The Order hands its practitioners no moral code. It does draw a small number of lines for itself, and it states them here plainly so that no one can mistake its position. These statements are maintained by the Keepers of the Library and apply to everything the Order publishes.
On Minors
The Order's texts are written for adults. The Order does not seek out or work with minors, and it asks that no one involve a minor in any practice described in its texts.
Young people who are drawn to these subjects are encouraged to read widely and critically, to talk openly about their interests with adults they trust, and to wait until they are of age before undertaking any formal practice. The texts will still be here. That is the point of publishing them freely.
On the Law
Nothing in the Order's practice requires breaking any law. The Order does not condone criminal acts of any kind, and anyone who cites its texts to justify one has misread them. Transgression, in the Order's sense, is directed at one's own conditioning and never at the rights or safety of others. See Venom and Remedy.
On Harm and Consent
No person may be made the material of another's initiation. Every person involved in any shared working must be an adult who has given informed consent, freely and without pressure, and who may withdraw at any time without penalty.
The Order's practice involves no sacrifice of any kind, animal or otherwise. No working requires harm to any living thing, and the Order rejects any practice that does.
On Intoxicants
No practice of the Order requires alcohol, drugs, or any other intoxicant, and the Order does not advise anyone to use any substance in connection with its practice. Clarity of mind is a precondition of the work. A record cannot be kept honestly by someone who cannot remember clearly what happened.
On Health
Occult practice is not a substitute for medical, psychiatric, or psychological care. Practitioners who experience persistent distress, intrusive thoughts, disturbed sleep, or any loss of contact with ordinary reality should stop practicing and seek qualified help. Doing so is fully consistent with the left-hand path, and with the fourth tenet, Will Answers to Reason. First Workings contains a full chapter on when to stop.
On Politics
The Order takes no political positions. It endorses no candidates, parties, or movements, and it has no political program. Its tenets concern the individual's relation to their own development and to knowledge. Practitioners hold their own political views and are responsible for them. Anyone who claims the Order's support for a political cause does not have it.
The Order's work is offered to everyone, without distinction of origin, sex, belief, or any other circumstance of birth or life. The Order rejects any use of its texts or its sigil to promote contempt for people on such grounds. Nothing kept in. No one kept out.
On Money
The Order charges nothing, sells nothing, accepts no donations, and has no bank account. The Keepers of the Library bear the small cost of keeping this site online themselves and accept nothing in return.
Anyone asking for money in the Order's name is not acting for the Order. Others may lawfully print and sell copies of the Order's texts, because those texts are in the public domain, but buying such a copy confers no rank, recognition, or authority.
On Impersonation and Paid Degrees
The Order confers no degrees, issues no certificates, appoints no representatives, charters no groups, and authorizes no teachers. It maintains no social media accounts, no mailing list, and no presence anywhere other than this site.
Anyone who offers initiation into the Order, recognition of a coil, membership, secret documents, or personal instruction on the Order's behalf is not acting for the Order, whatever they may claim. See the Journal entry No One Sells Our Degrees.
On Secrecy
The Order holds no secret teaching. Everything it teaches is in the Library. Anyone who claims to possess the inner, hidden, or unpublished teaching of the Order of the Serpent is mistaken or dishonest, because no such teaching exists.
The privacy of persons is not the secrecy of teaching. Practitioners are entitled to keep their own names, records, and practice private, and the Order publishes nothing that identifies any private individual.
On Groups Using Our Texts
Because the Order's texts are in the public domain, any person or group may use them. That use implies no endorsement, affiliation, recognition, or authority. The Order does not monitor, supervise, or vouch for anyone who uses its texts.
We offer one piece of advice to anyone who encounters a group teaching from these texts: if it asks you for money, secrecy, or obedience in exchange for what is freely available here, leave.
On Other Orders and Traditions
The Order has no relations with any other body. It has no alliances, no mutual recognition, no shared membership, and no quarrels. It does not name, rank, or recommend any organization, teacher, or author, and its accounts of the history and the currents of the left-hand path describe ideas and events, not parties to be joined or avoided. A practitioner may belong to any other body and remain as much a part of the Order as anyone else.
The Order claims no lineage. It was not chartered by any earlier order, holds no succession from one, and derives no authority from any tradition, ancient or modern. The left-hand path has borrowed names and images from living religions, and the Order does not speak for those religions or claim any part in them.
On Scholars and the Press
Researchers, journalists, and critics may quote, reproduce, and analyze anything on this site without permission. It is in the public domain. The Order welcomes study and criticism of its texts, and asks of those who undertake either only what it asks of every reader: that they read the texts themselves.
The Order gives no interviews and makes no comment, because it has no one who could speak for it. Anyone presented as its spokesperson, its representative, or a source within it is not one. And anyone who wishes to observe the Order from the inside has no need to conceal their purpose. There is nothing to join, and nothing here is hidden.