The Ramblings and Wanderings

Posts Tagged ‘updates’

Breaking the rules with words: I have been a busy little bee these last couple of weeks. Many things to do, podcast, work, finishing my stang, a lot of writing and such. Also I gave the main website a make over. Most importantly (at least to you guys) I have created a new section on the main website for the Collection Casting (divination with bits and pieces) and am starting to transfer info over there, as well as working on making new articles and making the workshop I taught at KG make sense for online purposes. Keep checking the “newest articles” box on the main page!

(Breaking the rules of wordless Wednesday … Sorry I haven’t been around much! I have lots going on right now. I’m writing like crazy, reading like crazy, working and job hunting, Bren’s birthday is coming up, helping with the starting of a ritual group, planning and performing all night rituals and Hedge crossings, doing some wood burning, there’s the podcast … the list goes on.

Two things I owe you guys: an article on Hedge Crossing for here and an article on building a relationship with a landscape for New World Witchery, I hope to have these finished up asap.

Also check out the upcoming book from Pendraig Publishing called “To Fly by Night” recognize any names? Only my first name is listed right now hehehehe)

Links:

Wild Hunt Blog

Dr. Brendan Myer’s website

The statement thus far:

Part 1

(Short version for print distribution.)

We are here –

– A circle of spiritual people from many traditions, groves, hearths, and circles. We are young and old, from many walks of life, and many parts of the world. We are Pagans of the modern era, Druids, Heathens, Wiccans, Witches, Shamans, practitioners of magical lore, and many more paths besides these. We walk the paths of the sacred Earth, in the footsteps of the Goddesses and Gods of the Land, the Sea, the Sky, and the Tribe.

2. We have learned of recent incidents of sexual exploitation and abuse perpetrated by individuals claiming to be religious teachers, some of whom claimed to be members of our community. In response to these incidents, we have crafted this statement.

3. We hereby categorically reject, disavow, oppose, and repudiate any and all coerced, nonconsensual, harmful or exploitative sexual acts, especially when claimed to be part of our ways and traditions. We identify all such acts as sexual abuse, and we refuse to tolerate them in our community.

4. Many of us believe the human body is profoundly sacred. Many of us believe that the presence of the Divine dwells within in the body. We therefore find that human sexuality, and acts of love and pleasure between consenting, informed, and mature people, have great religious significance. We affirm the goodness of human sexuality, and the goodness of celebrating sexual identity.

5. Because of these beliefs, we also find that coerced, nonconsensual, harmful or exploitative sexual acts are extraordinary affronts to the Divine presence which dwells within every human body. These acts grievously harm the victim, and inflict deep wounds upon the sense of bodily identity which all of us hold so dear.

6. A sexual predator who exploits the relationship of trust that exists between teacher and seeker harms the whole religious community, and undermines the good work of the honourable teachers in our midst. Similarly, acts of sexual abuse between seekers in the same circle, whether one party is a teacher or not, also harm the whole community.

7. An accusation of sexual exploitation is a very serious matter. The accusation alone, even in the absence of evidence, can damage the reputation and the self esteem of good people. We therefore find that a false or vindictive accusation of sexual misconduct is but another form of sexual abuse.

8. Yet we also recognize that real sexual abuse victims experience deep feelings of guilt and shame, and that they often struggle to admit that they have been abused. Their condition should not be made worse by a predisposition to doubt the validity of their claims. Nor should they be automatically counter-accused of having a vindictive intention, or of lying. We hold that anyone alleging sexual abuse should always be treated with compassion as a primary response, and that claims of sexual abuse should be handled with intelligence and concern for all.

9. We voluntarily commit ourselves to this declaration, and we encourage others to commit themselves to it, whatever their path.

Part 2

(for internet distribution, which includes part 1 as well as the following discussion.)

1. Our movement has many principles of moral thought, not just one singular monolithic principle. As there are many gods in the world, so there are many models of the good and worthwhile life for humankind. Some of us practice Heroic Virtue, others Classical virtue, others a Utilitarian principle such as the Wiccan Rede. There are also many among us who find that ethical principles are revealed through the intuition of a Divine presence that dwells within the human heart and mind. This presence unites us with the Earth, with each other, and with the cosmos.

2. Among our many traditions, groves, hearths, circles, and communities, there are broad areas of moral agreement. For the purpose of this statement, we (the authors and the undersigned) wish to emphasize the matter of sexual abuse. We agree to the broad and general principle that the human body is a sacred temple, a work of art, and a good home for the self and the soul. Many of us believe that the body is the dwelling-place of the Divine, and the seat of a deeply integrated web of relations which ultimately includes the whole of life on Earth. The human body is thus among the first of all things that deserve our care and respect. On this principle, the differences between our various circles tend to be only a matter of emphasis. Indeed, on this principle, we may share some moral agreement with the dominant religious traditions of our dominant culture: the view that the body is made in the image of the Divine.

3. In our circles, the sacredness of the body, as a religious truth, leads to positive conclusions about human sexuality. Our view is that sexuality, sexual identity, sexual expression, and acts of love and pleasure, between consenting, informed, and mature people, have great religious significance. Indeed such acts can take on the significance of ritual. We hold that our sexual identities are worthy of celebration. And for many of us, an occasion of shared sexual pleasure and lovemaking is a most spiritually meaningful event: a communion with the Divine which dwells within ourselves and within each other.

4. Indeed, there are some traditions in which a sexual act is performed as part of some rituals, such as higher-level initiations. Various names designate these rituals: Heiros Gamos, the Great Marriage, or the Great Rite, to name a few. In most cases, the Great Marriage is performed “in token”: for instance, a priest touches the tip of a wand or a blade to the bottom of a chalice held by a priestess. This is an ancient gesture, with precedents in the ancient cultures of the Greeks, the Romans, the Hindus, and other great civilizations of the distant past.

5. Naturally, given our perspective on the sacredness of the body, our view is that all coerced, nonconsensual, harmful or exploitative sexual acts, are seriously morally wrong. We find that sexual exploitation and violence are particularly worse than other forms of criminality, such as property offences, because sexual offences invade the body. Sexual abuse ignores the sacredness of the body, and ignores the privacy, the dignity, and the freedom of the victim to use and delight in his or her own body. It is an extraordinary affront to the Divine presence which dwells within every human body and which animates the body with goodness. It severely harms the victim, and degrades the dignity of both victim and offender. Sexual abuse also inflicts deep wounds upon the precious sense of bodily identity which all of us hold so dear. No exceptions or relativist interpretations can alter the basic moral wrongness of sexual exploitation and violence. We identify all such acts as sexual abuse, and we refuse to tolerate them in our community.

6. Thus in our contemporary circles, the rite of the Great Marriage, if it is not performed in token,  is held privately and by invitation only. The participants come in full knowledge of what they have been invited to. If there are any initiatory “surprises”, they are never intended to violate the sacredness of the seeker’s body. Ideally, the invitees already know, love, and trust one another. They have already given their informed consent, and retain the right to withdraw from the event without prejudice at any time. When we mix sexuality with religion, there is no space for deception or coercion. Religious sexuality is always consensual and never obligatory. No one should enter a circle with eyes covered when sexuality, sexual identity, and the sanctity of his or her own body is put to a test. This remains true even when the ritual participants are not strangers to each other. Initiatory surprises, tests, and ordeals are intended to help a seeker find the sacred within him or her self. If they threaten or invade that self, then the initiators are harming, and not helping, the seeker.

7. If someone finds a private group’s practices uncomfortable, he or she is always free to find another group to join. It is wrong to hold someone back from spiritual progress or knowledge for refusing to participate in a sexual act. We are always right to doubt the sincerity, honour, and spirituality of someone who claims that a sexual act is a mandatory requirement for initiation, or for any kind of relationship with the gods, goddesses, or deities.

8. An accusation of sexual exploitation is a very serious matter. The accusation alone, even in the absence of evidence, can damage the reputation and the self esteem of good people. We therefore find that a false or vindictive accusation of sexual misconduct is another form of sexual abuse.

9. Yet we also recognize that real sexual abuse victims experience deep feelings of guilt and shame, and that they often struggle to admit that they have been abused. Their condition should not be made worse by a predisposition doubt the validity of their claims. Nor should they be automatically counter-accused of having a vindictive intention, or of lying. We hold that anyone alleging sexual abuse should always be treated with compassion as a primary response, and that claims of sexual abuse should be handled with intelligence and concern for all.

10. It is clear that one need not be a spiritual person to recognize the wrongness of sexual abuse. Yet we are especially outraged when the perpetrator is a leader or a teacher in a religious community. In our circles, religious teachers are held in high esteem. A seeker who approaches a teacher in search of spiritual guidance and comfort offers a special kind of trust to the teacher. Teachers and seekers often open their hearts and minds to each other, and thus they becomes very vulnerable. It is for this reason many of our traditions require teachers to possess not only great knowledge, but also great integrity and honour. It is also for this reason that sexual predators will pose as religious teacher: in that way, they may find more victims for their gratification. There are also some teachers who, exploiting the trust given them, become sexual predators as well.

11. Furthermore, a person who uses this relationship of trust to exploit people thus harms the whole social environment in which teaching and seeking take place. For the sexual predator’s harm touches more than just the victim. It affects all the victim’s friends, family members, fellow seekers in the same circle, colleagues at work, and anyone to whom the victim may turn for help. The harm of sexual abuse thus affects numerous other people who the predator may not know, nor ever meet. Moreover, sexual abuse also casts suspicion and doubt on the intentions of the honourable teachers in our midst, undermining the good work that they do.

12. Finally a sexual predator can sometimes exploit the relations of trust that grow between fellow seekers in the same tradition, hearth, or circle, even when he or she does not pose as a teacher. This kind of exploitation also harms the whole community. In all cases, we maintain our condemnation of unwanted sexual acts.

Therefore –

We, the authors and signatories of this statement, commit ourselves to:

• Demonstrate by example a fully moral sexual spirituality;

• Vigorously entreat others to agree to the principles of this statement;

• Handle all accusations of sexual exploitation and misconduct with intelligence and compassion, for victims of real sexual harm, and for victims of false or vindictive accusations;

• Cooperate with the police when an incident of sexual abuse in our circles is under investigation;

• Help bring comfort, medical assistance, legal aid, and spiritual healing, to victims, as far as ability and opportunity may allow; and

• Help seekers find groups, circles, traditions, or individual teachers, whose practice involves as much or as little sexuality as the seeker feels comfortable exploring.

We voluntarily commit ourselves to this declaration, and we encourage others to commit themselves to it, whatever their path.

We remain, respectfully,

A community of Pagans.

Just a few of the things going on in my life right now:

Working on the 2011 Walking the Hedge calendar and day planner

Writing that book I’ll never finish

Getting ready to turn 30 at the end of the month

Hosted the Witch & Stitch Circle at my house

Working on the podcast

Writing the next blog post in the series on feminism and womanhood

Decided it was time to do a little re-vamping and re-dedicating of my Bag of Bones (and stones and sticks and things) I use for divination, also working on writing a blog post about that

Being a troublesome moderator, over at Bren’s forum

Troubleshooting bugs over at the Hedge

Working in the garden (stay tuned for blog post and pics about that)

Grieving my horse Morgan, who was mauled by a bear (at the family farm) and had to be put down, as well as hoping a beagle named Lacey (also at the family farm) comes home and isn’t lost forever

I hope everything is good in your lives folks!

Hedge Witchery

Hedge is a Teutonic term originally meaning any fence, boundary or enclosure, later meaning a specific type of living thicket planted to act as a fence, enclosure or boundary.

Old High German (language used roughly from 500 to 1050 C.E): hegga, hecka

Old Dutch (600 to 1150 C.E.): heggehn

Old Saxon or Old Low German (800 to 1200 C.E) : haeg

Anglo-Saxon or Old English (550 C.E to 1250C.E): hecg, hegge, haga, hecge or hege

Middle English (11th century and about 1470 C.E): hedge, hegge, hedgen, heggen

Suffolk dialect (at least 1300 C.E. to present day): hetch

Modern English (1550 C.E to modern day): hedge

Middle English hagathorn meaning “hedge thorn” becomes the modern hawthorn

Old Teutonic stem haja- meaning “behind the hedge” gives rise to the Old English haja, Middle English heye, haye and thus the English hay. Behind the hedge lays the hay field.

The old words for hedge also gave rise to the words hawk (hedge-bird), haggard, edge and hag (witch).

Old English for hedgerow is heggeræw.

Saxon haegtessa and the Old English haegtesse, roughly translates to hedge-rider, hag-rider, witch and witch-fury.

In a 13^th century Icelandic text called the Poetic Edda, we find a long poem called Hávamál, and in that poem the god Odin recites a list of Rune-spells he has learned while hanging upon the World Tree (axis mundi). This part of the Hávamál has come to be called the Song of Spells. The tenth of these spells particularly interests and inspires Hedgewitches. There are many translations of this verse; here are four of them.

For the tenth I know,
if I see troll-wives
sporting in air,
I can so operate
that they will forsake
their own forms,
and their own minds.

~ Benjamin Thorpe

A tenth I know: when at night the witches
ride and sport in the air,
such spells I weave that they wander home
out of skins and wits bewildered.

~ Olive Bray

If I see the hedge-riders magically flying high,
I can make it so they go astray
Of their own skins, and of their own souls.
~ Nigel Pennick

A tenth I know, what time I see
House-riders* flying on high;
So can I work, that wildly they go,
Showing their true shapes,
Hence to their own homes.

~ Henry Adams Bellows

* House-riders: witches, who ride by night on the roofs of houses, generally in the form of wild beasts.

From these translations we can infer that a Hedgewitch or Hedgerider is thus a person with some shamanic qualities. They can ‘ride’, as in travel through and over, the boundary of this world and into the Otherworld. They can leave the “enclosure” or “hedge” of their own body, experience soul-flight and send their spirits to wander in the night. It would also seem that Odin has the power to confuse their spirit flight and to return them back to their own bodies.

During the Middle Ages hedge begins to be used prefixed with other words to denote something that is born in, or belonging to, the outlying hedges or woods. Something or someone mean, base, low, odd, outlandish, an outsider. Such as hedge-priest, hedge-press, hedge-vicar.

The Raubritter or the robber barons in Germany during the late Middle Ages were sometimes called hedge-knights and even referred to themselves as hedge-riders. They were no doubt referring to the fact that they rode on horses amongst the hedgerows. These knights would descend from their fortified homes and prey upon the peasant class, raiding their cattle, robbing them and even holding people for ransom. Ernest F. Henderson in “A Short History of Germany” writes: “The knights themselves only saw the humorous side of the matter, and gloried in such names as “hedge-rider”, “highwayman,” “bush-clapper,” “pocket-beater,” and “snap-cock.” “

Now we must fast forward to the surge of interest in solitary Wicca, Paganism and Witchcraft takes off in the 1980s and sky rockets, we see more and more books and classes available on the subject as the years go by. The introduction of the internet insures that solitary practice is here to stay.

Ronald Hutton in his “The Triumph of the Moon” writes: “Alongside coven-based pagan witchcraft there appeared at the end of the 1980s a formally constituted strain which catered for the solitary practitioner. It was largely given identity by the West Country writer Rae Beth, who standardized for people the delightful term of ‘hedge witch’.”

It would seem the people who began to use the term Hedgewitch as a solitary Wiccan practitioner were looking at the usage of hedge from the Middle Ages. They were inspired by such terms as hedge-preacher but had not gone even further back in the history of the word.

During all this we also see a burgeoning interest in home based practice, as well as the nature oriented Witchcraft movement. Terms such as Kitchenwitch, Hearthwitch, Cottagewitch, Greenwitch all start gaining popularity. By the early 1990 you begin to see more and more fictional character called Hedgewitches in fantasy and other genres. In 1994, the now defunct Association of Solitary Hedgewitches (ASH) was established as a contact organisation for solitary Witches to network.

In the 1990s an interest in shamanic traditions also begins to grow tremendously within the Pagan and Witchcraft communities. We also begin to see more and more references to shamanic practices as a part of Hedgewitchery. Even Llewellyn Publications jumps on the bandwagon, adding to its “Witchcraft Today” series a book by Chas Clifton called “Shamanism and Witchcraft Today” wherein the Hedgewitch and Hedge-rider make appearances. Once we reach the year 2000 the term Hedgewitch has grown to mean not only a solitary witch but also one who practices shamanism, herbalism and who is typically found in wild and rural areas.

In the year 2000 Eileen Holland writes in “The Wicca Handbook”: “Hedgewitch: a walker-between-worlds, a non-Wiccan witch with a shamanistic path.”

In “Being a pagan: Druids, wiccans, and witches today” by Ellen Evert Hopman and Lawrence Bond, written in the year 2001, a self proclaimed Hedgewitch named Deborah Ann Light speaks about her practice: “A Hedge Witch is a Witch who lives in the country. We collect things. We wander the roads and byways and gather what we find caught in brambles and under rock and in the roots of trees.”

At this point Traditional Witchcraft and other Non-Wiccan forms of Witchcraft had begun to gain popularity. Once reclusive, more and more Traditional Witches write books and create websites, stepping into the limelight for the first time. These Witches lay claim to the word Hedgewitch, saying that it has always meant a shamanic practitioner of folk magick. That it is a Path within Traditional Witchcraft, and the usage of the term for a solitary Wiccan to be incorrect. Proving the claim that Hedgewitch was used by Traditional Witches prior to Rae Beth’s writing in 1990 is impossible unfortunately, due to the very fact that there is no written evidence. Traditional Witchcraft is secretive and the practitioners often oath bound into silence.

What we do know however is that the voices of the Traditional Witchcraft community were heard and the usage of the term Hedgewitch began to sift back into a definition more in keeping with what we find in the Havamal.

In a Chapter titled “Dancing on the Edge: Shamanism in Modern Britain” written by Gordon MacLellan from the 2003 work “Shamanism: a reader” edited by Graham Harvey we find: “But we do not have an extant shamanic tradition to draw upon. There are claims for surviving hedge-witch practices, some of the old covens have lasted down the centuries and there are tantalising echoes of still fuller traditions fading with our older generations. Descriptions of the Highland seers sound very like those of entranced shamans. Folk tradition is full of spirit-catchers and witch-bottles and the proper ways of living with the spirit world of Faerie.”

By this time even Rae Beth was correcting and adjusting her original definition of “Hedgewitch” stating that at the time of writing that famous book she had not properly done her research into the history of the word. Her spirits had spoken this word to her and she had applied it to her practice at the time without understanding. Today she is encouraging the growing trend of using “Hedgewitch” to mean a spirit walker, one who knows, a shamanic practitioner of Witchcraft.

“HedgeWitche’s cores practice is centered around the Underworld journey and therefore, around the invoking of trance. There is NO WAY you can enter the Underworld without the alteration of your consciousness, for you will have to experience the inner to access the Underworld. That alteration is done by trance – it is the experience of the inner – without the key of trance, the door will stay fully locked. And so if you want to be a Hedgewitch you need to know how to invoke trance.” From “Hedge-Rider: Witches and the Underworld” by Eric De Vries in 2008

From all this we have the modern English word Hedgewitch. There can be variations in the spelling of this term, such as “Hedgewytch”, some may use all lowercase lettering as well. There are also a few related terms, such as Hedge-Riders, Night Travelers, Myrk-Riders (“myrk” being the old spelling for “murky”, or a kind of darkness), Gandreidh (wand-rider). The old term of Cunning Folk is sometimes used, and also Walkers on the Wind.

Today its exact usage is still being shaped and taking form. The simplest definition would be a Witch whose practice is earth-based, involves the use and study of folk traditions, and is shamanic in nature.

(normally I allow people to steal my stuff, but not this please!)

It seems my rather controversial article  “Where Have All the Gardners and Crowleys Gone? (An Answer)”  has made the Top 20 Essays of 2009 on Witchvox! Which is pretty cool, I think they go by number of reads to decide.

I had opened my email box and wondered why I was getting mail about that one again. Good gods, just as the crap from its original posting had blown over … here we go again!

Maybe I should rewrite it for better clarity? (and maybe fix that one typo that drives me up the wall)  Since so many people seemed to choose to take it the wrong way last time, or missed the point entirely …

Nah, fuck them.

http://www.witchvox.com/