According to Interia.pl and GazetaPrawna.pl, vocalist/guitarist Adam "Nergal" Darski of Polish extreme metallers BEHEMOTH was formally charged on Monday (March 8) for insulting Roman Catholics.

Darski made headlines in his native country in September 2007 when he
reportedly called the Catholic Church "the most murderous cult on the
planet" during a BEHEMOTH performance in Gdynia and tore up a copy of the Bible onstage (see video below).

After the incident, Ryszard Nowak, head of the All-Polish Committee for Defense Against Sects sued BEHEMOTH for promoting Satanism. Although a court expert witness on religious
matters said that the act of destroying the Holy Bible could offend
somebody's religious feelings (a criminal offense under Polish law),
the case was discontinued because no one except Nowak accused BEHEMOTH
of insulting their religious beliefs. (Under Polish law, there must be
at least two formal complaints before a charge is laid. The previous
complaint was made in 2008, and recently an unspecified number of other
complaints had been filed.)

Nergal is pleading not guilty to the charge.

According to Metal As Fuck, in the first hearing, under cross examination, Darski stated what he does on stage is part of artistic license and it wasn't
supposed to offend religious feelings. However, an expert on religious
history and studies from Jagellonian University in Krakow stated that
every copy of a bible could be considered a religious icon.

There was no judgment ruled against Darski in the first hearing, but now that a second complaint has been filed, the matter will be heard by the courts.

If found guilty, Darski faces up to 2 years in prison.

In a 2009 interview with Decibel magazine, BEHEMOTH bassist Tomasz "Orion" Wróblewski explained that the Bible-tearing incident was by no means a spontaneous
outburst. "We'd been doing that for two years on tour before it
happened in Poland," he said. "So, we had discussed it many times
before. A BEHEMOTH show is a BEHEMOTH show, and BEHEMOTH fans are coming to a BEHEMOTH show. BEHEMOTH fans know what BEHEMOTH
is about, know what the lyrics are about, and know at least a little of
the philosophy behind the band. So, it's kind of surprising that there
are people coming to the shows and feeling offended with what we do
onstage. If such a person comes to a show, he comes with the purpose of
being offended, I guess, and it shouldn't be like that. We're not
offending any particular person. We're just offending the religion that
we've been raised in."

http://www.roadrunnerrecords.com/blabbermouth.net/news.aspx?mode=Ar...


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what do you guys and girls think about this?