The back of this book promises “Whether you are setting out on a Pagan path for the first time, or have been committed to one for many years, this insightful and informative book will offer you inroads into expressing your own beliefs and understanding those of others. Pagan Paths also provides a definitive resource for students of comparative religions.”
But does it deliver?
From the title and back cover one might expect that the book will include a guide to all the different Pagan Paths currently pursued in the UK. In the introduction Pete Jennings explains that because modern paganism is so diverse enquirers find it confusing and that this book addresses this question. He explains that Paganism is a collection of spiritual paths which can include Traditional, Hereditary, Gardnerian, Alexandrian, Seax, Progressive, Eclectic Wicca, Hedgewitches, Druidry, Asutra, and Shamanism, as well as Male and Female Mystery groups.
This particular list immediately confused me. I have not heard of some of these paths but I have heard of several others which have not been mentioned. So my first impression is that the book dwells on some traditions and paths to the exclusion of others and in that respect it cannot be described as comprehensive.
Jennings next introduces the PF (Pagan Federation), speaks of it as if it is the only and the definitive pagan organisation and implies that PF principles are held by all pagans. This is not the case.
Pete Jennings was the president of the Pagan Federation and it seems to me that this book is very much his manifesto for that organisation. If you look at the PF web site you will find exactly the same breakdown of the six major types of paganism as appears in this book; namely, Wicca (witchcraft), Druidry, Asutra, Shamanism and Male and Female mysteries.
Throughout the introduction I think Jennings makes too many generalisations: ‘Pagans do not believe in Christianity’; ‘Pagans tend to be sexually liberated since they have no concept of sin.’ ‘Every Witch is a Pagan, but not every Pagan is a Witch.’
After the Introduction Chapter one covers Festivals and Rites of Passage and chapter two is about Sacred Sites. The next ten chapters deal with individual traditions but rather unequally. Various forms of witchcraft get 5 chapters, Druidry, Asutra, Shamanism, Male and Female mysteries and eclectic get a chapter each. These are followed by 2 chapters on magic and 2 more on Paganism in general. Each chapter is followed by some questions to consider. The final chapter is a bibliography and list of web sites.
The first chapter – Festivals and rites of Passage
This chapter is divided into two sections , rites of passage and seasonal celebrations. The fist part mixes family based rites of passage, baby naming, puberty, handfasting, and funerals with initiation into pagan groups or self initiation. Jennings opens the chapter by explaining that paganism , like other religions has its own rites of passage and launches into a description of ‘Wiccaning’. It gives the impression that not only is paganism a ‘religion’ but also that these rites are common to paganism.
The second part covers the eight major festivals celebrated by many pagans. Jennings introduces this by casting doubts about the Celtic origin of the festivals and suggesting that it may have Anglo-Saxon or Germanic origin. He apparently does this to demonstate “that it would seem quite appropriate for non-Celtic paths to use what has always been thought to be a Celtic practice.”(31) I’m not quite sure that this is valid reasoning nor even relevant.
Chapter 2 is about Sacred sites such as Stonehenge etc. which is self explanatory.
Chapter 3 Hereditary and Traditional Witchcraft
In this chapter Jennings seems to be raising an issue that is a common debating point amongst established pagans. I could not see the relevance of introducing ‘ hereditary’ because by its very nature one could not choose it as a path. In the conclusion to this chapter he informs us that “traditional and hereditary groups are difficult, if not impossible to find’. This made me wonder why he had included this chapter at all let alone made it the longest in the book.
Most of the chapter is historical information on the origins of witchcraft including a discussion of the Pickingill Papers and a few other sources. Although it seems well researched I am aware the information on the Wiccan Rede at least is by no means complete.
Chapter 4 on Gardnerian witchcraft covers the history and practises, organization of Gardnerian witchcraft but does not mention spiritual beliefs, or the gods and goddesses.
The chapter on Alexandrian witchcraft tells briefly of its origins and seems to imply that the main difference is that Alexandrians allowed homosexuals into the coven.
In Chapter 6 he introduces Seax witchcraft created in 1973-4 which is a form of Saxon witchcraft drawing on Saxon mythology and here again he concentrates on practice. He mentions progressive witchcraft and American Georgian witchcraft but does not elaborate on these.
The Hedgewitch Tradition is covered in chapter 7. Hedgewitches, deriving from the book by Rae Beth (1992) and the writings of Marion Green are solitary. Jennings says”Hedgewitches may align themselves with any one of a number of mythologies,from Celtic and Saxon through to Egyptian and Finnish-Sami, or be completely eclectic.”(81)
What is glaringly absent from all these descriptions of witchcraft (and in fact the traditions that follow) is any sense or feel for the spirituality of the tradition. Even the PF website manages to do better in this respect. It explains: “It is an initiatory path, a mystery tradition that guides its initiates to a deep communion with the powers of Nature and of the human psyche, leading to a spiritual transformation of the self.”
Chapter 8 is on Druidry and describes the various forms of Druidry in very general and vague terms saying that ‘most Druids draw upon Celtic mythology which is very confusing especially if you are not a native speaker of the Celtic languages’.(86)
Chapter 9 Asutra and the Northern Tradition
Asutra, also known as heathen, Odinism and other names, is a reconstructed religious tradition which draws on the mythology and sagas of the Scandinavian, Teutonic and Saxon races. This is the author’s tradition and he tactfully explains that this tradition sometimes has been seen as aloof from mainstream Paganism not through any sense of elitism but because they have their own system. He briefly touches on the ‘Nazi’ problem associated with this tradition.
I attended a very beautiful Heathen ritual last year and it seemed to me that it is quite different from what I will term ‘general paganism’ and is very obviously deeply spiritual for its practitioners. In explaining the ritual they contrasted it with paganism in general especially emphasizing that they do not use a circle but a sacred space known as a ve. I know also that there are many in this tradition who find PF principles incompatible with their beliefs. Jennings did not touch on these issues.
Chapter 10 Shamanism
I found Jennings description of Shamanism very confusing because he does not make it clear whether he is talking about present practice or ancient cultures. Under what is shamanism Jennings explains, ”At its most basic level a shaman (male or female) is someone who goes into a trance state to travel psychically within the spirit world. While there, magical action may be attempted with the aid of ‘power animals’ or spiritual guides.” Under the methods Jennings seems to speak about the methods used in other cultures but this is not made clear therefore some people mind find it disturbing to read that “Sometimes the training experience may make the trainee very sick, or even close to death, when they are subjected to hallucinogenic plants and fungi. This is often thought necessary, as a sort of death and rebirth experience.”(102)
Under trance Jennings says that trance states can be arrived at by various means, dance, drugs, repetitive chanting and drumming, or physical pain. He briefly mentions sweat lodges commenting that at least one British person has died as a result of using one.
Chapter 11 Male and Female Mystery Groups and Psychic Questers
The male and female mystery groups described in this short chapter are very small hard to find groups. The female mysteries groups often known as Dianics were often started by lesbians or bisexuals (111) they are often radical feminists and political. In the US the male groups were often started by gay men. Jennings devotes one paragraph to Psychic questers who are a sub group on the fringe of paganism who like to solve esoteric mysteries. None of these is really what I would describe as a major path in paganism.
Chapter 12 Eclectic Paganism and Foreign Traditions
From the space and position given to this topic I got the impression that Jennings does not really approve of eclectic paganism. But to be honest this rather seems to be what most pagans are whether by design or circumstances. He points out that Gardnerian Wicca was itself eclectic in its inception.
When I read his piece on foreign traditions I realised why several modern pagan traditions had not been included in this book. Jennings obviously considers Roman, Greek, Mithraic, Egyptian and Native American etc to be foreign. This rather suggests that Jennings (and the PF?) think pagans should stick to their local (pre Christian?) religions. If this is the case then surely it is debatable whether Asutru should be included (didn’t the Saxons and Vikings arrive after the Romans and Christianity?). Shamanism, while obviously practised in many traditions is hardly best known as a British pre Christian tradition and even Wicca is suspect by this rule, especially as it tends to use ‘foreign’ gods and goddesses. That seems to leave Druidry doesn’t it?
Chapter 13 Magical Theory and its ethics This chapter opens with a few definitions of magic followed by a very brief mention of high magic and low magic. I felt Jennings should have gone into this just a bit more depth as high magic to a large extent is the spiritual aspect of magic and this plays an important role or should play an important role in the teaching of any path.
Under ethics he parried, rather unsuccessfully I think, with the PF principle ‘an it harm none’, saying ”This is an excellent principle, but magic and its usage are so complex that inevitably situations bring about dilemmas. Even walking across a field tramples plants and insects, so the principle taken to its ultimate conclusion would leave us immobile.”(122) He also says “even the most benign sounding spells are likely to harm someone.” This is precisely why some pagans object and refuse to agree to the principle.
After giving some examples he seems to suggest that one should not dabble with magic until you have a good knowledge of your spiritual path and inner self whatever that means. But having said that the next chapter is entitled ‘using magic’ and at the end of it he suggests “why not try to make your own simple magical spell?”(143)
Chapter 14 Using Magic
Jennings explains that many paths use several types of magic and he tackles these briefly under several headings including: Imitative or Sympathetic magic, Transference magic, Intuitive or Shamanic magic, Talismanic magic, But under the next heading, Ceremonial Magic the author goes off on a tangent and introduces various occult organisations.
Jennings opens the section stating “Not all ceremonial magicians are Pagan, although many are. Some may be Christian or Jewish.” I couldn’t see the relevance of this as not all Druids are Pagan either and they were given a chapter rather than a mere mention.
From its position in the book and the comments made elsewhere one very much gets the impression that the author does not like ceremonial magic much. (For example he earlier mentions ceremonial magicians as using a circle as a protective barrier to keep them from the demonic forces they summoned (50) and alchemist and cabbalist ‘commanding’ spirits and demons to do their bidding (117). The first thing he suggests that “it is not a cheap method to adopt” mentioning all the expensive paraphernalia necessary. This a strange statement to make as ceremonial magicians use much the same equipment as witches and some traditions have far more ‘expensive’ requirements because to become a member you have to attend courses and pay for expensive training.
I get the feeling that ceremonial magic or the Western Mystery Tradition is distanced from Paganism in his treatment but this is also the case with the PF. The PF does not include ceremonial magic in its examples of major Pagan traditions nor have any links to organisations. Similarly Jennings does not offer any links to UK organisations and the one link on offer is to a very dubious site indeed. Perhaps the ‘occult’ connotations might be seen to conflict with the view the PF wants to portray. The only other possible explanation I can think of is that modern paganism essentially seems to be an attempt to reconstruct and reinstate historical forms of religion which existed prior to Christianity. Ceremonial magic, on the other hand, was formulated largely within, or on the fringes of the Judeo-Christian tradition and therefore cannot be classed as pagan. The biggest problem with this division is that modern witchcraft is rather too heavily indebted to ceremonial magic to be so easily divorced from it.
Most of the description of ceremonial magic comprises a mention of organisations, the OTO and the Golden Dawn and a list of the members. In my understanding this chapter contains some rather misleading information.
There follows sections on Thelemic and Chaos Magic and Voodoo, on Dance and Musical magic and a small piece on Cabbala Magic. Again I found his mention of Cabbala rather misleading and dismissive. For example he states: Although condemned by more orthodox Jews’ I am currently attending seminars at Oxford University on kabbalah led by an Orthodox Rabbi who very much approves of it (although it is true that some might not) This is followed by ‘Divination’ which again is misleading because he implies it solely concerns prediction.
The second part of this chapter covers the application of magic rather than theory. In this section he covers timing of a ritual, the place, importance of having a clear intention, the form of the ritual, opening and closing a sacred circle, altered states of consciousness, writing a ritual and earthing.
Chapter 15 where Do We Go From Here is about life as a pagan. Jennings says,”Paganism should determine your whole lifestyle” and dicusses how this could possibly bring conflict. Chapter 16 is about the future of paganism which again is his own viewpoint and hardly of interest to anyone who is just researching or enquiring.
Chapter 17 - Bibliography, References, Websites & Organisations. This is actually quite useful and is helpfully reproduced on his web site and I suggest that you if you follow links to the web sites you will find far more details of the relevant traditions than contained in the book with the exception of magical traditions.
I think that there is a need for a book which introduces the various paths but that this book does not properly fulfil it. His choice of pagan paths is somewhat exclusive and his knowledge of several of them seems very limited or distorted. Overall I think that Jennings has not defined, or addressed, a specific target audience. Sometimes he seems to be addressing people new to paganism but often forgets his audience and either assumes knowledge or preaches to the converted. In treating some traditions he goes into almost ridiculous detail and with others he skimps.
One of his prime motives seems to be to portray paganism as a united collective containing many paths. In fact he actually wants to portray paganism as a religion with various denominations and actually draws an analogy between Christianity and its denominations. (8) Now the definition of ‘religion’ is much debated but typically it is understood to refer to an organized or unified set of spiritual beliefs, doctrines and practices which a community or society adhere to. Can ‘paganism’ therefore ever be classed as a religion?
A secondary motive is surely to promote the importance of his own Northern tradition. He implies the ‘wheel of the year is Anglo Saxon rather than Celtic(31), he casts doubts on the historical accuracy of Celts(18f), draws attention to Seax witchcraft and to Saxon shamanism , perhaps he should invent Saxon druidry to complete the series..
There is much in the book which might in fact scare a newcomer off completely. He assures people in the introduction that only a couple of paths within Paganism sometimes use ritual nudity(18). But in the chapter on Gardnerian, which he says is nearer to being an orthodoxy than any other European Pagan path, he mentions nudity and in the things to do section asks you to consider nudity. Similarly in another chapter you are asked to consider initiation involving sexual intercourse. By various statements he manages to imply that all ceremonial magic involves summoning demons and that Male and Female mystery groups are dominated by homosexuals.. He rather gives the impression that Shamanism is potentially dangerous, someone died in a sweat lodge, and implies the use of drugs and physical pain is a norm. So, at the end of the day, there are not that many paths that an innocent newcomer might want to consider.
By far my biggest criticism is that Jennings has not put any emphasis on the spiritual underpinnings of the traditions he describes.
So does it deliver? In short no! I don’t think the book lives up to the description on the cover. I don’t think it is the best of introductions to paganism for a beginner. But I do think the book could be used as a starting point for debate, not to mention some serious arguments, within the pagan community. Jennings does however say at the end of the book “I shall be disappointed if you have agreed with everything I have said!” (169) to which I could reply ‘I’m glad that he, at least, won’t be disappointed!’.
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