Gavin Bone
MT: Gavin, thank you and Janet for agreeing to talk to me. I mentioned at the beginning of Janet’s interview that you teach a progressive form of Wicca. Before we move on to the interview itself, are you first able to briefly give an example of what that means?
GB: Sure, Mark, and thank you for inviting us to be part of such an interesting project.
With regard to our work, I’m not sure all Pagans think the way we do. We’re not what you would call “Orthodox Wiccan.” We’ve worked with a host of different religions over the years. My favorite story comes from the US. A lone witch was looking for a coven or group in Sacramento back in the early ’80s but couldn’t find one. In desperation, he started going to the local Hindu temple, a new temple which had just been built—the Indian community is well rewarded for their hard work in the U. S., and are well respected for it. Well, he was noticeably this small impoverished white face, who would turn up in his battered car for every paja, while everyone else was either an Indian businessman or a member of the businessman’s family. After several weeks, the priest finally approached him and asked if he was Hindu. Our friend replied, saying, “No, I’m Wiccan,” and started to explain what that meant to him—the conception of deity, the system of festivals, etc. The Indian priest listened intently, nodding his head the way Indians do. Then when our friend finished, there was brief silence as the priest thought about what he had said. Then, looking at our friend intently, he said, “Ahhh … you’re a Hindu!” He now works permanently in the temple by the way, as the priest’s assistant.
MT: Oh, that’s wonderful.
GB: By the way, Mark, we read some of your other books, and Janet really loved the “spare a talent for an ex-leper” story, as did I! Well, I can say that we have a sense of humor. Old saying: “Take what you do seriously, but not yourself.” This is our mantra. Unfortunately, some Wiccans tend to be a bit serious and lack humor. Our view is that divinity must have a sense humor; look at the duck-billed platypus!
MT: Fabulous! So let me now talk to you about this strange and entrancing man we know as Jesus. Was he part of your upbringing as a child?
GB: Yes, he was part of my upbringing. I was brought up in a normal, regular C of E [Church of England] family. We weren’t strict Christians. I think I only really attended church a couple of times with my grandmother. Of course, there were the compulsory school events at Christmas and Easter, etc. I wouldn’t say he was ever an important figure in my life, and my religious life at this time revolved around the events which were of a social rather than religious importance.
MT: And does he feel important to you today, even if you don’t know why? Is he of interest?
GB: Is he of interest to me? Yes. Does he feel important? I have to say no. I did briefly start going to church in my late teens, where he did begin to figure importantly, but I became very dissatisfied with the teachings the church purported to be his. I should point out that at the same time, I was also examining other religions such as Hinduism and Buddhism. I came to the conclusion that Krishna and Christ were, from a spiritual viewpoint, pretty much the same figure.
MT: So, in your understanding, was Jesus a historical person?
GB: Yes, I do believe there was a historical Jesus, but I don’t believe that he is the person they really talk about in the Bible. I believe there are three Jesuses: the historical Jesus, the Jesus of the Christian Church and the Bible, and the “Cosmic /Astral” Jesus—the real “Christ.” From what I have researched and read, I believe that the historical Jesus was more than likely to have been a “rebel” Essene priest, with many of his teachings originating from the Egyptian tradition. Many people seem to forget that Palestine and Canaan were originally part of the Egyptian empire before they were Roman. He became a focus for all sorts of already-existing myths, and the Church even managed to merge some of the teachings of other figures with him such as Apollonius of Tyana.
I believe that all three figures are very different. The “Cosmic/Astral” Jesus has more in common with such figures as the Norse Baldur, the Welsh Mabon, and the previously mentioned Hindu Krishna than he does with the Jesus of the Bible. I think most Pagans find it easier to connect with someone who is “part of their land” than a figure who came from several hundred miles away. This is because it allows them to connect with both the spirituality of the figure and their connection with the Earth itself.
MT: Yes, as I said to Janet, I do go along with the view that Jesus and Christ are two very different personas, sometimes bridged together in one literal yet mythic story. For example, the Christmas story: What feelings or thoughts does that conjure up in you?
GB: I see it as an analogy for the return of the Sun; after all that’s why the Church set the Christmas story on the Winter Solstice. They managed to merge it with the already-existing Norse Modranacht (Night of the Mother) on December 24, Saturnalia, and the birthday of Mithras. You have to hand it the early Church fathers, they were very clever! For me, it is still a message of hope, regardless of what tradition it is from. It just depends on how you want to interpret that message.
MT: And the same for Easter?
GB: Sorry, I’m a Monty Python fan! Easter will always be tainted by The Life of Brian for me! I just wish some Christians had really understood what [the movie] was saying, as it wasn’t really about Christ. It was about how they had misused his teachings. Perhaps that’s why it got banned in some places, while the hideously violent and anti-Semitic Passion of the Christ wasn’t. Again, for me, Easter/Ostara is about the solar cycle, in this case the Spring Equinox.
MT: If there’s one favourite story, parable, teaching, or symbol of Jesus that stands out for you, what is it?
GB: The parable of the Good Samaritan, but not for the reasons most would think! The Church has so distorted the true meaning. They say “it’s about being good to your neighbour,” but they don’t point out the impact this story would have had on a Hebrew at the time. It would be like the Samaritan being a radical Muslim cleric who had found a Jewish Zionist lying in a ditch and had not only given him first aid but then taken him back to his house and given him food and water. It was saying that there is good in all people and in all religious persuasions.
From what I see, this is the problem with many of the stories in the Bible. They are not taken in context of the time they were written. A good example is “turn the other cheek.” It’s not saying that you should passively accept whatever is dished out to you; quite the reverse. To “turn the other cheek,” to face an aggressor was in original Hebraic tradition an act of defiance. Basically it was saying “you get the first hit free, now try that again!”
MT: Gavin, who do you think the historical Jesus was? For example, might he have been a divine prophet, a miracle worker, a magician, perhaps?
GB: I believe him to have been one of many supposed messianic figures who was roaming the Holy Land at the time. Sorry, we get back to that Life of Brian image of the square with all the prophets in it! People forget that Terry Jones, the writer, was an academic Oxbridge historian. Jesus was most definitely an Essene priest, as I mentioned earlier, just as John the Baptist was. This is where the act of Baptism came from. Was he a healer? Most definitely. He knew all the secret healing techniques of the Essenes which had been absorbed from the Egyptian traditions. These would have appeared “miraculous.”
Was he a divine prophet, a miracle worker, or a magician? I think he was as much one of these as Gandhi was. To use the Hindu term, I believe he was an avatar. He was a genuine spiritual person who had merged with the true spirit of his divinity. I think we are all capable of this, and this is what he was trying to teach us.
MT: What lesson do you feel the modern-day Church needs to hear from Jesus?
GB: TOLERANCE! I don’t really need to say any more than that. All his teachings point to this, but for some reason they seem to dwell on the Old Testament teachings rather than his. Sorry, can’t find anything in the New Testament saying Witches should be condemned or there can’t be gay marriages.
MT: Is it possible to be both Christian and Pagan?
GB: If you mean Christian by following the REAL teachings of Christ, then I think most good Pagans are good Christians by default. But, if you mean following the Jesus of the Bible and the Church, then no. If a Pagan can work with Krishna, Baldur, or the Mabon, then why not Jesus the Cosmic Christ?
MT: What can modern-day Pagans learn from Jesus?
GB: A lot of Pagans immediately dismiss him as a figure, which is a shame. The first thing they can learn is that you do need connection to personal deity. That is what is meant when he says: “I am the way, the truth, and the Light.” That doesn’t just mean through him, but through any of the major deity figures. When he says “I,” take it not to mean Jesus’s own ego, but of the divine he is channelling when he says it. Likewise, I think Pagans can all learn to connect directly to divinity in this way. Jesus wasn’t saying to follow his teachings, but to follow him, follow what was happening to him. We all have the potential in us to be “Christ”; to be able to bring divinity into us and bring healing to people and the Earth.
Pagans might wonder why I am talking like this. This is because I went through my own “born again” experience with the divinity I work with—my real initiation, as I call it. After that, I understood what Christ was talking about and what born-again Christians experience. The major difference between them and myself was through my magical training; I understood what was happening to me. I think this is something that both Pagans and many Christians can learn from.
MT: And what can Christians learn from modern-day Paganism?
GB: Well, they can learn how to do ritual properly, for a start! Christianity is already learning from Paganism, through the back door, from figures like Matthew Fox, who was responsible for introducing the doctrine of “Creationalist Spirituality” into the Episcopalian/Church of England.
There is of course, that word “tolerance” again! They need to learn that the other spiritual paths to God—or Goddess—are just as valid.
MT: Gavin, thank you so much for taking the time and being such a delight to talk to.
GB: You’re very welcome, and Mark, we’re honored to be part of your project.
About the Author
Born in Portsmouth, Gavin Bone was originally initiated into Seax-Wicca in 1986. He trained as a registered nurse, is a practising spiritual (naturally empathic) healer, and a trained reflexologist. He developed a fascination with the theory that Wicca’s roots are in tribal shamanistic healing traditions rather than medieval ritual magic and their related secret societies. He has studied shamanism in a Northern European context, with particular focus on the runes.
He met Janet and Stewart Farrar in 1989 at the Pagan Link conference in Leicester and moved to Ireland in 1992 after accompanying them on a tour of the United States. He co-authored The Pagan Path, The Healing Craft, and The Complete Dictionary of European Gods and Goddesses with Janet and Stewart.
In the UK, he was both a Pagan Link and Pagan Federation contact in early ’90s, and this led him after his move to Ireland to set up the Pagan Information Network, a contact network for Pagans in the Republic and the North of Ireland.
Like Janet, he is an honourary member of the Strega tradition, and ordained third-level Clergy with the Aquarian Tabernacle Church.