316 lines
17 KiB
Plaintext
316 lines
17 KiB
Plaintext
1
|
|
BELIEFS AND CUSTOMS OF WICCA
|
|
|
|
|
|
Not every Wiccan will subscribe to all of these points, but
|
|
generally they are representative.
|
|
|
|
|
|
1. The divine Spirit is present in all creatures and things:
|
|
people, animals, plants, stones...
|
|
|
|
2. The ultimate creative force manifests in both feminine and
|
|
masculine modes; therefore it is often symbolized as the Goddess
|
|
and The God.
|
|
|
|
3. In some covens, both are celebrated equally. In others, The
|
|
Goddess is given precedence or even celebrated without reference
|
|
to the God.
|
|
|
|
4. All Goddesses and Gods are aspects of The Goddess and The God.
|
|
The aspects most popular in Wicca are the Triple Goddess of the
|
|
Moon (Maiden, Mother and Crone) and the Horned God of death and
|
|
rebirth.
|
|
|
|
5. Reincarnation and karma are valid concepts. Upon death one
|
|
goes to a state of rest and reflection, and eventually chooses
|
|
where and when s/he will be reborn.
|
|
|
|
6. Magick is practiced for positive (helping) purposes:
|
|
spiritual development, healing, guidance, safety, etc.
|
|
|
|
7. Rituals are generally performed outdoors when possible, at the
|
|
New and Full Moons, and at eight Sabbat festivals which mark the
|
|
progression of the seasons.
|
|
|
|
8. Magick and celebration are performed in small groups, usually
|
|
3 to 13, called covens. These are basically autonomous -- there
|
|
is no central church authority or hierarchy.
|
|
|
|
9. There is no holy book, or prophet, no equivalent of the Bible
|
|
or Jesus or Mohammed. Individuals have access to the divine, and
|
|
do not require an intermediary. Every initiate is regarded as a
|
|
priest/ess.
|
|
|
|
10. The central ethic is "And ye harm none, do as ye will."
|
|
Whatever energy you send out returns threefold, so it is wise to
|
|
be kind to others.
|
|
|
|
11. We should live in harmony with the Earth and Nature, and not
|
|
exploit them.
|
|
|
|
12. Though Wicca is a valid spiritual path, it is not the only
|
|
one. There is no recruiting, and people should be free to choose
|
|
the path that best fits their needs.
|
|
|
|
13. The concepts of original sin, sacrifice, redemption,
|
|
confession, the divinity of Jesus, sinfulness of sex, Judgment,
|
|
Heaven and Hell, denigration of women, bodily resurrection, and
|
|
the Bible as divine revelation are not part of Wicca. Neither are
|
|
Satanism, the Black Mass, desecration of cemeteries, the sacrifice
|
|
of animals, etc.
|
|
|
|
EARTH-RITE / Mission San Jose, CA / 415-651-9496
|
|
Copyright (c) 1983 Amber K., Our Lady of the Woods. Used by
|
|
Permission
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Which G-File (Q=Quit) ?
|
|
|
|
|
|
Which section (Q=Quit) ?
|
|
|
|
|
|
= The Tears of Isis Main Menu =
|
|
Press (SPACE) to Abort -- CTRL-T = Time -- CTRL-O = On-Line Help
|
|
|
|
A>uto-Message B>BS List C>hat with Sysop D>efaults Section
|
|
E>-Mail a User F>eedback to Sysop G>eneral Text Files I>nformation
|
|
K>ill E-Mail Sent L>ast Callers M>ailbox Scan N>ew Message Scan
|
|
O> Log Off P>ost a Message Q>uick Message Scan R>emove a Message
|
|
S>can Messages T>ransfer Section U>ser List V>oting Section
|
|
X> Expert Mode Y>our User Stats Z> Express N-Scan *> List Subs Avail.
|
|
J> Switch Forums >,+> Advance Sub # <,-> Retreat Sub # #> Go to # Pressed
|
|
|
|
"/E" = Send Multiple E-Mail "/O" = Fast Log Off
|
|
"//VER" = BBS Version Information "//CLS" = Clear Screen
|
|
"//QSCAN" = Clear Q-Scan Pointers "//UPLOAD" = Upload a Text Message
|
|
"//CATCHUP" = Mark all messages as read
|
|
|
|
|
|
T - 00:17:23
|
|
[General]
|
|
[1] [Welcome New Users] :G
|
|
|
|
G-File sections available:
|
|
|
|
1: Basic Information
|
|
|
|
|
|
Which section (Q=Quit) ? 1
|
|
|
|
|
|
G-Files in Basic Information
|
|
:
|
|
|
|
1: One view of Wiccan Beliefs
|
|
2: pagan q & a
|
|
|
|
Which G-File (Q=Quit) ? 2
|
|
A LITTLE LESS MISUNDERSTANDING
|
|
|
|
(What Christians Don't Understand about Neopaganism)
|
|
|
|
by J. Brad Hicks
|
|
|
|
Q: Are you a witch?
|
|
A: That's actually a tricky question to answer, so let me go
|
|
about it in a round-about way. What I am is a Neopagan.
|
|
Neopaganism is a beautiful, complex religion that is not in
|
|
opposition to Christianity in any way - just different. However,
|
|
some of the people that the Catholic church burned as "witches"
|
|
were people who practiced the same things that I do. In
|
|
identification with them and the suffering that they went through,
|
|
some of us (Neopagans) call ourselves witches.
|
|
One expert, P.E.I. Bonewits, says that there are actually
|
|
several kinds of groups who call themselves "witches." Some are
|
|
people whose ancestors were the village healers, herbalists,
|
|
midwives, and such, many of whom had (or were ascribed to have)
|
|
mental, psychic, or magical powers, which were passed down through
|
|
the family in the form of oral tradition, and Bonewits calls them
|
|
"Traditional Witches." Some are people who have deliberately used
|
|
the term to oppose themselves to Christianity, are practicing
|
|
"Satanists," and practice (deliberately) most of the practices
|
|
invented by the Inquisitors. Bonewits calls them "Gothic" or
|
|
"Neo-Gothic Witches." Of a different kind are some radical
|
|
feminist groups, who call themselves witches because they believe
|
|
that the original Inquisition was primarily anti-female; some of
|
|
these also practice magic, many of them do not - Bonewits calls
|
|
them "Feminist Witches." But the vast majority of modern witches
|
|
are harmless people who worship God in many forms, including the
|
|
Lord of the Dance, the Lady, and the Mother Earth. These are the
|
|
people that Bonewits (and I) call"Neopagan Witches" - and this is
|
|
what I am.
|
|
I hope that this helps more than it confuses.
|
|
|
|
Q: Are you a devil worshipper?
|
|
A: I'm tempted to just say, "No!" and leave it at that, but that
|
|
probably isn't enough.
|
|
Devil worship (including Satanism) is really a Christian
|
|
heresy. (If you don't believe me, ask an expert - say, any well-
|
|
read pastor or theology professor.) In order to worship Satan, you
|
|
have to believe in him - and there are no references to Satan
|
|
outside of the Christian Bible. So to be a Satanist or a devil
|
|
worshipper, you have to believe in the accuracy of the Christian
|
|
Bible, then identify yourself with God's Enemy, proclaim that you
|
|
are "evil," and then try to "fight against Jesus" or similar
|
|
nonsense.
|
|
Neopagans do not accept the Christian Bible as a source of
|
|
truth. As a source of some beautiful poetry, sometimes, or as a
|
|
source of myth, but not as a source of truth. Emphatically, we do
|
|
not believe that God has an Opposite, an evil being trying to
|
|
destroy God, the world, man, or whatever. So it is non-sensical
|
|
to say that Neopagans worship Satan.
|
|
Of course, many people insist that any god other than
|
|
JHVH/Jesus (and his other Biblical names) is a demon or an
|
|
illusion created by Satan. Well, you're welcome to believe that
|
|
if you like - but over half of the world's population is going to
|
|
be unhappy at you. Jews and followers of Islam are just as
|
|
confident that they worship the True God as you are, and resent
|
|
being called devil worshippers. So do I.
|
|
|
|
Q: What do Neopagans believe about God?
|
|
A: Neopaganism is a new religion with very, very old roots. It
|
|
harks back to the first religions that man ever practiced (based
|
|
on the physical evidence). Neopagans worship a variety of symbols
|
|
from the Old Religions - the practices of the ancient Celts, the
|
|
Greeks, the Egyptians, the Romans - and differ with each other
|
|
over what those symbols really represent. What I (and many
|
|
others) believe is that they are all aspects of God (or maybe, the
|
|
Gods) - some kind of beautiful, powerful, and loving being or
|
|
force that ties all of life together and is the origin of all
|
|
miracles - including miracles such as written language, poetry,
|
|
music, art ...
|
|
|
|
Q: Do Neopagans have a Bible?
|
|
A: Not most of us. The closest analogue would be a witch's Book
|
|
of Shadows, which is a sort of notebook of legends, poetry,
|
|
history, and magic ritual which is copied by every newly-initiated
|
|
witch, then added to. But on the whole, even a Book of Shadows
|
|
isn't what Christians think of as a Bible. It's not infallible
|
|
(couldn't be, they've been brought to us via hastily-coppied texts
|
|
under trying circumstances), it doesn't prescribe a specific code
|
|
of morality (except for a few general guidelines), and it doesn't
|
|
claim to be dictated by God - except for a few, debatable parts.
|
|
Those of us who aren't witches don't even have that much.
|
|
Neopaganism is a religious system that relies more on the
|
|
individual than on the Book or the Priest. One of the principal
|
|
beliefs of Neopaganism is that no one, not Pope nor Priest nor
|
|
Elder, has the right to interfere with your relationship to God.
|
|
Learn from whomever you want, and pray to whatever name means the
|
|
most to you.
|
|
|
|
Q: Did you say magic? Do Neopagans believe in the occult?
|
|
A: Cringe. What a badly worded question - but I hear it all the
|
|
time. Neopagans as a rule don't "believe in the occult" - we
|
|
practice magic. Magic is simply a way to focus the mental
|
|
abilities that you were born with, and use them to change the
|
|
world in positive ways. Magic can also be mixed with worship; in
|
|
which case it differs very little from Christian prayer.
|
|
|
|
Q: But I thought that you said that you weren't a demon-worshipper?
|
|
A: That's right. Magic and demonology are two different things.
|
|
Magic you also know as "psychic powers" or "mentallics" or even as
|
|
"the power of positive thinking" - in essense, the magical world
|
|
view holds that "reality" is mostly a construct of the human mind,
|
|
and as such, can be altered by the human mind. That's all there
|
|
is to it.
|
|
|
|
Q: How do you become a Neopagan?
|
|
A: In a very real sense, nobody every "becomes" a Neopagan.
|
|
There are no converts, as no conversion is necessary. Neopaganism
|
|
is an attitude towards worship, and either you have it or you
|
|
don't.
|
|
My case is not atypical. All of my life, I have been
|
|
fascinated by the old mythologies. I have always found
|
|
descriptions of the Greek Gods fascinating. If I had any
|
|
religious beliefs as a child, it was that somewhere, there was a
|
|
God, and many people worship Him, but I had no idea what His name
|
|
was. I set out to find Him, and through an odd combination of
|
|
circumstances, I because convinced that his Name was Jesus. But
|
|
seven years later, I had to admit to myself that Whoever God is,
|
|
he answers non-Christians' prayers as well as those in the name of
|
|
Jesus. In either case, true miracles are rare. In both cases,
|
|
the one praying has a devout experience with God.
|
|
After searching my soul, I admitted that I could not tell
|
|
that I was better off than when I believed in the Old Gods. And
|
|
in the mean time, I had found out that other people also loved the
|
|
Old Gods - and that they call themselves Neopagans. When I
|
|
realized that what I believed was little or no different that what
|
|
they believed, I called myself a Neopagan, too.
|
|
The common element for nearly all of us is that nearly all of
|
|
us already believed these things, before we found out that anyone
|
|
else did. "Becoming" a pagan is never a conversion. It's usually
|
|
a home-coming. No one ever "brainwashed" me. I finally relaxed,
|
|
and stopped struggling against my own self.
|
|
|
|
Q: I've heard about witches holding orgies and such. Do you?
|
|
A: No, that sort of thing doesn't appeal to me. Most of the
|
|
crap that you've heard about "witch orgies" is nonsense made up by
|
|
the National Enquirer to sell magazines.
|
|
But I shouldn't be flippant about this, because it underlies
|
|
a serious question - what kind of morality do Neopagans hold to?
|
|
|
|
"Eight words the Wiccan Rede fulfill:
|
|
An it harm none, do what thou will!"
|
|
from an old Book of Shadows
|
|
|
|
That about sums it all up. Neopaganism teaches that it is
|
|
harmful to yourself (and dangerous) to harm others. It also
|
|
teaches that trying to impose your moral standards on somebody
|
|
else's behaviour is (at least) foolish - and probably dangerous,
|
|
as you run some serious chance of hurting that person. Perhaps in
|
|
a sense Neopagans don't have morality, for as R. A. Wilson said,
|
|
"There are no commandments because there is no Commander
|
|
anywhere," but Neopagans do have ethics - standards for behaviour
|
|
based on honor and mutual benefit.
|
|
|
|
Q: I saw on the news that Neopagans use a star in a circle as their
|
|
emblem. Isn't that a Satanic symbol?
|
|
A: A pentacle (that's what it's called) is a Satanic symbol in
|
|
precisely same sense that the cross is a Nazi symbol. The German
|
|
National Socialist Party used an equal-armed cross with four flags
|
|
attached to it as their emblem. (Yes, I know - that's a swastika.
|
|
Well, before the Nazis made the word common knowledge, people just
|
|
called it a "bent cross" - it's an old heraldic symbol, and it
|
|
means the same thing that a normal cross does). That doesn't make
|
|
the Nazis good Christians, and it doesn't make Christians into
|
|
Nazis.
|
|
In the same sense, Satanists (and some rock groups) use a
|
|
type of pentacle as their emblem. That doesn't make them
|
|
Neopagans, nor does it mean that Neopagans are Satanists (or even
|
|
rock-and-rollers).
|
|
|
|
Q: Are Neopagans opposed to Christianity?
|
|
A: Some Neopagans are ex-Christians, and I'm not going to deny
|
|
that some of them have a grudge against the Church because of what
|
|
they perceived as attempts to control their minds. Further, many
|
|
Neopagans are suspicious of the Church, because it was in the name
|
|
of Jesus Christ that nine million of our kind were murdered.
|
|
Neopagans are opposed to anyone who uses force to control the
|
|
minds of others. Does that include you? If not, then it means
|
|
that Neopagans as such are not opposed to you.
|
|
Do you work for the benefit of mankind, are you respectful to
|
|
the Earth? Then it makes us allies, whether or not either of us
|
|
wants to admit it.
|
|
|
|
- - - - - - - - - -
|
|
|
|
There are many other misconceptions in the popular mind about the
|
|
Neopagan religion. Unless you've studied it, read about it from
|
|
sympathetic sources, then you really don't know anything about Neopagan
|
|
history, beliefs, practices, customs, art, science, culture, or magic.
|
|
But it would take several entire books to teach you, and I already fear
|
|
that I will be accused of trying to win converts (despite what I've
|
|
said above). If you are curious and willing to learn, try some of the
|
|
following books:
|
|
|
|
Margot Adler, _Drawing Down the Moon_
|
|
Starhawk, _The Spiral Dance_
|
|
P.E.I. Bonewits, _Real Magic_
|
|
Stewart Farrar, _What Witches Do_.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Which G-File (Q=Quit) ? |