The Forbidden History of Europe - The Chronicles and Testament of the Aryan 201 existed in Khazaria (particularly Manichaeism), but, as in China and Babylon, they suffered constant social repression. Although Judaism was the state religion, other faiths were permitted equal worshipping rights. Khazar cities were divided into religious quarters, each of which was governed on a street level by the laws of the religion that held the reins of power there. Since the upper class and royalty were of the Jewish faith, many Jews came to Khazaria knowing that they would receive the khagan’s protection. The story of the Khazar polemic no doubt means that an undetermined number of the European Jewry were in fact only proselytes, and not of the semitic Jewish tribe by blood, an embarrassing and ugly thought to many Jews, and not one to be readily admitted. Yet we would do well to believe that there was already a considerable number of full-blood Jews living over that way. Post- exilic accounts allude to healthy numbers in Anatolia. The Celtic and Gaulish Magi Contention arises nowadays on the issue of Druidic origins, and more especially whether they belonged to the DRUIDRY traditional inhabitants of the British Isles or entered Britain with the Celtic migrations somewhere between 500-600 BC.754 The Celts who formerly lived in the Balkans and Central Europe, and whose linguistic cousins, the Tokharians, DRUID MEANS ‘A lived in Asia, as far east as the Tien Shan mountains, had an organised pagan religion. Their druidic religious MAGUS’ customs seem very much like those of the Magi. This is hardly surprising when you consider that the Celtic word draoi (ie; “a druid”) translates as “a Magus”. Druids studied in special pagan colleges, they had similar gods, and most importantly a formal dualistic religious calendar (which is nowadays termed the Coligny Calendar, after the place where the bronze plates were found). Pliny the Elder appears to associate Druids with the Magi, in more than just a linguistic sense, when he states: “Magic flourished in the Gallic provinces, too, even down to a period within our memory, for it was in the time of the PLINY STATES THEY Emperor Tiberius that a decree was issued against their Druids and the whole tribe of diviners and physicians. But why PRACTICED MAGIC, mention all of this about a practice that has even crossed the oceans and penetrated to the utmost parts of the earth? INSINUATING THEIR At the present day, Britannia is still fascinated by magic, and performs its rites with so much ceremony that it CRAFT WAS THE SAME almost seems as though it was she who had imparted the cult to the Persians”.755 AS THE PERSIAN RITES Firstly Druids, diviners and doctors were held to be part of a certain tribe that only inducted nobles, as was the case with the Magi also.756 Not only does Pliny divulge they were practictioners of magical rites akin to those of the Persians, and equally engrossed in it, but that the art itself had migrated into places quite distant to Persia, Britain and Gaul foremost.756 About 50 BC Caesar relates that Druidry was, according to indigenous legends lost in misty antiquity, native to AROUND 50 BC 756 the British Isles but spread to continental Europe, and it is perhaps because of this that Pliny adds “it almost seems as CAESAR REPORTS though it was she who had imparted the cult to the Persians”. DRUIDRY WAS One might guess Caesar’s sources were impeccable, in all probability the Arch-Druidic king of the Gaulish Aedui INDIGENOUS TO 756 tribe, Divitiacus. Despite his supposedly close friendship with the latter it is exceedingly unlikely that Divitiacus BRITAIN broke druidic protocols on secrecy to curry favour with his new Imperial overlord. What I do find curious is a lack of primary sources detailing the Celtic wanderings from central Europe as far West as Ireland. Whether this means the Druids accompanied them the whole way, or were chanced upon in the British Isles by the newly arriving tribes has never been adequately resolved. Druidic initiations consisted of vestiture, oaths of loyalty and reticence, and finally tonsuring that shaved away DRUIDS HAD A SPECIAL 757 hair on the front part of the head, leaving the back long (precisely the same tonsure found among the Medes of INITIATION Persia758). Augustinian missionaries sent from Rome to the Celtic Church described the haircut as “the tonsure of 759 Simon Magus”. The Celtic name for this tonsure was the berrad mog, perhaps stemming from the Iranian priestly THE CHARACTERISTIC title Aberad, that is the Magus, or indeed Mog who brought the sacred water and milk to the altar when Haoma (the HAIRSTYLE OF THE white Magian drink of eternal life) was mixed. DRUIDS WAS TERMED So began their long indenture to the druidic novitiate, which saw them head to unmentioned locations ‘THE TONSURE OF throughout the countryside for training in their arts, rites and sciences. Luckily the Book of Ollambs has survived, for SIMON MAGUS’ 202 The Forbidden History of Europe - The Chronicles and Testament of the Aryan it describes in elaborate detail the druidic curriculum, year by year. It began with studies in Ogham script, grammar, philosophy, epic prose, law, ancestral tales. DRUIDS LEARNED NATHS In the 6th year of their study, in addition to secret poetic devices, they learned 24 greater and 24 lesser Naths, a BY HEART, IE; POETIC poetic cycle imparting knowledge. The 8th Magian book of Dinkard describes the Magi’s academic syllabus. It CYCLES mentions “21 parts of its divisions, which are called Nasks”. That is 21 Nasks, 3 less than the 24 druidic Naths. If Naths were a Celtic rendering of the Persian Nasks one can account for this shortfall by taking into account the loss of 180 chapters of Magian philosophical teachings under Greek rule, purged from the Persian Rivyats, and so reducing their number from 1085 to 905. In short, if Druids were Magi, they perpetuated a form of Magianism practiced PERSIAN MAGI LEARNED before Alexander’s destruction of the Persian Empire (ie; very ancient, very primitive, and no doubt contained a NASKS BY HEART variety of Achaemenid and even pre-Achaemenid traditions and observances). The first seven were gathic in nature (ie; rites and prayers), while legal matters filled the final seven. Each nask was filled with its own peculiar information, all arranged in grammatically precise metrical lines, as an aid to mnemonic acquisition. In this respect they must have conceptually resembled Naths in more than just cursory ways. IN PERSIA THESE ORAL For example the Persian Pagag Nask contained regulations for ritual slaughter, particularly of sheep, the nature CODES WERE PRESERVED of work and ceremonies.760 It set down who sacrificial meat was to be shared out to, which portions belonged to fire IN WRITING and which to water. “And whatever is about a season festival; where the appointed place is, when one celebrates it, and when it has fully elapsed; the assembly of the season festival, and the donation for the feast; where and when the celbration is possible, in what proportion the provisions are to be given out, and when to be prepared and divided; where its advantage is (ie; in whose honour the sacrifice is made), and what benefit there is from it to the good creations both spiritually and materially”. 760 Pagag Nask set guidelines for the selection of fitting ritual officers, as well as purification rituals. “As to the selection of the president of the feast there is this, namely, what ability is requisite for that presidentship. The allotment of the portions, and giving them sooner to those who are sooner in need of them (ie; to feed the poor first). Scoffing before priestly authorities, who are great and good, and when they do not give a portion to the authorities are cases when the season festivals are not to be considered as celebrated”.760 It speaks of “the control of sin and computation of the portions, and more on the same subject. About the rotation of the day watches, days, months and seasons of the year - which are when it is summer and winter and the appearances therein which are owing to the motion of the constellations. Where the coming of the righteous guardian spirits (ie; the Fravashis) into the worldly existence occurs, in those ten days which are the end of the winter and termination of the year, because the five intercalcary gathic days among them are for that purpose”.760 A good many of these observances might have had a local format, all the while adhering to the wider fundamentals of Magian ritual craft. DRUIDS HAD SPECIAL The Druidic heirarchy Druids formed their own colleges and of itself this, I believe, conclusively proves they perpetuated a variety of COLLEGES teachings or customs, probably imparted by sages and spiritual mentors well known in their day; hence the distinctions between Druidic sects. KINGS KEPT DRUIDS BY A typical Celtic king maintained an elite retinue some ten in number including a druid, bard, stewards, a prince, THEIR SIDE doctor, musician and seancha.761 The Irish situation seems replicated in Scotland. Adomnan wrote of the Pictish heathen priests in Scotland, calling them Magi.762 They in particular served as advisors under their king Broichan.762 We could be forgiven for thinking that these concurrences are just a coincidence or a mis-translation, if it were not for the fact that there were substantial elements of Magian religion present in Slavia and other parts of Europe in ages past. The Celts seem to have formulated their own words for Magi - draoi (“a druid”, “a Magus”) and ban- draoi (“a druidess”, “a witch”).