High Priestess Judy Harrow wrote Exegesis on the Rede in 1984. As an advancing student, my teacher Susan Stoddard recommended this essay to me to help me better understand what the Wiccan Rede was and what it did — and did not — tell Wiccans to do with our lives. What it taught me was nothing short of miraculous in terms of changing the Wiccan Rede in my mind from an immutable law to a guiding spiritual principle.
As a younger witch, I interpreted the Rede to mean “do what you want as long as it doesn’t hurt anybody”. And as a younger witch, that was an empowering statement. But it was also very shallow, and as I gained experience, I realized it rang hollow. I learned that doing what I want was going to hurt people no matter how I tried to avoid it, so it seemed like the admonishment to harm none was unachievable and therefore irrelevant. At that time, it seemed like the Wiccan Rede was just another justification for being a benevolent asshole.
It wasn’t until I began working with Susan and with Taz Chance and reading what more experienced priestesses, like Judy, had written about the Rede that I realized that the Rede is a deep and dynamic guiding principle. Judy’s essays, combined with Susan’s spiritual insights and Taz’s down-to-earth realism, transformed my understanding of the Rede from permission to do what you want into a challenge to live rightly in and among the world.
Harming None
One of the things that Susan and Taz taught me is that there is a difference between hurting and harming. Hurting is a temporary discomfort, a reality of life. Harming is inflicting lasting detriment on oneself or another. For example, surgery hurts but it is performed with the ultimate benefit of healing. The discomfort is temporary, necessary, and fades away with time, and the purpose for which the surgery is performed is benevolent in nature and sees to the overall long-term health of the patient. Not doing the surgery would be the truly harmful thing.
The admonishment to harm none reminds us that we are not the only creature on the planet. It reminds us that our actions should always be guided by the desire to act with compassion and empathy in whatever situation arises. It’s also worth noting that ‘harm none’ includes ourselves. We are living beings, after all, and we can be harmed by our own actions. The Rede stresses that this is not in keeping with the spirit of benevolence and that self-sacrifice should be done with the same balance in mind that other activities are afforded.
Because we live in an imperfect world, there are times when the only choices to make are between less-than-ideal alternatives. In this case, the Rede challenges us to reduce harm as much as possible. Sometimes this is with creative thinking to find other alternatives, and sometimes this is with choosing the least harmful course of action. The Rede isn’t a law, but rather good counsel and advice to help us along our way with empathy and benevolence as a guiding principle.
Really Doing
The words ‘do what ye will’ reminds us to really, truly, physically act in the world. Taking no action is itself an action and has consequences, and (in the words of Desmond Tutu) choosing neutrality in the face of injustice is the same as choosing the side of the oppressor. Whatever it is that we decide needs doing in the world, we should commit to real action rather than philosophical debate. This doesn’t mean that we should act unthinkingingly. It means that we should think, then act.
It’s important to note that we are limited beings. We will never have all of the information we think we need. The challenge to act in the world empowers us to collect information, make a decision based on it, and go forward with our decision, accepting the consequences that come and modifying our action based on new information that arises. What we know, when we know it, and what we do with it are all parts of acting in the world.
Your True Will
The other part of ‘do what ye will’ is the will part. After all, there is a difference between what you want and what you really want. This statement challenges us to think of heartfelt long-term goals, which involves reflection, planning, commitment, and sometimes revision. As Judy mentions in her essay, this doesn’t mean slavishly acting in accordance with the long-term goal to the detriment of present circumstances. Rather, it means keeping a mind toward all aspects of your True Will and acting in accordance with it in every situation. Again, the Rede is a dynamic guiding principle that challenges us in every situation we find ourselves in to ‘check in’ with what we truly want.
Other Readings
I also recommend An It Harm None: High-Choice Ethics and Do What You Will: Best-Choice Values by Judy Harrow to further educate advancing Wiccans on how the Rede can be applied to develop a uniquely Wiccan worldview.