Wicca. What are you thoughts? what is it and where did it come from? Do you agree?

a reply to: Gryphon66

Read the thread.

Fact check. I won't hold your hand.

originally posted by: DeadSeraph
a reply to: Gryphon66

Read the thread.

Fact check. I won't hold your hand.

In other words, you won't back up your own claims.

Very good, you've made yourself clear now.

a reply to: Gryphon66

you are just too lazy to fact check them.

a reply to: DeadSeraph

Lazy? Hardly. You got called on your fallacious appeal to your own authority, and you're apparently smarting from it.

You have no basis for your comments. Crowley did not ever speak of Wicca. IF he did, cite his comment.

No other occultists prior to 1954 spoke of Wicca either. IF they did, cite their comments.

IF you don't or can't, then it becomes obvious that you're blathering on about your OWN OPINION which is fine of course.

And while you do, I'll continue to point out that you're doing nothing more comparing your preferred delusions to someone else's.

Wicca is and has been a recognizable minority religious movement in American and British society.

Hundreds of thousands adhere to Wicca as their religion. Source

Your opinion is merely one of many, including mine, Buzzywigs and others commenting in this thread.

a reply to: Gryphon66

lmao you still haven't named the person I have...

a reply to: Gryphon66

you must have casted wiccan spells. That is really cute!

originally posted by: DeadSeraph
a reply to: Gryphon66

you must have casted wiccan spells. That is really cute!

I'm an avowed atheist. You've gone from inane to utterly specious. We're done.

keep digging.

a reply to: DeadSeraph

If Gerald Gardner is your genesis that's fine, he's not mine.

he's the genesis of wicca - not that i've got anything against people making of it what they will

If anyone can demonstrate historically an earlier basis for Wicca that doesn't borrow from Golden Dawn traditions or the like, I'm all ears.

the liniage of these ideas are fairly easily traced (though off topic for this thread) - these 'secret societies' do seem to have a habit of publishing their manifestos

a reply to: aynock

he's one of them

a reply to: DeadSeraph

'my pagan head shall sink into the winter land, and there be purified'

originally posted by: nonspecific
I am simply asking this question because it has come up a few times in the past couple of days and opinions are divided.

I am not offereing an informative post on what I think it is or is not but asking you what you think it is.

What your opinion is?

Where does it come from/ Does it have a place in modern society.

What have you heard about witches?

It's a modern invention for people who think they are practicing "the old ways."


Meh, whatever floats your boat, IMHO.

a reply to: nonspecific

My mother is Wiccan. It is a nature oriented perspective that attempts to align power to do more good than harm, for people, for nature, for the self etc... There is a big focus upon health and herbal or even holistic approaches. My mother uses Tarot and does readings but I don't know if that is typical. They talk a lot about intent but don't really seem to grasp accountability past a surface level. In the end, they are trying to control their environment, which includes relationships and that last bit is where accountability slips. I've seen my mother try to perform some not very nice spells on people she doesn't like.

The magic stuff may be just fluff but all the same... While usually the intent is good there are times where human nature gets the better of anyone, and if you think that you have the "power" to "bind someone from doing evil" or make them sick or whatever... It can be tempting for anyone. From what I've seen it's not really a religion that is as prone to encouraging introspection as you may think.

As far as the source of it, it seems to be an amalgam of a lot of old Celtic deities, nature worship, some ideas about Druids that are usually cherry-picked from Roman accounts, scraps of pagan "rites" and ceremonies and where there are huge gaps in the historical record on those they just make up the rest. Not to minimize it, because they do fall back on some really old stuff but it is relatively new. It really started to get some teeth in it with the public in the 60's. Neopagan/ new age stuff.

Like any religion, there is good and bad.

As such things go, it seems much more appealing to take responsibility for what happens in one's life via personal actions (affirmations, "magick" or concepts of karma or the Three-Fold Law(even if those were "borrowed")) than merely to wish and hope and pray that things will be okay via some exterior deity and ask for "forgiveness" for any "wrongdoing" which is automatically granted as if some god was dispensing Get Out Of Jail Free cards from Monopoly.

In my opinion.

All religions started with humans, late or soon.

That's not opinion, that's fact.

originally posted by: NavyDoc
It's a modern invention for people who think they are practicing "the old ways."

Meh, whatever floats your boat, IMHO.

For people interested in "old ways" there are "old ways" to tell if a person is a witch or a warlock. You tie a millstone around their neck which should make them sink and if they are guilty of being a witch or warlock, God won't save them and they will drown.

Witch hunts

Gregory of Tours recorded in the 6th century the common expectation that with a millstone round the neck, the guilty would sink: "The cruel pagans cast him [Quirinus, bishop of the church of Sissek] into a river with a millstone tied to his neck, and when he had fallen into the waters he was long supported on the surface by a divine miracle, and the waters did not suck him down since the weight of crime did not press upon him."

So we see here that Quirinus didn't sink and was saved by God's miracle so he wasn't a warlock.

But the test was done differently elsewhere:

Ordeal by water was later associated with the witch-hunts of the 16th and 17th centuries, although in this scenario the outcome was reversed from the examples above: an accused who sank was considered innocent, while floating indicated witchcraft.

So under this test if you sink because of the stone tied to you and drown, that means you must have been innocent. But if you float, then the test proves you're a witch and they will kill you anyway. It would seem to be desirable to avoid undergoing that test if you can help it as neither outcome seems very good.

Given the inconsistency of how the tests are interpreted, I don't think either was very reliable at separating witches from non-witches.

originally posted by: Arbitrageur

originally posted by: NavyDoc
It's a modern invention for people who think they are practicing "the old ways."

Meh, whatever floats your boat, IMHO.

For people interested in "old ways" there are "old ways" to tell if a person is a witch or a warlock. You tie a millstone around their neck which should make them sink and if they are guilty of being a witch or warlock, God won't save them and they will drown.

Witch hunts

Gregory of Tours recorded in the 6th century the common expectation that with a millstone round the neck, the guilty would sink: "The cruel pagans cast him [Quirinus, bishop of the church of Sissek] into a river with a millstone tied to his neck, and when he had fallen into the waters he was long supported on the surface by a divine miracle, and the waters did not suck him down since the weight of crime did not press upon him."

So we see here that Quirinus didn't sink and was saved by God's miracle so he wasn't a warlock.

But the test was done differently elsewhere:

Ordeal by water was later associated with the witch-hunts of the 16th and 17th centuries, although in this scenario the outcome was reversed from the examples above: an accused who sank was considered innocent, while floating indicated witchcraft.

So under this test if you sink because of the stone tied to you and drown, that means you must have been innocent. But if you float, then the test proves you're a witch and they will kill you anyway. It would seem to be desirable to avoid undergoing that test if you can help it as neither outcome seems very good.

Given the inconsistency of how the tests are interpreted, I don't think either was very reliable at separating witches from non-witches.

OOOOooookay...and your point is?

a reply to: NavyDoc
That the "old ways" are generally primitive beliefs whether you're talking about old ways of witchcraft itself or tests to find witches. In other words the tests to find witches don't really work, neither does witchcraft itself, with the possible exception of things like the power of belief; people who actually believe in voodoo may have negative effects from seeing a pin stuck in a doll made to look like them, but that doesn't mean sticking the pin in the doll has any effect on someone who doesn't believe in voodoo.

Likewise a virgin sacrifice to appease the rain gods might be followed by a shower, and that may be enough to confirm the beliefs of people who don't think critically (which probably includes everyone practicing witchcraft), but odds are the shower had nothing to do with the virgin sacrifice in spite of superstition to the contrary and apparent confirmation.

We have the ability today to figure out how a lot of things really work, yet some people cling to old superstitions as if the age of enlightenment never happened.

originally posted by: Arbitrageur
a reply to: NavyDoc
That the "old ways" are generally primitive beliefs whether you're talking about old ways of witchcraft itself or tests to find witches. In other words the tests to find witches don't really work, neither does witchcraft itself, with the possible exception of things like the power of belief; people who actually believe in voodoo may have negative effects from seeing a pin stuck in a doll made to look like them, but that doesn't mean sticking the pin in the doll has any effect on someone who doesn't believe in voodoo.

Likewise a virgin sacrifice to appease the rain gods might be followed by a shower, and that may be enough to confirm the beliefs of people who don't think critically (which probably includes everyone practicing witchcraft), but odds are the shower had nothing to do with the virgin sacrifice in spite of superstition to the contrary and apparent confirmation.

We have the ability today to figure out how a lot of things really work, yet some people cling to old superstitions as if the age of enlightenment never happened.

Well, that's nice, but really has nothing to do with the fact that what modern people call "wicca" or "witchcraft" that they tell themselves is an ancient "craft" is really just an amalgam of recently made up stuff, folklore, popular media (movies and books), as well as bits and pieces of disjointed and unconnected historical stuff all rolled up together.

Not that there is anything "wrong" with it--myth is myth to me.

originally posted by: NavyDoc
Well, that's nice, but really has nothing to do with the fact that what modern people call "wicca" or "witchcraft" that they tell themselves is an ancient "craft" is really just an amalgam of recently made up stuff, folklore, popular media (movies and books).

It's related because it's all made up.

originally posted by: Arbitrageur

originally posted by: NavyDoc
Well, that's nice, but really has nothing to do with the fact that what modern people call "wicca" or "witchcraft" that they tell themselves is an ancient "craft" is really just an amalgam of recently made up stuff, folklore, popular media (movies and books).

It's related because it's all made up.

Fair enough.