The first humans were nomadic hunter-gatherers, and throughout the world human spirituality first developed when humans became aware of their environment and their position within the food chain, and when they found that by working together with others they gained safety and strength in numbers – the tribe.  Human spirituality developed in parallel with the birth of the tribe and the evolution of tribal hierarchy. 

Once humans became aware of their existence within the physical plane they yearned for greater control over the physical world.  As a result of the irrepressible human need to control what they could not, and also the desire to find purpose and divinity in human existence, human spirituality developed.  Humans began to look to the spiritual plane to gain greater control over their environment – for luck in the hunt, to heal the sick, and to keep the tribe working harmoniously together.  Ritual developed out of a need to symbolically control that; which, was out of reach of human control.  Humanity took to the symbolic catharsis of ritual to ensure the rising of the sun every day in the sky, to ensure the passing of the seasons, and the return of summer. 

Humans were moved by birth – that a woman could bring forth life from her own body – the ability of a woman to create life was magical.  Humans wondered about the new life - the newborn baby – and at the different character, temperament, and personality that developed.  Humans saw something that animated the new life – they saw the soul.  Humans wondered about the soul, and whether the soul was immortal, and sought to communicate with those who had passed.  They wanted to believe that their loved ones continued to exist – that there was more to existence than tangible reality – that their loved ones lived on in the spiritual plane. 

The first humans found divinity in nature.  Through the study of Palaeolithic cave paintings throughout the world (32,000–11,000 years ago), animism has been identified as the earliest archetypal religious belief in the scope of human spiritual evolution.   Animism is a pre-literate form of religion practiced by nomadic and hunter-gatherer tribes that relied on the hunt to survive.  According to the principles of animism all objects are alive and have souls controlled by collective spirit guardians.  Even inanimate objects were believed to have a spirit from streams, lakes, and the ocean, to mountains, rocks, and the Earth itself, to the air, the clouds, the sun, the moon, and the stars.

Pantheism is a progression from the religious principles of animism, where the divine is believed to be present in all matter and all things are a manifestation of the God/Goddess.  The idea that there is a collective consciousness – that the entire physical world is universally linked - is derived from this theology.  These ideas - that there is a spirit within everything - that divinity is present in all matter and links everything – that there is a collective unconscious and a universal life force – a universal power – the universal divine – is the platform on which the theology of magic is built today. 

Throughout the world, in different cultures and religions, humans have sought to direct and control this life force – this universal energy – to connect with the life force of other entities, and to set into motion actions which will cause deliberate change – to manifest will into being.  Humans have sought to master and control the energy of nature - the movement of the Earth around the sun, and the moon around the Earth; the movements of the distant planets in the night sky; the tides generated by lunar flux; the natural magnetic fluctuations of the Earth, and the polarity of the Earth; the spirits of the wild animals that roam the Earth; the ancestral spirits that have passed into the great beyond; and, the Gods and Goddesses given tangible form through the dreams of humans.

Throughout history, Shamans have been the priests, or spiritual advisors, of the tribe–those who communicate with the spiritual plane (the spirits of nature and of the hunt) to ensure that the hunt is always successful and food is plentiful. Acting as a link between the tribe and the spiritual plane, the Shaman was a spiritual creature – coexisting partly in this world and partly in the world of the spirit.  The Shaman connected with the spiritual world for the benefit of the tribe.  The Shaman had a gift, an ability to reach into the realm of the ancestors, seeking out residual memories of times past – of those who walked the earth long ago also seeking knowledge of the passage of life.  The Shaman voyaged into the world of the spirit by accessing an inherent spiritual connection to the ancestors, an ability to call on the ancestral spirits. 

The Shaman had a natural affinity with the spiritual plane – the Shaman walked between the corporeal world, and the world of the sprit – between the known, and the unknown.  The Shaman fulfilled many roles within the tribe - the Shaman is a magician/sorcerer, a priest/priestess, and one who walks the path between worlds.  The Shaman journeys into the world of the spirit to enrich the tangible world. 

Spiritual attributes that identify Shamanism, include the ability to commune with the many realms of the world of the spirit, and the ability to communicate with the spirits of nature and of the hunt.  Historically in all known cultures throughout the world a human was not just seen to consist of tangible flesh and blood, but also to contain some sort of spirit body – a soul.  It is the soul that continues into the afterlife, the concept of life after death is reliant on some element of a person transcending death – the soul.  In some cultures illness is believed to be caused by loss of - or illness of - the soul - and it is the role of the Shaman to heal a subjects ailments by healing their soul, or travelling to other realms to reclaim their soul if their soul has been taken, or lost. 

In many cultures the Shaman is required to enter a trance-induced state whereby he/she deliberately alters their consciousness, so that they may be able to communicate with spirits of nature, spirits of other realms, or ancestral spirits.  Many Shamanic cultures believe that a person has more than one soul, and it is these lesser souls that can disassociate from the body in order to journey into the spiritual plane and other realities while the Shaman is still conscious.  The Shaman masters the ability to walk between worlds by the mastery of advanced trance techniques and the mastery of the state of altered consciousness.  The Shaman exists in a reality where they are partly in this world and partly in the world of the spirit, or an alternate reality. 

Entering a trance state facilitates the disassociation of the lesser soul/s from the body, and the soul is then free to journey to otherworlds and alternate realities. This trance state is a form of self-induced hypnotism that is often achieved through rhythmic chanting, or drumming, and sometimes dance.  A hypnotic state is induced by repetition, where the Shaman enters a repetitive state of awareness through the medium of sound, or dance.  The tempo is gradually increased until a climax is reached, where the Shaman enters a state of spiritual transcendence, or enlightenment.  The lesser soul then disassociates from the body, and begins a journey that will bring greater understanding and spiritual enrichment to the Shaman and the tribe.  Sound is an important element in Shamanic cultures, as sound interacts with the body and the mind in a subtle and synergistic way.  Rattles are used by Shamans in American Indian culture for healing – a form of sound healing, where the rattles raise the vibrational energies of the body. 

In some cultures, for example, various American Indian tribes, there exists both black and white Shamans; although they follow opposing beliefs, they are both powerful; they have just chosen different spiritual paths.  The movie ‘The Missing’ depicts a black Shaman, who gains his power through the transgression of the power of nature – working against natural laws, rather than with them.  The scene in the movie, where he ties rattle snakes to a tree, so that they are suspended in mid air and unable to escape, demonstrates how he gains power through the transgression of the natural, to the unnatural.   

Many cultures believe black magic disrupts and transgresses the balance of nature, while white magic generates power by working with the laws of nature and the natural flow of the universe.  Disruption of the natural balance requires a great deal of energy; and, while the chaotic result may be powerful it is short lived, and results in a recoil as the universe seeks to realign itself, and regain its natural balance.  Voodooists believe that magic is all about balance; and, that white magic strives to maintain the balance of the natural world, while black magic aims to corrupt this balance and derive power from the resulting chaos.

In some cultures, the Shaman imitates the appearance and behaviour of animals, so as to better communicate with those animals in spirit, and in addition to take on the characteristics of those animals which may then empower the Shaman.  Cernunnos, the Celtic Horned God of the Hunt, is indicative of early Celtic Shamanic practices.  Cernunnos is believed to have originated in Gaul (now France) and emulated the stag – the God is depicted as having the antlers and ears of a stag.  Stags were thought to personify the watchful spirit of the forest, at once powerful yet graceful, elusive, and invisible.  Cernunnos is often depicted as accompanied by a boar - the boar possesses the attribute of speed - or snakes (sometimes with Rams horns) - symbolising regeneration.  In Wicca Cernunnos is often invoked and worshiped as the Wiccan God - the principal male deity - the masculine aspect of divinity – a spirit that personifies the masculine in nature.   The antlers of the stag are also revered as being a potent symbol of fertility, masculinity and regeneration, as the antlers of the deer are shed every year. 

The Green Man is another deity indicative of Celtic Shamanic practices – an extension of the Shaman imitating the appearance of animals, whence the Shaman becomes at one with the forest.  Medieval Christian Churches which were built on sacred Celtic sites, often have imagery of the Green Man worked into their architectural features - in the form of a mans face peeping out from dense foliage.  Often Pagan deities were integrated into early Christian architecture for the purpose of assimilating Pagan deities and culture into the Christian religion.  Celtic female fertility/reincarnation statues, the Sheila Na Gig figures, are another example of the assimilation of Pagan deities into Christian culture.  Many of these statues have been found to predate the churches into which they are built - churches that were built on ancient Pagan sacred sites – suggesting that the old gods endemic to these sites were integrated into the architecture of these early Christian Churches.

Humans began their spiritual journey as animists and pantheists.  They worshiped nature and places of great natural significance such as waterfalls, natural springs, forest clearings, forests, groves of trees, lakes, streams, bogs, mountains, and rock outcrops - these natural landforms were believed to be sources of great spiritual power.  These vortexes of spiritual power were places where the ‘veil between worlds’ was the thinnest, and therefore where the Gods and Goddesses could be contacted.  The early Pagans also worshiped the sun, the stars, and the moon, wherever it could be perceived that there is power in nature. 

These Pagan Gods and Goddesses are preserved from ancient times through mythology.  Mythology began as a way for man to explain how he thought that the world worked – how the world came into existence, and how humankind was borne from the world.  Through myth, humankind began to create; and, humanity found a poetic voice with which to convey dreams and ideas.  The Gods/Goddesses of mythology were a manifestation of the dreams of humans, on the spiritual plane.  These Gods and Goddesses were created from the dreams of humans as the human soul interacted with the natural world, and energised by the collective human unconscious.  Mythology then became a way of preserving the knowledge of the Gods/Goddesses who roamed the Earth – it was a way of imprinting this knowledge in the memory of man. 

Belief in the existence of Gods/Goddesses and nature deities, developed from the principles of animism - that everything in nature has a soul - and the logical progression from this being that this soul is expressed and made tangible in the form of a deity.  Different Pagan tribes developed different nature deities, according to their cultural influences and the geographical area over which they roamed.  The stories related to these deities became more complex over time in accordance with the evolution of language and culture - reflecting the spiritual growth of humanity and increasing sophistication of thought and emotion.  This development was synchronous with the progression from a hunter-gatherer existence, to a subsistence farming existence, which gave humanity more time to dream, converse, discuss, and learn from one another’s complexity of vision.