Rede of the Wicca

The Wiccan Rede has been around for a long time. It not only outlines our rules, but gives a brief summary of how we live the magical life. This is important stuff; so important, in fact, that I’ve always had my students commit it to memory.

Memorizing this will serve you well, too.

  Bide the Wiccan Law you must, in perfect love and perfect trust.

Live and let live; fairly take and fairly give.

Cast the Circle thrice about, to keep all evil spirits out.

To bind the spell every time, let the spell be spake in rhyme.

Soft of eye and light of touch, speak little and listen much.

Deosil go by the waxing Moon, sing and dance the Witches’ Rune.

Widdershins go when the Moon doth wane, and werewolf howls by the dread wolfsbane.

When the lady’s Moon is new, kiss the hand to her times two.

When the Moon rides at Her peak, then your heart’s desire speak.

Heed the Northwind’s mighty gale, lock the door and drop the sail.

When the wind comes from the South, love will kiss thee on the mouth.

When the Westwind blows o’er thee, departed spirits restless be.

Nine woods in the cauldron go, burn them fast and burn them slow.

Elder be the Lady’s tree – burn it not, or cursed be!

When the Wheel begins a turn, let the Beltane fires burn.

When the Wheel hath turned to Yule, light the log and let Pan rule.

Heed ye flower, bush, and tree, and by the Lady, Blessed Be!

Where the rippling waters flow, cast a stone and truth you’ll know.

Whenever ye have a need, harken not to others’ greed.

With the fool, no seasons spend, nor be counted as his friend.

Merry Meet and Merry Part, bright the cheeks and warm the heart.

When misfortune is enow, wear the Blue Star on your brow.

True in love ever be, unless thy love is false to thee. Eight words the Wiccan Rede fulfil: “An’ it harm none, do what ye will!”

SCRYING:

From the earliest times, people have seen supernatural images in shiny surfaces such as a pool of dark water, a black stone, a concave mirror or a crystal ball set against black velvet. In Tibet, seers sometimes gaze at a wetted thumbnail. The process is called “scrying”, which means, “perceiving”, and it is an art that many magicians aim to master as a way of answering questions about the future. To be able to scry you need to be able to switch off from the distractions of everyday life and enter an altered state of consciousness. It uses the same kind of inner vision as dreams, so you may find that by improving dream recall, scrying gets easier, or conversely if you learn how to scry you will remember your dreams.

 FINDING YOUR RELAXED STATE

To improve your success as scrying, it is necessary to be able to enter a deeply relaxed state, so performing this preparatory exercise might help.

  Find a time and place where you won’t be disturbed for at least half an hour. You will need an upright chair and a notebook and pen for keeping a record – you may wish to use your Book of Shadows or else create another magical diary, which you keep for recording your work with dreams and/or visions.

1.       Sit with your feet flat on the floor or on a thick book so that your knees are at a right angle, and find a comfortable relaxed position. Close your eyes.

2.       Breathe out fully and then, counting at your own speed, breathe in for a count of four. Hold your breath for a count of four, breath out for a count of four, then hold your breath out for another count of four.

3.       Repeat this entire breathing cycle at least 10 times. If you lose count, it will be necessary to start again from the beginning. You may find this pattern difficult, in which case you can try a slower 10 – 5 – 10 – 5. You can count quickly or slowly or, if you can feel your pulse while sitting in a relaxed position, count that.

4.       Focus all your mental attention on breathing slowly and rhythmically, and relaxing physically. Gradually, you will find that this helps you to become calm and focused.

5.       Bring your attention to the scrying glass, and gently open your eyes. You are in your relaxed state and ready to begin crying.

  LEARNING TO SCRY

Scrying is not a skill that you can learn automatically. Like riding a bicycle or swimming, there is a knack to it and it takes time. Practice and concentration. A common mistake in beginners is that they try too hard, which only creates tension. Rather relax, and you will see words, images, still pictures or actions flitting through your mind’s eve, rather like watching a film. The trick is not trying to hold on to what you see, but to let it go.

  After a while, you will find that the film slows down and the images or non-visual concepts remain visible long enough for you to study them. Like remembering dreams, you may need to tell yourself what is happening in order to fix it in your longer-term memory, but it does get easier with practice. You may find that it helps to cast a circle around yourself and the table with the scrying vessel (know as the “speculum”) on it, or that to light a candle and some sweet incense will bring on a more psychically open state of mind. Really it is a matter for patient experimentation to see what works best.

 TRUST WHAT YOU SEE

In order for scrying to work, there must be no distracting reflections on the surface of the object, so the ambient light where you are working should be soft and diffuse. If a vision is to emerge, the mind and body need to still and clamed by a period of quiet contemplation, with the eyes closed so that residual images fade from the retina.

  Once you feel you have reached the right state of mind you are ready to begin into the speculum induces a trance-like state and allows ideas to emerge from the unconscious mind, as they do in dreams.

The first impression may be of a mist, which eventually darkens and resolves into colours, shapes, symbols or complete images. Like the images seen in dreams, these are likely to relate to deep-seated issues and offer information that the conscious mind does not have access to. They may seem inexplicable at first, but become relevant later.

MAKING YOUR OWN SCRYING VESSEL.

Real crystal balls are difficult and expensive to obtain so before you decide whether to get one you can make your own scrying vessel. Use black enamel spray paint to coat the outside of a balloon-shaped wine glass. You may need several coats. Alternatively try scrying in a clear glass bowl of water. You can also make a simple mirror by painting the glass of a picture frame or as follows, using a sheet of black paper.

1.       You will need a picture frame, a piece of black paper and a pair of scissors. Take the frame apart and cut out a piece of black paper to fit. Place the paper in the frame behind the glass and put the frame back together again.

2.       Once the frame is properly secured, polish the glass thoroughly with a soft cloth. Your scrying glass is now ready to use.

  STEPS TO SCRYING.

  You can learn to develop your ability to “see” by following these steps.

1.       Allow yourself to sink into a relaxed state.

2.       Open your eyes to regard the glass, crystal, sphere or other “speculum”.

3.       Look within the glass ignoring any reflections or points of light on its surface.

4.       Sink within if, forming the question in your mind.

5.       In a while, you will find that the glass seems to cloud over, or become dim. Through the mist, a dark patch may appear.

6.       You might find yourself sinking into this dark patch, then picture, signs, numbers, words or other symbols may appear before you. 7.       This will probably not happen in the first experiments you perform but will come with practice.Continue for a number of regular sessions and you will gradually master this ancient and very valuable skill.

Choosing your RITUAL TOOLS

It is perfectly possible to perform spells and rituals using only your body and mind, but using magical props makes the experience easier and more fun.

  Witchcraft is a religion that uses symbols to trigger changes within the psyche of the individual and their environment to work magic.  These may take the form of ritual tools, which help you to engage with the natural world and enhance your most powerful tool – the imagination.  As the roots of witchcraft extend back to the beginning of time, your magical tools are often based on the equipment that humans needed in order to survive in prehistoric times.

  Obtaining your tools.

Forged from natural materials, and often handmade and individually crafted, items such as knives, staffs and clay cups are still used in witchcraft today.  You can purchase these from specialist stockists, but it is equally possible to customise or make your own.  Always consecrate your tools by passing them through the elements and calling on the Goddess to bless them.

  The tools of witch include candles, knives, wands, herbs, chalices, crystals and bells, and much more.

THE TOOLS OF THE MAGIC TRADE

  All ritual tools are linked to an element and connected to folklore.  Some of these are given in the list below.

  WAND

  Wands are tools of fire, made from different types of magical wood.

  The tools of a witch are often linked t elements.

  ATHAME

  The athame is a black handled knife, which is linked to the air element.  A white-handed knife is sometimes used for cutting herbs.

  PENTACLE

  This five-pointed star within a circle can be representative of the earth element.  The five-pointed star – a pentagram – not surrounded by a circle, represents the four elements combined by the fifth element – spirit.

  CHALICE

  The chalice is a tool of water.  Shaped like a goblet, it is used to hold ritual drinks and infusions.

Introducing the magical cycle of life:

  OUR ANCESTORS SAW THE CALENDAR OF OUR DAYS AND HOURS AS MARKING POINTS ON A GREAT WHEEL OF LIFE.

The perpetuation of our species was dependent upon a close relationship with the natural cycles of time: marking the seasons, understanding the pull of the moon, celebrating the power of the sun.  These cycles were seen, poetically, as phases in harmony with the birth, the life, the death, and the rebirth of the goddess, primarily, and of the god too. For a harmonious existence, it was important to shadow these moments – ‘as above, so below’. 

v     WITCHES WORK CLOSEL WITH THE ‘OLD WAY’ OF LOOKING AT THINGS, BECAUSE IT RECOGNISES THE NATURAL RHYTHMS OF THE EARTH, AND THE NATURAL HIGH AND LOW POINTS OF THE SEASONS AND THE PLANETS. Rather than seeing the earth simply as gas and rock and water, it is an invitation to see it still as a mother-nurturer-our home.  To keep the world turning happily, and to encourage the return of the waning sun and the correct behaviour at the dying year, the force of ‘earth magic’ was employed.  This was to caress the little mid-points – like spokes in the wheel of the year – into their next forward movement.

v     THOSE MIDPOINTS ARE THE SOLAR AND THE LUNAR FESTIVALS – OR SABBATS. The Winter Solstice is the shortest day of the year, measuring the happy moment from which the sun will grow stronger again.  This is December 21^st in the northern hemisphere (Yule), and June 21^st in the southern.  At the Spring Equinox, day and night are of equal length – just as they are at the Autumn Equinox.  In the north, the Spring Equinox is March 21^st and the Autumn Equinox is September 21^st, whereas in the southern hemisphere, again, those dates are reversed.  The Summer Solstice, of course, is the longest day – June 21^st for dwellers in the north, and December 21^st for Antipodeans.

v     THE LUNAR FESTIVALS RETAIN THEIR CELTIC NAMES, AND THESE MARK THE MOON’S MOST IMPORTANT CYCLES.  Samhain, also called Hallowe’en, is the start of winter, the Celtic New Year, and it equates to the so-called ‘dark moon’.  This is October 31^st.  Beltane is its opposite, also called ‘May Day’, and celebrates the arrival of summer – the full moon.  This is May 1^st.  Imbolc is the first day of spring – very early spring – and equates to the waxing (or growing) moon.  This is February 1^st.  Its co-ordinate point is August 1^st, the festival Lughnasadh (pronounced ‘loonassa’), which initiates the start of the autumnal moon, or the waning moon.  In the southern hemisphere, these dates are also reversed.  The Christian names of Lammas (for Lughnasadh) and Candlemas (for Imbolc) may be more familiar.

  The Purpose of these notes is to help you unlock the meaning and purpose of PAGAN and pre-CHRISTIAN celebratory days, and indeed the entire calendar year, as they have affected the ideas behind Wicca and Witchcraft. This way you can connect the significance of your magic with its ideological origins, and work it most easily in accordance with its design.  Celebrating and recognising the earth’s cycle through the year is a rich tradition handed down from our ancestors, which has been evolving since the dawn of time.  Whilst I would be the first to agree that much ‘magical’ practice does indeed stem from superstitious ideas and fears, I personally feel that magic is an expression of our inner psyche.  This could be described as a sense of wonder at the light of the moon and the sun, an awareness of their individual impacts on our own behaviour, and an acknowledgement of the importance of seasons and cycles.  Working with that knowledge we can survive seasonal, climatic and personal difficulties by adopting a particular frame of mind.

  As we now scientifically recognise the existence of S.A.D. (Seasonal Adjustment Disorder), we can comprehend the attention paid to the seasons, and the celebratory rituals designed to mark the darkest and coldest or longest and hottest – days, that our ancestors felt compelled to enact. We understand what they were experiencing.  Indeed, I believe that much of the ritual of the past acted as a form of communal treatment for what we might now call the tensions and stresses of life.  And so, too, magical forces are most potent when the rivers run highest, or the sun beats strongest, or the storms strike hardest.  Some spell making and mind-focus works on a high solar energy, some on lower, and likewise with the moons.

  There are Traditional Spells and Tasks associated with the Unfolding of the Year, so that You Can Work Magic on a Regular Basis Throughout the Year.  We will look at the significance of each day of the week, and of each moon; we will celebrate the seasons with appropriate activity and spell-making, and we will work rituals at each proper sabbat.  This is easy to do, and only takes a short time to become a part of one’s life.

  Finally, We Will Look at our Own Individual Calendars – Observing Magical Ways by which we can recognise and enshrine those dates that mean something to us individually. These will include blessing a new home and even choosing the best day to move; celebrating an engagement or anniversary; or finding a ‘witchy’ and magical way to mark the birth of a child, or their name day.

  TOGETHER We Can Quietly Inject Magic Into All the Days of Our Lives. Surviving Low Tides and Riding Triumphant on High Ones. We will carry our own inner sunshine through wintry chill, and keep cool and relaxed with magical awareness through the sun’s zenith at high summer.  We will dream brightly under a Beltane moon, and send mysterious thoughts on a watery, waning one.  We will love close to the earth’s pulse, and borrow from its resistance. En route, perhaps, we will have learned how to live in greater harmony with the earth and our neighbours, and we will understand how to admire her amazing treasures, and use them more wisely.

  :Rainbows of Blessings.

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·                 Are you willing to learn!

·                 Leave a message for me, with your e-mail address on this page.I will teach you if you are willing to practise magic.