Know your enemy—but not too well. In 2005, the Swedish band Reverorum Ib Malacht released their Satanic black metal album, What Do You Think of Our New God, We Call Him Judas? In 2006, they began studying the doctrines of the Catholic Church in order to create more accurate and effective blasphemy. And in 2008-2009, they converted to Roman Catholicism [1]. What can you say but, “Oops!”
This is always the peril of going up against a persuasive enemy. Who is more likely to be bitten by vampires than a vampire slayer? In WWII, after a decisive victory against the German General Rommel, the American General Patton famously exulted, “Rommel, you magnificent bastard, I read your book!” Now, reading that book was clearly good strategy—again, know your enemy—but what if he went on, by the same logic, to study all the Third Reich literature he could get his hands on? What if, in doing so, he became so steeped in their ideology that he wound up switching sides?
The story of RIM is fascinating because it illuminates an ancient paradox: the more you fight someone, the better you know them. In the video game Knights of the Old Republic II, the warrior handmaiden Brianna remarks that combat is “truer than conversing in words. In battle, the words are swept away, giving way to actions—mercy, sacrifice, anger, fear. These are moments of pure expression.” In the TV show Firefly, the fictional philosopher Shan Yu states, “Live with a man forty years. Share his house, his meals. Speak on every subject. Then tie him up, and hold him over the volcano’s edge. And on that day, you will finally meet the man.” And in The Matrix Reloaded, the Oracle’s bodyguard Seraph sums it up by saying, simply, “You do not truly know someone until you fight them.”
The flip side of this dynamic is perhaps best expressed by the titular hero of Ender’s Game: “In the moment when I truly understand my enemy, understand him well enough to defeat him, then in that very moment I also love him. I think it’s impossible to really understand somebody, what they want, what they believe, and not love them the way they love themselves. And then, in that very moment when I love them. . . I destroy them.” In short, the more you know someone, the better you can fight them. RIM, in their preparations for battle against the Church, leaned into this maxim—only to run afoul of the ancient paradox and be forever changed.
And speaking of paradoxes: RIM now describes themselves as “Roman Catholic black metal” [2]. What does that mean? Suffice it to say, their musical style did not suddenly transform into Gospel, or Gregorian, when their religious views altered. The band’s work remains loud, angry, and (seemingly) cacophonous, confronting the raw stuff of Creation and the horrifying evil of Nothing. Their first post-conversion album, for example, is called Urkaos (the original chaos), howlingly encapsulating the primeval battle of God against the Void. If you didn’t know you were listening to Christian thematic material, you could be forgiven for thinking RIM was still fighting for the other side. The goal changes, but the weapons stay the same.
If any of this sounds interesting, check out RIM’s most recent album from November of 2024, Malakt Amalka Maryam [3]. After almost twenty years, they’re still Catholic, and they’re sure as hell still metal. But be warned: knowledge comes with power, and power comes with a price. As they put it best in the video game Kingdom Hearts, “The closer you get to the light—the bigger your shadow becomes.”
1: http://web.archive.org/web/
2: https://www.invisibleoranges.
3: https://rubeusobex.bandcamp.com/album/malakt-amalka-maryam
Norman Grey is a co-founder of urd-thlol.blogspot.com and a member of the mysterious writing group known only as the Triptych. He has rediscovered joy since TSAAoH came back to the Internet.