Charge of the Goddess

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The Charge of the Goddess is a traditional inspirational text sometimes used in Neopaganism and Wicca. Doreen Valiente, a student of Gerald Gardner, originally wrote a Charge in verse, and later in prose: the prose version is the one known today. It has since been modified and adapted by many others.

The original text of the prose version is found in Eight Sabbats for Witches by Janet and Stewart Farrar. See The Rebirth of Witchcraft by Doreen Valiente, chap. 4, which also includes her original verse version.

The opening paragraph gives a motley collection of classical goddesses, some derived from Greek or Roman mythology, others from Celtic or Arthurian legends, affirming a belief that these various figures represent a single Great Mother:

Listen to the words of the Great Mother; she who of old was also called among men Artemis, Astarte, Athene, Dione, Melusine, Aphrodite, Cerridwen, Dana, Arianrhod, Isis, Bride, and by many other names.

This theme is echoed in the ancient Roman belief that the Goddess Isis was known under ten thousand names.

The second paragraph is largely derived and paraphrased from the words that Aradia, the messianic daughter of Diana, speaks to her followers in Charles Godfrey Leland's book Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches (1899). The third paragraph is largely Valiente's original contribution, with some phrases taken from ideas from The Book of the Law by Aleister Crowley.