Abomination: Devil Worship and Deception in the West Memphis Three Murders (31 page)

This alphabet is occasionally referred to as the “Runes of Honorius,” although Theban is not a runic alphabet. While it resembles some ancient alphabets, it is unknown before Agrippa’s publication. It is little used as a magical alphabet, except as an occasional substitute for Anglo-Saxon runes, or for making charms and amulets. Theban was introduced to Wicca by its founder, Gerald Gardner. To use Theban as a cipher, simply substitute Theban letters for English letters.

Cord Magick

Cords are an important part of magick in witchcraft. Historically, cords were used in spellcraft, especially knot magick in Egypt, Arabia, and Europe, and they continue to carry that role today.
¹⁹⁸

Typically, a nine foot long cord (three times three) is used for the knot magick. Wiccans believe that the cord functions as a storage cell for power. Woodcuts from the Middle Ages show witches offering knotted cords for sale. Sailors would buy them, and if sailing was slow, would untie the knot and call forth wind to propel their ships. Wiccans chant the following words while engaging in cord magick:

By knot of one, the spell’s begun,

By knot of two, it cometh true,

By knot of three, so mote it be,

By knot of four, this power I store,

By knot of five, the spell’s alive,

By knot of six, this spell I fix,

By knot of seven, events I’ll leaven,

By knot of eight, it will be fate,

By knot of nine, what’s done is mine.
¹⁹⁹

Modern Wiccans and Witches use knot symbolism in the following types of spells:
1. Bindings and banishings (especially of illness and negative energy),

2. Channeling energy into a specific location (the energy can be captured in the knot, and then released when most needed),

3. Fixing relationships,

4. “tying up loose ends” in a situation.
²⁰⁰

Talismanic Magick

A talisman is an object endowed with magickal powers for use by its owner. According to the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, a talisman is “a magickal figure charged with the force that it is intended to represent.” Often, the talisman would be endowed with a magical sigil, or seal. Before working on the creation of the sigil, the practitioner would determine the intent, or goal, of the sigil. The creator of the talisman would begin by using a magical square, typically consisting of 9 numbers. The desired word or object would be spelled out by tracing the numerology of the word in the magic square, forming an abstract figure, whose meaning would be known only to the practitioner.

Magic Square

Sigil Examples

Esbats and Sabbats

The regular meetings of Witches are called Esbats. It is at these that any work is done (e.g., magick, healing). Most covens meet once a week, but there is really no hard and fast rule. There should certainly be a Circle at least once a month, at the Full Moon. Since there are thirteen Full Moons in the year, then, obviously, there will be at least thirteen meetings in the year. In addition to the Full Moons, many covens also celebrate the New Moons.
²⁰¹

There are eight Sabbats in the course of the year. These are times to celebrate; to rejoice with the gods and have a good time...there’s much feasting and merriment.
²⁰²

Eight Wiccan Feasts of the Year

12. Witches and Witch HUNTs:

Past to Present

There is no starting date for the witch hunts in Europe. Fear of spell-casters, sorcerers and witches date back to the beginnings of recorded history. A resurgence of widespread persecution of the practitioners of witchcraft rose during the Later Middle Ages. Estimates vary but somewhere between 40,000 to 100,000 people purported to be witches were killed during the witch trials. Often, torture was used to obtain confessions. The Catholic Church controlled ecclesiastical positions and based their condemnation of witchcraft upon the fact that individuals made a pact with the devil, making witchcraft a heresy against the Holy Roman Church. The methodology of witch trials varied from nation to nation, city to city.

In the 14th-century, the Knights Templar were persecuted for witchcraft. The charges against them included sodomy and making pacts with the Devil. While the King of France, Philip the Fair, had much to gain financially from the destruction of the Templars, rumors of witchcraft helped solidify public outrage against the Order of the Templars.

Prosecution of witchcraft became more common in the 15th century. Trials took place in Switzerland, Germany and France, resulting in the standard form of execution--burning at the stake. Thus, modern adherents of witchcraft refer to the Middle Age persecutions as the Burning Times.
Some modern witches purport that over 7,000,000 witches were burned during the witch hunts, which is implausible considering the total population of Europe from the 15th to the 17th Centuries.
The trials against witches had similar patterns---lawyers would confront the accused with one or more of the following charges:

1)
that they met regularly at Sabbats,

2)
have sex with each other or the Devil,

3)
abused, harmed or even ate children,

4)
formally renounced Christ, and/or mocked the sacraments of the Holy Church.

In 1484, Pope Innocent VIII issued a formal written statement or Papal Bull that gave full backing for the work of local inquisitors against witchcraft. Responding to the Papal Bull, the most infamous treatise against witchcraft and the most influential, titled
Malleus Maleficarum
, (“The Witch Hammer” published in 1489) was written by members of the Dominican Order in Southern Germany. Printed widely in Gutenberg presses, the
Malleus Maleficarum
attempted to coherently address the problem of witchcraft and devised ways to prosecute and punish magical practitioners. In 1522, Protestant reformer Martin Luther bluntly declared that witches were the Devil’s whores.

Another important witch hunting guide,
Demonolatry
, was published by French lawyer Nicholas Remy in 1595. Thought to have witnessed witch trials in his youth, he became the foremost French witch hunter of his time. He blamed the death of one of his sons upon a witche’s curse, making his persecutions a personal matter. Lurid descriptions of devil worshipping witches fill the pages of
Demonolatry
, which soon supplanted the
Malleus Maleficarum
as the reference book of choice for witch hunters in Europe.

In England, King James I ascended the throne in 1603 with a conviction that witchcraft threatened his sovereignty and subjects. Prior to his coronation as King of England and Ireland, James I witnessed witch trials while King of Scotland. 300 people were charged with witchcraft in North Berwick. In addition to sponsoring the King James edition of the Bible, he penned his own witch hunting manual,
Daemonologie
in 1597, which states:

The fearefull aboundinge at this time in this countrie, of these detestable slaves of the Devil, the Witches or enchaunters, hath moved me (beloved reader) to dispatch in post, this following treatise of mine (...) to resolve the doubting (...) both that such assaults of Satan are most certainly practised, and that the instrument thereof merits most severely to be punished.
²⁰³

Daemonologie
by King James I

James passed laws that condemned to death any persons causing harm to persons or property by witchcraft. This strident approach led to unnecessary prosecutions based upon weak evidence and in one instance, required his personal involvement to defuse a fevered persecution and prevent an innocent person from punishment; i. e., burned at the stake.

Three-fourths of the time, women were the accused in witch trials. The lawyers attending to the cases, always male, believed women were more likely to be handmaidens to the Devil, commonly perceived as a masculine figure. Also, women of the Middle Ages had less status and power, making accusations and charges easier to bring by prosecutors on more vulnerable persons. Often, confessions occurred after severe torture, the persecutor often encouraging the victim to confess in order for the punishment to stop, which would in turn lead to their condemnation and death.

Puritan William Perkins wrote
Discourse on the Damned Art of Witchcraft
in 1608. He delineated all the indications of witchcraft, much of it based upon circumstantial evidence. The information in the book clearly indicates that all classes of Pilgrim society understood the myths and folklore superstitions concerning witchcraft. Trials, condemnations and executions for witchcraft began in the 1640’s in New England. Often the accusation of witchcraft occurred following personal disputes. Cases of early New England witch trials were recorded by John Hale in
A Modest Enquiry Into the Nature of Witchcraft
, published in 1702. Increase Mather and his son, Cotton influenced the approach to witchcraft in seventeenth century New England. Both held a common Judeo-Christian, “providential” view of society’s place in the world, seeing all blessings and cursings dependent upon that community’s obedience to a just God. Increase Mather, a Puritan minister, an influential member of the Massachusetts Bay Colony and an administrator of Harvard College, wrote
An Essay for the Recording of Illustrious Providence
. The book vividly depicts the New England Puritans fighting on God’s side against the Devil for control of the New World. Supernatural events and descriptions of witchcraft permeate the pages, cover to cover.

Increase Mather believed that individuals could be involved in witchcraft, but also stated “
It were better that Ten Suspected Witches should escape, than that one Innocent Person should be Condemned.”
²⁰⁴
His son Cotton, however, took an active role in the supporting the superstitions of the Colonial Era while a Puritan minister in Boston. He depicted New England as besieged by witchcraft and saw the primordial and pagan controlled New World just beyond the colonies as the “Devil’s Territories.”
²⁰⁵
His fevered and apocalyptic views shaped public perceptions in the New England colonies and laid the groundwork for the Salem witch trials.