Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
There are two separate definitions of the term Wicca that have been used in Paganism and Pagan studies since circa 1980. [1] The first developed in England during the 1960s. Broad and inclusive, it covers most, if not all, forms of modern Pagan Witchcraft, especially if they share sufficient theological beliefs and ritual practices to be considered denominations within a common religious movement.
The history of Wicca documents the rise of the Neopagan religion of Wicca and related witchcraft-based Neopagan religions. [a] Wicca originated in the early 20th century, when it developed amongst secretive covens in England who were basing their religious beliefs and practices upon what they read of the historical witch-cult in the works of such writers as Margaret Murray.
The watchtowers were among the Golden Dawn concepts introduced into Wicca by its founder Gerald Gardner. The complicated tablets and Enochian names were largely abandoned, but Wicca retained the watchtowers as "the four cardinal points, regarded as guardians of the Magic Circle." [6] They are usually mentioned during the casting of the circle.
Articles relating to Wicca, a modern Pagan religion. Scholars of religion categorise it as both a new religious movement and as part of the occultist stream of Western esotericism. It was developed in England during the first half of the 20th century and was introduced to the public in 1954 by Gerald Gardner, a retired British civil servant.
The 1734 Tradition is a form of traditional witchcraft founded by the American Joseph Bearwalker Wilson in 1973, after developing it since 1964. It is largely based upon the teachings he received from an English traditional witch named Robert Cochrane, the founder of Cochrane's Craft, and from Ruth Wynn-Owen, whom he called the matriarch of Y Plant Bran ("the child of Bran").
Charles Cardell (1895–1977) was an English Wiccan who propagated his own tradition of witchcraft, the Old Tradition, which was distinct from that of Gerald Gardner.Cardell's tradition of Wicca venerated a form of the Horned God known as Atho and worked with a coven that met on the grounds of his estate in Surrey.
A covenstead is a meeting place of a coven (a group of witches). [1] The term relates specifically to the meeting place of witches within certain modern religious movements such as Wicca that fall under the collective term Modern Paganism, also referred to as Contemporary Paganism or Neopaganism.
This made the Church of Wicca the only federally recognized Wiccan church to have its status as a religion upheld in a federal appeals court. [4] Within the American Wiccan and wider modern pagan community, the Frosts have been at the center of various disputes, particularly surrounding issues such as homosexuality and theology. [10]