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A Baphomet is an idol or image. The word's etymology is questionable. Variously, it has been described as: an idol with a human skull, a head with two faces, a cat idol and a bearded head.

During the supression of the Knights Templar it was claimed by the Inquisition that the knights used a Baphomet as part of their initiation ceremonies, and that this (among other things) sealed their heresy as an Order.

A much more recent and well known depiction shows Baphomet in the form of a winged humanoid goat with a pair of breasts and a torch on his head between his horns. This image comes from Eliphas Lévi's 1854 Dogme et rituel de la haute magie (in English known as Transcendental Magic). Lévi's depiction, for all its fame, is not particularly authentic to the historical description from the Templar trials, although it is copied from gargoyles found on several Templar built churches.

Baphomet, as Lévi's illustration suggests, has occasionally been misunderstood as a synonym of Satan or a demon, a member of the hierarchy of Hell. Baphomet appears in that guise as a character in James Blish's The Day After Judgment. Jack Chick claims that he is a demon worshipped by Freemasons, a claim that apparently originated with the Taxil hoax. The head of Lévi's Baphomet was inscribed with a pentagram which is a symbol occasionally adopted by Wiccans and other students of the Occult. A goat head inscribed within an inverted pentagram, the upper points filled by the horns, the side points by the ears, and the bottom by the bearded chin, is a symbol occasionally adopted by SatanistsSatanism is a religious or philosophical movement centered around Satan or another entity identified with Satan, or centered around the forces of nature, particularly human nature, represented by Satan as an archetype. Unlike many religions and philosophi and other followers of a Left-Hand PathBaphomet, symbol of some "Left-Hand Path" religions. The terms Left-Hand Path and Right-Hand Path refer to a postulated dichotomy between two distinct types of religion. The exact meaning of the terms has varied over time; the most modern usage regards re. The head, horns and torch together take the form of a Fleur-de-lis .

Many theories exist as to the origin of the term, including:

• From the Greek words 'Baphe' and 'Metis'. The two words together would mean "Baptism of Wisdom".
• Atbash cipher for the Goddess SophiaIn Gnostic tradition, the term Sophia ( Greek for "wisdom") has an esoteric meaning. Many Gnostics (especially the followers of Valentinius) taught that there was the One, the original, unknowable God (the Monad as it is called by Monoimus, or the first A. Dr Hugh Schonfield, one of the scholars who worked on the Dead Sea Scrolls, believed that the word "Baphomet" was created with knowledge of the Atbash cipher, which substitutes the first letter of the Hebrew alphabetThis article is mainly about Hebrew letters. For Hebrew diacritical marks, see niqqud (for the vowel points) and cantillation. The Hebrew alphabet is a set of 22 letters used for writing the Hebrew language. It is has also been used in mildly adapted form for the last, the second for the second last, and so on. "Baphomet" rendered in Hebrew becomes בפומת; interpreted using Atbash, it becomes שופיא, which can be interpreted as the Greek word "Sophia", or wisdom.
• A slanderous deformation of the Latinised "Mahomet", a mediæval European rendering of MuhammadMuhammad ( Arabic also transliterated Mohammad Mohammed and formerly Mahomet following Latin spelling) was the founder of Islam, and is revered by Muslims as the final prophet of God. According to his traditional Muslim biographies (called sirah in Arabic (مُحَمَد), the name of the Prophet of Islam. The Knights Templar fought among Muslims, but the very strong proscription of idolatry in Islam makes this origin doubtful.
• Idries Shah proposed that "Baphomet" may actually derive from the Arabic word ابو فهمة Abufihamat, meaning "The Father of Understanding," and associated with Sufism.
• Lévi proposed that the name was composed from a series of abbreviations: 'Temp. ohp. Ab.' which originates from Latin 'Templi omnium hominum pacis abhas,' meaning "the father of universal peace among men."
• The l'Abbe Constant says also that the word was formed by tem. o. h. p. ab. for templi omnium hominum pacis abbas, but the translation is abbot of the temple of peace of all mankind, which is considerably less menacing and may refer to the monastic order.