Celtic religion
| I'd rather be a |
| Suckled in a creed outworn |
Celtic religion is an attempt by those practising new age "religions" to show that their beliefs stretch back to the dawn of time and not to, for example, Victorian romanticism. This is a variation on the Noble savage where the beliefs of an ancient peoples are given credence because they were "closer to nature". Generally "facts" are cherry-picked or made up. Notable beliefs are:
- Stonehenge was built by the druids
- Random geographical features are aligned along ley lines
- One looks cool in a long white robe.
Notable things overlooked:
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Wymenwomen were not allowed to be part of the priestly class. Like most cultures in the world, they probably weren't really allowed much power, period. - It is likely they had *some* level of human sacrifice. Little evidence has been found that suggests they were the massive murderers the Romans claimed. But a man here or there, especially if he also was a criminal - what harm was there in that?
- They didn't use Runes, that was somebody else[1]
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[edit] Druids
An entire subculture has grown out of the neo-pagan movement to recreate the religion of the Druids, casting them into this innocent, non political, nature worshiping, farce of a group, when in reality the Druids, like the Sadducee of ancient Palestine, and the monks of middle China were in fact part of the ruling class, and held great political control for generations.
We know very little of them, except what is written about in texts by the Greeks and Romans - but those are potentially biased, as both groups wanted to destroy the Celts at various points.
There is, however, one surviving ritual, The ritual of oak and mistletoe that modern "Druids" the world over hang their hat on, as the center piece of the Druid religion. Of course, there's no reason to think this one ceremony was the equivalent of Easter or Christmas or bed time prayers, and not, say St. Sebastian day.
[edit] The facts
The Celtic culture spanned roughly 1,000 years and was widely dispersed, from Spain and Ireland in the west, across France and central Europe to parts of modern-day Turkey[2]. Though the religions of Celtic cultures shared some aspects, they were varied and specialized. And we know virtually nothing about them.
- We do know that they did not build, nor likely even use Stonehenge, which was built around 2500 BC. And though modern revisionist "Druids" worship there, there is little to no evidence that the ancient Celts ever did[3].
- We know trees were sacred to them, but not precisely why or how.
- We know they had no concept of "ley lines", as this is a new invention.
[edit] External links
[edit] Footnotes