Modern Wicca/Neo-Paganism often sees itself as an attempt to follow the magical practices of the ancient world, for example trying to recover the religion of the Goddess from the past. However, in order to understand the present, it is imperative to understand the origin of these magical practices and where their basis is derived from. In addition, to taking into consideration that these religions are exactly that two separate religions, therefore making uncovering these underlying resemblances and contrasting factors that much more important.
Modern Wicca is a neo-paganistic religion in which the main focus varies. There are many texts and even websites nowadays that try to serve as guides for what Wicca really is or should be, but there is …show more content…
For example, both ancient magic and modern Wicca/Neo-Paganism’s aim is to exploit and embrace one’s self-control and faith by using spells and charms in order to persuade forces beyond their control in the world to produce the desired demands they want. In other words, both use magic or magick to benefit their lives and make a certain outcome come true. Another way they resemble each other is because both associate with some kind of God like figure that they pray to or worship despite who that being is, being different from one another. In addition to both religions believing in supernatural forces that can or cannot be …show more content…
One way they are different is because ancient magic and modern Wicca/Neo-Paganism clash when it comes to the use of black magic. Ancient magic sees using black magic as just another spell or ritual to get what they want especially in getting people to do what they wanted but more specifically women since men looked down upon women. Wicca on the other hand, not only denounces the use of black magic but celebrates women and emphasizes their importance. Even though forms of Wicca vary, I found it interesting that while ancient magic would sometimes seek to harm others, all forms of Wicca wants to never harm anyone since they are about the wellbeing of everyone and everything. At first glance, it seems like that law means as long as you don’t do something bad or hurt anyone then you can do whatever you want but that’s not true. Wiccans, especially the one I spoke with, stressed something called the threefold law, which basically means that everything you do good or bad is returned threefold in this life. Yes, the spell or charm may work and have the results you want for a brief time but the same amount of force put into that spell will come back in the same way when karma comes back since people intervene with things they shouldn’t; when people go above and beyond to do harm by taking away someone’s free will. Thus explaining why Wiccans believe in the