Paganism vs Witchcraft

[mitchelwolfs]

I'm new here, but not new to the craft. I've followed the pagan path for 3 years now. People ask me about my pentagram and say that I do witchcraft. I tell them about what I do, but is paganism and witchcraft different, the same, or is witchcraft just the term for when we do magick?

[SpiritTalker]

Just replying to an old, unanswered FAQ post - that never had a reply but is still browsed.

I’m guessing that if people commented on a pentacle it’s because they saw the OP wearing a pentacle as an emblem of a spiritual path. The encircled, five point star is a common ritual tool found in modern ritual-witchcraft practice. It is also an old symbol pre-dating Christian religions but was briefly adopted by early Christians to symbolize the 5 wounds of Christ. To an ancient Jew it might represent the Pentateuch. It is seen in Pennsylvania Dutch “hex” designs. It is seen in Arcadian & Sumerian designs, in fact, it’s seen in ancient cultures world wide. There’s no single ownership or just one meaning.

Paganism generally is used as the broadest word for a religion that isn’t Hebraic, Islamic or Christian. These 3 are called Abrahamic because they share that figure in their beliefs. Paganism is a broad term and can refer to a structured religion (ex. Shinto, Hindu) or a spiritual path with a Nature-based story of creation. And might use magic or not.

Witchcraft & Magic are words that refer to structured methods of manifesting intention & possibly evolved from shamanistic practices going back to deer carved on rock stelae or painted on cave walls, so i think it must be part of the genetic strain introduced with Neanderthal-Cro-Magnon-Homo-Sapien-human. Magical use was at least recorded in ancient Nordic, Sumerian-Egyptian & Greco-Roman writing from where branches of modern European magical practices take their form.

So in my thinking - and you don’t have to agree - paganism and witchcraft are different in the details but share broad foundations in the development of human kind.

[Starwitch]

Good answer, thanks SpiritTalker.

To simplify:

"Paganism" an umbrella term, like "Judeo-Christian". It covers a lot of beliefs and religions.
Wicca is a religion, like Christianity.
Witchcraft is a practice, the same way prayer, laying-on hands, and speaking in tongues are practices that Christians do.