“Mind the Three-fold Laws you should three times bad and three times good.”
One of the most contested parts of wiccan beliefs is the rule of three. Years ago, When I began my journey on the pagan path, many of the authors I read were quick to explain that not all wiccans believe in the rule of three. To give a brief explanation, it is the rule which states any magic cast in the world would return onto the caster three fold. Thus a curse or hex would blow back on the caster while a blessing or healing would benefit the same. This is often likened to Karma or the Christian definition of sin and virtue. I am one of those who do find the rule useful and while I am not wiccan, I do incorporate the wiccan rede (where the rule of three comes from) into my core belief system. I’d like to explain my thoughts on why this rule is helpful to me and why I don’t compare it to either Karma or Christian sin and virtue.
The concept is a simple one for me. Think back to high school science class (or middle school, whichever covered circuits and generating electricity) and consider what we learn about generating energy. Essentially, the energy is built up in a generator, kept in a storage device like a battery, then transported along some sort of conduit, and ends up at a destination to fulfill a particular purpose. One of the things we learn about this process, there’s a lot of loss of electricity between the generator and the destination. The conduit’s resistance and the resistance of the surrounding materials as well as the storage device’s ability to hold the energy, all affect how much electricity makes it to the destination. Since none of that can be perfect, more electricity that is ultimately needed always needs to be generated at the beginning.
The structure we learn in science class is very similar to what happens with spell work. The witch gathers energy which is generated by their environment, into themselves (the storage space), sends it through distance to act out their intended result. Obviously, we’re not typically using a bunch of copper wires to deliver the magical energies to their destination and energy is constantly flowing into and out of people so it’s not the efficient, insulated system that we use for delivering electricity. Other factors of the environment and the destination will effect the potency of the energies sent out as well. Counteractive spells, energies, natural magical resistance of the target, and sheer distance, to name a few. The witch needs to take these things into consideration and gather enough energy into themselves to actually accomplish the set task against all of these factors.
The main area where spell work and electricity differ is in intent. Once electricity is generated, it’s neutral and has no intended purpose until it reaches the destination. Magical energy, by nature, is given an intention while it is still held by the witch. We can’t direct the energy after releasing it after all. This means that the first thing to be affected by the intent laden energy is the caster, and to a greater degree than the intended target (we’re holding more energy than will act out the result after all). The greater degree may or may not be three times the effect on the target, but it’s a handy saying. With this structure, it’s easy to see; if the witch’s intent is negative then negative energy will be acting on the witch while a positive intent will have positive energy acting on the witch.
In this way, I find the rule of three to be logical, useful,
and accurate in my experience. This
feeds into the other rule for wiccans: “An Ye Harm None, Do What Ye
Will”
Source for the Wiccan Rede:
Speaker's Circle 