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_Gandalf
Guest
I don’t happen to have any historical references off hand so I’ll have to look into that.
- Status
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Whitacre_Girl
Guest
_Gandalf_:
The problem here is that Christianity doesn’t allow for different interpretations for the divine because the divine has been revealed as God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. Scripture states several times, very clearly that the Lord God is ONE, and that there are no gods beside him (that is, there are no other gods, and there are no equal gods). There is also explanation that any power that manifests itself to detract glory away from the Triune God, is a deception of Satan.
To define “deception of Satan” I want to make it clear that this does not mean “bad” as deceptions of Satan. As described from Christianity, deceptions can appear to be good and wholesome things. Take for example the movement of agnosticism or atheism. There is no God, so it is up to us to make heaven on Earth by loving one another. This is a wonderful thing and has its roots in Christian concept (love one another) but is twisted just enough (there is no God) to detract people from God himself.
Arguing outside of Christian dogma and digging into the philosophical, we seem to be approaching the divine from two wholle different ways. If you approach wicca (I assume that is your path, correct me if I am wrong) the same way I did, then you probably see the divine as an entity rather shrouded and wrapped in mystery. It is not fully revealed, so it allows for differences in interpretation (Hinduism, Christianity, Judaism, Animism, Pantheism etc…) whereas my approach (and fundamental belief) is that the divine is able to be fully understood, and has been fully revealed. The divine reveals himself in his creation, and through that spirit that we feel and experience. I have no doubt that you yourself have felt the brush of the divine (Holy Spirit) but interpret that a different way. In my philosophy, this would be an error. In your philosophy, this is acceptable. Again, correct me if I am wrong!!
Basically, I live by this rule when it comes to that:
Are you going to believe the best about the people you don’t know and love them, or are you going to believe the worst about strangers and judge them. What kind of person do you think Jesus wants you to be?
I do feel a genuine sadness that you have encountered this. It is my hope that you don’t judge Jesus by his followers. Remember, he is perfect, we are all sinners!! I really love what Ghandi said about this:
“I like your Christ, but I do not like your Christians. They are so unlike your Christ.”
I also hope you can forgive my many spelling errors and weird logic. I just got back from a long camping/hiking trip and feeling a little tired and sunburned!
You make a good point, and I have often thought of this before. Let me restate what I think you are saying, to make sure that we are indeed talking about the same thing. It seems to me that you are saying that what we are seeing is the same deity, but different ways. I recognize the divine as the Trinity, you recognize that same divine as God, Goddess, and Universal Power. Almost as different facets of the same gem. If this isn’t right, feel free to correct!
The problem here is that Christianity doesn’t allow for different interpretations for the divine because the divine has been revealed as God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. Scripture states several times, very clearly that the Lord God is ONE, and that there are no gods beside him (that is, there are no other gods, and there are no equal gods). There is also explanation that any power that manifests itself to detract glory away from the Triune God, is a deception of Satan.
To define “deception of Satan” I want to make it clear that this does not mean “bad” as deceptions of Satan. As described from Christianity, deceptions can appear to be good and wholesome things. Take for example the movement of agnosticism or atheism. There is no God, so it is up to us to make heaven on Earth by loving one another. This is a wonderful thing and has its roots in Christian concept (love one another) but is twisted just enough (there is no God) to detract people from God himself.
Arguing outside of Christian dogma and digging into the philosophical, we seem to be approaching the divine from two wholle different ways. If you approach wicca (I assume that is your path, correct me if I am wrong) the same way I did, then you probably see the divine as an entity rather shrouded and wrapped in mystery. It is not fully revealed, so it allows for differences in interpretation (Hinduism, Christianity, Judaism, Animism, Pantheism etc…) whereas my approach (and fundamental belief) is that the divine is able to be fully understood, and has been fully revealed. The divine reveals himself in his creation, and through that spirit that we feel and experience. I have no doubt that you yourself have felt the brush of the divine (Holy Spirit) but interpret that a different way. In my philosophy, this would be an error. In your philosophy, this is acceptable. Again, correct me if I am wrong!!
None taken!
I don’t want to speak ill for others, but I feel it is our highest calling as Christian to always give the benefit of the doubt. I’ve said this on other threads, and had some…well, interesting responses.
Basically, I live by this rule when it comes to that:
Are you going to believe the best about the people you don’t know and love them, or are you going to believe the worst about strangers and judge them. What kind of person do you think Jesus wants you to be?
I do feel a genuine sadness that you have encountered this. It is my hope that you don’t judge Jesus by his followers. Remember, he is perfect, we are all sinners!! I really love what Ghandi said about this:
“I like your Christ, but I do not like your Christians. They are so unlike your Christ.”
While I wish this was true, I am very sad to report that sometimes it is not. I myself have encountered a lot of issues with Christians and even other Catholics. There are threads on this too; we are not perfect. I think we are all trying though. I just wish, again, that you don’t feel as though you can honestly and openly state your beliefs. I do think that while you will encounter opposition and frustration more for them, the lack of charity you experience is likely the same amount that I experience, or any other catholic. There are people who struggle with that just like the rest of us struggle with different things.
I admit, I got hooked on the movies. They were epic. After watching them to the point of memorization for a few years, I decided to read the books. I should get a good start on them when I start up school again and regularly hit the gym. I LOVE reading, and especially love it when I’m on the ellipticals!!
I also hope you can forgive my many spelling errors and weird logic. I just got back from a long camping/hiking trip and feeling a little tired and sunburned!
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_Gandalf
Guest
Well I’m actually surprised. Not only have you thought about this before you also seen to get what I’m talking about.
Thanks for the clarification, I had never thought of it that way. However in my opinion agnostics are religiously lazy, they don’t want to pick sides just in case they get it wrong. And plus you can logically prove that there is a higher power. Actually I think one of your saints did that. I’m not sure though, but I bet if I’m right then you will be able to supply the info (and if I’m wrong of course you’ll just let me know).
As a matter of fact I do not specifically follow Wicca (If you want to be picky I guess I would be a Solitary-Celtic, but that isn’t an official term), however many of the principals are the same.
Here however I have to ask, do you really believe that “The divine”, as you have named it, has been fully relieved to us? Do you believe that we are even capable of grasping the entirety of the higher power(s)? I don’t know about you but I personally think we can not. We are talking about the maker(s) of the universe, which is vast beyond any human reckoning! We can’t comprehend our solar system in its completeness and you think we can understand the being(s) that have created the whole universe? I don’t mean to sound rude, but that makes no sense to me.
I work under the belief that we can’t understand the completeness of (the) God(s). And because of that I am rather excepting of other beliefs, because chances are no one belief is correct, but many different ones have many different parts of truth to them. They are focused at the same thing its just how they are going about it. And I might be wrong about this, but don’t Catholics have what they call “The deposit of faith”? My understanding of it is that Catholics believe only some things have been told to them (what they need to know). I might be wrong about all of this, but that makes it sound like you know there is something that you don’t know. And also (I don’t mean to over-elaborate here, I’m just trying to clarify this) don’t you believe that God is infinite? Being finite in nature we cannot posses a true understanding of infinity, so how can we posses a true understanding of (the) God(s)?
I happen to like Ghandi, he was a great man. He has proven for the world that you do not need violence to prove your point.
I would recommended using Firefox, that will help your spelling. On the subject of camping though I feel the urge to congratulate you again. It is a good thing to do, and sadly it is not often done.
This is vaguely on the subject of camping though so I thought I would throw it out there for you. How do you act when you are in church? Despite your belief that God is everywhere you are always more respectful when you actually in church. Now imagine for me what it would be like if you where always in church, if your church was the universe. I believe that the whole universe is an embodiment of the God and Goddess, so I value the whole universe. I feel no need to lock myself in a building for an hour every week to feel in contact with my religion, the signs of life all around me every day is enough. Life is the most beautiful thing that has been created, so why lock yourself away from all of it when you worship?
PS: I had to delete some of the sections I had in here that were in response to your post (I’m starting to get really annoyed at that character limit), so if I missed something, I probably didn’t, I just couldn’t fit it on.
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Whitacre_Girl
Guest
Thank you.
I do know there was a saint who did that. Forgive me for not knowing who it was and how. It’s been a few years since I took Church History, and I need a refresher. I do know there was a saint, Pascal, I think, who had a wager. Basically the idea is there are pretty much 4 outcomes to following Christianity or not:
- God exists and you believed in and followed him: You receive the eternal reward.
- God exists and you did not follow him: Because you rejected Christ’s saving power, your likely to receive punishment for your sins in the afterlife (hell)
- God did not exist, but you followed him: You likely led a life with joy, peace, and had no major issues of conscience. You die in peace, and afterwards, there is nothing.
- God did not exist, and you didn’t follow him: Chances are you spent a lot of your life living in confusion or discontent, and die scared. Then there is nothing.
That’s good to know. I’ll remember that!
This is my fault, I should have been more clear. When I mean fully revealed, I meant that the personhood of God (his identity) is fully revealed, that is, we can know who he is. As to his nature, scripture points out time and again that he is all loving, benevolent, and just. However, his nature is pure love, and pure justice. This means that we will never understand his actions or personality because none of us can ever experience or understand pure love and justice because we are fallen. Basically, I feel that I have a fairly close (although I hate to say that because I am so aware of my sin) relationship with Christ. I know enough to know that I know nothing about the bounds of his love, forgiveness, patience, and justice.
I really love camping! I try to go as often as I can. I love hiking, and enjoy the splendor of creation. I don’t, however, care for sunburns! haha. Anyway, you make a good point about church. I think some people see it that way, but I see church in a way that is a little different. God is indeed everywhere. I experience his presense on the trail when climbing a mountain, and I experience it in church. The thing that sets church apart for me is the Eucharist. This is a time, according to my Catholic faith, that Christ becomes physically present. Also, church is set as a time for worship. Yes, I pray and worship and praise God for his creation when I go camping, hiking, fishing, kyaking, whatever. But in church it is a time set apart especially for worship. It’s very helpful to me because others are gathered with me to worship, there is teaching (homily/sermon), and the design of the building is geared to remind me of many things that God has done (stained glass windows, paintings, statues, crucifix, etc.) I’m also an artistic person, so there you go. It just helps me more, especially the music! (I’m a musician).
The point of church really is to gather together with others, worship, and experience Christ in the Eucharist. It’s a blessing to me, and a good retreat. It’s refreshing to the soul. So is camping in its own right. Basically, I see church as being more for us than it is for God. I also think you’ll find very few Christians who experiece God only in the church. The church is a teaching/meeting place. We experience the Trinity in everything. Heck, I’ve had moments where I was stuck in rush hour traffic and had an experience with Christ. Helped me not get mad at the traffic!
As for spelling, I am a pretty good speller, I just get lazy when I’m tired. LOL
I understand about the character limit! I had to shave down my reply!
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Gabriel_of_12
Guest
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_Gandalf
Guest
No problem, its my pleasure to finally talk to someone who seems to have their priorities straight (not that the rest of you don’t of course).
I would agree with this completely.
Personally the thing that has always bugged me about Christian religions as a whole is that they are always trying to define God with words. How can words possibly come close to describing a God? Thats another thing that doesn’t make sense to me.
I love any outdoor activity, it’s always a fun thing to do. However I do happen to get sunburns with amazing ease (some people claim I’ve gotten “moon burns” before, but I’ve never confirmed that), so I always try to use some really good sun lotion first.
What about the design of the planet and all of the things on it? Those are certainly the most wonderful achievements made by (the) God(s) that we can easily see. And what about the artistry of nature? The sheer beauty of what is out there! You can see things as intricate as a beehive (many near perfect hexagons stacked together), to things as fascinating as fractals (a shape that repeats the whole), to things as intellectual as pi (it does seem to crop up everywhere. And btw pi is actually my favorite number). And you like music? How about the sound of the birds singing! The wind blowing through the grass and trees! Or the rain poring down to the ground, nourishing everything there! These sounds are more beautiful than any sound man can make. At least they are to me.
Haha, I’m a terrible speller.
PS: Unfortunately I have realized something. Our current discussion is more than a bit off topic, so I’ve come to the decision that it probably shouldn’t be here. This makes me sad because I have loved reading your posts and making/sending replies, but there is an easy solution. We should be able to continue this topic in private messages so that way we wont have posts that are not directly related to the the topic (we have strayed kind of far form defining evil lol). If you are amiable to this all you have to do is shoot me a pm and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can. However if for some reason you do not like this plan I’m perfectly okay with posting here, I’m not an administrator on this forum.
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_Gandalf
Guest
Here I’m afraid we can’t see eye to eye. Creation itself is not sacred by its own means, but it is an embodiment of the God and Goddess (but not the God and Goddess, only an embodiment), so it is to be treasured. We have the responsibility to look after what has been given us, but not worship it. Also self-worship is an incredibly feeble religious concept that is built solely on egotism and pride, and has no place in a religion such as mine.
How about the official opinion on why Witchcraft is evil? I think that would do the trick for now.
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Gabriel_of_12
Guest
What you have described below has nothing to do with Catholicism nor the religion of Christianity in general. All of creation both visible and invisible reveal Our God the creator of heaven and earth. God created man after He created heaven and earth, and gave man the earth to subdue and tend the earth as its master gardner. It is the angels of God who obey God’s will in the elements of the universe not Witches or man made ideologies. These are left up to the providence of God never man or Sorcerers.
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Whitacre_Girl
Guest
I just saw this and I wanted to address one point:
Yes, but no more so than any other religion that involves the worship of false gods. The idea that witchcraft is any more evil than any other religion that doesn’t follow God is based off of cultural stigmas than Christian belief IMHO. It doesn’t matter if the god you follow is the Goddess of paganism, Gaia, or The Great Spirit. The point is, you are not following Yahweh. Just like with (and I don’t mean this to detrack the thread) homosexuality is a sexual sin, just as fornication is. Yet we, as christians, are more likely to accept those living in fornication sins more than those living in homosexual sins due to cultural stigma more than the sin itself.
It doesn’t matter if you are following a false god or no god at all. It doesn’t matter if you are a fornicator, a murderer, a rapist, a contraceptor, a liar, or a traitor. If you are not following God and loving him with all your heart, THAT is what gets counted. That’s kind of the whole point of my signature. It’s about the heart. The severety of the sin fades when one is choosing not to follow God.
So I would make the case that according to Christian belief as it is laid down, Witchcraft is not more evil (or the worship of false gods) than any other religion/sin when one isn’t following God. It’s simply the cultural stigma that causes the discomfort.
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Noesis
Guest
If I may, Gandalf, I would like to reply to this, despite not being Catholic.
As I understand, within the Christian paradigm there is the perception that anything which you or I would define as ‘magick’, is at its source a non-human capacity. Since this is the case, whenever a person indulges in magick, they are relying (if their rites are to ‘work’) upon a spiritual being which is more powerful than they.
A basis of this can be seen in the esoteric literature of past centuries, in the grimoires which defined certain spiritual beings as demons, and attempted to show methods of controlling them so that they will do a magicians bidding. From this source came the magickal orders of the 19th century, which in turn bred the earliest incarnation of modern witchcraft.
Given such a context, it is therefore no surprise that a common perception arose in Christian circles, that witchcraft has a very high correlation to what, in essence, is a communion with demonic powers. Of course, any Christian can be excused for finding this to be evil.
But the history of Western Occultism is not something which the average Christian will be familiar with, and I hope that it is clear that their views will nonetheless be informed by this history, even if they do not understand the origin of their views, which of course they have learned from others.
There is another aspect of all of this which I feel is important, and that is the phenomenon of conversion stories from allegedly ex-occultists.
The internet is rife with pages and stories of people who have claimed to have had all sorts of Occultic experience, which they later abandoned for the truth of Christianity. Such people use their stories to convince others to likewise convert, as they themselves had.
A common thread in these stories which I have noted, is the claim about the inner court of witchcraft. If you are unfamiliar with this sort of thing, I would like to simply state that witchcraft has two aspects to its teaching: there is the outer court, which is the sort of stuff that fills the pages of ‘101’ type books, and which people on TV might discuss; and then there is the inner court, which is something only accessible to the initiates of specific groups of witches. This part of their stories is, in my opinion, a fact; adult witches who take pride in being involved with traditional covens regularly attest to this reality.
The claim about the inner court of witchcraft, however, is simply that its central rites are all devoted to worship and communion with the horned god, and that his inner court persona is basically identical to the Christian Satan. Such inner court teachings are absolutely secret, and the people telling the conversion stories claim to have been initiated into such mysteries, and have in effect become whistle-blowers.
So yes, I believe that this to helps to create the image that witchcraft, whatever the mainstream view of it is, is at its heart a religion which is devoted to worship of a very dark god.
The works of people like Andrew Chumbley, and books like Call of the Horned Piper, Book of Fallen Angels or Pillars of Tubal-Cain, certainly provide ‘evidence’ for people who wish to create a stigma surrounding witchcraft, and who wish to argue against people who insist that witchcraft is only ever light, happy, and loving.
As I understand, within the Christian paradigm there is the perception that anything which you or I would define as ‘magick’, is at its source a non-human capacity. Since this is the case, whenever a person indulges in magick, they are relying (if their rites are to ‘work’) upon a spiritual being which is more powerful than they.
A basis of this can be seen in the esoteric literature of past centuries, in the grimoires which defined certain spiritual beings as demons, and attempted to show methods of controlling them so that they will do a magicians bidding. From this source came the magickal orders of the 19th century, which in turn bred the earliest incarnation of modern witchcraft.
Given such a context, it is therefore no surprise that a common perception arose in Christian circles, that witchcraft has a very high correlation to what, in essence, is a communion with demonic powers. Of course, any Christian can be excused for finding this to be evil.
But the history of Western Occultism is not something which the average Christian will be familiar with, and I hope that it is clear that their views will nonetheless be informed by this history, even if they do not understand the origin of their views, which of course they have learned from others.
There is another aspect of all of this which I feel is important, and that is the phenomenon of conversion stories from allegedly ex-occultists.
The internet is rife with pages and stories of people who have claimed to have had all sorts of Occultic experience, which they later abandoned for the truth of Christianity. Such people use their stories to convince others to likewise convert, as they themselves had.
A common thread in these stories which I have noted, is the claim about the inner court of witchcraft. If you are unfamiliar with this sort of thing, I would like to simply state that witchcraft has two aspects to its teaching: there is the outer court, which is the sort of stuff that fills the pages of ‘101’ type books, and which people on TV might discuss; and then there is the inner court, which is something only accessible to the initiates of specific groups of witches. This part of their stories is, in my opinion, a fact; adult witches who take pride in being involved with traditional covens regularly attest to this reality.
The claim about the inner court of witchcraft, however, is simply that its central rites are all devoted to worship and communion with the horned god, and that his inner court persona is basically identical to the Christian Satan. Such inner court teachings are absolutely secret, and the people telling the conversion stories claim to have been initiated into such mysteries, and have in effect become whistle-blowers.
So yes, I believe that this to helps to create the image that witchcraft, whatever the mainstream view of it is, is at its heart a religion which is devoted to worship of a very dark god.
The works of people like Andrew Chumbley, and books like Call of the Horned Piper, Book of Fallen Angels or Pillars of Tubal-Cain, certainly provide ‘evidence’ for people who wish to create a stigma surrounding witchcraft, and who wish to argue against people who insist that witchcraft is only ever light, happy, and loving.
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_Gandalf
Guest
I’m afraid you don’t understand what I was saying. I should have been more clear on that, so I will rectify my mistake by clarifying it now.
In your first post you said this:
What I said in my reply to your post was not about my opinion of Catholicism or Christianity, it was a reply about your opinions on Witchcraft or Paganism, which seem to be just as flawed as you appear to think my opinions of Catholicism and Christianity are. But now to move on to Whitacre_Girls post:
Well… I’m not exactly feeling the love. But I do want to point out that Gaia is a name often used to refer to the Goddess. They are the same, it just depends on your cultural preference. And just FYI the Great Spirit is also a name used in Paganism.
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_Gandalf
Guest
Well I have to thank you for the information, some of that was new for me. And it most certainly topped my post along the same lines.
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Noesis
Guest
Thank you for taking the time to read my thoughts.
If I may add something: Gaia is a *protogenos *, or primeval deity, of the ancient Greeks. Every aspect of this deity as it was described by those peoples, differs from the way in which the modern Wiccans and their denominations should like to describe her. She was never, for example, some sort of universal deity of the feminine, who wore masks which could be called by names of other goddesses. May I ask you something, then? Upon whose authority do such witches distort the nature of Gaia to fit into their own theology?
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_Gandalf
Guest
Pardon me, my mistake. I personally don’t use the name Gaia, and not following Greek Paganism I am not overly familiar with Gaia. I did however make the assumption that that it was at least similar to my belief of the Goddess, so I pointed that out in my post.
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Gabriel_of_12
Guest
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_Gandalf
Guest
So your saying that a mortal sin is not evil?
This is however your churches opinion on the nature of evil (as well as Witchcraft). Your statement about the Catholic church being a messenger for God doesn’t hold much sway over one who does not follow your belief system.
Well yeah, Witchcraft is pagan. That kind of goes without saying.
Once again I’m afraid we have the problem that your statement only holds true to someone who follows your beliefs. My religion, by default, can not have an issue with itself. I would have to accept your religion in order for their to be an issue with mine. And as I said in my original post, I’m not interested in converting.
Hey, knowledge is awesome.
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DrDave
Guest
I’d like to offer a few thoughts on the subject.
If one takes a Catholic view of the supernatural, (which I do ) there is one and only one God, (Though He exists as three persons within that one Godhead) There are angels (created beings of pure spirit in perfect alignment with God) there are the saints (spirits of people who have died in friendship with God and are now in perfect alignment with God) and the souls in purgatory (spirits of people who have died in friendship with God who are in the process of becoming perfectly aligned with God) We might refer to all of these as ‘the good guys’.
The ‘bad guys’ are the demons/devils (essentially the same kind of beings as the angels but who have chosen to reject God) and the souls of those who have died outside of Gods friendship.
When someone seeks supernatural assistance (through prayer, incantation or otherwise) they are seeking the assistance of one (or more) of these beings. (or a figment of their imagination.) If they then receive supernatural assistance, then we can rule out the possibility that it came from their imagination.
As others have noted, Christianity is a revealed religion. Thus if the Christian becomes aware of supernatural forces at work, they can ‘test’ the origin of these forces against that which is revealed. If the phenomena does not contradict what has been revealed of how God chooses manifest His power in the world, then we are permitted to speculate that what has been observed is what we would call a miracle. If the supernatural phenomena is contrary to what has been revealed, then the automatic assumption is that the beings behind those phenomena are ‘the bad guys’ This is where, I suspect the attribution of ‘devil worship’ comes from. I.e. if it’s not coming from ‘our’ God, then the devil/s are the only other possibility that our belief system allows for.
A second (and not necessarily related) thought is that ‘witchcraft’ has also been traditionally associated with potion making. Right from the start, the Church, following the tradition of the Jews before them, have had a very negative view of those people (traditionally depicted as older women) who mix potions that can be used to cause a miscarriage, or to put it into modern terms, a medical abortion (not unlike ru486) these kind of potions have been around for millenia, and I suspect are the root behind the more innocuous legends of ‘love potions’,
I did have a third thought when I started typing but it must have gone fishing while waiting for my fingers to catch up to this point.
if it comes back I’ll let you know.
Regards Doc
If one takes a Catholic view of the supernatural, (which I do
) there is one and only one God, (Though He exists as three persons within that one Godhead) There are angels (created beings of pure spirit in perfect alignment with God) there are the saints (spirits of people who have died in friendship with God and are now in perfect alignment with God) and the souls in purgatory (spirits of people who have died in friendship with God who are in the process of becoming perfectly aligned with God) We might refer to all of these as ‘the good guys’.The ‘bad guys’ are the demons/devils (essentially the same kind of beings as the angels but who have chosen to reject God) and the souls of those who have died outside of Gods friendship.
When someone seeks supernatural assistance (through prayer, incantation or otherwise) they are seeking the assistance of one (or more) of these beings. (or a figment of their imagination.) If they then receive supernatural assistance, then we can rule out the possibility that it came from their imagination.
As others have noted, Christianity is a revealed religion. Thus if the Christian becomes aware of supernatural forces at work, they can ‘test’ the origin of these forces against that which is revealed. If the phenomena does not contradict what has been revealed of how God chooses manifest His power in the world, then we are permitted to speculate that what has been observed is what we would call a miracle. If the supernatural phenomena is contrary to what has been revealed, then the automatic assumption is that the beings behind those phenomena are ‘the bad guys’ This is where, I suspect the attribution of ‘devil worship’ comes from. I.e. if it’s not coming from ‘our’ God, then the devil/s are the only other possibility that our belief system allows for.
A second (and not necessarily related) thought is that ‘witchcraft’ has also been traditionally associated with potion making. Right from the start, the Church, following the tradition of the Jews before them, have had a very negative view of those people (traditionally depicted as older women) who mix potions that can be used to cause a miscarriage, or to put it into modern terms, a medical abortion (not unlike ru486) these kind of potions have been around for millenia, and I suspect are the root behind the more innocuous legends of ‘love potions’,
I did have a third thought when I started typing but it must have gone fishing while waiting for my fingers to catch up to this point.
if it comes back I’ll let you know.Regards Doc
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Bob_Crowley
Guest
This business of “good witches” or “white witches” is a modern phenomena. All you’re really doing is fooling around with a modern version of pantheism.
When someone says they’re a witch, the traditional meaning of that is someone who worships the devil. And they exist. For an example get hold of “From Witchcraft to Christ” by Dorothy Irvine. She claimed to be a chief witch, and had certain powers. She converted to Christianity, although I do have a certain hesitation in saying this.
I think I remember my old pastor saying she actually made an appearance at his church on one occasion as a guest speaker. But he said he had this *very deep sense of unease *as he sat there listening to her. He said she hadn’t just been any witch, but a “chief witch”. He wondered what was really going on. But that is a digression.
I remember a pastor on TV years ago who got involved with a coven. He didn’t believe the alleged supernatural rumours, as all he was interested in as a young bloke was sex, and he thought it would be an easy way to get some. But in his own words, “The things I saw happening there convinced me there was a devil, and if there was a devil, there was a God, and I’d better find him, and quick!”
Secondly there is such a thing as truth. If Christ is the Son of God, then God is not going to give His glory to another. Nor will He tolerate deviations from that truth. This is the essence of heresy.
You’re fooling around with spirits that know precisely what they’re doing. And they can be quite dangerous. I remember walking past a young bloke with a display of crystals some years ago. As I got close to him I could see layer after layer of something in his eyes. I went past and turned around, and he gave me this demonic grin. Yet he probably started by thinking it was all quite innocent.
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_Gandalf
Guest
Hmmm… That actually makes sense.
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Yep, it is. However I would like to point out that there are many types of potions. A potion designed to cause an abortion (which incidentally I’m against) probably existed, but there were also many potions that did good things as well.
Gah! I hate it when that happens.
As you may or may not have noticed, I have not used the words “Good” or “White” when referring to Witches or Witchcraft in general. I do agree with you that the names are new, but the concept is very old. Like with everything else, you have (as the Doc pointed out) good guys and bad guys. Some Witches were/are bad people, so they, like every other bad person, do bad things. Some Witches are good people, so they, like other good people, do good things. It’s just like every other group of people you can assemble, some will be good, some will be bad.
There is a huge problem with your statement. We don’t believe in what you call the devil. It is actually impossible for that to be the traditional definition of a Witch, because Witchcraft has been around for far longer than your definition of what the devil is. A witch cannot be defined as someone who worships something they don’t believe in. Someone who worships the devil is called a Satanist, not a Witch.
I tend to automatically look at anyone with skepticism if they have fancy names like “Chief” in front of their title. She was probably in with a certain faction of Witchcraft and was given a title for some reason or another, it does not mean that she had any special powers or that she was particularly gifted. Usually the only people to use words like that are ones who don’t know anything but want to make it look like they do.
And? There are Witches who do bad things and are bad people. Some of them form groups and do bad things together, and usually it goes from bad to worse. What you must understand is that the word “Witch” is similar to the word “Christian” (though it is actually a little more vague than that). Christian isn’t a religion, it describes a branch of religions that have a uniforming belief (In this case, that Jesus was God). So I can’t compare the actions of a Lutheran to the actions of a Catholic because they are both Christian. I would be the first person to tell you that there are some very bad people who practice a form of Witchcraft, however in order for them to be able to do that they first have to distort its very nature.
Circular argument. I can switch it around and use it on you.
Possession can happen, but only if your mixing with the wrong crowd to start with. As the Doc pointed out there are good guys and bad guys. I like to associate myself with the good guys, but some people are lured in by the bad ones.
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Bob_Crowley
Guest
The devil exists, rest assured. If you don’t find that out before you die, you will very shortly thereafter.
- Status