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Subscribe to this list via RSS Blog posts tagged in witches sabbat

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Beyond the Hedge

 I'm goin' to a meetin', do you want to come along?

I'm goin' to a meetin', do you want to come along?

I'm goin' to a meetin', do you want to come along?

We'll dance by the light of the Moon.

(Appalachian traditional)

 

We don't know whether or not the classic Witches' Sabbat—the Horned Lord enthroned on the altar, the frenzied dancing, the love-making in the shadows—ever existed anywhere but in the tortured imaginations of the witch-hunters.

But this much we do know: it exists now.

It doesn't much resemble what some call sabbats, safely indoors with their decorous quarter-candles.

The Sabbat-in-true is no indoor rite.

The Sabbat is a rite of the woods, the mountain, the island: what witches call the Outgarth.

And yes, there's the Horned Lord enthroned on the altar, and frenzied dancing, and love-making. It wouldn't be the Sabbat without them.

At the Sabbat, the firelight flash of a moving knife denotes no casting of circles.

It's the sacrificial blade, descending.

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Posted by on in Culture Blogs
Triptych, with Horns

In India, on nights of the autumn full moon, the blue god Krishna stands in a clearing in the forest and plays his flute.

Hearing this, his worshipers—regardless of caste or marital status—cast social convention aside, and rush off to the woods for an ecstatic celebration, in which they dance wildly and have sex with their god.

This is called the rasa-lila, or "juice-play."

 ***

Among the Kalasha of what is now Pakistan, the only surviving Indo-European people who have practiced their ancestral religion continuously since ancient times, the presiding figure of the Prûn festival, the autumnal celebration which honors the grape-harvest and the return of the flocks from their summer pastures, is called the Budálak.

The Budalak is a virile young goat-herd who, dressed in goat-skins and horns, dances vigorously with the young women in wine-fueled, fire-lit nighttime celebrations, while—to the sound of drums and flutes—the old women sing his raunchy, raucous songs.

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Posted by on in Culture Blogs
Damnedest Thing

I tell you, it's the damnedest thing.

Every few years, the witches get together up on the ridge for one of their big shindigs.

Every few years, without any rhyme or reason to it.

Harvest time coming on, and suddenly they'll be up there, hooting and hollering and carrying on. All night they'll be at it, sun-down to sun-up.

Eeriest thing you ever heard. Hear the drums for miles, you can.

Funny, those are always bumper years: corn, apples, hay. Hens laying like crazy, and the cows! Seems like you never stop milking.

There's always good hunting, too, the falls of those years. Those are good venison years.

And here's something else: after the last one, in the spring, that's when Martha had the Twins. Nobody else in her family, or mine, ever had twins before.

Now, ain't that just the damnedest thing?

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Posted by on in Culture Blogs
A Night on Witch Island

Have you ever been to Witch Island?

You know the one I mean. That island out in the river (or: lake) where the witches go for their...doings.

You've heard the stories. Nobody else goes out there.

(Well, there were those kids that once. Did you ever hear what they saw there? All that weird shit carved on the rocks? The big pile of ashes? The bones? Did you hear what happened to those kids?)

You've seen the fires out there among the trees at night. You've seen the shadows of the dancers.

You've heard the drums, the crazy singing.

You've heard the howls.

The screams.

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Posted by on in Culture Blogs
The Question Any Witch Can Answer

Going to sabbat, expect the tylers.

They'll stop you on your way through the woods. You'll know them by the leaves in their hats, and the gleam of their blades.

They'll ask you the question that any witch can answer.

Then, when you've answered rightly, they'll give you your token, and send you on.

Fear not, you'll know the answer. If you're of Ours, you'll know.

And if you're not of Ours, then?

Well, now.

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    I have never heard of these, I must say. But learn of them and become one of you, I will one day. For I have a high thought to

Posted by on in Culture Blogs
"Just Like in the Woodcuts"

Our chant begins low and slow, but soon we are shouting, frenzied.

Horned One! Horned One! Horned One!

From the woods, a horn rings out. Another joins it, nearing, and another.

We call, He comes.

In the moving torchlight, He shines. Borne high, He stands astride, arms raised. His horns reach up to heaven.

At a run, His bearers cross the final slope and enter our midst, bringing Him in. He steps, precisely, from palanquin to altar. The drums fall silent.

In the sudden stillness, He scans our fire-lit faces. Between His antlers, constellations revolve.

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The Old Blood Calls

The Sabbat is the true paradise...where there is more joy than I can express. Those who go there find the time too short because of the pleasure and happiness they enjoy and, having once been there, they will long with a raging desire [un désire enragé] to go and be there again.

(Jeanne Dibason, 1630)

 

The Old Blood calls.

The Sabbat: the ecstatic adoration of the incarnate Horned God, the witch's True Paradise.

For nearly 25 years, the Midwest Tribe of Witches has gathered regularly—at the requisite irregular intervals—in immemorial Grand Sabbat.

Plans for Grand Sabbat 2018 are already under way.

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