by Chi Ibe

Rapper Jay-Z is said to be a devotee of Ordo Templi Orientis, known as OTO, a satanic sex cult which also claims to raise demons to do your bidding.

Jay Z has repeatedly purloined  imagery and quotations from founder Aleister Crowley’s work by wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with ‘Do what thou wilt’ or hiring Rihanna to hold aloft a flaming torch in his music  videos (a reference to the Illuminati, an outlawed secret society whose name  supposedly derives from Lucifer, or ‘light bringer’), he has given the sect  priceless publicity, Mail Online reports.

Also, his Rocawear clothing line is shot through with OTO imagery such as the ‘all seeing eye’ in a triangle, the ‘eye of Horus’  (an ancient Egyptian symbol frequently referenced in occult).

OTO is a living religion, with  followers still practising occult rituals set out by Crowley in his  books.

John Bonner, 62, the  head of OTO in the UK,  told the Daily Mail that:

‘We are not a  mass-appeal sort of organisation  — in the UK we number in our hundreds.  Worldwide it’s thousands. You could call us a sex cult in a way, because  we recognise, accept and adore the whole process which goes towards making  tangible the previously intangible.”

Mail Online reports;

Some conspiracy theorists have seized on this  as evidence that Jay Z is a member of a secret Masonic movement which they believe  permeates the highest levels of business and government.

Others take a more pragmatic view: that it is  commercial opportunism, cashing in on impressionable teens’ attraction to the  ‘edginess’ of occult symbolism.

A former FBI agent, Ted Gundersen, who  investigated Satanic circles in LA, found that Crowley’s teachings about  ‘raising demons to do one’s bidding’ suggested human sacrifice, preferably of  ‘an intelligent young boy’.

John Bonner is dismissive of any idea that he  and his fellow believers would even begin to countenance such excesses, pointing  out that his is the only religion that sends people a letter of congratulations  when they decide to leave (‘because they are exercising free will, which is what  we’re all about’).

But he accepts many people may not be able to  deal with Crowley’s complex teachings.

‘You’re not supposed to just jump straight in  to it. It takes time and study, but our rituals are not for public consumption.  You need to join us and go through the initiation process before you can begin  to understand.

‘But according to our beliefs we can’t turn  anyone away. So if you are over 18, are passably sane and are free to attend  initiations, then you have an undeniable right of membership.’

Crowley, who was born into an upper-class  British family in 1875, styled himself as ‘the Great Beast 666’. He was an  unabashed occultist who, prior to his death in 1947, revelled in his infamy as  ‘the wickedest man in the world’.

His form of worship involved sadomasochistic  sex rituals with men and women, spells which he claimed could raise malevolent  gods and the use of hard drugs, including opium, cocaine, heroin and  mescaline.

Crowley’s motto — perpetuated by OTO — was  ‘do what thou wilt’. And it is this individualistic approach that has led to a  lasting fascination among artists and celebrities.