Pagans, witches not linked with Satan

Thursday, November 12, 1998

Pagans, witches not linked with Satan

RELIGION: News article furthers misinformation, unwarranted
stereotypes

By Lauren Thomas

We at the UCLA Pagan Circle feel the need to respond to
offensive inaccuracies in the "Origins of Halloween" article
featured in The Daily Bruin (News, Oct. 30). The assertion that
Halloween (Samhain) descended from a "Black Sabbath of Witches" or
"pagan Black Sabbath" is not only a long obsolete theory among
religious and historical scholars and patently false, but is
outrageously insulting to the Pagan and Wiccan community of
UCLA.

Using the term "Black Sabbath" (a negative, "evil" reversal of a
holy rite of Christianity) implies a connection of Witchcraft and
Paganism to Satanism ­ a connection which simply does not
exist.

Witches and Pagans do not worship Satan or acknowledge the
existence of such a being; he is a part of the Christian and Muslim
religions. This false misconception is much like the commonly-held
falsity that the pentagram (five-pointed star) is a Satanic symbol.
In fact, the pentagram is an ancient symbol of protection and
wisdom (like the swastika before the Nazis perverted its sacredness
for their own purposes). Pythagoras and his followers wore
pentagrams in order to recognize one another ­ and, in
Medieval times, some Christian knights used the pentagram as their
symbol.

To modern Witches and Pagans the pentagram is a sacred symbol
meaning many things ­ four points correspond to the elements
air, earth, fire and water with the top point corresponding to
spirit, or "Akasha." The pentagram may also represent a human being
with their legs and arms outstretched, surrounded by the universal
wisdom or God (or Godess), which represents humankind at one with
deity and the environment. Satanists turn the symbol upside-down,
which puts the elements of fire and earth at the top (fire
symbolizes willpower and passion, earth symbolizes prosperity and
earthly goods) and spirit, spirituality, at the bottom.

Satanists also turn the cross upside-down. This in itself does
not make the cross or pentagram a Satanic symbol. The vital point
here is that while Paganism and the many paths that fall under it
are pre-Christian in nature, they are in no way anti-Christian.
Most Pagans and Wiccans (Witches) do not even associate with
Satanists.

Myths and falsehoods like these are the result of hundreds of
years of religious propaganda and misinformation spread about
pre-Christian and non-Christian religions. We are unsure where the
author of this article did her research, but it was probably not
among the thousands upon thousands of Pagan web sites that provide
accurate information and history about our religion and holidays
(for a very thorough and far more accurate history of the holiday
of Halloween/Samhain, an excellent page is
www.geocities.com/Athens/Forum/7280/samhain.html).

The ASUCLA Communications Board and The Daily Bruin claim to
"prohibit the publication of articles that perpetuate derogatory
cultural or ethnic stereotypes" and avow to "reject or modify"
material "whose content discriminates on the basis of ancestry,
color, national origin, race, religion, disability, age, sex or
sexual orientation" ­ but Witchcraft, and Paganism in general,
have been seriously maligned and discriminated against in this
article.

Witchcraft, or Wicca, has been recognized as a legitimate
religion by the Federal Government since 1985, and therefore its
more than 500,000 followers in the United States are entitled to
the same rights of freedom and non-persecution under the
Constitution as any other religion.

To publish this article in the same issue with the Viewpoint
article by UCLA Pagan Circle founder Celeste Christie (about
dispelling myths and misconceptions about our religion) was an
extremely perplexing decision by The Daily Bruin.

Comments, feedback, problems?

© 1998 ASUCLA Communications Board[Home]