a society engrossed in blood and violence. We put the Romans and their Coliseum to shame.
Consequentially, we have also become increasingly desensitized to the amount and types of violence we find acceptable. Anthony Hopkin’s Psycho shocked the nation sixty-years ago. Today, Psycho would not shock a ten-year-old. What was sensational 30 years ago, rarely rates being newsworthy today. We are continually finding new ways to shock. Not just with entertainment, but that is bleeding over into our news as well. Teenagers are increasingly desensitized with an endless orgy of violence and killing thanks to music, movies, video games, anti-psychotic medication (pharmakia) while being coached into a godless education without any moral compass. Then we wonder why they go on killing sprees, or why our young adults are increasingly nihilistic and choosing lawlessness and violence as the solution to every problem?
It is to the point now, that even our lawless generation has become bored with monsters, mass murderers (Jason, Freddie, etc.), and even gratuitous violence. The horror industry has had to find new ways to shock its’ audience, and since the 1970s, dove into the occult. Major blockbuster horror films like The Exorcist, The Omen, and Rosemary’s Baby, broke new boundaries and again, crossed boundaries that should not have been crossed. The audience was then (and now) being fed gratuitous amounts of Satanism in the name of entertainment.
Still, modern entertainment has reached back into antiquity to dig out those deep mysteries and bring them to life on the big screen unleashing in the imaginations of men with deeply demonic mysteries and undertones. The movie industry hides behind the labels of “entertainment” and “fiction” as if that shields them from the consequences of what they are exposing to their audiences. The occult has also made a comeback in a big way in America with Illuminati symbolism, pagan pageantry, superhero movies and shows, books, and that deal heavily in the occult. What is truly frightening, is the real-life, human monsters. Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin- 20-60 Million dead. Adolph Hitler and the Third Reich are responsible for an estimated murder of 6-10 million people. Chinese revolutionary and leader, Mao Tse Tung: 60 million dead. Democratic icon Margaret Sanger and her Planned Parenthood: 60-100 Million dead.
Noah’s Day
Murder is so common now that we barely even notice anymore when 15 people die over the weekend in places like Los Angeles or New York City. One of the most infamous mob hits in US history, the Saint Valentine’s Day Massacre, only saw seven gang members murdered. Today, that is a Friday night in Chicago.
The murder of the unborn (once known as “child sacrifice”) is now a routine medical procedure. Men and women kill their children, siblings kill siblings, children kill their parents and peers, and no matter how gruesome a crime is, something else comes along to distract us from what is going on. However, even with all this going on, God still intervenes, and the effective, fervent prayers of a righteous man availeth much. All of this violence has been WITH the restraint of the Holy Spirit working through His church here in these last days.
Now, imagine the world WITHOUT the Holy Spirit’s ‘ministry of restraint’ and you will quickly see a world racked with a level of violence previously unseen. I believe this rise and acceptance of paganism and the occult, which is accompanied by much bloodshed, is in part, the ‘mystery of iniquity’. The mystery is why it is not even more widespread than it already is.
As we are getting closer to those fabled ‘days of Noah’, we should take notice of the warning that Jesus gives in Luke 17 concerning the time for when He will return. Life will have a sense of normalcy to it in ‘buying and selling’, etc. However, Jesus being God knew what life was like back in Noah’s day, so let us look at what Genesis 6 has to say about the days of Noah…
“Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. So God looked upon the earth, and indeed it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth.” – Genesis 6:5, 11-12
So what is missing from today’s violence-filled earth as compared to Noah’s day? Nevertheless, we see the four items that marked the days of Noah and then compare them to today.
– Demonic activity (fallen angels=sons of God)
– Giants (hybrid offspring of angelic/human mating)
– Great wickedness and corruption
– Great violence
Understand that God initially gave Adam and Eve dominion over the entire earth (Gen. 1:26-27). However, when they fell, they not only lost both their immortality and innocence, but they also surrendered the title deed of dominion of earth, over to Satan. In turn, Satan has used the temptation of dominion, immortality, and innocence as a lure to trick every generation into chasing after something they could never attain apart from God. Satan used “forbidden knowledge” as the ways and means to get ancient pagan cultures to fruitlessly chase after the things God was giving away freely.
As we look back at ancient cultures like the Chaldeans, Phoenicians, Egyptians, and Assyrians, we get a basic understanding of why they believed what they believed. Their pagan religions were handed down from the time of the tower of Babel, where a common understanding of what life was like before the flood. Once God scattered them, they took these stories with them. This is why there are ziggurats all around the world that largely look the same. This is why their gods and demigods were largely the same, with the only difference being the name change from culture to culture. What we understand as mythology, was to some extent, very real, but was washed away in the great deluge.
The one, great distinction throughout the ancient world, were the Israelites. Instead of worshipping a pantheon of gods, they worshipped one. He was not a God they could see, except, when He acted on their behalf (Pillar of smoke and fire, Burning Bush, Mt. Sinai, etc.). The Israelites were not even allowed to carve an image of their God. He was for intents and purposes to them, invisible. It wasn’t until Jesus Christ came, and put a name/face to God Himself that the Jews were able to see their Creator…and they crucified Him.
As for the pagans, when we fast-forward in time. We see mankind worshipping a whole host of gods throughout the final pagan empires of the Greeks and Romans. They believed the Jews to be odd, worshipping only a singular God. They thought the Christians were cannibalistic nuts for worshipping three-Gods in one who they ate at communion. However, as Christianity spread, the misconceptions about it amongst the pagans and Jews were dissipating. It still took several centuries, but eventually, even the Roman Emperor himself converted to Christianity (to whatever extent that was legit).
Satan’s strategy of using demigods and the like was falling apart. The stories couldn’t be sustained and Christianity was real and powerful, and the more he persecuted it, the more it spread. He had to change tactics. Instead of trying to crush Christianity, he instead, began co-opting it and merging his paganism into it. What came out of this unnatural birth, was the Roman Catholic system. Instead of the Church going out into the world, the world came into the Church. Christ prophesied this when He gave His Parable of the Mustard Seed.
Another parable He put forth to them, saying: “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field, which indeed is the least of all the seeds; but when it is grown it is greater than the herbs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and nest in its branches.” Matt. 13:31-32
In context, all of the parables Jesus uses in Matthew 13, birds are used in a negative connotation (unclean, eating the seeds, etc.). Thus, if the Kingdom of Heaven is like a Mustard Seed, which grew into a giant tree (which they are normally small), and the birds (a bad/negative thing) come into the tree, this would be a picture-example of corruption entering Christendom. Some of you might be wondering what Roman Catholicism has to do with monsters. My point being, that Satan’s use of paganism never went away. It was simply repackaged into pseudo-Christian vernacular.
Conclusion
Some may be wondering why I included Roman Catholicism into a brief about monsters. The truth is that the further we become immersed in the last days, we are beginning to see a dramatic shift back towards paganism. As Europe and now America, enter into its post-Christian phase of existence, much of that lost ancient cultures are coming back to the forefront. Along with those cultures, came their gods and demigods.
The reason I believe the Roman Catholic Church incorporated SO MUCH non-Christian symbolism into its system, was Satan corrupting it by adopting and merging with paganism. Although the Roman Empire is no more, we are seeing a new version of it arising through organizations like the Club of Rome, the European Union (EU), and the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM). All of these organizations embrace the ecumenicalism of Roman Catholicism and secularism.
Certainly, we can see at least three of the four key indicators of Noah’s day, today…yet, most would say that life today is normal. Granted, we do not have any giants roaming around, at least not any that we know of…yet. However, the potential for that and a lot worse is on our horizon, as men seek to play god in science. Although it might seem fantastical today, I believe the Rapture will separate the age of reason from the age of signs and wonders, and that latter period will include a time when magic and monsters become a reality again.
As Christians, we are called to be salt and light to a dark and dying world. When that day comes and true, born-again Christian’s are removed via the Rapture, what will be left is man unrestrained. It will be the most horrific, violent time the earth has ever seen…even worse than in Noah’s day. When Jesus gave His overview to His disciples at the Mount of Olives, the Church had not yet been formed. Nor did the disciples even know what the Church would be. In keeping with that thought, He tells them what the Tribulation will be like in a manner that surely would have shocked them, considering they were well versed with Noah and Lot…
“For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be. And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved; but for the elect’s sake those days will be shortened.” – Matthew 24:21-22
I may be speculating a bit on this last piece, but I tend to think that what the imagination of men releases in this age will become a reality in the final years’ mankind has left before Christ returns. In all that man has conjured up, whether ancient or modern, he has done so in an attempt to remove God from the equation, whether it be false religions or secret societies will come to life.
Humanity is corrupt. Our corruption has been on overdrive these last few decades and does not seem to be abating anytime soon. We have entered a time again, where almost nothing is being withheld from us. Whether it be language, technology, communications, or travel. Our wickedness has almost succeeded in making what is evil, good, and good, evil. Once God removes His own, I believe, He will allow Satan, Antichrist, and the False Prophet to literally, bring hell on earth.
Just as they have chosen their own ways, And their soul delights in their abominations, So will I choose their delusions, And bring their fears on them; Because, when I called, no one answered, When I spoke they did not hear; But they did evil before My eyes, And chose that in which I do not delight.” Isaiah 66:1-4