Westminster College

How Magic Works: New Zealand

Theories of Ritual Actions

Claudio M. Velasco Algarañaz.

October 31, 2008

 How Magic Works: New Zealand Theories

of Ritual Actions

By Kathryn Rountree

In the article, “How Magic Works: New Zealand Theories of Ritual Actions” by

Kathryn Rountree, the author explains Wicca and Neo-paganism from the point of view of

New Zealand witches.

The author explains the New Zealand witches main ideas about Wicca from their

own experience. Rountree tell to the reader what New Zealanders thinks about magic, how

they conduct their rituals, how science and magic are related, and how rituals and magic

work.

Wicca and Neo-paganism in New Zealand are attracted to anything that looks

related to the magic. For example: the science fiction book series Harry Potter by J.K.

Rowling has millions of fan around the world and the Pottermania (what fanatics like to

call it) is growing more day by day. As people fascination with witchcraft increase, so do

the number of people practicing it; nowadays exist approximately 1,000 - 2,000 women

witches are in New Zealand, but even more women are interested in Wicca and read books,

or practice some kind of rituals.

The New Zealand witches ideas about magic are that with magic they think that they

can control the world, nature and the natural phenomenon. They believe that the entire

world is made of energy and all the things that we can touch and see are just the physical

representation of the energy. Therefore, magic is possible if we can control and manipulate

the energy of all the things.

 They also believe that magic is another form of science. For them, magic tries to

control and understand the nature phenomenon but from other perspective. So, magic could

be a substitute of science.

At the present day, anthropological theories of rituals and magic are having

disagreements about magic, science and rationality of the New Zealand witches. The New

Zealand witches believe that two orientations to the cosmos exist - the casualty and the

participation.

The casualty is related to the destiny. Sometimes we have not control of our destiny

because the energy that will move us is predestined. For example, if we are crossing the

street and a car crashes into us and we die; it was part of our destiny. On the other hand, the

idea of the participation thinks that in someway, we can control or manipulate our destiny.

For example: if we want to go to study in Italy, but we do not have the money to pay it. So

we start to study hard to get good grades to get a scholarship, and at the end, we apply and

we get it. Our participation was what moved our destiny.

New Zealand witches also believe that two worlds exist. One is physical, that is,

where people live, and the other is just made of energy where God, the Goddess, spirits and

devils live. New Zealand witches do no make a difference between this world and others.

Starhawk claims “God is felt to be separate form the physical world, but Goddess is

manifest in the physical world with the nature”

The rituals and magic New Zealand witchcraft is based in the use of symbols and

spells for making a change in the energy and then in the physical world. Starhawk says

“Symbolic act done in order to cause a desire change.”

 New Zealand witches believe that the spells works because they manipulate the

world energy. They also believe that many things are possible if you change your point of

view. Because your beliefs can change the energy, so it will change in the physical world as

well. As a result, magic could be explained as a science.

Therefore, they affirm that belief in science is the same as belief in magic. But we

do not know how to explain it. For New Zealand witches, magic has the same explanations

as science.

In my opinion, I think that the pretended New Zealand witches are moved for the

simple fascination of knowing more about the unknown worlds, the power of the un-

controllable things, and for the secrets of the world. Besides, Frazer concludes that the

dreams of magic may one day be the walking realities of science. Thus, if magic is

explained, then it ceases to be magic and is science, so it was never magic to begin with.