Talk:Wiccan Laws

Rename or delete this page
The naming of this page is rather strange and repugnant. These are (apart from inaccuracies) the traditional Wiccan laws (possibly invented by Gardner, but that's another issue). Lady Sheba was a self-aggrandising plagiarist who first published the Book of Shadows when it was intended to remain secret. She is thought very poorly of by traditional Wiccans. I would be very surprised if any traditional Wiccans (the ones most likely to still actually be using these laws) call them "Lady Sheba's Laws". I haven't heard any non-traditional Wiccans use this term either, although obviously some do... I would suggest the page be called "Wiccan Laws", if anything.

Also, it seems rather weird to me to have the entire set of laws published in an article. Wikipedia articles don't generally quote anything at such great length, especially when there are external web-pages that give the exact same information. I would like to propose that the actual contents of the laws be removed from the page, in favour of an external link. Fuzzypeg 03:19, 12 February 2006 (UTC)


 * OK, I'm going to look for some decent webpages that contain the laws, add them as external links, and remove the entire text of the laws. Fuzzypeg 14:37, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

The first publication of The Laws that I have come across were in the book King of the Witches by June Johns published in 1969. Jessie Wicker Bell (aka Lady Sheba) published a slight variation of these same laws in the in 1971 in the USA in her first book called Book of Shadows and again in 1972 in her book The Grimoire of Lady Sheba. I wold like to also note to the reader that the laws are not in Ye bok of Ye Art Magical, Text A, B, or in any of Doreen Valiente’s notebooks including one commonly referred to as Text C.  The laws were first presented to other people in the Craft by Gerald Gardner in 1957 in a non-numbered format. I have also heard the laws called the Ardains and the Ordains but this was more common in the USA in the early 1970's than in the UK. Lastly I wold like to add that the original document of The Laws only used ‘wica’ and not wicca or wiccan. ValGard


 * Thanks for the info. One of my colleagues mentioned they thought first publication was in King of the Witches, but my copy of this is buried in a box at a friend's place, so I couldn't check it. I'll change the article if you haven't already. Fuzzypeg 11:29, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Citations missing
Both of the external sites that are listed now direct to spam sites. There is no citation for the last sentance - "In 1979 a Council of Elders at a festival in America produced a set of heavily revised Laws which made them more acceptable to modern Wiccans." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.167.213.9 (talk) 01:54, 29 December 2009 (UTC)