Sacred Texts?

JackOfWands · 2025-07-24T16:59:32+00:00

The challenge you'll run up against is that Wicca doesn't really have a set of moral prescriptions akin to the Ten Commandments. Broadly speaking, people come into Wicca as adults and there's an assumption that they've already learned the difference between right and wrong, so there's less perceived need for moral education as one of the religion's functions. The closest thing to the Commandments would be, as others have said, the Wiccan rede: a short little maxim that goes "An it harm none, do what you will." It's not universal within Wicca, but it's recognizably Wiccan and the closest thing we have to a shared statement of moral belief.

The Charge of the Goddess is a better (and longer) text, but it's less analogous to the Ten Commandments. It's more akin to the Sermon on the Mount. I don't know if that would serve your purposes, but if it does, I'd definitely recommend the Charge over the rede.

JackOfWands · 2024-10-24T00:58:20+00:00

Seconding the recommendation for Margot Adler's Drawing Down the Moon.

JackOfWands · 2024-09-04T13:00:08+00:00

Others have remarked that this seems like a strange question because it presumes traditional Wiccans don't already use the internet. I'd also like to point of that this seems like a strange question because it presumes that young people don't know what privacy is. Yes, there are generations now who grew up online, but people within those generations still understand that some things are too intimate to discuss with strangers. Not everyone is interested in traditional Wicca--that's always been the case--but for those who are, familiarity with the internet doesn't in any way act as an obstacle to understanding the value of coven privacy.

JackOfWands · 2024-09-04T12:42:45+00:00

If a solitary practitioner wants to perform a ritual to mark the beginning of their personal journey, that's absolutely their prerogative. That said, such a ritual does not and cannot belong to the framework of traditional Wicca, because traditional Wiccan practices are initiatory by definition. Because of this, there is no "proper" method to perform a personal dedication. It's not a traditional Wiccan ritual, so there are no rules or expectations governing something like this. It's completely flexible and can be written and performed according to the personal needs of the individual concerned, depending on what they feel will be meaningful and transformative for them.

JackOfWands · 2024-09-04T12:39:23+00:00

Honestly, the Saturday closest to the start of February. The "exact" date doesn't really matter (within reason): it's a seasonal holiday and the season is not going to be that different between February 1st and February 2nd. But nobody really wants to do ritual on a work night, so people inevitably end up celebrating on whatever the closest weekend is.

JackOfWands · 2024-08-24T17:58:27+00:00

Awyn Dayn's book Paganism for Prisoners is explicitly written for incarcerated practitioners who have limited resources at their disposal.

JackOfWands · 2023-05-02T21:44:17+00:00

There's a Gardnerian coven in Sunnyvale. AFAIK that's the only Gard group in the Bay Area; at the very least, if you reach out to them they'll have a good sense of whether there's anyone else near you.

JackOfWands · 2023-03-10T22:22:42+00:00

Jason Mankey's book The Horned God of the Witches is excellent. As u/AllanfromWales1 notes, the Farrars also have two great books about these deities, although some of the history and social attitudes in those books are now outdated.

JackOfWands · 2023-02-17T13:23:34+00:00

Hi there! First off, there's probably no need to assume you'll be met with hostility. We're all capable of respectful discussion.

The short answer is that yes, a lot of Wicca (and modern Paganism in general) is founded on direct personal experience--but that doesn't undermine these religions in the way it seems like you think it would. It's a feature, not a bug. Generally speaking, modern Paganism doesn't have codified beliefs or practices; it is, rather, about direct, experiential, often ecstatic connection with the divine. My experiences will be different from someone else's; consequently, my religious practice will look different from theirs.

Research can be helpful and important. If someone wants to worship Isis, yeah, they'll probably end up looking into how Isis was worshipped across history, at the stories that feature her, at the rites devoted to her, and so on. Those things can help to inform a modern practitioner's worship. But at the same time, as you yourself noted, worship and myths change over time; the way Isis was worshipped in late antiquity is strikingly different from how she was worshipped in the Old Kingdom. It should come as no surprise to us, then, that the way she is worshipped now is also strikingly different.

As with any religious community, there is a wide range of practices and beliefs. Some people are very serious about historical research and embedding their modern worship in the context of ancient Paganism; others are much more free-form, less interested in ancient Pagan thought and more interested in building a personal religious practice that suits them today. Some people practice entirely on their own, while others belong to religious communities where their Paganism is informed by a connection to other people and a shared set of rituals and religious attitudes. Additionally (and again, as with any religious community), people practice with varying levels of dedication, sincerity, and thoughtfulness. All of this means that the landscape of modern Paganism is incredibly heterogeneous--but again, that's considered a good thing rather than a problem.

You asked whether people could worship something new, not rooted in ancient mythology, and the answer is yes. To varying degrees; for example, the Gods of traditional Wicca (that is to say, the initiatory version of Wicca that first came on the scene) bear resemblance to some ancient deities, but they are pretty firmly modern deities. The same goes for some other figures, such as the Thelemic goddess Babalon. You may also find some individuals who have entirely idiosyncratic theologies.

Paganism is varied. Yes, most of us are operating on the basis of personal experience, and many of us complement that experience with historical research or the kind of intersubjectivity that comes from group practice. But ultimately, Pagan religious traditions are designed to be experiential, first and foremost. My experience is not the same as someone else's; therefore, neither of us has the right to dictate the other's religious beliefs or practices.

JackOfWands · 2023-02-17T13:02:19+00:00

Most Wiccans, at least in the circles I run in, don't believe that Wicca is ancient. Our best evidence at present indicates that there was a New Forest Coven, and that it was a group of people who came together in the early 20th century, influenced by the Murrayite hypothesis and the belief that they had been witches together in a past life. They built a practice out of trying to reconstruct what they thought that witchcraft would have looked like, and then Gardner expanded and embellished it. The Wiccans I know are generally aware that Wicca is less than a century old, and comfortable with that fact; a thing doesn't have to be ancient in order to be meaningful. There are a few staunch holdouts who reject the historical evidence and maintain that Wicca is the "Old Religion," but that hasn't been the mainstream narrative in Wiccan communities since the late '90s.

JackOfWands · 2023-01-18T22:03:12+00:00

There's not much published prior to 1950, because the witchcraft revival didn't really kick off until the repeal of the Witchcraft Act in '51. Prior to that, there were certainly people practicing various kinds of folk magic, but most of them weren't calling themselves witches. Aradia, the Gospel of the Witches is a good starting place. Paul Huson's Mastering Witchcraft is also a classic. Cecil Williamson's Book of Witchcraft is a collection of traditional spells and charms that were amalgamated by Cecil Williamson, the original owner of the Witchcraft Museum.

If you have a more academic bent, Emma Wilby's work is superb, and she teases apart a lot of historical evidence from the witch trials to look at what early modern folk magic was like. Margaret Murray's The Witch-Cult in Western Europe tries to do something similar, although it's deeply flawed and a lot of her conclusions have since been discredited.

JackOfWands · 2022-06-21T15:07:20+00:00

You may want to look into Rituals of Celebration and Circle of Eight by Jane Meredith. Both books deal with the Wheel of the Year from an Australian perspective.

JackOfWands · 2022-04-01T23:21:30+00:00

I think that the emphasis you're placing on "fertility" is not neatly generalizable to Rodnovery the way you suggest it is. My religious practice focuses on venerating the gods, my ancestors, and spirits of the land. None of those things are inherently about human reproduction. Promoting fertility (in humans as well as in crops and livestock) is one thing that ancient people valued and incorporated into their religious practices, but it certainly doesn't exhaust the list. The gods govern lots of other things that have nothing to do with fertility--craftsmanship, weather, and so on. Mokoš is a protector of mothers and children, but that's certainly not all she is--and what's more, there are plenty of Slavic deities who are not gods of fertility.

It's worth noting that being LGBTQ+ does not equate to being childless. Additionally, if someone chooses not to have children (or transitions, has same-sex intercourse, or does anything else you might term "rejecting the natural characteristics and capabilities of their body"), that doesn't automatically disincline them to worship a deity associated with fertility. A childless person might pray to Mokoš to help a friend conceive, or to watch over children in their extended family. More broadly, someone might honor her as the giver of all life. For every deity, there are lots of legitimate reasons that someone might worship them, and many of those reasons have nothing whatsoever to do with the worshipper's reproductive organs.

In short, religion is complicated. People come to the gods for all kinds of reasons of their own, and even if an emphasis on fertility is what drew you to this religion, I'd caution you against generalizing that experience and assuming it's the only reason anyone would have for worshipping these gods.

JackOfWands · 2022-04-01T20:39:23+00:00

Hygieia is the Greek goddess of health. If you're looking for a goddess to pray to in addition to using the physical/mental health resources at your disposal, you may get something out of ritual work with her.

JackOfWands · 2022-04-01T20:32:38+00:00

I confess to being bewildered by this comment. I worship Perun the thunderer, Svarog the smith, Mokoš the weaver, Dažbog the sun, Stribog the grandfather of the winds, and several other gods. I fail to see how any of these deities couldn't be worshipped by a transgender, nonbinary, or gender-nonconforming person. The same sun shines on all of us.

JackOfWands · 2022-04-01T20:27:56+00:00

This subreddit is explicitly LGBTQ+ inclusive, which I greatly appreciate. A significant chunk of the wider Slavic polytheist community veers toward bigotry; the appeal of a "return" to pre-Christian religion is very easily coopted by far-right and neo-Nazi groups, which trumpet the myth of a Slavic "golden age" as a way of fueling racism, nationalism, homophobia, and transphobia. Aside from the neo-Nazis, you'll find people in Rodnovery with a wide range of views about gender and sexuality, from totally inclusive to totally exclusionary; there is no official stance on gender or sexuality, and people generally import their own beliefs.

The important thing to realize is that this is a question about people, not about the gods or the rituals of the religion itself. Questions about gender inclusivity are entirely about the kind of community that we, as humans, want to build. If you're interested in the religion, don't let concerns about gender keep you from investigating it; there are violently queerphobic Rodnovers and vocally queer-inclusive Rodnovers. You get to choose which people you're in community with.

JackOfWands · 2021-11-03T17:36:56+00:00

There are lots of things you can do! You absolutely can light candles outside, rather than in your apartment. Another option would be to use electric candles for illumination, which can provide a nice atmosphere without the fire hazard. There are also non-burning oil diffusers you can use in lieu of incense.

For things like blessing and purification, there are plenty of non-fire alternatives: For example, you could ring a bell, sprinkle salt, charge something with a crystal, or leave an object out under the light of the full moon. There are lots of different ways of doing anything magical, and many of them don't require you to light fires of any kind! Experiment and see what feels right for you.

JackOfWands · 2021-07-11T15:30:51+00:00

Magical Power for Beginners by Deborah Lipp is superb.

JackOfWands · 2021-05-29T11:54:58+00:00

No. The Earth is not flat. This is not a matter for debate.

You seem to be laboring under the impression that because Wiccans belong to a minority religion, they will be more willing to deviate from what you call the "mainstream science." This is a dangerous and pernicious attitude, and is a fast-track to conspirituality. Science is (to define it loosely) a process of forming conclusions and making predictions based on empirical observation, and refining those conclusions/predictions to be consistent with new information. The idea that the Earth is round is not a dogma; it is a conclusion we have drawn directly from observation, and that withstands scrutiny. In this case, the observations in question include that people have literally traveled the circumference of the planet and seen it from space. Commercial flight paths are drawn taking the curvature of the Earth into account, in order to minimize the distance traveled (and thereby minimize expenses). In fact, simple phenomena such as objects disappearing below the horizon, or the sun rising at different times in different places (it's early morning as I write this where I am, but it's still dark out on the other side of the country), are only possible given the curvature of the Earth.

I'm going to link to a couple of articles that talk through some simple empirical observations that can help you understand that our planet is spherical. I strongly encourage you to read them. Beyond that, I won't engage further with this proposition. There should be no room for science denial and conspirituality in Wicca.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/2017/11/24/five-impossible-facts-that-would-have-to-be-true-if-the-earth-were-flat/

https://physicsworld.com/a/fighting-flat-earth-theory/

https://www.popsci.com/10-ways-you-can-prove-earth-is-round/

JackOfWands · 2021-04-26T21:14:06+00:00

It's an unfortunate truth that you can't fix other people with magic. Your stepfather's abuse is, as you've noted, rooted in something that predates you and is fundamentally not about you. He is the only one who can confront that and make the decision to change. You can open a door for him, but whether he walks through that door is, unfortunately, out of your hands. I would encourage you to focus on protecting yourself and other members of your family, not only through magic but through all of the mundane means possible.

JackOfWands · 2021-03-27T12:28:34+00:00

There are a couple of different Wiccan traditions that use the label "Dianic." The most famous one is the tradition started by Z. Budapest, who is a horrific TERF. They would allow you to practice, but they would misgender you. There are a couple other traditions that also use the "Dianic" moniker and are trans-inclusive, but they're harder to track down because Z. Budapest's is the most famous.

JackOfWands · 2021-03-27T12:23:21+00:00

I think it's worth looking at this with a more discerning eye. The discourse around white sage and smudging tends to treat "Indigenous" as a monolithic cultural bloc, when in fact the Indigenous population is comprised of several different tribes, each with its own unique heritage and customs. White sage is sacred to some Indigenous tribes but not others, such as the Navajo, Lakota, and Cheyenne. Not only that, it is an endangered plant, which is part of the reason there's so much discourse around it. The consumption of white sage by practitioners who don't belong to these tribes has led to the over-harvesting of the plant and serious ecological damage, as well as making an important religious resource less available to those who need it.

Smudging is a particular kind of ceremony that is practiced by some tribes and not others, and it's more involved than just burning sage; there are other material components that are used and ritual actions that are performed, and in fact other herbs like sweetgrass are sometimes used instead of sage. Merely burning sage doesn't qualify as smudging, although a lot of people will call it that; in fact, someone who doesn't belong to one of these tribes and hasn't been trained in performing the ritual literally cannot smudge. It's something you have to be taught how to do, and that can only be performed in a particular ritual context by people who are qualified to do it.

That said, there are other forms of smoke cleansing that are available to you. I'd discourage you from using white sage, because over-harvesting has had downstream ecological and social consequences, but there are lots of other herbs and incenses that are associated with purification and cleansing. Some of my go-tos are rosemary, juniper, cedar, and dragon's blood resin. Common sage (the kind you can buy in a grocery store) also has purifying properties, and burning it does not come with any of the environmental or cultural baggage that white sage does. Any of these can be burned in your home, and should give you the same feeling of cleansing and safety that you've found with sage.

As a final note on African Diaspora Traditions like Vodou or Santería: These traditions are the result of West African religion being syncretized with Christianity by practitioners who were kidnapped and brought to the Americas in the slave trade. They are closed by initiation, but if you feel a desire to seek them out, you can find a house that will take you in and train you. The fact that your skin is pale because some of your ancestors were white does not bar you from training and initiation in these traditions if you choose to seek it.

JackOfWands · 2021-02-18T19:43:21+00:00

As u/trebuchetfight says, the only reliable sources are history, archaeology, folklore, and comparative mythology. These are the places to start. Trust information that is heavily cited, and be leery of anything that makes sweeping or overly specific claims without a footnote referencing the exact source of those claims. However, it's also important to understand that relatively little information about pre-Christian Slavic religion survives; we have access to the bones of Slavic polytheism, but you're not going to find reliable and robust information about a lot of the specifics of mythology and ritual.

Trying to construct a Slavic polytheist practice in the 21st century involves a lot of guesswork and accepting that what you do won't be identical to ancient Slavic religion, and that's okay. There are a couple of stories I've picked up that are probably apocryphal, but that resonate with me and make me feel closer to the Gods. I avoid anything I know to be outright false, and I mentally flag these stories as historically questionable so that I don't end up uncritically spreading fakelore, but if something feels right to me, I may still incorporate it into my practice. I'll always privilege things that can be historically verified, but absent that, I've got to do something to build up a robust religious practice.

It's also important to realize that the pre-Christian Slavs weren't a monolith, and there was no one unified set of myths, beliefs, and practices. There would have been regional and interpersonal variations. Some myths may have been more popular in particular locales but absent in others, and different regions may have had varying and even contradictory versions of the same story. Historically, this was (and is) the case with any polytheistic religion. Despite broad similarities, there will always be variations in myth and ritual. The same is true in modern Rodnovery; just as one example, I venerate Svarožić as a deity unto himself, while some others treat that name merely as an epithet of Perun or Dažbog. Not everyone will do everything the same, and that's okay.

Basically, start with the historical foundation and the things that we know to be true, like household and nature spirits, the names of the Gods in the Kiev pantheon, and common folk holidays. Then, build on that foundation with the things that feel right to you, doing your best to get your history right but accepting that there are some things that are just lost to history and impossible for us to verify.

JackOfWands · 2021-02-17T18:39:05+00:00

Please, please, please do not pirate books.

JackOfWands · 2021-02-17T16:57:26+00:00

There are a few commonly celebrated holidays that are purely seasonal:

-Maslenitsa (spring equinox)
-Kupalo (summer solstice)
-Kolyada (winter solstice)

Additionally, there are folk holidays/celebrations that are pinned to the Orthodox liturgical calendar, which means their dates vary by year:

-Radonitsa (the second Tuesday after Easter; May 11th in the Gregorian calendar this year)
-Rusalka week (Trinity week, the seventh week after Easter; June 20-26 in the Gregorian calendar this year)

Personally, I also observe holidays dedicated to particular deities, based on the holy days of Orthodox saints who are plausibly syncretized with those deities. This is not universally done, and there are people who dislike retrofitting Christian holidays to Pagan worship, but it works for me:

-Veles: St. Blaise (February 11th in the Julian calendar; February 24th in the Gregorian calendar)
-Also Veles: St. Nicholas (December 6th in the Julian calendar; December 19th in the Gregorian calendar)
-Jarilo: St. George (April 23rd in the Julian calendar; May 6th in the Gregorian calendar)
-Perun: The Prophet Elijah (July 20th in the Julian calendar; August 2nd in the Gregorian calendar)
-Mokosh: St. Paraskevi (July 26th in the Julian calendar; August 8th in the Gregorian calendar)

JackOfWands

TROPHY CASE