Wicca 404: Advanced Goddess Thealogy

By Esra Free

Beyond archeology, beyond mythology, beyond the endless stream of look-alike "Wicca 101" bestsellers lies the real Cosmic Goddess of Wicca, Her body the Universe, Her Mind and Spirit and Will flowing... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1430317728
• ISBN13: 9781430317722
• Release Date: March 2007
• Publisher: Lulu.Com
• Length: 103 Pages
• Weight: 0.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.8" x 0.3" x 5.8"

Customer Reviews

Brilliant!!

This is a brilliant exposition of Wicca. I know it's supposed to be for advanced Wiccans (hence the '404'), but really, those who are new to the Craft would find this book indispensible as well. I believe that this book would benefit those of our family and friends who look askance at our 'rejection' of their belief systems because it so precisely declares what Wicca is supposed to be about. I loved her chapter on 'egregores' and found the chapter about the God to be very thought-provoking. I plan to buy several more copies to share - you know, spread the love!!

One of the best Wicca books ever -- The Goddess is REAL, and Esra Free can prove it!

Just as another reviewer mentioned, I too bought Wicca 404 because I had another book in my cart and wanted to add an inexpensive second title in order to reach the $25 free shipping threshold. I mean, why pay for one book plus shipping when, for about the same price, you can get two books? I have been studying the Wiccan religion for some time now, and have read numerous books on the subject. The main book I ordered the day I also bought Wicca 404 was Raven Grimassi's "Spirit of the Witch: Religion and Spirituality in Contemporary Witchcraft." I read the Grimassi book first, as he is a respected "name" in Wicca, and an avid "Traditional," who claims both to be descended from ancient witches (the whole "Fam-Trad" thing), AND to have been at one time initiated into a Gardnerian Coven, before launching his own "Aridian Tradition" of Italian Stregheria. A "heavy hitter" by almost anyone's measure. A hundred pages into "Spirit of the Witch" I was ready to pull my hair out. Over and over and over, I read passages that began with versions of "ancient people used to believe that..." and "Nowadays we know that such and so isn't literally true, but witches still embrace the symbolism of..." Blah, blah, blah. I had grown beyond the nuts and bolts level of "Wicca 101," and I was hoping "Spirit of the Witch" would reveal a deeper element, some core truth about the reality of the Goddess of Wicca that might open up a new path for my journey... What I found read more like weak Jungian analysis, a bunch of archetypes and symbols and naive' ancient beliefs copped together with no sense at all that any kind of real, tangible deity was being talked about here. I kept thinking, "Why would anyone become a witch, if here's nothing REAL behind any of it? If it's all just a mix of disproven folk beliefs, Jungian psychobabble and role play dress-up?" Please understand that I DO consider myself a witch and a daughter of the Goddess. My embrace of the Wiccan path comes from my own deep, emotional and intuitive experience of the reality of the Goddess. In light of my emotional rootedness to the Goddess and Wicca, Grimassi's dry, strangely non-committal "think piece" left me feeling edgy and almost embarrassed to call myself a witch. It's so weird -- Raven Grimassi is a big name "Traditional" witch, and his book left me thinking that maybe witchcraft was a load of BS after all, considering how this big name Wiccan author won't even take a stand on the reality of it all... I put "Spirit of the Witch" aside, unfinished, and turned to Wicca 404... What a difference! Esra Free is a brilliant thinker and an exceptional writer. But what really grabbed me and wouldn't let go about Wicca 404 is that, from the word "go," Ms. Free discusses the Goddess as a real, tangible, living entity, as the personal mind and spirit animating all Nature. The truth I know deep in my feelings and intuition, Esra Free grants words in Wicca 404. You simply cannot read this book and think, "Well

Well worth the read

Over and over again, I've seen books advertised as "advanced" when they are really just rehasments of Wicca 101 whose topics the author simply views from a different angle. Wicca 404 is an advanced book and I don't recommend it for new students. Get well-grounded in basic Wicca before reading this work because there are many places in this work that the author makes sweeping statements about Wicca and Wiccans, which aren't necessarily true. A reader needs to have a solid foundation in order to see where this occurs and to realize the statement isn't necessarily true. That said, the author is a woman after my own heart. She sees Wicca becoming more and more trivalized and diluted by authors simply out to make a buck off the religion and don't care that what they are publishing is crap. As an HPS who has also seen this and is saddened by it, I truly appreciate and applaud Ms. Free for her hard work and dedication to the faith. Clearly, she has great insights and articulates them well in her work and that is why I've given this book 5 stars. Despite my crictisms of the book below, I highly recommend it to anyone who considers themselves very well grounded in the basics. It is worthy of a place on your bookshelf. Now for the criticisms, given the title of the work I was expecting feminist leanings inside, but not to the degree I found them. Chapter 6-"The God Problem" nearly caused my head to explode. Basically, the author states that the Earth as been in a state of what she refers to as "animus possessed" to the point that even the Pagan Deities have become corrupted and tainted to the point that working with Them is virutally impossible so, while we should acknowledge that the Great God of Wicca exists, we shouldn't make any real attempts to work with Him or get to know Him. Hog-wash! That, to me, is a cop-out to avoid the hard work that it may take to get to know Him in all His forms other than what are commonly found in our cultures. Admittedly, I had a hard time working with the Horned One when I first stepped on this path, but with persistance and hardwork I got passed the concepts of God commonly found today and got to know the Horned One in many of His forms. He wants to be known and to let us know He is more that Adonai, Jesus or Allah. He wants to be known "in His fullness" just as much as the Goddess wants to be known in Hers. If the author doesn't feel comfortable working with the God then she shouldn't, but she makes a terrible error in telling others not to do so as well. This stance also becomes rather confusing when Ms. Free states in the Introduction that her view of Wiccan Thealogy is based on experience, testing, observation, and was developed by "siphoning out what worked and jettisoning the rest". This leads me to ask how one can observe/experience life then completely jettison the masculine aspect of the Divine and still have anything that contains a realistic view of life as we know it, and it's processes. In Chapters 2 and

An Important Book that is Sure to Stir Controversy

Most popular versions of Wicca, to the extent that they attempt serious thealogical explorations at all, tend to envision the Wiccan Goddess as some brand of "Jehovah in a dress," a female deity, for sure, but still "deity" as that term has been defined for the last several thousand years by Middle Eastern religions like Christianity, Judaism or Islam, a supernatural "other" who created the universe and who from then on stands "outside" Creation somewhere, looking down on humans from "above." Just like the Christian G-O-D, only a girl. I'm sure many will take insult at this uncharitable characterization, but I shared it, too, without even realizing it, before I read "Wicca 404," so I'm not pointing fingers. It's very hard to recognize how subtly trapped we might be within a Christianized worldview until we have had opportunity to see our understanding (or lack thereof) contrasted against a view as utterly foreign to the "big wo/man in the sky" conception of deity as is Esra Free's wholly pantheistic "Great Cosmic Goddess." This is deity as natural phenomenon, not just some lovey-dovey "Goddess of Nature" out there somewhere, but the whole physical universe, the entire natural world, as the living, breathing body of a being as physically real as you or me, whose spirit we intuit as Divine Intelligence (Goddess), and within whose physical, emotional and spiritual life processes we humans play an integral, organic, even cellular, role. Starting from the simple contention that Wicca is a natural, as opposed to a supernatural, religion, Free builds a convincing step by step case for a view of the Goddess that I think our pre-Christian European ancestors would have wholeheartedly endorsed. Along the way, she explains how and why magick works, why we human beings exist, and just exactly what we ought to be doing with our lives. This is mind-expandingly good stuff with the potential to reshape Wicca as we have come to know it here in 21st Century America. Take heed! That praise delivered, the reader should also be warned that Esra Free is V-E-R-Y opinionated (negatively) toward Christianity (and to a lesser extent, Islam and Judaism), and expresses something of a grudge, as well, against Traditional Coven Wicca. In the second half of the book, a chatty and revealingly personal interview with the author from the pages of The Wiccan/Pagan Times, she repeatedly opens her response to various questions involving covencraft with versions of the phrase, "I'll probably make somebody mad saying this, but..." - and then she goes right ahead and says things she might have been wiser to hold her tongue about, unless she is intentionally trying to start a "witch war" with Traditionals. Which may well be exactly what she hopes to accomplish, as she is clearly a staunch champion of Solitaries everywhere, and of their stature within the Wiccan community. She even coins the (to my mind, quite brilliant) phrase "coven of solitaries" to describe groups all ove

Required Reading for Every Serious Wiccan

I bought this book on a whim, because it's cheap (I had another pricier book in my cart, and just wanted to reach the $25 free shipping threshold,) and because I liked the "spacey" cover. Admittedly, I had the shallowest of motives and no real expectations. Imagine my surprise when this small book by what was to me an unknown author entirely transformed my understanding of the Wiccan religion, my personal relationship with the Goddess, and the direction and meaning of my spiritual path. For Esra Free, the Wiccan religion is not a fashion statement, a New Age spiritual fad, or some kind of psycho-social "safe haven" for teenaged misfits from Traditional religions or mainstream culture (which, you have to admit, is how the Media usually portrays us to the larger society). Free's experience of Wicca is richly and wildly beyond all that, in equal parts intellectually stimulating and emotionally profound, simultaneously grounded in the Earth and inclusive (literally) of the stars. This is Wicca as real religion for real people, theologically on par with every other World Faith, yet still deeply personal and powerfully eclectic. In what amounts to a very few words (the book is only 104 pages long!), Free manages to reconcile Theology (TheAlogy, actually, being the feminine form of the word as used in Wicca 404), science, magick, and perhaps most importantly, to my mind, anyway, the real "nuts and bolts" of life's meaning, of why we're here and what we're supposed to be doing with our lives, not just as Wiccans, but as human beings. In the thealogy of Wicca 404, the Earth is physically and spiritually alive (Gaia), with Her own path to walk and spiritual evolution to pursue - a task in which She needs our help. We are integral to Her spiritual success, just as She is to our own. This is such heady stuff that I hesitate to give too much away in a review - I hate "spoilers," so I won't ruin the wonder for other. Just read Wicca 404 for yourselves! If I have one complaint, it is that the book is too short. I would have loved to have stayed in Esra Free's universe for a lot longer than the few hours it took to read this book from cover to cover, though I'm willing to bet that more will be forthcoming from Ms. Free and her "Cosmic Goddess Coven." I look forward to further installments. Part of Wicca 404 is a lengthy interview with Free taken from the pages of The Wiccan/Pagan Times, a small but reputable on-line Pagan publication. This theory/interview format worked well for me, balancing the at times challenging intellectual structure of the opening chapters with a fresh, personal and entertaining audience with the real flesh and blood woman behind the Thealogy. I was relieved to find all of my questions from reading the first half of the book (and then some!) answered in the interview. I wish the book was longer, but I have to admit that, after reading just the 104 pages provided, I honestly feel like I know this author and understand her i