Most people think of "Satanists" as edgy teenagers in black eyeliner or high-production-value activists like The Satanic Temple. Then there is the Order of Nine Angles.
It’s different. Honestly, it’s a lot darker than the memes would have you believe. While most modern occult groups spend their time arguing about tax-exempt status or social justice, the O9A—as it’s often called—has spent decades quietly influencing some of the most violent extremist cells on the planet. This isn't just about candles and pentagrams. It’s about a philosophy that views human life as "opfer" (sacrifice) and seeks to dismantle civilization itself.
You’ve probably heard snippets of the rumors. Maybe you’ve seen the news reports linking them to the military or neo-Nazi groups like Atomwaffen Division. But what is the actual reality of the Order of Nine Angles? To understand it, you have to peel back layers of intentional misinformation, weird "sinister" jargon, and a history that is as confusing as it is disturbing.
The Myth of the Monk: Who is Anton Long?
The story usually starts in the 1960s or 70s in the United Kingdom. According to the group's own lore, several small, ancient "pagan" covens merged together. But if you look at the evidence gathered by researchers like Nick Lowles from Hope Not Hate, most roads lead to one man: David Myatt.
Myatt is a bit of a shapeshifter. He’s been a neo-Nazi leader, a radical Islamist, and a monk. He denies being "Anton Long"—the pseudonym credited with writing the foundational O9A texts—but almost every expert on the subject thinks that’s a load of rubbish. The writing style is too specific. The obsession with "Aeonics" and "The Seven-Fold Way" matches Myatt’s known intellectual trajectory perfectly.
The Order of Nine Angles doesn't have a headquarters. It doesn't have a leader you can email. It functions as a decentralized collective of "nexions." Basically, if you decide you’re an O9A member and you start following their "star game" and "insight roles," you’re in. This makes them incredibly hard for law enforcement to track because there is no central database to hack.
The Sinister Strategy of Insight Roles
The most dangerous part of the Order of Nine Angles isn't the magic rituals. It’s the concept of the "Insight Role."
In most religions, you try to be a better person. In the O9A, you are encouraged to be a worse one—temporarily. The idea is that an initiate must go out into the real world and take on a role that is difficult, dangerous, or morally "taboo."
This could mean:
- Joining the military to gain combat experience.
- Infiltrating a political extremist group to sow chaos.
- Living as a homeless person to "harden" the spirit.
- Committing criminal acts to transcend "mundane" morality.
They call this "internal alchemy." They believe that by experiencing these extremes, a person evolves into a "new man." It’s a sort of Darwinian occultism. If you survive the role and the psychological trauma, you're "adept." If you don't? Well, the O9A philosophy doesn't have much room for "the weak."
Why the Order of Nine Angles Is Not Your Average Satanism
Standard LaVeyan Satanism is basically just spicy atheism. It’s about ego and following the law. The O9A hates that. They think it's "magian"—their derogatory term for mainstream, middle-class values influenced by Abrahamic religions.
To the Order of Nine Angles, the universe is divided into the "causal" (our physical world) and the "acausal" (where the dark gods live). They want to open a portal between the two. They use a specific terminology that sounds like a mix of Greek, Old English, and pure gibberish. Words like nexion, presencing, and wyrd are thrown around constantly in their manuscripts, like The Fenrir or The Black Book of Satan.
They also have a weirdly complex system called the "Star Game." It’s sort of like 3D chess but for occultists. It’s supposed to be a way of mapping the movements of "Aeons" and the human psyche. Most people who try to play it just get a headache, but for the true believers, it's a map of how to collapse the current world order.
Radicalization and the "Brown-Black" Alliance
In the last decade, the O9A has moved from the fringes of occult forums into the center of domestic terrorism investigations. This is where things get real.
Groups like the Atomwaffen Division (AWD) in the US and the Sonnenkrieg Division in the UK started incorporating O9A imagery and texts into their propaganda. They blended neo-Nazi "accelerationism" with O9A’s "sinister" spirituality. This created a lethal cocktail. It’s a belief system that says: "The world is dying, let’s burn it down faster, and by the way, the gods of darkness will reward you for it."
In 2020, a US Army private named Ethan Melzer was charged with conspiring with the Order of Nine Angles to attack his own unit. He allegedly sent sensitive information to O9A members, believing that a mass-casualty event would help usher in a new Aeon. This isn't LARPing. These are real-world consequences.
The Three Pillars of O9A Philosophy
It's hard to pin down exactly what they believe because the group encourages members to lie to "mundanes." However, three themes consistently appear in their core manuscripts.
First: Pathei-Mathos. This is the "learning through suffering." They believe you cannot grow unless you are in physical or mental agony. This is why their "Seven-Fold Way" involves things like standing alone on a hilltop in a storm for days or walking 80 miles in the wilderness without supplies.
Second: The Culling. This is the part that gets them banned from social media. The O9A texts openly discuss "human culling"—the removal of people they deem "worthless" or "mundane." They argue that a healthy society needs to prune itself. While some apologists claim this is "symbolic," the language in texts like Victim Selection is chillingly literal.
Third: The Galactic Imperium. This is where it gets a bit sci-fi. Myatt and his followers believe that the destiny of the "Aryan" or "Western" soul is to colonize the stars. But they think we can't do that until we purge the "magian" influence from our culture. It’s a bizarre mix of cosmic expansionism and tribalist hate.
Misconceptions: What the Media Often Gets Wrong
It's easy to label the Order of Nine Angles as "just Nazis" or "just Satanists." But that’s a bit of a simplification. Honestly, even other white supremacists often hate the O9A. Why? Because the O9A doesn't actually care about "the white race" in a traditional political sense. They care about chaos.
They are "accelerationists." If an Islamic caliphate would destroy the West faster than a Nazi uprising, many O9A members would (and have) supported the caliphate. This is what Myatt did when he converted to Islam and wrote "A Brief Guide to the Strategy of Propaganda." He wasn't necessarily a "true" believer in Islam; he was a believer in using any radical force to smash the current system.
Another big mistake is thinking the O9A is a large, organized group. It’s more like a virus. It’s a set of ideas that "infects" other radical movements. You don't "join" the O9A; you become it by doing the work. This makes it almost impossible to "shut down." You can arrest a cell, but you can't arrest a PDF that’s been floating around the dark web since 1998.
The Role of Art and "Sinister" Aesthetics
The O9A understands the power of branding. They use a very specific aesthetic—grainy black-and-white photos of forests, distorted electronic music, and sigils that look like they were carved into wood with a rusty knife.
They have their own musical genre called "Sinister Chant," and they’ve influenced certain corners of the Black Metal scene. This "cool factor" is how they lure in young, disaffected people. It starts with an interest in underground music or "forbidden" books, and it ends with a 20-year-old trying to blow up a power grid to impress a "dark master" they met on Telegram.
How to Spot O9A Influence
If you're a researcher or just a curious bystander, there are specific "tells" that indicate someone is deep in the Order of Nine Angles rabbit hole.
- Specific Vocabulary: Using terms like "mundane," "causal/acausal," "vindex," or "opfer."
- The Sigils: The "Septenary" sigils are distinct. They often feature a stylized "9" or complex geometric patterns linked to the seven planets of their system (they don't use Neptune or Uranus because they weren't known to the ancients).
- Calendar Dates: They often use their own dating system, "The Year of Fayre" (yf), which counts years from the birth of Adolf Hitler (1889).
- Extreme Contradictions: Someone who flip-flops between extreme political or religious ideologies might be practicing an "Insight Role."
Is the O9A Declining?
Recently, there’s been a massive crackdown. Discord, Telegram, and even archive sites have been scrubbing O9A material. Several high-profile members are behind bars.
But here’s the thing: the O9A thrives on being underground. Every time a major platform bans them, they treat it as "proof" that the "magian" system is afraid of them. It feeds their persecution complex and makes them look more "dangerous" to prospective recruits.
Some researchers, like those at the Centre for Analysis of the Radical Right, argue that the group is fracturing. Younger members are moving away from the complex "Seven-Fold Way" and just focusing on the violence. They’re stripping away the "philosophy" and just keeping the "terrorism."
Actionable Insights: Dealing With the "Sinister"
So, what do we actually do about this? You aren't going to defeat the Order of Nine Angles by arguing with them on Twitter. They don't care about your logic.
If you are a parent or an educator, the key is recognizing the signs of "occult radicalization." It usually starts with a search for "identity" and "transcendence." The O9A offers a sense of being "elite" and "separate" from the "boring" masses. Providing healthy outlets for that desire for challenge and mystery is often the best defense.
For law enforcement, the challenge is shifting from "tracking groups" to "tracking ideologies." Because the O9A is decentralized, the "lone wolf" inspired by their texts is a bigger threat than any organized "temple."
Next Steps for Research:
- Audit Digital Footprints: If you are monitoring radicalization, look for the "Seven-Fold Way" PDF. It’s the primary recruitment tool.
- Understand the "Insight Role": Recognize that an individual's outward extremist behavior might be a "test" rather than a sincere belief, which makes traditional deradicalization much harder.
- Monitor "Sinister" Aesthetics: Keep an eye on underground music and art forums where O9A imagery is often "sanitized" for a wider audience.
- Reference Real Experts: Follow the work of Cynthia Miller-Idriss or the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), who provide real-time updates on how these occult-fascist groups are evolving in the 2020s.
The Order of Nine Angles isn't going away. It’s a shapeshifting monster that adapts to whatever the "darkest" trend of the moment is. Understanding its history is the first step in stripping away the "mystique" that it uses to lure people into its orbit.