Witch Grass Coven
Home | About The Witch Grass Coven | New Membership | Introduction to the High Priest | Introduction to the High Priestess | Curriculum and Requirements | Reading List | What is NROOGD? | History of NROOGD | Cords of NROOGD | Essential facts about the history and nature of the Craft | The Sabbaths | The Craft Laws | The Wiccan Rede | A Daily Litany for the Lady | Invoking and Evoking | The 13 Wishes: A Wiccaning | Poetry | Coven Articles | Moon Lore | NorthWest NROOGD | Candle Magick | The Witches Credo | Herbal Exercises | Links
The Craft Laws

by Aidan Kelly

I originally wrote about the Craft Laws in my Aporrheton 5, in 1973. That essay has been circulated widely in the Craft and can even now be found in Pagan Archives on the Net. But it is now the year 2000, I and the Craft have grown in many ways, and our coven may well have needs quite different from those of the Full Moon Coven.
Some of the Craft Laws discussed in Aporrheton 5 were derived from the Gardnerian Laws, first published in 1971 and, as I later established, written in 1957. Some Gardnerians regard those laws as authoritative, but many still do not, and adopt only the ones that seem sensible to them, as we did in the NROOGD. The rest of the laws in Aporrheton 5 came from many different sources, and were adopted because they seemed true and/or useful.
What is most important in the NROOGD Tradition is that the Craft Laws we accepted were not imposed on us from above or outside. Rather, they were researched, discussed, amended, and adopted by consensus. And this is how it will be in the Witch Grass Coven. Once you begin working with a coven, you are obligated to observe the most important of the laws, the ones on which there is consensus throughout the Craft. Once you receive the White Cord, you have the right to ask that the Council of Initiates meet to discuss and amend the set of Craft Laws observed by the coven, if you feel the need to do so.
I present here the Craft Laws observed by NROOGD covens, in the form of theorems and corollaries. These are all open to discussion and interpretation, and I am sure that not all of them will be adopted by the Witch Grass Coven. However, you do need to know about them. The ones in CAPS are the especially important ones.

1. YOU CANNOT USE THE ARTS OF THE CRAFT TO CREATE OR INCREASE BAD KARMA, EXCEPT FOR YOURSELF.

2. YOU MAY NOT USE THE ARTS OF THE CRAFT TO AFFECT ANOTHER PERSON IN ANY WAY, UNLESS YOU HAVE THAT PERSON'S EXPLICIT PERMISSION.
These two replace the inadequate statement that "You may not use the arts of the Craft to work malevolent magic." Notice that the first one says "cannot," being an observation of fact, whereas the second says "may not," being a statement of ethics.
You cannot benefit from trying to harm another, because you are part of the fabric of reality, not separate from it.
You get whatever you give, because getting and giving are the same, just as the trough and the crest are the same wave.
You may not shed blood, except your own.
It is the other person's opinion that determines whether the effects of what you do are positive or not.
Do unto others not as you wish to be done unto, but as they wish to be done unto -- for their tastes may damned well differ from yours.
You may not do something for what you think is someone else's "own good"; you have no right to make that decision.
You may not even work a healing unless you have permission from that person to be healed; it is unethical to hit an unprepared person with a jot of energy.
You may work without prior permission for someone whose karma you are already personally involved with (as a mother for her child, a man for his wife, etc.), but you may not accept anyone's opinion that another would give permission if asked.

3. You cannot use the arts of the Craft to win fame, fortune, power, or any other sort of material or social advantage.
You can make your living by a psychic art, as long as you charge only enough to live comfortably by your society's standards.
The arts of the Craft are the gift of the Goddess; if you misuse them, She will take them back.
Do not attempt to control elemental or other spirits; that's a power trip.

4. You cannot use the arts of the Craft for show, in pretence, but only in earnest, and only in need.
If you work a ritual, it will have effects, whether you think you want it to or not.
You cannot "pretend" to throw a hex; the Lady does not recognize pretence.
You cannot work the arts successfully just because you want to; you have to need the energy or the information for some real purpose, else you can't tap into it.

5. The arts of the Craft are those that can only be learned and worked in a circle with at least one other person.
Psychic or magical arts that can be learned or worked under other conditions are not necessarily part of the Craft.
If you're working by yourself, you are working as a magician, not as a witch -- but you are still obliged by your oaths to the Lady to observe the other Craft Laws.

6. You must always pay whatever price is asked, without haggling or complaining, when you buy something to be used for the Craft.

7. You cannot belong to another coven that conflicts with, or in any other way hampers your work with The Witch Grass Coven.

8. None can coven with others they cannot agree with.
This is a tautology: the root of coven means to agree.
A coven can -- and often, for its own survival, must -- expel a member who, although not violating any other laws, is making it impossible for the coven to function.

9. You must not betray the secrets that cannot be told.
Never give anyone power of life and death over you.
Don't violate your own sense of your self-integrity.
If you stick your finger in a flame, you'll get burned.

10. All power in the Craft comes from the Goddess.
Although you have a right to earn a living, the Craft is free to all, being a gift of the Goddess: you may not charge anyone even a penny to be initiated into the Craft or to learn its arts.
The only genuine initiations in the Craft are those worked by the Goddess Herself.
There can be no authority in the Craft outside each coven.

11. IF SOMEONE INTENDS TO HARM YOU, YOU MAY USE THE ARTS OF THE CRAFT TO RESTRAIN HIM FROM DOING SO, BUT ONLY IF ALL IN THE COVEN AGREE THAT HE WILL IN NO WAY BE HARMED BY THE WORKING.
Those in the coven, having taken an oath to help one another, and being linked by the generation of the group psychic field, will all share to some extent in any bad karma generated by any member's misuse of the arts.
A coven has the right to expel any member who interferes in other people's lives without their permission or, of course, who attempts even blacker workings.

12. Always remember that all mankind and all creatures are equally children of the Goddess; therefore never boast or threaten, or do anything that might disgrace Her or your brothers and sisters in the Craft.
To blather thoughtlessly about the Craft, especially to persons who have no business knowing about your coven's affairs, not only drains your own energy and that of your coven, but also is a form of boasting, of using the Craft for self-aggrandizement.
Threatening to "hex" someone reinforces the false impression most people have of the Craft, and so disgraces the Goddess.
Being a Witch doesn't make you any better than anyone else.

13. You may not reveal the identity of a Witch to a non-Witch without the Witchs permission.

You cannot tell a cowan that someone is a Witch if he or she is keeping it a secret.
You may not publish or tell information that would enable a non-Witch to track down the mundane name and/or home address of a closeted Witch.
You may tell another Witch that someone is a Witch.
A Witch who publishes the fact of her membership in the Craft thus gives permission for that published information to be passed on, but only under the name used in the publication, and only to the same sort of audience as that addressed by the original publication.

an it harm none, do what thou wilt!