Creating Circles and Ceremonies: Rituals for All ... - reading...

194 Creating Circles & Ceremonies
Witch Sabbaths in Gerald Gardner’s T ime
By Grey Council member Frederic Lamond, 2002
I was initiated into “Witchcraft,” as we called it then, in the presence of Gerald Gardner on
February Eve, 1957, by Dayonis (who now lives in Salt Lake City). We were taught to make a distinction
between the four major Sabbaths on the one hand, and the equinoxes and solstices on the other.
In Gerald’s day, the four major Sabbaths were called by their traditional English names:
Hallowe’en, Candlemas, Beltaine, and Lammas. Gerald was trying to teach us traditional English
country lore, not Celtic traditions, since Southern England had been Saxon for 1,300 years.
“In pre-Burning Times (a favorite Geraldism) the four Sabbaths were great big parties celebrating
the end of one of the major phases of the agricultural cycle in which the whole village
participated. It was only the full moon Esbats that were private to the initiated witches, because
that was when spells were cast.” At the time I was somewhat cynical about Gerald’s pretence
that there was an unbroken line of initiations reaching back to the Stone Age, but now I realize
that he was using—consciously or unconsciously—a mirror technique, in which he described a
mythical past as a way of telling us what we should do in the future. So for “pre-Burning Times,”
read “this is what you should do when you feel safe enough to come out of the broom closet.”
In line with this, he encouraged us to invite uninitiated but sympathetic friends to bonfire parties
at the time of the major Sabbaths, especially Halloween and Beltaine.
We did not ignore the Solstices and Equinoxes, but celebrated these within the coven with
magickal rituals to turn the Wheel of the Year and to help nature to make the transition from one
season to the next. Yule, the Winter Solstice, was especially important. We had to turn the wheel
so that the sun would return in the coming year: “Unless someone somewhere in the world turns
the wheel on December 21 the sun will not return!” This may sound like astronomical nonsense
but has a poetic truth to it. Unless we celebrate the passing of the seasons we may lose all
awareness of them. We are already perilously close to this in North America, where 24- hour
shopping and public transport has blotted out the distinctions between night and day, and air
conditioning in offices insulates from the changes of temperature occurring outside.
When I asked him why we didn’t celebrate the Equinoxes and Solstices with parties, he replied:
“You can if you want to, but it would not be appropriate to the English climate in which
you live. The most important Pagan festival has always been the spring fertility festival,
which was celebrated when it had become warm enough to make love out of doors in the
fields to ensure their fertility (on the principle of sympathetic magick). In the Mediterranean
this is shortly after the Spring Equinox: hence the dates of the Jewish Passover (which
replaced the spring fertility orgy after Moses) and the Christian Easter. In England and
countries of similar latitude it did not normally become warm enough until the beginning of
May (according to the Julian calendar, which translates into mid-May in the Gregorian calendar),
as described in this popular ditty:
“‘Hurray, hurray for the first of May, outdoor loving starts today!’
“In Scandinavia it doesn’t get warm enough until midsummer, which is why Swedes,
Norwegians, and Danes still celebrate midsummer with all night dancing around bonfires,
with many couples disappearing into the bushes.
“Many children would be conceived around the spring festival bonfires who would be
born nine months later, especially by the May Queen, and this would determine the date of
the festival celebrating the return of the light: shortly after the Winter Solstices for people
who celebrated the spring at the Spring Equinox, but not until February Eve or Candlemas
in countries where spring is celebrated at the beginning of May.”
Our coven liked the feasts we had at the major Sabbaths, whereas we had only moooncakes
and wine at the full moon Esbats. So sometime in 1959 or 1960 we decided to have feasts at the
Equinoxes and Solstices as well as the major Sabbaths. Talk of the Celtic eight-spoke Wheel of