shiver

Why is the age of a particular 'view' important to the avid pursuit of philosophy or life perspective?

(refer to Infidel Rede post)

Veil of Fire

It can at the very least be traced back to Charles Leland's work on the goddess-cults of the Med. Sea region (particularly Italy). It is indeed older that Gardner (in some form or another; in it's present form, you're absolutely right).

Perhance:
It IS true. Gardner's work involved a lot of cobbling-together of other writings, including Leland, Crowly, and others, as well as some of his own biases (the 'skyclad' bit, for instance). Neopagans are hostile to Thelemites primarily based on the Argument from Undesired Relation: "I don't want to believe my faith is in any way related to THAT!" It's a kissing cousin to "I don't want to believe my great^50-grandpa was a monkey!"

You REALLY wanna piss off a Wiccan, tell them that the 'k' was added to 'magic' by Crowly to make his geomatria fit. Watch the veins in the forehead start to pulse.

Shiver:
It's a blatant Appeal to Tradition, and I try to ignore it. *shrug*

Notice that atheists equally assault religions that have thousands of years of undisputed history. Some days I think they're just grasping at any possible flaw simply to have another reason to discredit, considering that they'd hold Wicca in the same regard if it had a perfectly clear, linear history going back to Methusela's granddaddy.

Karen M

Who said it was?

Perchance

Veil of Fire:

Thanks for confirming the Crowley relation! I've found many more websites insisting that Wicca is in no way related to that evil, nasty Crowley than those pointing out the relation, so I wasn't sure.

Also:

For some (and I would hope most) atheists, at least, I don't think the age of the religion has anything to do with it. Since Wicca does acknowledge the existence of deities, and atheism doesn't, then atheists argue against it for the same reason they argue against any religion: they find the notion of deities incomprehensible, ridiculous, not logically supported, or a variety of other things that are also "wrong" with other religions.

I've never read an atheist argument specifically targeting Neopaganism, though, so I don't know for certain.

-Perchance.

Eudaimonist

Who are the atheists who are criticizing neopaganism because it's not old? I'd say instead that those neo-pagans who want to believe their religion is old when it really isn't are the ones who feel that old implies true.

Technos

If it Harms none, Do what Thou Will!

That's not bad, I've heard it a few thousand times but it's a good philosophy.

Veil of Fire

Perchance: A great informational site, even if it comes across as confrontational, is<a href="http://www.whywiccanssuck.com" target="_blank">This One</a>. Lots of good historical references (although I found to be a bit less lacking in the depth I'd've preferred due to several broken links).

But yes, there's indisputably a Crowly relation to Wicca. In fact, IIRC, Gardener lifted a few rituals verbatim from Crowly's books.

Perchance

Veil: Thanks for providing the link! I'd heard of that site before, but whenever I tried to get there from a link on another site, the link was always broken. (Possibly they were pointing to old sites?)

I especially like the idea that Wiccans do have their devil- Christianity.

True in a lot of ways...

-Perchance.

Malcolm_MacDohmnall

Interesting notes about Sympathetic Magic.

<a href="http://www.sacred-texts.com/pag/frazer/gb00301.htm" target="_blank">Golden Bough</a>

I don't want to bother talking about the relevancy or possibiity of the first system of "magic" but would note something about the second.

Quantum entanglement.

I think if the true Druids of the past were here today they would be more interested in current science than recreating a mythos to hide explainations of natural phenonema. What magic would act outside the realm of the true natural laws? Would it not be fantasy rather than truth?

Just a thought.

dostf

Wiccan? WICCAN!

Humanity is and must move forward...

Be seeing you...