The Horned God of the Witches

by Jason Mankey

  252. Farrar and Farrar, The Witches’ God, from the table of contents.

  253. RavenWolf, To Ride a Silver Broomstick, 49. I pick on this book a lot in my books, but it remains my favorite “101” book.

  Chapter Seventeen

  The Witchfather: The Horned God

  in Traditional Witchcraft

  Traditional Witchcraft (also sometimes called Old Craft or Traditional Craft 254 ) is a branch of the Modern Craft that looks to English cunning-craft, folk magick practices, and the witch trials of the late medieval and early modern periods for inspiration. Some practitioners go much further than simply inspiration and insist that their practices represent a surviving Witch tradition much older and more authentic than that of Wiccan-Witchcraft. Many who practice Traditional Witchcraft (especially older generations) have an especially antagonistic attitude toward Wiccan-Witches, derisively describing Wicca as a “neo-Pagan” tradition, while stating that Traditional Witchcraft claims indicate a “pre-modern provenance.” 255

  Though my main practice is Wiccan-Witchcraft, I’ll admit to also being seduced by the charms of Traditional Witchcraft. The smart Witch uses whatever works, and many of the ritual techniques and ideas from Traditional Witchcraft work! I also see Traditional Witchcraft and Wicca as generally stemming from the same set of ideas and impulses. While Traditional Witchcraft most certainly contains a lot of older folk magick elements, many practitioners have also been influenced by modern literary sources such as Robert Graves’s The White Goddess and James Frazer’s The Golden Bough. How those elements have been used and interpreted varies, but that’s the beauty of Witchcraft! A Craft capable of growth, change, and adaptation is far more desirable to me than one that stands in place.

  Unlike Wicca, which often focuses on the Goddess (or goddesses), Traditional Witchcraft tends to emphasize the Horned God. Within Traditional Witchcraft, the Horned God is known by several additional names: Witchfather (or Witch-Father), the Dark Lord of the Mound, and the Witch God, along with additional names and titles, depending on the Traditional Witch one is reading or speaking with. Unlike in Wicca, Traditional Witches often proudly state that their Horned God is “none other than the Devil himself.” 256

  Azazel and The Witchfather

  Robert Cochrane is generally credited as being the first public Traditional Witch. Articulating a Witchcraft practice radically different from that of Gerald Gardner, the Witches of Cochrane’s tradition worked robed and outdoors and utilized a unique ritual system. Instead of the athame, their primary working tool was (and still is) the stang, a pitchfork or walking stick shod with iron and often containing “horns” on top. Cochrane’s Witchcraft was heavily influenced by Graves’s The White Goddess and was the first modern Witchcraft tradition to freely add elements from Christian and Jewish practices.

  The theological underpinnings of Cochrane’s Witchcraft have always been hard to nail down. Unlike the works of many other Witchcraft architects, much of Cochrane’s written legacy is in the form of letters to various individuals, and in those letters Cochrane was often deliberately obtuse. Witchcraft writer Michael Howard (1948–2015) believed that the essence of Cochrane’s system was the use of magic and religion to overcome Fate (also the name of a goddess, according to Howard); in other words, Witchcraft was a tool to take control of one’s life.257 Unlike with later Traditional Witches, the Horned God was not always the primary deity in Cochrane’s Craft; however, Cochrane did help define modern interpretations of the Horned God in Trad Craft.

  Writing to American Witch Joseph Bearwalker Wilson (1942–2004),258 Cochrane provides a cosmology of deity, ending with the “God of fire, of craft, of lower magic and of fertility and death.” 259 Cochrane goes on to write that all the things of this world belong to him, and that he is “the star-crossed serpent.” The term star-crossed serpent would be used by later Traditional Witchcraft writers and is a reference to Azazel, a former angel and “son of heaven” who fell from grace.

  The story of Azazel comes from an apocalyptic Jewish work titled the Book of the Watchers.260 A group of stories most likely collected during the Maccabean Revolt (167 to 160 BCE), the book tells the story of a group of angelic beings known as the “Watchers” who were charged by the Jewish god to look over human beings. (How old the story of the Watchers is in Jewish tradition is an open question, with some scholars suggesting the stories themselves could date back to the third or fourth century BCE.) Upon beginning their duties, the Watchers were consumed with lust for human women and left heaven in order to have sexual relations with them. The union of mortal women and angelic Watchers produced the Nephilim (“fallen ones”), a race of giants that brought violence to Earth.261 When some Traditional Witches talk about “witch blood,” they are generally referencing the idea that there are people (witches) descended from the Nephilim and the Watchers.

  The Book of the Watchers contains two very different stories outlining the fall of the Watchers. In the story above, the angel Semihazah (or Semyaz, depending on the translator) leads the Watchers. A second story gives the name Azazel as the leader of the Watchers, with Azazel’s gifts to humanity being more than just carnal. Azazel teaches women magick (Witchcraft) and cosmetology; the “beautifying of the eyelids” is held up as an especially horrible skill to teach human beings.262 Perhaps even more importantly, it’s Azazel who gives humanity the knowledge of the forge, and with it, weapons, introducing violence into the world. Azazel’s gift also includes how to manufacture jewelry, which is also condemned. As the story of Azazel progresses, he is credited with introducing all sin into the world.263 Since Azazel was the architect of so much on earth, it’s no wonder that his name most likely translates as “strong god,” for strong was Azazel’s influence on the world.264

  The story found in The Book of the Watchers was eventually added to another piece of apocalyptic Jewish literature, the Book of Enoch. Enoch contains material from five very different sources and can be looked at as a document expressing the development of Jewish (and later Christian) ideas about the Devil. Over the course of Enoch, the name of the “evil one” changes from Semihazah to Azazel and eventually to Satan. Since they were all added to the same religious “book,” the different stories in Enoch began to be interpreted as one tale instead of several, with the figures of Semihazah, Azazel, and Satan all becoming one and the same.

  While seen as a source of wickedness in Christianity and Judaism, Azazel can be interpreted in other ways. Instead of being an evil force, Azazel is a source of knowledge and human betterment. As a deity of forge and flame, he has parallels with Lucifer, the light bringer. Azazel is a figure who chose to be on Earth and not occupy a place above the natural world. While Yahweh apparently found sex with human females sinful, Azazel believed, like Modern Witches, otherwise. Sex is not some sort of cosmic test; it’s something to be enjoyed among consenting adults. Azazel is also the original teacher of magick, certainly an important skill for Modern Witches. Azazel is also intensely human in his longing and desire to be with others physically.

  Robert Cochrane called his coven (or cuveen) the Clan of Tubal Cain, named after the legendary Hebrew blacksmith Tubal Cain. According to the Book of the Watchers, it’s Azazel who gave the power of the forge to humanity, so by naming his group after Tubal Cain, Cochrane was linking it to Azazel and the Watchers’ gifts of light, knowledge, and magic. Paul Huson, writing in 1970, would later connect Tubal Cain and Azazel to the legends of the goddess Diana and the Babylonian god Shamash.265 Huson would also retell the tale of Azazel (generally spelled Azael by Huson), placing it front and center in the many Witch traditions that would later be inspired by his book Mastering Witchcraft.

  The star-crossed serpent wasn’t Cochrane’s only conception of the Horned God and male deity. In other letters, he wrote of the “horned child,” an idea most likely inspired by the Maiden-Mother-Crone mythos found in Robert Graves’s The White Goddess.266 In another lette
r, Cochrane calls the Horned God Carenos (most likely a misspelling and a reference to Cernunnos) and writes of him in a way that parallels most modern descriptions of the Horned God. Cochrane says that this figure is Lord of the Animals and the god of joy, passion, growth, strength, happiness, fertility, and fruition. He calls him the “wild hunter” and “Ruler of the Woodlands” as well, and compares him to a young Dionysus.267

  The Horned God in Later Traditional Witchcraft

  If there’s any one thing that marks the Witchfather of Traditional Witchcraft as different from the Horned God of Wiccan-Witchcraft, it’s the idea that the Witchfather is far more dangerous. Writer Gemma Gary has complained that the Horned God’s “darker aspects are ignored” in many Wiccan traditions, and that his role has been reduced to something “green and benign.” 268 Old Crafter Nigel G. Pearson has written that the Horned God of Traditional Craft is “no, gentle, loving father-figure” and is “the render, the destroyer, the ripper and raper.” 269

  Figure 19: A depiction of the Horned God as he often appears

  in Traditional Witchcraft. One of the most popular images of the

  Horned God today features the Horned One with the skull of a stag for a face.

  While to some this all might sound offensive or needlessly frightening, both writers have a definite point. If the Horned God is the King of the Wildwood, then that wood has to be wild. He’s not just the god of gentle summer rains; he’s the lord of thunderstorms and earthquakes too. While this book has taken pains to point out that within Wicca the Horned God has traditionally been associated with death, it’s still something that’s very uncomfortable to a lot of people, and it’s a truth that’s often left out of Witchcraft books—which often don’t mention the Horned God in anything other than superficial terms to begin with (figure 19).

  Life is not always easy, and if the Horned God is a god of life, then he can also be a god of hardship. This is not to suggest that anyone sees the Horned God as purposefully wishing ill on Witches, but only that the world is full of obstacles and adversity that must be overcome. The Horned God then is a part of that adversity, and by working with him and acknowledging this truth, we can grow as people and as Witches. In his book The Crooked Path, my friend Kelden writes that the Witchfather is “the wild and untamed natural landscape,” and there are few things more powerful and challenging than the raw force of nature.

  Most Traditional Witchcraft writers are also very clear that their Horned God has very real links to Christian ideas about the Devil. As mentioned earlier, for many Traditional Witches the Devil and the Horned God are one and the same, and to shy away from such a reckoning is to deny our own impulses and wants as humans.270 Even though the Devil is freely acknowledged there’s still the caveat the Horned Devil of Traditional Witchcraft is not the Christian Satan, architect of all the world’s evils. Besides, the evils of Satan were not ever really evils most of the time. As Gemma Gary reminds her readers the Devil is the god of personal freedom and power, sexual satisfaction, dancing, feasting, ecstatic celebrations, and joy.271

  Many Traditional Witches believe in activities such as cursing and hexing, so it’s no wonder that within the tradition, the Horned God is often seen as a source of power.272 Instead of love and light, the Horned One is capable of bringing all the power of nature to bear on a situation. The idea of the Devil offers a person control over their own situation in life and, much like Cochrane’s ideas about fate, allows a Witch to control their own life and live as they see fit.273

  Traditional Witchcraft also acknowledges that Christianity has had a direct impact on the rites of the Witch. While many Witches run screaming from anything having to do with Jesus or the Church, there’s a long history of Christians practicing magick in various guises. Because of this, Traditional Witches are generally comfortable embracing all of the folklore associated with the Devil. That folklore is also used to their advantage: people’s fear of the Devil lends more power and energy to magick done in his name. Witchcraft has always existed on the margins, and embracing the Horned God as the Devil is a return to Witchcraft’s roots and keeps it from being rooted in the passive positivity of New Age thought.274

  In addition to seeing the Horned God as the Devil and the wild, many Traditional Witches see him as a bearer of light and knowledge, similar to Lucifer.275 Some Trad Witches go a step further and believe that the Horned One is the “sum and accumulation of all wisdom and knowledge.” 276 In order to share that knowledge, some Old Crafters have suggested that the Horned God has physically incarnated on Earth several different times over the centuries, even showing up once as the Christian Jesus.277 (Just imagine telling Grandma that Jesus and the Devil are the same thing, and that Jesus likely had horns hiding under his hippie hair.)

  The exact nature of the Horned God within Traditional Witchcraft varies by practitioner, much like it does in other forms of Witchcraft. For some, he’s an amalgamation of countless spirits from across the centuries.278 Others take the approach that their Horned God has appeared in various roles throughout history, including the familiar Herne and Odin, but also Lucifer, the King of Faery, and Azazel as a goat instead of a fallen angel.279 While the Horned God in most Traditional Craft is generally written about as a deity, some Trad Witches see him primarily as a “spirit of place and a primordial force,” despite rituals and practices that suggest a god.280

  Perhaps my favorite honorific for the Horned God in Traditional Witchcraft is the King of the Mound. For me, the phrase brings to mind rot and decay, things generally seen as unwanted by society at large. However, without rot, there is no life. Like the Horned God within Wicca, the Horned One of Traditional Witches is a god of life and death. Traditional Witches just often seem more at ease with the uglier implications of this. The Horned God lives within a decaying carcass just as much as he lives in green forests and bubbling streams.

  [contents]

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  254. To make all of these terms even more confusing, in the United States, initiatory Wiccan traditions, especially older ones such as Gardnerian and Alexandrian, are often called BTW (British Traditional Witchcraft or Wicca).

  255. Cochrane, with Jones, The Robert Cochrane Letters, 12.

  256. Kelden, The Crooked Path, 86.

  257. Cochrane, with Jones, The Robert Cochrane Letters, 22. Edited by Michael Howard. Howard’s interpretation is on page 25.

  258. Wilson was a true Witchcraft pioneer and helped put together the first Witch newsletter in US history. He’s also the founder of the 1734 Tradition, much of which was inspired by letters from Cochrane to Wilson.

  259. Cochrane, with Jones, The Robert Cochrane Letters, 26.

  260. The Book of the Watchers was later added to the non-canonical Book of Enoch, which includes material from five very different sources.

  261. Pagels, The Origins of Satan, 49–50.

  262. Wray and Mobley, The Birth of Satan, 101.

  263. Wray and Mobley, The Birth of Satan, 101.

  264. Wray and Mobley, The Birth of Satan, 107.

  265. Huson, Mastering Witchcraft, 9–10.

  266. Cochrane, with Jones, The Robert Cochrane Letters, 31.

  267. Cochrane, with Jones, The Robert Cochrane Letters, 165.

  268. Gary, The Devil’s Dozen, Thirteen Craft Rites of the Old One, 14. If it sounds like I’m being critical, I’m really not. I find Gary to be one of the most lucid and interesting writers in the Traditional Witchcraft world. I highly recommend her work.

  269. Pearson, Treading the Mill, 21.

  270. Orapello and Maguire, Besom Stang & Sword: A Guide to Traditional Witchcraft, the Six-Folk Path & the Hidden Landscape, 11. Orapello and Maguire are two of the most lucid Trad Witchcraft writers working today. This is a great book.

  271. Gary, The Devil’s
Dozen, 10.

  272. Gary, The Devil’s Dozen, 10.

  273. Gary, The Devil’s Dozen, 11.

  274. Gary, The Devil’s Dozen, 14.

  275. Kelden, The Crooked Path, 86 and 88.

  276. Pearson, Treading the Mill, 219.

  277. Pearson, Treading the Mill, 225–266.

  278. Kelden, The Crooked Path, 86.

  279. Gary, The Devil’s Dozen, 16.

  280. Orapello and Maguire, Besom Stang & Sword, 13.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Ritual to Meet the Witchfather

  When I first discovered Modern Witchcraft, most materials documenting it were focused on the idea of the Great Goddess, along with various female deities. When books mentioned male deity, it was generally in passing and often felt like an afterthought. The idea of the Goddess as central to Witchcraft lies in stark contrast to how Witchcraft has generally been perceived (especially in North America and Europe) over the last seven hundred years. For most of that time, the supreme deity of Witchcraft was a horned god, the Devil.

  That Devil was never the menace that the general populace imagined him to be. He was simply a convenient scapegoat for their superstitions, pettiness, and cruelty. That Devil was the repository for everything people didn’t understand. He was a source of power, knowledge, and magick, three things that governments and churches have always been terrified of because they know those ideas are beyond the control of their authority.