The only thing I really like about Halloween is that it gives equal time to witches. We scarcely even think about witches the rest of the year, and we certainly don't give them the respect they deserve. But during the last days of October, we can scarcely think about anything else. Even the latest mega-celebrity can't hope to keep our attention, unless she sails into the headlines on a broomstick.
This annual descent into the dark ages has its unfortunate aspects, including the plague of plastic pumpkins, dime store ghosts, and all trick or treaters over the age of five. But at least it reminds us that witches, like angels, are everywhere.
It's unfortunate that our present-day image of witches comes almost entirely from "The Wizard of Oz." The wicked witch in that movie gave the whole profession a bad name with her silly costumes, anti-social attitudes, and outrageous overacting. At Halloween, the fake witches on sale in the stores always have the same black robes, the same pointed hats, and faces that are always yellow or green – suggesting either serious liver problems or motion sickness brought on by the unsteady flight patterns of their broomsticks.
At this particular juncture in American history, we might learn more about real witches by thinking back to the seventeenth century Massachusetts witch trials. The Puritans back then were almost as sexually neurotic as Puritans now. Their fears and fantasies focused on women they felt were dangerous, women who were in some way different: unmarried, solitary, argumentative, unorthodox, or eccentric – all the things a woman was not supposed to be. A witch hunt was the persecution of women who forgot their place and challenged the sacred power of men. The last witch was executed, as far as we know, in 1663.
Women have always scared men simply because they know so many arcane things that men don't know. It's all too tempting to put these strange skills down to witchcraft. Women also upset men by giving unwanted advice, like the three witches in "Macbeth," who (if you read the play without prejudice) seem quite a jolly bunch of ladies, and rather more helpful than sinister. But the nervous spirit of the old New England theocracy seems to be alive and well in twenty-first century Washington.
Almost five hundred years later we are once again hearing about witch hunts. What can this mean? Are the bad old witches back? What dark magic are they accused of? But of course we have left those ages of primitive superstition behind, and a witch hunt now implies nothing more sinister than a futile search for something that does not exist. But, wait a minute, witches DO exist. We will meet them on our doorsteps in their plastic costumes on Thursday night. Be careful, you never know which ones are genuine. And witchcraft or "Wicca" is a perfectly real neo-pagan, woman-oriented religion with 350,000 followers which goes all the way back to the Stone Age. So far from being something pointless and malicious a witch hunt is a search for something or someone hiding in plain sight. For a moment I was afraid I had misunderstood.
Copyright: David Bouchier
