Wizards?

English is a hopelessly bastardized language. When translations of Deuteronomy 18:9-11 prohibit all enchanters, soothsayers, sorcerers, etc. how can we possibly understand these terms without any historical context? How did the translators choose these labels? Wouldn't the warning to avoid these things necessitate at least some anthropological study of their practice? In any case, as modern practitioners of timeless wisdom in service to the public, we have to just accept the damage done to such mystical parlance.

Of all terms, "wizard" might have survived the dark ages, perhaps by virtue of stories about Merlin or Shakespeare's Prospero. I believe it to be a more practical word for the archetype of sage, denoting someone actively seeking the virtue of sagacity. We mustn't call ourselves "magicians," nor do we actually practice "magic," because both these terms are historically confused and appropriative, if not pejorative, of Zarathustra's living lineage. Adding a final 'k' to distinguish it from sleight of hand is a moot point made by Aleister Crowley and maintained by those clinging to his fad.

Likewise, there is so much ambiguity around the term "witch," both etymologically and semantically, we should simply reserve it for followers of Wicca; may they salvage its worth. We extend the benefit of the doubt to anyone who professes to practice "witchcraft," understood as seeking spiritual remediation or physical healing through natural correspondences and traditional folk rites - always in general interest of welfare and natural balance, not toward cursing or manipulating free will... Regarding such "wicked arts" or the many theories of witchcraft nigh diabolism now gaining currency, we do not endorse acts of abomination or acknowledge the efficacy of baneful spells under the theory of antithesis and desecration. While we don't necessarily distinguish ritual craft as having either "high" or "low" techniques, we do draw a definitive boundary between benevolent and malevolent intents. While this is not the place to address the errors of demonology apart from the theory and practice of "theurgy" and "thaumaturgy," i.e. Divine-working and Miracle-working specific to the curriculum within our College of Rites, such are the genres of ritual defined within which we may operate licitly for the public.

Wizard, i.e. Wise One = Middle English wysard, derived from wīs "wise" with adjective suffix. Traditionally, the word meant a learned person, sage broadly, often in practical philosophy or natural knowledge; its mystic trope developed over the centuries, from medieval romances like the Arthurian Legends to later Renaissance works informed by Shakespeare and Goethe.

Cunning folk, i.e. Able Knower = Old English cunnan, meaning “to know, to be able to.” Derived from Old Norse kunna "to know," via German können "to be able to." See also, Dutch kunnen and Gothic kunnan. This term is a polite designation for traditionalist healers, herbalists, and often midwives, who knew something about folk remedies and intuitive healing, through spirits or otherwise.

Soothsayer, i.e. Truth Sayer = Old English sooth "truth" and secgan "to say." The term referred to the practice of augury or divination by various means and omens. This word has been stained biblically with a shade meaning "specious proclamation."

Sorcerer, i.e. Sorter of Lots = Latin sortiarius, meaning "one who casts lots." Derived from sors "lot, fate, or fortune." Cf. the divinatory technique of sortilege. This word has taken on such nefarious connotation over the centuries that it has generally come to signify someone "skilled in wicked arts." A particularly uncharitable interpretation of sorcery, one which highlights the inherent danger of fortune-telling, might be "to arrange someone's fate by manipulation with deceitful logic, or ill advice, framed as a mysterious and inevitable prophecy."

Witch = Old English wicca / wicce, female and male respectively. Possibly derived from Proto-Germanic wikkōn / wikkjaz, via Indo-European root *weik "to bend, shape, turn, or twist," i.e. "deviate / deviant," alternatively, "to sort, divide, or separate," possibly linking it to the early Germanic practices of cleromancy reported by Tacitus. The word could also be derived from the Indo-European root *weg, meaning "to animate, awaken, liven," thus, “one who animates, brings to life, awakens.” Another possibility is from Old English wīgl "divination," from wig / wih "idol, sacred object, consecrated place." The Brothers Grimm note the term is cognate with Gothic weihs, meaning "sacred." A circa 1250 translation of The Book of Exodus into Middle English, calls the Egyptian midwives saving the newborn sons of the Hebrews witches: "Ðe wicches hidden hem forðan, Biforen pharaun nolden he ben." Elsewhere in scripture, the "Witch of Endor," Hebrew ’ōshephet Endor, mentioned in 1 Samuel 28, is based upon a root word meaning "to whisper, to consult, or to call up," likewise used in Leviticus 19:31 & 20:6 to describe forbidden necromantic practices. When translated to Greek, the Septuagint used pharmakeuousa, which no doubt influenced the European association of witches with pharmacological potions, poisons, and herbology. Cf. Anglo-Saxon term lybbestre, meaning "witch or sorceress," from lybb "drug, poison, charm." All this considering, a "witch" could definitionally mean (at best) Enlivener and Shaper, or (at worst) Dead-raiser and Crooked-maker. As much as we might like to fantasize about a coherent spiritual tradition only recently lost and debased by fear-mongers, all possible etymologies of the term are tentative at best; it cannot be rescued from ambiguity. 

Hag, i.e. Spirit Trapper = Old English hægtes or hægtesse, from Old High German hagazussa, likely combining "enclosure, hedge, fence" and "spirit, being." Alternatively, it could be a class of genus loci, literally "hedge-spirit." This word evolved into the English word hex "curse," derived from Pennsylvania German Hexen "spellcaster." 

Saḥir = Derived from the Arabic trilateral s-h-r meaning "to stay awake" or "to watch," it commonly denotes a "practitioner of evil crafts" working under the cover of darkness. In Islam, witchcraft is associated with "the evil of those who blow into knots” cursing the prophet (Surah Al‑Falaq 113:4). And moreover, in Chapter of the Red Heifer (Surah Al‑Baqarah 2:102), the enticement of magic is a test: "And they followed what the devils recited during the reign of Solomon. And Solomon did not disbelieve, but the devils disbelieved, teaching people magic and that which was revealed to the two angels at Babylon, Harut and Marut. But the two angels do not teach anyone until they say, ‘We are only a trial, so do not disbelieve.’ And yet they learn from them that by which they cause divorce and enmity between a man and his wife. But they do not harm anyone through it except by permission of God. And they learn what harms them and does not benefit them. And certainly they know that whoever purchases this magic would have no share in the Hereafter. And wretched is that for which they sold themselves, if they only knew.” In the wake of The Greek Magical Papyri, it is extremely curious to read about techniques for binding lovers in this light.

Magician, i.e. Indo-Iranian Priest = Old Persian magush "priest" was appropriated into Greek as magos, and then into Latin as magus plural magi. The practice of these priests, their mageia or magia, Greek and Latin respectively, developed into the Old English word magik via French magicien. Zoroastrian rituals are known to be long and rather complex, as is their cosmology and metaphysics. Thus, as it was associated with such ritual knowledge, likewise the sciences of astrology, dream interpretation, illicit power, manipulation of unseen forces, "magic" as an occult art was distinctly separated from orthodox religion in the Middle Ages. Classically, it was used as a general name for a foreign sage or exotic ritualist (viz. The Three Magi), but it developed a suspicious air in the 5th century BCE. The Codex Theodosianus, written in 438 CE, bans the practice of nefarious "magic" or Zoroastrianism in Roman society: "If any magus therefore or person imbued with magical contamination (magicis contaminibus) who is called by custom of the people a (maleficus) magician [...] should be apprehended in my retinue, or in that of the Caesar, he shall not escape punishment and torture by the protection of his rank."

Necromancer, i.e. Ghost Whisperer = Greek nekromantēs, from nekros "dead" and manteia "prophecy." This defines a person who consults spirits of the deceased for secret knowledge, often accomplished by unearthing a corpse from its grave. Such practices as made there way to Europe likely derive from charnel grounds in medieval India, where aghori sadhus would ceremonially enthrone unburied bodies to serve as vessels for a Vetala or Vetali, i.e. ancient vampiric spirits; once inhabited, the animated corpse would converse with the practitioner, and, if made servile by potent rites, could even become slave or sexual consort. However, the danger was always present that they would kill the summoner and go on murderous rampage. Curiously, such spirits have a certain prominence in tantric Buddhism - which developed among Buddhists inhabiting the same charnel grounds as those involved with this practice. 

Conjuror, i.e. Oath Joiner = Latin prefix con “together, with” and jurare “to swear, take an oath.” This word refers explicitly to the practice of contractually binding demons, viz. the Solomonic Grimoires or Goetia. "Goetic" is a word late associated this genre specifically, derived from Greek goētēs “sorcerer, charmer.” The term is likely necromantic in origin, etymologically related to gous "loud cry, wailing, lament," the likes of which women ritually performed at funerals to placate the deceased. Goetic conjurors are those who "make pacts with the Devil" or further distress the dead through slavery.

Warlock, i.e. Oath Breaker = Old English wǣrloga, commonly meaning "traitor, scoundrel, monster, devil." Derived from wǣr "covenant" and lēogan "belie, deny." By definition the term is blatantly antinomian and antichristic, meaning a willful "denial of the covenant" between God and humanity, or a literal "out-law" of social morality. This term holds absolutely no virtue.

Parallel to the prohibitions in Deuteronomy, The Long Discourses of the Buddha go to great lengths outlining the "low lore" (or "debased arts" in another translation) which constitute an immoral livelihood: from astrology and meteorology to palmistry and surgery. I believe the basic point is that: many of these practices are derived from specious traditions or sophistry, and, whatever the intent of the practitioner, they assuage or prey upon people's fears without ever addressing the root causes of their anxiety... let alone justifying the cost of such advice.

Note, like Biblical remonstrance, these are moral statements and not a systematic form of ethics. Cf. Traditional Buddhism has no Ethical System.

Dīghanikāya, Sāmaññaphalasutta, 4.3.1.3. The Long Section on Ethics, translated by Bhikku Sujato:

There are some ascetics and brahmins who, while enjoying food given in faith, still earn a living by low lore, by wrong livelihood. This includes such fields as augury, omenology, divining portents, interpreting dreams, divining features of men and women, divining holes in cloth gnawed by mice, fire offerings, ladle offerings, offerings of husks, rice powder, rice, ghee, or oil; offerings from the mouth, blood sacrifices, limb-reading; geomancy for building sites, fields, and cemeteries; exorcisms, earth magic, snake charming, poisons; the lore of the scorpion, the rat, the bird, and the crow; prophesying life span, chanting for protection, and divining omens from wild animals. They refrain from such low lore, such wrong livelihood. This pertains to their ethics.

There are some ascetics and brahmins who, while enjoying food given in faith, still earn a living by low lore, by wrong livelihood. This includes reading the marks of gems, cloth, clubs, swords, spears, arrows, bows, weapons, women, men, boys, girls, male and female bondservants, elephants, horses, buffaloes, bulls, cows, goats, rams, chickens, quails, monitor lizards, rabbits, tortoises, or deer. They refrain from such low lore, such wrong livelihood. This pertains to their ethics.

There are some ascetics and brahmins who, while enjoying food given in faith, still earn a living by low lore, by wrong livelihood. This includes making predictions that the king will march forth or march back; or that our king will attack and the enemy king will retreat, or vice versa; or that our king will triumph and the enemy king will be defeated, or vice versa; and so there will be victory for one and defeat for the other. They refrain from such low lore, such wrong livelihood. This pertains to their ethics.

There are some ascetics and brahmins who, while enjoying food given in faith, still earn a living by low lore, by wrong livelihood. This includes making predictions that there will be an eclipse of the moon, or sun, or stars; that the sun, moon, and stars will be in conjunction or in opposition; that there will be a meteor shower, a fiery horizon, an earthquake, or thunder in the heavens; that there will be a rising, a setting, a darkening, a brightening of the moon, sun, and stars. And it also includes making predictions about the results of all such phenomena. They refrain from such low lore, such wrong livelihood. This pertains to their ethics.

There are some ascetics and brahmins who, while enjoying food given in faith, still earn a living by low lore, by wrong livelihood. This includes predicting whether there will be plenty of rain or drought; plenty to eat or famine; an abundant harvest or a bad harvest; security or peril; sickness or health. It also includes such occupations as arithmetic, accounting, calculating, poetry, and cosmology. They refrain from such low lore, such wrong livelihood. This pertains to their ethics.

There are some ascetics and brahmins who, while enjoying food given in faith, still earn a living by low lore, by wrong livelihood. This includes making arrangements for giving and taking in marriage; for engagement and divorce; and for scattering rice inwards or outwards at the wedding ceremony. It also includes casting spells for good or bad luck, treating impacted fetuses, binding the tongue, or locking the jaws; charms for the hands and ears; questioning a mirror, a girl, or a god as an oracle; worshiping the sun, worshiping the Great One, breathing fire, and invoking Siri, the goddess of luck. They refrain from such low lore, such wrong livelihood. This pertains to their ethics.

There are some ascetics and brahmins who, while enjoying food given in faith, still earn a living by low lore, by wrong livelihood. This includes rites for propitiation, for granting wishes, for ghosts, for the earth, for rain, for property settlement, and for preparing and consecrating house sites, and rites involving sipping water and bathing, and oblations. It also includes administering emetics, purgatives, expectorants, and phlegmagogues; administering ear-oils, eye restoratives, nasal medicine, ointments, and counter-ointments; surgery with needle and scalpel, treating children, prescribing root medicines, and herbal bandages. They refrain from such low lore, such wrong livelihood. This pertains to their ethics.

A mendicant thus accomplished in ethics sees no danger in any quarter in regards to their ethical restraint. It’s like a king who has defeated his enemies. He sees no danger from his foes in any quarter. In the same way, a mendicant thus accomplished in ethics sees no danger in any quarter in regards to their ethical restraint. When they have this entire spectrum of noble ethics, they experience a blameless happiness inside themselves. That’s how a mendicant is accomplished in ethics.