Sunday, January 20, 2013

"The Good Witch, as they are termed, because they doe seeme to helpe."

.
SATHAN TRANSFORMED into an Angell of Light
LONDON, Printed by Barnard Alsop. 1622.

pp. 207-208 (pp. 176-177 in the original)

CHAP. X.
Of the Subject of Witch-craft.

NOw let us come to the maine Subject and Occasion of this Treatise: Namely, to consider of the Practiser of this Mystery, to wit, the witch, whether man or woman.

And heere, first consider wee the Generall Notion or Description of a Witch.

Secondly, wee will resolve these points, I Whether men as well as women, may not bee Practitioners in this Art:

And yet, Why more women then men are engaged therein.

Thirdly, we will lay downe the divers kindes of these Witches: namely, 1 The Bad Witch, which is the Hurter.

2 The Good Witch, as they are termed, because they doe seeme to helpe.

Where it shall bee resolved.

1 Why Satan useth these severall instruments for these contrarie ends.

2 Whether the good Witch cannot hurt, or the bad Witch helpe.

3 What places are especially infested with Witches.

pp.  234-236 (pp. 203-205 in the original)

And so contrariwise, there are others who by Divine Justice, are given up to Satans power with this limitation onely, to helpe and do good, and these are called Good Witches, Blessers, Wise, and Cunning-women. And this Divine Dispensation is both Sutable to the parties who are limited thereby, and also very availeable for the execution of the Divine Justice.

I say sutable it is to the severall qualities of the parties thus diversly dispensed, whereof some being vaine-glorious and drowned in Poperie are therby caried with the applause of Good Workes, and therefore are fitted by Satan thereunto: Others are prone to malice discontent, couetousnesse, & c. and so are likewise fitted by the Devil, with power to bee avenged.

And doth not the just and holy God, by this diversitie and restraint of Satans power, accomplish most wisely his just wrath upon the wicked?

Yea certainely, and that not onely upon the unbeleeving world; but upon the very Witches themselves. As for the unbeleeving and wicked Generations they are hurt by the one, that they may with the danger of their soules seeke helpe of the other: And they have helpe by the one, that so, as a punishment of their infidelitie they may bee given up againe to bee hurt of the other. And so betwixt the Good Witch and the Bad, afflictions are encreased, and yet repentance excluded, and so the measure of sinne is made up among the children of disobedience, that so the measure of vengeance may accordingly be inflicted.

And doth not this also very wisely, further the damnation of the Witches themselves.

Yea certainely, the Bad Witch, by hurting, makes way for the good Witches helpe, and so thereby encreaseth her sinne; and the Good Witch in helping bewrayes the Bad Witch, and so, many times, brings her to the Gallowes.

The Good Witch in helping makes more worke for the Bad, who being suspected, revengeth her selfe usually by doing more mischiefe, and so thereby ripens her sinne to the Gallowes, and so still makes more worke for the Blesser to encrease her condemnation. The Bad Witch, because she doth hurt, is hated of the world, and so thereby encreaseth her malice, and doth more harme. The good Witch is honoured, and reputed as a God, because she doth good, and so is hardened in her sinne and ripeneth the same, by adding to all former sinnes, finall impenitencie, and so usually commits the unpardonable sin.

pp. 300-301 (pp. 269-270 in the original)

CHAP. II. Of the detection of Witches, and meanes thereto.

OF the detection and punishment of Witches: That they are to bee punished with death, especially the Blesser and good Witch, as they terme her.

SECT. I. Of unlawfullmeanes of detection.

HAving discovered the power of Witches, and so followed them to the utmost of their glorie and advancement: Seeing now Pride goeth before destruction, and the glorie of the wicked is their shame: Let us now consider of their Fall and confusion, and of such meanes as further the same.

Wherein we may behold the admirable wisedome and power of God, who as hee leaves them to their owne lusts, to embrace Satan, and submit unto him, for the obtaining of their desires; so hath hee so disposed in his wonderfull Justice, that the God whom they worship, when he hath them sure his owne, seeing he is greedy of his Prey, and would gladly have other imployment to doe more mischiefe, therefore he cares not how soone the bargaine be performed, and rather then faile, though all other meanes of detection should cease, himselfe will bee the instrument to bring his Beare to the Stake: And this he doth, 

By Being an instrument for the detection of the Witch, and yet in such dangerous policie, as that heerein also he hunts after unstable soules, while he seekes to give them content in the discoverie of the Witch which hath done them so much mischiefe. To this is it, that he hath not onely The Blesser readie to discover and detect the A Bad Witch, that so he might thereby encrease the poore peoples rage against the Witch, whereas indeed they should be angry at their sins.
Posted by Apuleius Platonicus at 1/20/2013 10:50:00 AM 8 comments
Labels: , , ,

Saturday, January 19, 2013

"the Curing Witch, comonly called, The good Witch"

.
More quotes from Richard Bernard's 
"Guide to Grand-Jury Men".
[Cornell University Library of Witchcraft Collection]

pp. 7-8 

The sinne of witchcraft, and the diabolicall practice thereof, is omnium scelerum atrocißimum, and in such as haue the knowledge of God, the greatest apostacie from the faith. For they renounce God, and giue themselues by a couenant to the Diuell. Bad Witches many prosecure with all eagernesse; but Magicians, Necromancers, (of whom his late Maiestie giueth a deadly censure in his Dæmonologie) and the Curing Witch, comonly called, The good Witch, all forts can let alone: and yet bee these in many respects worse then the other.

p. 146  (p. 129 in the original)

The good Witches (vn truely so called) may be sundry waies knowne: I. From the quality of the party, one commonly very ignorant of religion, an obseruer of times, of good and bad daies, of good and bad lucke, very superstitious in many things, not induring willingly such as feare God, and such as delight in his Word. They are also fantastically proud, as Simon Magus was, who boasted much of himselfe, as these doe of their gift and power; as those in Spaine, which call themselues Salutadorres.

p. 153  (p. 1 36 in the original)

This Bodinus sheweth by examples three or foure, where of one Healer came to a Bishop, and willed him to trust in him to cure him, and this was in the hearing of Bodinus himselfe, there in the Chamber, and one Doctor Faber, a learned Physician. Thus may these, falsely so named good Witches, be discouered.

pp. 245-246  (pp. 228-229 in the original)

5. The Physician, if vse haue beene made of him. It is very necessary to haue his iudgement in this case, to know whether the disease bee naturall, as hee vpon mature deliberation, and diligent search hath found it? or whether there bee any counterfeiting herein? or if the disease bee not naturall, yet whether Satan may not mixe with it his supernaturall power, beyond the force of the disease? These are for Physicians to iudge: And therefore it is very requisite to haue the aduice of some iudicious Physician herein.

6. The report of a White or good Witch, as the people call him or her. This Witch must be brought before Authority, and it must be demanded of him or her, I. What they haue reported of the suspected partie? 2. Vpon what grounds they haue thus accused the said party? for such an one may know the other to bee a Witch, one of these two waies ....

Posted by Apuleius Platonicus at 1/19/2013 05:54:00 PM 6 comments
Labels: , , ,

Friday, January 18, 2013

"Of good witches falsly so called."

.
"That there are such as bee called good Witches, and how they may be knowne."

For many years now, Ronald Hutton has claimed that the English word "Witch" has "traditionally" only been used to refer to individuals who (1) cause harm through magic, (2) are malevolent in their disposition toward others, and (3) are hated by the other members of their communities. According to Hutton, the use of the word "Witch" to refer to practitioners of beneficial magic is a purely modern development.

The problem for Hutton is that there are a great number of sources that directly contradict his theory. These sources incontrovertibly document the fact that, essentially for as long as the English language has existed, the word "Witch" has been used to refer to healers, diviners and other practitioners of beneficial magic who, far from being hated, have been valued and sought after for the good that they do.

Hutton now claims that all such cases in which Witches are referred to as healers, etc, are irrelevant because they are confined to the utterances of "radical, evangelical Protestants" and other "churchmen", whose use of the word "Witch" was wildly divergent from that of "the great bulk of the populace," who only used "Witch" as an epithet for hated, malevolent, evil-doers. This argument is put forward by Hutton in his new article in the latest issue of the Pomegranate journal: Revisionism and Counter-Revisionism in Pagan History.

The thing is, though, that in the sources that Hutton refers to, one never finds the authors putting forward arguments of the form:

A. Those who are commonly referred to as healers, soothsayers and wise-women should instead be referred to as Witches, because they are in fact evil-doers who deceive people into following Satan.

If such arguments could be produced, they would give some validity to Hutton's position. But in every case what we find instead are arguments of the following sort:

B. Those who are commonly referred to as good Witches, because they heal and otherwise appear to do good, are in fact evil-doers who deceive people into following Satan.

Arguments A & B both refer to the same group of people, namely, practitioners of beneficial magic.  And both arguments are concerned with how these people should be named, and how they should not be named. Argument A says "do not call them healers, for they are Witches." While Argument B says "do not call them good Witches, for they are not good." Argument A is purely a figment of Ronald Hutton's imagination, while Argument B is found throughout the entire history of the English tongue.

Therefore these sources completely undermine Hutton's claim, for they provide direct testimony as to the ubiquity in common usage of  "Witch" to refer to those who do good, and, moreover, that those who were called "Witches" by the common people were also referred to by them as "blessers", "healers", "cunning women", etc.

But please, don't take my word for it. Below are the first two pages of Chapter VIII of Richard Bernard's 1627 book, Guide To Jury-Men. That chapter is entitled "That there are such as bee called good Witches, and how they may be knowne." [For much more along these same lines see also Witches: Good, Bad, and Otherwise.]

--------------------


As in Gods Church there be good and bad; So in this kingdome of Satan, there bee good and bad Witches.

These good or white Witches are commonly called blessers, healers, cunning wisemen, or women (for there are of both sexes) but of this kinde, many men.

These haue a spirit also, as one Ioane Willimot acknowledged, and are in league with the Diuell, as well as the bad and black Witches be. By their spirit they learne, who are bad Witches and where they dwell, who are strucken, forespoken, and bewitched, and by them they learne how those doe, whom they vndertake to amend; for the spirit is sent vnto their patients from them: all which the foresaid Ioane Willsmot acknowledged before Authority in her examination.

The profession of these Witches is, for the most part, to heale and cure such as bee taken, blasted, strucken, forespoken, as they vse to speake, and bewitched: all which cures they doe by their compact with the Deuill.

But though these Witches be almost all healing Witches, and cannot doe to man, or beast any hurt, except they procure some other to doe it, yet we may finde, that some of these sometimes haue the double facultie, both to blesse, and to curse, to hurt, and to heale, as it is probable Balaam had at the least in Balaks imagination, Num. 22.6.








The whole text of Benard's book, along with images of the original publication, can be found at the online Cornell Witchcraft Collection: http://ebooks.library.cornell.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=witch;cc=witch;rgn=main;view=text;idno=wit140




Posted by Apuleius Platonicus at 1/18/2013 10:41:00 AM 13 comments
Labels: , , ,

Wednesday, January 16, 2013

Ronald Hutton on Witches. Yet again.

I am still working on a new post - but I accidentally hit "publish" while I was still editing it. Anyway, rest assured that I will soon be responding to Ronald Hutton's most recent attempt to deny the simple, historical and linguistic truth about the meaning of the word Witch.

In the meantime, please enjoy these past posts from this blog on that particular subject:

Posted by Apuleius Platonicus at 1/16/2013 10:56:00 AM 0 comments

Monday, January 7, 2013

Are modern Pagans morally and intellectually superior to adherents of "traditional and indigenous" religions?


There is another problem with the globalization of the term Pagan. It make us (real Pagans) think we are like other traditional religions like the Hindu, Buddhist, or Taoist traditions, or the indigenous cultures like the Shuar, Cherokee, or Yoruba, among so many others. We are not.
Do you think the Earth is the center of the Universe?
Do you think diseases are caused by germs and viruses?
Do you know about more elements than four (or five)?
Has the scientific revolution touched you?
Do you think democracy is a good idea?
In traditional and indigenous society the valences of the above questions are reversed and we are in no position to go back to them. (Everyone in the room who is still alive because of antibiotics, raise your hand). In fact, these ideas are so important that traditional and indigenous societies are adopting them and adjusting themselves accordingly. Good for them, but these ideas are *native* to us. We figured them out, for the most part, and they changed us permanently.
[Sam Webster, "Welcome, Thinking Pagans"]


The above quote is from an online article by Sam Webster smugly entitled "Welcome Thinking Pagans." Webster's casual ethnocentrism is, sadly, all-too common among well-educated modern "liberal" Westerners. Another example of this kind of ethnocentrism, and one which I have previously written about in this blog, is the claim made by David Loy, a prominent American Western Buddhist writer, to the effect that the very concept of social justice is utterly foreign to non-Westerners in general and Asians in particular, and that Asian Buddhists require the guidance of Western Buddhists in order to overcome this deficiency (see  David Loy & the White Buddhist's Burden). The same conceit can also be found in another contemporary Western Buddhist writer, Stephen Batchelor, as I have also discussed elsewhere (see Reason #7 in Top Ten Reasons Why Stephen Batchelor is Full of Shit). And the same kind of ethnocentrism is also implicit (and sometimes explicit) in the writings of the New Atheists (such as Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris) whenever they deign to discuss religions other than Christianity and Islam (such as Buddhism and Hinduism).

But lets return to Sam Webster, and his claim that "traditional and indigenous" cultures have their "valences" "reversed" when it comes to things like science and democracy. Better yet, let us turn away from Webster and instead look to the writings of a genuine expert on the subject of democracy and social justice: Martin Luther King, Jr.

As always happens with the best and the brightest, Martin Luther King, Jr. searched for a guiding philosophy while he was a college student, a journey that he continued in even more earnest as a young seminarian. What he was looking for, as he later recounted it, was a world-view that applied “the love ethics of Jesus” to the problem of social injustice.

During this “intellectual odyssey”, as King himself called it, he studied the works of Thomas Hobbes, Jeremy Bentham, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, John Stewart Mill, John Locke, Friedrich Nietzsche, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Karl Marx, and Vladimir Lenin, as well as Christian authors such as Walter Rauschenbusch and Reinhold Niebuhr, and also ancient authors especially Aristotle and Plato. In particular, King struggled long and hard with the writings of Niebuhr, especially wrestling with Neihbur's rejection of pacifism.

In addition to the above listed writers, King was also was personally influenced, during his studies at the Boston University School of Theology, by Walter Muelder, Allan Knight Chalmers, Edgar S. Brightman, and L. Harold Dewolf. It was under the mentorship of Dr. Brightman that King undertook a close study of Hegel, and King would later say that Brightman had provided him with ‘the metaphysical and philosophical grounding for the idea of a personal God’’ [Papers 4:480].

But none of these Western philosophers, revolutionaries, teachers, and theologians, either living or dead, provided what King was looking for.

In his book Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story, King wrote: “Prior to reading Gandhi, I had about concluded that the ethics of Jesus were only effective in individual relationships …. But after reading Gandhi, I saw how utterly mistaken I was.” Moreover, in King’s estimation, “Gandhi was probably the first person in history to lift the love ethic of Jesus above mere interaction between individuals to a powerful and effective social force on a large scale.” King wrote further that: “The intellectual and moral satisfaction that I failed to gain from [Bentham, Mill, Marx, Lenin, Hobbes, Rousseau, and Nietzsche] I found in the nonviolent resistance philosophy of Gandhi. I came to feel that this was the only morally and practically sound method open to oppressed people in their struggle for freedom."

Martin Luther King, Jr. is unquestionably one of the most celebrated champions of social justice and the basic principles of democracy in modern history. His search as a young man for a guiding philosophy was based both on moral and intellectual requirements. He was not looking merely for a philosophy that expressed the moral sentiment of social justice, but one that met the intellectual challenge of showing how to apply a philosophy of compassion not just to interpersonal relationships, but to the much broader realm of social change, up to and including social change on global scale.

Those who naively privilege the modern West as the sole font of democracy, equality, and liberty, really need to closely study that figure who, more than anyone else, personifies the modern conception of progressive social change: Martin Luther King. Anyone who makes such a study cannot help but conclude that not only does modern Western culture have no monopoly on "social justice", but that, as a matter of fact, we in the West have much to learn from others.


Also see these related posts from this blog:

Posted by Apuleius Platonicus at 1/07/2013 04:32:00 PM 1 comments
Labels: , , , ,

Friday, December 28, 2012

Little Witches

Some fools (albeit possibly well-meaning ones) claim that "children can never be Witches", when the truth is that children are naturally fascinated by magic, and it is common for children to at least fantasize (and possibly much more than that) about exercising magical powers. Does anyone still need to have this explained to them, in the wake of Harry Potter?

Foeksia de Miniheks 



Lili – La Petite Sorcière (Hexe Lili) 



魔女の宅急便 (Kiki’s Delivery Service) 



Bibi a Bruxinha 

Posted by Apuleius Platonicus at 12/28/2012 08:47:00 PM 1 comments
Labels: ,

Thursday, December 27, 2012

Witches: Good, Bad, and Otherwise

Here is a very gently annotated list of links from this blog on the nature of "Witches" and "Witchcraft". Special attention is paid to the false claim that "Good Witches" are a modern, romantic notion with no historical foundations.

Some, prominent among them being Ronald Hutton, claim that "traditionally" the word "Witch" always and unambiguously denoted practitioners of harmful magic, and, moreover, that it always and unambiguously denoted persons who were hated and feared by the communities they lived in -- indeed, that those "traditionally" denoted as Witches were viewed as "inherently evil".

I believe that the materials linked to below (both primary sources and contemporary scholarship) taken together form an overwhelming historical case proving that for as long as English speaking peoples have used the word "Witch", it has been used to refer to practitioners of beneficial magic, and, moreover, that it has denoted persons who were greatly valued and sought after by other members of the communities in which they lived.


Posted by Apuleius Platonicus at 12/27/2012 09:12:00 AM 0 comments
Labels: , , , , ,

Wednesday, December 26, 2012

Charming and Witchcraft in Early Modern Scotland (a la Joyce Miller)

In her Devices and directions: folk healing aspects of witchcraft practice in seventeeth-century Scotland (scroll down for full citation at the bottom of this post), Joyce Miller poses the question: “Why were charmers sometimes prosecuted for witchcraft? On the other hand, why were there so few?”

Miller is in something of a quandary. She wishes to insist (in fact, she does insist) that there were “intrinsic differences between witches and charmers,” but she finds that it is utterly impossible to keep the two separated. If two phenomena have large areas of overlap, as Miller concedes is the case with Witches and Charmers, then they can hardly be said to be “intrinsically different”.

In a future post I will try to disentangle all the zigs and zags that Miller is forced into as she attempts to to toe the academic party line (that Witches and Charmers are "intrinsically different") while also trying to accurately describe Witches and Charmers in early modern Scotland. But why is this the "party line"? Because, you see, the "scholarly consensus" is that Witches and Witchcraft are "inherently evil", in the words of self-appointed-scholarly-consensus-builder-in-chief, Ronald Hutton (look here for sourcing: Ronald Hutton: Witches are "inherently evil".). Therefore, since "Charming" is quite obviously not "inherently evil", it must be "intrinsically different" from that which is "inherently evil", namely, Witchraft.

In spite of herself, Joyce Miller proves over and over again that there simply is no clear bright line separating Charming from Witchcraft. This makes Miller's testimony all that much more convincing, albeit not in the way that she intends.

With that brief preamble, I will now let Joyce Miller speak for herself:
The first question to address is: what was charming? Charming was one feature of witchcraft practice and belief, but not all charmers practiced witchcraft nor did all witches practice charming. In some cases one person’s charmer may have been another person’s witch. However, under what circumstances the questionable practice of charming could become the crime of witchcraft is difficult to establish categorically.

Witchcraft, sorcery and charming were all features of magic or preternatural power. Although magic had developed a negative meaning, this hostility increased as a result of witchcraft prosecution and theological developments, which stressed its irrationality and downplayed its cultural significance and relationship with religious belief. Since all three were aspects of magic, charming was therefore related to, and in some cases part of, witchcraft practice and belief, yet it was not entirely the same. It shared many of the same physical and verbal actions — the words and deeds — of witchcraft, but it was usually equal to, and opposite from, witchcraft. Unlike witches, who were labeled by others, charmers knew who they were and would label themselves as such. There was also a difference between the perceived source of power of the two groups and, very importantly, their intent. Witchcraft was demonic and malicious: charming was neither.

The authorities, and particularly the church, did attempt to include charming with the prosecution of witchcraft. In 1646 the General Assembly of the church attempted to extend the scope of the witchcraft act to include the charmers:

“Because our addresses to the oridinar judge for punishment of charming, it is informed to us that the Acts of Parliament ar not expresslie against that sinne, which the rude and ignorant ar much addicted unto; may it therfor please your lordships that the Act of the 9 Parliament of Queen Marie made against witches and consulters be enlarged and extended to charmers, or that such other course be taken as that offence may be restrained and punished.”

Throughout the period of witchcraft prosecutions in Scotland, individuals were investigated and interrogated for practising charming. However, at the local level, attitudes were varied. The two presbyteries that were examined closely demonstrate the variation in investigation and prosecution of witches and charmers that was seen in Scotland. The Haddington presbytery had a higher percentage of accusations of both witchcraft and charming — 83 per cent — compared to Stirling, which had only 17 per cent. Given that the estimated population of Haddington was approximately 1.75 times greater than Stirling this difference was quite remarkable. Eighty-seven per cent of those who were accused of demonic witchcraft were from the Haddington presbytery, and only 13 per cent from the Stirling presbytery. The figures for accusations of charming, however, demonstrate the complete opposite: 56 per cent of those who were accused of charming came from the Stirling area, and 44 per cent from Haddington. This illustrates that local conditions and habits appear to have influenced both the rate, and type, of accusation that was processed through the church rather than any national pattern.

The church punished the majority of charmers, but some were prosecuted for witchcraft if their charming actions were categorised as indicating demonic intervention. Local kirk sessions and presbyteries examined evidence of both accused charmers and their clients in order to ascertain whether or not the practice was demonic. But the church appeared to have great difficulty in deciding what to do with them. In October 1630 the Dalketh presbytery asked the sunod of Lothian and Tweeddale for advice about charmers, those who consulted them and also those who had been slandered with no evidence of practice. The synod replied, ‘those that are simple charmers and consulters suld be refered to their [own] repentance’. As for those who had been slandered they thought nothing of them. It would appear then that if the practiced was believed to be demonic, then civil intervention would be required, if not it could be dealt with at local level by the church and the individual’s own conscience. The whole area was clearly confusing. On some occasions the question of whether the practice was demonic or not, was decided by whether rituals had been used, and whether these involved the use of words and actions, either alone or in combination.
[pp. 91-92]
The issue of “whether rituals had been used, and whether these involved the use of words and actions, either alone or in combination” is taken up again by Miller a few pages on. The bottom line, according to Miller, is that if both ritual and words were used, then this could be taken as evidence of Witchcraft, as opposed to mere Charming:
The recurrent motifs or features in the charming treatments that were analysed in this may be categorised according to time, place and manner. The ritual could be carried out as a particular time of the day, week or year; at a particular place such as a boundary, crossroads, bridge or river; in a particular manner, perhaps in silence; or particular direction, moving sunwise, anti-sunwise or backwards. Further categorising motifs which were recorded included the use of words or spoken charms; the use of a particular type of water, or at a specific place; numbers; fire; the use of an object such as a shoe, mail, thread or belt; cutting of nails or hair; use of an animal; meally oats but occasionally wheat. Although charmers did not use the polypharmacy of orthodox medicine they still employed a wide variety of motifs.

Detailed research in local sources from the presbyteries of Haddington and Stirling between 1603 and 1688 has revealed almost 100 references to some form of charming. They have been examined for the use of ritual and words, either alone or in combination, or for the inclusion of other motifs. The use of a physical ritual was by far the most common feature, as nine out of ten treatments (92 per cent) included a reference to soem form of ritual or routine. Words were mentioned in 42 per cent of the charms. A third (38 per cent) used words and ritual together but in this sample, perhaps surprisingly, only 3 per cent used words by themselves.

Andrew Youl, who tied a live toad around neck of his sheep in 1646, told the church officials that he had not used any words along with this ritual. Nevertheless he was reprimanded by the Haddington kirk session and told that unless he stopped using the ritual he would be censured as a charmer. The Haddington presbytery decided that Adam Gillies and his wife were not witches because, although they had tied wheat and salt tot heir cows’ ears, they had not used any words and had merely been carrying out, in the words of the church authorities, an ‘ignorant superstition’. To a large extent these physical rituals appear to have been excused as having carried out through simple ignorance rather than deliberate transgressions. The use of ritual alone appears to have been regarded by the church and judicial authorities as charming not witchcraft. In this case the rituals or charming might be seen to have been superstitious practice continued through ignorance rather than outright deliberate, demonic practice.

There was some concern, however, that rituals could be used to conjure supernatural spirits or powers and were therefore still very much antithetical to Christian practice. As [Stuart] Clark [Thinking With Demons, Chapter 32] points out, the term superstition had a number of applications or definitions that were used by the church. Firstly, superstition was used to define that which was opposite to accepted religious practice. Secondly, it was used to denounce certain practices and habits as valueless, either because they were carried out excessively or in the wrong manner. In its third version, superstitions, or inappropriate worship, was associated with demonic worship. In general, its use was perceived as due to ignorance and lack of understanding rather than active rejection of the authority of the church. In 1581, parliament passed an act making it illegal to visit wells and participate in pilgrimages. In 1629 the privy council issued a similar proclamation. In the 1648 the Dunblane synod passed an ordinance which again urged the abandoning of ‘superstitious wells and chapels whereunto people resort’. It would appear, however, that the ordinary population did not respond immediately, or at all, to these proclamation. Despite the desire of the authorities to force the general populace to abandon these practices they continued to be important to many and so continued to be observed despite the threat of punishment. For those involved, an accusation of charming or ‘ignorant superstition’ was in many ways a better option than an accusation of witchcraft which might result in execution.
[pp. 97-99]
And, finally, here is how Joyce Miller wraps up her essay:
The remedies offered by charmers in the seventeenth century were as varied as the treatments prescribed by orthodox medicine, but both were founded on logical principles and experience. The treatments displayed a consistency of technique, belief and participation, which show that charmers and society had a solid cultural foundation for understanding the causes of disease and the efficacy of their healing practices.Knowledge and skill in charming was both passed on through generations and gained through empiricism, but the knowledge was neither arbitrary nor chaotic. The charms were founded on both cultural and religious or spiritual traditions; their similarity with pre-Reformation practice was certainly marked although their principles and origins are likely to have been even older. This does not imply that charming was simply an alternative religious belief system recognised by a small section of the population. On the contrary most of society practised and understood an amalgamation of beliefs. It was the organised church itself, not society, which incorporated certain beliefs and rituals for its own purposes and rejected others. The pre-Reformation church accepted pleas to saints or pilgrimages to holy sites to help relieve suffering, but the Protestant church removed these elements of worship or ritual as being too Catholic in meaning. It has been suggested that the Protestant church in Scotland caused a change in attitude towards the causes and cures of disease. The church wanted sufferers to turn to the comfort of prayer and personal contemplation and responsibility, rather than using charms or magic. The goal was to achieve an ideal godly state, but it is clear from the records that many of the ordinary members of the population were slower in abandoning a system which they had followed for generations and which provided comfort, hope and control. In the absence of access to professional healers and in the wider context of witchcraft belief, the practice of charming was mainstream, rather than alternative, medicine.

Witchcraft practice in seventeenth-century Scotland was complex and mystifying, both for the ecclesiastical and secular authorities and the population at large. Charming — or folk healing — was only one aspect of witchcraft, but was an extremely important one as it provided both spiritual and practical comfort. It provided society with a means to counter the threat of malicious witchcraft. Charming also demonstrates that contemporary definitions of witchcraft practice, in its broadest sense, were not fixed solely in demonic terms, but were at times fluid and dynamic. Indeed charming continued to be practiced long after the church and the law decided that witchcraft was no longer a threat.
[pp. 104-105]
Joyce Miller’s Devices and directions: folk healing aspects of witchcraft practice in seventeeth-century Scotland is chapter 6 in the anthology The Scottish Witch Hunt in Context edited by Julian Goodare, published by Manchester University Press, 2002.

[Note: This is a very slightly edited version of a post originally posted on my Wordpress blog back on Luly 25, 2011.]

Posted by Apuleius Platonicus at 12/26/2012 03:12:00 PM 0 comments
Labels: , , , ,

Koenraad Elst vs. an "Eminent Historian"

Hinduism is, by far, the single most important example of a religious tradition that has successfully resisted the onslaught of monotheism in all its forms. Having withstood Islamic invasions, Christian colonialism, Communist infiltration, and even the combined alliance of Christians, Muslims, and Marxoid "Secularists", Mother India stands tall and proud as a beacon of hope to all the Pagans of the world.

And here, by "Pagan" I mean not just those who espouse the Wiccan Rede, or who endeavor to "reconstruct" the Heathen ways of pre-Christian Europe. I mean all those hundreds of millions of human beings in Africa, the Americas and throughout Asia who keep the old ways alive and who worship the Gods, Spirits, Ancestors, etc, who have been venerated since the dawn of humanity itself.

Anyhoo. Koenraad Elst has fought in these trenches as long as anyone currently drawing breath. So, if you are up for a little scholarly inside baseball, you really should read his most recent blog entry: A debate with an eminent historian.

Here are three excerpts to whet the intellectual appetite:

[I]t is not true that Aurangzeb [sixth Moghul Emperor, reigning from 1658 to 1707] was a cruel character, he was not more so than his less notorious predecessors. If he was cruel and fanatic, it was because he started taking the core doctrine of Islam to his heart. He was a pious person, more than is good for a ruler, so he became increasingly averse to the religious compromise on which his great-grandfather Akbar had built the Moghul empire. So at some point in his advancing years, not his personal predilection but his growing commitment to Islam took over. That is when he ordered all Pagan temples destroyed: when the Moghul empire became truly Islamic at last.


For lack of facts, Prof. Mukhia likes to throw names around instead. But a real historian remains unimpressed by this show of name-dropping. The fact that Prof. Mukhia has many like-minded colleagues in academe while his opponents have to remain on the outside is not the result of better competence among his friends, but of a deliberate policy in university nominations. Any young historian who lets on too early that he has pro-Hindu convictions, will see his entry into academe barred. Word will spread around that this man is “dangerous to India’s secular fabric” and he will be excluded. There have been some old historians who entered the profession before their cards were on the table and who only became forthright critics of Islam at the end of their careers, the likes of Prof. Harsh Narain and Prof. K.S. Lal, both since long deceased. Today among university historians, the school that sets the record on Islam straight is simply non-existent.



In several respects, Eaton’s count is incomplete [referring to RM Eaton's claim that only 80 Hindu temples were ever destroyed by Muslims]. Muslims destroyed Hindu temples before 1200 and after 1760 too, witness the near-absence of the once-numerous Hindu temples in Pakistan, witness the regular occurrence of temple destruction in Bangla Desh. It is also seriously false that for this period, Eaton’s count is complete. How could it be? Off-hand, Venkat could name a few cases from his own Tamil village, which was only briefly touched by the Islamic invasions but nonetheless already lost several temples, and they don’t figure in Eaton’s list. Archeologists regularly find remains of destroyed temples, often underneath mosques, which do not and cannot figure in Eaton’s list. Finally, one item on Eaton’s list doesn’t mean one temple destroyed. The thousand temples destroyed in Varanasi during Mohammed Ghori’s advances ca. 1194 form only one item on his list. What Mukhia calls “eighty” is in fact thousands of temple demolitions. So in spite of his Islam-friendly intentions, Eaton has only proven what Hindus have been saying all along: Islam has destroyed thousands of temples.   
Posted by Apuleius Platonicus at 12/26/2012 11:02:00 AM 0 comments
Labels: ,
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)