Week 1 - History

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Week 1 - History

Fundamentals in Witchcraft

Week 1.

TermsHistory and a Warning

Recent Developments essaySome traditions compared

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PLEASE NOTE: There is a saying; "Ask three witches a question, and you will get six

answers." I will be teaching what I know, or believe, or have pieced together, or culled

from the mysteries. You can expect to find other teachers who disagree with me onvarious pointsyou yourself will probably disagree with me on somegood. There's an

awful lot of truth out there, and you're not going to get it all from me or any one

individual. When all else fails, trust your heart.

TERMS

Before we get into our study of Wicca and witchcraft, I think that I need to define a few

terms, as I see and understand them, so we can all be on the same page. There is atendency in todays paganism to blend and blur terms. The result is that there is a lot of

confusion in Neo-paganism and Wicca as it is practiced.

Wicca: a relatively modern religion first put forth by Gerald Gardener in the early part of

the 20th Century. He supposedly got his information from Old Dorothy, a witch that he

had encountered in the New Forest in Britain. Her and her coven supposed practiced atradition that had been handed down for ages.

The facts tend to point in a different direction. No one who was associated with Gardenerever met Old Dorothy and a lot of the rituals she gave to him were heavily influenced

by Masonic and Golden Dawn materials. Is it a surprise to learn that Gardener himself

was associated with the Golden Dawn?

This is not to say that Wicca is an invalid religion because it is new. It is a beautiful and

powerful religion. Its tenets are focused on worshipping the Divine as seen through the

dualism of the natural world. This dualism is expressed as a God and a Goddess. MostWiccans worship this duality and have a reverence for nature and the natural rhythms of

life. Wicca is usually very eclectic, using a lot of different things from different cultures,

mixing and matching them. This does blur a little into Neo-Paganism when a covenfocuses on one culture, lets say the Celts, and uses Celtic deities exclusively in Wiccan

rituals

Wiccan: someone who practices Wicca.

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Paganism: any religious worship or practice that is not based upon the Abrhamic

tradition; i.e. Judaism, Islam, Christianity. This could be Buddhism, Wicca, Astaru, etc.

Pagan: someone who practices paganism.

Neo-Paganism: the practice of worshipping deities from different, usually ancientcultures. This is different than Wicca as Neo-Paganism normally focuses on just one

culture and practices/worships as close as possible as that culture did. Lets take Greece

as an example. You can have a Hellenic Pagan, who is close to Wiccan practices or the

other extreme is a Greek Reconstructionist who tries to worship as close as possible asthe Ancient Greeks did which is far different from Wicca.

Neo-Pagan: someone who follows Neo-Paganism.

Witchcraft: this is the practice of magick. The magick used and practiced in witchcraft is

termed Low Magick; not because it is inferior, just that this is the type of magick

practiced by the every day man or woman. It consists, or can, of candles, herbs, poppets,knots, colors, crystals and/or gems, etc. It is different from High Magick which was the

magick practiced by learned men and women. High Magick consists of calling on various

spiritual beings, using planetary hours, sigils, evocations, etc.

Witch: someone who practices witchcraft.

The reason that I wanted to take a moment and define these terms, again, as I see them, is

that there tends to be a romanticized ideal about our pagan ancestors. There seems to be

this trend to think that they were witches, who always seems to be an elder, usually awoman, who were noted for their wisdom. They were respected, they were advisors, etc.

The truth, as I see it, is probably far different. Our ancestors didnt use Guardians of the

Quarters, I doubt seriously that they drew down the Sun and Moon, their altars looked fardifferent than ours no athame, salt, cup, wand or incense. These are the elements added

by Gardener drawing from his past association with the Golden Dawn.

Also, they wouldnt have had the same notions of the elements as we do. That came from

mediaeval writings, by Paracelsus and Agrippa I believe, who were drawing on Ancient

Greek philosophies.



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I want you, as a student, to have a clear understanding of our pagan past. Religions today

take what is told them at face value and do no research to verify things. Did you know

that the ancient Hebrews had a Moon Goddess? They had several deities who over timebecame merged with their One God. Today, Jews and Christians both follow under the

misconception and have never looked at their religions roots. Another example from the

Bible; in Genesis, it is translated as God created the world. The actual Hebrew wordused for God is Elohim. This word is interesting in that it is the feminine form of the

word (Goddess) which is Eloah with a masculine plural ending im. Put together, you get

that the Gods and Goddesses created the world. I want you to have a clear picture ofour past and not go through life with rose colored, pagan/wiccan blinders. Dont just take

my word, do your own research.

HISTORY AND A WARNING

According to Aidan Kelly1, there is no traceable Wiccan tradition beyond GeraldGardner, roughly the late 1930's. This is exactly correct. Before Gerald Gardner, Wicca

in its present form did not exist. But that is historical "proof" of a single pagan tradition,

Gardner's, which later becomes the basis for modern-day Wicca. Things like witchcraftmust have always existed and they did, in the form of all the ancient pagan religions:

Greek, Norse, Egyptian, etc. However, these ancient pagan traditions WERE NOT

Wicca. Please, do not get them confused.

You will hear some Wiccans claim that we are practicing the worlds oldest religion. This

is only true in a very limited sense. As has been pointed out, Wicca is a relatively new

religion. What these Wiccans should say is that paganism is the worlds oldest religion.

Paganism is the worship, basically, of any deity not of the Judao-Christian or Muslimbelief (Abrahamic religions). These claims stem from archaeological findings such as the

Venus of Willendorf statue or various cave paintings showing either a Horned God or ashaman dressed in a horned animal pelt. They claim that this is proof of the antiquity of

Wicca. It is not, it is proof of the antiquity of paganism. These finds are Paleolithic mans

first questing after the Divine; their attempt to identify, understand and honor the forces

of the universe that they could sense.

Oddly enough, no one had heard of this supposedly ancient religion (Wicca) until Gerald

Gardner came along and started selling books about it, after the repeal of the anti-Witchcraft laws in Britain in 1951. His first (rather vague) books sounded suspiciously

similar to Margaret Murray's descriptions of what witch covens are supposed to be like inherWitch Cult in Western Europe, published several years earlier. (Historians findMurray's "facts" not only dubious, but outright dishonest.) Gardner's description of Wicca

soon turned away from intellectual, masonic-type rituals (oh, by the way, he had

previously been a member of the Golden Dawn) to a simpler version which soundedmore suited to ordinary peasants.



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Gardner's info on this ultra-secret cult supposedly came from his membership in a

mysterious coven run by "Old Dorothy," who has conveniently vanished into the mists of

time. So, at most, we can believe on Gardner's word that there was one pre-Gardnerian"Wiccan" coven. There is absolutely no evidence of earlier "Wiccan" traditions (although

there's plenty of records of other secret occult groups, such as the Knights Templar).

When Gardner started his own public coven, the first and purest form of the religion of

"Wicca" was born. But just as the Christians are made up of several different sects (the

Protestants breaking away from the Catholics, the Mormons breaking away from theProtestants, etc.) Wicca has evolved into several different traditions in the past 50 years.

The most well-known branches are Alexandrian, Dianic, and Seax Wicca.

But just because they're "pagan" beliefs doesn't make them heretical or magical. It doesn'tmean they have anything to do with Wicca, at all. You're kidding yourself if you think

these old "pagans" had anything in common with neopagans.. For example: "Diana" and

"Demeter" were Greco-Roman goddesses, not Wiccan ones. This was its own unique

religion, with its own beliefs and rituals, which everyone believed in - not just someweird old lady on the edge of town.

Aljust, a High Priest of Between Worlds coven, says: But there was a space of five and a

half centuries in Europe and America where practicing these techniques could get you

burned. Or immersed in boiling oil. Or, if you were lucky, quickly strangled.

Part of the Inquisitions pogrom, called, erroneously by modern pagans "The Burning

Times", was a Christian ecclesiastic institution of the Catholic Church, dedicated to

finding and destroying "witches", and incidentally confiscating their lands andpossessions. This latter actually seemed to be the primary goal. If you didnt like

someone, you were jealous, you wanted their land, etc., just raise the charges of Witch!

Also, since a lot of the Witch Finders were more secular than religious, most of themcould be bought. The hysteria was unbelievable, the warped logic of the witch hunters

simply insane.

A woman (it was nearly always a woman depending on the locale. In Iceland, it was

almost exclusively male) could be accused of witchcraft if she said 'good morn' to her cat,

or acted as a midwife, administrated herbal remedies, or happened to be irksome to

someone of influence, or was just different, or, more likely, had something someonewanted.

Torture was used and conviction once accused was taken for granted (the confiscation ofproperty occurred at the time of the arrest.) - depending if this was local or national court

and how secular they were. Anyone who declared the cruelty and insanity of the system

risked, and often suffered, its wrath. Per Aljust, The Catholic edicts, which made theInquisition possible, have never been repealed. The office of Grand Inquisitor, under a

different name, still exists. In a way, it is possible to see what function the Inquisition

fulfilled, and why most governments went along with its atrocities. It has to do with

power2.



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The following excerpts were found on the internet. For the complete article, I direct you

to the following website http://www.cog.org/witch_hunt.html . Jenny Gibbons has an

M.A. in medieval history and minored in the history of the Great Hunt. This articleoriginally appeared in issue #5 of thePomegranate (Lammas, 1998).

Recent Developments in the Study

of The Great European Witch Hunt

by Jenny Gibbons

Since the late 1970's, a quiet revolution has taken place in the study of historicalwitchcraft and the Great European Witch Hunt. The revolution wasn't quite asdramatic as the development of radio-carbon dating, but many theories which

reigned supreme thirty years ago have vanished, swept away by a flood of newdata. Unfortunately, little of the new information has made it into popular history.Many articles in Pagan magazines contain almost no accurate information aboutthe "Burning Times", primarily because we rely so heavily on out-dated research.

Beyond the National EnquirerWhat was this revolution? Starting in the mid-1970's, historians stopped relyingon witch-hunting propaganda and began to base their theories on thorough,systematic studies of all the witch trials in a particular area.

Ever since the Great Hunt itself, we've relied on witch hunters' propaganda: witch

hunting manuals, sermons against witchcraft, and lurid pamphlets on the moresensational trials. Everyone knew that this evidence was lousy. It's sort of liketrying to study Satanism in America using only the Moral Majority Newsletterandthe National Enquirer. The few trials cited were the larger, more infamous ones.

And historians frequently used literary accounts of those cases, not the trialsthemselves. That's comparable to citing a television docu-drama ("Based on atrue story!") instead of actual court proceedings.

400 In One Day: An Influential ForgeryAnother, smaller breakthrough also profoundly altered our view of the earlyhistory of the Great Hunt. In 1972, two scholars independently discovered that afamous series of medieval witch trials never happened.

The forgery was Etienne Leon de Lamothe-Langon's Histoire de l'Inquisition enFrance, written in 1829. Lamothe-Langon described enormous witch trials whichsupposedly took place in southern France in the early 14th century. Run by theInquisition of Toulouse and Carcasonne, these trials killed hundreds uponhundreds of people. The most famous was a craze where 400 women died inone day. No other French historian had noticed these trials.



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In the early 20th century, the prominent historian Jacob Hansen included largesections of Lamothe-Langon's work in his compendium on medieval witchcraft.Later historians cited Hansen's cites, apparently without closely examiningLamothe-Langon's credentials. Non-academic writers cited the writers who citedHansen, and thus Lamothe-Langon's dramatic French trials became a standard

part of the popular view of the Great Hunt.

The Inquisition but then what of the Inquisition? For many, the "Inquisition" andthe "Burning Times" are virtually synonymous. The myth of the witch-huntinginquisition was built on several assumptions and mistakes, all of which havebeen overturned in the last twenty-five years. First, the myth was the logicalextension of 19th century history, which blamed the persecutions on the CatholicChurch. If the Church attacked witches, surely the Inquisition would be thehammer She wielded.

Second, a common translation error muddied the waters. Many records simply

said that a witch was tried "by inquisition". Some writers assumed that this meant"the" Inquisition. And in some cases it did. But an "inquisition" was also the nameof a type of trial used by almost all courts in Europe at the time. Later, whenhistorians examined the records in greater detail, they found that the majority didnot involve the Inquisition, merely an inquisition. Today most historians arecareful about this, but older and more popular texts (such as Rossell HopeRobbins' Encyclopedia of Witchcraft and Demonology) still have the Inquisitionkilling witches in times and places where it did not even exist.

Third, the only witch-hunting manual most people have seen was written by aninquisitor. In the 1970's, when feminist and Neo-Pagan authors turned their

attention to the witch trials, theMalleus Maleficarum

(Hammer of Witches) wasthe only manual readily available in translation. Authors naively assumed that thebook painted an accurate picture of how the Inquisition tried witches. HeinrichKramer, the text's demented author, was held up as a typical inquisitor. His ratherstunning sexual preoccupations were presented as the Church's "official" positionon witchcraft. Actually the Inquisition immediately rejected the legal proceduresKramer recommended and censured the inquisitor himself just a few years afterthe Malleus was published. Secular courts, not inquisitorial ones, resorted to theMalleus.

In fact, in Spain the Inquisition worked diligently to keep witch trials to aminimum. Around 1609, a French witch-craze triggered a panic in the Basqueregions of Spain. Gustav Henningsen (The Witches' Advocate) documented theInquisition's work in brilliant detail. Although several inquisitors believed thecharges, one skeptic convinced La Suprema (the ruling body of the SpanishInquisition) that this was groundless hysteria. La Suprema responded by issuingan "Edict of Silence" forbidding all discussion of witchcraft. For, as the skepticalinquisitor noted, "There were neither witches nor bewitched until they were talkedand written about."



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In 1973, Barbara Ehrenreich and Deirdre English suggested that most witcheswere mid-wives and female healers. Their book Witches, Midwives, and Nursesconvinced many feminists and Pagans that the Great Hunt was a pogrom aimedat traditional women healers. The Church and State sought to break the power ofthese women by accusing them of witchcraft, driving a wedge of fear between

the wise-woman and her clients.

And there was worse to come. Feminist and Pagan writers presented the healer-witch as the innocent, enlightened victim of the evil male witch hunters. Trialsshowed that as often as not, the "white" witch was an avid supporter of the"Burning Times." Diane Purkiss (The Witch in History) pointed out that "midwiveswere more likely to be found helping witch-hunters" than as victims of theirinquiries. How did witches become witch-hunters? By blaming illnesses on theirrivals. Feminist authors rightly lambasted male doctors who blamed unexplainedillnesses on witches. Trial records suggest that this did happen, though notterribly often. If you look at doctors' case books you find that in most cases

doctors found natural causes when people thought they were bewitched. Whenthey did diagnose witchcraft, doctors almost never blamed a particular healer orwitch. They were trying to explain their failure, not to destroy some individual.

Traditional healers and "white" witches routinely blamed diseases on witchcraft.For a doctor, diagnosing "witchcraft" was admitting failure. Medicine could donothing against magick, and doctors were loathing admitting that they werepowerless against a disease. However baneful magick was the forte of thehelpful (or "white" witch). Folk healers regularly blamed illnesses on magick andoffered counter-spells to cure their patients. Many were even willing to divine thename of the cursing witch, for a fee.

From Nine Million to Forty ThousandThe most dramatic changes in our vision of the Great Hunt centered on the deathtoll. Back before trial surveys were available, estimates of the death toll werealmost 100% pure speculation. The only thing our literary evidence told us wasthat a lot of witches died. Witch hunting propaganda talked about thousands andthousands of executions. Literature focused on crazes, the largest and mostsensational trials around. But we had no idea how accurate the literary evidencewas, or how common trials actually were. So early death toll estimates, whichranged from several hundred thousand up to a high of nine million, were simplypeople trying to guess how much "a lot" of witches was.

Today, the process is completely different. Historians begin by counting all theexecutions/trials listed in an area's court records. Next they estimate how muchevidence we've lost: what years and courts we're missing data for. Finally theysurvey the literary evidence, to see if any large witch trials occurred during thegaps in the evidence. There's still guess-work involved in today's estimates andmany areas have not yet been systematically studied.



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But we now have a solid data-base to build our estimates from, and our figuresare getting more specific as further areas are studied.

When the first trial record studies were completed, it was obvious that earlyestimates were fantastically high. Trial evidence showed that witch crazes were

not everyday occurrences, as literature suggested. In fact most countries onlyhad one or two in all of the Great Hunt.

Why It MattersThese changes make it critically important to use up-to-date research if you'reinvestigating historical witchcraft. We have perhaps 20 times as muchinformation as we had two decades ago. Witchcraft studies have also become aninter-disciplinary field. Once the domain of historians alone, it now attractsanthropologists and sociologists who offer radically new interpretations of theGreat Hunt. Anthropologists point out the ubiquity of witchcraft beliefs,

demonstrating that the Great Hunt was not an exclusively Europeanphenomenon. Sociologists draw chilling parallels between the Great Hunt andrecent panics over satanic cults, evidence which hints that we're still not out ofthe shadow of the Burning Times.

We Neopagans now face a crisis. As new data appeared, historians altered theirtheories to account for it. We have not. Therefore an enormous gap has openedbetween the academic and the "average" Pagan view of witchcraft. We continueto use of out-dated and poor writers, like Margaret Murray, Montague Summers,Gerald Gardner, and Jules Michelet. We avoid the somewhat dull academic textsthat present solid research, preferring sensational writers who play to our

emotions. For example, I have never seen a copy of Brian Levack'sThe Witch

Hunt in Early Modern Europe in a Pagan bookstore. Yet half the stores I visitcarry Anne Llewellyn Barstow's Witchcraze, a deeply flawed book which hasbeen ignored or reviled by most scholarly historians.

We owe it to ourselves to study the Great Hunt more honestly, in more detail,and using the best data available. Dualistic fairy tales of noble witches and evilwitch hunters have great emotional appeal, but they blind us to what happened.

And what could happen, today. Few Pagans commented on the hauntingsimilarities between the Great Hunt and America's panic over satanic cults.Scholars noticed it; we didn't. We say "Never again the Burning!" But if we don'tknow what happened the first time, how are we ever going to prevent it fromhappening again?



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Aljust defines a witch as, "A witch is one who studies and pursues the complete

utilization of the Self, regardless of social convention or custom, but with strict attention

to the Real." Aljust has these thoughts and asks these questions regarding the burningtimes: What can a government do with such people? People who trust their own

judgment, who have no need of rank, who believe in a cycle of reincarnation and don't

believe in eternal punishment, whose modest pleasures include direct contact with Deity,and who revere and relish life? These people can't be panicked, won't placidly join

armies, won't buy indulgences from the church, and know that a social contract is

negotiable. What's a government to do?

Gather firewood.

Aljusts opinions go on to say, I mention all of this just in case you think that themodern study of witchcraft is a safe, amusing pastime, and a sort of spiritual Halloween

party. Forget it. The structures of power that upheld the Inquisition are still in place, the

governmental mindset that says, "We have the right to destroy our citizens." It is still in

place. If you would grasp your heritage among the Wise, whose decisions are deeplymoral you will encounter great pleasure, awesome vistas of existence, loads of work,

thankless obligations, and personal danger.

Not to get too far off track, but as to the government. The government can only do what

we the people allow it to do. Could the US turn into a totalitarian or fascist state say, like,Nazi Germany? Only you can answer that. Would you allow it? As to the personal

danger, I think that he is referring to possibly dealing with a religious bigot. Say, a boss

at work who is a Protestant Christian fundamentalist or zealot. If he may, upon

discovering you are pagan or Wiccan, may cause you grief. This type of person wouldprobably cause grief for a Muslim, a Jew, a Catholic, etc. Also, as in life, the qualities

that Aljust speaks of do not apply to all pagans. You have good and bad, spiritual and

material, peace loving and warriors in all classes, religions, walks of life, etc

SOME TRADITIONS COMPARED

Today's witches practice a wide range of different traditions, of which the oldest

acknowledged is the Gardnerian, named after Gerald Gardner, who claimed to have beeninitiated into a coven in 1938.

How can something be called a Tradition if it is only fifty years old? Well, unlike classic

cars, there is no time limit on religions. How can there be? Everyone had to startsomewhere, and the oldest ones are no exception. This is one of the (very few) tenets of

modern North American mainstream witchcraft - we are not just allowed, but almost

required, to build it ourselves, and that is just what we are doing.



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It's a tremendously freeing concept, and has led to the creation of dozens of forms,

sharing only the bare bones of paganism - The First Law, the Threefold Law, Immanence

of Deity, Holiness of Creation, and Personal Power and Responsibility. This variety is astrength and a weakness - it has enabled each group to accomplish its own work in a way

that suits it best. The resultant richness is a great treasure. It also has resulted in some

very weird and strange beliefs and practices see the Dianic tradition below for anexample.

GARDNERIAN

Gardnerian Wicca is the tradition created Gerald Gardner' It has spawned many other

traditions. The rites are done "skyclad" (ritual nudity), and initiations can include tokenbondage (of one ankle) and token whipping (with knotted yarn). Gender-balanced, with

first, second, and third degrees of initiation. Formal and hierarchical.

From the Metareligion website (http://www.meta-religion.com):

Wicca is a relatively new religion. A man named Gerald Gardner was mainly responsiblefor bringing it out from the shadows. Gardner supposedly discovered a traditional craft

coven in England and was initiated into the coven- and oaths of secrecy prevented him

from going public with his practice. Eventually, Gardner did go public with his supposedpractice, but was forced to fill in, embellish, and write in occult practices to make up for

what he was not allowed to reveal. His "creation" became what is known as Gardnerian

Wicca- a practice that combines goddess reverence, ideas borrowed from the Ordo

Templi Orientis of Aliester Crowley, the Golden Dawn, and some ideas found withinEastern philosophy and Freemasonry. Many others have contributed to the beliefs and

practices of the many traditions of Wicca, but most give Gardner credit for being the first

to bring it to public attention, and being the "creator" of this modern religion. I will alsoadd there is much debate and skepticism concerning the coven with which Gardner said

he was a member....whether or not it truly existed, etc. Even so, Wicca was successfully

established in the early to mid-twentieth century.

ALEXANDRIAN (also from the Metareligion website)

Founded by Alex Sanders and his wife Maxine in the 1960's, the Alexandrian Tradition

originated in England. Alex Sanders was often referred to as the King of the Witches,and with the help of his wife Maxine, they were instrumental in opening up Wicca to the

general public. During the 1960s and early 70s, they were responsible for initiating

many hundreds of newcomers into the craft, amongst whom where Stewart Farrar andJanet Owen.

http://www.meta-religion.com/http://www.meta-religion.com/


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VARIOUS SMALLER GROUPS

How many splinter groups, newborn traditions, and personal visions of Deity can danceon the head of a pin? As many as there are people with a will to maintain them.

Reform Druids, Egyptian and Babylonian ritualists, Animists ("all things are alive andaware"), Pantheists ("all things are forms of Deity"), Bambi-pagans ("all things are just

wonderful"), and unnamed forms of worship living in someone's heart and growing there

the variety is astounding.

There is a growing movement called Reconstructionsim. This is the practice of trying to

rebuild and practice the ancient pagan religions as they were practiced in their original

cultures. Allowances are made for the modern times as some practices dont go alongwith our modern society, such as ideas on a womans place in society, slavery, sacrifice,

etc. I know that there are four main Reconstructionist groups, for the Greek, Celtic, Norse

and Egyptian pantheons. The idea is appealing somewhat, worshiping as our pagan

forbearers did.

THE OTHERS (SECRET)

I don't know them, I infer them. Working covens are more common than I ever expected,and there must be many, rural or urban, who watch us newcomers indulgently or

impatiently and solemnly gather to exercise their power and observe the cycles of the

Earth.

SHAMANIC

The Shamanic practices are not Wiccan, but some Wiccans use them. They are becoming

well known in North America through workshops and books. They hold a strong appeal

particularly for men, but many women also work as shamans.

Shamanic practice involves trance journeys to Lower and Upper worlds, to gain the aid of

power animals, to ask advice from wise elder spirits, and to learn from things seen in

these journeys. Shamans often work as healers.

The beating of a drum generally induces the trance, which can go on for 15 minutes to

over 60 minutes. The journeyers lie down while a designated drummer provides a fast,monotonous beat (similar to a heartbeat). Much more impressive than it sounds. Earthy.



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CEREMONIAL MAGICIANS

Also appealing to the discipline of Ceremonial (or Ritual) Magic. There have beenclaims that this is not a religion, and that is true. It can be pure magical practice. There

are many paths under the heading Ceremonial Magician. Some of them are almost a

religion. They deal with the spiritual improvement and advancement of the practitionerand his or her union with the Divine. Since a Magician practices, almost daily, they can

be closer and more in tune with the Divine than the followers of a religion. Here is

also where all the trappings of Magic show up - clouds of incense, herbs with weirdnames, staffs and robes and chalked designs in dead languages, and deep-throated rolling

invocations to spirits both Supernal and Infernal.

Many of the structures and ideas of ceremonial magic were lifted into Wiccan practice,including the idea of a "magic circle", the knife called the athame and the restriction that

it never be used for cutting, a lot of the invocations.

OTHER PAGAN, MAGICAL AND SIRITUAL TRADITIONS

There is much to be learned from the many other surviving pagan religions. The Native

practices can teach us about respect and patience, for example. Voudoun (usually

mispronounced "voodoo"), the folk religion of Haiti derived from African pantheonsmixed with Catholic practices, can remind us of true ecstatic possession by the Gods, and

the "fear of God" that some of us seem to forget. The Australian and New Guinian

aboriginals have a lot to tell us about being imbedded in nature - living and dying by Her

rhythms.

Other spiritual teachings are also useful. Tai Chi, The graceful "martial art" so kind to

the body that even the very old do it, is called meditation on motion by some. Principlesof Zen Buddhism can be illuminating, as are the teachings of the Qabbala (ancient

mystical Jewish writings), the Taoist "Tao Te Ching", and, of course, the Christian Bible.

I include this last deliberately. There is wisdom and beauty in here, poetry and teaching.

But go to it, as to all other sources, with your brain in gear. Judge it; don't just swallow it

whole.

1 Aidan A. Kelly, Crafting the Art of Magick: Book I, A history of Modern Witchcraft, 1939-1964. c.1991

Llewellen Press, St. Paul. Scholarly and readable, an uncommon combination.

2 This is one interpretation (mine) only - historical events seldom have a single cause. See "The Witch

Craze of Western Europe" for a non-magical and non-feminist approach to persecutions of the time that

included witches, Jews, Muslims, and 'heretics' of all sorts. And I'm sure there are others that failed to be

mentioned.

Note: This class is based on a course initially created by Aljust, a High Priest of Between Worlds


Documents

Week 1 - History