Wicca is all there is to witchcraft?

Question

Why is it that most people seem to think ALL witchcraft is Wicca, or that Wicca is all there is to witchcraft? Wicca only goes back 50-60 years. Robert Cochrane was not Wiccan, nor was Andrew D Chumbley or Austin Osman Spare. Yet, both these men belonged to traditions of witchcraft other than Wicca. Could it be that most Wiccans, and the public at large are just ignorant of witchcraft other than the fluffy "Raving Twit" mass rip-off, white-washed stuff you find in most new age shops?

Answer 1

I think that its easier for the media and people that are truly ignorant to the history of witchcraft its easier to put a label on us if they just call it "Wicca". Some of us also should take a look back in history to see where our beliefs were founded. Sometimes I see teenagers who say "I'm a witch, better be afraid." and it really upsets me to think they are doing this only to piss their parents off. Not that every teen witch does that at all but... The mainstream media and part of the public are just ignorant to what a true witch is.

If you are just starting on your path as a witch, please please read the history maybe even find a mentor to question about different paths and traditions. The best weapon is knowledge.
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Blessed Be

Answer 2

NO! Wicca is definitely different than Witchcraft! Wicca has only been around ever since the 1950's but Witchcraft has been around for at least 3,000 years. I'm a Witch...definitely not a Wiccan!

Answer 3

Well, I've been Wiccan since before it was popular, longer than the Scott Cunningham books have existed, and before Silver Ravenwolf got whatever idea into her head to write whatever she thinks she's writing about, and in my experience, you're making an error of proportion....
that is, the vast majority of people don't conflate Wicca and Witchcraft, but those that do do so obnoxiously, and therefore seem like large numbers.

HOWEVER, in the pre-Leek, and more accurately Pre-Murray days in the New Forest and other places the terms Witch and Witchcraft were not used to refer to Familial Magical Traditions (FMTs) but the appropriate language term for the folk practices (pellar, kenner, for example) were used.

The use of the words witch and witchcraft to describe these folkways is as much a popularity game as what Ravenwolf has done to Wicca is.

Answer 4

As a practicing witch for nearly 20 years (not Wiccan), I'd have to say give 'em a break.. Wicca has been promoted more in the past 30 years than the craft itself.. when you look at the media attention on Wicca, the books published by companies like llewellyn, and the television shows like "charmed"; not to mention movies like "the craft".. do you really wonder why people associate the two as being one?

Educating the masses isn't really necessary. Personally, I'd prefer they just know we exist and we don't worship "satan" and that they'd leave us alone.

I happen to have a great deal of respect for Wicca.. it's a peaceful path that closely connects to nature.. nothing wrong with that whatsoever... I don't care how young it is.. the world could use more people like that in it.

Answer 5

There's a number of major flaws with your position.

To start off with witchcraft does not equal Wicca, just as not are all Pagans are Wiccan.

Some of the more fluffy element might prefer to believe the continuous spritual connection to the Pre-historic. And to a point they are right - but this connection is as 'real' as the connection to the teachings of JC to the actions of the Hate mongering Fundy.

History has been as cruel to indigenous European spirituality as it has been to any conquered Indigenous culture elsewhere on the planet. Just it's been going on longer in Europe for 700 odd years.

All the founders of Wicca have done is to try & recreate that spirituality, and it's no difference to the many differnt attempts of any indigenous group to recreate their culture that'd been destroyed by "Stolen Generations" and the like.

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Answer 6

That's right. the wiccan movement has sort of stolen Witchcraft as its own personal property. Wicca is a religion but witchcraft is a craft that spans back to babylonion and sumerian times thousands of years ago. Gardner formed the Wicca movement in the 50's and is white washed with xtain overtones. I embrace forms of witchcraft but i certainly dismiss the Wiccan aspect.

Answer 7

Huh? Most people seem to think ALL witchcraft is Wicca, or that Wicca is all there is to witchcraft?

Really? What makes you think that? I think "most people" know better.

Answer 8

traditionally, the be conscious "witchcraft" grew to become into used to signify evil practices: extremely malevolent magic. workers of benevolent magic could be respected in a community and weren't observed as witches. even regardless of the undeniable fact that, maximum historic witches are fiction. human beings concept they have been executing people who have been magically blighting plant life, inflicting sterility, and so on., yet in reality the victims have been in many cases innocents swept up in a panick hysteria. the admired use of the term "witchcraft" is morally impartial. it extremely is a sort of magic. good and evil comes from how the witch makes use of it. Many, yet no longer all, witches have very stringent ethical policies by utilizing which they artwork. no longer inflicting magical injury is an basic (even regardless of the undeniable fact that no longer absolute) rule between witches. Wicca is a polytheistic, contemporary faith that acnkowledges the existence of magic yet would not require useful purposes of its use (i.e. spells). Witchcraft is a mystical prepare in many cases specializing in useful purposes. Witches could or won't be non secular and could or won't comprise faith in with their magical ideals. Lord and lady have been initially the Outer courtroom names for the Wiccan deities. people who had no longer yet been initiated does no longer understand the right names of the coven deities yet rather might refer to them in basic terms as Lord and lady. as we communicate, some human beings prefer to easily tackle their deities by utilizing such words, or they use it as a favourite placeholder, recognizing that all of us stick to a Lord and lady, yet their identities selection from Wiccan to Wiccan and coven to coven.

Answer 9

there are so many paths of paganism (and witchcraft) that for even those "in the know" it's hard to keep track. For christians and other monotheists it's very difficult to keep track so they call everything wicca

Answer 10

Wicca is a modern term for an ancient tradition. Used to be, you learned from an elder, either a relative or someone close to you. Nowadays, you can learn from books, from taking courses, from the Internet. How authentic this gets you is open to debate.

I tend to avoid the term Wicca unless I must choose a label and this is the closest fit. Actually, I also avoid the term witch, for similar reasons. It implies much to other people that I do not want to be associated with.

I'm just me.