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The Cord
The Witch's Cord is the badge of initiation and rank in the Craft. While you are yet cordless, you are an
apprentice. Your first cord is given to you to mark your entry into the coven, and your new status as
Priest/ess and Witch. In our tradition, this first cord is white, a reminder of the Maiden Goddess. It
signifies that you are yet young in the Craft, and that your studies are now really beginning, much like
entry to medical school after successfully completing a pre-med program. It means that you know
enough to conduct a ritual on your own, that you know the meaning of the various seasonal
observances, and that you have absorbed enough general knowledge of the Craft to go on in your
studies without having to ask basic questions. It also means that you have made some sort of
commitment to the Goddess and Her ways, either working alone or in a coven.
When you receive your White Cord, your measure is taken, and knots are tied in the Cord to denote this
fact. This means that you are known, height and breadth and depth, by the Goddess; there is no fooling
Her or shucking or sliding away from the responsibilities She has laid upon you in this life. It also
means that your co-coveners have taken your measure, and are willing to accept you into the fellowship
in perfect love and perfect trust. This bond, which is also symbolized by the Cord, is in some ways
closer than a marriage. It takes continual work and care and maintenance.
The Cord is also a tool of binding: you are bound by your oath of faithfulness to the Lady and to the
coven; you are bound by the discipline which only you can set upon yourself to study hard and to
practice assiduously; and you are bound to follow the leadings She gives you.
After a year and a day as White Cord, you become eligible for consideration as a candidate for Red
Cord (second degree). The second cord is red to stand for the Mother aspect of the Goddess, and the
attributes of a second-degree Witch are not unlike those of the Mother: nurturing, teaching, organizing,
taking care of a coven as High Priest/ess. Some people never attain the Red Cord, but this is no shame:
it is not for everyone.
While wearing the Red Cord, a Witch has many responsibilities outside her/himself. Teaching and
healing, counseling and organizing, are all things which take a great deal of time and
energy--sometimes it seems as though the Red Cord is colored so by the wearer's lifeblood. And after a
time of wearing the Red Cord may come the time of moving onward to the next stage, the third degree.
In other traditions, third-degree Witches wear not a cord but a garter. However, in our tradition, the next
step onward (not necessarily upward--on occasion this might be a lateral move) is the Black Cord, black
to signify the Crone, the repository of Wisdom. Since there have been (up until now) no Black Cord
Witches, there is nobody to grant this cord to the aspirant.
Thus it is necessary for the would-be Black Cord to ask the entire coven to call the Goddess into
her/him. This completes the circle of energy and signifies that any hierarchical structure used in the
coven is there for convenience' sake alone. Once you have been accepted as Priestess and Witch you
need bow the knee to nobody. Hopefully, however, you will have the good sense to recognize talent and
ability when you see it in another and not let yourself get ego involved in power politics. For a Black
Cord Witch the path is away from self-aggrandizement and power and toward that portion of starry
wisdom which the Goddess holds out as a gift and a prize at the end of each particular path.
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