CUEW Triad

There's a very, very common question that eclectic and solitary Wiccans get asked. Invariably, it's asked by traditional Witches (who are, apparently, not the same thing as Wiccans at all). The basic thrust of this question is this: "Justify your faith! How can you be a real Witch (sorry, Wiccan - no, wait, Witch - oh never mind) if you're self-taught, if you work on your own, if your practises come from cultures all over the world, instead of the received wisdom of your elders? Aren't you just a dabbler? If you don't do things the way I do them, how can you possibly be like me?"

The terrible thing is that I've thought about this question, and the more I've done so, the more I've realised something: they're right. I can't. In fact, as a solitary, eclectic Wiccan and a keen student of all things related to my faith, I found the whole idea profoundly educational to think about; it shed a great deal of light on these people's choices in life, and made me understand my own in a whole new light. I am, I must admit, a recent convert to Wicca; I am scarcely half way through my online study course, and thus far my library of worthy Wiccan tomes has included only such outdated pieces as Gardner's first book on witchcraft, T C Lethbridge's deliciously eccentric mid-twentieth-century examination of the same subject, and Mad Aunt Margaret's memorable 'The Witch-Cult in Western Europe". I understand that later in the course I will have the pleasure of reading Ronald Hutton's 'Triumph of the Moon'. Such paltry supplements to the course material as I have been able to find independently include Francis King's 'Modern Ritual Magic' and a number of terribly narrow-minded books on individual traditions which make no reference to Traditional Wicca at all; Rae Beth's 'Hedge Witch', for one.

It is also, I am ashamed to say, true that I am a jack of all trades and master of none (although ironically, my master's degree is in fact in computer science). During my time at Cambridge, for example, I studied not computer science but modern languages; and following a number of what I can only describe as growth experiences in industry, I am now a professional writer. I am often at a loss to understand how I could have failed so badly in the attempt to pick a path and stick with it; it's a constant relief to me that the experiences I do have at least provide me with ample material to write about. Occasionally, I even find they allow me a measure of insight into myself, and others who may perhaps be like me.

But I am digressing from my attempt to answer this fascinating challenge. Unfortunately I am also inadequate in my abilities in this respect; I cannot describe the impact of pure self-study since while I am both a solitary and an eclectic Wiccan, I am in fact learning in a very structured environment. My mentor is Australian, as I discovered when she asked me to proofread her PhD thesis, and my classmates hail from places as far apart as Britain (like myself), South Africa, Canada and the USA. We are indeed a sorry hodgepodge, a mishmash of cultural mongrels; it is difficult to see what there is of value to be gleaned from the knowledge we each bring to the table. For example, in Australia it's difficult to know which festival to celebrate when because there may be only two seasons, or conversely as many as six; and in the US Wiccan traditions can and do incorporate themselves as churches and attempt to set up disturbingly pseudo-Christian institutions like charitable funds and refuges for the homeless. I ask you, reader: what lessons could anyone possibly learn from a formless chaos like that?

Another personal failing I have is the fact that while I am British born and bred, I have callously and shamelessly ignored my native tradition of Wicca - the original tradition, nonetheless, created by the gods and Gerald Gardner for my personal betterment. What it is that led me to do so I cannot say; perhaps I am simply too Bohemian, an intellectual butterfly incapable of settling and putting in the necessarere sun, mere soil? Where is magic and miracle, where is the breathtaking moment of understanding - in the invisible unfolding of a silly little seed, or shrouded in polyester satin robes and swirling with incense in some dark and vaulted scout hall?

No; I have failed in my duty as a Wiccan. I have abandoned my faith in the divinity of the priests of Gardner, and foolishly placed it instead in absent, abstract gods, things that cannot be seen or touched or spoken to. Not for me safety in numbers, not for me poems and rituals and explanations ready-made; instead I must approach my gods myself, crabwise, sidle up to them through a thousand refractions and gingerly reach out, as if their faces might be totally changed by the touch of a different hand. I have put my faith in the gods and not in man, and my punishment for this crime, this sin, is to be an eclectic: to walk in the wilderness, touching leaves and feeling the sky above me, eternally cast out from the inner circle of the traditional witch. Spare a thought for me as you taste the incense in the air and raise your blade; pity the poor eclectic, the lonely dancer upon the naked Earth.