Isnt it all about the journey of the person doing the magic? witch craft was my first interest,only to find through the years information that formed my ideal of living a spiritual life.A Faery tale of old can hold portal thoughts to astral realms,and a witches cellebration holds echoes of these dimensions, to me they both feel right and true.From black to white and all the chakra colors ,a sight like this is a haven for brothers and sisters of majick . Blessed be, Red hearts an Venus
I agree with you Brysing. I don't want to be corrupted by these new ways, I want to follow a path, but I feel separated in so many ways. Stuck, on what to choose.
Why can't witchcraft just be witchcraft? Have no extra labels?
The trouble with witchcraft is that it has become an "umbrella name" for many other beliefs and faiths. It is sad, but that is the modern way. My sort of witchcraft has become somewhat "obsolete" because of the advancement of modern medicine. We are not "needed" any more. I still do feel wanted in the sense of easing emotional problems: but actually "healing" as it used to be is no longer needed. I still have the spiritual side of my "craft". But mostly I meditate at my altar. "Contact" with the spirits, especially of my ancestors. I don't cast many spells these days; not that I cast many before! I recently cast a spell for the people of Joplin, Missouri, and for the people of Japan. For peace in the world (some hope of that!) For the health and well-being of my family. I am content in my old age. But I do feel sorry for the young, influenced as they are by TV and movies. All I can really say is, believe what you wish, and stick by your beliefs. Any belief that gives comfort in this "vale of tears" is okay by me.
Correct me if Im wrong. Isnt wicca originally a mantle that protects todays witches from what is classified as "evil fools"?
Throughout history, people never liked witchcraft and now suddenly its a completely normal lifestyle? Those who practised witchcraft were usually very poor (women). these people had very little money and had to make their own tools (and their own imagination) For example: They used skin and bones from dead animals( toads, birds, goats, horses, sheep), pubic hear and their own urin in their spells. Women used many methods that where selfish and "evil" to ward off other women from her husband. Or so she wanted to create a "Little settlement" for a spirit and made a ball of pubic hair so that the spirit could live in it. My examples comes from old english witchcraft.
The methods were repellent and were considered as devil worship.
thanks to wicca this has been protected and now he is called Pan, the horned god of the forest? and In wicca it is said that satan is a biblical figure. I experience this as conscious conflicts so that witches finally can be left alone.
Anyone with historical references?
Info: Wicca Is the maleform of modern witchcraft. Wicce is the femaleform. (less renowned)
And there are many forms of ancient witchcraft from around the world. Why would that be a better source than the witchcraft that is born today?
Is it because todays active magicians lives protected by modern precautions? Is todays witchcraft acidified by censorship?
What is needed to prove -any form of witchcraft - that its actually working?
Is it about natures eternal laws? (Darwin,gravity, atoms, birth, decay)
Is it about mysterious creatures? ( fairies, dragons, giants, demons)
Is it about life after death? ( one god, multiple gods, many lives, one life, darkness, light)
What should be the core to call something "witchcraft"?
As a child I was taught that witchcraft was the use of common items to inflict harm magically on a person or their property. I was told that is was the "devils work". At the same time I was taught about how to cure common ailments with garden herbs, how to ward off evil with hex signs, and how to place my thoughts into what I was doing such as stirring in my love when was cooking. My Christian parents and grandparents made it clear that God would protect me, love me, and let me into heaven as long as I believed and was a good girl. When I was about 12 years old I was sick of feeling like God/Jesus was not listening to me when I asked for help. So I looked into a vast array of religions and settled into Buddhism. (I was drawn to the meditation.) In my research I avoided all aspects of "witchcraft" because of what I was taught in my younger years. It was after a friend (a boy I went to church with as a child) and I were discussing faith and religion that he suggested I look into Wicca. When I put my preconceived notions at the age of 13 aside and read about Wicca I knew I had found a closer to my thoughts path. It was not until years after trying to fit into the Wiccan mold that I realized that I am a pagan but not a Wiccan. I also found out the truth of about witchcraft .
Witchcraft is the use of common and sometime rare items for a magical purpose. It does not matter what the purpose is. What matters is that you are making a craft for a magical purpose.
Common examples are brewing a tea, hanging a wind chime, burning a candle, braiding string like items, making a poppet, drawing a hex sign, burning herbs or incense, adding an oil to a floor wash, the list can go on and on. As long as these things are done while you are focused on the purpose of the action and you are adding energy to help that purpose manifest then they fall under the term witchcraft. Even blowing out your birthday candle as you make a wish is a form of witchcraft.
Oh,dear, here we go again. First of all, Wicca is the male form, not the female. The old word for the female form was "wicce". Also, Wicca, as a way of witchcraft, is really less than a hundred years old, the teachings and writings of Gerald Gardner and Doreen Valiente.
As I have said, there are now many "paths". Believe what you wish.
"Throughout history, people never liked witchcraft and now suddenly its a completely normal lifestyle?"
Untrue the greeks, egyptians, celtic, norse and many other cultures in pre-christian times were very magickally orientated. It was normal. Only for the past 2000 years of christianity (which is still very young for a religion) was witchcraft outcasted and outlawed. Christianity to this day doesn't effect many corners of the earth and its only been in America for about 500 years. That's a very small time frame considering the entire known history of human existence in magick.
"Those who practised witchcraft were usually very poor (women). these people had very little money and had to make their own tools (and their own imagination) For example: They used skin and bones from dead animals( toads, birds, goats, horses, sheep), pubic hear and their own urin in their spells."
Witchcraft was present in all classes of society. It is the witch hunters who assumed it was only women, but just as many men were magickal. The reason witches make their own tools and use natural materials as well as their own bodily fluids, hair, nails, etc is because it is natural. Witchcraft's roots is in nature. Therefore its through nature that magick flows most readily.
It was a different time then. People could live out in the woods or on a farm and never need money. They took from nature, they planted their own foods, made their own clothes. To me, it was a beautiful time that I feel has been stolen from us. We cannot do that anymore (except in smaller countries). We now need money, then they did not. Money was a luxury not a necessity.
I don't have one thing on my altar that is synthetic. I even made a pentacle for my husband out of silver wire, my hands, and an oak tree stick with a flattened point. I used flame to soften it. And an iron hammer to harden it afterward. I have the money to buy one, but that's not the point. My candles are beeswax and I plan to make them myself in the future as well (I've yet to get adventurous with it).
"The methods were repellent and were considered as devil worship. thanks to wicca this has been protected and now he is called Pan, the horned god of the forest?"
Let me explain this in more detail for those on this site who do not know. The Lord is a very old tradition, "the horned one" being a phallic metaphor. All of paganism has representations of the male and female genitalia. Archeologists have found civilization that they know very little about (because they are that old) which have had artifacts with exaggerated erm... characteristics. Every culture has its own archetype/deity they consider to be the dominant male and female. Christianity took this and used it to say that we were worshipping the devil. Pagans saw sexuality as beautiful and embraced it. Christianity was very much the opposite. So when a Christian saw these things, they immediately assumed we really were worshipping a devil.
From Pan came the imagery of the Christian devil because edwardian and victorian neopaganisms followed Pan, therefore the half goat "devil" took form. But he is only one of many many archetypes of the horned god all over the world. Margret Murray made the horned god more popularly portrayed as an archetype of fertility/sexuality in modern witchcraft which was then picked up by Wicca.
There is more connections about the devil imageries but I don't want to bore you, you may look it up yourself if you are interested.
This only goes to prove that what I've mentioned about neopagans and overcomplicating things is true. It takes quite a lot of digging to find the root.
No one is saying anything against Wicca. It has popularized witches and made them more acceptable. But at the cost of narrowing the views of witchcraft into a more acceptable form to Christian philosophy (in my opinion). Wicca is just one religion, a newer religion among a huge landscape of other pagan paths from around the world. Wicca has modernized and narrowed down witchcraft into set rules of a newer form of dogma and doctrine in order to be acceptable which is uncomparible to the older paths.
There is nothing wrong with being Wiccan. But you must understand that it is not the "old religion" that it claims to be.
Has the TV created magical "religions"? and if so, can you really say that "you can belive what you want"? when its only fiction?
Im probably not wrong when I say that Twilight and Harry Potter one day will create groups, which then becomes a new religion. Twilight and H.P has nothing to do with magic. But many kids belive it is.
And thats because kids think that fantasy and magic are the same thing. Entertainment is now a kind of magic.
Many people who claims to be able to talk to spirits, heal and conjure is often conartists who do not know what they are doin. And no one will check if they are truly justified their occupation. And of course they earn plenty of money.(I think of the medium Sylvia Browne, she makes me so sad) As long as no one reveals the lie, everything is cool... Fiction creates frauds.
I like twilight, its a good show. but it has nothing to do with magic. And this site is dominated by the so called vampires.
What do vampires and magic have in common? Is it our new fiction-religion? Those who invent their superpowers interfere with the serious performers. And I feel sorry for them.
