What is a Witch?

By Deborah Birkett

Much of the answer to that question depends on who is asked. Ask a European in the early 1500s and you might hear that a witch is a sexually, morally depraved woman in league with the Devil—a heretic. Ask some Africans and they might tell you that a witch is an unconscious agent of malevolence. Ask a modern witch and she might simply say she regards magic as a normal part of life.

Fear and hatred of witchcraft is ancient; the Bible exhorts readers, "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live." But prior to the emergence of the European witch hunts, a certain degree of tolerance and even respect for witchcraft coexisted with fear and hatred in the Western world. Due to complex political, religious, economic and social factors in Europe and North America, hysteria and panic about witchcraft arose in the fourteenth century, waxing and waning over the next four centuries.

People were subjected to extreme and absurd accusations of sacrilege, heresy, sexual misconduct, violence and destruction. "Confessions" were frequently extracted through torture, and about half of all trials resulted in execution (usually hanging or burning). The number of people executed as witches is grossly exaggerated by some modern writers to as many as 9,000,000; most scholars place the number between 50,000 and 100,000—about three-quarters of which were women. North America's worst outbreak occurred in Salem Village in 1692, where nineteen people were hanged.

Written by Inquisitors Johann Sprenger and Heinrich Krämer, and reprinted more than twenty times, Malleus maleficarum (The Hammer of Witches, 1486) was the most influential witch-hunting manual, a deeply misogynist work which contributed powerfully to the witch craze. This, along with Pope Innocent VIII's condemnation of witchcraft as the worst possible heresy, created an atmosphere of extreme persecution which peaked from approximately 1550-1650.

The decline of witch-hunts and trials is attributed to factors nearly as complex as those giving rise to them. One thing is certain: accusations of witchcraft and ensuing trials, tortures, and punishments are a terrifying expression of profound social tensions. Witch-hunts occur to this day in troubled parts of Africa.

While very negative images of witches persist in popular culture and imagination, witchcraft and the occult began to enjoy a revival in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as a result of books by such authors as folklorist Charles Godfrey Leland, occultist Aleister Crowley, anthropologist Margaret Murray, and classical scholar Robert Graves. Murray's books argued an ancient origin to European witchcraft, with connections to early mystery religions and fertility cults. Largely discredited now, her work was nonetheless very influential.

Modern witchcraft is essentially opposed to the prevailing stereotyped notions of witchcraft as a malevolent approach to achieving any end.

The most significant and controversial book was probably Witchcraft Today, published in 1954 by British author Gerald Gardner, who, inspired by Murray's theories to some extent, asserted that witchcraft was a surviving pagan religion, and that he had been initiated into an English coven. His book was very successful and an understanding of witchcraft as an earth-based religion based on pre-Christian European traditions (particularly Goddess worship) flourished in the receptive counterculture atmosphere of the 1960s. In a time when movements such as feminism and environmentalism were gaining ground and organized religion experienced a decline, the ideas of worshipping nature and the Great Goddess were particularly appealing and easily promulgated.

Gardner and coven member Doreen Valiente established many creative rites for modern witches and are considered by many to be the father and mother of modern witchcraft, or Wicca (from the Old English word wicca, "witch"), as it has become widely known. The great majority of Wiccans today adhere to two primary ethical concepts: the Wiccan Rede, which states, "If it harm none, do as you will," and the Three-Fold Law, which states "Any energy you send out will come back threefold."

Satan is not worshipped; indeed, most Wiccans reject the existence of Satan as a Christian concept not applicable to their religion or worldview. Modern witchcraft is essentially opposed to the prevailing stereotyped notions of witchcraft as a malevolent approach to achieving ends. Contemporary discussions of witchcraft must encompass both the historical understanding of the concept as well as the eclectic and harmless practices and traditions of modern witches.