WHY I AM A SOLITARY PRACTITIONER,
OR,
IS THE CRAFT BECOMING TOO DOGMATIC?
By Gary R. Varner
One of the most profound precepts of Wicca, which attracts a great majority of us to the Craft, is that we are able to participate and work directly with the Divine without the "middle man" telling us what we need to do, how we need to do it, and that only "one way" is the right way.
Chas S. Clifton wrote in his introduction to Witchcraft Today: The Modern Craft Movement (1) that:
"As a religion, Witchcraft turns the typical religious pyramid hierarchy upside-down; every Witch is at least theoretically a leader; there are no large congregations. Wicca has no pope or president; anyone claiming to be `queen (or king) of the Witches', `a member of the High Council of Twelve' or any such thing may be assumed to be a liar."
Clifton's statement is a reiteration of the 1974 "Principles of Wiccan Belief", put forward by the Council of American Witches, which stated:
"We do not recognize any authoritarian hierarchy, but do honor those who teach, respect those who share their greater knowledge and wisdom, and acknowledge those who courageously give of themselves in leadership."
I think most of us seek out and devour information about the Craft as soon as it becomes available. New ritual, scrying techniques, meditation methods as well as the prehistoric and historic basis of the Neo-Pagan movement are all of high interest to the Pagan and Wiccan community. Books that help us understand the Goddess and the Lord of the Wild and to work with Them to heal the earth and each other are also of high interest and are found on the shelves of most mainstream bookstores as well as "New Age" shops. However, the more I read of the literature creates an underlying sense of unease in me. Why? Because many of those teachers who represent the Pagan community, and have been active the longest, are assuming a trait that is more characteristic of the leaders of the dogmatic and patriarchal religions of the world. That trait is one of an unyielding, unaccepting and dogmatic attitude. An attitude that strives to dictate to, and dominate over, Pagans who have chosen to follow a religion based on individual paths to the Divine. The same attitude has caused misery and destruction throughout the world, throughout the history of patriarchy. Misery and destruction caused not so much by the underlying philosophy of the patriarchal religion, but by the unyielding and dominating manner in which the philosophy is expounded.
Some examples gleaned from recent literature by prominent Wiccans:
"We are opposed to teaching our magic and our craft to men until equality of the sexes is a reality..." (2)
Another writer stating that women cannot truly realize the Goddess unless they experience sexual bliss with another woman. (3)
A writer stating that one cannot become a real Witch unless one joins a coven (4)
Let me examine each of these statements so that I may fully explain my discomfort.
The first statement by well-known and respected Wiccan, Zsuzsanna Budapest, is a shocker. Why? Because it simply replaces women, as victims, with men. The Catholic Church refuses to allow women to be priests simply by the virtue that they are, in fact, women. The church bases this prohibition in the belief that since Jesus was a man and was the Son of God, women can only serve the men who are "the leaders, the teachers, the moral and intellectual icons", but cannot themselves be priestesses of that religion. Ms. Budapest is indicating that men cannot even be part of the Wiccan religion by the virtue that they are men. Catholic leadership at least allows women to participate in the Catholic rites.
It is very understandable why women in the Craft would have the attitude that men should be excluded from Wicca. The entire world has suffered terribly from the patriarchal and dominating society imposed upon humankind and the earth's ecosystems. That includes males as well. Wouldn't it make more sense to include men in nature and Goddess centered theology, to expose men to the nurturing of the Goddess, and thereby reduce sexism through education and enlightenment rather than excluding those in need and hoping that sexism stops on its own? Wicca and Goddess centered theology as an alternative to patriarchy must be made available to everyone—not just women.
The Gods know that men need as much help as we can get to counter the perversion that has been placed as a yoke around our necks for thousands of years.
Paganism and Wiccan thought focuses on the concept of polarity in the universe. The Principles of Wiccan Belief also includes the statement:
"We conceive of the Creative Power in the Universe as manifesting through polarity—as masculine and feminine—...We value neither above the other."
This polarity represents balance rather than complete opposites. Not poles apart but equal halves of a whole. Anodea Judith and Richard Ely summed it up by writing:
"The point is not to deny male or female, spirit or matter, or any other polarities, but to remember that they are children of the wholeness from which they are created..."(5)
Rae Beth in her book, The Wiccan Path (6) wrote, "the true aim of witchcraft is reconciliation of opposites. Bitterness, hatred and resentment between the sexes is as old as history, but witchcraft is the only religion which has as its avowed aim the healing of these wounds."
However, there appear to be those who have considerable influence, at least among those new to the Craft and Paganism in general, who wish to perpetuate the imbalance in the universe, to see all men suffer and be denied communion with the Goddess because of the terrible repression of women and the destruction of the Goddess based, matrifocal society of the distant past. While the Judeo-Christian-Islamic faiths still strive to keep feminist theology down, to continue to treat women as property, there is a large and growing movement among men to defeat this archaic mind set as well.
Ms. Bolen's statement that only through "physical and mystical encounter with another (woman) through a meeting of both soul and body...(can) communion...then take place", (7) also is an attempt to exclude half the world from communion with the Divine as manifested in the Goddess. A much more subtle form of Budapest's exclusionist message it is, nonetheless, still meant to keep men from the Goddess. In addition, one's sexual activity and preference is up to the individual, but to imply that a woman must take part in lesbian activities to fully commune with the Goddess is not only manipulative but also, again, dictating how a woman should live the most intimate aspect of her life. This is contrary to basic Wiccan precepts.
Are there women's mysteries or men's mysteries? Yes, certainly. There are mysteries associated with women involving birth, preservation, transformation and fertility/menstruation. And there are the Dark Mysteries concerning lunar magick, death and regeneration. Men's mysteries involve those masculine characteristics associated with men; the Hunter/Warrior, the Satyr, the Hero and the Slain King. Many Pagan males feel not only an affinity toward the Horned God and the Green Man, but also a reverence toward the Great Goddesses, the Earth Mother. There are characteristics of both sexes in everyone. But perhaps it is due more to the different ways that women and men obtain, assimilate, perceive and translate those experiences they have with the Goddess and the God. Men and women are different both physically and mentally. Again it is a matter of polarity. It is doubtful if either sex may have the same experience and understand it or perceive it in the same manner. These mysteries will remain as such, sacred and special to men and women in different ways. Again, the two seemingly different halves that comprise the whole.
Pauline Campanelli wrote that Wicca is "a religion of duality or polarity, recognizing that the creative process results from the interaction of opposites—positive and negative, male and female, spirit and matter, God and Goddess—but not `good and evil,' evil being the result of a cosmic imbalance." ( cool
The Craft is a religion of acceptance, of inclusiveness, not one of unbending dogma.
And because of this willingness to include and to accept all traditions and teachings, it is contradictory for a teacher to state that only "one way" is the acceptable way to practice the Craft or to commune with the God/esses.
The third statement mentioned above that deeply concerns me, is that one must belong to a coven in order to be truly Wiccan. Covens have been a part of Wicca for ages but so have solitary Witches. Power and focus and learning can be very effective in a coven. At the same time it would appear that, as part of the human condition, some individuals become obsessed with power and expect absolute agreement and obedience from the other coven members. As the "Principles Of Wiccan Belief" indicate, "we do not recognize any authoritarian hierarchy" and we "owe no allegiance to any person or greater power than the Divinity manifest through our own being."
While teachers are welcome, no one is, or has, the "one way" to the Goddess. Raymond Buckland wrote in his Complete Book of Witchcraft:
"Back in the `old days' of the Craft, there were many Witches who lived at a far distance from any village or even from any other people at all. Yet these were still Witches. They still worshipped the old gods and still worked their own magic. That, I feel, was as it should have been...and as it still should be."
I caution everyone to not allow Wicca to become a mirror image of the patriarchal disaster we have today in the Judeo-Christian-Islamic faiths. To carry on in the same manner, but to re-label and to attempt to disguise the behavior in more acceptable terms, is wrong. We must work toward change to cause the Universe to again become balanced and harmonious. Hatred, sexism and manipulation from any quarter is not a part of our Wiccan past, present or future.
NOTES
1. Clifton, Chas S.. "Witchcraft, the Magical Religion" in Witchcraft Today: Book One, The Modern Craft Movement. St. Paul: Llewellyn Publications 1992, pg. 1
2. As quoted by Carol LeMasters. "The Goddess Movement Past and Present" in Gnosis, #48, Summer 1998 pg. 46
3. Bolen, Jean Shinoda. Crossing to Avalon. San Francisco: Harper Collins 1994, pg.133
4. Lady Sabrina. Cauldron of Transformation: A New Vision of Wicca for Modern Pagan Practice. St. Paul: Llewellyn Publications, 1995. This same writer, who insists that only through coven work can one become a Witch, does not hesitate to offer a correspondence course to individuals!
5. Judith, Anodea and Richard Ely. "The Tertiary State: The Perils of Polarity", in The Green Egg, vol. 30, #123, 1998, pg. 48
6. Beth, Rae. The Wiccan Path: A Guide for the Solitary Practitioner. Freedom: The Crossing Press, Inc., 1990, pg. 12
7. Bolen, op cit.
8. Campanelli, Pauline. "Seasonal Rites/Magical Rites", in Witchcraft Today: Book One, The Modern Craft Movement, edited by Chas S. Clifton, op cit., pg 53-54
9. Buckland, Raymond. Buckland's Complete Book of Witchcraft. St. Paul: Llewellyn Publications, 1986, pg. 215
OR,
IS THE CRAFT BECOMING TOO DOGMATIC?
By Gary R. Varner
One of the most profound precepts of Wicca, which attracts a great majority of us to the Craft, is that we are able to participate and work directly with the Divine without the "middle man" telling us what we need to do, how we need to do it, and that only "one way" is the right way.
Chas S. Clifton wrote in his introduction to Witchcraft Today: The Modern Craft Movement (1) that:
"As a religion, Witchcraft turns the typical religious pyramid hierarchy upside-down; every Witch is at least theoretically a leader; there are no large congregations. Wicca has no pope or president; anyone claiming to be `queen (or king) of the Witches', `a member of the High Council of Twelve' or any such thing may be assumed to be a liar."
Clifton's statement is a reiteration of the 1974 "Principles of Wiccan Belief", put forward by the Council of American Witches, which stated:
"We do not recognize any authoritarian hierarchy, but do honor those who teach, respect those who share their greater knowledge and wisdom, and acknowledge those who courageously give of themselves in leadership."
I think most of us seek out and devour information about the Craft as soon as it becomes available. New ritual, scrying techniques, meditation methods as well as the prehistoric and historic basis of the Neo-Pagan movement are all of high interest to the Pagan and Wiccan community. Books that help us understand the Goddess and the Lord of the Wild and to work with Them to heal the earth and each other are also of high interest and are found on the shelves of most mainstream bookstores as well as "New Age" shops. However, the more I read of the literature creates an underlying sense of unease in me. Why? Because many of those teachers who represent the Pagan community, and have been active the longest, are assuming a trait that is more characteristic of the leaders of the dogmatic and patriarchal religions of the world. That trait is one of an unyielding, unaccepting and dogmatic attitude. An attitude that strives to dictate to, and dominate over, Pagans who have chosen to follow a religion based on individual paths to the Divine. The same attitude has caused misery and destruction throughout the world, throughout the history of patriarchy. Misery and destruction caused not so much by the underlying philosophy of the patriarchal religion, but by the unyielding and dominating manner in which the philosophy is expounded.
Some examples gleaned from recent literature by prominent Wiccans:
"We are opposed to teaching our magic and our craft to men until equality of the sexes is a reality..." (2)
Another writer stating that women cannot truly realize the Goddess unless they experience sexual bliss with another woman. (3)
A writer stating that one cannot become a real Witch unless one joins a coven (4)
Let me examine each of these statements so that I may fully explain my discomfort.
The first statement by well-known and respected Wiccan, Zsuzsanna Budapest, is a shocker. Why? Because it simply replaces women, as victims, with men. The Catholic Church refuses to allow women to be priests simply by the virtue that they are, in fact, women. The church bases this prohibition in the belief that since Jesus was a man and was the Son of God, women can only serve the men who are "the leaders, the teachers, the moral and intellectual icons", but cannot themselves be priestesses of that religion. Ms. Budapest is indicating that men cannot even be part of the Wiccan religion by the virtue that they are men. Catholic leadership at least allows women to participate in the Catholic rites.
It is very understandable why women in the Craft would have the attitude that men should be excluded from Wicca. The entire world has suffered terribly from the patriarchal and dominating society imposed upon humankind and the earth's ecosystems. That includes males as well. Wouldn't it make more sense to include men in nature and Goddess centered theology, to expose men to the nurturing of the Goddess, and thereby reduce sexism through education and enlightenment rather than excluding those in need and hoping that sexism stops on its own? Wicca and Goddess centered theology as an alternative to patriarchy must be made available to everyone—not just women.
The Gods know that men need as much help as we can get to counter the perversion that has been placed as a yoke around our necks for thousands of years.
Paganism and Wiccan thought focuses on the concept of polarity in the universe. The Principles of Wiccan Belief also includes the statement:
"We conceive of the Creative Power in the Universe as manifesting through polarity—as masculine and feminine—...We value neither above the other."
This polarity represents balance rather than complete opposites. Not poles apart but equal halves of a whole. Anodea Judith and Richard Ely summed it up by writing:
"The point is not to deny male or female, spirit or matter, or any other polarities, but to remember that they are children of the wholeness from which they are created..."(5)
Rae Beth in her book, The Wiccan Path (6) wrote, "the true aim of witchcraft is reconciliation of opposites. Bitterness, hatred and resentment between the sexes is as old as history, but witchcraft is the only religion which has as its avowed aim the healing of these wounds."
However, there appear to be those who have considerable influence, at least among those new to the Craft and Paganism in general, who wish to perpetuate the imbalance in the universe, to see all men suffer and be denied communion with the Goddess because of the terrible repression of women and the destruction of the Goddess based, matrifocal society of the distant past. While the Judeo-Christian-Islamic faiths still strive to keep feminist theology down, to continue to treat women as property, there is a large and growing movement among men to defeat this archaic mind set as well.
Ms. Bolen's statement that only through "physical and mystical encounter with another (woman) through a meeting of both soul and body...(can) communion...then take place", (7) also is an attempt to exclude half the world from communion with the Divine as manifested in the Goddess. A much more subtle form of Budapest's exclusionist message it is, nonetheless, still meant to keep men from the Goddess. In addition, one's sexual activity and preference is up to the individual, but to imply that a woman must take part in lesbian activities to fully commune with the Goddess is not only manipulative but also, again, dictating how a woman should live the most intimate aspect of her life. This is contrary to basic Wiccan precepts.
Are there women's mysteries or men's mysteries? Yes, certainly. There are mysteries associated with women involving birth, preservation, transformation and fertility/menstruation. And there are the Dark Mysteries concerning lunar magick, death and regeneration. Men's mysteries involve those masculine characteristics associated with men; the Hunter/Warrior, the Satyr, the Hero and the Slain King. Many Pagan males feel not only an affinity toward the Horned God and the Green Man, but also a reverence toward the Great Goddesses, the Earth Mother. There are characteristics of both sexes in everyone. But perhaps it is due more to the different ways that women and men obtain, assimilate, perceive and translate those experiences they have with the Goddess and the God. Men and women are different both physically and mentally. Again it is a matter of polarity. It is doubtful if either sex may have the same experience and understand it or perceive it in the same manner. These mysteries will remain as such, sacred and special to men and women in different ways. Again, the two seemingly different halves that comprise the whole.
Pauline Campanelli wrote that Wicca is "a religion of duality or polarity, recognizing that the creative process results from the interaction of opposites—positive and negative, male and female, spirit and matter, God and Goddess—but not `good and evil,' evil being the result of a cosmic imbalance." ( cool
The Craft is a religion of acceptance, of inclusiveness, not one of unbending dogma.
And because of this willingness to include and to accept all traditions and teachings, it is contradictory for a teacher to state that only "one way" is the acceptable way to practice the Craft or to commune with the God/esses.
The third statement mentioned above that deeply concerns me, is that one must belong to a coven in order to be truly Wiccan. Covens have been a part of Wicca for ages but so have solitary Witches. Power and focus and learning can be very effective in a coven. At the same time it would appear that, as part of the human condition, some individuals become obsessed with power and expect absolute agreement and obedience from the other coven members. As the "Principles Of Wiccan Belief" indicate, "we do not recognize any authoritarian hierarchy" and we "owe no allegiance to any person or greater power than the Divinity manifest through our own being."
While teachers are welcome, no one is, or has, the "one way" to the Goddess. Raymond Buckland wrote in his Complete Book of Witchcraft:
"Back in the `old days' of the Craft, there were many Witches who lived at a far distance from any village or even from any other people at all. Yet these were still Witches. They still worshipped the old gods and still worked their own magic. That, I feel, was as it should have been...and as it still should be."
I caution everyone to not allow Wicca to become a mirror image of the patriarchal disaster we have today in the Judeo-Christian-Islamic faiths. To carry on in the same manner, but to re-label and to attempt to disguise the behavior in more acceptable terms, is wrong. We must work toward change to cause the Universe to again become balanced and harmonious. Hatred, sexism and manipulation from any quarter is not a part of our Wiccan past, present or future.
NOTES
1. Clifton, Chas S.. "Witchcraft, the Magical Religion" in Witchcraft Today: Book One, The Modern Craft Movement. St. Paul: Llewellyn Publications 1992, pg. 1
2. As quoted by Carol LeMasters. "The Goddess Movement Past and Present" in Gnosis, #48, Summer 1998 pg. 46
3. Bolen, Jean Shinoda. Crossing to Avalon. San Francisco: Harper Collins 1994, pg.133
4. Lady Sabrina. Cauldron of Transformation: A New Vision of Wicca for Modern Pagan Practice. St. Paul: Llewellyn Publications, 1995. This same writer, who insists that only through coven work can one become a Witch, does not hesitate to offer a correspondence course to individuals!
5. Judith, Anodea and Richard Ely. "The Tertiary State: The Perils of Polarity", in The Green Egg, vol. 30, #123, 1998, pg. 48
6. Beth, Rae. The Wiccan Path: A Guide for the Solitary Practitioner. Freedom: The Crossing Press, Inc., 1990, pg. 12
7. Bolen, op cit.
8. Campanelli, Pauline. "Seasonal Rites/Magical Rites", in Witchcraft Today: Book One, The Modern Craft Movement, edited by Chas S. Clifton, op cit., pg 53-54
9. Buckland, Raymond. Buckland's Complete Book of Witchcraft. St. Paul: Llewellyn Publications, 1986, pg. 215
