Your opinions on a controversial subject

MadArchitect

LanDroid, the Malleus Maleficorum and most (if not all) of the techniques and episodes described by Sagan come from the Enlightenment period. My "line of spin-doctoring" seems misleading mostly because you've conflated two time periods that are seperated by a good 800 years. Paganism was already nearly a thousand years dead by the time the witch crazes occured, and that death was more a sigh than an explosion.

A conflicting opinion claims Christianity is the force that preserved this non-existent tradition.

Not the tradition, but some elements from paganism. We don't know for certain what roles the Yule log, mistletoe, and so forth played in Pagan religious ritual. We do know, however, that they're alien accretions to Christianity, absorbed into Christian practice when the new religion displaced older Pagan practices in their native regions. The traditions don't survive; merely artifacts from them, commuted to a new religious mileu.

LanDroid · Posted: Fri Jun 23, 2006 8:08 pm Post subject: Inquisitions

The Malleus Maleficarum was first published in 1486. Inquisitions had been going on for several hundred years before that and continued for several hundred more. Few people consider this a period of Enlightenment.

Maeveautumnrain · Posted: Fri Jun 23, 2006 10:26 pm Post subject: Re: Inquisitions

MadArchitect said that Paganism was already nearly a thousand years dead by the time the witch crazes occured, and that death was more a sigh than an explosion.

I kind of disagree with that statement. Paganism may have been underground and dormant but it was surely not dead. People would use everyday items for ritual because they were afraid to use actual ritual items. But just because they did not have a permanent altar set up in their homes as I do, that does not necissarily mean that Paganism was dead. I don't mean to offend, but that's just the way I see things.

MadArchitect · Posted: Sat Jun 24, 2006 12:29 pm Post subject: Re: Inquisitions

LanDroid: The Malleus Maleficarum was first published in 1486.

Which is still 800-1000 years later than the period I'm talking about.

Inquisitions had been going on for several hundred years before that and continued for several hundred more. Few people consider this a period of Enlightenment.

Witch trails and burnings were isolated incidents until around the 17th century, which is the beginning of the period recognized as the Enlightenment. That's when witch-crazes as a phenomenon spread across Europe like wild fire. The witch burnings that preceeded this era were mostly a matter of local phenomenon, in much the same light that a plague-ridden or economically destitute village might seize upon the local Jews and accuse them of having worked some necromantic art to affect the gentile population. It wasn't until the decline of the Middle Ages that witch hunts began as a concerted drive to rid Christendom of malign influence, something of an afterthought since paganism had no significant representation in the European population at that time. It's far more likely, as H.R. Trevor-Roper has argued, that the hysteria was directed towards whichever side of the Reformation line the minorty of a city represented. Witch, at the time, became all but shorthand for "heretic". Examination of the accusations and confessions of the time reveal virtually no link with any recognized form of paganism; all of the witches were accused, and confessed when confession was extracted, in the terminology of Christian daemonology -- even the spontaneous confessions spoke of Satan and demons.

I'm perfectly open to the suggestion that the details of witch belief at the time were built in part around the artifacts of ancient paganism, but with the qualification that those details were, by that time, just as divorced from pagan belief as the Yule log and Easter egg in orthodox Christian ritual. That is to say, while elements like the broomstick and familiar may have been derived from ancient pagan practices, there's no indication that they retained their original function, and their presence does not indicate the continuation of pagan belief. The elements had apparantly, at that point, been adapted to the shadow-side of Christian belief in demons.

Maeveautumnrain: Paganism may have been underground and dormant but it was surely not dead.

It may have gone underground, and some remnants of the traditions of paganism may have survived, probably within individual families, if at all. Margeret Murray suggested something of the sort in her book "The God of the Witches", but subsequent criticism has indicated the weaknesses in her theory. Until I've seen some evidence to substantiate the continuous transmission of pagan tradition, I don't see any reason to treat it as anything but a possibility. Because original paganism was not associated with written literary expression, only one or two generations of lapsed pagans would be enough to discontinue transmission altogether. The explanation that modern Pagans are adopting, adapting and extrapolating from the work of archaeologists and historians seems entirely sufficient to me.

I don't mean to offend, but that's just the way I see things.

It certainly doesn't offend me. I'm more worried that my skepticism is offensive to you. The beliefs that undergird modern Paganism are, so far as I know, just as likely as the beliefs that undergird any religious or metaphysical belief. But the claims that those same traditions were transmitted almost entirely intact from the pre-Christian period in Europe are amenable to the standards that any historical claim would have to meet. So far, I just haven't seen any strong evidence to suggest it.

Maeveautumnrain · Posted: Sat Jun 24, 2006 2:17 pm Post subject: Re: Inquisitions

I was not offended by your acceptance of the "possibility" rather than blind aceptance. I totally understand because we can't prove a lot of history. We have to piece together what we have and make assumptions. I can only say that paganism/witchcraft has survived, but in a smaller number of people who've kept it going. I only say this because I peronally know a few people who can really trace their coven back several hundred years. For respect of their privacy I could not and would never divulge their identity. But it lets me sleep knowing I am celebrating something that has stood the test of time and lots of dissention by others. I believe it may have morphed a little because we don't live in post modern times, but I do in my heart and when I am in nature, away from electricity and running water, I can feel the way my ancestors might have. And that brings me peace, which is what I desire.

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