The witch-cult hypothesis is a
discredited theory which proposes that the
witch trials of the Early Modern period were an attempt to suppress a pre-Christian,
pagan religion that had survived the Christianisation of Europe.
...
Although the "Murrayite theory" proved popular among sectors of academia and the general public in the early and mid twentieth century, it was never accepted by specialists in the Early Modern witch trials,
who publicly discredited it through in-depth research conducted in the 1960s and 1970s.