Witchcraft, but not as you know it

[rug]

The Irish Times - Saturday, October 1, 2011

PROFILES: Witches aren’t scary, but they do cast spells, writes FIONOLA MEREDITH , who talks to some Irish practitioners of the ancient craft of Wicca

WITCHES HAVE SUFFERED from centuries of bad press. The very mention of witchcraft calls up images of sinister warty crones; cauldrons full of dogs’ tongues and newts’ eyes; broomsticks streaking across the night sky. Influenced by half-remembered folk memories, lurid tabloid stories about satanism and even the Harry Potter books and films, the public perception of witches remains caught somewhere between fantasy, mockery and deep suspicion. The witch is still the ultimate female outsider figure: strange, transgressive and misunderstood.

But the two witches who run Féile Draíochta, Ireland’s annual festival of magic and spirituality – formerly known as Witchfest Ireland – taking place today at the Camden Court Hotel, aren’t scary at all. In fact, they seem open, friendly and remarkably down to earth.

Barbara Lee, who describes herself as an Alexandrian high priestess, has been practising witchcraft or Wicca since the late 1970s, and has run a coven for nearly 30 years. Lora O’Brien, who met Lee when she was 18 (“back when she was just a baby witch”, Lee says), is known as a high priestess too, although she prefers to be called Bean Draoí – which means female user of magic. “I will answer to plain old witch too though,” O’Brien says.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/magazine/2011/1001/1224304834352.html

[Odin2005]

1. "Ancient Craft" my ass, it was pulled out of Gerald Gardiner's rear end.

It is revived Neo-Pagainism with influences from the ceremonial magicians of the Heremetic Order of The Golden Dawn.

[ZombieHorde]

2. True, but less romantic to say. nt

[lbrtbell]

3. The Fam Trad witches, etc., kept up the Old Ways

Many of us prefer folk magic over that which you describe. :)

[aquart]

4. Well, sure, if you go the gooey route.

[reggie the dog]

12. actually witchcraft is old, lots of descendents of former slaves

practice "voodoo" or some kind of witchcraft on lots of the islands around the world that were colonized by europeans and where slave labor was used. the woman i am dating now comes from a line of "spiritual healers" kind of witches that goes back generations back to the days of slavery. i think that any benefit that they can give is the palcebo effect but her father was given 6 months to live due to stomach cancer 21 years ago, the doctors said it was a "miracle" that the cancer just seemed to die off. i am an athiest and dont belive in any witchcraft of anything but if people do believe perhaps the placebo effect goes to work.

[Odin2005]

17. I was not including Voodoo and Santeria in my rant.

:hi:

[white_wolf]

5. I've always been interested in these things.

I actually spent some time studying Ceremonial Magic, the type practiced by Crowley and the Order of the Golden Dawn. It was very interesting, though I never tried any of it. The skeptic in me, which was the strongest element of my personality, said it was a waste of time and the part of me that believed it might be possible was a pessimist and told me I'd end up summoning some demonic entity.

[tama]

13. Skeptical empiricist in me

says that active disbelief or belief that something is impossible is very unsceptical and also uncreative.

But I agree that USING magic is waste of time and not very interesting, realization of BEING (and being used) as a part of larger inclusive whole is where the real magic start to happen. IMHO.

[white_wolf]

15. That's why I love this section of the forums.

I always get very unique perspectives on things, that make rethink a lot of my positions on spirituality in general.

[TlalocW]

6. I like Wiccans

The ones I've met have seen genuinely sincere about the tenets of their faith, genuinely serene and happy, etc.

But actual spell casting? Magic? Feh. Give me a deck of cards, and I'll show you more "magic" than they ever could.

TlalocW

[Manifestor_of_Light]

7. I'm not impressed with them.

somebody already made the point about Gerald Gardner making it up.

[snagglepuss]

8. Its rather strange that you posted this because I had been considering

posting a comment I came across the other day about witches which shocked me, namely that women who are not submissive have traditionally been considered witches. I had never considered the submissiveness or the lack thereof as having anything to do witchcraft. I suppose lack of submissiveness is why certain women got labelled as witches and regarded as strange and transgressive.

[AnnieBW]

9. Well, it's certainly better than Catholics vs. Protestants!

Be Pagan once again!

[roguevalley]

10. the oldest religion in the world. Gardiner not so much. Don't

get me started on skyclad.

[tama]

14. Well

As people of a Siberian shamanic tribe say: "We don't have religion, that's what Russians have. We have only our shamans.".

Religions have no doubt their origins in shamanistic experiences, but it is matter of definitionism if you want to define shamanhood and shaministic ways of life as religion. Does not really matter.

[roguevalley]

16. true. but given the knowledge and terms that most use, its a reasonable

term to apply in this discussion.

[AnnieBW]

18. Yeah, I've heard Janet Farrar dish dirt on old Gerald

Basically, he was a ceremonial magician-wannabe who liked to run around in the woods naked.

I don't care. It's still my spirituality.

Blessed be!

[flamingdem]

11. Wasn't the Chalice and the Blade influential too?

I know Celtic people who read this and it clicked for them. There's a personal level of practice and a varity of groups.

If anyone knows of a group closer to this book I'd like to know. It might be that it was popular many decades past but for sure it influenced people in Great Britain and probably here as well.


http://www.sibyllineorder.org/reviews/rev_b_chalice.htm

Link to Amazon.com

The Chalice and the Blade

by Riane Eisler

Riane Eisler describes how humankind once lived in a caring, sharing environment. That period, which lasted for tens of thousands of years, survived, though barely, just into historical times. It was characterized by a worship of the divine feminine as represented by the chalice in the title of Eisler's book.

In a blink of the eye, historically speaking, that environment was brutally overthrown and replaced with the beginnings of the patriarchy in which we live today. Those who overthrew this golden age worshipped not life and creativity, but death and destruction; in short, the blade. Those in power today continue to worship that blade, which has been changed by the rapid rise of technology into the lethal systems that could end all life on the planet in a matter of days or hours.

The premise of The Chalice and the Blade is that the rapid transition from a partnership society to a male dominator society was the result of the sociological equivalent of a "critical bifurcation point" in Chaos theory. Eisler explains in some detail how the currently popular scientific theory applies to that sudden shift into darkness that occurred approximately six or seven thousand years ago. However, she also goes on to propose that we once again face a critical bifurcation point; that we live in an exciting, dangerous time in which we can just as rapidly overthrow our hierarchically controlled patriarchal system and replace it with a technologically advanced model of the partnership system in which both genders work together to emphasize the nurturing side of life.

That's the theory, anyway.

I found the early part of The Chalice and the Blade fascinating. Eisler frequently quotes such notables as Marija Gimbutas and James Mellaart, whose archaeological findings are the supporting pillars in Wiccan/Pagan cosmology. In fact, my only complaint about the first two-thirds of the book is that Eisler often refers to specific photos in the books of those two authors, but does not reproduce the photos in The Chalice and the Blade. Not a problem if you have the other works at hand; however, not everyone does.

About a third of the way from the end of the book, however, I began to lose interest. This is the point at which Eisler begins to explain how our age has reached that critical point in which we can effect a rapid transformation of our patriarchal (dominator) society into anything we want--in particular, the partnership model that would truly represent a maturing of our species. So why did I lose interest? Eisler's theory is the stuff of dreams.

I would give almost anything to return to a Chalice-oriented social structure. However, Eisler just didn't convince me that we have reached that critical bifurcation point. She labors long on man's cruelty to woman and what things might be like; too long, by a good measure. Of course, in the vernacular of the internet, YMMV (your mileage may vary).

Having lived in those heady days of revolution known as the sixties, I'm a little more realistic about the pace at which change occurs. However, those days also taught me that persistence is how to bring change about. For that reason, I can criticize Eisler for her verbosity, but not her persistence.

If you've read Mellaart and Gimbutas, you might want to pass on reading The Chalice and the Blade. However, if your Goddess history is a little weak, you should take a look at this book to fill in the gaps. ~ Yona