Why Do Modern Folks Think Granny Witches Were Crazy?
Well now, that is a question worth sitting down and thinking on for a spell. Religion has a whole lot to do with it, if we are being honest. Orthodox Christian views and certain readings of scripture have led people to form some pretty strong opinions about what these women were really up to. And instead of seeing Granny Witches for what they truly were — healers, helpers, and pillars of their mountain communities — folks today have a tendency to picture some wild-eyed old woman living back in the holler somewhere, casting hexes and stirring up trouble. That picture could not be further from the truth.
Granny Witches used the Tarot Oracle the same way a good counselor uses conversation — as a way to seek guidance, gain insight, and help folks find a path forward when life had them turned around. The cards gave them a way to look deeper into a situation, to shed a little light on the roads ahead when it came to circumstances and choices, both for themselves and for the people who came to them for help. Now let us be clear about something. Cards are paper. Just paper. The images printed on them represent the spiritual journey of a human being walking through this world. It is the reader’s own intuition that brings those pictures to life, connecting one to another the way an old-timer connects the stars into constellations on a clear mountain night. It is a practice. A skill. A gift, even. But somewhere along the way modern times decided to slap a label on it — witchery, devil’s work, the ramblings of a crazy woman.
Here is where it gets interesting though. Let us talk about a man that every psychology student and science researcher worth their salt knows well. His name was Carl Jung. Nobody called him crazy. Nobody accused him of devil worship. They gave him awards and named schools of thought after him. And yet Carl Jung had some of the most fascinating things anybody has ever said about the Tarot cards.
Jung was one of the most respected psychologists of the twentieth century, and he did not wave the Tarot off as superstition or nonsense. He looked at those cards the way a wise person looks at an old family story — as something carrying a deeper truth worth paying attention to. He believed the images on the major cards, figures like The Hermit with his lantern, The High Priestess sitting in her quiet knowing, The Fool stepping forward without fear — were what he called archetypes. Universal patterns that every human being carries inside them no matter where they come from or how they were raised. These were not random drawings to Jung. They were reflections of something ancient and shared, something written into the very nature of who we are as people.
Jung also gave us the word synchronicity, and mountain folks would likely understand exactly what he meant without needing a long explanation. It is the idea that sometimes things line up in a way that feels too real and too meaningful to chalk up to pure accident. When a person sits down and draws a card at just the right moment in their life, Jung believed that image had something true to say about where that person stood. Not because magic was at work, but because the deep mind is always speaking in pictures and symbols if we are still enough to listen. The card does not tell your future. It holds up a mirror so you can see yourself a little more clearly.
And that is exactly what the Granny Witches were doing all along.
Now it is no surprise that some folks are quick to judge what they do not understand. It has always been that way. But here is the part that ought to make those finger-pointers stop and think for a minute. Those Granny Women, and the ones who carry on that tradition today, do everything they do in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Every prayer. Every healing. Every reading. All of it lifted up to the same God the Orthodox crowd claims to serve. So before anybody starts hollering about devil’s work, it might be worth asking yourself just who exactly these women were calling on when they did their work. Because it sure sounds familiar.es have since been validated by modern science.