If it harm none, do what ye will

[PrincessKLS]

So how far can this one Wiccan rule be taken? Think about all the over sensitive people who get hurt over everything. Do you have to forsake yourself at times?

[DracoJesi]

most think it's a law but it's not, Rede means advice.

you will never be able to "harm none" or please everyone, however.

the Rede teaches us to live and let live, so choose the path of least hostility and greater understanding, but this is not always possible, you have to look at things in the long term, sometimes you need conflict for resolution.

the rede does not say you can't harm anybody, but that you shouldn't, and to only do so when there is no other choice.

we must eat to survive, even vegetarians kill the plants they consume, what the Rede advises is that whatever we do, it can affect others, and the greater whole, and you shouldn't just think of yourself when making a decision, but thats not to say you always have to be helpless.

you first must help yourself to be able to effectivly help others, in this sense, it is a cycle, you need balance, there is no one path that is 100% right in life, it would be nice, but there's not.

the Rede helps us decide, by comparison, which action is the best, although even with the Rede, the dicison isn't always easy.

[Shanti]

So how far can this one Wiccan rule be taken? Think about all the over sensitive people who get hurt over everything. Do you have to forsake yourself at times?
Theres a difference between actually harming someone and the re-actions of those who find it easy to be the victim.

Example. You marry someone your mom doesn't approve. You are not hurting her. She is choosing to hurt herself by judging your choice based on her own opinion.
She can not except the freedom of choice you have and allow herself to disconnect from her own personal opinion in order to support your attempt at your happiness. Thats her prob!

But if you did the same marriage just to make her mad....your bad!

[DracoJesi]

Theres a difference between actually harming someone and the re-actions of those who find it easy to be the victim.

Example. You marry someone your mom doesn't approve. You are not hurting her. She is choosing to hurt herself by judging your choice based on her own opinion.
She can not except the freedom of choice you have and allow herself to disconnect from her own personal opinion in order to support your attempt at your happiness. Thats her prob!

But if you did the same marriage just to make her mad....your bad!

oh I missed this xd

I agree :)

[Nox_Mortus]

It's a piece of advice reflecting on karma (for lack of a better term) no Wiccan is going to run around calling you a sinner or something if you hurt someone, though they may disassociate from you if you continually fail to follow the Redes advice.

[PrincessKLS]

Well I've seen this advice being used. I've always been taught by my sister who taught me Wicca and witchcraft to be careful of every little thing and personally I believe some of it came out of her own biasness.

[Lunar Raven]

As others said, it's simply advice rather than law...and it's good advice to live by. I do my best not to harm others..and I've done so before finding any religion or spirituality.

[Stoirmeacha]

I'm not Wiccan, but I have always thought that this advice was made as an affront to bad intent. If you accidentally hurt someone, it isn't your fault, it is the way the person reacted. But if you intend to hurt someone, out of spite or something, then you might get bit with some karma...

[MonSno_LeeDra]

Let me preface this with I am not Wiccan so my views and perspectives will be different.

As a guide I think this statement is about as clear as mud.

On one hand the very meaning is driven by an established concept of what is defined as harm. That meter often established within the establishment of a dedicated and formal Wiccan organization. What the "Group" accepts as identifiable or perceivable harm being the crux upon which the statement becomes defined.

All actions and retributions within the group have acceptable conditions for usage. As the group dynamic evolves, the meter, retribution and gauge may change, but the change is within the grouping not driven by forces outside the grouping.

To those that are part of the original group or a sub-set hived off the original group the meaning and meter are set and identifiable. Each component part of the whole has the same gauge for defining what is or is not harm, as defined by the group.

Nox_Mortus wrote:



no Wiccan is going to run around calling you a sinner or something if you hurt someone, though they may disassociate from you if you continually fail to follow the Redes advice


To say no Wiccan is going to do or not do something is only a valid statement when each grouping that is defined as Wiccan defines the constraints and gauge by the same extremes. To say a Gardanerian or Alexanderian coven would or would not do such may be a possibility based upon their structural beliefs. That you (collectively) may not does not establish just what everyone would consider harm or appropriate response to those that you perceive as having done so.

When moved outside of the established "Meter" then the concept begins to collapse under the broadness of what each individual defines harm as. Harm truly then becomes a catalyst that can be viewed as little as annoyance to a catastrophic event.

There being no true answer or definition accept to the grouping that first established the meter and gauge to judge it by. Once outside that original structure their is no structural guidelines so each individual will decide what is acceptable based upon their own morals and beliefs even though they may continue to use some catch phrase derived from a more established section.

How far can it be taken? The horizon is endless, the extremes are just as endless.

[Laoghaire]

I don't think it's any different from the Christian rule...

[Lunacie]

Well I've seen this advice being used. I've always been taught by my sister who taught me Wicca and witchcraft to be careful of every little thing and personally I believe some of it came out of her own biasness.

Either her own biases or because someone else with personal bias taught her that.



I'm not Wiccan, but I have always thought that this advice was made as an affront to bad intent. If you accidentally hurt someone, it isn't your fault, it is the way the person reacted. But if you intend to hurt someone, out of spite or something, then you might get bit with some karma...

I agree that it has a lot to do with intent, but sometimes we must do something to harm one person in order to prevent harm to many people. If someone was trying to hurt me or my family I would have no qualms about doing whatever I needed to do to stop that action, even if what I do to prevent it harms the first person.

And there is no "might get bit", there are simply consequences. There are always consequences.

I think Catherine Noble did a good job of explaining the Rede on her website "Wicca For the Rest of Us".


The Rede does not command us to "harm none". It tells us that any action that will harm none is acceptable.

http://wicca.timerift.net/rede.shtml

Sometimes explaining it backwards makes more sense. The Rede advises us that it's okay to do anything that will not deliberately cause harm (to ourselves, to others, to nature). It does NOT command us that we must never deliberately hurt anyone or anything.

[Ben Gruagach]

I wrote a short article about the Wiccan Rede a while back -- it's available here on my website (http://witchgrotto.com/content/view/31/26/).

Basically, I see it as a guideline rather than a commandment (that whole "rede" thing.) It's a useful guideline to help us decide if a particular decision might be good or not.

Another important thing that comes out of the Rede and a companion concept, the idea of return (often called threefold return), is that it's not just enough for us to be aware that our decisions have consequences but that we must be willing to accept responsibility for those consequences even if they are surprising to us. Are we willing to take responsibility for what happens as a result of our actions or even as a result of our decision to not act?

For instance, if I see a child being hit by an adult in public I can choose to step in and stop it, or I can choose to do nothing. Am I willing to accept responsibility for either outcome? If I don't do something and the child is seriously injured or killed, how would I be able to live with myself knowing I could have done something to stop it? Choosing to not act is a decision with consequences too.

Of course no one can live up to the ideal of causing absolutely no harm. But that doesn't mean it's an unworthy ideal to work towards either.

[Silverfire Darkmoon]

I personally don't give a tinker's damn about it or the horrendous poem it's attached to.

[SoulFire]

I wrote a short article about the Wiccan Rede a while back -- it's available here on my website (http://witchgrotto.com/content/view/31/26/).

Basically, I see it as a guideline rather than a commandment (that whole "rede" thing.) It's a useful guideline to help us decide if a particular decision might be good or not.

Another important thing that comes out of the Rede and a companion concept, the idea of return (often called threefold return), is that it's not just enough for us to be aware that our decisions have consequences but that we must be willing to accept responsibility for those consequences even if they are surprising to us. Are we willing to take responsibility for what happens as a result of our actions or even as a result of our decision to not act?

For instance, if I see a child being hit by an adult in public I can choose to step in and stop it, or I can choose to do nothing. Am I willing to accept responsibility for either outcome? If I don't do something and the child is seriously injured or killed, how would I be able to live with myself knowing I could have done something to stop it? Choosing to not act is a decision with consequences too.

Of course no one can live up to the ideal of causing absolutely no harm. But that doesn't mean it's an unworthy ideal to work towards either.

Just read your article. Good work.

I recall a former covenmate telling a story that once when she pointed her finger in anger at her son, he said, "Mom, when you point that finger at me, you have three more fingers pointing back at yourself." Out of the mouth of babes. I always thought that was cute. ;) (Try it; point your finger at something.) I like Raven Grimassi's elaboration that our actions affect us on three levels: spiritually, mentally, and physically. Recently, at Pantheacon, I heard this expressed another way by a fellow Feri initiate who thinks that our actions affect all three souls.

Twenty-four years ago, my former Craft teacher, Lilly, taught a threefold concept she called the "Threefold Law", but not the same Threefold Law that most Wiccan think of when they hear the term. Lilly taught that it is threefold because it is comprised of three parts:

1) Reincarnation - Mortality
2) Cause & Effect [Karma] - Magick
3) Retribution [Law of Three] - Morality

See: The Ancient Art (http://www.sacred-texts.com/bos/bos121.htm) by Jo & James Dixon for a fuller explanation. (I later discovered that this was an elaboration on teachings originally from Raymond Buckland's book The Tree [ca. 1974] where he lists the three basic tenets of Wicca: Reincarnation, Retribution, and Magick. Sybil Leek expands the tenets in her book The Complete Art of Witchcraft [ca. 1971].) According to Lilly, the "Law of Three" is a subset of the Threefold Law. I think this idea must have been unique to Lilly, as most Wiccan use the terms interchangeably.

Many Wiccan erroneously attribute the Threefold Law to karma. According to the Dixons, our actions are returned in like kind; they say nothing about things coming back three times. Karma has nothing to do with things happening in threes either. Personally, I think the concept of the Rule of Three is a modern elaboration on the Law of Return. The latter term is certainly better than calling it "Retribution" or the "Law of Three"; calling it the "Law of Return" avoids some confusion. Incidentally, before she died, Doreen Valiente said she did not believe in threefold return:

"I don't believe this stuff about the threefold return, you know. I've always been very skeptical about that... I think old Gerald cooked it up in one of his rituals, and people took it terribly literally. Personally, I've always been skeptical about it because it doesn't seem to me to make sense. I don't see why there has to be one special law of karma for Witches and a different one for everybody else. I don't buy that" (Fireheart magazine, #6 (http://www.earthspirit.com/fireheart/fhdv1.html)).

Three very good articles on the Rede are: "Wiccan Ethics and the Wiccan Rede" (http://www.sacred-texts.com/bos/bos661.htm) by David Piper, "A Partial Analysis of the Wiccan Rede" (http://www.wildideas.net/temple/library/letters/rede.html) by Lynna Landstreet, and "The Wiccan Rede" (http://wicca.timerift.net/rede.shtml) by Catherine Noble Beyer.

These three articles, more than any, helped me to understand the Rede. I now know that Gardner is responsible for the overly simplistic rendering: "Harm none". The concept is actually much deeper and more complex than we've been lead to believe, as Piper, Landstreet, and Beyer explain.

Piper's thesis is that there are two renderings of the Rede, which he labels the AC (actual construction) Rede and the MR (modern reconstruction) Rede. According to Piper, they mean two different things. The AC Rede states (paraphrasing), "If it is not going to hurt anyone, it is okay to do something"; whereas, the MR Rede says, "If it hurts anyone, it is not okay to do it." IOW, any action that harms someone is forbidden. The MR Rede, Piper argues, is impossible to follow, as others have commented.

To give an example of how these play out in the real world, self-defense would be a violation of the MR Rede, but not the AC Rede. (I'm actually still grappling with this, because in self-defense, you may not hurt everyone, but you may hurt someone.) But Piper argues that the Rede does not instruct on actions that cause harm, only those that do not. (There is even a version of the Rede that goes: "Except in self-defense it be, ever mind the Rule of Three." Anybody know the origin of that?)

I like Beyer's statement that "the Rede is comprised of eight words, not two." ;) Incidentally, my first Craft teacher interpreted the Rede as being like the Golden Rule. When understood that way, it's not so bad IMHO.

Bookmark these articles; they're invaluable. Put them in your BoS.

I also like Laurie Cabot's linking of karma and quantum physics in Power of the Witch, and I don't have the space to quote it here. I like to think of wyrd (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wyrd#Concept) as being the Pagan equivalent of karma. Another similar concept I find intriguing is Indra's Net (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indra%27s_Net). Both of these are more complex than the overly simplistic Threefold Law. Basically, if everything is interconnected, then whatever we do affects us as well as others. Starhawk wrote:

"Interconnection is the understanding that all being is interrelated, that we are linked with all the cosmos as parts of one living organism. What affects one of us affects us all. The felling of tropical forests disturbs our weather patterns and destroys the songbirds of the North. No less does the torture of a prisoner in El Salvador or the crying of a homeless child in downtown San Francisco disturb our well-being. So interconnection demands from us compassion..." (The Spiral Dance 22).

(See also Butterfly Effect (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butterfly_effect).) When I was starting out in the Craft, most teachers taught personal Responsibility over a proscribed set of moral codes. The best recent explanation of Craft ethics I have read is in Be a Goddess by Francesca De Grandis, who also talks about ethics and laws of magic in terms of quantum physics.

I don't want to go into the subject of Feri ethics right now; that would be another article. We don't follow the Rede (Victor didn't teach it) or a proscribed set of morals, but we do have concepts such as honor, loyalty, truth, and respect for others and for ourselves. Or as a former covenmate puts it, "Don't be an asshole!" :hehehehe:

[Ben Gruagach]

Great post, SF, and very thought-provoking.

I especially liked this part and the explanation that followed it:


When I was starting out ... years ago, my former teacher, Lilly, taught a threefold concept she called the "Threefold Law", but not the same Threefold Law that most Wiccan think of when they hear the term. Lilly taught that it is threefold because it has three parts:

1) Reincarnation - Mortality
2) Cause & Effect [Karma] - Magick
3) Retribution [Law of Three] - Morality

One little clarification though...



These three articles, more than any, helped me to understand the Rede. It is now my belief that the overly simplistic rendering ("Harm none") originated with Scott Cunningham, to the detriment of traditional Craft teachings. The concept is actually much deeper and more complex than we've been lead to believe, as these authors explain.

The simplification of "harm none" was Gardner's. He mentions it in the long list of laws (the "Ardanes" as some call them). You can see it in the Ardanes at http://www.sacred-texts.com/pag/gbos/gbos38.htm in section L, item 45. It's also presented in "Gerald Gardner: Witch" on page 207 (this book was a biography of Gardner written by Idries Shaw with Gardner's full approval and cooperation.) It's also discussed pretty bluntly in a simplified way in Gardner's "The Meaning of Witchcraft" on page 127.

It wasn't until Doreen Valiente's speech in the 1960s though when the eight words "An it harm none, do what you will" were brought forth (I think right out of Doreen's poetic mind) and took off in the Wiccan community.

[SoulFire]

Great post, SF, and very thought-provoking.

I especially liked this part and the explanation that followed it:

Thanks, Ben.




One little clarification though...



The simplification of "harm none" was Gardner's. He mentions it in the long list of laws (the "Ardanes" as some call them). You can see it in the Ardanes at http://www.sacred-texts.com/pag/gbos/gbos38.htm in section L, item 45.

You're right! Thanks for that clarification. I see I need to edit my post again. :doh2:

[Dawa Lhamo]

I agree that intent plays a part, but I really don't think the Rede is just about intent.

I think it encourages us to really analyze our actions for the possible consequences and to act deliberately, with full understanding of how what we do effects everyone around us (and ourselves).

We can do some pretty stupid stuff with good intentions if all we're thinking about is intent. No, I think we're meant to actually think beyond intent and really determine if, for us, the ends justify the means. Intent is just looking at the ends... the means matter, though, and I think the Rede encourages us to consider the means, and the side-effects of our actions.

Not that it's prohibitive, since it really is just advice..., it's instructive, I think, encouraging clear-thinking and deliberate behaviour.

As far as things we do which hurt ourselves... well, we should think about what's really hurting us. (harm and hurt are different things... removing a splinter can hurt, but allowing it to become infected can hurt *and* harm) Is it the action itself that hurts or how we react to the situation, how we might have difficulty shifting our paradigm, or our attachment to things/to the idea of permanence. Witches, IMHO, should not be afraid of hurting ourselves if necessary to achieve what we need to achieve. It's painful to dig up old hurts, for example, but sometimes that's just what's needed to get past them and grow... on the other hand, there's a line between that and dwelling on old hurts, on picking at them until they overwhelm us...

[~*Sacred*~]

I think it's way too over-analyzed for me.

Don't beat people, killing people etc etc etc and don't be intentionally malicious towards people.

That's my take on it.

[Louisvillian]

So how far can this one Wiccan rule be taken? Think about all the over sensitive people who get hurt over everything. Do you have to forsake yourself at times?
Like NK said, most people over-analyse it and take it to be unbendable moral law. I think it's meant to be, well, a rede (as the title of the poem from which that line originates calls itself)- a piece of sage ethical advice. Suggestions, not laws.
It is impossible to go throughout life without harming other beings and people. I think the Rede, particularly the line "An it Harm none, do as Ye will," means that one's actions should consist of doing what feels right, what is willed and not simply wanted, and in the course of doing so, one should hurt as few as possible, and be aware of personal responsibility for the effects of one's actions. This goes along with the Law of Return and other parts of Wiccan ethics, which emphasises the goal of personal responsibility.

[Thyrsos]

"None" has to include yourself. Too many novices have taken this axiom as an excuse to pull a Belushi and destroy themselves.

[Lunacie]

Like NK said, most people over-analyse it and take it to be unbendable moral law. I think it's meant to be, well, a rede (as the title of the poem from which that line originates calls itself)- a piece of sage ethical advice. Suggestions, not laws.
It is impossible to go throughout life without harming other beings and people. I think the Rede, particularly the line "An it Harm none, do as Ye will," means that one's actions should consist of doing what feels right, what is willed and not simply wanted, and in the course of doing so, one should hurt as few as possible, and be aware of personal responsibility for the effects of one's actions. This goes along with the Law of Return and other parts of Wiccan ethics, which emphasises the goal of personal responsibility.


"None" has to include yourself. Too many novices have taken this axiom as an excuse to pull a Belushi and destroy themselves.

There aren't enough people giving the correct interpretation of those eight words. "As ye will" does not mean, "do what you want to do". Your "will" is your considered action with the knowledge of the conseqences that are likely to follow.

[RainInanna]

There aren't enough people giving the correct interpretation of those eight words. "As ye will" does not mean, "do what you want to do". Your "will" is your considered action with the knowledge of the conseqences that are likely to follow.

QFT.

This is worthwhile reading - http://www.draknet.com/proteus/rede.htm

[Kern]

To me the Rede is good advice, I dont have any real qualms about it, but I like the Lycian version better.
"An it harm none, do as you will. An it cause harm, do as you must."

[*~Amora~*]

So how far can this one Wiccan rule be taken? Think about all the over sensitive people who get hurt over everything. Do you have to forsake yourself at times?

I believe that regards the use of magic(k) and not day-to-day living. Thereby, if you focus your will and/or manipulate energy to harm someone, then you've violated the Rede. It's all in the intention, because that's where the spell is born.