Book of Life

Choose your path.

There’s no shortage of types of witchcraft, meaning there’s also no
shortage of choices for an aspiring witch. Rather than get
overwhelmed, get your bearings by having at least a basic
understanding of the terms below.
Paganism: An umbrella term for religions other than the Abrahamic
faiths of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam that typically places
emphasis on the earth and nature. Its modern-day practitioners are
known as neo-pagans.
Wicca: A religion that’s perhaps the popularized form neo-paganism,
thanks in large part to the so-called Father of Wicca, Gerald Gardner,
who cultivated his specific ideology, now known as Gardnerian Wicca,
in the mid-1900s. Whereas witches are typically thought of as women,
many Wiccans are men and worship both a god and a goddess. What
was initially thought of as an anti-monotheistic gesture, though, has
more recently been criticized for espousing heterosexuality and the
idea of a gender binary, which was, in part, what led to the emergence
of Dianic Wicca, in the 1970s, for those who chose to only worship the
goddess and to do so only in the presence of women—a policy that’s
since proven to be problematic, as many of its covens prohibit
transgender women.
Ceremonial: The by-the-book practice of placing the highest value in
—not to mention expertly executing—ceremonies and rituals.
Brujería: An umbrella term for African, Caribbean, and indigenous
Latin American witchcraft, dating back centuries, if not thousands of
years. Increasingly, though, the word bruja, Spanish for witch, has
been reclaimed by Latinx women interested in their heritage—and
made contemporary by, say, using the gender-neutral term brujx.
Solitary: This group is made up of those who choose not to find a
coven, but instead operate on their own with the type (or mix) of
witchcraft that they choose.
Eclecticism: A more social route for those who choose not to stick to
a particular category but instead mix traditions as they please.

Learn the terminology.

You can get a more comprehensive guide to definitions via Shelley
Rabinovitch and James Lewis’s The Encyclopedia of Modern
Witchcraft and Neo-Paganism, a good portion of which is available on
Google Books. Before that deep dive, though, any beginner should
have at least cursory knowledge of the terms listed below.
Initiation: The rites that put a budding witch on the path to making
things official, by joining a coven after studying its practice,
traditionally for a year and a day. The initiations that follow eventually
allow the initiate the opportunity to become a high priest or high
priestess; those with enough knowledge, experience, and dedication
can become the leader of a Wiccan coven.
Coven: A gathering or community of initiated witches, usually led by a
high priest and/or high priestess. If a coven is Wiccan, their meetings
often involve sabbats, which are celebrations of the annual cycle of
seasonal festivals known as the Wheel of the Year. (Non-sabbat
meetings, such as the observation of a full moon, are known as
esbats.)
Familiar: An animal-shaped spirit that serves as a witch’s spy,
assistant, companion, and protector—the classic example of which is
Sabrina’s black cat, Salem.
Altar: A surface that a Wiccan uses solely for activities such as
casting spells, chanting, and worshipping the god and goddess.
Typically, the altar is covered in a symbol-adorned cloth, which

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protects it from ash, liquids, and candle wax, as well as religious and
ritual items like incense, wands, chalices of water, and cauldrons.
Pentacle: A magical tool such as an amulet or talisman that often
appears on an altar, and is also often confused with a pentagram—a
symbol popular in Wicca and, confusingly enough, the Church of
Satan, which has pretty successfully taken ownership of its inverted
version. (Inverted pentacles aren’t necessarily satanic, though
Wiccans have recently largely strayed from using them to avoid that
association.)

Black Magic: A form of magic used with dark, malevolent, and

harmful intentions, commonly associated with satanism. Spells
have been used for a variety of purposes ever since the days of
the Magi of Zoroastrianism and Ancient Egypt, but those that are
specifically used for negative and/or harmful purposes are known
as hexes and curses.
Séance: A ceremony used to contact spirits, including the dead,
usually with the help of a medium.
Grimoire: The umbrella term for a magic text, ranging from
diaries to textbooks.
Book of Shadows: A Wiccan’s personal grimoire, used to store
information they need, such as thoughts, recipes, and instructions
for spells, rituals, and hexes.

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