The Mistery of Belicena Villca
“ Gaul : The earliest mention of druids is reported by Diogenes Laertius ( Vitae , intro ., I and 5 ) and was found in a lost work by a Greek , Sotion of Alexandria , written about 200 B . C ., a date when the greater part of Gaul had been Celtic for more than two centuries and the Greek colonies had been even longer established on the South coast ”.
“ The Gallic druids which were subsequently described by Caesar were an ancient order of religious officials , for when Sotion wrote they already possessed a reputation as philosophers in the outside world . Caesar ' s account , however , is the mainspring of present information , and it is an especially valuable document as Caesar ' s confidante and friend , the Aeduan noble Divitiacus 33 , was himself a Druid . Caesar ' s description of the Druids ( Comentarii de bello Gallico , vi ) emphasizes their political and judicial functions ".
“ Although they officiated at sacrifices and taught the Philo-sophy of their religion , they were more than priests ; thus at the annual assembly of the order near Chartres , it was not to worship nor to sacrifice that the people came from afar , but to present their disputes for lawful trial . Moreover , it was not only minor quarrels that the Druids decided , for their functions included the investigation of the gravest criminal charges and even intertribal disputes ”.
– Himmel !, I exclaimed , while I suspended my reading for a moment : can it be that I ' m so suggested by the Führer ' s Doctrine that I see Jews everywhere ? Well , why deny it ! those Priest- Judges , with their white ephod , seemed to me to be pure Hebrew Levites-- . You are not wrong ! --the Voice of Kiev affirmed in my mind-- . The Druids are Hebrews ! Someday you will know the Truth ! I kept reading :
" This , together with the fact thay they acknowledged the authority of an Archdruid invested with supreme power , shows that their system was conceived on a national basis and was independent of ordinary intertribal jealousy ; and if to this political advantage is added their influence over educated public opinion as the chief instructors of the young , and , finally , the formidable religious sanction behind their decrees , it is evident that before the clash with Rome the Druids must very largely have controlled the civil administration of Gaul ”.
This omnimode power , both in peace as in war , this intermediation between Heaven and Earth , this ability to " train the people " in all its strata , this power to legislate and judge , was it not analogous to that of an Aaron , a Joshua , a Samuel , Levites , that is , that tribe of Israel to whom Jehovah commissioned the mission of officiating the Cult of the Law ? Questions without answer for now ; but questions that gave way to very suggestive intuitions . This is how the article continued :
“ Of druidism itself , little is said except that the Druids taught the immortality of the human soul , maintaining that it passed into other bodies after death . This belief was identified by later writers , such as Diodorus Siculus , with the Pythagorean doctrine , but probably incorrectly , for there is no evidence that the druidic belief included the notion of a chain of successive lives as a means of ethical purification , or that it was governed by a doctrine of moral retribution having the liberation of the soul as the ultimate hope , and this seems to reduce the druidic creed to the level of ordinary religious speculation ”.
Very contradictory , I thought on the train . It is quite unlikely that barbarian peoples , such as the Celts , would submit by millions to the religious , moral and judicial leadership of Priest-Judges , retired in the forests , which only supported a " mere common religious speculation ”. Something patent must be exhibited by the Druids , something more than mere rational speculation , something that for the Celts was the Truth .
“ Of the Theology of druidism , Caesar tells us that the Gauls , following the druidic teaching , claimed descent from a God corresponding with Dis in the Latin pantheon , and it is possible that they regarded him as a Supreme Being ; he also adds that they worshipped Mercury , Apollo , Mars , Jupiter and Minerva , and had much the same notion about these deities as the rest of the world . In short , Caesar ' s remarks imply that there was nothing in the
33
Divitiacus is the same Druid " Viviciano " mentioned by Professor Ramírez in Book Three , Chapter III .
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