How old it is, again brings up uncertainly,  while some outside like to think of the craft starting with Wicca in the 1950's, there are many earlier books that talk about much of the detail, and even going back to very early writing you find witches mentioned and reported upon. Many other books tell of add sighting of covens and individual witches, of healing wells, and country rituals. 

A popular misconception among those who have been exposed to Christian or Jewish groups is that witchcraft has something to do with the devil or Satan, and this probably comes from the concept that if you are not for them you have to be against them. The Satan or devil is a character from the Jewish and Christian religion and is not a part of the craft at all. We think it was introduced to these religions to explain how evil things could occur, as man was said to be made in gods image, if god was not evil how could man be.

You will get some disagreement with some groups as to what they believe, but the traditional groups that belong to the Traditional Craft Association, share a common belief in a single intelligent god, that can be approached by different groups who see different faces of the single god. We are therefore happy to see the Christian god, the Muslim one and any one else's god as just different faces of the same god that we have. We also can choose to approach whichever face we wish. 

The spirit or god is neither male or female nor is it an animal like creature, but an energy that is in everything, and is everywhere, the master pattern of nature, the universe and more. We are able to seek and get its advice but have the right to then decide to follow it or not. We see evil as what some men prefer to do, and often the group effect or gang,, not the work or any other power.

We see magic as a straight line where, science that we can explain is at one end, and miricles at the other. In the middle we see conjuring, new scientific knowledge taking the covers off magic, and of course much of the craft's skill base which we understand but is not understood by most people. back 200 years ago just think how much of what you take for granted would be complete sorcery. Imagine going back to that time and taking out a mobile phone, when they didn't have even any understanding or what a phone was. I am in my 50's and the second job I had, was using a primitive adding tool, I had bought myself, that came before calculators and was pulled up by one manager who was concerned that this would cause me permanent harm, and it was several years later that I managed to get the people I was working for to buy me a calculator, very expensive at that time. At that time only a few years ago, mobile phones were the extreme of science fiction.

Of course as we have moved forward we have also lost much knowledge, many of the common cures, plants and the like have been forgot by many as they have been able to go to the chemists and buy the packaged equivalent, and for many years we have looked down on witchdoctors in other countries although are now discovering many of their medicines worked. Hypnosis was at one time used, before anesthetics, to undertake operations, while today quite a lot of  people are unsure that hypnosis is genuine. Similarly other sciences of the past that people excepted and knew existed such as water divining, is now not understood as well. Connect the science of divining with that of hypnosis and you have the craft area, and scientific area of ideodynamics. Very many of the craft areas have modern equivalents you would see elsewhere such as most of the therapies, for example hydrotherapy, aromatherapy, homeopathy....

Often we will use a little from many areas to get what we want, combining the effects of different sciences or knowledge, and to this science we will add spells and ritual. To know if what we do works or not we record what we try in our ledger or book of shadows, and like any scientist learn from experience. this does not necessarily mean we can repeat the something each time, but neither can a doctor, or that we can predict accurately the weather over a long period any more than modern weather forecasters, or that whatever changes we make will not be undone by some other factor or nature or man.

Witchcraft many will tell you is the craft of the wise, and being a witch means being a wise person. You could be of any religion, of any nationality, or any parentage, and from any social class.

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