In my previous blog post recapping NWTS 2022, I talked about how much I enjoyed the “Which Witch is Which” lunch panel discussion. So that you don’t have to click between pages, here’s what I said about it:
The best part of all? Hands down, the Which Witch is Which lunch panel discussion. Each practitioner on the panel represented a different perspective on witch identity and witchcraft, from whether they identify with the moniker “witch” (some yes, some no), what is witchcraft anyway, and their takes on covens, solitary practice, closed vs. open traditions, altars, ancestor work, and more.
Thank you, Mat, for giving a shout-out to Taoist ceremonial magic! And wish the incredible Onareo, who was present in the audience with me, could have also been up there on the panel to represent brujeria.
In this Bell Chimes In video chat, I wanted to ruminate on my own responses to the questions “Do you identify as a witch?” and “What is witchcraft, to you?”
Answers to those two questions are not at all easy to arrive at.
I waffle back and forth on what defines a “witch,” especially since the definition seems so varied. You walk in seven different directions asking for a definition of that term and you’ll get seven different often conflicting answers.
Not to mention there is no perfectly-well-conveyed translation equivalent in any of the East Asian languages, as far as I know. We have designations for priest or priestess, shaman, diviner, fortune-teller, psychic, spirit medium, methods masters, masters of the yin and yang methods (i.e., occultists), Traditional Chinese Medicine or energy healers who are using holistic health care practices, etc.
But witch?
And then I am reminded of the extent that Taoist-based magical practices and mysticism are excluded from pagan and witchcraft communities. Despite the long history of Diasporic Asian presence in the Americas, to this day we’re still seen as foreigners. Likewise in the pagan and witchcraft communities, we’re often left at the margins, forgotten about in conversations on ceremonial magic and witchcraft.
All I have to do is attend any pagan or witch gathering here in the United States to immediately be confronted with the reality that I probably don’t belong here. I think I’m a pagan until I attend a pagan event and socialize with other pagans; I think I’m a witch until I attend a witchy event and socialize with other self-identified witches.
But maybe it’s a bit our fault, too. I also don’t see swaths of Asian Americans claiming the moniker “witch,” or “pagan.” So to that extent, as an Asian American practitioner of the craft, there’s benefit to identifying as a witch. At the very least, it gives us visibility, and finally, an opportunity to be included.
benebell wen 
Benebell the pentagram and the many pagan rituals and golden dawn occult was taken from enochian and Egyptian practices according to what I’ve seen from the golden dawn material but tarot and Romanian concealment during witch trial century’s -I believe the Romanians in the tarot of the bohemians were holding the tarot from India I believe during the witch trials but the difference between taoists and witches is that taoism is orthodox in micro and macrocosmic study where as witchcraft of paganism is unsafe because of limitations of mediumistic orthodoxy and profoundness, and parts of pagan witchcraft is demonic worship anti Christianity -whereas taoism explains the ruthlessness and neccessity of control over heaven and earth even with good and bad magick but orthodoxy of the complete trinity of all deity’s and energy’s involved which cannot be paralleled.
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Benebell the real tarot here in the USA belongs to the church of light of California and the creator studied astrology on all levels his whole life and this tarot works precise with medical astrology giving close details of persons description, health,birth effects, and all out description through the use of ruled planets and planets -I’ve seen no other tarot better than the church of light.
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Dear Benebell, I teach adolescents who are autistic. I find your mention of this topic wonderfully provocative, especially your discussion of a witch, 4:20+. So, since you recorded this have you had any philosophical moments on this topic that you could share? Thank you, Ed
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“Taoist-based magical practices and mysticism are excluded from pagan and witchcraft communities”.”
Doesn’t Wicca at it’s core essentially teach about Karma? But yes, besides that and maybe in herbalism some teach about ” positive and negative” energies that plants have Neopaganism in America never really goes deeper than that.
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The concept of karma in Western culture has become something almost entirely independent from its origin. A lot of stuff from Eastern culture (like Buddhism, for example) understandably gets lost in translation once it makes its way literally to the other side of the world, but the way these concepts and spiritual practices have been stripped of their cultural context, co-opted, and commercialized is a bit more intentional and less innocent.
To me, I just see “karma” as being one word with two entirely different definitions now, so I’m not going to say what people call “karma” in the West is wrong, but it’s definitely not an “Eastern” thing and should be considered wholly separate from the original meaning of the word.
That being said, for Wiccans, I’d say the “three-fold law” is the term used and a different/better term to describe the philosophy than “karma”. The guy who started Wicca was British and from the 40s, a whole world and era away from karma as it is in the Eastern philosophy, and much much younger too.
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