Witchcraft Today By Gerald B Gardner Review

I decided to go back to start my 2012 Pagan Reading Challenge by getting back Wicca's roots. I hate to admit it, but even though I have studying Wicca, witchcraft, and paganism for the last 16 years, this is the first time I have read anything by Gerald Gardner.It was fascinating to be able to see how much of Wicca has stayed the same and how much has changed. The basics of ritual including Cakes and Ale, Drawing Down the Moon, the Fivefold Kiss, ritual dancing and chanting all have stayed the same. The basic tools of Wicca have stayed the same. Gardner even mentions the spiral dance which Starhawk has made immensely popular. The basics of making magic have remained much the same as well. Gardner talks about the power of suggestion, using herbs, and making charms.The biggest difference between Gardner's Wica (which was never spelled with an extra "c") is that it was practiced by skyclad couples in a coven. Gardner believed that wearing clothing during ritual blocked your power and that a balance between a couple was needed to properly raise energy. It is interesting that he was taught that power radiates through the skin. I found Gardner's understanding of just how magic worked a bit primitive. We now know that the ability to raise power and use it goes far beyond whether or not you are wearing clothes.Reading Gerald Gardner's actual words shattered many myths that I had about him that I have gathered through the years. One of those being that he believed you had to be in a coupled coven to practice witchcraft and practicing as a solitary was forbidden. At no point, does Gardner ever say that! In fact, he acknowledges all kinds of magical practices from the medicine man (shaman) to voodoo to being a local wise woman.Another misconception, and I think it is a huge one, is that Gardner invented Wicca. He never makes such a claim! The truth is he gives huge credit to the influence of Celtic beliefs, in particular the Sabbats. His exact words are "Celtic ideas crept in." He also credits pre-Christian cults, Druids, Kabbalah, and Egyptian practices as all forming an amalgam that we now call modern Wicca. What's fascinating is that he believed, at least in part, that the root of almost all the practices went back to ancient Egyptian magic.I say in part because in the first half of the book he credits these many different sources as coming together to form modern witchcraft. The second half of the book is a historical account of the Little People and how they contributed to witchcraft, which in my opinion, didn't make much sense after reading the first half. In one chapter he even switches mid-chapter talking about the Little People to suddenly discussing the Knights Templer. I'm still confused on what these have to do with each other.Much of the book is dry, historical accounts of different practices of witchcraft throughout the world. Like I said earlier, he acknowledges all types of magical practice from the medicine man to the ceremonial magician, but what I found most frustrating is how incredibly disorganized all of this information was. The book desperately needed more editing!Two-thirds of the way through, he leaves this historical account of witchcraft throughout the world and switches back to the practices of European witches. When he finally mentions the word Wica, it almost seems odd. He says that the people he has been studying with may not be witches as all but "people who call themselves the Wica, the 'wise people' and who practice occult teaching which they think to be magic or witchcraft. That they think to be magic or witchcraft? I find this comment confusing, but unfortunately Gardner never explains just what he means by it.In another part, when talking about the European witches he writes, "As the Magic was done only to show me, I cannot say whether it works or not: they assure me, however that is does." I literally laughed out loud at this. I am assuming that Gardner is talking about a specific group and not witchcraft as a whole, but to write an entire book about modern witchcraft and then say near the end he never had proof whether or not the magic worked was just hilarious to me.However, throughout the entire book it does seem that Gardner was more interested in the religious practices of witchcraft than the magic. What baffled me was that Gardner never seemed to talk about his own place within witchcraft. He talks about the research he has done and all the things that he has been shown or told, but how much Gardner truly practiced Wica himself never seemed to be explained.I had also hoped this book would shed more light on just how much Gerald Gardner influenced modern Wicca himself. If it were to be judged by this book alone, he didn't create anything. He simply brought what was already created by someone else into public knowledge. Witchcraft Today is truly an anthropological study of the history of witchcraft. My only explanation is it is in the future that Gardner becomes much more involved in Wicca on personal level. In fact, according to Witchcraft Today, Gardner didn't believe that witchcraft would survive. He writes, "But I think we must say good-bye to the witch. The cult is doomed...The modern child is not interested."Clearly Gardner was hugely mistaken when he wrote that people were not interested. It's incredibly ironic that it was this very book that sparked the beginning of the modern witchcraft movement. One can't help but wonder, if Gerald Gardner hadn't been brave enough to write this book, would witchcraft have actually died out? If it did survive, what would it look like without Gardner's involvement?The description of Gardner's next book titled The Meaning of Witchcraft is, "It was the first sympathetic book written from the point of view of a practicing witch." So likely it is Gardner's next book where his personal influence begins to be felt in Wicca and he goes beyond just an anthropological study.I'd also like to add that Gardner had a very open mind when it came to different ways of practicing magic and witchcraft. I never felt that he believed there was only one right way (skyclad in a coven of thirteen.) Like I said earlier, he acknowledged all different kinds of practice from the medicine man to the voodoo priestess. So I am very confused as to where the idea of British Traditional Witchcraft came from and their sometimes dogmatic view that this way of witchcraft is the only way. Did Gardner realize he was "the father of Wicca" and it went to his head? Was this an idea that was later propagated by Alex Sanders? Is it an idea that doesn't reflect Gardner or Sanders beliefs at all?This book is a must read for anyone interested in Wicca and witchcraft. But I must admit, it raises more questions than it answers!