Season Of The Witch

[Leo Lane]

I'm going to use the Holiday season here as an opportunity to open observations and discussion on "cousin" paths. Tonight on the menu is Wicca.
Wicca the spiritual philosphy most associated but not exclusve to Witchcraft is probably the most successfull branch of the Neo Pagan movement. What I'd like to do is offer my personal "pros & cons" and I ask that you do likewise.
What I like: (on paper) An honest attempt to balance the deity factor into male and female manifestations. An appreciation for Mother Gia (Earth). They celebrate every part of the year (winter festivals included) using the wheel of the year. The best of them are very eclectic. Discarding orthodoxies and making use of anything and everything from various cultures and tweaking the dials as they go along.
What I don't like: The balance of divinity into male & female went right out the fucking window. The goddess wears the pants in Wicca. Males witches are called witches (de balled). Funny considdering the word "Wicca" means male witch. Wicce is the female variation of the word.They clamor for non discrimination but woe unto you if you stumble upon them with a Baphomet around your neck.That tolorance they so desire from the mainstream is not afforded from them to Satanists. (Had a brush or two). And quite frankly their beliefs (the ultra white witches) can go off the deep end sometimes.
NEXT!

[Mister_Six]

Leo, it just honestly depends on who you talk to. Wiccans are usually highly educated and can give you a run for your money intellectually, and some physically as well.

I breached the topic of religious guilt with my ex, the love of my life, and it's not exactly religious guilt that Wiccans are suffering from and their religion is actually highly emancipated from xianity. Back on topic.... Physics states that for every action there is a positive or negative reaction, this principle can also apply to magic. It's basically a relationship with the world and realizing that you will suffer negative consequences for "bad" workings. Her theory was that the energy expelled did not dissipate but caused reactions, and returned in the form of Karma, and she just didn't want to be responsible for sending anymore negative energy her way. makes sense if you think about as we are constantly expelling energy.

I do not agree with emasculation of any kind, as no gender is superior just because they have Moon Cycles. Both sexes should be equally empowered, and not fall victim to this elitist mentality. Honestly I can live without women, so I see nothing superior when it comes to women, but I do know that I have different skill sets just due to my gender, and she has hers. Feminism was designed to empower women, not emasculate men.

[Ana, Daughter of Lilith]

Leo, I despise Wicca, which is a happy-clappy mutation of true witchcraft. For me it's a pseudo-religion invented by that proto-hippy Gerald Gardener, a practice full of Appleseeds and Moonbeams. :-))

[Leo Lane]

Appleseeds and Moonbeams! That was pretty goddamn funny! (No I don't use lol)

[SugaCubez 352]

I agree with Ana on the GG. Ana have you ever read Gardner's rituals for his three degrees (as well as the three degrees of Alex Sander's "tradition" and the other proto-wicca traditions) and compared them to the three blue degrees of Masonry?

I have a theory that GG was very much inspired by Crusty Crowley and his thelimic recreation of the OTO so he wanted to reinvent a poorman's OTO of sorts, so he ripped off Masonry's blue degrees (and barely made any changes); thus "Gardnerian Witchcraft."

I despise Wicca as much as you (I assume we both equally hate it), but there are things to be learned from "Wicca."

During "wicca's" first decade or so, each tradition was heavily structured, with it's organizational leaders, its initiation rites, and stuff. This kept it's numbers very low. It wasn't until that guy... what's his name, Scott Cuningham (?) came along and "liberated" wicca" (if I may use the term) from the limiting hold of such heavily structured "traditions" and gave it to everybody that wicca's numbers grew.

We are now barely beginning to see the same thing sociologically happening in "Satanism." It was onces structures and monopolized by organizations like the Church of Satan, and Temple of Set; but these heavily structured organizations is dying out and finally giving way to that "movement" known as "theistic Satanism" or "spiritual satanism" where you basically "do-it-yourself."

There is one great thing about wicca I do like, which is that nature, and a certain reverence and respect for nature is given a significant part in their memeplex. Otherwise wicca to me looks and feels like a cheap swap meet of pick-and-chose bastardized memes a la Theosophy & the Golden Dawn like the Shish-Kabbalah, Hindu karma, that obnoxious three fold law, and the sky clad stuff. I mean can you imagine having to stare at a fat bearded old guy with a beer belly with his hairy nut sack hanging as he wears a crown of antler horns?1

[Ana, Daughter of Lilith]

Thanks, Sugacubez. We are obviously not a million miles apart here. You should read some of the things said about Wicca on Dark Witchcraft, one of my favourite Ning haunts! I’ve written so much about the differences between Wicca and Witchcraft that I could risk going on here at interminable lengths. I think I may just add a blog later summarising my views.

Anyway, on your particular point, I think I’ve read just about everything Gardner (sorry about the typo!) wrote though I never thought to relate it to the Masons, Rosicrucians, yes, but not the Masons. I don’t suppose there is a huge difference, though. Crowley? Now that is a novelty! If you have anything more specific on this I would love to hear it.

There are always things to be learned, Suga, even from one’s enemies, especially from one’s enemies, and I try always to be receptive and open minded. When I first came to witchcraft in my early teens it was through the Wicca route. I quickly realised that there was something wrong, almost on an intuitive rather than an intellectual level, if you like: that this presentation of a cult, this saccharine goddess worship had nothing to do with witchcraft as traditionally practiced, which was all about power, about harnessing nature towards a desired set of ends. For me it was about freedom not ritual. This is how I put it in a discussion on a pagan site;

So, what is freedom, what does freedom mean to me? Why, everything; it’s about self-expression; it’s about who I am as a person. Witchcraft attracted me in the first place because it seemed to me that the whole purpose of the art was the attainment of higher forms of freedom and purer forms of power. I hate rules and laws and have very little time for Gardner’s Wiccan mutation, which seems to me to be the very antithesis of that higher, untrammelled expression of pure freedom. I simply refuse to be restricted by anyone or anything. This world is my world, and I will do as I please.

My love of the Great God Pan is another dimension of my love of freedom; for Pan is the wildest and least inhibited of all of the ancient deities. In the pursuit of Pan there is no need for alters, chants, incantations and rituals; there is, in other words, no path to Pan. To worship Pan is to exist, and to exist in the least complicated of ways, following desire wherever it happens to take one, removing all obstacles that fall in the way. That is my freedom and that is my power.

I came to hate the artificiality of Wicca, no better, so far as I was concerned, than traditional religious hierarchies and churches. And as for your final paragraph, well, I love it. And if some old fat guy asks me to get ‘sky-clad’ he’s likely to end up with his prick falling off! The Craft is rising in a pure and original form. This is our time; ours is the power. No goddess; no rituals; just us.

[Ana, Daughter of Lilith]

For your information. :-)

Ana's Rede

Just some thoughts I've pulled together. Is this my version of the Black Mass? :))

1. Hold no law that is not worth holding.

2. Let all spirits in, dark or light.

3. Listen to that which sings your song. Honour that which honour deserves.
Despise the rest.

4. Go by the Moon, when the werewolves howl

5. Seek your heart’s desires, Moon wax or wane.

6. Welcome the new, from north or east or south or west.

7. Love will come on all winds that blow. Never look for peace and rest.

8. Burn what you will, fast or slow.

9. Seek what is beautiful, seek what is the wise, seek what is brave.

10. Look for danger where danger is..

11. Be true to what is true; be true to yourself.

12. If any harm you, harm them more.

13. Do what you will, when you will, how you will.

14. Let Freedom be your only law.

15. Pan will be your guide in love and life.

No, not poetic, but it's the essence of the thing; it truly is!

[Leo Lane]

A) That Rede is pretty snazzy. I'd copyright that if I were you.
B) I did in fact like that movie.

[Ana, Daughter of Lilith]

Thanks, Leo. I don't mind sharing. :-) The Craft is one of my all-time favourite movies.

[Leo Lane]

First, I'm not on a Jihad against Wicca. I'm just pointing out things I like and things I don't care for. Strictly a casual observation. Note: I didn't even approach the subject of magic(k)
But c'mon! If you were a Wiccan would like to introduce yourself as a "witch" being male?
Yeah, Yeah, I know why they frown on the term "warlock" but in a religion that is mistakenly named in the masculine, you're going to split hairs over the archaic meaning of the word "warlock"?

[Dalton Miller]

me either, but I think eventually it may turn that way. I normally call wiccans treehuggers, but thats just me.

It seems to me that this is a new teen trend. I hate trends. Satanism is starting to be a fad around here too. I just go up to them and say "Are you laveyan?" and then when they answer "Whats that?" thats when I know they are part of the fad.

[Leo Lane]

Ana, From where did you put together your "witchcraft"? Any particular source material?
And from the bearded beerbelly guy, aren't you relieved that I'm a pragmatic Satanist? I know I am.

[Ana, Daughter of Lilith]

Oh, Leo, sweetie; I wasn't thinking of you!

Yes, I have read huge amounts on witchcraft, on the history and the practice, as well as talking to people. But my thoughts, my conclusions and my beliefs are as unique as I am. You see, Leo: I am the will to power and nothing besides! Hey, let's go skyclad. :-))