Arkansas
Could the Satanic Temple’s Baphomet statue be moving out of Salem?
The Satanic Temple’s Baphomet statue has been sitting in Massachusetts. But it might have a new place next to a Ten Commandments statue in Arkansas.
A hearing for Cave et. al. v Thurston is expected Friday. The lawsuit filed five years ago, contests a Ten Commandments monument at the Arkansas State Capitol Building grounds, according to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
The lawsuit, combined with another lawsuit led by the president of the Arkansas Society of Freethinkers filed on the same day, was filed by members of a walking and cycling club and supported by the American Civil Liberties Union of Arkansas, the news outlet reported. A few months later, the Satanic Temple in Salem got involved.
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Motions filed in March ask that the Ten Commandments monument be removed or the Temple’s statue of Baphomet be put next to the statue, according to the newspaper.
The Satanic Temple headquarters moved into a Victorian-style home that was once a funeral parlor. The temple has a one-ton statue of Baphomet in back.
Baphomet is a seven-and-a-half foot tall bronze statue, a goat-headed figure with horns and a beard.
But it’s not the first time it has been to Arkansas.
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In 2018, around the start of the lawsuit, the Baphomet statue was in Little Rock as members of the Satanic Temple sought to have next to a Ten Commandments monument on the grounds of the state capitol. Members made a similar attempt on the grounds of the Oklahoma state capitol.
It returned to Salem in September 2018 in time for the Halloween season and the grand re-opening of the headquarters of the Satanic Temple.
The headquarters closed at the end of 2017, and the organization worked on the foundation and added a new heating and cooling system, vintage lampposts, and a new kitchen.
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Support braces were installed under the floor so the Baphomet statue could be moved inside, instead of sitting out in a shed.
In this Oct. 24, 2016 photo, Lucien Greaves stands on the porch of the recently opened international headquarters of the Satanic Temple in Salem, Mass. The Satanic Temple is waging religious battles along a variety of fronts nationwide, and its co-founder says it’s just getting started. Greaves says the temple hopes to ensure Satanists “have a place in the world” and that “evangelical theocrats” don’t monopolize the religious freedom debate. (AP Photo/Elise Amendola)AP
A “Black Mass” ritual, an “Unbaptism” ritual and a “Devil’s Dinner Party” helped welcome back Baphomet and open the headquarters.
The same year, the Satanic Temple sued Netflix and Warner Bros. for millions of dollars claiming the company used a copied image of the temple’s Baphomet statue in the recently released “Chilling Adventures of Sabrina” series.