Wicca: A comprehensive guide to the Old Religion in the modern world. Vivianne Crowley
as well as a material reality, but it does not believe the non-material is superior to the material. Matter is not regarded with horror and the emphasis is on the joy of the flesh rather than the ascetics’ view of flesh as sin. This is not to say that Wicca is hedonistic, but rather that we are followers of a middle way. Our time in physical incarnation is a gift from the Gods. However, we must also seek spiritual growth that expands our consciousness and allows us to live on levels beyond the physical.
Wicca is a religion that looks to the good in human beings rather than to the evil and seeks to bring out that good rather than dwelling on people’s faults. It does not seek unrealistic sainthood, but rather makes the best of what is there. It does not divide people into the chosen and the damned but sees people as being in different stages of struggling towards the same end – that of unity with the Divine.
Wicca does not lay down a set of rules by which to live. Since life decisions are rarely black or white, the onus is on us to make decisions between various shades of grey. This moral sense is developed by seeking to adhere to certain basic ideals of love, joy, truth, honour and trust, and making decisions which are most in accordance with them. There is no book of rules, but there is one meta-rule by which we live our lives.
If it harms none, do what you will.
This is no easy morality but a difficult one which makes us scrupulously examine the motives for what we do.
Although Wicca has a strong ethical base, it has little dogma. It is a living religion which belongs to the present and, in Pagan philosophy, that present is ever-becoming, ever-moving. Since the present is not static, nor is Wicca. In Christianity, Islam and other Religions of the Book based on revelations of one person at a particular point in time, the dogma tends to become fixed. Once some authority figure has made a pronouncement, it becomes very difficult for the religion to evolve to meet new circumstances and needs that present themselves as the human race and the societies we create evolve.
Although much has been written about Wicca in recent years, it is primarily an oral tradition. Witches learn from the more experienced through formal teaching and by watching and learning from what they see their elders do. Covens will keep a Book of Shadows that contains rituals and spell lore. This is passed on to new initiates who must copy the material by hand. Each Witch then adds their own material as they learn and discover more. The Book of Shadows is not a straitjacket of belief and practice. The seasonal rituals, for instance, are in skeletal form. This allows each group to incorporate the basic material into its own rituals and from this to develop rituals that meet the needs of its members. Much of the newer ritual material used in Wicca has been channelled through dream, reverie and vision. This has fleshed out the bare bones of our Craft inheritance. The rituals are constantly reinterpreted as our understanding evolves, but on the basis of a shared core of information that preserves a common thread that is recognizably Wicca. There are common themes which are celebrated at the festival of Lammas, but whether the emphasis is on the sacrifice of the Corn King, the beneficence of the harvest Goddess, or both, will vary according to the group’s needs. These will grow and change over time, as the needs of individuals grow and change. New parts will be added to the ritual and other parts taken away.
Each Witch keeps the core material that is handed down through initiation, but new Witches are encouraged to write a second volume, which is their personal Book of Shadows. This consists of rituals, invocations and spells, many of which they will have devised themselves. This material will grow and develop as they progress through their spiritual journey.
Since Wicca has little dogma, we are not burdened with convincing ourselves of vast doctrinal details and impossibilities against which our intellects rebel. The intellect is one of humanity’s greatest assets and also one of its greatest handicaps. Its development has allowed us to master the environment around us (not always with very desirable results) at the expense of losing touch with our inner worlds. Often when people become interested in Wicca, their thinking side protests that it cannot believe in Elementals and magic and that mighty Gods and Goddesses stalk the Earth. This does not matter. Blind willingness to see everything as literal is as foolish as people who persist in believing that the Earth is flat.
Wicca operates in two realms of truth – metaphysical truth and psychological truth. Our ancestors operated in the realm of metaphysical truth. They believed that if they did not perform the correct rites at the Winter Solstice, then the Sun would die. Scientific observation shows that this is not case but if, together with literal interpretation, we reject the concept, we miss the point entirely: the Sun really will not rise. It is not however the Sun of our physical world that dies, but the inner Sun of our spiritual world.
What is required in Wicca is a simple belief that our consciousness is not dependent on the body, but can extend beyond the limits of the sensory world, and that the life force should be reverenced. Other than these simple beliefs in the life force and the powers of the human psyche, all we need accept is that the framework of ritual and symbolism in which Wicca operates contains age-old truths. These are not literal truths but meanings that are hidden and the truth of which will unfold over the years as we integrate them into our own lives.
Wicca sees itself as only one of the many religions and spiritual paths open to the spiritual seeker of today. We do not see ourselves as having a unique monopoly on truth. Indeed Wiccans believe that for a group of human beings to say that they do is ludicrous. Wicca sees the human race as evolving. As our understanding grows, so too will the picture we are able to produce of ultimate religious truths. In Wicca there can be no once and for all revelation of the right way to approach the Divine and the right way to live. In The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, the Hindu mystic and worshipper of the Goddess expressed this most beautifully:
God has made different religions to suit different aspirants, times and countries. All doctrines are only so many paths; but a path is by no means God Himself. Indeed one can reach God if one follows any of the paths with whole hearted devotion … One may eat a cake with icing either straight or sidewise. It will taste sweet either way.2
To Witches, deities manifest in different ways and can be worshipped and contacted through any form suitable to local conditions and personal needs. Wicca does not believe, as do the patriarchal monotheisms, that there is only one correct version of God and that all other God forms are false: the Gods of Wicca are not jealous Gods. We worship Goddess and God, recognising that all Gods are aspects of the one God and all Goddesses are aspects of the one Goddess, and that ultimately these two are reconciled in the one Divine essence. There are many flowers in the garden of the Divine and therein lies its beauty.
This is Wicca today, but where did it begin?
Early religion
The Gods of Wicca are those of our earliest ancestors. In Europe, from the Palaeolithic or Old Stone Age around 12,000 years ago onwards, we find paintings on the walls of secret caves that are difficult to access and many of which have been only recently discovered. These are paintings in glowing colours of the Horned Lord of the animals, God of the hunt and God of the hunted, who controlled the movements and fertility of the herds of deer, wild bison and larger, fiercer game, on which our ancestors depended. We also find crude images with the bulging bellies of pregnancy, great breasts and vaginas. These are images of the Great Mother Goddess, She who brings fertility to the people. This is no prettified Virgin Goddess, but the Earth Mother, strong and raw in her power.
With the Neolithic or New Stone Age, there were changes in our ideas about Goddess and God. With the development of agriculture, a settled way of life, and the recording of time, our ancestors noticed the effect of the Moon on women’s menstrual cycles, on the gestation of seeds and on plant growth. The Moon, agriculture, the Earth in which the crops were planted, womanhood and motherhood became associated with the Goddess who was depicted now not just as Earth Mother, but also as the Moon.