Solve Coagula

‘Solve Coagula’ comes from the Latin words ‘Dissolve’ and ‘Coagulate’, the two words describing a process to break a substance down to its basic elements before reforming it into something new, which is to say that nothing new can be built if not before we make space, breaking the old.

It’s written on the forearms of Baphomet and is tattooed on the side of Marilyn Manson’s hands, as on the the 1856 drawing popularized by French occultist Eliphas Levi, as described by BBC News,

He envisaged a winged hermaphrodite with a torch between his horns and a pentagram on his forehead. Its arms bore the Latin words SOLVE (separate) and COAGULA (join together) – the powers of “binding and loosing” usurped from God. Levi’s drawing was the inspiration for the Satanic Temple’s new monument.

That Detroit monument was unveiled in 2015; Time magazine’s quote from a key organizer adds a socio-political meaning to the de-facto controversy created,

“Baphomet contains binary elements symbolizing a reconciliation of opposites, emblematic of the willingness to embrace, and even celebrate differences,” Jex Blackmore, who organized the unveiling, told TIME late Sunday night. In a sense, the statue is a stress test of American plurality: at what point does religious freedom make the people uncomfortable?