Do Witches Perform Sacrifices
One of the accusations made against witches in the past was that they killed unbaptized babies and sacrificed them to Satan. (The same slander was used to vilify Jews and, sometimes, gypsies.) There is no acceptable evidence in support of this accusation. Indeed, the only evidence available is provided by those who, on encountering infanticide, immediately stated that the killer was a witch.
Certainly, if we are to believe our earliest and most credulous historians, the tribes of Celtic Britain in the druidic period did perform human sacrifices. It has also been stated by Frazer in The Golden Bough, and by margaret Murray, that in the Old REligion the Divind King(or his substitute) was ritually murdered after seven years' reign, King William Rufus' death in the New Forest being adduced as certain proof of this. Animal sacrifices occur in a great many cultures, of course, the entrails being consulted for purposes of divination and the flesh providing the main course of a feast.
In order to get thissubject into perspective, we must look at the word "sacrifice" itself. The word derives from the Latin sacer(holy) and facere(to make). Something is made holy by giving it to the god, goddess or gods, and thus "sacrifice" grew to mean giving something up, perhaps in hopes of reward, perhaps not.
Sacrifices involves destruction; the sacrificial object or creature is destroyed. But there is no such thing as absolute destruction, for life is perpectual; there is only transformation. Thus sacrificial destruction is really an act of transformation. Thus sacrificial destruction is really an act of transformation, a moving of the sacrifice from one plance of being to another. If this is done in order to "make holy" the object or creature, no evil has been performed. We must here, however, consider the Witch's Law, "Do what thou wilt, and harm no one." We must not send a living creature on to another plane of existence without most careful consideration of all aspects of the matter. No human creature should be killed without his or her wholehearted assent, and where that assent cannot be given, as is the case with the new-born children suffering fromb rain damage or crippling disease and with persons living in coma and existing physically by mechanical means, no diceision must be made without deep heart-searching. Such deaths must be made sacrifically, must be given as a "making holy", as a blessing.
If I have strayed from the common notion of sacrifice, it is because here we are faced with many problems. We hear of soldiers who "sacrificed their lives" or who "were sacrificed" in war. Are there true sacrifices or not? In some instances soldiers did accept death, or at least the risk of death, willingly; in other instances this is not so. War is undoubtedly evil, but sometimes it is necessary to read the injuction to harm no-one as an injuction to judge between two possible harms. One should perhaps "harm" the psychopathic killer, the racist, the terrorist, to preserve the lives of other people. Witches, in general, however, perfer to frustrate the wrongdoer rather than damage him, to influence his will, his decisions, and to give him the opportunity to turn his life in other directions.
The ritual sacrifice of living creatures other than humans presents fewer problems. The rhythm of the natural world is based upon a system of inter-relationships, an done of these is that between predator and prey, host an dparasite. We feed upon one another. The human race is carnivorous; though particular human beings are able to discipline themselves into being vegetarians, the majority eat the flesh of animals, fish and birds, and some eat reptiles and insects. The killing of creatures for meat is not therefore a breach of natural law, nor is the breeding of animals for food. To sacrifice a bull or chicken or a sheep is therefore permissible, provided that the desire is, indeed, to "make holy".
Here we come tot he nub of the problem: the act of sacrifice. It must, first of all, be done humanely and without causing suffering. Secondly it must be done reverently. Thirdly it must be done as part of a feast in which all share, so that the meat and its blessings are part of the celebration. Unused portions which cannot be turned to good use should be burned in the fire.
In the past, occultists would "sacrifice" an animal, often a black cockerel, largely in order to derive psychic energy from the positive explosion of released power that comes from sudden and violent death. This energy was then used by the magician to "raise" spirits to be commanded, and to give the magician additional personal power. Witches do not seek power in this fashion. Their power comes not from the stimulation of the ego but from the subjection of the ego to the lifeforrce of the universe. Witches do not make sacrifices of the kind I have described.
Witches do, however, "make holy" many objects they use, and transform them in the process. The burning of a candle is a sacrificial act, a giving-up, a transforming. The burning of leaves, twigs, flowers, in a fire is a sacrifice. So is the burning of incese. when anything is consumed in the fire during a magical act or ritual, it is "made holy" by being given up to the Goddess. Moreover, there is a "making holy" in every blessing given at a meal, especially if a token portion of that meal is "yielded up" by being consumed in the fire or buried in the earth.
There are some Wiccan sacrificial rituals, but they take the form or returning, symbolically, to the Goddess, to the life-force, someof her gifts. Thus one may make a sacrifice to the Goddess as Sea-Mother by floating something out upon the tide or throwing it in the water, as some of the Canadian west coast Indians return the first catch of the season to the river or sea. One may sacrifice to the Corn Goddess in the traditional rite of burning the first sheaf of corn that is reaped. One may sacrifice tot he Eartch Goddess by burying something appropriate, and to the Sky Goddess by sending smoke from a fire up into the sky. The Goddess of the Woodland may be worshipped by hanging gifts upon trees. Sacrifices of this kind will be found in all nature-orientated cultures. In the far past some of these sacrifices were bloody and brutal; theya re not so today.
Witches do make sacrifices but not blood sacrifices, and before contemplating any sacrifice they ask themselves, "Is this part of the natural rhythm of the universe?" "Does this bring harm to anyone?" and "Is this a making holy?"
taken from "the Practice of Witchcraft" by Robin Skelton
Back to
Main Page