If you’re interested in how contemporary Practitioners see, perceive and work with the Goddess Hecate stay tuned because you’re just about to see the paper I delivered at the conference of the European Association for the Study of Religions 2022 at the University College Cork, in Ireland.

Hello everybody, I’m Dr Angela Puca and I will be talking about the Goddess Hecate and how she’s been reframed in the contemporary world. I use the word Witchtok on my title because I will, of course, be talking about TikTok and the community that has been created over there which is called WitchTok for Witches of TikTok. But I will more generally be talking about Hecate or Hecate, the Greek Goddess and how she’s been reinterpreted in a contemporary world that engages a lot with the online social media world.

So first of all I want to thank Joseph Sedgwick because he’s studying a PhD at the University of Edinburgh on the Goddess Hecate and we had a conversation and he gave some interesting insights and sources, so I wanted to acknowledge that.

Also, my methodology is based on reading and accessing primary and secondary resources on the matter, especially primary sources because there isn’t really much on the map in terms of academic scholarship and Netnography, which is a methodology for the study of online communities and contexts using ethnographic research techniques. And a survey, which I decided quite recently, as you can tell on the 14th of June and I collected 410 responses. Actually, now there are more because they are still coming in but those are the ones that I will be using for this talk.

So first of all, who is Hecate, at least, in a brief historical overview? She was seen as quite harmless in Hesiod in The Theogony and later becomes to be seen as more threatening as a Goddess. We will see that she is, or used to be, defined as a Dark Goddess, as a Dark Mother Goddess but in more recent years and thanks to online exchanges and development of how this Goddess has been seen. Now she’s not seen as much as a dark Goddess but for quite some time you could see her described as a dark Goddess. You don’t have this threatening element in Hesiod and in The Theogony. Then, during the Hellenistic and Roman times, she was worshipped as a regional mother Goddess and in the Eleusinian myth and cult, she is also quite kind and caring. And she helps Demeter in her search for Persephone and after the reunion of mother and daughter, she becomes Persephone’s minister and attendant. And then we have that in the Chaldaean Oracles she then was adopted by Neoplatonists and Hecate becomes an epiphanic celestial deity and cosmological principle to the cosmic soul – accessible through ritual as well as contemplation. So this is kind of the historical background of the Goddess.

Now in the contemporary world, there are a few authors that have spoken a lot about the Goddess Hecate. One of these is Sorita d’Este who has a community around Hecate and has written a few books about Hecate and she focuses a lot on the history of the Goddess and her development from history. And in a way, she contributes to how it is now being seen. And then there’s the group, the Covenant of Hecate which has a website, which is amazing as a resource on the Goddess Hecate and as you can see, even though in popular culture there’s a gigantic list of all the books and movies and TV shows and everything that has talked about Hecate, and so it gives a good sense of how this figure, this Goddess has been perceived throughout the ages and we will see that there has been quite an evolution from Hecate being seen as a threatening figure now that contemporary Practitioners are still attaching her in some way to the darkness but in a very different way, in a way that is more, perhaps, enlightening.

Then we have another known author, Jason Miller who focuses a lot on Hecate and he focuses a lot on Sorcery and Magick with regards to Hecate, and he also has a course called The Sorcery of Hecate. And in this case, differently from Sorita d’Este and the Covenant of Hecate, there is less of an emphasis on the historical figure and more of an emphasis on the relationship that the practitioner creates with the Goddess and in a way that affects how the Goddess is perceived. It is maybe a bit more based on the individual experience, of course, you have that across the board with contemporary Practitioners but there are some practices and some authors and, in this case, he defines himself as a Sorcerer, he tends to focus on that element a bit more. And also he associates her a lot with protection and contrasts with that more generally to associate her to the magick practice.

Then we have, I could say, in a few TV shows like Charmed and in Buffy. And in this case, in Buffy, you see her as the Goddess of Witches, which is a common theme that you find across many Practitioners, the idea that Hecate is the Goddess of Witches. In Charmed she is kind of the Queen of the Underworld. That’s another element associated with Hecate, she’s often associated with the underworld, with the world of the dead she’s a psychopomp deity and allows people to interact with the dead. So you have these elements in Charmed and in Buffy, you see her as the Goddess of Witches and then The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, which is more recent and you have that, you know, we substitute Lucifer because in The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, you have the Witches as followers of Lucifer. And then they overthrow Lucifer because there’s an acknowledgement of certain misogynistic aspects and basically the main deity, the main divine figure becomes Hecate.

So it’s interesting how she’s portrayed. Hecate, Gatekeeper, Guardian and Guide, stand with us side by side. Hecate light your Torches’ flame. Torches’ flame – another element that is often represented in images about Hecate. We call your name. Hallowed Maiden Mother Crone through the dark your light be shown. And interesting also this element of maiden, mother, crone and in Wiccan circles and Wiccan-inspired magick Practitioners you do see Hecate associated with the triple Goddess, the idea of maiden, mother, and crone. Whereas others are criticizing this reading of Hecate because it is based on Robert Grave’s book The White Goddess and has been then adopted by Wiccans. But actually, even though Hecate was being seen as a triple Goddess, even in antiquity she wasn’t seen as a maiden, mother, or crone or in some cases she has been associated to the crone more specifically because of that dark element and that connection would work there. But actually, she was defined, in antiquity, even as the protector of the young and there were sacrifices being made to her of puppies because of the association with youth. So these are more Wiccan interpretations of the Goddess Hecate that have been challenged by contemporary Practitioners and you’ll see conversations about this online.

Now on to WitchTok. As I was saying earlier there is a community on TikTok. I don’t know if you guys are familiar with what TikTok is. TikTok is an app, a social media platform. We can define it as the app that became more popular among the younger generation but now I see it is becoming more popular, more widely, across the ages. And TikTok became famous for the, you know, dances and lip-syncing over, you know, parts of movies and it is quite an entertaining platform. And people try to convey messages through the use of images and sounds and music in a way that conveys a very brief message. And usually, TikToks tend to be very short and they are short and punchy so they keep you engaged on the platform. And over time there has, you know, you see the formation of this community on TikTok which has been called WitchTok or Witches of TikTok and it has created a community in itself. And there are conversations about Witchcraft and Magick and interestingly Hecate is quite popular as a Goddess on the platform, on Witchtok. And so you will see here I screen-shotted three popular TikToks on Hecate but there are many so if you hashtag #Hecate on Tiktok you will find many, many TikToks.

So some elements that you find as recurring themes on Hecate, on Witchtok are that she’s the Goddess of Witchcraft, the Goddess of Witchcraft and Magick. That’s why, you know, she’s quite popular, she’s quite popular on Witchtok because in Witchtok darkness is quite popular. So the dark deities are quite popular at the moment. So she is seen as the Goddess of Witchcraft and Magick, she’s considered to be powerful and so if you are engaging with Witchcraft and you’re interested in Witchcraft it’s desirable to be working with Hecate, even though you need to wait for her to call you and to engage with you, this is something that you also find in the recurring theme in the discourse that happens on TikTok.

Also, she’s seen as a dark mother Goddess. So you still see this element of darkness but as we will see later, it is a darkness that is not linked to evil or something that is evil. Also, Hecate is associated with Lucifer and this is quite interesting because, as I said, you found this also in Chilling Adventures of Sabrina and I’m not sure whether it is related or not related but it’s interesting how there are Witches that work with Hecate and Lucifer as, in a way, the Goddess and the God – portraying them in a similar manner, as two divine figures that have an element of darkness but are also able to bring you to the light. Because Lucifer comes from the Latin luciferus which means bringer of light. And Hecate has also been associated, has also been called, in antiquity, the bringer of light at one point.

So interestingly now there are magick Practitioners that are working with these two deities – as dark deities that can allow you to access, to shed light, in a way, onto a darkness, in a way that allows you to proceed and evolve on your spiritual or religious journey.

And on the topic, shadow work is another very recurring element associated with Hecate. And shadow work is in the discourse in the Witchcraft, you know, based discourse is working with your… this is based on interpretation of Carl Jung’s psychology and the idea of the shadow is the repressed, hidden side of yourself. And so shadow work is a spiritual endeavour that, as a magick Practitioner, you will take so that you can face your inner demons, you can face the hidden parts of yourself, you can face all the elements, the trauma, all the aspects that are painful and that are in the dark but they are still controlling your mind and your responses to the world and to others and even to yourself.

So it’s quite fascinating how people are working with Hecate as a way to foster and help the shadow work. And shadow work is considered as a spiritual practice but also as part of the magick practice that people engage with.

Now on to my survey which, as I said, I collected over 400 responses. Of course, not, you know, not every single question was answered by all of them as you can see here we have fewer than 400. So there are some interesting conclusions that can be drawn from the survey.

So the first one, and this links very well to the previous paper where we talked about hard polytheism and soft polytheism. So briefly again, hard polytheism is believing that gods are ontologically real and they are separated from us. And soft-polytheism is the idea that gods are archetypes or they are not ontologically real and separate from us. They can be seen as real, in a way that is more linked to the individual than practices, in the way of being an inner part of the person or an energy or a force but are not ontologically real in the same way. And even though there are these two specific terms you can see that in most cases it is more of a spectrum and it’s not like one Practitioner is solely a hard-polytheist or solely a soft-polytheist it’s more a spectrum.

So the first thing that we see is that hard polytheism prevails over soft polytheism and this is something that I discussed with Joseph, that I acknowledged in the beginning because he also noticed that in his research. So for the majority of the respondents, Hecate is an independently existing entity or deity. So those who work with Hecate seem to believe that she is ontologically real. So we have a hard polytheist approach that is sort of prevailing here.

Then we see another interesting aspect is that for people… here I asked how important was for people, you know, being adherent to the mythology and the history regarding the Goddess and interestingly the average response was a six – so it’s not all that important for Practitioners to stick to the historical understanding of the deity because for a lot of Practitioners, actually, what matters is the relationship that they create with the deity. It’s not really what Hesiod said about Hecate, it’s more about what occurs as a result of their relationship with the Goddess.

Then also Hecate is strictly linked to magical practice. Do you work with Hecate for magical purposes? An overwhelming 75% answered yes. So Hecate is clearly, for Practitioners, a deity that is linked to magick and for a lot of them, she is the Goddess of Witches and the Goddess of Magick.

Then do you believe that Hecate is associated with shadow work? Which I was mentioning earlier and again an overwhelming 73% answered yes. So Hecate is now being associated with shadow work and the idea that on your spiritual journey, on your spiritual journey as a magick Practitioner, Hecate can help you shed some light on your shadow’s health, on the hidden parts of your past and of yourself.

Then what’s the most important thing to understand about Hecate? And here there were, you know, 400 responses. It was an open-ended question so everybody said something different. But I highlighted here a few things, a few things that were recurring, are representative of what our other responses were also saying. So Hecate is not just about death and dark magic. She is a light bearer, guide, protector, teacher and more. So again you have a challenge, you have people challenging the idea of her as a dark Goddess but there is still an element of darkness that is associated with her. But in the same way, a darkness that can shed a light on, you know, on your journey. Like all gods, she represents both good and evil and worship of any pagan god will break away from the duality of the mainstream religion. These are interesting elements because I highlighted them here because it shows how Practitioners that work with Hecate, you don’t have a very demarcated ethical stance. So the ethics are much more fluid. She’s not Maiden, Mother, Crone. So as we saw this view has been challenged, which was influenced by Wicca. She’s not all plush and sweet, she’s stern but yet motherly. And so once again you have this sense that, you know, she’s quite… there is this element of darkness and sternness but at the same time, you know, Practitioners find help in working with her. Hecate is her own energy, her own entity. All the mythology and history about her is a perception of her energy. She does not have to be antiquated and morose, she can be light and sassy and humorous. So this is also another interesting aspect that I think mirrors, also, what we have already said about the Goddess.

So thank you for your attention and I am also on TikTok – that’s how I gathered my data and I also have a YouTube channel where I disseminate academic scholarship on the, you know, on the subject of Magick, Witchcraft, Esotericism and Paganism. So thank you for your attention. I look forward to your questions.

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First uploaded 3 Jul 2022