#949- Selling Your Soul To The Devil, Faustian Fiction Or Modern Manipulation?

Oh that's are hello, and welcome to the show.

This is the Cult of Conspiracy and my name is Jacob Hi Raving, and today we are going to be diving into one of the more famous troupes to ever

No? Really, I actually haven't you.

Being the avid reader, I figured that maybe you would have picked up the book at some.

Point I have heard, Like I didn't really remember. Like once you started kind of telling me about it, I was like, Okay, now I kind of know, but I haven't actually like read it before at all. I knew I know more of like the more modern stuff when it comes to this, then the you know, later years and stuff.

So if I was to say the name Mesostopheles, does that do anything for you?

That was? Is that a composer? That's the devil? The devil?

Oh in the in the book, No, no, no, no, you're fine. Some people recognize the term, some people don't.

I do not.

So in Faust, long story short, and we're gonna read the synopsis of the play from the f I'm not Mistaken the Manchester Opera House. There has been movies composed of this, there has been plays, there has been operas, but it all is based off of a book named Faust. And long story short, this guy who is he's a genius. He has devoted his life to learning everything that there is to learn on earth, of all of the humanly knowledge,

I want to live forever because I don't think like you can take ten lifetimes and you still wouldn't learn everything.

This guy allegedly decided that he had learned enough, so he decides to drink some poison and as he drank the poison, he heard church bells and he realized it was Easter Sunday, which actually ended up saving his life. Cut to the next day, he's talking with a homeboy of his and he's like, look, I'm just I'm over it.

Right, twenty four years, that's all you get? What well, at the time, why would you like, no, dog, I'd be like, all right, twenty five hundred years, let's do that.

So we no, no, no, maybe the whole living foreverything, that's just not a possibility. Right as far as the literature during the Middle Ages of Renaissance goes, that was only for vampires and they don't have to make a deal with the devil. They already did so according to them, of course, ecy four years, so he was sixty or around that time frame. Whenever Mesostophiles first introduced himself.

To him, he's like, look, you get eighty, you get to eighty four, Ye're done. Look that is a solid gap.

Eighty four in the fourteen hundreds, Like brother, you grand old man of your village at that point, like for.

Real it is. Think now you've be working at eighty four and he's over here, like eighty woman.

You want caveat Within those twenty four years, he jumps back in age thirty years. So although he's a sixty year old man, he gets the look of a thirty year old again and the.

Vitality, Oh wow, good for him.

So it's wild. It's wild, and y'all, if you've never read the book, I've.

Never heard the like I've heard of some of it, but not.

It is wild, and the synopsis is not going to do it justice. This dude ends up banging Helen of Troy, Yes, that Helen of Troy. It's a whole fucking thing. He ends up killing Paris. It be like what it's it's so wild, it's so wild. Basically, long story short, every step of the way where he thinks he's about to get ahead, right, He's about to do some wild things and everything's gonna be better for him. Come to find out, the devil's got his hooks and I'm so deep to

What is with everyone in Helen and Troy? Like straight up?

Because apparently this was the face that launched a thousand ships. Apparently this chick was so hot and her shit was lined in gold, had to have been to the point to where this dude. Keep in mind, she was married to the King of Sparta, like the whole thing. It's not like she was married to some scrub. She was married to the actual king of one of the most prolific warring nations to ever grease the face of the earth.

M I would love to have seen what she actually looked like, like real shit look like. I mean maybe old boy King of Sparta's you know, was not great in a lot of ways, and maybe she was just like you know what, I'm sick of your shit.

Oh no, I mean, I guarantee he wasn't exactly the kindest husband to her. The Spartan men weren't known for being like super sweet and loving to their wives. I mean, you know how they took wives mm hmm. You had to successfully force yourself upon her and then if you succeeded, this is clearly your wife now. So like I guarantee there was some animosity.

But a little bit hatred, you know, I don't blame her for being like Baye.

But also Spartan women held a lot of power because of inheritance laws. Yeah, so men would die in battle, so usually women would get the inheritance. So you had a mafia, let's just call it a cartel of women who actually were running Sparta.

Through and why it fell. That's it's true.

That's that is a true statement, but that's also a bit of an oversimplification because fell into disrepair for like two centuries.

It is totally a simplification of it, and that in the way that they were overranmed by their slave population. But I will say that they had an opportunity to stand up and take arms and do things, and they were just like, nah, I mean, we want to be like the Greek women.

Yeah, their slave population out numbered them seven to one. Yeah, like I mean, yeah, you know, that's why they launched their war every year with Okay, but at the point, off topic. So anyway, cut to Faust, right, who, Yes, later on in the play slash book, he ends up betting and taking Helen for himself, but then she decides to go to the underworld rather than be with him.

It's wild, yeah, because.

That's there's but that's a part of the deal with the devil, right. It wasn't like she lost favor with him. He did something to betray her, and it's because he made himself look like Paris. Oh, he like shape shifted into Paris to bet her. It's yeah, So anyway, anyway, anyway, we're gonna read the synopsis of Faust, and then we're gonna talk about the actual guy, because Faust isn't just

Well, but hell hounds are sent out to collect the dues. See I didn't You don't know about that.

So the hell hounds that I know of are from playing Nazi zombies and every fifth level is the hell hounds level, So I don't know. No.

So a good example is Supernatural has a great, like you know, show about hell hounds are sent out to collect the dues. There's actually like a whole thing about that is how they get sent out. Instead of like, no one's gonna be bothered, They're just gonna go send the hounds out. And you hear the hounds first, yeah, and then you know you're fucked, like they're coming for your soul and then they you know, rip you apart and they take your soul.

That would explain why in the game, whenever the hell Hounds come, you hear the demon voice saying, fetch me their souls.

That makes perfect day they come to collect the souls because they're the lackeys.

Shouts out to Supernatural for getting so many things spot on. Like I understand, it was just a TV and it was all that. Every time they go up about a Greek god, Nordic god, im, a nim for whatever the case is, they do their fucking homework.

They did their homework on a lot of things. It's a good representation of that specific thing. And also the Crossroads stuff too, which we will get to you later.

Oh, the Crossroads are going to get their play on this episode. Good cult members, because as we start off talking about the fictitious faust, then go into talking about the real faust. There have been a laundry list, and we're not talking about maybe ten, maybe twenty. We're gonna go over upwards of forty people this evening, and this

You can get commercial flu listen.

We understand the commercials suck. We have no say so and how often these ads play or what ads are played. But the way you can kick those ads out of here and get commercial free listening access to every single episode that we put out is on patreon dot com slash Cult of Conspiracy podcast. The link is in the show notes below. Anyway, without further ado, let us get to the articles and all the things. So let's start off with the Metropolitan Opera. And this is a quick

For all of eternity. How is that even a fair trade? Like, why would you even assume that this would be a fair trade.

I mean, the guy was already suicidal, you know, it's not he ain't and to lose, he's just like sure, I guess we'll see.

But that was the other thing too.

If the demon could not hold up his end of the bargain, then the deal was off. And a portion of this was he wanted to recapture the innocence of youth, but also he wanted to achieve true intellectual enlightenment.

Doesn't say enlightenment how to be not spiritual? No, No, I meant intellectual yeah.

He wanted to have some sort of an epiphany that was unmatched and would be rivaled by all of humanity for the rest of eternity. And if the demon could not provide that for him, the deal was off. So the devil says, Okay, no problem, homie, let me just get a little contract going on real quick. And this is where the expression of signing your name in blood comes from. If you've ever seen any of these movies where you're making a deal with the devil or selling for your soul or whatever the case.

He out of nowhere pulls.

Up this really nice parchment scroll like contract and you have to prick your finger and sign your name in blood. This comes from Faust, really, and as a matter of fact, it's interesting when he first signs the contract his blood coagulates rather than soaks into the paper. It's even more of a play of his body saying like homeboy, stop, what are you doing? Even at a cellular level, his

That's crazy, I didn't know that came from this.

Yeah, it's wild. There are so many tropes that come off of this play or this book. I should say so continue. It says, when Faust hesitates, Mephistopheles conjures up a vision of Marguerite. Marguerite is the love interest that is the deciding factor for Foulest to be like, you know what it's worth it? Yeah, screw the enlightenment, the knowledge that piece right there, that's what's worth selling my immortal soul for. So he does it. Them Germans be doing.

The mostest shocker. A man's gonna sell his whole school for a woman.

Yeah, I've seen many of men, many men ruin their life for something they found on the streets. I'na be very honest with you, on the streets, in them streets, because she belonged to the streets, and they should have

You've filmed some type of boy on that one. I'm just saying, to be fair, there has been quite a bit of things you tell me you don't happen. I will say that men tend to think with their dicks.

So you know.

That post, that clarity is a vibe that's show that men definitely need to per take in.

Boys, boys, if you're listening right now, wrap it up too, by the way, wrap it up for one and for two. Listen, Uh, don't go into the situation with around in the chamber.

Okay. That has definitely happened to a lot of marines, so many, so many, and and.

I'm saying this from a place of love, gentlemen. Okay, I get it. But also if you go in without around in the chamber, you are far more likely to make a conscious decision rather than an impulsive one. That's not a one hundred percent rule. Saying it gets you the best likely scenario for yourself.

Anyways, back to this girls, Marguerite, so.

He shows her or he the demon shows Faust a vision of Marguerite, and Faust is like, yep, that's it.

We sign on the.

Contract and returns to his youth, although again he's still in his upper years of things, but his body basically is thirty years younger looking. Think hocus Pocus when the witch is sucked in the life force of that one girl. They weren't children by it means, but they were now of the cougar variety rather than the old spencer lady variety. If you get my vibe, Yeah, yeah, I get it all right. So Act two, Valentine and Wagner are going off to war with other soldiers, and Valentine is concerned

Cool, that's kind of awkward. You'd be like, sure, random person spirit thing yep, okay, yep.

Dissatisfied with the wine on offer, Mefistopheles conjures up a better vintage to toast Marguerite. This angers Valentine. He might sugi bitch too. Yeah, demons be.

Like that wine wine level, you know.

So Valentine, who is this soldier and apparently this wasn't his first battle. He was actually a pretty decorated warrior his sister Marguerite. The demon just toasts to his sister and this angers Valentine and both draw their swords. Valentine strikes out and his blade shatters because he's trying to slap a demon with a sword. You'll have that on those jobs. Everyone is convinced they're in the presence of the devil. Mephistopheles leads Faust to a place where couples

Gotta leave him one and more. God playing hard to get here goes the chase because you know, she said no, but like I didn't hear it, so I'm just gonna keep going.

Yeah, that's a thing. So sea Bell gathers flowers for Marguerite outside her house. As Memphistopheles predicted, they wither, but holy water seems to restore them. Yeah, there's a lot of Uh, there's a lot of religious symbolism and nods throughout this play I should mention, and yeah, the atmosphere

What is it with the innocence situation?

Like, because your boy Faust was already kind of corrupted. He literally just sold a soul to the devil. So the only thing that's gonna make him even slightly I guess attracted to somebody would be if they were so pure.

Yep, you know, I'm not gonna touch this.

No, no, no, no, Marguerite was of age. Gonna throw that out.

It just seems like, you know, hey, she's so sweet and innocent. Let me corrupt the shit out of that and like ignore everything that she's saying.

So, you know, that being said, they just say that Marguerite is a maiden, which in the proper context just means an unwed woman. I don't know if they actually said what her age was. I think in the book they probably did. I don't know if they In the play they actually make.

A mention of it, but it's sixteen probably for the day and age. It was so.

Okay, yep, that's bad anyway. Moving on, and so Marguerite finds the jewels that Faust had left for and puts them on. When she looks in the mirror, she sees a different woman and is further confused by the encouragement of her neighbor Marth Faust and Metastophele's return, and Metastopheles flirts with marthe giving Faust the opportunity to seduce Marguerite. He's playing wingman vibes right, He's he's jumping on the handker day for his homie.

That was all the m names, I know every one of them.

It'd be like that, though.

He is uh.

She begins to give in and Mevastophles conjures up a garden and makes Martha run off before disappearing himself. Marguerite realizes she loves Faust, and they make love. Quite the scandal of the DNA should be hooking up with the guy you only met at a dance hall a couple of nights prior, and uh.

You know, probably twice her age at least, if not more.

But he looked closer.

To her age. He looked thirty.

We don't know if she was twenty. We don't know that. We also don't know, to your point, we don't know if she was sixteen. I cannot speak intelligently on this, but yes.

She was innocent. I'm assuming that she's probably maybe eighteen and four. We're gonna be you know, lucky here.

Yeah, yeah, yeah at four. Seduced and abandoned. Yeah, so Faust as soon as he knocked her up dipped.

Out by the way, shocker.

Yeah, I know, it's crazy. So seduced and abandoned. Marguerite is expecting Fauss child. She is still in love with him, and praise for him and their unborn child. She really is like a good girl all the way through to her death.

She really is.

I should also mention this story and play are considered a tragedy if you couldn't see the riding on the walls. But all right, uh. The soldiers return with Valentine. Sebil tries to stop him seeing Marguerite, but Valentine, suspecting the worst, pushes him aside outside her house. Melastopheles serenades Marguerite on Faust's behalf. Valentine and Faus fight and with the intervention of Mevastopheles, Valentine is fatally wounded. Yeah, the entire fight

What do you expect I was gonna sounds like he's dirty. Obviously he's gonna do everything dirty because like he doesn't want to lose that soul, so he's gonna win any way he wants. So.

Indeed, indeed, Marguerite watches her brother die and hears him curse her with her last with his last breath, so basically she's holding him in his head or his head in her hands, gingerly whispering sweet words to him of encouragement and all this. He basically curses her to just be damned for her actions. Shit, because he knows that she's knocked up out of wedlock, which puts this honor

Well, I mean, shit, he just died for old girl being But to be feared like this sounds like a whole predatory Oh yeah, just Hey, I'm going to seduce you vibe situation Like, I feel like they were right in worrying about her being alone or getting stolen or anything like that. But a now all boy dies for it.

So I should also mention faust abandoned her the next morning, not out of some there's no way to not be a shipbag about this. I understand that he actually left out of guilt because he realized that he had ruined her innocence. It wasn't because he was like, oh well she's damaged goods now and dipped out. He actually felt really horrible about deflowering.

And I agree.

I agree.

He's like how old mentally quote unquote yeah sixty ish, Yeah, sixty ish, and we're talking she's like at best eighteen, okay, yes, like but all real shit.

Keep in mind he was on his way back to her, which is when he and the brother met up. Like the fuck up. I'm just saying, it's not like he was trying to be like the night Shining arm or over here. He still did dirty Like, for sure, he's a dirty dog with it, But I just wanted to be known that he didn't just like knock her up in a pedophile.

I don't even care which way you slice it.

We don't know if he was a pedophile.

Okay, even eighteen, we're gonna call it for what it is. He's still being shitty. Yes, yes, yes, and of course he doesn't die.

You know he didn't.

Force himself upon her. He did not do that. Yes, because manipulating an innocent child is good. How are you going to try to spin I'm not looked. Fouls is a piece of shit.

I'm not trying to spend it in his favor, but like I'm just saying, we gotta let the whole story play through.

Okay, he's still a piece of shit, even at the end, Like, fuck this guy every way, shape and form, Like not feel bad for the brother and this girl.

Yeah you should, you should.

I feel bad for everybody involved that.

I'm not trying to defend him either, I'm trying to give proper context to the story.

Rate Ja, I know you're giving condext man.

He's still a piece of shit and he deserves what he got. But fuck anyway, right guy? Yes, fuck faust anyway?

Moving on?

Uh? Where are we at here? Distraught, Marguerite goes to church to pray for forgiveness. When she hears the voice of Mephistopheles telling her that she is damned, she collapses in terror. Act five, which also she.

Falls shows up just to be an asshole because he's a demon. Yeah, that's fair.

Also, she collapses out of terror and basically gets arrested and put into a scene asylum a fourteenth and fourteen hundredth version of one, Oh my gosh, so you could tell what's going down here terrible. She then gets like set to be executed.

This is a horrible story, by the way.

The tragedy, it's it's one of the mostest continuing here. Act five, while Purgis Nights, that's a that's apparently a celebration that takes place in Germany. Uh Faust and Mefistopheles are surrounded by a group of demons. Faust has shown a vision of Marguerite and she has been imprisoned for infanticide and gone and sane. Yeah, the baby dies.

Well, hobnestly and clearly infant side.

With Mefistopheles's help, Faust goes to the prison in an attempt to save Marguerite. She seems to recognize her lover and recalls the night when he first seduced her, Faust is overwhelmed with pity. Marguerite panics at the side of the devil, and with a frantic appeal to heaven, she dies. Mefistopheles damns her, but angelic voices proclaimed that she is saved. So all right, here's the deal.

They're in.

They're in the prison cell, and essentially she is in her last act declaring that the Lord is her God and that you know, stand back Satan, this whole, this whole dramatic spiel.

And as they're leaving, the.

Demons like, yeah, well you're still going to hell, and then Angel's voices come in and say, actually, Marguerite, her name is written in the Book of Life. Thank you.

So she gets to go to heaven. At least she gets to go to heaven out of this whole ordeal, because I'm sure that she probably gave birth and was having postpartum and she was probably you know, dying from sepsis because they didn't you know, properly remove the placenta and everything else. So yeah, she's probably just suffering this. This is a terrible story, by the way.

So they kind of again, this is a not a very good synopsis. They leave out everything about when they go back and look at ancient Greece, because he wanted to learn everything of human knowledge, which leads them to go back to ancient Greece. He starts looking into some of these mystery schools of the olden days, which is when he sees Helen and the whole shebang that happens there. Yeah, this whole situation with the prison is after he bangs out Helen Detroit too, which it's it's wild now. I

No, fuck that guy. He doesn't need to go to heaven.

Option B Forty demons come out from Hell and rip his body limb from limb, tear his organs apart, splay him all over the room, and bring his screaming, kicking, piece by piece soul to hell, part by part.

I take Option B for this man again.

The scholarly debate has not been concluded on this because there are certain literary elements that would suggest that option A was written first, and then other references that are made that would suggest.

Option B was written first.

We don't know which one is the original, which one is fanfic, or if the author himself wrote two different versions of the story and just kind of made one more popular than the others. There's so many hypotheticals on this one, but it was later turned into a play for obvious reasons. Certain things of the play were certain things of the book, I should say, we're removed from the play. Certain themes were rather softened for very obvious reasons.

Theme of them.

One of these stories looks like it's more of a play on humanity versus human guilt, and the demon in the middle of it all is more or less the catalyst, but it's more or less a human being dealing with his own inherent evil nature that he's born with. Another option is showing that like when given the opportunity, human beings are going to make the worst decision possible every fucking time. When you offer enough money, enough power, basically

I still go with be option B for old boy. Yeah.

So that is the overarching themes and again very very brief synopsis missing. Well, we're gonna talk about that one here in just a bit, but first let's talk about Johann George Faust. This is a real dude, that's a real person that really walked the earth.

Okay.

So, and they are those myself included, that believe that he was the theme, the inspiration rather for Faust the book. Let's get into it here. So Johann George Faust. He was born, they argue between fourteen eighty and fourteen sixty six, but he died confirmed in fifteen forty one. A d also known in England as John Faustus, which is where sometimes the term doctor Faustus gets thrown out in some of the more English adaptations of the German book.

Moving on, he was a German.

Itinerant, alchemist, astrologer and magician of the German Renaissance. By all accounts, this guy was a polymath, And for anybody who doesn't know what that is, a polymath is somebody that, by today's standards we would say has multiple doctorates in

What made this guy so special that they did this whole play on unless this was really the dude that had this whole situation go down.

So let's learn about that together, right, Because just to say that this guy was an alchemist and an astrologer and a magician, typically those three things run together, honestly, and you know, alchemy, we would consider that a chemist by today's standards. Although there was a little bit more of the X factor, if you will. Reason for that is because by today's standards, we have something called stoichiometry, right,

I'm terrible at chemistry.

I love it.

I love it. I am just well, I had a terrible teacher, So I'll say that I have a I had a terrible teacher, but I do believe that I could hopefully learn it one day better.

Well even still, it's per the day and age. So they didn't have help me, is.

The well they so this guy believed in all of this, and so he practiced everything together essentially okay.

And that's very typical in most true alchemists. They would not practice alchemy unless it was in Hebrew. They wouldn't do it unless it was in a certain time of the year, because the alchemical experiments wouldn't work unless it was in a certain month, or at least is what they believed. The stars had to be aligned a certain way if they were trying to do this incantation. What we might call an experiment by today's standards.

So like the elixir of life, what they're looking.

For basically, well, not every alchemist was trying their hand at getting the Philosopher's Stone. A lot of them were. Yeah, Isaac Newton very famously an alchemists who discover gravity. He didn't, he just put turn to it. But he actually died from drinking mercury because he was in the process of trying to create the Philosopher's Stone off of alchemical texts. But so, yeah, the whole magician thing as well. A

Mm hmm.

Yeah.

And like if you add different chemicals together having it turned different colors, that can you know, consider magic.

And then you could also understand why certain church leaders would see this guy mix things from glass jar a to glass jar B and it just changed colors. And now there's smoke. That's not God's work, that's the demons. So clearly everything alchemical must be demonic.

Yeah, and definitely got to kill all the women though, because like the Mingo.

There was very few women alchemist. I know, I was just kidding, I'm hi.

Fourteen hundred women read grows.

Yeah, it's crazy, but there were a few very prominent female alchemist throughout the years. Marry the Jewish or Maria the Jewish is one of the more famous ones, but that was first century a d. And she was brought up in alchemistry from her Hebrew backgrounds in Germany in the fourteen hundreds. She well, when we got our ears chopped off for such such heresy. But yeah, so anyway, moving on here, let's talk about the biography of Old Boy.

Okay, yeah, that's a big difference, but okay exactly.

The City archive of Ingolstad has a letter dated on the twenty seventh of June fifteen twenty eight which mentions a doctor Jong Faustus van Heldeberg or Heldeberg. Other sources have Georgias Faustus Heimstel. In the archives Heidelberg University, there are records of Georgie Helmsteader inscribed from fourteen eighty three to fourteen eighty seven, stating that he was promoted to baccalarius in July of fourteen eighty four and a magister

Yeah, and so this guy's he's just as good as the other guy.

Yeah, well, okay, So again, giving the proper historical context here, to claim that somebody was guilty of sodomy could just mean he was a homosexual.

Which is totally fine.

It could also mean that he was raping his students.

Yeah.

Both both are very much possible in the historical context of the fourteen and fifteen hundreds.

Unfortunately you don't know. Also, I was thinking, since his birth is like unknown, could it be because he aged back in time.

This is a portion of the reason why they think that the actual fouse was. Maybe the story isn't so much of a story as much of a retelling of true events.

That'd be wild.

This that's what some believe. Anyway, let's get in the possibly. I mean, granted, the timeframe of his birth was we're talking give or take fourteen years, so that's not exactly the twenty four years. But afford it fucking close, right.

Still gonna afford it. We're gonna count for it.

Small little adaptations here there. Maybe her name wasn't Marguerite. Maybe his name.

Was martinuez I said, Martin, you know, Martin Martini, Martin who even knows?

Yeah, slight little adaptations to make it more palpable for the stage of the sixteen hundreds. Who knows, I mean, but.

They But homosexuality has been around for a very long time, so it.

Was never seen as a positive thing. You'd be put to death for such things for the vast majority of human history.

That's sad. By the way, it is what it is.

So anyway, uh, let's see Conrad Multanus Rufus in fifteen thirteen recounts a meeting with a chiromanticus okay, oh, chiromanticus very interesting, called Georgis Faustus. I'm not going to pronounce those terms. Basically, it means Demi, god of Heidelberg, overhearing

I'm surprised that he gave a horoscope to a bishop.

I agree like that.

I didn't think that was a thing that could go down, you know, isn't that the devil's work?

Some would say so, although depending on which section of the Old Testament you are quoting, it does say that we, as followers of the God of Abraham, should be setting our calendars by the stars in the.

Moon Okay, so if you are, but you're getting your horoscope done, like you're still participating in things that are not from the Bible. So I agree.

But there are those I even know Christians that get down with horoscopes and they're like, well it sens right here in the Bible, we should watch the stars. And it's like, no, no, you're you're cherry picking half of one sentence of the entire book.

Do you think that horoscopes are evil?

Of No, I think they're silly, not necessary. I guess it depends on how you use them. Okay, it's like saying, do I believe a gun is evil?

No?

Could it be used for evil purposes? Sure? If you're using the stars for divination or magic or speaking with the dead or something like this, yes, I believe that that is satanic.

Like moonwater is satanically based.

I don't know, are you speaking to some other deity when you're doing moonwater?

More or less you can charge your crystals. You put out some water the moon kind of like re like there's a thing about energizing water, like the enzymes inside of it, and it helped you know, you could make a ritual of it to where it's like wanting positive vibes pretty much.

See. I again, I don't really get down with the charging of crystals. I think that is silly. I don't.

I don't think that's I mean scientifically though they hold energy.

They do so, but they hold electricity, they hold that type of energy. The moon has no bearing on electrical vibrations whatsoever.

True. But I mean people, there's still some science based that there is energy within everything, and so yeah, I don't see the harm in it. I just I don't see the harm and horoscopes, I mean, I think it's fascinating. I actually, you know, there's a lot of I have a friend that's super into astrology, and she like does all the kids. She's like, when were you born? At what time?

What?

This?

And this and this, and she is a little star chart.

Oh yeah. She was like, girl, I'm gonna do all your stuff. And I was like, look, you can do all the legwork and then tell me about me. That'd be great because she's she has all of it down to the absolute science, which is cool. I mean, I think there's a lot of interesting information with it. I'm not super huge into it in the sense of I don't know enough to be to be like really into it. But I don't see how it is of the devil. It's not one of those things that I feel that

I think it's interesting, and I think that if you're using it, how could I put this per my believes God made the stars, he made the moon. Using these things, I don't think is inherently bad. You are using these as a replacement for the Word, or for salvation, or whatever the case is, then it gets to be blasphemy. That's where I'm at with it. It's interesting. Like crystals, for instance, I don't have a problem with crystals. I don't.

I guess I just don't. As long as it's not hurting anybody, it doesn't bother me. I have tons of crystals in my house, and I have them, I use them in my berth, and I wear a ton of bracelets and stuff that have different, you know, different meanings for what I'm wearing and stuff I don't. It's the same with the tarot deck. I only actually I was gifted a tarot deck that's actually a really really nice tarot deck. It's not even one that I would even

So Taro specifically and me and Jonathan always had these conversations. If it's something that is trying to tell you your future, it is probably satanically based that just right out the rip. Any kind of divination, any kind of sorcery, communicating with the dead, those that deal in chance by that they mean of tongues, No, no dealing in bones and cars, oh yeah, chance would be like yeah, yeah, no, speaking in tongues that's a that's a gift of the spirit. That's the other side of the coin.

See. And I actually was raised that tongue is demonic.

How it talks about it multiple times.

I know it talks about it in the Bible, but I was so some of the churches that I went to when I was younger, like tongues is that no one on earth knows how to speak in tongues now, and that what people are talking in is actually demonic.

That is a claim for the record. No one is supposed to know how to speak in tonguese. Not something you're taught, it's it's something that.

But like what they're channeling is not of God, that it's actually demonic in presence. And one of my girlfriends actually went to a church down here that that they were speaking in tongue and she faced himy and I was like, mmmm, not today say nine that even though I'm like not of like super Christian room, but I was like mm mmm. I was brought up like that, like if that's happening crazy, Yeah, Like no.

To think that's demonic, that's like I would love to meet the pastor that's giving that sermon, Like brother, that's like saying, laying healing hands on somebody is clearly demonic because nobody knows how to do that these days, Like you don't learn that that's a thing that you do what.

I do think it's kind of funny though, like the whole situation watching it, just like what are you just randomly talking some bullshit like that? No, I will say that it randomly going going hard for no reason, and then I don't know, that's We're not going to get on in tangent of religion. But I just think that's an interesting I feel.

Like a lot of people that are doing that are acting, oh yeah, I'm very honest with you, which at that point that is false false grace, which is a form of lying in a church. So like, I'm with you as far as that goes that, maybe that is demonically based. But that's that's a bold claim to say that anybody attempting to speak in tongues or get that gift of the spirit is channeling a demon at a church service

Don't know that's just the way I was brought up with it, and I'm like, I personally, I won't go near it. I'm like, hmm.

But getting back to this though, for the horoscopes, I don't think inherently knowing your sign or having your star chart read is necessarily evil. However, if you are using it as a basis to predict your future, that is when it gets to like, no, you're not supposed to be predicting your future. You're supposed to be making the best choices you can as of this moment. That's that's where it goes to the realm of like quote unquote divination.

I mean, I don't see any harm in it, just personally for myself, and I think people that participate in it aren't doing anything bad. But that's just me.

I'm not judging anybody. Oh no, I mean, but yeah, so, especially in the fourteen hundreds, it is crazy that he was giving a.

Bishop, a bishop of all things. That's why I'm like, way, a bishop wanted.

His horoscope and got paid for it.

That's even more crazy to me, Like, what is happening?

He got paid with tithe dollars for that shit?

Man? Yeah, just be taking shit from people.

Hear you, the bishop don't just like got money. They don't get paid for their services. Yeah, that was tie dollars. That's crazy. So anyway, continuing on, it says in fifteen twenty eight Faust visited Ingolstadt, where he was banished. Shortly after. In fifteen thirty two, he seems to have tried to enter Numberg, which I believe is Nuremberg these days, according to an unflattering note made by the junior mayor of the city to deny free passage to the great neck

Wow.

Later records give a more positive verdict. Thus, the Tuebingen professor Joachim Camerius in the fifteen thirty six recognition of Faus as a respectable astrologer and physician. Philip Bargarti of Worms in fifteen thirty nine praises his medical knowledge. The last direct attestation of Faus dates to the twenty fifth of June fifteen thirty five, when his presence was recorded but in Munster during an Anabaptist rebellion.

Interesting, now do you be making his rounds? He did.

Now, let's talk about his death some of the more controversial things surrounding him. Faus death is dated to either fifteen forty or fifteen forty one. He allegedly died in an explosion of an alchemical experiment at the Hotel zoom Leuen in Staufen, Mbresgau. I can't speak German. My apology, y'all.

God, you're butchering this, but I can't do any better.

His body is reported to have been found in a grievously mutilated state quote unquote, which was interpreted to the effect that the devil had come to collect him in person by his clerical and scholarly enemies. Wow. In fifteen forty eight, the theologian Johann Gast, in his Sermons Covalates, states that Faus had suffered a dreadful death and would keep turning his faith to the earth in spite of the body being turned up on its back several times.

Hmm.

In the fifteen forty eight account. Gass also mentions a person meeting with Faus in Basel during the faus Wit or excuse Me, during which Faus provided the cook with poultry of a strange kind. According to Gast, Faus traveled with a dog and a horse, and there were rumors that the dog would sometimes transform into a servant. Yeah.

Oh, shape shifter status.

Shape shifter status. That would be his servant, that would do his bidding. I have very similar to Mephistopheles with Faust.

Hmm, that's very similar. Definitely. I bet you this could be the real guy and the real story.

There's at least that kernel of truth. Right, There's that thread, there's that yarn on the corkboard, right. Authorship of grimoires. There were several prints of grimoires or magical texts attributed to Faust. Some of them are artificially dated to his lifetime, but the prints in fact date to the late sixteenth century circa fifteen eighty, the same period of the development

Wow. For two hundred years, this man still continued his quote unquote legacy.

But that's the thing. A lot of it was plagiarized. The same with King Solomon and Hermes Tresmegistus. There are so many people that think that Hermi's Tresmagistus is Toath who made his way to Greece, as Hermes who made his way to Rome as Mercury, because it's clearly the same guy. It's like, there's like five things that you could maybe say connect them all. Maybe one of them is like gave humans writing.

So clearly it's the same guy.

And I'm like Toath was wearing a coum crown from his uncle, Hermes was wearing a winged hat and winged shoes. Mercury didn't like, what the f are we talking about here, But so many people wrote Hermes Trees mcgistus as the author of this grim wire, this magical text that they were working off of, so it's it's all written. And the same thing with King Solomon. There's so many thing about the Lesser and Greater Key of Solomon and all the things that he wrote down in his lifetime, and

In the day. I mean, everything can changes. It's not like they had fact checks. So like whatever you wrote down, whatever was spread, is how it's spread so exactly. And then it's easy one hundred years all misinformation can you It dies out. So whatever you want to make the story of the narrative the next hundred years is going to be running with it and changing each hand. It's

It's same thing with right, because in fifteen eighty seven, a German chapter book about Fauss sins began the literary tradition of the Faust.

Character to like forty something years later after his death. Yeah okay, not.

Even one whole lifetime away. It was edited and exerbted by G. R. Wildman and Nicholas pitt Fitzer excuse me, and was finally republished anonymously in modernized form in the early eighteenth century as the fausboch Day Christish Maidenden. Yeah, I don't speak German. This edition became widely known and was also read by Goth in his youth. Goth is the one that read, that wrote the book that we

Then the monkey chain of events and the you know, conversations that keep changing, so yeah, so continuous says.

As summarized by Richard Stretcher, this version is the account of a young man called Johann Faust, son of a peasant, who studies theology in Wittenberg. Beside medicine, astrology, and quote unquote other magical arts. His balanced desire for knowledge leads him to conjure the devil in a wood near Wittenberg, who appears in the shape of a gray fair who calls himself Mephistopheles. Fout centers and packs with the devil, pledging his soul In exchange for twenty four years of service.

Has a dog that would follow Okay, yepka.

Faust goes on to live a life of pleasures. He visits the Pope in Rome, the Sultan of Constantinople, and the Kaiser in Insbruck. After sixteen years, he begins to regret his pack and wants to withdraw, but the devil persuades him to renew it, conjuring up Helen of Troy, with whom Faus sires a son called Justus or Justice. As the twenty fourth year comes to an end, Satan, chief of the Devil's appears and announces Faust's death for

That's all I was gonna say. I was like, were they performing actual rituals during the play themselves? Did they actually draw the correct symbolism and they were actually performing? Because that was the whole thing that ties into the rest of the industry that we're going to get into, is them actually performing rituals that you're listening to continuously, and that you're actually summoning the devil or different spirits to you.

You ever seen Tombstone the movie of course, remember that bar scene when they're watching a play.

Yes, that was Faust.

Really, that's why she was wearing the devil's mask and she was presenting him with a contract. Yeah, oh that was fast.

I didn't realize that.

Okay, this play in this trope you ever seen shit was name not Hell Rider, Nicholas Cage Bike.

Oh oh yes, yes, oh my gosh, ghost goes right. Yeah, he doesn't seem There's so many now that I'm sitting here thinking about, there's so many movies. So this all comes back to this man that, by all accounts, sounds like he was actually the real dude that this is actually based off of.

Yeah, huh, And we don't know to what level he was a piece of shit. Keep in mind the context of the day and age. This guy was doing alchemy, which, depending on who was paying you, might have been great. And the king knew about it because he brought you into Alchemists will be brought into courts of kings to do their sciences for the king, because the king wanted

That'd be stressful. I mean, it's a really cool practice to like look into and all the different back in the day ad, you know, doing chemistry and doing that kind of stuff and trying to experiment. But I definitely feel bad for them because it was just very very touch and go every time they actually did any kind of experiments.

That being said, the real faust was he actually a massive piece of shit? Maybe is it also possible that these sources that we are reading were clerical people themselves who saw anything he did as clearly satanic, so they only wrote the worst possible things about him, half of which aren't even true, and we're made up to make him seem even worse.

That's probably honestly, more or less. I mean, I could see him doing, you know, being a man of that day and age and whatnot. But it very milt could be that there was you know, a bishop, felt some type of way or who and whoever, and then just ended up changing more and more.

It's very possible both ways, and that's why I think it's so interesting to look at this for the historical context of it and the conspiratorial context of it, because with this, there have been so many people that have claimed that they sold their soul to the devil for fame, for fortune, for talent, for power, for position, for whatever the case would be.

And we're gonna get to those in a bit.

But now as we're talking about the trope itself of the Faustian bargain is what it's commonly referred to of so Gothic tropes, the Faustian bargain. We all know, never to make a deal with the devil, right, The concept of engaging in trades or bargains with the demonic figure has been a common motif in folklore around the world for centuries, but this particular iteration the Faustian bargain derives the same from the German folk legend of doctor Faust.

He fucked himself when he put that one in there.

Possibly Mevastopheles helps Faust win over Gretchen, the woman he loves. So what in the the Maiden? Now it's a Gretchen. I forget what the other one.

Her name starts with an M, Marguerite, Marguerite, so it wasn't Marguerite now yeah, now it's Gretchen, which I do love that name for girls.

I'm gonna be honest, correct, Gretchen. Gretsch is a solid name.

I know, Greta.

I've only met one Gretchen in my life and she was cool. I duggar anyway, the woman he loves, though his meddling seems to cause more tragedy than happiness. By the end of part two, fous or Pince of his bargain and is ultimately saved by God's angels. Yeah, okay. Few Gothic characters who enter such a bargain are so

At the first the beginning part, I was like, oh wow, this is like one of the first dark romances created. And then and then as we were like read on, I was like, in a dark.

Romance, I don't want to dark romance has got all kinds of that ship up in them.

First of all, there is not.

A lot of I'm gonna go ahead and let you finish your sentence, but go ahead and think about it.

There's not a lot of murder.

There, you go, there's not a lot of murder, because that's the takeaway from that one.

There's not anyway, depends on the book.

Sure, Sure. The Fallacian Barget plays a more central role in Charles Martine's eighteen twenty Gothic novel Melmoth the Wanderer. The titular character of this story is a scholar who has sold his soul to the devil in exchange for one hundred and fifty years of extended life.

That makes more sense, much better, one hundred and fifty instead of twenty four.

But still it's an eternity in hell. Even one hundred and fifty seems like a that's a drop in the bucket.

I would be like, cool, we'll do like one hundred thousand years then like maybe we'll talk, but like eternity versus one hundred thousand, Oh, I don't know, you know, maybe there's like a bargain, like how many people can I like bring to you?

Oh my god, you would damn other people sold a hell to live longer. Okay, Jack Sparrow, I would not do such a thing. I would not.

I'm just you know, maybe maybe like a bounty hunter. Ooh, like if I could like bounty hunt like the bad Ghostwriter. Yeah, be like, Okay, hey, if I bring like the really bad people to you, can we like knock off a hundred year each one. I'll even do fifty seventy five fifty to.

Be like ghost Writer. I think that would be a solid bargain honestly, but even still, like you remember that movie he made me deal with the devil to save his dad's life, only for his dad to die in the very next race. Oh yeah, because that's how the devil does business.

Well yeah, because he didn't like fine print laid it out. But I'm just saying, like if I was gonna have to go down that route, which I would not do this, but if I had to, I would definitely try to find a loophole in like, can I bring all the bad people to you? Like what if I hit every war and like just like reap souls like a valkyrie and just be like, hey, if I bring you like X amount of time, we just keep knocking off that chip.

Valkyries weren't reapers.

They were escorts.

They were escorts, I know, but I was talking not of the prostitution type. I mean they were they.

Well they cleared the battlefield, and so I was just simply saying, like if I cleared the battlefield, like that'd be cool. Dude. This book, though, that we're looking at, for those of you that cannot see it, is like some wild out faces. It reminds me of the Vampire movie.

It's oh God, oh you mean Twilight.

No, the amount of shit on TikTok with Twilight is just because it's deserved.

It's so good. It's so good. God. Anyway, anyway, moving on here, Uh every word I leave off in an ironic twist. Rather than enjoying the longevity he paid such a dear price for, Melmuth spends most of his years trying to find someone who will take over the pact so he doesn't have to fulfill his end. Portions of Morton's novel are told from the perspectives of various people that Melmoth has tried to tempt, but none of these

I feel like you could easily find somebody to take that over. You ever seen Drag Me to Health? Yes, it's just like that.

The gypsy woman cursed her and said in one year she's gone, so she kept trying to find who to give it to.

I feel like you could easily find somebody.

I feel like in the moments, I might be like, yeah, sure, as soon as they molded over for a minute, be like, ugh, I'm just gonna like take super.

Finding super desperate people, drug addicts.

Yeah, but even drug addicts don't want to spend a life an eternity and torment.

I would make it sound really nice. I like there's a sauna and the whole sales pitch for it. Yeah, there's a sauna, like like it's it's nice and toasty warm, like you know, so czy. There's like, you know, the ambiance in the background to put you to sleep.

The screams and the mashing of teeth.

I wouldn't say screams. I would just say the ambiance music in the background.

I know.

I make it look real nice and like, you know, it's a great place to go. The last example.

The last example of a more subtle Thausian bargain is Oscar Wilde's The Picture of.

Dorian Gray from ah Acty Know This. Indeed.

Indeed, while no demonic figure appears directly in the novel and forces Dorian to sign a literal contract, some unholy power is implied to be the cause of Dorian's supernatural link with his portrait. Dorian unwillingly, unwittingly makes a bargain win. Upon seeing the completed portrait for the first time, he murmurs to himself, if it were who I was, to be always young in the picture, that was to grow

Yeah, he's really nasty looking by the end of it.

Yeah, And that's another very famous trope, the whole Dorian Gray thing. Yeah. So anyway, moving on, there are other examples, real life examples of people who allegedly sold their soul to the devil for creative power, special abilities, wealth, fame, fortune.

Is it alleged though?

Some of these yes, some of these know you be the judge. One of these, as are still sticking to the historical side of things, is Niccolo Paganini. I might be mispronouncing the name of my apologies. Again, I speak American English, not Italian. Was such a gifted violinist. People thought he sold his soul to the devil. Born on October twenty seven, seventeen eighty two, in Genoa, Italy, Niccolo was an incredibly gifted musician and is widely considered one

Can we just talk about his nose? He was Italian and his chin. Look, he looks like a witch in that photo. He looks one hundred percent like a witch that you would find out in the middle of a forest.

So there may be some things so why that is, but we'll talk about that. But yes, to your point. He does have a certain look about him. But also notice how large his hand is.

I was gonna say it was like his hand looks monstrous compared to the violin in his hand. His cheekbones are super intense, his jawline is like the most it's a look reminds me of that old boy that Inbread the King Old Habsburg. Dude. Yeah, but the jaw line, yeah, that's yeah, no, it's it's definitely for those of you that can't see it, Like his nose is an actual like witch hook and it is. It's pretty intense like angles going on.

So this picture, as a matter of fact, says at the bottom, Nick Paganini or not, this is a famous fake, derogatory deragatype or early photograph of the violinist.

So they think this might be him. So they pretty much probably you know, over exaggerated all of his features. Maybe.

I mean, photoshop was a thing even back then, but it was a lot more difficult to pull off. So this very well, maybe him, This very well, maybe somebody who was a favor medals and awards.

Okay, I was wondering because I was like, those look like medals and awards for stuff. But I'm certain what they are.

Very interesting, very astute of you, ravenly to see that. So the one around his neck we're going to talk about in a minute. He was actually a Knight of the Order of the Golden Spur, which is a Catholic knighthood. Okay, so there's okay, as far as knighthoods go, there are those that are given by kings and queens. Okay, there are papal bulls, popes that pope will make an edict for lack of better words, there are orders of knighthood

But yeah, it's worse Tony when we need him.

Oh my god, right, Well he's he's a Knight of Columbus, so I know.

But he has like so much knowledge, Yeah, he does I will say I feel very stupid a lot of times when I listen Tony, I'm like, I go read a book.

The dude is just his brain is like an encyclopedia.

Yeah, wild thing reminds me of Luke too.

Yeah, Oh my god. Luke's brain operates at levels that I hope I can get to one day, but like, I just know it's not gonna happen.

I do want to talk to Luke and like point me in the direction and then I'll watch a lot of YouTube videos and read and then like maybe I'll feel somewhat intelligent when I talk to you.

Yes, indeed, alright to getting back to it. The violinists fame slowly turned him into a heavy gambler, drinker, and a serial womanizer, As fame and fortune has been one to do to many a dude with a lot of extra spending money. A rumor even spread that Paganini had murdered a woman, used her intestines as violin strings, and imprisoned her soul within the instrument. Women's screams were said to be heard from his violin when he performed on stage.

Wow. Wait, that's a bull claim, Cotton, Mike. You also know.

That's the difference between a violin and a fiddle.

Is the intestines, right is yeah.

Cat intestines. Yeah yeah, I can't believe that they were actually using that as string, but like that is the thing. I mean, I've never heard of a woman's intestines being used before. But all right, we got a we got against up in here or gain whatever his name was, ed Gainst against the serial murderer, that being furniture out a cloat of skin and shit.

Yeah.

Yeah, anyway, so we don't know if that's true or not. That is a claim. One thing was for sure. Paganini's skill in the violin was unparalleled. He was one of the first solo violinists to perform publicly without sheet music, choosing instead to memorize everything known, particularly for his fiendish

Man, I would have been so fucked in so many ways.

You've never heard like the left hand path, because the devil's path.

No, I know, yeah, I'm also left handed, I know, I know, yeah, And it's actually like a treat in my family. We have a lot of left handed people in my family.

Back in the Middle Ages, y'all would have just been a hole. They just would have blasted all as Satanists.

I don't even know if I'd probably make it to even adulthood. Like, let's be really honest, Like, I don't I don't think that would have been your face.

Fuck man, Maybe you don't know really, maybe maybe your dad would have like made a deal with the wealthy aristocrat and married you off early, and like he would have just treated you amazingly. I could see that going well for you. You know, we're talking to Middle Ages, Okay, this is not today.

I mean I would have me being like Countess to Winter, you know. Yeah, for those of you that don't know three Musketeer reference. She But to be fair, she had a reason why she killed her husband, so it was at least a decent reason. We're gonna go back. We're gonna go but like, I'm not gonna be imprisoned by no man.

Back in the day, it didn't have to be prison.

It could be because they were so great to their women.

There are examples, not a lot of them, but there are examples of men who have treated their wives amazingly throughout the course of history. There are more examples of men who were absolute bastards to their women throughout the course of history. I'm not gonna say that it's like an even fifty to fifty spread here by any stretch, but like, you may have been lucky. You may have got a shot.

Sure maybe with my left handed ways you would have had to hide that in my mouth of my opinions.

Some men found that fetching in their women.

Oh man, good cult members. Thank god. We are in the day and age, thank god where we can have.

Wow, what God?

Yeah, it's pretty Jesus and shit, you know the female members who call their like you know, you might be a tadbit sexist. Oh come, it's clear that this is all in Yes, it totally is.

But yeah, now, in the Middle Ages, I don't know how that would have worked out for you. To be honest, I don't know how that would have worked out for me either.

Really, what you'd be like, I am a knight.

I wasn't born into it. I know I would have been a part of the peasantry, to be fair.

Out of the two of us, technically, lineage wise, I'm more aristocratic than you.

Right. Yeah, I said your dad might have married you off to a wealthy aristocrat to strengthen ties.

I don't know that's fair. I probably would have been married off, y'all.

I would have been lucky to get an apprenticeship with the local blacksmith guild.

Yes, if you're gonna be very shoving some whole shit, very possibly, maybe you could be an old boys what's his name? Old boys next to victim or something. Oh, oh, paginie. Yeah, oh my god. He was after women, not men.

Good God, who knows? I get don't fuck it anyway, So going on, it says we talked about that one. It is said that he could play twelve notes per second, a feat later achieved by violinist David Garrett, who played Panini on The Devil's Violinists, a twenty thirteen film based on the composer's life story. So keep in mind, this dude was doing things that could not be matched until twenty thirteen.

That's insane. Yeah, that's insane. I would have honestly wanted to see this guy yeah perform.

So the devil incarnate Pagini or Paganini whatever, was a striking man with hollow cheeks, pale skin, and thin lips. He was very tall and thin, and often dressed in black. He also had very long, thin fingers, and without a restriction of performing with the sheet music, he flailed about on stage, earning him the nickname rubber Man. It is now believed that Paganini's unusual finger length, which allowed him to play three octaves in one handspan, which is fucking insane,

I man, this guy can't win for losing. He's just like an epic artist and they're just like Yep, the Devil, clearly, clearly the Devil.

And I could also envision a world where this might be the basis for the Devil went down to Georgia. It had a playoff with fiddles.

I don't know, Adam love violin. I think it's such a beautiful instrument.

Same. Uh. One of the first rumors came out of a concert in Vienna, where one audience member said they thought they had seen the Devil helping Paganini play. People soon began claiming to have doppelgangers of Paganini with horns and hooves.

Yeah, obviously, because he looks so different compared to other people, and he's off balance and everything else and anything that was out of the realm of perfection or normal. He was considered of the Devil.

Absolutely. He was even said that the Devil once made lightning strike the end of Paganini's bow during a performance.

That's a bold claim.

It's a very bold claim that bow would have been blown apart, but sure anyway, So how did he die? He was sickly for much of his later life. He contracted syphilis in eighteen twenty two, you know, as one does, who's a prolific womanizer. Yeah, which was treated with mercury, leading to further health problems. Again, these people, they really

Paganini said.

He turned the priest away because he thought he was going to die, or he thought he wasn't going to die, So he's like, no, don't be even my last rites, brother, I'm.

Gonna be fine here.

But those that believe he was in league with the devil didn't buy this explanation. A week later, Paganini died without receiving last rites, and his local church refused to bury his body or or body on consecrated grounds, even though he was a member of the Order of the Golden Spur. That's insane, Like you're such a level of knighthood with the Catholic Church and the only way you're getting that is if you have done so much for

Paying completely devout and they still wouldn't even bury his body on consecrated ground, which is such a thing.

Well for a bit anyway, Over the next four years, his corpse would be transported to an extraordinary tour of Europe. His involved body was later left on a deathbed in Nice for two months before it was transferred to the cellar house or the cellar of the house, where it remained for over a year. After his local church refused to bury him. His body was later taken to an abandoned lepper house before being moved to a cement vet in an olive oil factory and later to a private house.

Your niece, my God, he got around.

Yeah, oh you think that's crazy. You ever looked at what happened to Abe Lincoln's corpse? No, he moved the body nine fucking times.

Oh, I had no idea.

That they like re exumed it. They had people open up the casket just to see if it was really Lincoln in there. And it's like, brother, why what.

The going all around?

After four years, or almost four years after his death, Pope Gregory the sixteenth allowed the Violinist's body to be transported to Genoa, and he was finallylaid to rest at La Villetta Cemetery in Parma, Italy, some two hundred kilometers from his birthplace in Genoa.

Wow, at least somebody finally let the old boy rest.

I mean finally. That being said, I do want to go ahead and play this clip, this movie clip of this uh, this movie The Devil's Violinist. And I'm gonna be honest, I didn't even know this movie existed. I really want to see it, like you'll you'll see why here in a moment.

But let's let's check it out together.

You are an innovator. In your hands is an orchestra.

He can play an entire concerto just on the grain.

Commit to me and I would have you top of this billet. Brown to London, smash this world to bets.

The press are obsessed with the Italian mastro. I'm looking for the right person to sing this area.

Would you do me the honors and try it? Please?

Deep? Who is surreal you? I don't want many people to know me. I left your music sweep everything I feel. I am.

I want to be I put into music.

This trainy is a notorious seducer. How he worships together.

Lose it? To my eyes, I have not the devil. I serve the devil. Are my masters? Your life, it's my life.

I totally want to watch it.

I really want to watch that movie.

It actually looks really good. Like right, it does look really good. I'm not gonna lie.

And that the actor is the violinist who was able to actually match his record. Really yes, so the actor himself can actually produce that same Uh? What was it? I want to get the numbers wrong here, but it was like twelve something twelve notes per second. Twelve notes. Okay,

Of learning, practice, and performance.

Tartini then passed the devil his violin to see if the fiend could reproduce any of what he'd been taught. The devil confidently took up the instrument, and Tartini was astounded when he began to play with incredible virtuosity wow, delivering a performance which was powerful and intense, but exquisitely tasteful and executed with the most breathtaking precision. The Devil's playing easily surpassed even Tartini's brilliance. Tartini stared at the fiend,

Hmmm, that is actually pretty cool. I've dreamed that some crazy dreams, and I've tried to recreate like artwork that I've seen in my dreams and I wasn't able to even do it. And I was trying to like go back into the dream to see it more vividly, and it just didn't happen or I'd have a picture of it. Oh. Man, I have wild dreams, so I don't have just like calm dreams. I have different types of dreams, dreams that I know that I'm dreaming. Inception is definitely a fantastic movie.

You know. From my one to two dreams per year that I do get, they're never like super cool. I think in the last two years that I had one dream that was like actually kind of dope. But then looking back when I woke up, I was like, oh, yeah, that was a dream. It clearly like the logic finally sets in and it's like, damn it.

But I dream like deja Vou's stuff too.

I've heard of people doing that.

Yeah, yeah, so I walk at least, so there's a lot of times when I I don't even know, I'm not I don't not really good with the dreaming world. But it's like I walk. I walk the walk pretty much, and there's like two roads, and I pick both routes, so I go down both routes and I see what happens. And then in the waking world, eventually it will come to pass and I will be I know my options laid out, and I know what the outcome is, and

I'm jealous, honestly. I maybe one day I'll figure out how to dream. I don't know, We'll see how it goes. But yeah, for the longest time, I thought it was because I was like drinking myself to sleep, and I thought, maybe the alcohol is killing that.

But even I know I dream like that too, I thought.

But now that I'm living the life that I'm living, I'm still not dreaming. It's like, well, all right, cool. Now I talk to my dad. He's the same way. He doesn't dream.

I wonder what the I wonder what the science behind that is. Actually, I wonder what the why certain people dream and certain people do not.

I don't know.

I wonder if it's like a chemical thing in your brain. I wonder. I don't actually know enough about it. That's something I'm gonna have to look into, because there's a like my friend has like a dream book, and I would tell him some of my dreams and she's like, hang on, we gotta like look up honestly, some of the stuff that I've seen in the dream books. It's like, Okay,

Yeah, I mean I know when I went to the VA and got my brain scan done for a sleep study. I'm basically in a coma outside of like the what's it called involuntary body functions like my heart beating and breathing.

You're just deep in rim.

I'm basically in a fucking coma because rim sleeps where you dream. Yeah, I'm I'm whatever is beyond that, where like this person is borderline brain dead, like his brain's functioning enough to keep his heart beating and his lungs inflating, but other than that, like homeboys down, you know, not me.

I've dreamed. There's I've dreamed of lives that I believe that I've lived past lives, so I've dreamed them since I was very young. I can tell you everything about the lives that I feel like I've lived before.

I would love to see if Jonathan was to try to hypnotize you, well you, I don't know if you can be hypnotized, Honestly, I don't. I don't know to do a past life regression, I would be very curious where you would end up.

I don't know. I've thought about having Jonathan do you a past life regression on me. I don't know personally if I could relax enough to be hypnotized. Fair point. Uh, I am way too much of a control freak. I will say I did use hypnosis for my burse and okay, but that took a lot. You're talking months and months of listening to it every single night going to sleep. So I got to the point where like I never actually meditated on any of it, because I'm gonna be

And still doing.

You know. I'm just like I'm like, wow, do people I've taken actual courses like in urates and I've gone and and like everyone's quiet and like it's so peaceful. And then I'm like okay, but like can we hurry up please? It's like I got I can't sit still this long, like and I and I see the beauty in it, and there's so much information to like begin and self like you know, self exploration, and me, I'm

I can't even do the meditation shit, Like I can't find two hours to go outside and enjoy a cigar on a regular occasion. Like I'm gonna sit there and just do nothing for an hour. What kind of fucking fantasy are we living in right now? Yeah?

But I'm also on those people that have to like listen to music while reading while like doing something else, Like I can't physically just do one thing, even though the science behind it proves that technically multitasking most people can't do. And if you are doing it, you're not

I try doing that, but I end up accidentally writing the song lyrics I'm listening to.

Oh No, I only fuck well I can't listen to actual music like with song lyrics, but I actually listen to like, yeah, instrumentals, so I'm very I actually listen to Irish music. Certain ones are like Celtic music. I get like really into them, and then I just like hyper fixate. There's one in particular that I listen to you all the time. If I'm writing massive papers like forty plus pages, I will listen to it on repeat over and over and over again. I'm just like la

I love listening to Bach and Mozart.

But that's I grew up with that, and I used to listen to it. At like six years old, I had a collection of CDs that was like Beethoven's always been my favorite, and so I would listen to it on repeat for hours and hours and hours.

Young Beethoven, I like at the end of his life when he went deaf.

Yeah, I didn't like some of his older stuff.

Yeah, it's like and I understand, like, and I'm not knocking the amazing genius that went into him, like basically was like sticking a pole to his sternum and playing a note on the violin to see how it vibrating, and that's how he still composed mad respect, but you know, you kind of need your ears to be able to compose good music. That's just my own hot take. I know there's tons of music snobs out there that think that I'm just evil for making such an assumption.

But there is deaf people that I've actually made beautiful music really by vibrations. Yeah. I worked at a deaf and blindness living and I got taught so much about

Although I will say, actually, wow, I bet that a deaf person could probably be a really sick, nasty edm DJ there.

I think there is a pianist that's deaf really, Yeah, I'm I'm fairly positive there is one that's like, actually a really amazing composer that's legit. Yeah, you learned something new every day.

Good cult members Anyway, moving on here out of his efforts to remember the diabolically brilliant tune Tartine. We already read about that one, The Devil's Trill. But while from the hundreds of compositions he wrote in his lifetime, this piece would remain Tartini's favorite. He felt it was so inferior or yeah, he felt he it was so inferior to what I heard that we're jumping into like a

Dramatic munch well, you know, tortured artist type.

Yeah, last around sixteen and a half minutes. The Desert The Devil's Trill sonata contains three movements and both haunting and expressive melodies. He quite a solo here. The sonata is below, So if you dare, you can have a listen. As someone relatively unschooled in classical music and knowing next to nothing about the violin, I'm going to try to describe how this piece strikes me on a simply emotional level. It's sixteen minutes, and if you want to look it up,

Anyway, it's best beautifully written, to be honest, very much is actually.

As The Devil's Trill sonata goes on. Emotions conflict, dark tones intrude upon wishful memory, wistful memories, Sinister surges overwhelm sweet recollections. The desponcies. Uh yeah, the dispundencies getting deeper, as if there's sometimes an acceptance of some dolorous fate, as if the violin's sobbing, but an echo of thunder now grows something gathering energy, mounting chaotically to a discordant

Now I really have to listen to this piece. We're gonna have to make that happen. This sounds wonderful. That's a very long article, it is. This is long story short.

Let's see the suspiciously successful career of Tartini. As well as pinning the Devils traul Sonata by any judgment and incredible piece of music, Tartini had a very successful life and career. He was born in sixteen ninety two in

Wow. So anyway, so.

Let's see here, how might Tartini fit into the history of devil inspired musicians and soul sellers. Other characteristics of musical history have been linked with soul swapping legends. One individual alleged to have been struck or struck a demonic deal was the We already talked about Pagini, and we talked about him a good bit here, according to famous

But he is definitely featured on a lot of things. He came up on a couple of my searches as well.

Yeah, I mean, when you're talking about selling your soul to the devil for musical genius, especially us being Americans, you're gonna hear about these types of people. But talking about the Crossroads reference, I think it's a good time to jump into the folklore s the crossroads itself, because while we hear this, we all think, because again we're Americans, most of our listeners are American. We think of the crossroads in Mississippi where allegedly so many musicians got their start.

Oh? No, No, you read a lot better than I do. I can like summarize at least the ancient religion aspects of it.

You read books so frequently.

I read very well. To myself. I have a bit of a steamer when I read out loud. I get really anxious about it and fumbling words all up. So I actually practiced in the Marine Corps to get better at reading. I would read romance novels out loud to everybody because we would be sitting around waiting, and so we would have romance novels. And I definitely was not

Fair enough, okay, fine, So let's talk about the crossroads in folklore. In folk lore, crossroads may represent a location between the worlds, and as such a site where supernatural spirits can be contacted and paranormal events can take place. Symbolically, it can mean a locality where two realms touch and therefore represents liminality, a place where literally neither here nor there, or betwixt and between. Very interesting, So let's talk about

M that's very fascinating. Yeah, you can see the picture.

That she has the three goddesses. Yes, got you, got you. Yes.

They were also about the crossroads as well, and then they would have a fea scroll down there's a pillar and that, so they would have a pillar at the crossroads.

So I also think it's very interesting that both Greeks and Romans did this when there was a god, not a goddess, a god and there was like a mile marker, they only included two things on it, very very famously, their head and their dick.

Yep.

And the rest of it would just be a big statue with some words on or whatever. The head would be a traditional bust like you would normally have, and then it'd just be a square pillar with a dick hanging out of it, and pauls and pubes and always very small, yes, because they thought the big dicks were brutish and if you had a big dick, you must.

Be dumb mm hm. And you know, men are really attached to their penises, so it does grow on them, you know, I mean, they are pretty obsessed with it. So it doesn't shock me that like those are the two things that are included in everything.

Yeah, I could imagine such and then also I could see that too, and I don't know this for a fact.

They say that the larger.

Penises were for the brutish and the unrefined and the dummies of the world. I could also envision a world where penis in me was a thing and they were basically like, look, i've got a three incher over here. That's more than Hermes. Clearly, you've seen all the statues, a hong bigger than a god, and you're still unsatisfied.

Woman.

I could see it going that route as well.

I mean, I guess I'm not really sure why they felt so you know, inclined.

It is. It is what it is.

I guess there is some statues though, as like time changes that are more well endowed.

Yeah, but that didn't come around until like the Renaissance.

I was gonna say it was like the Renaissance era.

Even the medieval depictions of things like that, nude photos and photos, nude paintings and stuff that would be still very very small. Of all things considered, it's it's actually pretty hilarious.

I mean, I guess because they're always soft, so okay, fair like they're I mean that could be it's cold outside and they always there was always a draft happening. Oh my gosh, but you're a stone statue, the pool man, the Renaissance. So their sculptures are like beautiful. I don't know if you've ever seen them in person. I have, I've done I've gone to a lot of art stuff and then in a statue of David. But even that one very small. I mean, I guess that's just a vibe.

Gonna we're gonna short change him on the dick. We're gonna make sure he's carrying a whole bakery with all that cake. You know what, You're so off topic.

We're just trying to anyway, trying to talk about good old hectic.

Yeah, let's learn, let's learn about her and Hermes. According to the fourth century historian phili Chorus, at Athens, offerings also were sent to the crossroads on the sixteenth of the month i e. Half a month after the new moon offering at the time of the full moon. In the Greco Roman society, rituals of protection were done at crossroads and purification ritual remains were left at the crossroads.

I didn't even know that was going to be about in this. That's very interesting.

There's actual, you know, lines that are written in I'm assuming Greek or Latin.

I don't see the ritual incantation.

It actually gives the modern English text. It says there once lived a man named Mercury, who was very deceitful, and though quite wise in speech, was treacherous in actions and lies. The Pagans, in their account, also made him their great God, and often and frequently offered him sacrifices at crossroads through the teachings of the devil, and to the high hills they often brought various offerings of praise. Okay, that was from the eleventh century, so that makes sense.

Very interesting. I actually didn't know that until I was reading that earlier.

I've never heard this before. I mean, as far as suicides and criminals, you don't want to bury them on hollow ground right outside of a church, so you would have to bury them somewhere. But why crossroads, let's read it says this may be due to the crossroads marking the boundaries of the settlements, couple with the desire to bury those outside the law, outside the settlements, or that many roads would confuse the dead.

They didn't want them to wander back, the spirits to wander back into town, so they would bury them at the crossroads, so it'd be confusing for them.

That's crazy, especially if those are like the markers between settlements. So they basically put them. They didn't want to bury them on some other people's land because then that spirit might haunt them. But they wanted to get as far away from them as they possibly because they would bury it on the borderline. That's crazy. Were commonly used as a place of criminal punishment and execution by gibbet or duel tree any idea what those are?

The dual tree It should be.

Like a hanging tree.

Yeah, it should be the hanging tree.

Or let's read the dual tree or dual trees in Scotland were used as gallows for public hangings.

Okay.

They were also used as gibbets for displays of the corpse for a considerable period of time. Gibbets or gibbets.

Oh like they used to do pirates like a case.

Yeah, yeah, you would hang a body from Okay.

So you actually didn't know the name of that. To be honest with you, I hope.

I don't know if that's a hard or soft g to be honest with you. Gibbet or gibbet, which may have also been a reason for it being a side of suicidal burial, as suicide was considered a crime right. This ritual of crossroads burials dates back to Anglo Saxon times and continued until being a bo in eighteen twenty three.

Wow, lasted a really long time.

That made a good run. How about that While they became a place of burial for suicides and other unable to be given proper burials in the Middle Ages, the crossroads were once a burial place for a second only to the consecrated church for Christians. In Western folk mythology, a crossroads can be used to summon a demon or devil in order to make a deal. How interesting that that was a Western europe thing before it became an American thing.

This legend can be seen in many stories.

For example, we talked about Faust describes the character fouls inscribing magic circles at a crossroads in order to summon the devil in freeze Freeshoots folk tale often similarly involves summoning the devil at crossroads in order to cast magic bullets. By bullets, I think they might mean decrees or like a spell. Okay, I don't know. I don't know a

But okay.

A form of African magical spirituality practiced by African Americans in the United States. The crossroads originates from the Congo cosmogram in Central Africa. It represents the rising and setting of the sun, the human life cycle of death and rebirth.

Very interesting.

The center of the crossroads is where the communication with spirits takes place. During the Transatlantic slave trade, the Congo cosmogram was brought to the United States by African slaves. Archaeologists unearthed representations of the Congo cosmogram on slaves plantations in South Carolina on clay pots made by enslaved Africans. The Congo cosmogram is also called the Ba Congo cosmogram

In the Voodoo tradition, Papa Legba look at right there, I called it.

Uh, Papa Legba is the Iowa or Iwa of the crossroads or the guardian or deity of crossroads and a messenger to the spirit world. Yeah, we actually have a buddy of ours, that is a practitioner of Santaia or resident Santuria. Correspondent. I might add shout out Mario, and uh that is his patron, Saint.

Legba. Excuse me, yeah, oh yeah, I forget like and he he's talked about it a couple of times on the Cult.

So in that tradition you usually get a patron saint, but whenever you sacrifice something to them, you also have to give a sacrifice to Papa Legba so that it will make its way to the the god figure that they worship. But he actually doesn't have to because this patron saint is Baba Legba.

It's really interesting.

Yeah, he went into this whole practice that he does every day. It's pretty crazy.

Yeah, he came on your show like two years ago, two or three years ago, talked about it. I know that he talked about it the other day on the Cult when because he was getting better from his tumor.

Yeah, every day he lights the cigar and he takes the whiskey a shot of it, switches in his mouth and spits it on his altar and it's a whole thing.

Anyway, it's fascinating.

It is really crazy, Like not in a bad way, Mario, I love you to death, but yeah, it's very interesting to see the cultural differences for sure.

I love I love hearing all the different practices people do.

Yeah, in who Doo, there has been a practice that is believed to be who Doo in origin, such as selling your soul to the devil at the crossroads in order to acquire facility at various manual and body skills such as playing a musical instrument, throwing dice, or dancing. It is believed that one may attend upon a crossroads a certain number of times, either at midnight or just before dawn, and one will meet a quote unquote black man whom some call the devil, who will bestow upon

Interesting. The were wolf.

Shape shifting is a thing that has brought up in a lot of devil circles, so to say that the devil was also in this mix makes sense.

But wow, I just didn't think it was gonna be associated with crossroads the.

Same, but I guess here we are and religious us as the favorite play of the manifestations of the left hand entities left hand entities such as exis look they said it, not me. I'm just reading the thing here.

But I like how you had a pause for that one, Like, hmm, yeah, five five to seven percent of the world is left handed. Shout out to all my left handed homies. Five to really, yes, it's very very small because most people try to force people to be right handed because.

I mean correct handed.

I'm joking. I'm joking, okay, but no, because they consistently tried to hand it to their right hand, and it's hard for most left handed people to actually stay left handed. True, So I'm amidextrious in almost everything I do. I've also broken my wrist quite a few times, but I'm amidextrious because I had two right handed parents and they would consistently try to hand me things or show me in a right handed way, and so I I like learn how to do it that way. But my dominant hand is left hand.

So can you write with your right hand? I can?

I can write with both hands.

I'm jealous of people like you. I remember in school, I'd see my buddy, who was left handed, be in the middle of it, and this teacher would be on a long, wintered rant and we'd be taking notes, and then he'd just swap over to his right hand like it was no big deal, and his hands started cramping, mean, while the rest of us are just sucking high tit over here, and it's like, man, fuck you, nick.

I don't write as good with my right hand because I don't practice it often. But I can, in fact, write with both hands. I can cut things with both hands. I can throw with both hands, catch with both hands.

You're right eye dominant, though, aren't you left? You're shooting eye?

It would be my left, my left right, yeah, she was my Yeah, I hold on your right hand. Well, no, I shot with my gun. I shoot right handed like I hold it because that's the only way. They they couldn't figure out. They were like, eh, we're not going to teach you the other way. So that hard, I know. But they were like, no, you're the only one. And I was like, okay, hi, so all right then I've only shot with my left hand, like with my you know,

I'd be very curious to find out. You have to make a range day happen one of these things? Hell yeah, anyway. Left hand entities such as Exis and where to find offerings to the arishas Issue and Legba derive from the same African deity, although they are viewed in markedly different

So the old school, like the really old school version of a devil.

That was taken on because of Mephistopheles.

Okay, so in.

Modern fiction, and also bearing a trident that also came.

Around to them. The modern we'll talk about good old Robert Johnson, so you don't have to read that.

Yeah, yeah, all right.

So, as we see crossroads.

Hold a lot of significance to a lot of cultures throughout the course of human history. This is not a modern construct by any means. So as we're talking about people making a deal with the devil for their soul in exchange for you know, better playing abilities, money, power, knowledge, whatever the case it be. Now we cut to the nineteen twenties.

So now we're gonna.

Cut from the older stories of the crossroads and these deals with the devil and bring it more to the modern day, or closer to the modern day anyway, because we have all heard these stories of these musicians and these old blues players, and we've heard a couple of references to Robert Johnson who sold a soul to the

Yeah, it is.

All of these statements are very, very true. The Devil's deal that shaped Mississippi blues mythology before the Three Temple ov psychic Youth's industrial quote unquote magic with a K, or even Black Sabbath's bedeviled notations that birthed heavy metal Handshakes with Beel's above were associated with the Delta blues musicians playing the juke joints and small clubs across Mississippi.

How volatile perform.

Gandalus playing the guitar between his legs. Ah, my God, how promiscuous of the devil. Clearly Johnson would stay and as one of the day's most influential bluesman if eclipsed by Robert Johnson's captivating mystique, if not by rather taught by his older brother Laddel Johnson's siblings, tutor would regale for years how the curious young blues enthusiast ran away from home for two years and returned with a god given or from some other supernatural being, knack for blues

So he disappears for two years. He had no talent beforehand and comes back just like epic.

I don't know if he had no talent before or not, because he was taught by his brother beforehand, at least the basics of how to play.

But so you know, he could come back and have actual talent.

But you know, and by his own emission. He claims that he sold his soul to the devil to play good.

Oh so he admitted to it. Yeah all right, you helped him out then.

Right right. And if you've ever seen O Brother were Art thou I have, of course fact because you have culture. And if you live in the Southern states of the United States and you haven't seen that movie, then you need to fix yourself. It is, in fact a part of your culture.

Damn. Yeah, no, I absolutely I will. I will fuck with that song so hard. I listened to it at least once a month. I feel like I'm not joking. I'm like evening, you know.

George Clooney actually didn't sing it. Yeah, I voiced over. He was pissed about it because like he went to the recording studio one day and like sang it out and he thought he did great, and he comes out and everybody's.

Like, mm hmmm great, So that was great.

It's great.

So here's the guy that's gonna be singing the song. He just pulled up and he's like.

Oh wow, fine, okay, never mind, Sorry, George Clooney, don't get all the fun.

Have you ever actually heard like a voice recording you like, you're thinking you're just slaying it, and then you actually hear yourself singing and how offbeat. Like, at least for me, I'm like, yeah, I'm doing so good. And then I heard myself and I was like, this is why I do not perform music.

So I can sing. I'm not saying I'm like the songbird of a generation ninety fucking means, but I can sing. It depends on the song, depends on if it's in my octave or not. Uh, but yes, to your point, I've listened back later on and been like, oh, I did not like that. But the microphone does things to your voice. It sounds different in a mic than it does in your own head. And that's yeah, that's something that took me a good long while to.

Cause I've heard my voice when we were playing like back on episode and I'm like, oh my god, I sound like that because in my head I have a lot deeper voice, yeah, than what I have on the mic. And I was like, wow, I sound really ultra girly on the microphone than any more in fact a girl though, I know, but my voice in my head is way deeper, and like I have a deeper girl voice than most girls that I know of.

Oh you do you do? It's not like way deeper, it's low. Oh my god, stop, No, it's not gravel. You don't smoke to Carton to day, but like it's uh, you definitely have a lower octave voice than most females. But what I can't stand. And I've seen men do very similar things.

You ever see him do?

Take a phone call and all of a sudden, what's going on? Yeah, like you drop your voice on the phone for no reason whatever. Girls do the flip opposite.

Hey, how's it going?

What I answer?

I'm like, I'm like, Hi, how's going?

It's I've never understood it.

I don't either, But my kid does that when he answers the phone, He's.

Like, Hey, is it going on? Oh my god?

And I'm like, I was like, you haven't even hit puberty. What are you talking about? Like, I have a deeper voice than you. What are you talking? Big? Don't let him hear this emotion on DA anyway anyway.

So yes, apparently this guy claimed himself Tommy Johnson that he sold his sold of the Devil, the character of Tommy Johnson in O Brother, where Art thou is literally based after this guy. Everybody thinks it's based off of Robert Johnson. His name was Tommy Johnson. In the movie Tommy Johnson is the guy who sold a sord of the Devil.

I don't think I would be telling people I sold my soul to the devil. I don't think i'd be like, Hey, by the way, did you know, like over some tea, Hey, did you know that I sold my soul to the devil to become famous?

No, it's not like something he just like randomly brought up. He was asked about it. That being said, I agree with you, but he also saw the capital potential in saying that, because if nothing else is going to get your notoriety.

How old was he when he died?

Let's see here, I don't really know if he even said when he was born.

I didn't think it said when he was born. It said when he died, but I didn't see. I'm just wondering if he's a part of the twenty seven club that I'm going to get too laid off.

I know he died rather young. Now you got me worried on. Yeah, we're looking this up in real time. Good cult members let's see, he was born in eighteen ninety six and died in nineteen fifty six.

So no, nope, Now.

He lived at least a decently moderately good life.

All right, alongevity skiles.

Now let's talk about Robert Johnson, who sold his soul to the devil in Rosedale, Mississippi. Oh God, the script is small. Im have to zoom in. Good cult members, if you would like to see what the hell we're talking about here, then you're so small. Yeah, and it's not letting me zoom in because they're being ridiculous. Oh my gosh, there we go.

Hey, old people tell me about it.

So this is actually written in two thousand and four, this article. Last month, while I was driving down the Mississippi River on a magazine assignment, I had a curious experience in Rosedale, Mississippi. As I was eating lunch in a place called Leo's Market, a waitress mentioned that Rosedale is the place where the legendary bluesman Robert Johnson sold his soul to the devil in exchange for a musical genius, an event alluded to in, among other places, the Coen Brothers.

I had no idea that was a vibe. I was like, who are we talking about?

Yeah, this is a two thousand and four So I don't want to be dead naming nobody because I'm a person of the people or whatever. The fuck. I feel your eyes from here.

Yeah, my face is speaking very loudly, being so loud right now to those that can't see my face. I'm giving him a look of like, okay, yeah, now has that.

No, I'm about the culture, but not that dumb shit. As if to prove it, the waitress handed me a wrinkled, typewritten transcript of a quote unquote vision about Johnson's fateful moment that it appeared to blues mean Henry Goodman as he was traveling the road from Rosedale to Anguilla. For the sake of posterity and because I have never seen it elsewhere, I am publishing Goodman's vision in full below,

Yeah, it really is. The man said, I got his soul in my hand, and the dogs yeah I know.

Yeah, got that dog get him as it were, and causing the strings of his guitar to vibrate, hum and sing with a sound, dark and blue, beautiful, soulful chords and notes, possessing Robert Johnson, taking him over, spinning him around, losing him inside his own self, wasting him, lifting him up into the sky. Robert Johnson looks over in the ditch and sees the eyes of the dog reflecting the bright moonlight, or, more likely so it seems to Robert Johnson,

Wow.

Robert Johnson rolls his head around, his eyes upwards in their sockets, and stares at the blinding light of the moon, which has now completely filled the pitch black Delta night, piercing his right eye like a bolt of lightning. As the midnight hour hits, he looks at the big man squarely in the eyes and says, step back, devil man, I'm going to Rosedale. I am the Blues. The man moves to one side and says, go on, Robert Johnson,

That's interesting.

In the postcrip, you're not gonna read the entire thing, but I did want to make a mention of this. People say that the crosswords where Robert Johnson made the Pack of the Devil is in Clarksdale, where Highway forty nine intersects with Highway sixty one, But as can be seen from the events described above, that's not the case.

So that's interesting.

It's it's wild, and I hope that everybody appreciated my colorful.

Retelling of the tale. I was like, you're you got into it right there. I was trying.

I was trying to read it as best I could because the way it was written, I can't just read it. You're going to sell your soul to me, Robert Johnson, What do you mean, devil man? I didn't want to. I didn't want to.

Go to you like blue voices on it.

Yeah. Try So anyway, there's multiple cases, like we said, of people selling their souls to the devil for fame and fortune. Up Nesta blah blah blah blah. Words are hard. Up. Next, I have a list of ten celebrities who claim to have sold their souls to the devil.

They claim it, so they actually admit openly that this is this is a vibe.

Yes, indeed, one of them being Bob Dylan, the folk legend. Bob Dylan, the legendary folk rock icon, has long been at the center of rumors and speculations regarding his persona and musical prowess. While we can't say whether he actually sold his soul to the devil, his life and career have been shrouded in mystique.

Okay, fair enough.

Some even suggest that his Highway sixty one revisited album cover featuring an eerie crossroad sign, is a subtle nod to the classic blues legend of the Devil's Pack.

Well, they're all about their symbolism, so I wouldn't doubt it.

They are lil uzi Vert the rap enigma. First of all, No, he's not. No, he is not a rap enigma. He is a trash rapper.

But you know what, who the hell are you talking about? Lil uzi Vert.

People think that he is a artists. He is trash and I'm being very generous with that for the record to anybody who listens to rap.

Any artists associated.

With the fucking Freshman Cipher of twenty sixteen are all shit. I'm just throwing that out.

I literally don't even know what you're I know you.

Don't lil Yachty, litl Uzi Vert twenty one, Savage, No, none of them. Uh uh, Kodak Black, They're all just trash. Okay, they're not artists, they're not lyricists. Hell, they ain't even hood.

But moving on, this is why rock will always be superior. I agree.

I agree apparently with his distinctive style and enigmatic persona. By that, they mean he carries a purse and wears a pearl necklace and calls himself manly. It's ridiculous.

Oh these are all the yeah, oh now I get it. These are the memes that that I watch from the other.

I'm It's no wonder people are fascinated by him. Born Oh my god, Samir Woods, Yes, lil uzi Vert aka his given name, Samir Woods, the artist game fame with his debut album Love Is Rage two, featuring a mega hit XO tour life. However, little Uzivert statement about making a pack with the Devil.

Have raised eyebrows. Oh very interesting.

Actually, it says up here Little Uzivert, a rapper who's taken the music world by storm. No he hasn't. Has made headlines not just for his chart topping hits, but also for his intriguing claims. In the ever bizarre celebrity world. Little Uzivert has been at the forefront of the quote sold their soul to the devil rumors. The rapper has openly mentioned his affiliation with Marilyn Manson and even hinted

I have had my own experience with Marilyn Manson.

So yeah, no, he's also a trash human being.

Oh yeah, I mean he's just it was. It was the weirdest concert I've ever been, and he was like he like took a personal offense that I was not participating in the clearly yeah, clear ritual that was happening. I was there for the music, obviously, I was in the front row. He was like eating a Bible at one point, and I mean it was very like all the symbols, all the stuff, okay, cool whatever. It was

I used to like his music, but I gotta say after so many, not like one or five, tons of allegations have been brought up against him.

And him and Johnny Depp having the child pornography situation and stuff like that, And I actually did look at his tattoos on his arms, in his hands.

The symbols of that world, and it's, yeah, I can't separate art from artists when it comes to that.

I haven't listened to Marilyn Manson's since that day. It's been like five years. And I'll tell you, like I've I've met a lot of people, and because I'm a huge concert goer for those of you that don't know, I love concerts. It's my jam. It always has been. So I've met a ton of people. But he there's something about him and the way that he looked at me.

He's on also that if he makes the list on one of these, I wouldn't be surprised. Hint hint, wink wink. Let's keep going here, Lady Gaga, the go Goa, the eccentric pop.

Star Mariam Bramovich's like shining people.

Yep, Lady Gaga, the flamboyant pop sensation, is no stranger to controversy. Her eccentric style, provoca performances, and outlandish fashion choices that's an understatement of the century have left people speculating about the origins of her creative genius. Some have gone as far as to suggest that she made a deal with the devil for her unparalleled success. But let's separate fact from fiction. Born Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanada.

Germanyst Stephanie. Her name is Stephanie. What I said, Stefani, It's Stephanie.

That's one way to spell it.

Sure.

Lady Galgat is renowned for her chart topping hits, including poker Face and Bad Romance. She has won numerous Grammy Awards and has celebrated for her vocal prowess. Moving on here, however, attributing her success to a pact with Satan might be a stretch. In reality, Lady Goga's devilish image is a part of her artistic expression. She's known for her provocative costumes, catchy tunes, and boundary pushing videos that challenge social norms.

I actually really love Lady Gaga. But I could think of like multiple videos just off the top of my head that have heavy symbolism into satanic stuff, and they definitely is a lot that she talks about. I mean, her song Judah, for example, is pretty clear in and of itself of where she kind of stands with stuff.

I think it is, but.

There is a lot that it's actually based in Christianity and like fighting against the devil and stuff. But you wouldn't really know it because they actually hold true to their Korean correct Yeah, their Korean Korean, so they have a lot of Korean folklore in it and it's actually fantastic.

Yeah, they did their homework on that one too. We talked about that the Saja Boys, which is the boy band of demons that are going against the hunters. Saja in the Korean culture is more like what we would call the Grim Reaper in our culture. They're not a inherently evil thing. They're more or less kind of just they're doing their job for the underworld and in this realm, for the demonic side of things. These guys are seen as like bringing the souls to the underworld and stuff.

The hard times. The Cat's even a part of their folklore too. Yeah, and the Bird and the Bird too. The Bird's great. The bird has like side eye glarious people, and I'm like, yeah, oh my god, I like the bird man and the bird in the category.

All right, oh, good old Oprah, Oprah winfree.

I don't even they need to read that, because we all know about Oprah and how she is attached.

Yeah. Yeah, if you don't know, it's it's literally a quick Google search away Oprah. Some some speculate that she has sold her soul to the devil for her success. Moving on, Nicki Minaj, the rap Queen, I could see it. I could absolutely see it. Continuing. Snoop Dog, the hip hop icon uh, the legendary rapper and culture icon, is no stranger to the spotlight. Known for a smooth flow and laid back style, he's also been at the center

Okay. Well, him and Martha Stewart, which Martha Stewart has a lot of symbolism into the occult as well. They are like buddies. Yeah, I mean he's buddies though with so many people that you've seen attached to the occult and that have their hands in Satanism, Like, yeah, all of them are in on this. It's not just one person.

Yeah, So now let's let's see even further here. Some conspiracy theorists argue that the transformation was a sign of his deal with the devil and a nod to the infirm feline figure. Moreover, Snoop's lyrics, content, lyrical content, and explicit themes in his music have raised eyebrows. He's a

Next up is.

Kim kay, Oh god, I you know what I hate.

I'm not even gonna read it because there's no point. What was the point of it?

I believe Kim Kardashian has absolutely sold her sold of the.

Devil, the entire Kardashian family, but all of them, they were put.

On the map because of her daddy being Ojy's lawyer. That being said, she got put on the map with her sex tape, right, yes, I remember, And from that sex tape, the entire family got their come up.

I mean, yeah, they probably sold her into it.

Yeah. And if you look at the marrying track record of the family as well, they Yep.

There's actually a video when I was doing my research, it was talking about the Kardashians and it was talking about their heavy Satanic presence and that if you're married to one of them, they pretty much like it's a ritual in and of itself, and they pretty much destroy the men that they're with for like reasons and stuff. I forget it said a whole bunch of stuff, but yeah, they really do.

It's crazy. Next up is Damson Idris h. When it comes to Hollywood, there is always whispers of fauscian bargains and sinister packs. One name that has been floating around in this intriguing conversation is none other than Damson Induriss. The rising star has been setting the screen on fire with his talent and devilish good looks, leaving us wondering if there's more to his success than meets the eye.

All right, I'm just gonna assume that anybody that makes it big period is a part of this at this point, Like I wouldn't even see why not, Like it's been so heavily talked about for decades like that at this point, there's no denying it.

But are we also having a Paganini conversation that the guy was so naturally talented and gifted that everybody's like, oh, clearly it's Faustian and it's like or he's.

Just a gangster. M I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

I know that like Santana, for instance, has saw in Black Magic Woman. Okay, I get it, But even still, I don't know if I've seen any of his imagery or her.

I've only seen a couple of his videos. To be honest with you, I haven't heard him in a long time? Who's the number one? Number one?

Ozzy Osbourne, Prince of Darkness?

Ri ip.

Ozzy Osbourne, the Prince of Darkness himself, has long been associated with the darker side of fame. His decades in the music industry have fulfilled or have been filled with tails and wild antique drug field adventures, and a penchant for biting the heads off of bats, among other things.

I might add, not just bats, but.

What's that's Ozzie apart on this list of his willingness to embrace the myth of selling his soul to the devil. Yeah, because it adds to his metal mystique. And I know people that saw the concerts in the eighties and early nineties when he was biting heads off a bat. It was fake, It's not It wasn't a real bat. That How could he train a bat to fly around the stadium onto his hand on stage and then bite the head off?

Yeah, it was.

It was basically a glorified gummy bear.

I saw him in concert before.

Yep.

Yeah, he was a hot wreck.

I mean that's how he lived.

He was pretty terrible, to be honest with you, as it was not very good performance, but I still would have.

Loved to have seen him. Anyway, let's move on to this next list, and we're not going to read all the stories on these just twenty famous people who definitely sold their souls. This is from crack dot com.

So is that old boy from Bigfoot from Littlefoot James Corden?

Yeah, yeah, nobody in history has done so much with so little, which is very true. He's what is his thing being British?

His laugh, he can actually sing, not bad. Small Foot was great. I did like small mother foots great.

Hear me out. Before he quote unquote made it big, there was a British guy in the comedic space that was the voiceover for every role that required a British voice. That was Russell brand Well.

Yeah, but he also turned like crazy Christian and crazy Republican and like kind of like lost his shit so exactly, so he lost in their sense.

Yeah, so they needed some sort of like comically British guy to take that role, and James Corden again with practically no talent. I don't know about his singing capabilities, but like he's not a very good actor metrosexual British dude or is he gay? Mmm?

I don't actually know, but but yeah, anyway, so I don't mind him that much.

According to Cracked dot Com, James Cordon absolutely sold his soul to the devil. Uh. Moving on, Let's see run dmc mm, which is crazy because isn't he a pastor?

Now wasn't he always a pastor?

Right? So yeah, okay, James Cordon, ariana Grande.

Oh yeah, we all all know that.

I believe that. Chris Brown yep, yep, Madonna, Oh my god, shocker. Uh, Travis Scott, Yes, we talked about the Astra World episode when that played out. Ryan Seacrest, Yeah, I can see it. How the f can that man work like four jobs? He's definitely visiting the Secret Island.

Dude, there's like four of them, four of him because he's on everything out at the same time.

Yeah. He just has really good I'm not even gonna say time management. He has good handlers and make sure he gets from point A to point B and has enough drugs to make it through.

Oh yeah, Meryl Streep, Yeah, I could see it.

Armie Hammer. He eats children to quell the demon's desire.

I have no idea who that is.

I'm curious. I feel like we're gonna know once we see him.

M hm Armie Hammer.

Oh, okay, I recognize his face.

Yeah I don't. I don't know. I actually don't know who that is. Huh Nope, okay, cool, just a ran mass celebrity.

Okay, he's an actor, Mark Wahlberg, because he's only the dupious celebrity men.

No, he's like devoutly catholic. No, not not Markie Mark.

I okay, this list is already starting to poke holes.

This is Joe Rogan.

Oh my god, clearly.

I wrote I can see Adam Levine one percent.

I can see old boy Joseph Kennedy. I think he made a deal with the devil and curse his family in the process. Talk about Daddy Kennedy. Yo, he was he didn't make a deal with the devil. He got out of the stock market before the crash happened.

Yeah, but what they did to their sister is disgusting, absolutely disgusting and ambooring.

I agree. So you know, hey, you're the one with the botomy set.

First off, that is a part of his story history and pretty cool.

But u Kim Kardashian's mom watched her sex tape and then leaked it to the public for fame. Yeah. Even in the article we just read about Kim k leaked was quote unquote.

They've never leaked anything. They've given everything to the press, and they've they've been open about that before. Yeah, Kanye, Yeah, we could see that one hundred percent.

Kanye goes back and forth with his religious beliefs too.

Taylor Swift is like of the devil, oh God, Tay, I hate Tay.

There's never been an artist that has made enough money in one year to account for America's total GDP. Like that, that's insanity. I was having to explain this to Jacob the other day. I'm like, do you understand the amount of money that that is. He's like no, I'm like, you realize in one year she made more than any artist period in history in one year.

Well, her nosebleed tickets for New Orleans were like anywhere between one thousand to like fifteen hundred for a nosebleed ticket. The floor ones were like five k.

And that was after she had a movie that got released. Then she went on tour to promote the movie. So it was just money on money with money. It's insane. And now she's with Travis Kelsey. That poor boy there.

I don't I don't like any I mean, I don't mind some of her music, but like I like some. But there is no way I'm a Tale Swift fan. No, sorry to disappoint everyone, j Lo not Jenny from the block. Oh yeah, of course, of course.

Oh man. Uh Steph Curry, ok okay, Steph Curry just be throwing shit up from wherever and nobody smell the solfur come off the net. That that is a claim.

This is a wildless that you found. Yeah, Steve Martin, Steve Martin, Okay, Okay, who's number one? Then? Damn Steve Martin.

I'll make you rich and famous beyond your imagination, but you'll have completely silver hair by the age of twenty three. That's fucking hilarious. Okay, number one, Kenneth Copeland, it's kind of obvious. Yeah, no, I I could see that one. I don't think he sold his sold to the devil. I think he sold a sold to greed. But I mean it's a free using air changeable dialogue. At that point,

A hit cover. I don't like any of his music. I do like the alien An Farm cover. You haven't heard any of you? Okay? From Yeah, I have. I just don't like anything. I don't like Michael Jackson in particular, like in just his music. I'm just not a fan.

I get it. I get it. So let's let's dive in here, because I've heard this story before, but it's been so long, I honestly forgot. Michael Jackson's Smooth Criminal was inspired by a killer who worshiped Satan. Jermaine Jackson

Be noted I sing it in my head.

I was like right, So Jermaine said Michael didn't want to talk about the song's origins, partly for religious reasons. For context, Michael was a Jehovah's Witness, which is a cult.

We should mention that he was a Jojo.

He was a j W, which is crazy because they didn't even accept black people for the for a good long while.

What do you mean now he looks white?

You know this is a Mandela effect for you. Some people claim that Michael Jackson used to be black. Gotta be honest with you, Jacob can't verify these claims. Jacob was born in ninety two. Michael Jackson was only white when Jacob was alive. I'm just going off of people in blind faith that Michael Jackson used to be black at one point.

What he was?

It says, who photoshop pictures? I mean the media.

Our parents saw him black. Yeah, but they are parents.

Our parents and grandparents also believe that Vietnam was like probably for good reasons too.

Wow, your logic is so sound have I'm I'm highly impressed by it. Yeah, it's very intelligent of you.

Yeah, I use the same logic whenever people were like, well, look, if I wasn't there to see it, how do I know what really happened. I'm like, I feel you Apparently Michael Jackson used to be black. I don't know that's a true statement or not. Oh it's great. Oh now it's your co hosting. You're gonna meet some of these people. We're gonna have guests on the show, and they're gonna talk about how they don't believe nuclear bombs exist. They

I don't know. To be fair, history books are written and change consistently, and the Smithsonian is a great example of hiding knowledge, destroying knowledge, and keeping so much knowledge from the public. I understand people's reservations and trying to figure out what is true and what is not. Hell, I'm trying to do that. But I have held in my hands ten thousand year old artifacts like carbon dated they they are ten thousand years old, and like they

So no, no doubt. But you'll hear people make some pretty bold claims. Bold is a very kind word to use for some, not all. We have people that make very wild claims sometimes, but they're not baseless. At least you could see the line of thinking that led them to this conclusion, and I can respect that. I might disagree with it, but I can respectfully disagree and like it's all good.

You're gonna hear.

People just doing the mostess and it's like, yeah, bruh.

I need a diagram. I need you to draw it out on whiteboard for yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm a visual learner. People, I'm a visual learner. Bring your white boards if you're gonna teach me some shit. So continue.

It says there were two reasons not to reveal this inspiration at the time, First, so that the media didn't accuse him of glorifying such a heinous crime, and second, he didn't want the Jehovah's Witness elders to know that a worshiper of the occult partly inspired this song wow. Even though again, the Jehovah's Witness is in fact a recognized cult. They are known for making their into the world predictions. I think they're on their sixth one, right, now like as a congregation.

It's been anyway, That's fun.

Another version of Smooth Criminal was also a hit. Smooth Criminal reached number seven in the Billboard Hot one hundred, staying in the chart for fifteen weeks. The tune appeared in the out Bad. If Smooth Criminal was on any other album peaking at number seven, it would be impressive. However, Bad produced five number one singles, it's title track, Okay this is going down some I just can't stop loving you the way you made me feel Man in the mirror,

That is pretty crazy, especially if he was a devout jojo.

Yeah, absolutely, I know that.

It's I know that we have barely touched on the surface of everything there is to do with the occult and Satanism and all of that, and to dive into what I was going to it would take us a good long while.

We're gonna an episode.

Yeah, we might do a whole episode on him in and of itself, and because talking about the occult and talking about Satanism and the symbolism of the music industry, it is such a multifaceted thing, and once you pull on one string, it's like fifteen in ravel and you got to go down all of the different ways they

It very much will. I know that for a fact, there is no shortage of people who the public have believed has sold their soul to the devil for fame and fortune and talents and all these things. But we did want to take this episode good cult members and show the historical precedent for this. And of course faus is not the first claim of something along these lines, however, it is one of the most popular oldest claims that

M hm, you know, I mean there was a lot that you just pulled up quickly with just a few articles them referencing it.

Yeah, and there's so many basically any one of these tropes that you can think of, either through literature or movies or songs where somebody has to uh. And there's a couple of different ways this can shake out. Sometimes it is out of desperation and these people are signing their soul a way to get themselves out of a jam. Sometimes these people are signing their soul a way to elevate their status or abilities or whatever the case is.

Well, the next thing we talk about the rest of this, it will do a full circle of how the selling of the souls and all this stuff, and we'll bring up quite a few celebrities, some stuff that happened in the eighties, how it all ties and plays together even today.

Yeah, I'm excited. It's gonna be a good one. So yeah, on the next one, as a matter of fact, we're going to be talking about Jean Jean Michael Bestquette, best Guett, best Guett, that's his name. Famous artist, Yeah, if anybody

There's so many, yeah, so many, Like just sinking because I'm a movie buff too, and so like just the amount of movies, television shows and books that have some type of contract that is that has been signed in blood, that has been used in blood. I mean blood is blood is what gives ritual's power and gives the practitioners power. And so it is pretty much in like everything under the sun that you could think of is gonna be

So I had heard of Faust, and I had heard of the Faustian Bargain and all these things. I had no idea that it was actually based on a German alchemist had all these historical claims behind it. I mean, and same like we said ghostwriter, for instance, I knew that that was a trope. There's an old Disney movie HG Double hockey Sticks where it was another faustian bargain that was struck to be a world last hockey player.

Another, that's pretty cool. And I learned a lot of stuff tonight that I didn't know about. So good cult members, we want to hear from you.

I do want to apologize for all the butchering of pronunciations and the stammering through the scripts. A lot of these names are from countries of origin that I do not speak the language or the dialect and don't know how they pronounced their words.

But I did better than I would, so I.

Made it through. I made it through. So apologies in advance, or I should say postmark for that, because you've already heard me stammering like a babbling buffoon all night. But that's fine, it's fine, we're here.

So good Cult members.

We want to hear what you have to say about this before I give you all these things. We do need to give the shame as plugs. If you go to link in the description below to Good Feels Cannabis Seltzer, that is the best place to get your marijuana infused Seltzer's. If you're somebody that does not like to smoke the Sacred Herb, but perhaps you would like to drink the Sacred Herb, go there and you will get twenty percent

Do you know somebody that may have made that bargain yourself?

Do you think this is all just literary hoopla and it's just an artistic troupe. Do you think that there is some sort of a basis of reality to this. We want to hear from you. In the best place to let us hear that.

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Links to those are in the description as well, and we thank you. Everybody's already gone and done so.

And with all of that being said, this was another beautiful aatfist of the Cult of Conspiracy. My name is Jacob and there is one very important, extremely final piece of information we need you to learn.

Just then heads romanly possible.

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