Some scholars believe that a clear predecessor to the Camino, the Way of St. James, is the old “Callis Ianus” or “Via Janus” named after the god Janus, who occupied the highest rank among Etruscan-Latin divinities and represented the “Earth’s Axis”, the initiation to the Mysteries, the protection of life on Earth. Janus was god of beginnings and transition, of gates, doors, passages, endings and time; the god of motion that caused the starting and ending of action and change; and master of the four seasons and transformation. He was the "God of gods." He holds the key to open the gates of the invisible world and is usually depicted as having two faces, since he looks to the future and to the past, to the sun and the moon. It's fitting that January is his namesake. Another name that was used to describe the Camino is Via Finisterre (from Latin, the Way to Land’s End), seems fitting. Archaeological sites along it show that Celtic peoples traveled it 1,000 years before Christ in search of Land’s End and the Sun’s resting place, celebrating all various ceremonies, as did other people before them. Others, labeled as Pagans, travelling across northern Spain in a born-again ritual on a Megalithic path following the Milky Way. The true origins of the Path are lost in time.
The earliest known Etruscan language is 700BC and the people associated with this language were derogatorily labeled as Pagans by the Christians. These people used the Camino as a rite of passage to the end of the earth to be reborn. I think it's more accurate to say that the pagans had no religion in the context that we normally use this word today. It's similar to the way people call Buddhism a religion, when it's a way of life. They had no tradition or writings about ritual or religious matters, no organized system of beliefs to which they were asked to commit themselves, no authority-structure aside from philosophical debate, or antiquarian treatise. Above all no commitment to a particular group of people or set of ideas other than their family and political context. If this is the right view of pagan life is it not fitting that we simply view it as a label invented during the transition of the second to third centuries AD specifically in relation to, or conflict, with Christians, Jews and others.
I'm not walking and biking the Camino for any religious reasons, it's more as a rite of passage and reflection, to open up new chapters in my life and explore the amazing history. Am I going to be labeled as a Pagan? Maybe I'll meet Janus and he will show me the invisible world? I'm currently in Tomar, an ancient town the first grand master of the Knight Templar established. I leave tomorrow for my first day on the Camino.
